The New York Tech MeetUp- The March Edition

Do I Exist
Image by ShanaLC via Flickr

I know it is late.  I’ve had a humongously amazing, yet busy week. (and I don’t normally talk like that)  I feel so thankful that I am finally really starting to become less shy with people in the NY Tech Community.  Everyone I am meeting has been wonderful.  Y’all are great people.  Just has to be said.

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Over-Advertisement makes me Want You!

Détournement d'image
Image by Christian Bachellier via Flickr

Actually it makes me want nothing.

I’m living in the age of over-advertisement.  It’s everywhere, and often misplaced.  My to be children, by the time they are 6, are more likely to know the cartoon character Ronald McDonald that to recongize the face of their current President.  And I’m not sure why.

What’s worse, is the lack of control I have over the spectacle of advertisements surrounding me, even though in theory, at least on the internet, they should be user generated.  I’ve been advertised Birth Control while looking on male friends and aquainatances.  My email thinks I will watch ESPN some days because I will write to and about startups (I don’t watch sports, and I never have).  When I visit a college campus, or talk to college friends, apparently because I am female, I should sell my eggs.  If a friend of mine is talking about her cousin’s wedding, apparently she needs bridal gear.

Meanwhile, no computer has yet to realize that I have picked out my aspirational pair of shoes.  (Oh come on…besides I would look good in really high shoes that are classy)  Part of the reason is: I don’t go looking for shoes on a daily basis.  I know what I want in shoes.  I do go looking at tech, and talk to friends, and all of these middle of the road sorts of behaviors on daily basis.  My aspirations is what I want to see. What I actually see, is nothing like that.  I want to see a world of food where the recipes come from Alice Waters toned down for a beginner to medium cook.  And copies of really nice, tasteful clothing. And Art listings  Not ESPN and lets pretend Shana is a teen Whore who likes to party (I don’t like to Party.  I like to have coffee and gelato with friends)

And here is the problem: I need to tell a computer what to do.  And I need to filter down.  And I need an easy way to do so, so I can easily tell advertisers to stop bothering me so much (and when they do, to only bother me with stuff I want to see).  And this all needs to be fairly seamless.  Right now, this is based on my browsing history.  I get the majority of my fashion not from browsing around (sorry).  I get my food recommendations from passing around small emails here and there, and small recipes written down on papers, with friends.  So how do I tell someone in this world, I am interested, wihtout telling them too much?  Without having to give up so much information?  That world is my private one, my aspirational one, and that is also the one I want to be advertised to and about. It’s the one where dreams are made of.

 

Suggestions welcome! (Yes I realize this is backwards…and examples here are examples.  There are  other categories…)

 

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On Venture Capital, Aliya, And Israel

Bookfair, at the Jerusalem Israel Museum, Week...
Image via Wikipedia

One note about this post: Disqus allows me to keep a heavy eye on you all.  I’m not out to have a politics here or politics there talk.  This is not a YAY ISREAL or a BOOO ISRAEL post.  My politics are my politics and they are shaped by my experiences and my beliefs.  If you want to discuss politely, that’s fine.  If you want to have a screaming match- get off this blog.  And pre-check your facts first.  I have no tolerance for people who don’t pre check in what can be a politically tense topic.  Also, if you want to discuss with me the politics of Aliya, first go read the Shemonah Esrei (The 18 benedictions) and Birkat Kohanim (the Priestly Blessing) in the oldest form you can find them- you’ll quickly realize I’m the wrong person to argue with…

OK then.  While originally I was going to post about ad targeting and how funnily bad it can be, instead, I’m going to post about a book put out recently by the Council of Foreign Relations that has large relevance to the venture community: Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle. Many words have already been poured about the state of the Israeli Start-up community (if you really want a heavy read on the subject, you can just pop over to Tech Aviv or Ouriel Ohayon’s place, though Read, Write, Web did a nice writeup recently.).

