I'm now blogging at jessepodell.com

There's No Crying In Baseball

"Have you ever been hated or discriminated against?  I have.  I've been protested and demonstrated against, picket signs for my wicked rhymes, look at the times, sick is the mind of the mother____g kid that's behind, all this commotion"    Eminem

A constant criticism of startup companies being built in this bubble is that too many are being built with only an exit in mind. Even though it's fun to imagine building a super successful website and selling to a large public company for lots of cash, it is delusional as a game plan. That doesn't mean your friends and loved ones aren't rooting for some splendid exit for you, but in some senses, you pass the fantasy to them and focus on other seemingly epic goals like, validating an assumption or two, or, if you are among the very few, actually achieving product/market fit.  When I began my wall street career in Knight Securities' training program in '98, I guess it's fair to say I had an exit in mind.  I figured I'd slang stocks for a decade or so, be stinking rich, and then have enough money to do what I really enjoyed.   Little did I know, months after I slunk into my work place downtown, skirting protesters during the height of OWS, another trader at a competitor who was in the biz the same length as me was having his own machinations of "returning human" - in a very public way.

The Trend Is Your Friend

New Rule:  Find the thing people are going batshit crazy about.  You're then able to leave the guessing world and understand what really turns people on, and then figure out how you are not going to fight it, but encourage it and work hard to help people solve problems.

First Wave

(not me)

As fall creeps into the air here on the Eastern End of Long Island, one of my favorite weekends arrives; The Hamptons International Film Festival.  It's a one of a kind festival- competing with the much larger New York Film Festival, with most crowds containing many folks over 60yrs old, due to the year-round inhabitants that includes many retired and extremely wealthy people who reside out here after long careers working in NYC industries such as Financial Services, Law and Real Estate. There's a great mix of films and film lovers.  The festival provides many world premiers- and I was honored to buy tickets to a film called Drift and be part of the second audience to ever see this fictional account of how in the 70's such huge international surf apparel and equipment brands such as Billabong and Quicksilver got super viral after being started by just a pair of brothers or some friends who lived for surfing, but had the vision for commercial enterprise.  

Where's the love?

And yet in our world everybody thinks of changing humanity, and nobody thinks of changing himself. - Tolstoy

We've got a big problem on our hands.  People just love to hate.  We piled on NFL replacement refs for sucking, that's how we spend our time.   How does it feel being humiliated on newspaper covers, by announcers, by owners, by players?  Does that improve their ability to officiate football games- or make a better call for YOUR team next time?  I certainly think not.  Why did we pour the negative energy on?  Just to be dicks?

I propose that we should be a bit more careful just how much we hate on Apple ($AAPL).   After winning a big lawsuit and rolling out IOS6 with a terrible Maps App, people just love to hate, while 55 million homes have at least one iPad, iPhone, iPod, or Mac in the house.  Be careful what you're rooting against.  Particularly when it holds the fate of your personal wealth.  

Out of the Darkness

I guarantee that you will enjoy this video!

Wasn't I right?  How on earth does it only have 3,200 hits?  It's not for lack of trying on the star's part.

Her name is Whitney Hess. I first heard about her about two months ago while taking a class at General Assembly.   She knows a thing or two about publicity, and harnessing social media.  If you find her on (very active) twitter, the photo is a close up shot of her grill.  Her linkedin is free for you to see.  She blogs about personal stuff.  She gets the joke- you are either all in or not in at all when it comes to branding yourself.  She has also forgotten more about "user experience" than I will ever know.  If you asked me two months ago what UX was, I'd probably have guessed it had something to do with Unix, the awesome operating system we used at Knight Securities in 1998, and never saw again.

Labor Day

Notorious Big and Frank Sinatra - Everyday Struggle / A Day In The Life

Since this is the first Labor Day in my post-college career that I don't have a job to go to on Tuesday, I thought I'd wish a happy holiday to my friends in New York.

To my friends with big jobs and don't make nearly as much money as people think they do in entertainment, medicine, and over at large financial conglomerates like Amex, happy labor day.

To my overeducated friends with several degrees who can't find good work, and are doing things like selling gym memberships for a living, happy labor day.

To my former wall street friends who are out on their asses, burnt out, with bills to pay, happy labor day, take this time to relax, and take a breath, no one can figure it out for you, the hand that fed you is no longer there, and it's time to make some decisions.