Arugula

Image via WikipediaArugula has knocked off Brazil as the top searched term at this blog. As in most people who search for something and end up at this blog search for the wonderful "arugula."

When "Brazil" took the crown I am like, wait a minute, I love soccer, but this is not a sports blog. Now I am alarmed all over again. I don't want this to end up a food blog.

This is a tech blog. Technology and business. How do I steer it back in that direction?

In Brazil's case I took care of the "problem" by writing many many posts about Brazil's economy. And I did some country study posts on Brazil as a potential country to go into for my microfinance venture.

But I don't know what to do with arugula. Houston, we have a problem.

Arugula And Location Patents
Brazil: Sao Paulo: Photos

I think I need to blog about FoodSpotting less often. Google by now thinks I have a food blog.

Is Square A Microfinance Company?

I am watching this video and I am thinking, is Square a microfinance company? Is Square like microfinance for white people?

Think about it. People use Square for micro transactions. I have lost count of how many times I have heard Jack Dorsey make his cappuccino example.

Square just made my list of Stuff White People Like.



Jack Dorsey And I Were At Columbia Yesterday Evening
Jack Dorsey Also Has A FinTech StartUp

Jack Dorsey And I Were At Columbia Yesterday Evening

I did not even realize until after my event was over. We were at two separate events. I was at the Eric Ries event. I spotted Sree while I was there.

To You I Offer Buddhism And Yoga

Image via WikipediaMinority Majority Nation?
Gender Talk And Pragmatism

TechCrunch: What’s The Most Difficult CEO Skill? Managing Your Own Psychology.: By far the most difficult skill for me to learn as CEO was the ability to manage my own psychology. Organizational design, process design, metrics, hiring and firing were all relatively straightforward skills to master compared to keeping my mind in check. Over the years, I’ve spoken to hundreds of CEOs all with the same experience. Nonetheless, very few people talk about it, and I have never read anything on the topic. It’s like the fight club of management: The first rule of the CEO psychological meltdown is don’t talk about the psychological meltdown. ....... this is the most personal and important battle that any CEO will face. ..... no CEO ever has a smooth path to a great company. Along the way, many things go wrong and all of them could have and should have been avoided. ..... If CEOs were graded on a curve, the mean on the test would be 22 out of a 100. This kind of mean can be psychologically challenging for a straight A student. It is particularly challenging, because nobody tells you that the mean is 22. ...... At a certain size, your company will do things that are so bad that you never imagined that you’d be associated with that kind of incompetence. Seeing people fritter away money, waste each other’s time, and do sloppy work can make you feel bad. If you are the CEO, it may well make you sick. ....... Every problem in the company was indeed my fault. ....... Being responsible for everything and getting a 22 on the test starts to weigh on your consciousness. ....... CEOs often make the one of the following two mistakes: 1. They take things too personally 2. They do not take things personally enough ...... Ideally, the CEO will be urgent yet not insane. She will move aggressively and decisively without feeling emotionally culpable. If she can separate the importance of the issues from how she feels about them, she will avoid demonizing her employees or herself. ...... In your darkest moments as CEO, discussing fundamental questions about the viability of your company with your employees can have obvious negative consequences. On the other hand, talking to your board and outside advisors can be fruitless. The knowledge gap between you and them is so vast that you cannot actually bring them fully up to speed in a manner that’s useful in making the decision. You are all alone. ....... asking oneself anything 3,000 times turns out to be a bad idea ...... if you don’t like choosing between horrible and cataclysmic, don’t become CEO ...... Make some friends ..... it is extremely useful from a psychological perspective to talk to people who have been through similarly challenging decisions. ...... Get it out of your head and onto paper ..... I wrote down a detailed explanation of my logic ...... Focus on the road not the wall—When they train racecar drivers, one of the first lessons is when you are going around a curve at 200 MPH, do not focus on the wall; focus on the road. ........ A Final Word of Advice – Don’t Punk Out and Don’t Quit As CEO, there will be many times when you feel like quitting. I have seen CEOs try to cope with the stress by drinking heavily, checking out, and even quitting. In each case, the CEO has a marvelous rationalization why it was OK for him to punk out or quit, but none them will every be great CEOs. Great CEOs face the pain. They deal with the sleepless nights, the cold sweat, and what my friend the great Alfred Chuang (legendary founder and CEO of BEA Systems) calls “the torture.” Whenever I meet a successful CEO, I ask them how they did it. Mediocre CEOs point to their brilliant strategic moves or their intuitive business sense or a variety of other self-congratulatory explanations. The great CEOs tend to be remarkably consistent in their answers. They all say: “I didn’t quit.”