This is not that post.  I cannot claim expertise on the Israeli start-up community.  I can say, I lived in Israel during the 11 months preceding Disengagement on a Kibbutz, where I was studying in an Israeli Seminary with close ties with the Army.  It had a hesder like program for women, one of three in the entire country. (This stay doesn’t include the  few weeks of Pesach + March of the Living.  But I did mostly learn to tremp, hitchhike, like a native :) )

What I can do is the following- comment on the lack of the ties the Israeli Venture Community has with the American Jewish Community.  I don’t know why this is.  It is very confusing to me.  The book actively promotes that Israel has an immigrant community,however  the portrayal of Americans are neutral to none, beyond as people where funds are raised.  This is largely due to the fact that  Americans, among other English speaking communities (the “Anglos”), seem to have reistance to making Aliya (that includes you, South Africans!) This I know as someone who has had Aliya activists running after me when I was younger and sprier ;) and studying as a seminary student (never call me that…) Americans don’t like making Aliya, because they have more stable jobs with more money in the US.  This is generally true of English speaking countries.  Yet being Jewish is actually cheaper in Israel, especially if you are somewhat actively Jewish.  Your kids pretty much turn out Jewish in Israel no matter what you do.  I mean, even if there is a saying in Tel Aviv that the best parties are on Shabbat, at least they know it is Shabbat. In the US, you have to pay mucho bucks for your child to understand what day is shabbat and how those calculations work.

Why is that?  I don’t know. There is a ton of money poured into getting Americans to make Aliya.  Namely in the form of Nefesh B’Nefesh.  Their web-pages are depressing.  Look at this one for Graphic Designer.  From this web-page, I would never guess Israel was one of the top technological communities in the world. Java?  What about…Ruby?  Why are none of the standard web design associations listed?  (Even funnier, there is no page for anything involving the web.  I could say I do SEO work- and Nefesh B’Nefesh would come up…blank.  There is nothing for programming- either general or web specific, which is why I had to use graphic design.  That’s what I call, humongously bad PR)

Why is it that you have to buy a separate whole book (or take it out from the library) to find out that you can join a start-up?  That is ummm, stupid.  Why is it that said book doesn’t even list ways for someone to join a start-up.  It is, after all, supposedly an awesome thing to do after graduation.  Up there with taking hikes in the Galilee, if you are going to go do the Making Aliya thing…  I mean this is a ridiculous way of saying: Hi, I’m a startup in Israel, I’m nice and friendly, and I would like to hire you.  Horrible PR.

Meanwhile, there is a known “thing” that Israelis tend to become Yeriedim as they become more successful, especially as their companies are sold.  (Mammon may be the king of the world…)  So management relocates to say the US, Europe; it creates new problems (and yes, Start Up Nation touches on this problem).  Meanwhile you have the American Jewish community and those who are Yeridim stuck here in the US with management talent.  What are they doing here?  Why aren’t they in Israel with the start-ups? Why aren’t they staying there?  And why aren’t you just attracting the people who want to be management in the first place to go make aliya (you know those people who want to be “associates”).  That way you can stop the management talent drain.

Further, even Ouriel Ohayon complains of Aesthetic problems in the start-up community.  This to me is funny, because it says that someone(s) in the Israeli Start-up community is not looking hard enough and is being lazy bums at developing talent (though I don’t think it is Ouriel’s problem to solve alone). It also means that the start-up community doesn’t know how to get its management in place to look for viable design.  In Treatment is an Israeli import which is commercially successful in the US on HBO.  It is also not the only Israeli art import that is commercial viable in the US (say Michal Rovner who is represented by Pace Wilderstein….Or even Mona Hatoum if you dare to be a tad dangerous when it comes to rightist polics, not that I’m on the right, and I happen to love her art)  And didn’t the MOMA have a famous Israeli designer Ron Arad over the summer???

