Last week it was announced that Microsoft would be buying Powerset for $100 million dollars. Powerset, for those who have never heard of it, is a search engine that was dubbed the “Google Killer” since it would allow users to do semantic searches. Unfortunately they have been years delayed and when they finally did release, 3 months ago, it was restricted to only Wikipedia and was severely inaccurate. However that was months ago and a lot can change.
After the acquisition was announced I decided to put them to another test and see how good they were at finding the title to the latest Bond movie (named Quantum of Solace) .
Here are the results:
Google won this contest by getting the answer in the first link:
Yahoo placed second with the answer in the 2nd link:
Finally Powerset rounded the rear and the answer was in the 4th link:
It seems like Powerset still has some ways to go. However Microsoft’s own search engine Live.com got the answer as the 7th result.
The morale of the story? Even if you’re bad at what you do, as long as you’re better than Microsoft,
you can still be worth $100 million.
So I finally graduated (well sort of, I have one minor breath class that I need to complete, but close enough). This year’s speaker was Oprah and you can watch the replay below:
It’s extremely similar to Steve Job’s speech a few years back but none-the-less just as inspirational and insightful.
Oprah had a tough childhood. According to Wikipedia, she was born “.. in rural Mississippi to a poor unwed teenaged mother, and later raised in an inner city Milwaukee neighborhood. Winfrey was raped at the age of nine, and at fourteen, gave birth to a son who died in infancy.”
It always amazes me at how someone can come through so much adversity yet still have the drive to follow his or her dreams.
She had three main points - and for those who don’t have the 30 minutes to listen to the entire speech - I want to highlight some of the parts I felt were meaningful.
On Following Your Feelings…
“When you’re doing the work you’re meant to do, it feels right and every day is a bonus, regardless of what you’re getting paid. It’s true. And how do you know when you’re doing something right? How do you know that? It feels so… Every right decision I’ve made—every right decision I’ve ever made—has come from my gut. And every wrong decision I’ve ever made was a result of me not listening to the greater voice of myself. If it doesn’t feel right, don’t do it. That’s the lesson.”
“Trust your heart and success will come to you…how do I define success? Let me tell you, money’s pretty nice…. But having a lot of money does not automatically make you a successful person. What you want is money and meaning. You want your work to be meaningful. Because meaning is what brings the real richness to your life. What you really want is to be surrounded by people you trust and treasure and by people who cherish you. That’s when you’re really rich.”
On Coping With Failure…
“Many of you know that, as President Hennessy said, I started this school in Africa… I spent five years making sure that school would be as beautiful as the students. I wanted every girl to feel her worth reflected in her surroundings. So, I checked every blueprint, I picked every pillow. I was looking at the grout in between the bricks. I knew every thread count of the sheets. I chose every girl from the villages, from nine provinces. And yet, last fall, I was faced with a crisis I had never anticipated. I was told that one of the dorm matrons was suspected of sexual abuse.
“That was, as you can imagine, devastating news. First, I cried—actually, I sobbed—for about half an hour. And then I said, let’s get to it; that’s all you get, a half an hour. You need to focus on the now, what you need to do now… And Gayle and I got on a plane and flew to South Africa. And the whole time I kept asking that question: What is this here to teach me? And, as difficult as that experience has been, I got a lot of lessons. I understand now the mistakes I made, because I had been paying attention to all of the wrong things. I’d built that school from the outside in, when what really mattered was the inside out. So, it’s a lesson that applies to all of our lives as a whole. What matters most is what’s inside. What matters most is the sense of integrity, of quality and beauty. I got that lesson. And what I know is that the girls came away with something, too. They have emerged from this more resilient and knowing that their voices have power.”
On finding Happiness…
“Not a small topic this is, finding happiness. But in some ways I think it’s the simplest of all. Gwendolyn Brooks wrote a poem for her children. It’s called “Speech to the Young : Speech to the Progress-Toward.” And she says at the end, “Live not for battles won. / Live not for the-end-of-the-song. / Live in the along.” She’s saying, like Eckhart Tolle, that you have to live for the present. You have to be in the moment. Whatever has happened to you in your past has no power over this present moment, because life is now.”
