February 10th, 2009

The U.S. Is In Trouble…

It’s graphs like these that make me glad I’m self employed and business is growing:

November 4th, 2008

How I Voted in the 2008 Elections

President / VP
Obama/Biden

#1 – should income tax be abolished in MA.
No. There are enough cuts as is. Property taxes would jump, not a solution at all.

#2 – decriminalize marijuana poccession under 1oz.
Yes. It’s ludicrous how much is spent incarcerating adults who choose to use this relatively harmless drug. Where are the questions banning alcohol?

#3 – ban dog racing in MA
Yes. Although the job losses are a negative here I think entertainment value of watching dogs run in circles is not worth all of the illegal activities that come with it.

August 25th, 2008

Mashable Summer Event Boston

Myself and the rest of the CampusLIVE staff attended the Mashable.com Summer event in Boston and met some pretty cool people. We came away with 3 or 4 great connections there, a great return for the time and money.

While there I was interviewed by the guys at Mashable / Stickam. Here’s the video.

July 31st, 2008

Back to Work – Another great vacation is over.

I just returned from a great vacation in South Carolina. Had a great business meeting while there – but really enjoyed seeing the entire family. It was my grandparents 50th anniversary – 25 of us got together for the week. A VERY full house.

I came back to the office to start a very hectic week. We’re launching a new product so things are very crazy. Organized chaos is a good title.

Here’s a shot from my vacation – my little cousin Connor has clearly tired me our after riding on my shoulders for quite a while.

June 3rd, 2008

The Bank of America “Double Hold” – Another reason to hate them.

In case you didn’t already have enough reasons to hate Bank of America, I have another for you. This is in addition to the 50+ other reasons that I would elaborate on if I hadn’t wasted so much with them already.

Today I log into my online banking and see two entries that told me nothing about what they really were:

• 6/3/08 – HOLD/DEBIT HOLD $500
• 6/3/08 – HOLD/DEBIT HOLD $500

Clicking on each transaction didn’t help me investigate at all, no information whatsoever. The only hunch I had was that I deposited a client’s $500 check a week earlier. Perhaps it bounced, but if so that should only be one $500 charge, not two. I went to BOA customer service for help – a daunting task for anyone.

Support put me on hold for 10 minutes to  “pull up my account information”. After explaining the charges to them they said that the $500 check I deposited had bounced – they subsequently put a “double hold” on the transaction. I told them this was ridiculous and to at the very least refund the BS second charge. After some resistance he removed the second hold.

I will be accelerating my move to another bank who doesn’t aggressively rape their customers (for lack of a better word).

March 17th, 2008

No, I do not have a resume – sorry

I have been organizing thoughts for the last week so that I could write a post about how the people who really stand out, the truly extraordinary ones, don’t need a resume. Their achievements and reputation precede them. I’ve been a strong believer in this for a few years now. The last resume I wrote was for Junior writing at UMass. It was a good exercise in organization, however I’ve yet to give to anyone, even if they ask.

I’ve had potential web clients ask me for a resume. I kindly let them know that I have a portfolio of work available online, a blog, and a few pages of Google Search Results that should speak for themselves. If you’re truly extraordinary – worth hiring and associating with, then people will seek you out naturally. You will be in demand.

So what if you’re not in demand? It’s easy to make a move in this direction. Hit the pavement and get your name out there, make your name mean something.

One of my favorite bloggers, Seth Godin wrote a great post today in support of my theory on this.

Light up the fire – torch your resume.

February 11th, 2008

Gabe and Max’s Internet Thing

Saw this today, hilarious.