 

So the Americans are stealing your good Aesthetic sensibilities.  Probably because what we really stole was the good management.  Good to know. Maybe you should fix the ways to get to us managers to come to you on a more permanent basis so you can’t complain anymore.  K?   Stop worrying about access to the Nasdaq (you have that now) and start worrying about a long lasting ecosystem (with management and the pretty stuff that we seem to be borrowing on the international art scene, and movie scene, and other scenes.)  Make sure you can keep “associates” around.  Apparently, yes, they are necessary.  even if they are, annoying… (I don’t want to be a suit either).

Fix the Aliaya site.  Because umm, I laugh right now.  It doesn’t make me want to make aliya.  It doesn’t make me want to do much of anything involving the Israeli startup scene.  Which is very weird.  You would think, with all the money poured into to me to be very Jewish, and my introductory activity in the American (particularly NY) startup scene- I would be a good fit.

And it isn’t just a me thing either.  There is a secret club at MIT to help Jewish students get jobs that dates back to the 1920s I believe (my dad would know more, he wears a brass rat, it started because there were periods in American history where there was anti-semitism in the hiring process…now it just deals with out of work Jewish people because they are out of work).  My college Hillel post jobs that deal with Jewish things involved, even if it is only peripherally Jewish: Working in an Israeli Startup would count (and you would like my Hillel, lot of thinkers there).  It’s very typical for Hillels to do that!!!  You could post Startup Jobs in every Hillel at an Engineering school across the country for Israeli Startups.  After all- you don’t have to pay rent money for the first year! (Sal Klita baby!)   I’m sure there are plenty of people who have been active in Hillels, or have gotten a modicum of Jewish education, that if you went to them, the government of my country will pay your rent money for a year and we will pay you a small salary with stock options (oooohhh) to go work in my startup people would go.  Or even we would love for you to come to help us start a business. (ooh) And you still don’t have to pay the rent!

Not until you get your acts together- I wouldn’t dare go.  And that means ummm, making it look like there are jobs available and incubators, and all the fun stuff we have in the US!  Seriously…just because I can get my To’ar Sheini (that’s a masters) for free, really helpful if you want to switch over to Comp Sci (though I would have to prepare in the US, those university standards are very tough, don’t you know), I don’t think that the Israeli Startup Scene will cut it at all.  Or something involving management.  I know in the US, we produce too many managers.  In Israel, you produce lots of mashups: but you are importing management.  Which may or may not stay.  What does this say about you?  Nothing amazing.  That I can say.  I can bully way too many people there, and I kind of don’t want to, because I want to be held accountable so I can learn.

That says something if you want talent to make aliya.  Just saying…

 

Go fix that!!!  Really, I would go if I knew what the hell was going on in Israel in a realistic sense….and I felt like it could be a huge learning experience (this would be after ulpan, my hebrew has gone to crap).  Seriously Go Fix your recruiting for your own benefit and stop complaining…

 

(If you really want to fix that, seriously, You can petition ideas below by Feburary 15th for the Presentense Fellowship.  If we can come together with some good ideas, I can go to J-town as your representative, and get $30,000 and 1 year to implement, which is a lot better than having no publicity in the world of Aliya as an option.  It’s best to say I have sponsors for something this silly yet this massive.  And it is silly.  You need the publicity and the worker bees. And closer American Ties can’t hurt anyone statically, having been one of the few lay people who have seen both the AviChai Foundation numbers about Israelis and the NJPS numbers about Americans.  Sucktatic!  Though the Israelis are ahead.*

That, and you can hire one of my very early ex’s from my yar in Israel, who did make Aliya, Eitan Marks for an internship at a startup.  He’s studying Graphic Design at Bezalel, is pretty organized, draws well, and is an overall Nice Dati Guy who likes interesting movies, the bible,  and wears glasses and an ugly hat that he got from the army.  It will be good for him, trust me!)

 

 

*My hobby is to keep track of Judaism on the internet.  It’s a very interesting hobby, it tells you a lot about how culture and religion change when interacting with media and how media changes people and their practices.  Now I just need to get that unpublished  thesis about the growth of Post-orthodoxy during the 00s.  Should be an interesting read.

