Today is a struggle for all with a heart:

Today is a struggle, for all with a heart,

A simple desire, to become an essential part

Of something greater that we alone can create.

 

A simple man’s struggle, with corruptive forces in play,

Knowing little of failure, yet much knowledge of decay.

We have all been mixed and thrown,

Into some huge flask,

Where we all wear, both a costume and a mask,

We are gifted with seeds, yet no sense of when and where they should be sown.

We endlessly seek something, creating a field of unrealized dreams.

Sensing somehow our elaborate cover has been blown,

While our souls greatest longings, are torn apart at the seams.

 

Mixed and intertwined amongst the common fruit of the earth,

The ones with greater visions of world without lament,

Watch their dreams grow old and begin to ferment.

Is this the true grand plan engineered by our Maker?

A world that is controlled and manipulated by the greatest faker.

Perhaps I should simply don the hat of a baker,

and knead and toss dough in the air for a profit,

Or become an architect focusing on the design of the soffit.

 

Little effort is ever wasted or lost

For even the penniless dreamer in the end,

gets buried at no cost.

 

It’s never a simple thing to attempt to change the world for the better.

When the rains pour down from heaven, our souls do not become wetter.

The unsung heroes of this world, in the winter of it’s decline

With their patient and loving weaving of a colorful and warm sweater.

 

A child en-clothed within the strands of wool entwined by the loving hands of it’s mother,

Rarely thinks to question or wonder,

At the meaning of the exceedingly dark or coarse fibers,

For these deeper meanings are unknown to many,

Are deliberately encrypted in nearly incomprehensible verses,

Of ancient texts which require,

Translation and and explanation by wise and expert transcribers.

 

The poets gaze turns back upon the world,

While the quill is dropped and in frustation the bottle of ink is hurled.

 

Today is a struggle, for all with a heart,

A simple desire, to become an essential part,

Of something simple yet strong,

yet supple and yielding,

when serenaded by song,

Which emanates such a powerful chord.

The howling wind, it’s unique and beautiful song

is made by the trees, as they react to these forces unseen.

 

Todays Clouds bring both good and bad news, yet they all have silver linings. It’s our job to find them. Stephen C. Sanders, a picture to match the them of my poem, Today is a struggle for those with a heart.

 

The music like poetry these trees and wind produce like candy for our ears,

Reminds us of simpler times, when we turned to our parents to comfort our irrational fears.

They did not seek to stop the simple and honest flow of our tears.

They only sought to soothe and comfort us, during those younger, more innocent and un-jaded years.

 

Yes the world is changing, for better or worse, the enlightened ones can hear it in the wind.

It’s believed we cannot tame such essential forces of the earth.

Which erode our very bodies, with have become filled with much sadness and mirth.

 

Yet visionaries who not long ago like us, slowly traversed upon the slopes of our great maintains.

Found and invented a simple way to beat the wind,

to force it to act under their direction.

And gave us the airplane to more efficiently connect time and space.

 

The answers for all the secret desires which our souls endlessly seek to fulfill, are there,

When we drive our tap into these unseen and unknown forces,

We must be ready to enjoy

the outpouring of knowledge’s glorious fountains.

 

Stephen C. Sanders–

A poem out of place- Today is a struggle for all with a heart (the hour is later than you think)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Source of definition above and attribution below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis

The technique is credited toAlbert Humphrey, who led a convention at the Stanford Research Institute (now SRI International) in the 1960s and 1970s using data from Fortune 500companies.

That being said I would like to address the matter from a more universal point of view. I suppose it’s all good and well if you exist in some very collegiate setting, wearing a tweed jacket, with leather patches on the elbows, perhaps a pocket protector thrown in, or if not perhaps fine wisps of smoke rising from a freshly stoked pipe.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that this methodology, along with a universally acknowledged valuable tool, the business plan, is a bad thing. In fact, I believe it’s a good thing.

Courtesy of: Absolute Placement Today.

 The image on the left is of a SWOT analysis conceptual map. Perhaps when you attended high school, one of your teachers at one time has taught you the value of a concept map, perhaps as a pre-writing tool.

I suppose you may have already guessed, if you have read more than one of my posts, here or elsewhere, that I am not likely to use such techniques in my writing. However to delve deeper into this topic is clearly out of the scope of the immediate task at hand.

