Agile Business on the Web (long)

[CrayZee]

I don't think that chances of success via brute force is any better than getting a few computer dorks together and working on something. I could see Mr. Now getting confused w/ worker volume, say, in the case of Google. But from what I know, most of the side projects that take off by Google employees are done in small groups and/or individually.

As said before, it's difficult to work in consensus w/ even just a few people.

However, Mr. Now might be able to meet some good poker computer dorks randomly on here and do something. I would think that he'd know some good candidates in person.. Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I like to see the people that I work w/ and meet occasionally.

[Colt McCoy]

If this gets off the ground, I'll look forward to watchign the "free rider problem" in all its glory.

[El Diablo]

CZ,

I have tons of ideas where I've done initial evaluations of the concept. 3 or 4 of those I'm actively working on in some capacity. 10 or so I think have potential and when I have time I want to do a little more research. Then many more that might be something, but are longshots or not quite right. That last group is where the ideas I'd contribute to something like this would come from. I can't imagine anyone involved being any different.

Take Mr Now, for example. This is a guy who is supposedly very rich. Why would he ever contribute any of his best ideas to this effort?

[Erik Blazynski]

Maybe this effort is one of his best ideas?

Maybe someone here is smart enough to figure out a way to elisit good ideas without the fear of someone stealing them.

There was an organization called "First Business" here in CT, and they brought together people with money with people who had ideas, people would create a presentation re: an idea and present it to about 100 people in a completely open meeting. My thoughts at the time were that you would have to be a fool to bring an idea here, you had about 50 VC and 50 smart business people all looking for something to do. After a while the ideas were really stupid and it was just a networking event where VC guys were mauled by every Joe with an idea. The VC guys stopped coming and it died.

[elus2]

Notice in Mr. Now's model, the financiers are also the guys with the ideas.

[CrayZee]

I'm familiar w/ some of Mr. Now's posts, but missed the "I'm rich" part. My impressions were that Mr. Now is still developing his knowledge base and/or still learning a lot.

I can see him gaining some learning experience from this even if he doesn't disclose his best ideas or anything worthwhile happens. Of course, he could also get lucky and make a lot of money from those that don't play the give-somewhat-mediocre-or-questionable-ideas game.

Personally, I know that if I had some sort of First GUI paradigm shifting idea, I wouldn't give it this group. I'd form my own team, poss. stealing the best members of the group. Finding good team members is the most valuable asset; otherwise tech hiring and recruiting would be cinch.

[El Diablo]

CZ,

About Mr Now

"MrNow built a tech services business from absolutely nothing to 4.3 million in sales in just 6.5 years. MrNow accomplished this without ever borrowing a dime during the entire experience. The business was never less than 30 percent net profitable. Ya, baby. Quick: what's 30% of 4.3 million again?? My tax bill in 2002 was higher than the income of 99% of all USA taxpayers in 2002.

It can happen to you.

MrNow came up the hard way with no help from anyone except his parents, who taught him how to work like a dog. MrNow has a CompSci degree and a minor in business from a no-name state college-- and proud of it, man. MrNow played poker to finance college and didnt owe a dime upon graduation. I have had some folks with impressive degrees from Ivy schools come and work for me. It's always correct to pay up for quality people. (hint hint)

MrNow is the author of two books in his field and has some software patents.

MrNow's tech services firm won the Deliotte and Touche FAST50 Award back-to-back in 2001 and 2002. This award annually honors the fastest growing tech firms across the USA. MrNow's firm started in 1994 grew like a weed in the period from 1997 to 2001-2002.

MrNow knows the entreprenuer game. He knows how many beans make five. He has no MBA and doesn't need one. What he has is real experience in growing a startup from absolutely nothing to 4.3 million in sales, minimum 30% net-of-all-expenses profitable at all times, with 45+ people spanning offices in 3 states."

[CrayZee]

El D,

Thx.

Then I'm either completely wrong w/ my perspective about him or he's a poker forum hustler. (Or maybe something in between.)

Doing a $4.3 mil in sales services company and shotgunning 2p2 forums is just inconsistent. Perhaps this is poker forum metagame strategy? [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[Jimbo232]

CZ,

Mr. Now's Business

-Jimbo

[CrayZee]

Well, I suppose that the two things can be congruent about Mr. Now... I just have a hard time w/ people that are exuberant about agile, xp, scrum, etc., methodologies.

I remember when I first learned about this stuff a few years ago, in particular XP, I was excited. I later come to realize that a lot of the "beliefs" that these methodologies instill suck arse. Sure, pair programming might be useful in some situations, but in general it's lame. (Go ahead, try to convince me otherwise.)

I highly doubt that successful companies like Google are using Scrum and XP and the like (or even other things like CMMI). Good agile comes naturally and is not forced simply because some manager has read some "exciting books" or attended some "exciting seminars."

The software world can be as fickle as fashion.

The one thing that I think might be confusing to management is the fact that some of these methodologies might actually make some organizations more effective/efficient. This could be due to the simple fact that their previous practices were much worse.

OTOH, Google might be an exception to the rule because they supposedly have a lot of smart people working there.

If it's not a con, then it looks like Mr. Now has a lot of faith in the poker community, or at least the 2p2 forum community, to bother trying.