Archive for October 2008

On the requirements of an Apple store

I once wrote a plea to Apple about giving Malaysians access to the iTunes music store as well as selling the iPhone’s in Malaysia.

I stepped into one of the Apple Premium Authorised Resellers the other day, and spoke to someone who seemed knowledgeable about these things. I mean, I purchased my MacBook Air in Machines. I purchased an external DVD drive for it from the EpiCentre store, more recently.

The shocker? RM5 million in sales, sustained, for at least three months, before Apple would consider even opening an official Apple store in Malaysia.

Is this hard to reach? I find it hard to believe that this isn’t already reached. I take buying Mac hardware for granted. My latest iPod purchase however wasn’t in the market – I ordered it from the Singapore online store (I wanted it engraved).

If I want it engraved, I can only imagine that a lot more Malaysians want it too. Of course, I also imagined Malaysians spending more than RM5 million on Apple hardware per month.

Anyone know if this is an Apple requirement?

Friendster as an act of revenge

A recently jilted man, aged 27, decided to post information about his ex-girlfriend on Friendster. The Star reports:

In March he started his antics again, which she tolerated, until she started getting disturbing calls from men who had read the “invitation” for a life partner over the Friendster account, which had been created unbeknownst to her.

Get this. In recent times, there were 19 such cases, with 90% of the victims being women!

There’s just some irony in this (besides it being creepy – men, don’t be creepy!). Today it is your number posted on Friendster. Yesterday, it was plastering your number in some random toilet, with a sexy message. What will it be, tomorrow?

On pitching to VCs

I give a lot of talks, but not a lot of pitches to VCs. But if I were planning to, I’d definitely recommend you to watch David S. Rose on pitching to VCs from TED. It’ll eat up fifteen minutes of your life, but the pitch coach, is simply fabulous. Heck, you can learn a thing or two for normal presentations too…

I took some notes:

* People – convince them that you are the people and convince them you are the one they are going to invest it
** 15-30 minutes at most
* Convey integrity, passion, experience, knowledge, skill, leadership, commitment, vision, realism, coach-ability (ability to listen)
* Business models, financial requirements – this is normal
* Timeline: 10-30s to get attention (grab the emotional attention), and keep on getting better, better, better, and then knock them out. A logical progression (think like a staircase)
** validation, believable upside (don’t lie!), things I know or understand, things that make one think, no typos/errors/etc.
* when speaking? use images, or something like what steve jobs does
* slide deck: company logo, business overview, management team, market, product, business model, strategic relationships, competition, barriers to entry, financial overview, use of proceeds, capital & valuation
* always use presentation mode, always use a remote control, hand outs are NOT your presentation (lots more information as it has to stand without you), don’t read your speech, never, ever look at the screen

Thanks to @ditesh for pointing this out.

EveryDNS

I have always recommended the use of OpenDNS, and of late, I’ve decided to stop having to dabble with DNS (in general), and use EveryDNS. For the uninitiated, they both have David Ulevitch in common.

There’s a web interface, its not as simple as tinydns, but it gets the job done. For free, you can host 20 domains, and 200 records (CNAME, MX, etc.). I don’t think I’ll be exceeding that limit anytime soon, but I think its time to make a donation.

Nothing but satisfaction, in the last few weeks of use. One service less to maintain. Anyone else use EveryDNS and is really happy with their service?

MySQL CfP officially ends October 22

I think Giuseppe (the man with too many blogs!) was a little too optimistic in his last post… the MySQL Conference Call for Participation has received an amazing amount of proposals, but not enough by our standards.

I personally believe there should be a 1:3 accepted-rejected ratio. Currently, its not there yet. Why do I like such high ratios? It means that there are actually so many good talks, and we (the voting committee) pick the best of the best, to give attendees the most mileage for their time and money. Or am I too harsh?

Anyway, the word on the street is that we will extend the Call for Participation, mostly because it is the right thing to do, and lots of people expect it. Expect an official announcement to go out soon about this. But remember, you’d be loved more if you submitted before midnight (PDT) on October 22.

MySQL training in KL

Within the APAC region? Planning to attend foss.my (November 8-9 2008)? Why not stay a little longer, for the MySQL for Developers training course – 5 days, from 10-14 November 2008, conducted by my good friends at hSenid (MySQL partners in Malaysia). To register, or find out more, drop Ruchith a quick email at ruchith[at]hsenid[dot]com.


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