Image above was found by using a google search for images: SWOT Analysis

http://www.absoluteplacementtoday.com/2012/11/05/seo-swot-analysis-for-your-business/

You can learn more about this tool, which from my perspective, knowing what I already know, may have some value, by going to the link provided above.

Now that I have devoted so much space, to an business which at least theoretically, be in competition perhaps at some time in the near future for you web-advertising  or web-development expenditures, I need to get a little more from this what amount to perhaps a small advertorial by displaying some of their actual content:

Threats

Threats may be things that can prove to be harmful to the success of the website:

• Competitor or directory ranking for your brand Name
• Competitor improves SEO
• Competitors with stronger domain
• Competitor dominating SERPs

Ah, problem solved, to be continued:

Stephen S. Sanders

Authors Note: This particular post is a bit of a departure in its style from previous posts, primarily in it’s primarily autobiographical description of some of my early experiences in website production using Web 1.0 technology, going back to 2001.

As I wrote these words, something from relative recent memory came to mind.It was a single term which I had clearly associated with an actual website that somehow had lead me to the article. 

The term was SWOT analysis, and will likely be topic of a different post, unless of course I end finding someway to integrate these two topics, which because they were connected (at least in my mind) I have a strong feeling that I will get to it.

A special mention to Jimmy Went who was the person I first learned of the concept of a  SWOT analysis, even though the blog; linked below may not go into specific details about it. Perhaps he might respond and consider doing our first ever guest blog on this website. I will ask him, and see if there is some interest.

http://jimmywendt.wordpress.com/2011/02/26/cheap-custom-web-design-david-vs-goliath-affordable-web-design-tips/

Always the most obvious thing in identifying needs, is to look at money. There is no doubt that money is something which we all need, one should not overlook, the results one is trying to accomplish with money. In other words the statement need to be added to the needs in a clear way. For example. one could state that their web-based business model requires and dedicated server, and a specified sum of money for software, or software development or customization.

The article has taken a shift in its focus, so elaborating on the needs based model to determine the true financial resources required for a given web-based startup will be reintroduced and taken up in a later article, or perhaps even a guest post.

At one point in my diverse work history, I asked the employer who I was interviewing me for a job, what was needed to be good in his business. The fellow’s name was Morty Leventhal, and the company was Sylite, a computer which sold lighting fixtures, to local 3 electrical distributors. He told me something interesting which is a meta description in itself, point which I am trying to elucidate. 

Morty told me that the important skill was the ability to retain things. 

Now this conversation goes back to when my daughter was under three years old, and she is now fifteen years old, however I remember the conversation vividly even with his gestures as he sat in his chair and briefly looked upward while he gathered his thoughts to  explain what he meant by his intriguing statement.

Now as is turned out what followed was perhaps no where near as intriguing as the first comment, mainly because a lot of the work to be done involved knowing the prices, and specifications (even down to the model number) of various type of lighting fixtures, however it was the direct answer, along the way of how he viewed his abilities that I wanted to point out relevant to this post.

Now when I had decided what the topic of this particular post was going to be about, the primary thought had been about identifying one’s needs. I also realized that strengths and weakness came to mind. My belief is that people who have strong writing abilities tend to do a great deal of thinking, even putting various phrases, thoughts and sentences together in their mind, before they even actually sit down to write. I hear so many stories about how people sit there staring at blank pieces of paper thinking about what they are going to write.

I believe that people will often spend a great deal of effort in focusing on the obstacles, especially when it come to start up ventures. The most likely reason for this is the is a very common, very prevalent belief that it is nearly impossible to develop a startup business that will thrive. One possible explanation for this is that just about anyone that a given person is likely to encounter is going to be yet another naysayer, telling you, how difficult it is to accomplish even a small well thought out enterprise.

Building A Web Based Venture Using Basic Tools: was the idea I had when I undertook the building of this “Tinker Toy-Alphabet Block” Web graphic.

I have used the image above quite a bit in my little niche in cyberspace. One time I did make the mistake of asking someone what they thought of the picture and their response was:

” Tinker Toys?”

