Another adventure begins. Goodbye Omaha.

My time in Omaha is coming to an end.  On Friday, February 3rd I’ll have relocated to San Francisco.

When looking back at the past three years it’s hard to decide what to put in this rather long retrospective post.  But I’ll use it as my last opportunity to highlight, clarify, give thanks, and try to explain why I’m taking on this new adventure.

I moved to Omaha thinking I’d have to dodge cows on the way to the office every day.  I thought I’d really dislike the city, but the job I moved here for would make it worth it.  Many of you know how quickly I discovered the opposite.  I fell in love with Omaha, its people and vowed to leave my job within a year.

Being around the Omaha community I learned, for the first time, about taking risks, trying something new, and that putting your all into something wasn’t just something for the “other guys”, it’s something everyone should do.  I knew quickly I needed something more than “a job”.  I also learned of the support system sometimes needed in order for you to take those risks.  Omaha provided that for me.

I attended the first Big Omaha and  left with an idea.  Something I wanted to build because I wanted to use it myself.  The idea of Hollrback was born.  With the help of my friend Kat I compiled a video to try and drum up some support for the project.  Before long project “Mysterious Dottie” was in full swing.

Through the experience of Hollrback, among many other things, I started to learn the city that I previously decided I’d be more than happy to live in for the rest of my life may not be for me after all, at least in the short term.  I started to feel like personally I was missing out on something.  Something I’ve been needing to learn, not even knowing what it is.

On top of that I’ve been slowly finding that my idea of the startup culture that I wanted to experience was something different than what was aimed for in the Prairie.  I wanted endless incubators, .com veterans, mentors and people willing to invest (not just financially, but that too) into the people here.  It made me realize instead of continuing my never-ending stream of regional constructive criticism, trying to turn it into what I want it to be, instead I should just go.

This isn’t easy, though.  I feel like I’m giving up on Omaha.  I care a lot about this place, the people.  I know many are probably thinking by this point “just go already and shut the hell up”, but I’ve always only wanted the best for everyone.  I wasn’t always happy with just warm fuzzies and people giving each other high fives and pats on the back.  To me it’s not about how many people can think nice things about other people.  To me it’s about execution.  I’ve failed with my first attempt at execution, but damnit I tried.  I’ve wanted Omaha to be full of people building awesome stuff to fulfill whatever vision they have.  But it’s a very service-oriented city.  Consulting firms, financial services, branding agencies, development houses.  I’m not interested in doing work for people.  I want to build stuff to put into real people’s hands.  The public.  Not ten people in an office somewhere to help them turn $1million into $2million.

But I never would have known this about myself if it weren’t for Omaha giving me the opportunity to learn it first hand.  Seeing the DownsDesigns, the What Cheers, the Princess Lasertrons, the Rahul Guptas, the Secret Penguins branch off from whatever they did before and start doing their own thing under their own rules.  Showing me that “having a job” is never the goal, and it’s about doing something awesome that you care about.

I wouldn’t be moving on if it weren’t for Silicon Prairie News highlighting others and giving me something to aspire to.  For highlighting little things I do, even when I tell them it’s dumb.  (The post they wrote about my Chrome Plugin was the 2nd most read story on SPN last year, after I told Danny it was stupid and a waste of his time.  He did it anyway.  I was wrong.)  For creating Big Omaha and letting that inspire me to try something for myself.  Danny, Jeff and Dusty are probably sick of listening to me after three years, but I’ve never had anything but the upmost respect and admiration for what they’re doing.  For reference: Here’s the full catalog of things they felt worthy of discussing when it came to me.

As an example of SPN picking up on the goofy things I do in the early days, here’s the first interview they ever did with me to discuss “Retweet Thursday”.  News was slow back then.

Going forward I just hope something I did here in my short time has made some kind of impact. I always tried to be the best representative of the city of Omaha as I could be when going out to meet the rest of the world.  I always told them how if you need to go somewhere, and you don’t know where to go, put Omaha first on your list.  This place can give you clarity that you didn’t even know you needed.

I’m not one for heady advice one liners, but I can leave with you the one thing I told myself when given this opportunity to pick up from my Omaha life and build a new one:  Live the life you’d be jealous of.  So that’s what I’m doing.

Come visit some  me time.  I can’t promise I’ll have room in my apartment, though.  Housing is a little tight out there.

Embarrassment is embarrassing.

I haven’t updated many people on what i’ve been up to lately.  And there’s a simple reason for that: embarrassment.  It’s not fun to talk about being a failure.  Part of me didn’t want to be dramatic in telling a story and having people read into things, but I’ll try to be a little more transparent and see where that gets me.

