More Tim Ferriss-isms

Tim Ferriss - of Four Hour Work Week fame- has a new TV Show out titled "the Tim Ferriss experiment". To promote the show, Tim appeared on two recent podcasts - Mixergy and Product Hunt - Maker Stories - both of which are well worth a listen.
 

How to start an E-Commerce company and get acquired by Amazon.com for half-a-billion-dollars

Unfortunately, in this fun From Scratch interview, Vinnie Bharara and Marc Lore, Co-Founders of Diapers.com refuse to reveal exactly how the deal with Amazon - which acquired Diapers.com's parent company, Quidsi, for $540 Million in 2010 - came about. But they still share in detail how they went about thinking through and building out the business - something that Indian E-Commerce entrepreneurs, who are treading down the "build scale, the profits will follow" path, will appreciate.

The funny parts include Vinnie's imitation of his dad's reaction - when he saw the $80,000 charge for bulk purchase of diapers from a wholesaler - in his (Dad's) Indian accent; Diapers.com's tagline "We deliver everything but the baby" & a T-Shirt they made with "We're both No. 1 and No. 2" (Don't Ask).

Quick Links: How SolarCity is delivering cheaper power (than grid power) to consumers

Engaging "From Scratch" interview with Lyndon Rive, CEO of US-based, publicly listed SolarCity, in which he comes across as as a very passionate advocate of solar energy. (The positive way in which he's handled his Dyslexia is inspiring.) His claim that SolarCity is already delivering power to consumers at rates cheaper than that from grid is validated in this NPR Planet Money episode titled "How Solar Got Cheaper".

For a long time, solar power has seemed like a thing of the future. A few environmentalists with a lot of money could afford it, but it wasn't really available for everyone.

That's changed. Suddenly, solar power isn't this weird fringe technology anymore. People get it not to save the planet, but because it's a good deal.

The Vital Importance of Playing!

NPR has aggregated some great TED Talks on the Importance of Playing!

Does something serious happen when we play? In this episode, TED speakers describe how all forms of amusement — from tossing a ball to video games — can make us smarter, saner and more collaborative.

Seth Godin's Startup School Series

This Series (a recoridng of a talk by Seth to a group of entrepreneurs about to embark on their startup journeys)  is a great listen with a lot of takeaways for both newbie and established entrepreneurs.

How Freshdesk's is Aceing PR, Funding, HR

Chennai, India-based SaaS CRM firm Freshdesk's Founder & CEO Girish Mathrubootham has an engaging interview on Mixergy.

I especially liked the aspects relating to how the company leveraged the HackerNews community to attract and get early customer traction; how it attracted the attention of its first VC investor, Accel Partners (Girish got Angellist founder Naval Ravikant's attention - by saying soemthing nice about him on a HackerNews article, which got them on to AngelList, where Accel noticed them and reached out) and how Freshdesk practices "strengths finder" principles to fit its employees to the right roles.

Making Babus Walk the Talk on Ease of Doing Business. Via Reality TV!

NPR's Planet Money has a great episode based on the findings of Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto whose work led to the World Bank's annual Ease of Doing Business Ranking  of countries.

Samples of de Soto's practical approach:

- he actually set up a company to find out how long it takes and costs to get various approvals; and

- he got the President of Peru to listen to complaints from business folk on live TV. Who (On Air!) issues diktats to the concerned departments to resolve the matter within a stipulated time. And, best of all, a reporter visits the department by deadline day to follow up - again, with camera in tow!

Quick Links: Matt Mullenweg (Founder of Word Press) with Tim Ferris

A 2-hour conversation that is so easy to consume!

I especially liked Matt's description of

1) How the process of learning music at a young age helped in his programming career that came much later.

He talks about how the person who is practicing new notes which sound awful to someone who might be listening casual  is pushing himself/herself more than someone who sings/plays what might sound good to them (and hence limit expanding their horizons)

2) Hiring based on actual assignments - rather than based on interviews. He in fact insists on text chatting with the interviewee - which is how most work related communications happen (at least in the tech world) -  so as to not let the person's in person / video interviewing "skills" do not prejudice him.

Related link: Matt's HBR article

Quick Link: Economists' Tips on Fund Raising for Non-Profits

Yet another awesome Freakonimics Radio episode:

In this podcast you’ll hear the economist John List give us the gospel of fundraising — what works, what doesn’t, and why. List and economist Uri Gneezy write about the science of charitable giving in their book The Why Axis: Hidden Motives and the Undiscovered Economics of Everyday Life.

List gives us a lot of ideas about how to successfully raise money — like using good old-fashioned guilt, for instance. Or that attaching a lottery or raffle to your fund-raising effort is a good idea. But our favorite way that List says you can raise more money: get an attractive person, preferably a woman, to do the asking for you.

Quick Link: Sharing Economy Startups versus Regulators

From Times of India article titled "New age taxis violate laws: Bangalore cabbies" dated Nov 12, 2014 titled:

The Bangalore Tourist Taxi Owners Association (BTTOA), Adarsh Autorickshaw Drivers' Union and Karnataka Maxi Cab Owners Association are meeting the city transport commissioner on Wednesday to discuss certain practices of the new operators which they allege go against the law.

"Some cab operators are using state and all-India permit vehicles to ply point-to-point taxis. That's against the Motor Vehicles Act 1988. Also, the Karnataka government has set a standard fare of Rs 19.50 per kilometre for radio taxis, but Ola, Uber and TaxiForSure are offering rock bottom fares, subsidizing customers with the tonnes of funding they have received," said L Radhakrishna Holla, general secretary of BTTOA that runs 45,000 cabs.  

But Raghunandhan G, co-founder of TaxiForSure, countered, saying Rs 19.50 per km was only a ceiling, and an all-India permit did not restrict point-to-point city services.

This Freakonomics Radio episode on the ongoing battle between the peer-to-peer marketplace enabling startups in the US - like Airbnb, Uber and Lyft - and the regulators provides some pointers as to how the issue might pan out here as well.