It began to occur that the distance between the web-based ventures that I have spent a great deal of time on, and the mind set of the people that I would ideally like to bring on– board was quite vast.

So the thing I needed to do was to create some vehicle where I could bring together like minded individuals which is one of my goals, that I have actively been working with some level of success. One of these goals was to become part of the solution, rather than adding my name to an extraordinarily large  group of disenfranchised individuals who have effectively given up on the dream of developing their own web-based business.

Identify your strengths:

One of my strengths is writing. I enjoy writing and one of my earliest websites was called:

http://TheWritersCafe.org

However, this particular website (due to an area which could only be included under weaknesses no longer exists in all of it’s form glory. So while you might find a “website” at the link, it is not now what it once had been. Which is not to say that I do not have plans for the website (or all the files in the way of posts, pictures, links, and advertisements) because i most certainly do. However the site itself is due for a major overhaul relating to it’s domain name, and theoretical value.

Suffice it to say, for the moment, that I had learned the hard way, that the best thing one could do, from a monetary point of view, is to choose to develop the right type of website, utilizing strengths of the underlying domain which the website is to be built upon.

The first website I ever built was made using technology which I have heard to being referred to as Web 1.0

It utilized Angel Fire templates, and free webspace provided by some sort of partnership between Tripod and Lycos. Interestingly enough I found a post exactly 14 hours old that discusses how Google had to pay Lycos a sum of $30 million in patent infringement lawsuit.

The article explains:

Vringo claimed Google’s Adsense program, which is also used as the advertising platform for third-party companies and AOL Search Marketplace, infringed the patents.

 

Google was told to pay $15.8 million, AOL $7.94 million, and IAC Search & Media Inc. $6.65 million, Vringo said in a statement. Target Corp. was told to pay $98,833 and Gannett Co. $4,322. The companies all use Google’s program to display ads based on search results.

 

Published: November 12, 2012 3:00 a.m.

Google loses patent ruling

Must pay for use of technique to link ads, searches

http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20121112/BIZ07/311129944/1031/biz

Susan Decker | Bloomberg News

The website I was going to share the link with below (before the above newsflash interruption) was produced on the tiripod/lycos interface using well under the allotted 25 megabytes of space right before the world changing events that occurred on Sept 11, 2001. The cost to produce the website which was coded in html in notepad and uploaded to the web using CuteFTP including the cost of the software was exactly $0.00.

http://tiger_bythe_toe.tripod.com

The website consisted primarily of my review of free play of a performance of The Seagull, by Anton Checkhov with Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline et al.

My little claim to fame was that if you place the words: Chekhov Meryl Streep The Seagull in a Google search, my website would be on one of the top pages in results. Then one day the website disappeared entirely. I was extremely upset to say the least. After several emails back and forth to Tripod (or Lycos) the website url was reactivated along with their apologies, for having lost the files. Luckily I had backup copies of all the pages and files on my computer so I was able to resurrect the website.   

Today, there are tools perhaps at least a thousand more times powerful, such as WordPress, Drupal (which is much harder to use than WordPress) that are also available for free. 

A final story about how I got started with buying domains, and perhaps another link or two, and then back to my other strengths, photography, and advertising sales. 

I was doing a bit of bragging about how my Tiger_bythe_toe.tripod website place very high in the Google search engine, and someone literally tapped me and later ended up asking me to help him launch his first publication; TheWritersCafe.

I accepted the position and other than my helping him  with the advertising sales, my primary contribution was my insistance on his producing a limited number of mock editions or prototypes of his magazine.

One day we had been discussing a website version of the magazine and he then informed me that he had tried to get the domain, but it was taken. Then one day when I was doing some web surfing I came across this interesting web post about blogging on the fly, using blogger or what is now call blogspot this blogger explained how it worked and said you really get the best results using your own domain, which you could use to point to your blog, and there was a link to a domain selling website. So I did a quick search and found that the domain; TheWritersCafe.org was available. So I bought it. 

 Always lead with your strengths, because to get anything at all accomplished, you need to believe that you can get it done.

A few words about weaknesses. We all have them and to deny them, does not truly help one work through them.