PS that’s a picture of what Jerusalem really looks like- It’s the Jerusalem Book Fair!!  Woot for book fairs!  Why can’t New York have one, they’re so much fun. :(

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The AVC People List

Woman Sitting in Chair
Image by ShanaLC via Flickr

I’m not sure what to say right now.  Though the AVC People list is here. (now you can’t complain, it is at the top of the post.)

Originally I had started this list many moons ago because Fred Wilson told me that I should follow the people on AVC.com in order to learn more about the world.

I originally was using Disqus, I found that experience semi-unsatisfying.  It was doable, but all the comments seemed out of context.  So I ended up stalking the user base on twitter.

Then the KidMecury outed me one day.  That was embarrassing.  Not soon after, Erik Schwartz asked if there was a twitter list available of regular commentators.

Thus, my personal ambition of just being quiet and going on my way was sort of crushed.  The List kind of had to get bigger.  My original intent was to just get all the people who had commented 10 times per month. I figured they were definitely reading and not just popping in this one time, never to be seen again.  I wanted to look for those who were engaged, and then make them more engaged.  This was extremely hard to figure out.  Some people just pop in occasionally.  Some people post an occasional comment here and there, and I wasn’t sure where they were primarily associated with.  And some people hid their twitter or just didn’t have (and still do). I’m still not sure of who everyone is (Though Hi! if you are missing can you tell me?)

I needed help so I asked and became a pain in the neck.

The post announcing the list has a huge amount of unique comments.  A number included people who hadn’t commented before; who feel like “All I can say is Yes” or who read through Rss feeds, who feel like if they comment they are late to the conversation, and even a person who just likes stuff without telling anyone until now.

To those people: You have something valuable to say.  Maybe not all the time (and I probably talk to much, but I’ll admit publicly I’m actually, uh, competitive about comments.) Just find someone who you disagree with slightly.  Or maybe  say why you like something.

 

I wasn’t ever expecting to become a commentator with a massive amount of comments.  I wasn’t ever expecting to ever write a blog, or start talking about what I like from a UX/UI point of view.  This was not my imaginary life (actually I didn’t know what I wanted precisely, and I’m still working parts of that out.)

I did it because I found it engaging. Clearly the vast majority who read AVC.com find it engaging too.

Next question:  What now?

I’m not fully sure.  This is a very unique experiment in social media.

This list is now massively larger than it was before.  I have managed to get everyone in the comments so far.  How am I supposed to get those other missing people over time? (and I may eventually break the list down into two if it gets too heavy- there is a 500 person limit to lists I think.)  And what do those people want? (I like products, I like engaging people, and it’s a good question.)

Further, some new complications.  This is an over 200 person list, and that is before I add the people who are following the list, before I get to Listorious.  It’s a bit of a madhouse of a list.  I’m ok with this.  However from a sheer practical perspective, I don’t think many people have the tolerance for engaging in 200+ people at once even through a stream. Let’s face it, in person, I get intimidated by a crowd of 200 people.  I figure for some it is very similar in social media.

There has to be multiple uses for this list.  Don’t be afraid to engage people- but also don’t be afraid to cull down into your own little world if you find this all very intense.  This is a contact list, a question list, and answer list, a place where people tell the world little bits about their tiny corner of it.  And there are a large variety of folks, from crafters to hedge fund people (and this is not the time to make fun of hedge funds).  In some ways, it’s very diverse (though there is a definite lean towards men in their mid to late 30s involved in technology.)

In exchange- look out for each other and the list.  And find the people who aren’t engaged yet, and engage them.  Ask them why.  Really simple request.  I promise.  Just asking apparently makes people feel a lot better.  Yes, people want to know what you are thinking.

Also- piece of advice: Go back to the original intent of the list.  I only created it because I wanted to learn more via other people.  Contact people with questions, comments, and see if you learn something new.

