Comments by blake borgeson

Hmm...I don't, but since I haven't really done much with that account, I was
going to change the password so you could check it out. Unfortunately,
there doesn't seem to be any way in their account interface to change
passwords, and the 'lost my password' function is broken.

I haven't tested it much honestly, but it seems sweet. Something for you to
look forward to. =)

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This is of the best posts I’ve seen on pitching, and probably the first one any entrepreneur should read after deciding to raise money.

Thanks.

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Sounds great--I'll be there.

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Hmm…I don't, but since I haven't really done much with that account, I was
going to change the password so you could check it out. Unfortunately,
there doesn't seem to be any way in their account interface to change
passwords, and the 'lost my password' function is broken.

I haven't tested it much honestly, but it seems sweet. Something for you to
look forward to. =)

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Hmm…I don't, but since I haven't really done much with that account, I was
going to change the password so you could check it out. Unfortunately,
there doesn't seem to be any way in their account interface to change
passwords, and the 'lost my password' function is broken.

I haven't tested it much honestly, but it seems sweet. Something for you to
look forward to. =)

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my first startup plan
make a website then profit
did i skip a step?

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There is clearly a tremendous need for a revolution in finance--a retooling of the system in terms of the regulations, the regulators, and the incentives among the players to restore our faith. As one of the first to observe how truly broken our current system is, any specific guidance you can develop on what should be done would be well received and probably very influential right now.

I'm an entrepreneur. For the last several months I've been mainly focused on researching and reflecting to try to decide where I should direct my energy next and make a difference. I feel I have a decent grasp of things like harnessing the internet, building and leading a team, developing software, and other general aspects of starting and growing a technology company.

What I feel I lack most is domain expertise in the areas that I think are most in need of innovation, and I believe this is a widespread problem: the disconnect between people who have a deep understanding of the problems and needs of certain domains (in this case, finance), and people who are looking to create value directly by trying to solve problems, in my case hopefully by starting an innovative business tackling the biggest problem that I uniquely can contribute to solving. I think there are a lot of talented young people out there who end up creating a modified twitter clone when they could probably be solving a much more valuable problem if they had some idea of where to start looking.

Right now these are just thoughts, but I'm trying to develop them into ideas for how this disconnect could be improved. Especially given the urgency of the need for innovation in finance right now, I'd be up for any sort of brainstorming sessions for starters, either in person or online somewhere. I put up a discussion site at ideaify.com, not because it's a perfect solution, but more to show I'm serious. Open to suggestions...

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Dan,

Your comments are all spot on. In retrospect, I can see that the excerpt I chose doesn't do much more to talk about what ideas Obama has about what will change. It more just describes at a high level, via references to the last few presidents, where Obama sees himself on the political spectrum economically.

As you supposed, there are lots of more specific details in the article itself, and to that point, that's really the challenge someone like Obama faces. He's really got a good handle on the economics issues in my opinion, and I think this article shows that, but how can he communicate that to Americans? Not more than 1 in 20 Americans is actually going to read anything as long as that whole article, and it's a lot less than that probably. So how does he convince the country that he's the best person to put in charge of it? He's got to break it down into terms people can understand, and that's the goal I think he's trying to work towards mentally in that excerpt.

One of the specific ideas/plans mentioned in the article, something I've been hearing about in the last couple of months as a possibility, is decreasing the payroll tax. The way it's structured, it essentially discourages businesses from investing in people. I agree that decreasing or phasing out the payroll tax, and picking up the slack with the changes he proposes to income and capital gains taxes, would likely be great for the country.

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Sorry disqus ate your comment, and thanks for letting me know--that's something I should keep an eye out for if I can.

tonchidot: No, I definitely don't think it's really real. I mean, the video isn't fake, but yeah, I agree that it's a hacked demo in that their application isn't really ready at all. They seeded it with perfect data in a perfect scenario, so the video wasn't realistic at all. But it's coming soon, I hope.

swype: Yeah, I skipped them--I never paid attention to them at the event because I have an app on my iphone already as of a couple weeks ago that does what they're doing, called writingpad (http://www.shapewriter.com/iphone.html). So swype's technology didn't look that unique or defensible to me. I like writingpad a lot, though right now it's confined to its own little notepad application rather than subbing in for the default iphone keyboard. That's what swype is trying to change, I guess. Seems like apple and the other phone makers will just do it themselves, and hopefully have it as another option for the way the keyboard works.

Although looking at their website, it seems swype might be targeting actual computer touch screens over mobile devices. That seems like it could be really useful.

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That's true--I think right now the idea definitely doesn't have a lot of support yet. Maybe we need an authoritarian government to bridge the gap...with me in charge. =)

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Good point. It actually does seem reasonably achievable to do some experimentation of this sort at the local level. Experiments with governance on a national level may have to wait until the first seasteading (seasteading.org) colony is launched. =)

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Sorry disqus ate your comment, and thanks for letting me know–that's something I should keep an eye out for if I can.

tonchidot: No, I definitely don't think it's really real. I mean, the video isn't fake, but yeah, I agree that it's a hacked demo in that their application isn't really ready at all. They seeded it with perfect data in a perfect scenario, so the video wasn't realistic at all. But it's coming soon, I hope.

swype: Yeah, I skipped them–I never paid attention to them at the event because I have an app on my iphone already as of a couple weeks ago that does what they're doing, called writingpad (http://www.shapewriter.com/iphone.html). So swype's technology didn't look that unique or defensible to me. I like writingpad a lot, though right now it's confined to its own little notepad application rather than subbing in for the default iphone keyboard. That's what swype is trying to change, I guess. Seems like apple and the other phone makers will just do it themselves, and hopefully have it as another option for the way the keyboard works.

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Sorry disqus ate your comment, and thanks for letting me know–that's something I should keep an eye out for if I can.

tonchidot: No, I definitely don't think it's really real. I mean, the video isn't fake, but yeah, I agree that it's a hacked demo in that their application isn't really ready at all. They seeded it with perfect data in a perfect scenario, so the video wasn't realistic at all. But it's coming soon, I hope.

swype: Yeah, I skipped them–I never paid attention to them at the event because I have an app on my iphone already as of a couple weeks ago that does what they're doing, called writingpad (http://www.shapewriter.com/iphone.html). So swype's technology didn't look that unique or defensible to me. I like writingpad a lot, though right now it's confined to its own little notepad application rather than subbing in for the default iphone keyboard. That's what swype is trying to change, I guess. Seems like apple and the other phone makers will just do it themselves, and hopefully have it as another option for the way the keyboard works.

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That's true–I think right now the idea definitely doesn't have a lot of support yet. Maybe we need an authoritarian government to bridge the gap…with me in charge. =)

Reply | Original | Permalink | Share | Tweet

That's true–I think right now the idea definitely doesn't have a lot of support yet. Maybe we need an authoritarian government to bridge the gap…with me in charge. =)

Reply | Original | Permalink | Share | Tweet

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