By working through our own personal weaknesses, even though for valid reasons we should and indeed are naturally extremely hesitant to share them, we can begin to understand who we truly are, and why we may have been gifted with these weaknesses from The Creator, along with our strengths. Our weaknesses in some ironic twist of nature, might be a factor in what gives us the greatest push to interact meaningfully with others.

Some trees outside my window in Windham, NY. Photo by Stephen C. Sanders.

Creative use of color both in backgrounds, web graphics and text, is beginning to become something I am more effectively exploring in my personal website creations. The web-based business which I have been working on are also consuming a significant amount of my time. Perhaps the simple analogy of how trees which have inherent weaknesses are useful to get an idea of how we can gain a stronghold in the particular niche we would like to occupy. Some trees (which we could compare to the well funded ventures) succeed by growing tall and straight and more quickly than all the others. Their advantage is that they can get the first rays of the sun, and not have to stand in the shadows of others.

   However those of us who are more earthbound, and simply do not have the same resources readily available from the outset also are able to thrive and survive. Even when considers even the two different types of trees in the picture, we immediately notice that some remain green all year round (the evergreens) while others lose their leaves (deciduous), and have a cycle uniquely their own.

People, like trees have different cycles that are uniquely their own. Some are young, some small, some are damaged by the natural forces of the weather. Some are fast growing while others grow more slowly. These things are all uniquely specific based on both their genetic heritage, along with the conditions present in their surroundings.

However unlike the trees we are able to change our surroundings. Whatever tendencies, are disadvantages we face we are able to overcome them with a strong enough desire. As for the fruits that we are may produce; web-based ventures for example, we can interact with others across the globe to find the resources, be they financial or technical to aid us in our goals.

The darkest moment that we who have invested something be it time, or money, or both, in our ventures, is when we first put our seed-idea, in the ground, and hope that with some attention, effort and care, The rewards for our efforts become apparent when the first glimmer of green emerges from the beneath the ground.

Listen and learn from others, until you develop enough skills to learn from you own mistakes. 904 words includes images and web graphics. (original draft published well before 4:05am in attempt to save a specific “graphic with transparent text” effect.- Subsequent completed draft; November 7, 2012 4:05am EST.-By: Stephen C. Sanders

Everyone is free to develop their own ideas and plans, however you should understand that experience is the most expensive form of learning.

The truth is that there are all sorts of resources, right here on the world-wide-web, this website is just one small example of such a resource. If I had a magic wand and could turn back time, I probably would have done well to take a job doing web-site development, effectively allowing some company or department to pay for my learning. 

Yet real life does not always allow for such things, so here is what I would like to tell my readers. This particular website may well be extremely popular with folks who want to promote their own website. The best way to promote a website is to provide high quality content, that is regularly updated and by continuously adding new content.

There are 1000’s of tools at your disposal. It’s fun to build websites, yet keeping them going, and growing requires work.

This particular website is an excellent example of how experience has made me a better website developer. Some of my earlier websites are currently down for no truly particularly good reason. This website is thriving (based on my currently slowly yet steadily increasing Alexa ratings) because I have hit upon a fairly good premise. My start-ups may indeed be floundering because my early entusiasm only got me so far. I realize that I have a very strong need to involve others in what I am currently striving to achieve.

Utilize your greatest strengths when ever possible. For example some of my earliest was and always has been photography. The thing I truly love doing is simply catching what I see, in images. Having such abilities and interests is huge advantage. Early on even with the latest computer, and fairly powerful software, I did not know how to get words overlaid on a photograph. Now as you can see, using a photograph as a backdrop to my words has definite value. The photograph behind these words is one that I had used on many occasions. Now that I see there might be a problem with the  color of this text, now that I have run into the earth tones of this photograph, I am going to need to s stretch my understanding of the tool which I am using to produce this, However experience has shown me, that if I am not careful, and attempt to save what I have already produced, then all the results of this current attempt will be lost forever.

Learning the tools and exploring their limitations. The photograph above along with the light yellow text was a hands on exercise in frustration. I wanted to use most if not all of the “un-manipulated” photo above. Yet the idea of using the same color throughout was a challenge! Originally the text I typed over the photo was a color similar to the current one, which worked perfectly for the top part (the sky portion) of the photo.

