A Nice Little Niche

It’s a testament to the beauty and simplicity of...

Sat, 05 Jan 2013 20:03:00 -0500

www.rootsy.com

www.geni.com

It’s a testament to the beauty and simplicity of Geni’s original signup interface that even six years later, online family tree-builder startups still deviate little from it. To the extent Rootsy adds extra fields to theirs, usability clearly suffers. Lazy Registration FTW!

I’m in the midst of writing an essay on how Genlighten can...

Sun, 28 Mar 2010 00:41:00 -0400

I’m in the midst of writing an essay on how Genlighten can search for a bigger market. I’d like to claim I don’t need to, but have we really shown yet that we already have strong customer-perceived value?

This is, as Harper would say, pretty awesome.

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 00:34:30 -0500

This is, as Harper would say, pretty awesome.

charliepark: hiten: Steve Blank’s Customer Development, Eric...

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 22:30:22 -0500

charliepark:

hiten:

Steve Blank’s Customer Development, Eric Ries’ Lean Startup and Dave McClure’s AARRR[G] in one slide. Created by Brant Cooper

Dean: Well, there you go, that’s all I need to do then!

The family tree is missing medical history

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 23:10:42 -0400

bijan:

My wife and I have recently become quite interested in putting together our family tree. It’s such a diverse family with various backgrounds and cultures. And a large family at that.

We signed up with Geni and with a bit of nudging and effort from various family members we now have a tree that spans over 380 people and growing.

We are getting a ton of details that we wouldn’t have known otherwise. It’s really quite excellent.

As we reviewed all the information and watch the tree develop, we started thinking about health matters and family medical history.

For example, my wife’s dad died at 50 years old. Her father’s father also died at a very young age as well. Her’s father’s grandfather also died at a young age. All of them died because of heart failure. It’s clear how important it is to understand your family medical history.

But aside from that striking data, we really don’t know much about other medical history we inherit from our family tree. Who in our family has diabetes? Or cancer? Or Alzheimer’s?

I realize that I’m walking into a hornets nest and patient records are highly confidential. But if I had a medical issue that might pass down to my kids and so on, I would very much want them to know about it. I assume my grandparents, parents, uncles & aunts feel the same way.

At some point, we are going to have better tools that give us data and access. Of course, we will need assurances & security to make sure that the right people have access to the right information.

Electronic medical records are a start. Stitching our medical records with our family tree is the next step after that. And we will all be better for it.

Can Genlighten tackle these issues? Not yet, but it’s something to keep returning to.

First Formal Beta Invites Go Out

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 23:51:00 -0400

Today was the day we sent the first batch of private beta invitations out to interested Genlighten users we’ve met at conferences over the past few years or who’ve signed up on the site. So far it looks like about 20% have registered. Not as many new lookups offered as I would have hoped, but it’s a start. Great feedback from one potential power provider.

"I could talk for ages about how awesome and valuable the beta process was. We learned so much during..."

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 23:00:37 -0400

“I could talk for ages about how awesome and valuable the beta process was. We learned so much during the first year when invitations were going out slowly and we were talking to the users of the site about what they wanted every single day. I would do it all over again in a heartbeat — start with something that works, get people in it, and build it together.”

- Ravelry from Tim Bray’s blog Ongoing

I love the way the founder Casey Forbes talks about his Knitting and Crocheting community site, Ravelry. I want our beta process to be just the way he describes his.

Writing down your life story

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 23:25:00 -0400

bijan:

We spent Thursday and Friday in New York City.

Yesterday, we arrived at my parents in Long Island. Last night after the kids went to bed, my dad told us some amazing things about his childhood that I had never heard before.

My brother and I have learned a lot about my parents lives over the years but I know there are gaps missing from the stories. And there are certainly photos missing. The old photos we have aren’t tagged or organized at all and we don’t have any videos naturally.

I told my parents that they should write down their life story. Start at the beginning. They have led fascinating lives. One little tidbit: They both came from different countries to the United States in the 60’s. My mom is from Korea. My dad is from Iran. They met after medical school during their residency in New York. My mom was supposed to be arranged but she met my dad.

These days many of us are sharing our lives on Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, blogs and flickr. It’s an attempt to write down and share our life story. From the seemingly mundane to the other end of the spectrum.

I hope my kids can one day check out my shared life to get another window into my life story.

And hopefully they will do the same for the next generation.

Dean’s take: So far, that’s two East Coast VCs (the other being Fred Wilson) who have indicated an interest in their family history on their blogs. This bodes well for our potential Genlighten Techstars presentation.

"Startups make all kinds of excuses for delaying their launch. Most are equivalent to the ones people..."

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 00:07:00 -0400

“

Startups make all kinds of excuses for delaying their launch. Most are equivalent to the ones people use for procrastinating in everyday life. There’s something that needs to happen first. Maybe. But if the software were 100% finished and ready to launch at the push of a button, would they still be waiting?

One reason to launch quickly is that it forces you to actually finish some quantum of work. Nothing is truly finished till it’s released; you can see that from the rush of work that’s always involved in releasing anything, no matter how finished you thought it was. The other reason you need to launch is that it’s only by bouncing your idea off users that you fully understand it.

”

- Paul Graham, 18 Mistakes That Kill Startups, via Hiten

I’m really starting to run out of excuses for delaying our launch…

"The whole entrepreneurial thing is that you kind of jump off a cliff and assemble your airplane on..."

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 23:12:28 -0400

“The whole entrepreneurial thing is that you kind of jump off a cliff and assemble your airplane on the way down. And financing, by the way, is a thermal draft, right? You’re a little further away, but the ground’s still coming at you if you can’t establish an airplane.”