(Just remember this does expose you a little, if you feel uncomfortable about exposing parts of your life, or being exposed to other people’s- you should also ask to not be part of this.)

One last thought:

AVC.com has it’s own twitter id.  It’s now attached to the list.  So yes, the posts will appear too, along with each other.

Have fun!

PS If you have advice, you might want to throw in a word or two.  This is new even for me.

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The IPad UI stupidity

SAN FRANCISCO - JANUARY 27:  An event guest pl...
Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Even though I don’t really care one way or another about whether I’m blogging about what everyone else is blogging about, after seeing pictures and having to deal with weeks of (over)-hype:

With all due respect to the Blogosphere, Mr. Steve Jobs, and Apple Inc., that IPad looks like it has serious flaws that are going to damage it long term in market.

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Seesmic Look! Would it work for my Ex?

Loic Le Meur at Seesmic Look Launch - January 2010
Image by David Berkowitz via Flickr

So Loic Le Meur and Seesmic decided to release Look.

And being Shana-licious, I stuck it on a netbook to test.

As many people have commented, it is an extremely beautiful UI.  This doesn’t mean I am not going to nitpick at it.  The question is, Would I recommend this to my Ex, who recently registered for an account, is following 7 people, and as far as I know, never goes on Twitter.

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This is depressing

Because of some odd scheduling stuff, I couldn’t get registered for anything I really wanted to go to for Social Media Week.  So now I am waitlisted to death.  And I am not sure what to do.  Advice welcome.

 

Bleh.  I hate when these sorts of things happen.

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FailProduct: Mendeley

Trapped in Hyde Park
Image by quinn.anya via Flickr

This is one of those products which makes me so sad.  It actually could be a really useful product.

As soon as I saw it, I realized why college is so depressing when it comes to research.  it’s because no matter what you do, the stuff out there, sucks.

Part of this is problems involving different fields of research: While generally, pretty much everyone cites one of two ways (MLA or Chicago), especially on the undergraduate level*, if one ever decided to go look up the amount of ways to cite primary and secondary material in say, The Chicago Manual of Style, one would know that just a paper is never enough when it comes to citing.  From there, there are four ways to stick your cites into your paper. Then you have to deal with different kinds of material.  It’s why the Chicago Manual, 15th edition, aka the orange brick, has two chapters on the subject.  Citing a Musical Score is not the same as citing a paper from Nature.  Depending on the length of your paper, of course…

Now trying to gather and manage all this stuff is a pain.  Across different disciplines, forget about it.  Someone like me, actually might be citing all of this.  Or trying to.  Or managing all of this information (Major students in my department have been told to read everything from hard core bio textbook to look up articles about how charts good charts are made for their theses.  I realize that if I want to get really good at art, I would need to graduate, get a job, and study…math, statistics, and comp sci because of the kind of art I’m interested in….whereas other people I know would be studying totally different material….)

I actually had Mendely installed (because I tried to register for everything Le Web ‘09 offered that was explained in English).  I’m part of their prime demographic (I’m a student on leave doing a bachelor’s thesis work in Art, and I am expected to defend a thesis of artwork through actual research.  That’s pretty normal where I’m from due to class schedules versus requirements.)

I realized I couldn’t figure how to make the damn program work; How was I supposed to organize books that weren’t there, papers in the process of being written, movies that need to be annonated, and artwork that needs to be relooked at (if I am so lucky)?  Before sticking in my own stuff.  Delicious actually does a better job for me right now, for the most part.

That just annoyed me.  I realized it wasn’t going to be a me thing either: How would someone import their lab notes (primary research) or other sorts of primary documents, particuarly rare ones?  And then share them?  Primary documents are everything when doing research: how else are you going to check that what you are doing is the right thing?

Those lack are a total fail.  If your layout can’t make clear what is going on within 5 minutes, students will ignore you.  I also can’t beleive I de-installed.  I’m tempted to re-install to figure out what happened, but that may be a waste of my time.  I have reading to do, you know…

 

(I never de-install, I mean I never de-install.  And therefore, I’m sad.)