I had incorrectly believed that when I got to the earth tones, that I could selectively “switch” to a color similar to the one I am using now. As someone with a fairly solid understanding of the warm earth tones versus the cool sky tones, I was aware of the challenges I faced.

What I did not know was the limitations of the tool that I was using to produce this effect. It seems that the tool would not allow me, to switch the text color, somewhere in the middle of my paragraph. Therefore, I thought, okay, let me save my work as a draft, and then, give  the mid-paragraph text color switch with the same background a shot. Well it did not work. Also the old settings were not saved along with the draft.

Conclusion:

One needs to learn and thoroughly understand when they have reached their personal limits. When this occurs, there are several strategies one could employ. One could simply give up, or one could somehow push past their own limits, and learn from their experience.

Tomorrow’s Challenge:

Just as I at times have gotten caught up in “color and design” there are many other trappings that can and will distract a beginning web designer or developer from making the best and most effective use of their resources. These resources include time, and money. Both of these resources once expended, become difficult to recoup. Perhaps there is no substitute for experience, however one need not master every single element of the field to produce quality results.

Stephen C. Sanders

Someone told me today that making a good website is difficult-this person has never even attempted to create a website! My response was that it’s no really difficult, rather it’s tedious.

When one has a website that they are interested in obtaining traffic and a significant presence on the world wide web, its useful to check your google results every now and then.

For example you might learn while you look into who else has similar ideas to your own, that there are some major players in the field who are doing things amazingly similar to what you have began working on. One of the major differences  which you might also learn is that their name and products are well established, while yours in fact are new to the marketplace. In such cases there is no need to be disillusioned in fact it should server to bolster your own belief in what you are actually attempting to accomplish. One thing you should come to believe is that the greatest or most important things that are developed either  today or in the past, are rarely just some lucky insight which happens randomly without the expenditure of significant effort. 

The excerpts below are from the website: http://www.weather.com/news/weather-hurricanes/sandy-top-five-20121028

Hurricane Sandy picked up strength and speed this morning and is now nearing landfall. Landfall should occur near extreme southern New Jersey or central Delaware by late afternoon or early evening.

Ironically, the power went as I was working on this post. So without further ado, lets have a go at this. In my web-surfing I had found a post which I had planned on linking to which shared some of the top principles from the movie (and book) The Secret.

The principle I would like to share is this, the universe loves speed.

The important thing to do with regards to a Hurricane, is to predict, where they are going. 

The essential thing regarding a website is to have some definite direction. With so many websites that already exist, along with new ones being created all the time, it’s important to have an idea of where you are trying to go with any given website.

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1543561897001?bckey=AQ~~,AAAAAAQxtuk~,N9g8AOtC12eobrWkZvrqKiXxOtGg-8h1&bctid=1282358292001

Destructive Winds:

Normally such ethereal things as the wind, is rather difficult to visualize, quantify, and measure. When it comes to hurricanes special equipment is needed to determine both how fast the hurricane is traveling as well.

 When it comes to websites, one can also.….….….….imagine that it might be difficult to visualize the progress.                          There might in fact be so many things going on behid the .….….….….….….….….….….the scenes. In the case of this website, LeanStartupGuide.com I spent a fair amount of time developing the design, Additionally, I learned how to use some fairly advanced plugins. There are some very simple tools available that allow a .….….….….webmaster to evaluate how “available” a given website is.     One the tools I use all the time is the Alexa rating.The Alexa rating compares a.….….…… given  websites ratings, as compared to other websites: 

Statistics Summary for leanstartupguide.com

There are 1,370,877 sites with a better three-month global Alexa traffic rank than Leanstartupguide.com. Approximately 55% of visits to this site consist of only one pageview (i.e., are bounces). Visitors to it view 2.5 unique pages each day on average. Leanstartupguide.com is relatively popular among users in the city of Albany-Schenectady-Troy (where it is ranked #4,214). The site has attained a traffic rank of 395,368 among users in the US, where we estimate that 55% of its audience is located.

Source of the Above Alexa as of October, 29, 2012.

This particular website, like dozens of my other websites, has been languishing for some time.

When it comes to hurricanes, one rarely hears that a hurricane is languishing. One might hear that a hurricane has stalled. Often the hurricane might unexpectedly change direction in such a case. The other thing one might consider, is that a hurricane quite unexpectedly develops at some location that is conducive for such anomalies. However we do not actually beginn to take interest until the hurricane comes our way. 

