I’m a huge Apple fan and this very recent Steve Jobs interview from the D Conference is fantastic. Steve touches on the iPhone, iTV, and iTunes, with snippets about the Mac and software development. What an amazing speaker… take a peak.

I received an email from Smart Experience, an independent school in New York City offering classes on state-of-the-art topics to working professionals in the Internet, mobile, and software fields.  I am looking to possibly take one of their classes, which is 2 2-hour sessions that are on July 10/17th here in Manhattan on “Using Internet Business Strategy.”  I’m a huge fan of learning and feel that the class may be beneficial, but I’d also like to meet the other cool people taking the class as well.  I believe the class costs $140.

Is anyone signed up to take the class?  Have you taken any classes with Smart Experience in the past?  Was it worth it?

I’ve been playing around with the idea of creating a vertical search engine in my spare time (not sure when that even is!) and came across a few really interesting documents that have been guiding me through the anatomy of the search field. Prior to this, I had no real formal training in search other than understanding how search marketing works and following Bruce Clay during my days in marketing Conducive Corporation and product management at FortuneCity.

The monster “thesis” that I have been reading thoroughly is The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine written by the infamous Sergey Brin and Larry Page during their time at Stanford University. I guess you cannot argue with Sergey and Larry as they’ve done it right so far… I mean, a marketcap of $150.64B is more than proving their concept.

I have also spent a fair amount of time reading up on the ht://Dig movement for Internet search engines. Their site breaks down the search methodology into three seperate steps including digging, merging, and searching. It’s a solid primer to show you how important each of the three steps are.

After a bunch of research not limited to the above, I went and read up on the Google Mini and the Google Search Appliance. I came to the conclusion that I believe that these hardware/software platforms are perfect as they are essentially what I need in a rack mounted server, to be plugged in a data center and after a quick setup, I could be on my way customizing the front-end. I could purchase a unit for under $10,000 and be well on my way of indexing for my vertical search project… but not so fast.

I traded emails with Google’s Enterprise Team early this morning (Monday) and they told me that their products could do what I wanted (within reason) but their EULA does not allow for this. Here is their exact response:

Technically this is doable but the Google Mini EULA won’t allow you to do so. In fact, you may crawl any content that is located on servers that are owned and operated by you or servers that are operated for your benefit. For example, you may crawl your content that resides on servers operated by your hosting company.

Bummer. I thought I had found the short cut to creating a search engine but unfortunately, it’s probably going to be a bit harder now. I’m not 100% sure what I’m going to be using yet nor if I’m going to go forward with this project, but it’s something in which I’m learning a ton and I’m having a great time doing it. If you’ve got any technical search expertise, I’d love to chat with you to hear how you’ve deployed and what tradeoffs you’ve made in terms of hardware and software.

Also, to round out all of Google’s search products, I have been playing with co-op, but need something wholly owned by me as well, as, the ability to customize the front-end and back-end as the project is more than a search engine (but it plays a large role).

NYC Entrepreneurial Space – Open Source

Back in early April, I alluded to some entrepreneurial space that I was thinking of building out and it got picked up across the blogosphere with overwhelming response.  Had I been a real estate agent here in Manhattan or had already built out this space, I could have filled it up rather quickly.

After about 45 days of dealing with multiple properties and looking at term sheets and arrangements, I decided to pass on this idea, but that does not mean that this idea should die… which is why I’m sharing my thoughts and notes with everyone so maybe they can be used in some other capacity.

My overall vision after having it refined by multiple close friends and colleagues was to create an early stage inspiration space for entrepreneurs to come and conceptualize and incubate their ideas.  This is not the type of space you’d run your ad-sales team out of or code 24/7 with your entire coding team, but rather a bright space that inspires creativity and the place where you can begin writing your business plan, work on selecting co-founders, talk about raising capital, meet your next lawyer/accountant, etc.  My ultimate goal was to create an entrepreneurial network for digital media and technology and have multiple spaces around the world so that people can use them in whichever major city they were traveling to.

This space would have couches, desks, wifi, white boards, bean bags, sofas, coffee tables, but not cubicles or permanent desks that you would sit day-in/day-out for months.  There was a software component that we were going to build that would allow you to reserve space and coordinate when you were going to be there with others – so you could maximize your time in the space by seeing if other likeminded individuals were going to be there at the same time.

Think of this as an entrepreneurs social network with physical space in multiple cities.  You would pay a monthly fee but would have access to great people and entrepreneurial space that would help you get your startup off the ground.

All of this sounds grand and I was ready to take this all on.  I was going to build out the software with my team and create deals with vendors on a revenue share basis.  Unfortunately, the lead space I wanted to work with was moving much too slow and showed disinterest over time due to a few corporate issues.  Could I have gotten this up and running had there been readily available space?  Probably – and could launch it in 90 days… however, my resource is being spread too thin now and will be fighting battles elsewhere.

