Control Online Niche Markets
Creating and managing your digital brand with creativity and consistency is our legal niche. We revel in helping create the digital narrative that your brand becomes. Keywords, metatags, linquistics & logic! Mouthwatering for us. We provide here some quick and dirty tools for you, or engage us and sit back and relax!
Leverage collaboration, Maintain brand identity
We believe that the power that can be unveiled in collaboration and sharing is revolutionary. Allow us to empower you with the tools and resources you need to create a viral brand that is shared among millions, delivering your message freely.
Structuring for Global Transactions
The global nature of the digital marketplace makes for some fun tax minimization strategies. Global tax structures heretofor the exclusive purview of high-net worth individuals (and politicians), can now be set up (legally) quite cheaply, and effectively. Let us show you how ;)
Cross – Platform Application Development
Monetizing your brand online should be easy! The key lies in leveraging digital tools freely provided by Facebook, Youtube, Linkedin, Twitter and others, and being strategic and consistent in your message across multiple virtual media platforms. We provide tools and resources for you to leverage your brand, or, engage us and watch sparks fly!
I hope that with postponement of discourse on SOPA and PIPA, we can begin talking about some of the things that really matter.
Speaking of matter, you may have heard that in September physicists at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN announced that Einstein’s theory of relativity may be bunk. Neutrinos arrived 60 nanoseconds faster than light. So the speed of light is not constant in the equation: E=MC2, throwing some of our fundamental physical truths out-of-wack.
Under SOPA this website would be taken down for using this photo
We are hoping that the Large Hadron Collider at CERN may produce evidence of the much-theorized Higgs-particle (ie. a fifth force), but no revelations thus far. (Actually, nobody has ever technically seen the ‘gravitron’ either but we know its there because of the patterns of the other molecues).
Surfer and cosmonaut Garrett Lisi has suggested that our experiments at CERN may yield evidence of 3 more particles, representing 3 other forces. Check out his ‘An incredibly simple theory of everything’ for some radical thought. Essentially, he says, the universe (and everything in it) is an E8 model — incredibly beautiful, mathematical-model resembling a super-huge, really humongous (or, at the atomic level, a really really really tiny) donut-like object. Perhaps even more notably, Lisi emphasizes the need for Science Hostels and the three most important things in life: love, beauty and quality of life.
It wouldn’t be the first time a surfer has figured it all out in the Green Room. In his excellent book West of Jesus (about the myths we tell ourselves), Stephen Kotler reminds us that Dick Brewer, legendary surfer and board shaper, generally credited with pioneering the radical shortboard design that gave rise to all modern surfing, a feat which occurred just two weeks after a zazen meditation that allowed him to briefly glimpse a moment of white light and pure enlightenment. (Afterward, the famed 113-year-old Zen master Yosefari Roshi took Brewer aside and pronounced him the only enlightened Westerner).
Personally, I’m just learning to get into the wave. Which sorta feels like moving from observer, to actor. I’ll keep you posted.
There has been much talk (but surprisingly little action) around the two bills in front of the House and Senate with somewhat benign titles, respectively the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect Intellectual Property Act.
These bills would effectively strangle the Internet with regulation, with an absurd (bordering on ridiculous) ‘kill first, ask questions later’ mentality. If it passes, the legislation would allow the government to take down any website that any copyright holder claims to be an infringement.
If you are like me, you take some fun perusing the legal terms and functionality of sites like Youtube, Twitter and Facebook, which are really quite sophisticated (and compliant with the Digital Millenium Copyright Act). They each presently comply with over 10,000 ‘take down’ notices a year under the act, but are not responsible for the infringements.
Under the proposed new legislation, however, a violation could be a single link on a single page, such as user-generated content that includes a movie clip or song lyric. Any start-up, no matter how innovative and disruptive, could be litigated out of existence before it can even begin.
Gorilla playing Stravadarius
My point is this: the most effective solutions to technological disruption often exist in technological fixes, or hacks– witness iTunes, Netflix, Hulu, others. L. Gordon Crovitz eloquently sums it up thus: “Washington regulating the Internet is akin to a gorilla playing a Stravadarius.”
Everything you need to know about the Bills can be found here. If you want to take action, please do so here.