- Reid Hoffman, as quoted by Jeff Bussgang in his new book, The VC Playbook (via fred-wilson)

The ground’s definitely coming at us. But it won’t take much revenue to keep us safely in the air.

"Making things is a circle. You start the arc with an idea about the world: an observation or hunch...."

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 23:15:34 -0400

“Making things is a circle. You start the arc with an idea about the world: an observation or hunch. Then you sprint around the track, getting to a prototype—a breadboard, a rough draft, a run-through—as fast as you can. Your goal isn’t to finish the thing. It’s to expose it, no matter how rough or ragged, to the real world. You do that, and you learn: Which of your ideas were right? Which were wrong? What surprised you? What did other people think? Then you plow those findings back into an improved prototype. Around the circle again. Run!”

- New Liberal Arts in Simple HTML (via heyitsnoah)

Coming soon: Genlighten’s rough and ragged private beta. Then, “around the circle again.”

Someone seems to like it...

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 23:49:00 -0400

Despite all the usability roadblocks that are probably there, somebody managed to order 9 death certificate lookups on Genlighten tonight. Biggest revenue day ever! :)

"I’m prone to those revelations where something blinks and things suddenly make sense but your..."

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 23:37:12 -0400

“I’m prone to those revelations where something blinks and things suddenly make sense but your excitement for this new understanding is clouded by your annoyance that you didn’t figure it out earlier and save yourself mountains of stress and frustration. And sometimes those revelations aren’t even that clear, you know know that you’ve jumped back on the right track somehow after being off it for some unknown period of time, even if you have no early idea where that track is leading you.”

- Not So Quick Travel Blip | sbdc

I love this description of those oh so big revelations that happen so rarely in life..

(via hiten)

Sometimes they seem to come only when when we commit in advance to act on them, whatever they might be.

Which is more important: tithing or paying off my credit-card debt?

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 08:23:00 -0400

Which is more important: tithing or paying off my credit-card debt?:

Would that the dilemma were as straightforward as this Slate article makes it sound…

"The ultimate goal of a lean startup is to identify where its vision intersects with what reality can..."

Tue, 11 Aug 2009 23:39:14 -0400

“The ultimate goal of a lean startup is to identify where its vision intersects with what reality can accommodate. It is neither a capitulation to “what customers think they want” nor a willful ignorance of conditions on the ground. It is a company built to learn.”

- The Promise of the Lean Startup (via hiten)

I *think* we’re built to learn. I sure hope we are…

"There are so many people that don’t care about their past. They are more interested in the here and..."

Sat, 08 Aug 2009 00:42:00 -0400

“There are so many people that don’t care about their past. They are more interested in the here and now. Isn’t that the way it should be? But I believe there also needs to be someone that keeps checking the rear view mirror of our lives so that we don’t go off the straight and narrow path; so that we treasure what is beautiful and unique about our particular family; so that we don’t forget the precious and the notorious individuals that share our genes.”

- Jennifer from the “But Now I’m Found” blog: My Genealogy Habit

I like the idea of genealogy as the “rear view mirror” of our lives.

"It’s really amazing how many startups fail. Not that ideas fail, no, that’s a given — but that..."

Sat, 08 Aug 2009 00:39:02 -0400

“It’s really amazing how many startups fail. Not that ideas fail, no, that’s a given — but that as the costs of running a business plunge ever lower so many smart people can’t cover their $4,000/month “don’t die” costs.”

- Colin Plamondon, How the opportunity cost of a great idea destroys startups

Funny, those are just about our “don’t die” costs, too.

"By far the dominant reason for not releasing sooner was a reluctance to trade the dream of success..."

Sat, 08 Aug 2009 00:30:54 -0400

“By far the dominant reason for not releasing sooner was a reluctance to trade the dream of success for the reality of feedback.”

- Kent Beck, Three Rivers Institute blog, Approaching A Minimum Viable Product
also quoted on 37Signals’ SvN blog.

via @garrytan What is Genlighten’s “vast and endless...

Wed, 05 Aug 2009 14:07:00 -0400

via @garrytan

What is Genlighten’s “vast and endless sea”?

When Web Developers Don't Consider Usability

Mon, 03 Aug 2009 22:45:00 -0400

When Web Developers Don't Consider Usability:

Via the GetElastic blog

Should users be able to complete the entire checkout process without having to register? If not, how should registration be handled? These are the familiar e-commerce site usability issues Genlighten is grappling with right now.

A Nice Little Niche

It’s a testament to the beauty and simplicity of...

I’m in the midst of writing an essay on how Genlighten can...

This is, as Harper would say, pretty awesome.

charliepark: hiten: Steve Blank’s Customer Development, Eric...

The family tree is missing medical history

First Formal Beta Invites Go Out

"I could talk for ages about how awesome and valuable the beta process was. We learned so much during..."

Writing down your life story

"Startups make all kinds of excuses for delaying their launch. Most are equivalent to the ones people..."

"The whole entrepreneurial thing is that you kind of jump off a cliff and assemble your airplane on..."

"Making things is a circle. You start the arc with an idea about the world: an observation or hunch...."

*Someone* seems to like it...

"I’m prone to those revelations where something blinks and things suddenly make sense but your..."

Which is more important: tithing or paying off my credit-card debt?

"The ultimate goal of a lean startup is to identify where its vision intersects with what reality can..."

"There are so many people that don’t care about their past. They are more interested in the here and..."

"It’s really amazing how many startups fail. Not that ideas fail, no, that’s a given — but that..."

"By far the dominant reason for not releasing sooner was a reluctance to trade the dream of success..."

via @garrytan What is Genlighten’s “vast and endless...

When Web Developers Don't Consider Usability

Someone seems to like it...