If you want to pick up this idea or talk with me about it, I certainly welcome it.  I have learned much while talking to different people relevant to this and could impart anything I’ve learned…even a collection of domain names I was going to use for this project.

If you’re looking for some extremely cost efficient space and want a cool atmosphere in the mean time, check out Sunshine Suites who are opening a new location in Tribeca.  The principals Cheni and Joe are friends of mine and I was fortunate to be a tenant… these guys know how to create a community for their tenants and I’ve referred many nextNY’ers and blog readers to their space and all have thanked me.  You can check them out here.

Long live the NYC entrepreneurial scene…

I was invited to attend the DFJ East Coast Venture Challenge today at Columbia University.

The DFJ event has been top notch.  They have courted such sponsors as Administaff, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Sunshine Suites, Silicon Valley Bank, and Merrill Corporation and together, they have provided ample food, a beautiful room/stage, and great enthusiasm to the early-stage business world.

One thing I’m shocked about is that many of the companies presenting have little to no traction.  The Ivy League presenters at this competition are competing for $250k in seed funding (with the option for more) and many other perks including office space at Sunshine Suites.  I’ve sat through about 6 presentations so far and they are all ideas with a business plan and a few contacts already made.  Lots of people in the digital media space always talk about how cheap it is to start a company for $50k, why couldn’t any of these folks done so?  They are certainly smart enough…

Do not get me wrong… the presentations were mostly great, the brain power was high, and some of the ideas are solid, but I would have imagined more teams to show prototypes, betas, demos, etc.

Tip:  If you’re going to be pitching VCs, be sure to show your product/service in motion… certainly sets you a part.

NPD just released some fresh numbers about the video game marketplace… take a peak:

Year to date, the industry has generated some $4.2 billion of hardware, software, and accessories sales, up 46 percent from the same time during 2006. Hardware is up 83 percent at $1.6 billion, software has risen 23 percent to $2 billion and accessories have climbed 56 percent to $600 million.

APRIL 2007 US HARDWARE SALES (All numbers approximate)
1) DS: 471,000
2) Wii: 360,000
3) PlayStation 2: 194,000
4) PlayStation Portable: 183,000
5) Xbox 360: 174,000
6) Game Boy Advance: 84,000
7) PlayStation 3: 82,000
GameCube: 13,000

What I find interesting… Playstation 2 is still outselling Xbox 360. 

Kevin Wolf over at Found|Read typed up an unfortunate turn of events that he faced this week in regards to his startup.  I believe all early stage entrepreneurs should read this, especially if you’re searching for co-founders.  I have witnessed this now twice as an entrepreneur and it’s certainly a tough time.

Please keep in mind that Kevin’s article is only one side of the story.

Today, a colleague of mine at IGA Worldwide passed along the most recent issue of New York Magazine because it contained a restaurant review of a sushi place that I have been talking about non-stop:  15 East.  Located right off of Union Square here in Manhattan, it has come to be one of my favorite spots both personally and with clients.  The sushi swims up to the plate (well, not really) but tastes extremely fresh and the executive chef, Masato is absolutely amazing.

New York Magazine didn’t really think so… they gave it 2 stars.  In NY Magazine, 2 stars means very good… but still, I believe it should have gotten at least 3.5 (out of 5).  The review was positive and recommended the place, but would have personally liked to have seen a few more stars to it’s name.

GothamGal also recommends 15 East.

If anyone would like to go to 15 East for an Omakese menu tasting for lunch ($55+), please let me know and maybe we can organize a nextNY/digital media lunch there.  Just a thought…and you can rate this jewel of a restaurant for yourself

CBS is making some interesting moves lately with investment into the virtual world gurus Electric Sheep Company, possible investor/acquirers of WallStrip, and now, funding the development of Cavemen, taken from the almost cult-popular Geico commercial.

Back in March, the Wall Street Journal reported:

Although the project is at a nascent stage - there’s no script and no cast - plans call for the comedy to be titled “Cavemen” and focus on a trio of prehistoric characters who battle prejudice in modern-day Atlanta. Walt Disney Co.’s ABC will pay for the pilot and show, if one eventually materializes. Geico, a unit of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., will have no creative control but will receive a royalty payment for the use of the character.

AM NY reports that the pilot succeeded and Cavemen got their show which will be airing this fall.

My prediction - two to three episodes at most,  then… pulled.  Sorry Geico.

Late last week, David Askaripour of Mind Petals fame asked me to join him on his MP Radio Show and I excitedly accepted.  I think the show came out well…. you can listen to the show here.