Id like to cleanup a few unfinished thoughts that are more specific to what I am specifically interested in accomplishing with this website. I developed a bit of a new strategy which is based on information sharing. 

Get you Alexa tool bar here.

Above I have already shared the current Alexa ratings for this website, which really are pretty good relative to the amount of effort that has been put into this website. There are things that are not always so readily apparent to me, for example, I even right now wondering; why this website is so popular in: “Albany-Schenectady-Troy (where it is ranked #4,214) ?

The other thing which I could not hope to even conclude this post without at least mentioning is a topic which is very important to us all, money.

People will bring up the very important money topic for quite a good number of very valid reasons. Unless you are developing a website, just because you need a creative outlet for your talents, genrally people hope and expect that their website can be a source of income.

This logo is meant to convey the essence of this site. A startup is like a newly hatched chick, it will take some time and money to grow it something valuable.

It might be difficult to see,  however the background for the word “Guide” in the logo image above has coins as the background and not hundreds of dollars as shown by the word lean. I have some advice for someone who wants to begin to develop websites or other web-based ventures. When you are spending only your own money, because you have not yet been able to attract any investor interest, you need to be very careful with your expenses. 

When you consider the initial cost of the domain, along with the cost of web hosting for one year, it easy very easy to spend $100 or more. If you go ahead and try to locate a graphic artist to create a custom logo for you, you might end up spending even another $150-$300. 

Whatever you can actually learn how to do, and subsequently end up being able to do yourself can easily save you as much a several hundred dollars. If you only have limited financial resources, yet have an abundance of time you may do well to take the time to learn the tools of the trade.

Well, I would to keep this going and say so much more, yet the place that I am writing this from, has just informed that they are closing up. Stay dry!

The hurricane has arrived.

The hurricane is here!

Stephen C. Sanders

October 29, 2012, 7:32pm

The essential enigma is that despite all the things you may hear as you sincerely set out to launch your very own venture, is that there is a very strong force which can best be described as, a force designed to assure you will fail.

 A more common and descriptive term for this force can also be used, its expenses. 

It is helpful to look at the world as several different forces. One of these forces wants you to believe you can and will succeed in your venture. The reason for this position is that this force or group wants to sell you the products that will help you to succeed.

An entirely different force also exists and it is entirely far too common to ignore. This force or group can be collectively referred to as the naysayers. Now its really hard to understand where all the wisdom that the naysayers seem to possess comes from. A very common form of this is the person who tried to launch their own venture and failed. Therefore they want to tell you, how difficult it is to succeed (and of course they are right) the real question you need to ask yourself is why are they telling you, that your venture will fail? Put very simply the odds are with them and against you. Therefore it is very easy for them to predict your failure with relative accuracy.

The naysayers have nothing to lose by telling you that your venture will fail. If you accept their advice and give up before you try then you will not have to taste the disappointment of trying and failing. If you forge ahead anyway and succeed then they will be happy to congratulate you, and admit that in your case they were wrong. If you do try, and fail, then they will be on hand to say, “I told you so”. 

  It often will appear as if the very fabric of society is pitted against you. if you persist in swimming in the wrong direction against the current, you may become a strong adherent to various types of conspiracy theory. You will find all sorts of people who want you to explain your venture in detail. The reason you keep believing that these people want to take your idea and leave you out of the picture is because that is very possible and even probable outcome.

 When you finally decide the only way to progress is to do it on your own, relying primarily on your own ability, then you become part of a very hard working crowd which could be correctly called, the boot-strappers. 

Some how without the proper funding and expertise you have to get your venture far enough along that you can actually show it to someone, and then take it to the next level.

Stephen C. Sanders

August, 14, 2012 1:27am

 PS: Obstacles are by nature difficult to overcome, yet if and when either you or I are by some miracle able to overcome these built-in obstacles, we will become much wiser and able to accomplish great things, that most people only dream of.

Being that I have to be somewhere this morning anyway, I will see if any of my readers might be able to say why with a comment.

This was a graphic designed by my daughter which I love to use when anything that is a sphere is needed.

