rebels, jesters, believers, and thinkers
May 30th
I am building a game of value. What does this mean? I see a distinct need for a neutral and engaging way to get us talking about our values. Here is some evidence of the gap identified at the world economic forum. The people of this planet have many deeply held beliefs, values, and opinions and GAIA wants to create a value management system to help us discuss them. The game part is in the mechanics, that filter and organize the content. The more you help out, the more prominence and influence you will wield, to promote the values you have. If this interests you, in even the slightest manner, I have a request. Find the question that resonates the greatest YES for you and take action. Together we can shift the world and show our collaborative colors!
Are you a rebel?
Definition #2 To resist or defy an authority or a generally accepted convention.
Rebels want freedom. They want control over their destiny and choices. They want freedom from authority, rules, and restrictions. I love freedom and think our democracies would be much better served if we promoted and valued our rebels more. Marc Emery is a rebel, and a hero of mine, who is currently locked up for selling seeds (a heinous crime indeed). What rule or authority are you railing against? More >
personal growth
Jul 5th
I am a being of light and shadow. So are you. People observe that light comes from the Sun and stars and shines on the Earth. Too often we take this for granted. After millions of years the light and energy that has gathered on this planet have been transformed into an amazing biosphere of energy beings. While the source of life remains a mystery we can easily attribute our continued existence to the “original” energy of the thermonuclear reactions of the Sun. The key is that light has become concentrated in us. We feed on other energy beings and grow our light within. We do this with the intention of shining it back out into the universe. I think individually we are pretty bright, and collectively we are absolutely brilliant.
We are so bright we are actually polluting the world with our brilliance. Some people think this picture is a testament of our power, and they are probably right, but I think this picture is sad. To me it shows how greatly we are wasting our light trying to “beat” the dark. The key is we are beings of shadow and light, and to deny our darkness is a division that does not serve us. We need to reach for a balance or our light may yet destroy us. More >
galaxy dance
Jun 28th
God looked over
At what s/he had created and said,
“Gosh, what a great solar system this turned out to be.”
S/He danced and sang with the Sun in a brilliant embrace.
S/He swung to Mercury and said “,You’re a quick one, you’ll mess with the message, but get it there.”
The freedom of business
Jun 24th
Got Values? on Prezi
Current presentation of what I’m doing. It still sucks, but I want to take a break from presentations and start coding. Thus this iteration gets pushed out the door, unpolished just like the rest.
Positions & Props: the Play with no Prototype
Jun 7th
It’s time to go to the last all day session of the Market Entry Program. This is my homework, though I’ve failed to do it as suggested. I may have gotten into the program a little ahead of schedule. I definitely qualified by having no customers, but I also have no product. Thus I am mostly bringing my brain to market. However, maybe it has positioned me well for a different route.
Last week I got into my #1 competitor’s beta: Quora. This application is amazing and their name is way better than mine. 
I love that they share the same central idea in their product: No duplication of questions. There are some great strengths and obvious weaknesses to me, but I’ll save that post for later. Today I redo my go to market strategy for my non-existent prototype, which I can’t seem to start by myself. I keep saying I’m more of a fixer than a build-from-scratch guy, but maybe I should just get on with it. I’m definitely way behind these guys technically. I hope my story will catch their eye and we’ll talk about teaming up. Either way I’m sure we’ll talk eventually. More >
contest failure
May 30th
I didn’t make the cut in the contest. My average score from the 5 judges was 1.92 / 5
I love how encouraging everyone has been throughout this process, but it really isn’t a contest for concept stage companies. Anyways, it’s all good. I’m failing fast as the saying goes, and now I have more time to focus on what I should have been doing all along: building a prototype.
Thanks for reading!
idea wave!
May 24th
I just applied to this cool conference in Victoria called Idea Wave. It’s on July 10-11, 2010. Here is my application to speak for 10 minutes about the QuestionCollector. By the way, I’ve been trying to think of a better name for the product. Maybe PeaceQuest? (the domain is for sale, but I can’t afford it yet.) Would love to hear your ideas for a name.
Title:
A value centered social game for questioning everything.
Talk Abstract:
A text-based social game for online debate. We want your questions, the ones that burn
in your identity. The ones that move you to action. The ones that make you burst into
laughter. We want you to gather with people and organizations of similar values and form
questioning communities. We want to serve your debates, and opinions in a fun and
neutral sandbox where you control your identity. Most of all, we want you to feel
empowered to share your vision. More >
Free and flowing, forever elemental
May 23rd
The moon floats by,
Bobbing on a wisp of gravity.
The stars smile gravely,
With million year old light.
Sweet fire rays dominate the dark,
Pushing it around into shadows.
Never quite caught; always slipping away,
Chasing one another endlessly. More >
peace, war, and freedom
May 17th
Time for some philosophy, passion, and opinions. I’m sharing my vision of peace, because it is the driving force behind my business. People think peace is priceless, but I think this is a huge failure in valuation. Ever hear of a company that set their valuation at priceless? I bet someone told them to go beg on a street corner. So this is what the peace industry does. They raise awareness, they raise money, but what do they build? Where is the peace product lineup? This is a major hurdle for the peace industry, but I think we can overcome it with some ingenuity and by realizing what a valuable commodity peace already is.
Help me make it to round three!
May 3rd
May 10 is the deadline for my submission to qualify for round three of the New Ventures BC 2010 contest. I’m writing this post to detail my current draft plans and get feedback from you. Is it clear? Did I answer the questions? What else should I consider? I would love your harshest criticisms and any encouraging comments you can spare. Thanks for reading!!!
the listening machine?
Apr 20th
I dug this out of my archive. I liked the pictures I used. Isn’t BC beautiful? Anyways, this is from a Toastmasters speech I gave in July 2009, and it covered some of the basic problems I’ve been approaching. I want to thank Victoria Beaver Toastmasters for cheering me on. They seemed to think I was going to be rich someday. I don’t know if they were right. I think I’m already rich and I sure don’t have any money. I just want help building this thing, so I can play it and see if games really can change the world.
I think I’ve done two full iterations of the design and talked to at least seventy-five people directly about it since then and most people are really enthusiastic. I’ve only had one person say it was a terrible idea on a blog comment, I asked him to find others to berate me and stop me from going ahead, but he said it would only take one person to stop a bad idea. Anyone else think that is slightly illogical? I want war to end. Did it work?
I also want to thank Allen for coming up with this draft tweet for entry into a US contest I can’t enter. “Engage politically disenfranchised with online game which displays consolidated opinion and fuels sponsorship of political clarity #100KTwitch” It’s nice to know that someone out there is reading my blog and getting a clear picture of what it would look like to them. Any other enthusiastic readers interested in this game? I want to stress this is a text based game, not video, and not 2d graphical, but still a game with actions to take, an exciting ladder to climb with your friends, and nifty rewards to earn. I would love a set of comments saying “I am interested” or even better “I’ll do everything in my power to stop you, even if I have to do it alone!”.
Love your enemies! Thanks for reading.
Follow us on Vator.tv