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I’ve seen the term ‘hack’ defined in a number of ways, negative and positive. My favorite definition is: ‘a clever, non-obvious solution to an interesting problem.’ But a close runner-up is: ‘an appropriate application of ingenuity to creatively overcome an obstacle or limitation’.
Notice that neither definition is restricted to computers, or web. Nor does either require an illegality element. Though there is some controversy around whether the definition should have a pejorative element, I like to keep it all positive. In fact, I’m not adverse to the occasional life hack too.
Within the legal side of my brain, I look for clever, non-obvious solutions too. Two companies that are doing this for digital entrepreneurs are Docracy and Contractual.ly. Docracy open-sources critical legal documents for digital entrepreneurs, and allows for community sharing of feedback. Very helpful.
Contractual.ly is similar, but different. Contractual.ly makes it easy for start-ups to manage negotiations and document preparation. Simply upload your documents to a contractual.ly account, and easily negotiate, organize, track all changes and sign your documents all in one place. Awesome.
(In fact, the combined power of docracy and contractual.ly is where we see the most value.) We like to use clever playfulness to achieve legal solutions for digital entrepreneurs. We use both Docracy and Contractual.ly in our every day operations, and we encourage entrepreneurs to do so too.
If you want to learn more, hit me @LegalHacks.
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Genability Explorer takes all the powerful functionality of the Genability APIs and makes it available through a web interface. With Genability Explorer anyone can find utilities and tariffs, upload usage data and run precise calculations all without writing any code. Furthermore, Genability provides accounts to help you organize all the activity surrounding a customer or facility.
If you’re interested in learning more you can sign up for our weekly webinar (every Wednesday morning at 10 AM Pacific) or watch the brief introduction below.
The C100 is a Silicon Valley based support group for Canadian digital entrepreneurs that boasts a heavyweight membership comprising up-and-coming executives of high profile technology companies, start-up entrepreneurs, and venture investors representing more than $8 billion in investment capital.
Whipping Canadian entrepreneurs into shape, valley-style
Every year (twice) they host an event called 48 Hours in the Valley that immerses select Canadian entrepreneurs into a Valley-style boot camp that relentlessly whips you into fighting shape, kinda like a frat-party, road-trip and MBA all wrapped-up in one crazy weekend. Applications for this year are open.
There is a digital track and a Cleantech track. To apply, ask yourself, like a boss, whether your venture will:
• address a $1B or greater market
• have the potential to be a >$500M company
• have a product or service that is live or going live within 12 months or have a significant forward contract or business validation
If you are accepted, you can crash in my extra room at the Potrero Refugio. Find it here and here. (You might even get to borrow my golf tdi, if you promise to fill up at Dogpatch.)
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Search engine optimization is a company’s lifeblood. It is an art and science, in a fluid environment that is constantly changing.
Please make sure your SEO practices are up to date, else you will be penalized in your rankings. One excellent resource (among thousands) is the blog (and tools) at SEOmoz. In particular, their ‘Whiteboard Friday” videos are an excellent, up-to-date view from the heart of the SEO world.
Please take 5 minutes and watch this particular video, because the SEO landscape has changed dramatically in a ‘post-Panda‘ world: Whiteboard Friday.
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I cancelled all of my Telus accounts (cell, home, ADSL) three months ago, hoping to never deal with their labrynthine customer service voicemail again. But guess what? The bills kept coming. Every week I call in, speak to another representative, am put on hold for over an hour.
All I want is to break free from the strange, Alice-in-Wonderland antics that Telus seems to embody. Hours and hours of my time are wasted. And billed back to me on my Rogers cell-bill. Invariably, after my explaining the situation over and over to Telus clerks, I am promised that a manager will call me back. Invariably, no one ever does.
It turns out that I’m not alone. There are serious telus-haters out there. Check out: www.telussucks.info, a Facebook Group, Amplicate, Telus Mobility Review, Telus Proboards, and others.
If you are interested to pursue a Telus in court (no matter how little your claim, whether for lost moneys or time or other grievances), please respond to this post. We are assembling a list of potential plaintiffs, and hopefully we can remind Telus that the customer, and not profits, should come first!
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