The world gets a little bit better...again!

If you want to accuse me of posting the cat, go ahead...I don't care.

Just before 1:00 a.m. today my (superhero) wife Jenn gave birth to our second son, Caleb Michael Holt Corcoran. Weighing in at 7 lbs 5 oz, Caleb arrived less than 35 minutes after we landed at the hospital. He is welcomed by parents, granparents, aunts, uncles and proud older brother Luke. Check him out...


Special thanks to everyone at St. Mike's who made it such a great experience again, including Cathy and Drs. Tessler and Czzik. Caleb...welcome aboard!

Albert Lai...I hate that guy!

How does this guy do it? I think he developed his first computer program before he could ride a bike. In the late 1990’s at something like 14 years of age, he reached wunderkind status with the sale of mydesktop.com, making him both a millionaire and poster child for the potential and prosperity of the Internet. Today he’s found himself in the right place and the right time again, this time with Internet photo-sharing startup Bubbleshare.

Bubbleshare is the epitome of the so-called Web 2.0, the next generation of web sites (if you can still call them that) defined by dynamic, community and collaborative features such as user-generated content (e.g. blogs, personal web sites), file and photo sharing, and content customization (e.g. RSS). And like Web 1.0, companies in this space are all the rage, commanding headlines, site traffic and valuations in the hundreds of millions. Some of the most recognized examples include MySpace.com (which recently passed Google as the most visited property on the Web), del.icio.us and flickr (two social search and photo sharing sites recently acquired by Yahoo!).

It's not enough that Lai is in the Internet sweet spot again…he’s there despite my direct skepticism. Albert and I sat down about 2 or 3 years ago when he was first getting the company started and, having spent about a year working with Vancouver-based digital imaging company ACD Systems (makers of ACDSee), I offered him some wise words of advice: the way Windows, Google and Yahoo are moving, I really don’t see a lot of opportunity here for you…it would be like coming out with a new search engine.

Damn it was I wrong. Not only was there opportunity for photo-sharing, but with del.icio.us and the social search evolution, event search engines are being turned on their heads. I hate guys that can see this years out!

Seriously though, Albert deserves all the success that’s coming to him, and I suspect there’s going to be a ton. I’d look to see his name in the news soon as Yahoo! or Google fork out seven or eight figures for another one of his creations. And with another notch on his belt, there’s no doubt he’ll be on to the next thing in short order. Only this time, he’ll have at least one more believer behind him from day one.

Beauty idea, eh?

Kudos to Sean Wise and Reg Cheramy for their recent launch of the Canadian Tech Mob, a web-ring program aimed at showcasing the achievements of Canadians on the domestic and world stage in the areas of technology and innovation.

The web-ring works almost like a virtual lapel pin, where Canadian entrepreneurs, bloggers, venture capitalists and overall champions of innovation show their Canadian pride by posting the Tech Mob icon on their site. The icon then serves two purposes: highlighting Canadian pride, and linking interested visitors back to the web-ring to see other examples of Canadian leadership and innovation.

Beyond being a neat idea, the Canadian Tech Mob hits on an issue that’s very close to my heart; showcasing how Canadians, contrary to conventional wisdom, have been behind some of the most important innovations and discoveries in high tech, wireless, the Internet, biotechnology, medicine, and more. Whether it’s because we’re too humble about our accomplishments or that we’re simply not good at marketing ourselves (two typical criticisms of Canadians from an international business perspective), Canadians are one the world’s largest invisible minorities when it comes to achievement and recognition. Even on our own soil, few recognize how Canadians like Jeff Skoll (ebay), Jeff Mallet (Yahoo), Rob Burgess (Macromedia) and more have created some of the new economy’s most important companies and technologies. With Bernie Ebbers, we’ve even got our own celebrity white crime criminal to boast!

Another factor contributing to Canada’s invisible minority status is that, at least during the dot-com era, many entrepreneurs felt they wouldn’t be taken seriously if they held onto their Canadian identities. When I was doing marketing and PR for (then) dot-com darling DocSpace, CEO Evan Chrapko was religious about maintaining an American face for this very reason; even based in Toronto, my business cards had a Menlo Park address and phone number, I never gave out my Canadian coordinates, and Evan even led workshops on talking more American…to this day I still say project, process, out and about like I was from California.