To Catch A Dollar

Front Facing Camera

This guy got more votes than me when I ran for Freshman Class President.

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Obama Has A Computer

Kassidy Brown: No April Fool Joke

Friday, April 1, 7-9 PM
Curry In A Hurry
Lexington + 28th

I announced yesterday that Kassidy Brown of Journey Of Action is going to be there for the FoodSpotting First Friday dinner in Little India. Because that happens to be on April 1 there might be speculation the whole thing is a joke, a trick I am pulling upon the FoodSpotting enthusiasts.

I want to say that is not so, although I have a track record. In middle school I imitated the headmaster's handwriting and signature and got a teacher to rush over to the headmaster's bungalow.

But this is real. Kassidy Brown really is coming on Friday. Be there.

Journey Of Action: Connecting The Dots: Social Activism: Social Media
Splitting A Platter With Kassidy Brown
Inviting Charlie O'Donnell To A Pillow Fight
Journey Of Action

Barack's Positivity

Image via WikipediaAt first I thought he was being naive. That was in 2007. I loved the guy. I was his first full time volunteer in the city.

He will get knocked around a few times, and then he will come around to it, I thought. He will learn.

And then he started winning. Big. And I am like, wait a minute, whatever he is doing is working. I declared myself a student of his new kind of politics, his positivity.

First I thought it was naive. Then I thought it was maybe weakness. Then I saw it was pragmatism. I mean, it was working wildly.

Woodkid: Iron

Woodkid - Iron from WOODKID on Vimeo.

(Via Kirk Love)

Holy Ghost!: Wait And See

(Via Soraya Darabi)

Rudiments Of A Corporate Culture

Image via WikipediaPassion For Microfinance
Passion For Social Media
Passion For Tech
Passion For People
Post-ISMs Individual: No Sexist/Racist/Homophobic/Classist Jokes/Comments
Passion For Profits: Work Hard, Play By The Rules, Innovate

Passion For Microfinance

We are a microfinance outfit. We are not a political party. We are not in education. We are not health people. We don't do bio tech.

Passion For Social Media

Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, LinkedIn: You need to be active on these platforms.

Jacob Barnett: Boy Genius?

The Daily Mail: Autistic boy,12, with higher IQ than Einstein develops his own theory of relativity: A 12-year-old child prodigy has astounded university professors after grappling with some of the most advanced concepts in mathematics. Jacob Barnett has an IQ of 170 - higher than Albert Einstein - and is now so far advanced in his Indiana university studies that professors are lining him up for a PHD research role. The boy wonder, who taught himself calculus, algebra, geometry and trigonometry in a week, is now tutoring fellow college classmates after hours. And now Jake has embarked on his most ambitious project yet - his own 'expanded version of Einstein's theory of relativity'. His mother, not sure if her child was talking nonsense or genius, sent a video of his theory to the renowned Institute for Advanced Study near Princeton University. According to the Indiana Star, Institute astrophysics professor Scott Tremaine -himself a world renowned expert - confirmed the authenticity of Jake's theory. ...... 'The theory that he's working on involves several of the toughest problems in astrophysics and theoretical physics. ..... 
Image via Wikipedia'Anyone who solves these will be in line for a Nobel Prize.' ...... 'Whenever I try talking about math with anyone in my family they just stare blankly.' ... Jake was diagnosed with Aspergers syndrome, a mild form of autism, from an early age. ..... he didn't talk until the age of two ...... He would fill up note pads of paper with drawings of complex geometrical shapes and calculations, before picking up felt tip pens and writing equations on windows. ..... By the age of three he was solving 5,000-piece puzzles and he even studied a state road map, reciting every highway and license plate prefix from memory. ..... By the age of eight he had left high school and was attending Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis advanced astrophysics classes. .... Jake has trouble sleeping at night as he constantly sees numbers in his head..... Jake has turned the sleepless nights to his advantage - debunking the big bang theory. ..... The next step, according to professor Ross, is for Jake to leave class altogether and take up a paid research role.