Naturally there is another image that I am sure you have already guessed I will be using. The question is how to get the colors in the image on the left to become “semi-transparent”. Being that this is a “Lean Start Up Guide” if anyone wants to write a guest post, I request that they explain how to do this using gimp.

Send Submissions To: admin@LeanStartUpGuide.com with “Baseball/Earth Transparency Project” in subject.

Feel Free to use the earth above, or any other, baseball available at:

http://www.gif-favicon.com/sports/baseball-sports-transparent-background-10079.php

Now I can imagine a few different possible thoughts flying through the head of my reader. One of them being, well why not just over budget and then if there is money left over, what’s the big deal? Well, it kind of is big deal if you think about. Lets say for example that somehow you figure that for the things you will need for your first one to two years of operation, you really need say $25,000. Your calculation is roughly broken down into figures that seem reasonable.

For example lets say that you feel you should be able to build your website for around $3000. The number sounds about right, because you have heard plenty of people say that a professionally designed and developed website costs about that much. Of course you know that there is some sort of expense involved in web hosting, and that you also have to buy a domain. All this time since its the website you are believing is going to be the heart of your business you try to get a realistic estimate on it’s cost.

 

Now you realize that there are going to be other expenses as well such as advertising and if your buying and selling a product on your website you know that there will be some expenses involved in that as well. You figure by the time you are ready to seriously obtain the financing you will need you will be able to come up with all sorts of facts and figures to justify what you felt was a pretty solid number.

Yet there is something you just were not ready for. The people or places that you thought might want to lend you money along these lines, it turns out are not even interested in lending you that kind of money.

Now here is the part that you most like were not expecting to hear:

• The reason that they do not want to lend you “that kind of money” is not because you are asking for too much money. You are actually asking for too little money, and these venture capital firms are not set up to do business with these kinds of numbers. 
• So naturally you figure, oh okay, I can take on an employee, maybe rent an office, etc. In other words now you are trying to figure out how to grow the expense for your “Lean Start Up” before you even get started, because the one lender you approached told you, his investors invest a minimum of $250,000.00
• The reason for these kind of figures are deceptively simple. The package that has to get put together to obtain venture capital funding, is quite complex. Also there is an expectation of high returns on investment (ROI). For decades banks have depended on readily available sources of low risk investment with a relatively nice return of 10% interest. [ More on this in some other forum ] So now when the venture capitalist is going to take “actual risk” he wants a significantly higher rate of return. 

• 
  

   THE FIGURES I AM ABOUT TO SHARE WITH YOU ARE FROM 

  INSIDE SOURCES- SOMEONE ACTUALLY 

  IN THE VENTURE CAPITAL BUSINESS!

  WHEN A VENTURE CAPITAL FIRM LENDS OUT THE KIND OF MONEY I MENTIONED ABOVE, THEY WANT 30% INTEREST FOR THE TERM OF THEIR LOAN. ADDITIONALLY THEY ARE EXPECTING TO GET PAID BACK THEIR ENTIRE INVESTMENT IN AROUND THREE TO FIVE YEARS. 
  

  
  
  No one I know (including myself)  is actually seeking out this sort of investment. When I consider even the strongest of my ventures I simply cannot imagine wanting to get into such a seemingly raw deal as the one described above, Yet somehow in the end when the thing goes into a an initial public offering (IPO) then somehow everyone is happy and all the people involved make many millions of dollars.
  
  
  [ To be continued ]
  Stephen C. Sanders
  Ip-Ipo.com
  When a project goes from an internet based venture to an initial public offering there are all sorts of large amounts of money involved. Therefore the largest companies often have an method of ownership where a significant portion of the companies assest are held by those who buy stock in the company.
  

  When I was looking for the “Money” image I guess my daughter’s iphone automatically saves the image as photo.jpg, so I never even knew I had this one.

When a website developer learns new coding methods, or simply expands his abilities, it is absolutely essential to put the new modalities to use, even if he has not mastered the particular element.