I’m also a huge fan of the Tech Mob concept because it’s not the first; it builds on previous initiatives (some of which I’ve been involved with) to help put Canada on the domestic and global innovation map. In 2000 entrepreneur Michael Lewkowitz and e-bay co-founder Jeff Skoll founded The Leaf Initiative, a grass-roots, non-profit initiative that ran awards programs and published success stories about Canadian new economy icons before it merged with SMART Toronto in 2003. Out west, Vancouver VC Brent Halliday and the late founder of CanadaIT.com Peter Standeven formed TechnicallyHip.ca, a sort of clearing house for all things Canadian in the context of high tech ventures and successes. And Leonard Brody, former Onvia Canada co-founder and overall huge fan of Canadians, has authored two best-selling books on the subject, Innovation Nation: Canadian Leadership from Java to Jurassic Park, and Everything I Needed to Know About Business...I Learned from a Canadian.

For Sean and Reg, these past experiences should provide both momentum and support from those who were involved, and some important lessons in how to make the program work. Ultimately the crux of any program like this is…what’s the incentive for people to join? Someone like me is an easy sell, but motivating the masses, the silent majority of Canadians out there, is a different story. From my experience, three factors stand out:

Target the Influencers – A motivating factor for a good number of people in networking programs like this is gaining access to recognized leaders. With the Leaf Initiative, we had people like Jeff Skoll, Andrea Reisman, Roger Martin, Jonathan Ehrlich and Dean Hopkins involved as early supporters and champions.

Promote the Hell out of It – Leonard Brody didn’t just let his books fly off the shelves of Amazon or Indigo; he pounded the pavement promoting his book through a non-stop tour of speaking engagements and networking events across the country.

Merge Virtual with Physical – One of the most successful global, nation-based networking groups I’m aware of is The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE). With over 10,000 members in 44 countries, TiE has succeeded in part by combining a simple brand with valuable, compelling networking events, special interest groups and programs specifically to nurture the next generation of Indian entrepreneurs.

Either way, I’ve signed up and you should be seeing a Tech Mob icon on this site shortly. If you’re Canadian and you’re doing something valuable, opinion-influencing, innovative or groundbreaking in high tech, take two minutes out of your day to sign up too. It’s a quick and easy process to sign up, it’s a worthwhile cause and, ultimately, propping up Canada’s position on the global technology stage will benefit all of us involved in it.

Eavesdropping spells relief

The third and final straw that got me back into the blogging mood came earlier this week with George Bush and Tony Blair being caught on tape having a candid conversation about everything from sweater styles to Hamas and Hezzbolah. The lines that most media outlets have singled out are, from Bush to Blair:

"I feel like telling Kofi to get on the phone with Assad and make something happen."

"See, the irony is that what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit, and it's over."

In contrast to the opinions of pundits and columnists I’ve come across in the past day or so, I reacted rather uniquely to the exchange; I’m actually relieved that this is what Bush and Blair talk about when they’re off the record. When I first heard that they had been caught on tape, I was worried that Bush said something about a reporter he didn’t like, or how his progress with My Pet Goat was coming along.

Was it rehearsed or scripted? I don’t know. What I do know is that I feel at least a bit more comfortable about the state of the war on terror knowing that the two guys with their fingers closest to the button actually talk about the issues (instead of fighting to the death with same sex marriage advocates) and, just as importantly, they appear to believe in what they’re saying.

Freakonomics changes outlook

The second thing that got me up on the blogging horse again is that I went on vacation. And while out in the Eastern Townships – where, the more I think about it, the more I want to retire eventually – I finally read Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. It’s only been on the best-seller list for about 1,000 weeks now.

In any case, why this book prompted me to put finger to keyboard is that, upon initial reflection, I didn’t think it changed a thing for me. Like Boom, Bust & Echo, I could argue (assuming that I could likely dig up some research findings to support my case) most of the points raised in the book to at least some degree and, like David Foot, I thought Freakonomics authors Levitt and Dubner did a great job of predicting…what had already taken place.

As an aside, this isn’t much different from my previously bitter view of economists’ predictions in general: given current and underlying market conditions, this stock/market/commodity will absolutely positively go up in price…unless it doesn’t.