Maybe the last thing you knew was that Hollrback launched, I was traveling around talking to amazing people about it, and getting awesome feedback.  And then things kind of hit a brick wall.  I ran out of money to sustain myself, and I knew that if I could no longer eat or have a place to live that Hollrback would ultimately suffer.  So I made the really hard choice to give up with ad-hoc projects and dedicated Hollrback efforts and get a “real job” in order to keep things afloat.

This is how I failed Hollrback.  This is how I failed Omaha.  This is how I failed my friends that had faith in me.  I had to cave and push Hollrback aside in order to survive, in order for Hollrback to survive.  I was once told by a representative of a local tech blog that Hollrback was no longer a “company”, but a “small side project” due to the fact that I had to get a job.  I was completely crushed.  I’ll never forget that feeling, Hollrback was now seen differently because I needed to be able to pay rent.  Now I wake up every morning, look in the mirror and see a fuckup.   Everything negative that comes to me I’ve seen since then as justifiable punishment for not being good at what I do.  If you’ve never been there I don’t expect you to understand.

I really, really tried.  It’s really, really hard.

This was months ago.  As time went on deadlines took time away from what I was passionate about and put energy into what I had to do.  Don’t get me wrong, my job is great.  I’m building some neat stuff for neat people.  But Hollrback was getting farther away from me every day.  I didn’t know what to do next.

I was alone with a product that I saw as something the world could really use, and I had no idea what to do with it.  It wasn’t about money, it only had to do with my inability to do anything successfully.  I have no idea what I’m doing, and I’ve been pretty honest about it if you’ve ever approached and asked me.

Early on I was pretty confident I would build a great product, but I had no idea how to build a great business.  So my plan was to surround myself with people that would work with me on that journey.  Ultimately when it came down to it none of that really worked out. Not for any reason in particular, it’s just hard.  Everyone involved has been top notch and I think highly of them.  But once I found myself stuck I put all pride aside and started to contact people that I respected, and others I didn’t know but who others respected.  Some pushed me aside, others replied with an “it’s ok to fail”.

And that’s what you’re thinking right now, aren’t you?  I get it a lot.  ”That’s too bad.  What are you going to work on next?”  I feel pretty strongly that if you had something you were ready to jump on at the first sight of strife that you never really cared that much about what you were doing in the first place.  I don’t have a plan B or a “next idea”.  What’s wrong with this one?  It’s not Hollrback who failed.  It’s me.  It’s just me.

In my mind I ask a series of simple questions.  ”Is Hollrback pretty great?  Yes.  Does people think highly of it?  Yes.  Do people want it to succeed?  Yes.  Is there a competitor in the space that has succeeded where Hollrback could not?  No.”  If any of the answers were any different than those I’d gladly pack up my code and move on.  But Hollrback is bigger than myself.  It has nothing to do with me, my success, or me being right or wrong.  It’s about giving something to the world that I thought that it could use.  If I ever felt that it wouldn’t benefit people I would have given up.  It’s never been about me.

That being said, I’m trying to figure out what’s next that’s in Hollrback’s best interest.  In no scenario would folding it benefit anyone.  Remember when I asked if there was currently a better solution than it, and I answered no?  If there was, then I’d let them do it and I’d be a happy user of their service.  But even the people with millions of dollars behind them (and have copied some Hollrback functionality, I’m honored) can’t make things take off.  To me that’s called an even playing field.

So I’m looking at options.  I think the incubator/business accelerator model is perfect for me.  I want to be surrounded by people who have done it before.  But Omaha doesn’t currently have anything and the “big ones” out there care a lot about you having an awesome team, and I have no team.  It’s just me.

So that’s that.

I thought about disabling comments to this post, since I assume the responses will be over simplified (everybody seems to know what’s best when they’re not involved), but go ahead.  Tell me what you would do if you were me.  Keep in mind this isn’t a product issue (“U SHULD ADD BADGES AND INSTAGRAM SUPPORT”), but a larger issue regarding myself and my attempt to give something to to the world.  If you know someone that might be interested in talking with me, go ahead and share this post with them, I’d love to chat.

Boulder Startup Week 2011

So on the recommendation of my friend @sethhwilson in the hour before the deadline I half-assed an email to @ryanwanger of Boulder Startup Week for their “We’ll fly you to Boulder free” offer.  They were going to hand pick a handful of people and bring them in for the event.  I honestly kind of forgot about it, and I really only did it as one of those “take advantage of opportunity because you never know” kind of things that I’m trying to be proactive about.  Logic says nothing will come of it due to too many other people being involved, but lo and behold I got a call a few days later asking if I’d like a free flight to Boulder, Colorado for Boulder Startup Week.

