My life has been crazy this last year.
Last May, Greg Bell and I started a company called Orange Peel Media. It was an exciting time, because I have always been an entrepreneur at heart.
At that point in my life I made the decision, to let my music take a backseat to my career. At the time, Adrian Glynn and I had been doing a monthly gig at Backstage Lounge, where I enjoyed some of my favourite shows as a performer. I will always look back on those times as exciting. However, because of my career, I started to find that they were becoming a chore. I didn’t have the time to put into them like I used to. So, after two years of good times at Backstage, Adrian and I decided to give it a rest.
For a few months I put my guitar in a corner (the first time in about 8 years) and didn’t even think about it. I even really enjoyed the time away from it.
Anyway, in the last few months, I have picked it up again and have made a few passes at writing some new songs.
Nothing seems to be working though: I have one rhythm, and that’s all I seem to know how to play; I can’t come up with a half-assed lyric for the life of me; and I’m far too stuck to know what’s wrong.
In a way I feel like I’ve just sobered up and realized that I was never a very good songwriter… well, not really, but that’s what I tell myself to get depressed so that I can write.
When it comes down to it, like most songwriters, most of my best songs have come out of depression and melancholy moods. It has always worked for me because I’ve always been depressed in one way or another, but now things seem to have changed. It’s not because I’m blissfully happy… because I’m not. And it’s not because my life too good to be depressed about it… because it’s definitely not. But I am just too busy to be depressed, and I just can’t afford to be melancholy!
Now that I’m quite sure that I know what the problem is, I’m not sure I want to go there. It makes me wonder if a songwriter can really put out good music without the manic lows, and fleeting highs…
So the question is: where does music fit in my life now?
I got my first tattoo on Saturday morning!
It’s a peregrine falcon-head encased in stone. Falco Peregrinus (peregrine falcon) is Latin for foreigner, or stranger; which is exactly what I was to Vancouver four years ago. Falcons are also symbolic of calculated risk, and adventure.
For me, this tattoo symbolizes the last four years of my life: the risk and adventure of moving to a new city, starting a new career (despite all the advice to the contrary), and then starting my own business.
It’s been a crazy ride so far, and won’t be slowing down any time soon. It’s exciting and scary at the same time. I guess this is the curse of aiming high? ;)
We launched ScrnShots this morning at 10:00 am PST. So, far the traffic has been encouraging, people seem to be really into it, so that’s good.
ScrnShots is a community where you can upload, tag and share your screenshots. Greg Bell and I just started full time on this project last week, and it’s very exciting for us to have a product that is actually out there and available to the public.
If you wanna signup for an account you can do it here.
We also just got blogged about on Web Worker Daily, which is also very exciting!
Spread the news!
ScrnShots Launches next tuesday, May 6 (10:00am PST).
Thank you to everyone who has blogged about it already, and to those of you who have been participating in the private beta. We really appreciate the feedback and the input.
We’re really pumped to see how the community is going to grow in the next few weeks!
It’s official!
We’re named Orange Peel Media!
feedback?
My first week as a startup co-founder was pretty good!
Working for myself is something that I’ve been thinking about for years, and now that it’s here, it really feels no different than doing homework at home. I love it! If I hit a wall, I take my dog for a walk, and if I’m suddenly not into it, I work in the evening instead.
And, next week will be even better, as Greg will be joining me for the “official” kick-off.
One thing that everyone warned me about, that still took me by surprise, is the excessive time that legal and finance can take up. Just thinking about how the daily processes of our company, how things will happen and how things will function is a lot to think about. I knew this, I just hadn’t experienced it… Until now!
What I took away from this week: Taxes alone can suffocate you
Today is my first day inside the startup bubble.
Greg Bell and I have decided to start our own company. Our primary focus for the next 3-4 months is a social community called, ScrnShots. ScrnShots is a place for people to upload, tag and share screenshots of inspirational design, usability or anything else of interest.
Everything still seems quite unrealistic at this point, but I’m sure that the long hours will bring a touch of reality with them.
Stay tuned, as I will be updating this blog regularly with interesting tidbits of acquired knowledge and grumblings.
I was at the Seattle Library this last weekend. I’ve been meaning to go for the better part of a year already, but just never got around to it. It was an absolutely amazing sight to see.
The building was designed by Joshua Prince Ramus. Check out this Youtube Video of Prince Ramus explaining his reasoning behind the design.
I have spent the last six weeks at Engine Digital. I’ve done everything from IA to development, and even some design.
Overall, it has been a good experience. Since most of my experience up until six weeks ago, consisted of working with teams of 6 people or less, I would have to say that the biggest lesson learned was communication among a bigger team.
In a group of 5 people, you can get away with verbal communication. But, when you throw an extra ten people into the mix, mistakes are easily made. Documentation becomes KEY. At Engine we use Basecamp for all our project management, todos, milestones, etc. However, even basecamp isn’t detailed enough to keep track of everything, and so for little bugs, fixes, or edits related to a project, we use Mantis.
Also just general communication among your team, is different too. With a small team, you can’t help but be involved in everyone’s projects. With a bigger team, you have to purposely ask people for feedback, make sure everything is going as planned, because time is easily wasted if you’re not aware of what everyone else is doing, and any twists that the project has taken.
Lesson Learned: Communication is good - Communication with Documentation is better