“But I think she’s also saying, be a part of something. Don’t live for yourself alone. This is what I know for sure: In order to be truly happy, you must live along with and you have to stand for something larger than yourself. Because life is a reciprocal exchange. To move forward you have to give back. And to me, that is the greatest lesson of life. To be happy, you have to give something back. “
Who knew there were so many remedies for sunburns?
This weekend, it was extremely sunny in LA…and I got sunburned.
I’m originally from Newport Beach, and have always used SPF 4 at home…well not this time. Got a pretty back burn - I guess it was just way too sunny and my skin wasn’t used to it after being in SF for 5 years.
Poking on the internet, I saw some home remedies - dare to try?
1) Vinegar - put in a spray bottle and then spray on the burn
2) Tea - brew tea to ‘until black’ and then use a rag to wipe it on your body
3) Lemon juice - squeeze a bunch of lemon juice and place on the burn
Well these items are all slightly acidic, must be that acids can help you with the burn.
James recommended Chocolate and Panda Sauce…if you are brave you can try that.
The CLZ team went to LA this weekend for some much needed R&R.
We stayed at The Standard on Sunset Blvd in West Hollywood. The hotel lobby was pretty awesome. It looked very modern and they kept a girl in her underwear inside a glass aquarium, which I thought was pretty cool. We went to a bunch of bars on Friday night and on Saturday we went to the beach in Santa Monica. I also ended up doing a little shopping while I was there.
The highlight of the trip was Saturday night, when we went to Les Deux, one of the hottest clubs in Hollywood. Everyone complains that it’s difficult to get into clubs like this in hollywood, but we used the CLZ patented method of Advanced ForceTM and went in without waiting in line.
We had a lot of fun that night. The music was good, the girls super hot, and we saved a bunch on car insurance. You can expect to see the CLZ team back in LA in the near future.
Like most of the tech world yesterday, I was glued to the various live bloggers covering the Steve Jobs keynote. It was pretty boring with the hour-long fest of fruitless demos but in the end we finally got what we all were waiting for: the specs for the new iPhone.
Unfortunately though, I was extremely disappointed from the company that has blown my expectations year after year. Here are five reason why the new iPhone is NOT what it was hyped-up to be.
1. It’s not smaller
Though it’s not confirmed, it’s obviously not smaller than the first iPhone. If it were, don’t you think Steve would have mentioned this 50 times in his keynote? Yes, I understand he needed to make the phone last longer and put in a 3G antenna, but Nokia has a phone out right now with the same capabilities and is half the size.
2. It’s delayed
Why do I have to wait until July 11th? The phones are already made and sitting in warehouses in the US. I suspect it’s AT&T who is frantically trying to ramp up their systems. This is probably pissing off Steve a great deal but they could have done a better job on communication and planning.
3. Price and data plan
Yah sure the price is now an affordable $199 but the data plan is going to cost more. In the long run I am going to end up paying more and this was not touched upon in the keynote.
4. Camera is the same
So if the iPhone is the same size, the camera ought to be a little better. 2 megapixels is not going to cut it these days when the standard on most phones is 3-5.
5. More difficult to unlock
Besides the fact that it is running the new 2.0 iPhone version, AT&T is reportedly going to force activation at their stores. This clearly shows they are tired of people who are unlocking the phones and I am sure Apple has taken steps against this as well. Part of the fun of having an iPhone was the ability to add custom software and applications that were tailored to our needs.
I turned 23…and I wasn’t too thrilled because it seems that I’m older and not that much wiser. (I got most of my grey hair when I was 20).
Well I wasn’t thrilled until - MOM decided to ship me a Birthday Package - that showed up a day before my birthday. I probably have the nicest mom ever.
Look - she sent me a present through the mail, nicely wrapped in gift wrapping. Oh - and don’t forget the matching card.
Awesome - and I really hope these Birthday Packages continue showing up year after year. Makes me feel like I’m 12 again!
So the other day I was talking to some friends and an interesting issue came up. Are PR firms really necessary for a startup’s growth? I for one have never used a PR firm nor have I ever had an inkling to find one. This got me interested however so I went around to do some research. I wanted to know what exactly these people do and why they are useful.