I had already planned a trip to San Francisco in a few weeks, and work was piling up, so logically I should had said that too many things coming up in order for me to go.  But much like the reason I sent the email in the first place I went ahead and took advantage of the opportunity and said “Really?  me?  Well, ok.  I’m in.”  The trip was booked and they found someone for me to stay with while I was there.

I didn’t know what to expect, as I didn’t know anyone who lived there, and I had no idea what was going on there.  I knew it as the home of TechStars, and that’s really about it.  So with no expectations I figured I had very little chance of disappointment.  Little did I know there was no way for me to be disappointed by Boulder and its people.

The events for the week were loosely organized.  There was a central schedule, but anyone could organize an event and have it be added.  Some were very tech focused like “The Mobile Web and Why it Sucks”.  Others had nothing to do with tech like the “Pizzeria tour and Tasting”.  And then there was the immensely fun, 1300 people packed house edition of “Ignite Boulder”.  I’ve heard of Ignite events in cities, but it was my first chance attending one.  It was so much fun.  The whole city was excited for it, and I came out understanding what the fuss was about.

But to be honest the events had little to do with my Boulder adventure.  It was the people and the culture that made it special.

Everyone was happy to meet me.  I think there was a certain novelty when they found out I was one of the few chosen for the “free flight” deal.  But the people were extremely welcoming to me from the second I set foot on Boulder soil.

The first thing of notice, when I met new people they all asked the same thing: “Are you moving here?”  I found that very odd.  Why would they think because I’m visiting they expect that I’m moving there?  I’d simply respond to the question, with a “no… I’m just visiting, I have no intention to move anywhere.”

People were genuinely excited when I told them about Hollrback and the other work that I do.  They wanted to know more.  They wanted to be involved.  They made me feel special.

Speaking of Hollrback: Boulder likes Hollrback.  They’ve actually heard of it before.  Can you imagine the smile on my face when I walk into the TechStars bunker and someone from the TechStars class said “oh yeah, I know you guys.”  Something about Boulder made me feel like a founder of a “real” startup, not someone pretending to be someone he once read about in TechCrunch.

At this point I’m not going to go into detail about everyone I met, or everything I did.  That would make this post kind of lame.  However, some things:

• I was in the Denver airport when Britney Riley texted me with “Brad McCarty just told the pitch session attendees that Hollrback is one of his new favorite products.”  Holy shit.  He told that group… a group of people who are doing awesome things, that he respects Hollrback?  Wow.  He also mentioned Hollrback in a couple tweets over the startup week.  Seriously, the US editor of The Next Web telling people that he influences that Hollrback is rad.  Mind.Blown.  Also, this tweet.
• Andrew Hyde seeing my tweets online and replying to me because he knew I was in Boulder.  I also got to have lunch with him and hang out quite a few times chatting.
• People like Chris Vieville, Marissa Berlin, Cali Harris, Ryan Angilly and so many others would see me at events and make sure to say hi to me.
• Having Dave Taylor sit next to me at Atlas Purveyors and then realize after “Hey, that was the askdavetaylor.com guy!”
• I got quoted in Huffington Post after I spoke to a journalist at the Startup Week opening party.

Anyway, that’s enough of that.  I could spend all day talking about the culture, the environment and opportunities for startups such as mine and the atmosphere that the people create.  I could compare and contrast to Omaha, but instead I’ll thank those who made the week possible:  Elaine Ellis, Andrew Hyde, Ef Rodriguez, and Ryan Wanger who coordinated us out-of-towners.

Oh, and after a while when asked “Are you moving here?” I started to say “Maybe”.  And I meant it.

Here’s a video I threw together of some things I captured while at the event.  I put no time into it, and it’s not very exciting.  I didn’t grab as much content digitally as I should have.  It features some clips/photos  from Ignite Boulder, Boulder Open Coffee Club, and some of the other events.  Here you go!

2010 Year in Review

I was planning on doing the @lasertron Radvent project more than I did, but after the first few I wasn’t able to resonate with it anymore.  They involved things that didn’t make sense to me.  Either making things, or interacting with people.  Christmas parties, neighbors, etc.  I didn’t have any of these and I felt pretty lame.  So instead I figured i’d write this blog post about 2010.

I wish I could say I have a lot of detailed things to talk about that happened in the past year, but I really don’t.  It’s been a year that has been focused on just a couple things, and It’s been a year of removing anything that diluted the focus.

I guess I lost a lot of friends this past year.  I couldn’t tell you exactly why.  Some I’ve purposely cut out as a way to get away from people and/or situations I find distracting or making me unhappy.  Others have quietly slipped away from my life, maybe citing the same reasons, who knows.  Though this year I found I need to step away from unhappiness due to the hands of others.  And I had a really awful Summer that involved some of that.  I even told my parents during a visit this year that they’re not allowed to come back.  I’ll stand by that.  I learned unhappiness due to guilt or association is stupid.

