Wow, Thanks So Much for the Feedback

We are blown away with the response to the recent post "What Videos Should We Make?"  Not just the quantity (over 50 comments and lots of email), but the quality.  It's exciting to see suggestions that have opened up new ideas and ones that fit with a couple of the themes that have been top-of-mind. 

Being Lightweight: Business Design

This is the third in a series of posts about Being Lightweight.  The first two were about Working with Clients and Tools We Use.

We are lucky to have a product that people like. Our challenge is to experiment and find the best ways to build a business around this product. To be successful we need the business to be profitable, but also work within the life we want to live.

Custom Video: Meetup.com

Being Lightweight: Tools We Use

This is the second in a series of posts about being lightweight.  Our first was focused on working with clients and this installment is all about tools we use.

Tools, or the the wrong tools, become a risk when they create unnecessary drag in every day work. Often, we've found ourselves wondering if we're using a sledgehammer to drive a nail.  If so, we look for alternatives.  

Being Lightweight: Working with Clients

It's a question we ask each other all the time - what is the most lightweight way we can do this?

We are a small company who is trying to do big things. In order to be
successful, we need to reduce drag - to remove the processes,
bureaucracies and commitments that slow us down and don't pay off. 

Today we're kicking off a series of posts called "Being Lightweight" that will relate what lightweight means to us and hopefully help you think differently about how you focus your attention.

Our Story of Getting Started with Online Video

We're often asked how we got started with our videos.  Here's the story.

It all started with an online community.  It was the latter part of 1999 and I was working in a healthcare data company called HBSI (which was eventually merged into non-existence).  The customers were asking for a way to work together across hospitals.  So, a few of us started an email group on eGroups, which is now Yahoo Groups.  Through this experiment and the online community that grew out of it, I discovered my passion.

Our Videos at One Year: Facts and Figures

Well, as of today it has been exactly one year since all this video craziness began.  On April 22, 2007 we published RSS in Plain English.  We never guessed these videos would take us so far - it was just a problem that begged to be solved.  Did you ever see a blog post with the same name from 2004?

Since our work is in front of people often, we both feel a little self conscious in talking about the numbers behind the videos. We don't want to seem ostentatious or too self-promotional.  But, at the same time, I think that exposing some of the figures provides context and hopefully examples of the power of Social Media.

Custom Video: Using Google Apps with Salesforce.com

Own It

What is the point where many projects get off track? We think it's when decision making becomes a burden.  Indecision, lack of ownership and unclear reasoning often means stasis and frustration.  Over the past year, and likely through traveling together, Sachi and I have evolved a system that helps us be productive without wasting time.  It's a system of ownership - of being personally accountable for the small decisions that contribute to the overall goal.
 

Talkin' Bout My Education

Looking back at my education, I wasn't a great student.  I made decent grades and went to a good university and grad school, but school was never my thing.  Looking back, I can pin-point a couple of points at which I lost faith.

It was sixth grade and I was in a math class with Mrs. Paine (it's true - Paine).  The subject was least common denominators.  I didn't get it.  My worksheets came back with red marks, but I didn't really understand what I was supposed to be doing.  The class moved on while I was caught up in trying to memorize the details. Instead, what I needed was an understanding of the reasoning - not how, but why. It was at this point that I fell behind and began to dread math, as I do today.