 

Sorry guys.

 

 

*In case you are curious, I cite Chicago.  This means I’m an intellectual snob. :)  Actually, the real reason is I went there.  And if you like the photo, it is from one of my favorite Hangouts on Campus, the Regenstein Library. (Go A-Level!)  Someone actually is documenting all the grafitti there, some of which is quite awesome, because it is an awesome library.  Go take a look…(also here is her book)

Posted in Business, Interfaces, Internet, Product Design, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Talking to some Bloggers last night

This post covers two areas: Who may be reading this blog, and what I should do about it.

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Freedom and Google

Google Inc.
Image via Wikipedia

Normally I avoid the subject of freedom at all costs.

But the Google/China standoff has made it really important to say something, because I’m watching this in more bated breath than Haiti.

Most people, upon meeting me, don’t realize that I burn with certain questions, one of them being “What does it mean to be Free?”

I was very lucky to have a ridiculous amount of Internet access from the earliest age possible.  My father is a hardware nut, and my mother a programmer, so it was normal that I would get these sorts of things (cellphones they don’t get though…)  I was able to realize (being very retro here) that AskJeeves was better because it was a meta-searchengine, and that because search engines sucked, you should display results in 100s, not in 10s.  I also understood I could look up anything, including religion, sexuality, fanfiction, anything.  I understood this very early on.

It gave me the ability to look at the world with some more open eyes, even if I didn’t understand it (and still don’t), I was able to see that there was a broader world out there, and that I had and will always have choices.

Google made that process better.  It made the choices more apparent (around the same time I stopped reading fanfiction, for the most part).  Not everyone will use those choices wisely.  That’s not the point.  The point is, for those people who will: It will be life changing.  It is the difference of knowing there is someone out there who cares, who is your emotional and intellectual equal, who cares about the same issues as you, and then being able to connect.  It is the difference between learning a new fact that makes your argument and your person through the expansion of your intellectual abilities stronger.  And is knowing that the people you meet will slowly bolster you.  Losing that can kill people and can kill societies: or it can rebirth them.

I was talking with some people last night: A chunk of them blog and wanted to know if I read their blogs (I’ll come back to you in a bit)*, and I didn’t want to tell them that even though I can’t feel what they write right now (personal reasons), it’s adminrable that they do.  They were fighting a good fight from a niche community.  And they allowed their voices to be heard and to grow from it.

That may be what Google gives up if they leave China.  And it wouldn’t be for 7 people.  It would be for billions including millions of students, all of whom are like me on some practical level.  I know I know nothing of the world.  The only way to know is to put yourself out there.

Even so, Google is hacking back.  I’m not sure what I think about a huge company just peering inside other large companies and potentially large governments. Yes, I know their policy is “Do No Evil.”  However, to be free is to recognize that one is small and that I can come together with others for mutual benefits (usually to protect myself from harm) (This is Locke people, I accept Locke.) How does Google manage to protect my freedom without being, well, oppressive in some sort of utilitarian sense.  They have my information, and I wonder what could cause them to turn it over.  Right now, nothing.

I’m so sad when I watch this- I don’t know if there is anything I can do except watch and wait, and maybe want to cry a little.  I want freedom to win.  Freedom to be whatever I want to be.  Freedom for everyone to be what they want to be: and that requires information to flow.

I wish someone would translate this into Chinese: If you are in China and can see this: The thing that unites you is that you are all a little different, that in fact is normal.  It is the ability to find out together what those differences are and then to repsect them: That is what makes the Empire strong.  I wish those my own age so much luck in all of this, because I know that this one of those defining expeirneces that will affect you for the rest of your lives.  May you rise above it and change societies and governments for the better because of it.  May you bring some sense of liberty and Joy, a sense of better understanding of who you are as individuals, and therefore what China and the Chinese people are, as you scale the wall.  Good Luck!

*You get your own post.

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