While I say I haven’t done anything exciting this year, it’s not entirely true.  I mean, I went to Seattle to visit the TechStars program for frack sake.  How cool is that?

I also was able to go to South By Southwest for the first time.  Something I’ve always wanted to do.  Just being in attendance and meeting people doing awesome things, and hearing people’s ideas, and watching things in action is really a jump to anything you might be doing.  I’m really looking forward to SxSW 2011, hopefully bringing my own passion and ideas in tow.

I thought maybe this past year would have included me working on more music, but again, my passion and focus was elsewhere, so unfortunately a lot of the tunes I hoped to some day finish is again being pushed into the next year.  Maybe 2011 will see the completion of my mysterious album.  Though I am releasing tracks as they get finished, so I suppose I’ll give myself a little credit there.  Plus I was able to finally put out the music video for “Got Skillz?” all these years later.  Something from 2006 finally online?  That’s pretty cool.

Also being that I left West Corporation at the very end of last year, 2010 was also thus far the entirety of my freelance/consulting work.

For the most part, I can’t complain. I’ve made some neat projects and really done my best. Though the output of the process has been a complete failure. As of this writing 55% of my invoiced total have not been paid. If you think that’s an impressively high number…YES it’s a high number. Some of it i’ve written off as “I’ll never get it, so I’m not going to fight it any longer”, and some of it I’m actively fighting. A lot of that number comes from clients “unable” to pay me due to their client not paying them in some shape or form. And this isn’t just a single client, there’s multiple. So I’m thinking it’s just part of the game. Sometimes you luck out and get paid, sometimes you don’t.  My advice if you’re going into consulting work, only do it if you love it, because you’ll be doing it for free most of the time.

So I don’t know.  Do I have other things to wrap up from the year?  Probably.  I’m just doing this off the cuff.

I hope you’re all having a great holiday season, and I hope to catch up with you all soon in the new year.

Radvent Dec 5 – #Radvent tunage

Create the soundtrack of your year.

Now THIS is more like it!  Though to be honest I feel like I talk about music to people so often I don’t know what to put here that’s worth reading.

It’s actually pretty easy for me to find what I’ve been listening to this past year because of Last.FM.  In fact here is my 12 month chart in detail. However, this year I haven’t really been “into” anything significantly like most years.  It’s certainly been a soundtrack of a year built of previous years and a couple new discoveries.  But unlike years where I can say “I was really into Daft Punk” or “I discovered the new pornographers this year” this year has been a pretty casual listening time.

Of course Nine Inch Nails has been a staple, but there’s nothing new there.  Though I really enjoy any live releases that happen to come out from shows, so there’s generally always been something new to listen to.

Ghostland Observatory came out with a new album this year, “Codename: Rondo” and I’ve given that a few e-rotations.  They ended up pretty high in my list with 119 plays.

Crystal Castles also came out with a new release this year, and I’ve played them a bit.  Well, only 85 times.

I went to see Lords of Acid this year, and around that time I was playing them quite a bit.

Blaqk Audio is an electronic dancey group that I never would have heard of if @andrea_joi didn’t suggest them to me.  They get a pretty constant play rate in my rotation.

If you organize my music by what tracks I listened to the most it gets even a little more broad.  Is that Semisonic’s 2001 hit “Chemistry” way up on the charts?  Yes it is.  And that, my friends, shows you that it’s been kind of a down year when it comes to tunes for me.  (Don’t get me wrong, I really like that song.)

For some reason “Shiny Toy Guns” was a staple this year as well.  But that’s some feel-good, fun time poppy dance tunes that I can’t go wrong with.  So who would blame me?

If you look at albums I’ve listened to the most, I think it’s a pretty good list.  We start with Blaqk Audio’s SexCells, as mentioned before.  A couple soundtracks, including Repo!  The Genetic Opera. And the awesome comedy album by The Lonely Island, Incredibad.

Also as far as albums we have that new album by Ghostland Obervatory I mentioned, The Dance Macbre Remix album by The Faint, Daft Punk’s Discovery, and Battles’ Mirrored.

I’ve heard Battles in previous years, but it was just this year I got their album “Mirrored”, and it’s really great stuff.  Highly recommended.

To close things out I’ll point you to songs that I’ve been recommending, as they are a great example of music I’ve loved at that point in time.  So seriously head over to http://gabekangas.com/musicrecommendations to hear some tunes.

I know this post wasn’t very deep or anything, but hey.  What do you expect?

Below I’ll embed a few sources of tunes probably mentioned above, and you can partake if you like.  Enjoy!

Create a MySpace Playlist at MixPod.com