The reason is that initially the evolving developer will not have mastered the new methods. In order to fully comprehend their value he needs to put his press his newly acquired abilities into immediate use. In truth this was a significant reason behind developing this particular website at this juncture in my current level of sophistication in developing websites. For example, I am right now using a rather sophisticated tool, that until I developed this website absolutely no knowledge or understanding of. I wanted to change the color of the preceding line using this tool, yet when I “updated” the change, it simply changed the color of all the previous text to the new value.

A Low Resolution Image That Has Been Scaled With Gimp. Sure there are interfaces much easier to use than Gimp for simple cropping and scaling. Keep reading.

When you start applying your newly acquired web development techniques, you will begin to understand their limitations and features. Initially this may slow down your productivity, how ever what you end up producing will most likely be of higher quality.

Transitional sentence.

I have several examples that are part of this very post, to demonstrate my point. I like to think of such commentary as meta-commentary and is the kind of things I like to demonstrate:

Now, for the style I am using a mixture of the old technology, the standard WYSIWYG editor that comes with WordPress. However before I was trying to use a custom feature. The style for this is the button that look like the quotation marks, and the color choice is from the standard WordPress text editor as well.

 

However; when I wanted to introduce a new style above;

#483D8B,

 The reason is that initially the evolving developer will not have mastered the new methods. In order to fully comprehend their value he needs to put his press his newly acquired abilities into immediate use.

Two functions I was trying failed to work in the manner that I had hoped.

Executive Summary:

Growth of necessity is a painful process, in order to master any technique, one needs to put it to use. The most universal aspect of this  concept as applied to web development is utilizing a new modality will result in errors. The errors however can be repaired. There are a few errors even in this explanation. There are things I did, because I did not want my “changed style” that I wanted to use for my “new block of text” to effectively eradicate, and revert the previously coded block of text.  

A resourceful individual will find work-arounds when the new modulaties fail to preform as expected. Yet if one does not put the newly acquired tools to use, one will simply not master the newly acquired methods.

The use of examples from this article may have focused on one specific tool, which I am thrilled to be able use, The Tiny MCE Ultimate Plug-in for WordPress, however the reader should understand I am merely using this one small specific example to convincingly prove a larger more comprehensive concept.

One needs to begin to use the his newly acquired skills immediately because it will make him a better website developer.

 

The ramp up time required to master the newly acquired skill, will only be extended by waiting. One does not really master a newly acquired technique simply by endlessly learning or reading about the topic. 

 

Next Topic Requires Active Participation:

I have included a low resolution pic of the famous “Freedom Tower” at stage of its construction photographed last year. At the time of this post I am going to research some web hosting providers, or perhaps use one of my existing ones and allow this image to be downloaded (possibly as anonymous FTP) Annoying thing just happened when I sued the spell checker (the usual one from an “underlined word” the WordPress derived style and font color reverted to some sort of default.

 The easiest way for me to get the picture to those who want to develop their creative image manipulation techniques, is to simple send me an e-mail with the phrase, “Freedom Tower Pic”. I have already spent several hours manipulating this image to be used as and “Edge or Background Element” in a Premium WordPress template.

Here is assignment (or contest) number one:

Use either your own or my image provided of the Freedom Tower, and develop something which you feel would be an excellent border element.

Example: http://BuildASite.US

I used different photograph of the freedom tower, from one of my other website which uses very simple open source software for website building:

http://www.mydomainresearch.com/bp_content/DSCN0400.JPG

What we are seeking is a step to step explanation of the various “image manipulation” techniques yo utilized, please save every single step. We will happily publish up to three finalist and will use the best submission with proper attribution and links to the submitters website or profile.

Okay so here is what we are looking for. The idea is that the Freedom Tower is probably the most photographed building ever. I find it hard to imaging that anyone would actually seek to copyright their image. Hoever as a publisher I do need to state that since it is my intention to utilize the images for border effects for one of my newly planned websites,

http://www.big3news.net/2011/09/10/remembering-911-as-i-watched-that-tower-fall-i-fell-down-with-it/

The source of the image used above is linked above, it is also accompanied by an article attributed below:

Remembering 9/11: “As I watched that tower fall, I fell down with it”

A word about use of images or other people’s content. The image above was found using a google image search. It is not my image yet somewhere I do need to state that this is the case, Additionally I try to reward the website that posted the image with a link to it’s website. Finally an attribution is also something which takes a little time yet is a good thing to do.