I found several sites but the best article I read was from a guest writer on TechCrunch:
The author does makes compelling arguments for why these people are needed… they know the PR “secrets”.
However, being a skeptical person, I still had my doubts. Like I said above, if they were so important, why have I not already sought one out?
After more reading, my doubts were bolstered by this response from Loic le Meur (serial entrepreneur and founder of Seesmic, which is located right below us)
I absolutely love this rebuttal and his response really strikes a chord. Basically, a good product and strong community is greater than anything a PR firm could do. Loic, I couldn’t agree more and I am going to adopt your belief as one of my own tenants as well. This argument (at least in my mind) has come to rest.
Ok - what I’m talking about is not goofing off on the white boards. Whether you do that or not is definitely not my business.
But I will tell you that if you’ve ever had problems cleaning white boards. Like, say, when your dry erase markings don’t come off…you should try some Goof Off.
The stuff seems harmless except for the fact that you can probably get high off from it (has this industrial smell to it). The smell goes away after a while, though.
We’ve been having trouble cleaning our white boards for a while. Water doesn’t really work, neither has board cleaners. So Linus tried Goof Off.
Boy - you can practically use our boards as mirrors now. Spanking clean!
As a bonus for you reading this, here’s a couple of pics of Linus wiping the boards down. The girls in the office came over to check our our boards - though I couldn’t figure out if they were actually checking out the boards or Linus’ ass. You be the judge.
Last night I went to Cobb’s Comedy Club in San Francisco’s North Beach to see my favorite comedian Russell Peters perform. This was my first time at Cobb’s, it was a lot bigger than I imagined. Since I got there late, I had to settle for a seat at a table way in the back.
Russell Peters did not disappoint. I was also surprised that it was all new material, all of it stuff I haven’t seen or heard before. The man is a comic genius. Most of his material consists of ethnic jokes, and he makes fun of everyone. Chinese, Indian, Jews, Latinos, and Blacks: no one is safe, not even white people. But he did say some stuff that also made me pause and think. One such example is when he said, “I’ve always told people that I’m Indian. It’s really easy to define ourselves ethnically, but no one knows what they are culturely… I look Indian, but I never realized how not Indian I am until I went to India.” For the most part however, I was ROTFLMAO.
The audience was mostly Indian and Asians with a smattering of other ethnic groups thrown in. I found it really funny because we really responded well to the self deprecating ethnic jokes. There were two warm up acts for Russell Peters and it was a study in contrast. The first, a Filipino guy was hilarious and set the atmospheres. But the second, a white guy, told mostly really hardcore sexual jokes. That totally didn’t hook with the crowd. Most people were like “huh?” which was funnier than the jokes. I felt sorry for the guy.
But… then Russell Peters set everything right. He’s still here for the rest of the weekend. So if you’re lucky, you can still scalp some tickets (they’re officially sold out). In case you don’t, here’s a sample of his old material:
If you’ve been to San Francisco, you’d know that we have a great many awesome restaurants. Well if you know that, then it must not be a surprise to you that there are great brunch spots. I live on the border of Russian HIll and the Marina District - there’s quite a few places near my house.
Rex Cafe - with awesome ‘chicken and waffles’ combinations, The Crepe House on Polk and Washington, and of course Polker’s Gourmet burgers.
But - we dared to try something outside of our common neighborhoods this weekend: brunch at The Top of the Mark. Mark Hopkins is a hotel in SF, it’s situated nicely on top of a hill (I think it’s Russian Hill). Website - normally we’d go there at nights to enjoy a couple of drinks while surrounded by SF city views on the 19th floor.
Brunch was a totally different story. Waking up at about noon - the weather was so nice outside that we thought being high in the air would give an extraordinary view of the city. We were right.
The brunch is located at the top of the building, and I’ve never seen such a view in all of San Francisco - gorgeous bay views with sail boats roaming around as well as unobstructed views into Twin Peaks and Noe Valley.
The food? Well they had everything from Omletes to Prime Rib to Crab Claws (don’t know what they do with the rest of the crab). Our group was there for more than 2 hours - the unlimited amounts of champaign helped to get us to eat a lot more also. And we were deeply satisfied when all done - and we were barely able to walk.
This is actually the first time I’ve been to a buffet in the city - well worth every penny!