Upon further reflection, however, I found Freakonomics has changed everything for me, or at least it has in the sense of assessing and questioning things in a whole new light. One of its most consistent themes was John Kenneth Galbraith’s notion of conventional wisdom which, contrary to conventional wisdom, isn’t a function of being wise. On the contrary; in many cases it is a set of universally misunderstood concepts that, because the population hasn’t sufficiently questioned underlying assumptions behind certain beliefs, lead to a widely accepted, inaccurate outlook on a given topic.

What Freakonomics instilled in me isn’t that all public policy is misdirected, but rather that I have been as guilty as anyone in accepting conventional wisdom as fact, failing to question seemingly sound assumptions because they do a good job of explaining why certain decisions get made. Here are a few examples:

Guns vs. Swimming Pools – Espousing what I think is a fairly typical Toronto attitude, I’m on side with the move towards stricter gun laws and tighter gun control (both in Canada and the U.S.). If my son goes to a friend’s house and I find out one of the parents has a gun in the house, I’d at least take a cautionary note of the fact. But if the friend had a swimming pool, I probably wouldn’t give it a second thought. Imagine how dumb I felt when reading – according to Levitt’s data – a child would be 100 times more likely to die at the hands of the swimming pool than the parent’s gun. Wow.

Terror vs. French Fries – Hundreds of billions of dollars have gone into the war on terror, a cause that I support whole heartedly. At the same time, I’m not what you would call a religiously healthy eater and I’ve been known to eat the occasional banquet burger (and fries, with gravy, and a beer). All in all, not abnormal, but concerning when you consider that, as Levitt puts it, “the likelihood of any given person being killed in a terrorist attack are infinitesimally smaller than the likelihood that the same person will clog up his arteries with fatty food and die of heart disease,” not to mention that modifying eating habits is likely to be a) less expensive and b) more successful than guaranteeing protection against terror/extremist attacks.

Couch Potato Tots vs. Literate Babies – Studies from volumes of California elementary school data show that, as compared to factors such as the socio-economic status of parents and low birth weight, the amount of reading a child does at an early age – and as a corollary, the amount of TV they watch – have little or no bearing on a child’s performance in school.

Now, having said all this, don’t get me wrong; am I in favour of tighter gun control? For sure. Am I going to continue reading every day with my son? Definitely. Do I support the war on terror? Without a shadow of a doubt. What I am doing differently though – and why I’d recommend the book – is questioning assumptions that I previously accepted blindly, questioning the underlying rationale behind personal and political decisions and, ultimately, questioning why I support the things that I so often do with passion and vigour. And some of the answers have been very eye-opening…maybe even fodder for an upcoming blog??

Too much gay ol' time on their hands

Yikes!

Is it ever easy to let this blogging thing slide. First it was a couple of days, then weeks and, by then, you figure you've got to write something really provocative to justify why you haven't written anything in so long. That leads to further procrastination and, before you know it, it's been three months. By then, what's the bother of trying to share your view of the world?

Luckily, it seems this cycle can be broken. For me, it was three things that sparked me out of my cycle of blogging-funk. The first was when I woke up one morning to find that the most important threat facing the free world is that of same sex marriage defiling what some feel can only be shared between a man and a woman.

In the span of a single week in June, I witnessed State Representatives, Governors, Members of Parliament, U.S. and Canadian Senators, not to mention Bush and Harper, spending not minutes, but hours and (in some cases) days lobbying the media and public to help protect the sanctity of marriage. I even witnessed one spokesperson (although I can't for the life of me remember who) saying the destruction of the institution of marriage is as fundamental a threat to the U.S. way of life as terrorism.

Regardless of where you stand on the issue, is this really what our elected leaders should be spending their time on? Is the war on terror over? What about energy supply, aboriginal land disputes, greenhouse gases, world poverty, gun crime, affordable daycare...and even electoral reform?

As usual - and this was ultimately the final straw for me to say something about it - a comedia/pundit summed up in a few words what I've been trying to get across in my head; in his amusing collection of mini-rants, New Rules, Bill Maher said:

"Sometimes I just don’t understand this country. I don’t get that your air is poison and your job is gone and your son is scattered all over a desert you can’t find on a map, but what really matters is boys kissing."