Northwest Technology News and Development

Seed investments, incubator, software development consulting

Regarding Mike Homer: condolences is the wrong word

True enough.

Erin left a comment suggesting that since Mike is alive and fighting that a more appropriate word should prevail.

Eric says:

Condolences is the wrong word. You use that word only when a person has died. “Sympathy” is the right word in this case. Mike is alive and fighting.

Sympathy is indeed better. We wish Mike best of luck.

Quite a real estate list

All things real estate seem to be grabbing headlines these days. I found this nice resource to all things real estate online this morning. From brokerage to market data to agent ratings/feedback…it’s a pretty nifty list. And I like lists. If you work in the biz you’ve probably already seen this. For those who you are might be thinking about buying or selling a home this is a decent bookmark.

RealEstate List

Condolences to the family of Mike Homer

One of the better known technology veterans in the Silicon Valley is Mike Homer. In addition to running marketing at Netscape he also helped to launch Opsware, Tivo and Palm. Stanford University recently determined he has Creutzfeld-Jakob Disease – a neuro -degenerative disorder. Victims are born with it and by the time symptoms are apparent when people hit in their 30s or 40s, there is typically only a year or two left to live.

An interesting quote from Mike in the associated video clip…those who often have the preliminary conditions of many deadly diseases don’t know who to go to in order to determine why they feel strange. Many times a deadly disease doesn’t start with symptoms that seem catastrophic. It is quite often our friends who encourage you to find out what is troubling you.

Mike is 49 years old.

Need icons?

So, for various projects its always handy to have access to royalty free icons or at least a bunch of inspirational examples to get your own creative juices flowing.

Here are four great resources I use:

IconFinder


Smashing Magazine Ultimate Icon List


Famfamfam


FeedIcons

Icons!

A list of web based software you MUST bookmark

Get organized, be more productive, manage your finances, keep lists, remind yourself. Do whatever it is you need to do using this incredible list of great web-based software apps.

Freelance tools

Where’s Kelly?

So posts are not as frequent as I’d like them to be because Tricia and I are traveling throughout Europe much of August. Check out some of the pics I’ll be posting during our trip! We’re sitting on the small (and highly recommended) isle of Hvar in Croatia right now. I’ll post plenty more pics later tonight. Here’s a picture of Tricia in Zurich…our previous stop before Croatia.

Zurich

The irony of Amazon Fresh

Amazon Fresh

So I’ve longed believed that much of the dotcom wreckage wasn’t so much about bad ideas…just bad timing. Or bad fiscal management. The Amazon Fresh launch reminded me of a John Cook article in the PI about some of Seattle’s worst web ideas. One of the companies mentioned was MyLackey.

Now, I ask you… Is it really a bad idea to launch a company that aggregates much of the services nobody wants to do – such as dry cleaning or car detailing – under one brand wherein you get one bill for not doing the work yourself?

It doesn’t seem any worse an idea than home delivered groceries. Funnier still is that both Kozmo and HomeGrocer were listed in the article. Now Amazon is into the idea.

Frankly, I think MyLackey could still work. Imagine you go to a website. Pick your services from an ala carte menu. Schedule them. Get one bill on a monthly basis for everything from lawn edging, car cleaning, errand running, auto detailing, dry cleaning and more. Everything done at your house or place of work. You drive nowhere. You pick nothing up. One company guarantees satisfaction for all services regardless what subcontractor was used.

Doesn’t seem dumb to me at all. Amazon, on some level, seems to agree.

Congrats to Andy Liu at BuddyTV

I’m a bit late in congratulating Andy but hey…I’m traveling. Anyway, BuddyTV has raised $2.8 million in funding from Gemstar-TV Guide International. Very cool. Traffic on BuddyTV is incredible and Andy & team know how to drive it to even higher levels. This is one of the cooler start-ups in Seattle should anyone care about my opinion. It’s got all the makings of a hit. In fact, already its the largest social network centered on television shows (that isn’t owned by a major studio). Way to execute Andy & David! Keep up the great work.

BuddyTV

  • Curious Office companies

    The companies below represent current Curious equity holdings.

    Inkd

    Inkd is our latest internally developed concept. We raised our $1.7 million seed round on September 22 and are backed by Second Avenue Partners and a variety of tremendous angel investors. We are developing the World's First Market for Original Print Design.

    Read the TechCrunch article.

    Visit the Inkd website!

  • CafePress

    Cafepress acquired Imagekind in July 2008. CafePress.com is an online marketplace that offers sellers complete e-commerce services to independently create and sell a wide variety of products, and offers buyers unique merchandise across virtually every topic.

  • Imagekind

    Curious Office started Imagekind in 2006 and it is the world's fastest-growing art site offering over 750,000 high-quality fine art images for sale. Imagekind gives consumers limitless options to purchase museum-quality framed and poster art from over 50,000 domestic and international emerging and established artists.

  • SEOmoz.org

    Curious Office invested in SEOmoz along with Ignition Partners in 2007. SEOmoz serves as one of the largest online hubs for search marketers worldwide by providing education, tools, resources and paid services to help make every SEO the best they can be.

    Seattle PI: SEOmoz raising funds from Ignition, Curious Office

  • Shelfari

    Amazon.com acquired Shelfari in September 2008. Based in Seattle, Shelfari introduces readers to our global community of book lovers and encourages them to share their literary inclinations and passions with peers, friends, and total strangers

  • Fanzter

    Fanzter is headquartered in Collinsville, Connecticut and are the creators of the wildly popular celebrity style and entertainment platform Coolspotters.com, which launched in May 2008. Fanzter secured $2 Million In Series B Funding Led By Steamboat Ventures in March 2009.

  • Wishpot

    Wishpot is a free social shopping service that makes it easy to save and share interesting things you find in stores and online. Items are easily collected online or from stores and organized using simple online lists. Lists and items can be kept private or shared with others. You can collect and discover products you like, recommend your favorite stuff, share and explore gift suggestions or ask for opinions and advice.

  • FeedDigest

    FeedDigest is a parser, regenerator, and syndicator for, and of, RSS and Atom feeds originally built by Peter Cooper. In August 2007, Feed Digest was sold to its new owners, Informer Technologies, Inc., and in 2008 rebranded to Feed Informer.