Memories

Sometimes a single incident sparks so many memories. I was invited to be bestman at a friends wedding. The feeling was rather overwhelming. It is not often that I feel overwhelmed. The times I spent with the two friends, now getting married, rank amongst the best times of life.

It also reminded me of a friend that I have not spoken to in a long time. I should make a call soon...

Long Night

Another long start-up night. We finally fixed the referral bug close to 6am, but this was an important issue for some builders of the community and they felt strongly about it. We got it done :)

Thanksgiving day, here's wishing all celebrating a great time.

We have some great AGLOCO fans out there already...this makes it worth the long nights :)

www.johnchow.com

thanks to all the fans...

AGLOCO goes live

AGLOCO went live and indeed there are supporters and haters alike :) not many start-ups receive so much attention when they launch :)

Sign-ups are coming in strong and things just get busier now :)...

sleep? what's that then ?

The time is nigh

Its nearly 2am as I write this post. The team is wide awake and pounding away...there is no sleep tonight...

come daylight.....

Start up hours

We were up till 3 am...A pizza lunch, a Chinese dinner and tons of diet soda later we called it a night and decided to get some rest...launching in two languages at the same time is tough...the table was strewn with a dozen laptops and a desktop (we were working out of the house I currently share with Brian, Javier and Nick).

Carl came over with some sandwiches this afternoon...these were well received :)

work continues we are pushing our tech guys and making sure that all the odds and ends are tied up...

Stanford Business School

Stanford Business School magazine Quote:



"If nobody's saying bad things about you, you must not be doing anything important."

these words ring true for the AGLOCO team right now....

Venture World

Meetings with VC's are always good, because at some point a start-up needs funding :) right now the VC's have started to circle around AGLOCO. Meeting requests are coming in and life is in overdrive...

Start-up life

When a company is in the idea and development phase, its always interesting to see who comes on board and how the chaotic environment affects them. Some people just can't stand the lack of structure and drop out, others take to it like fish in water.

Sometimes when what you do can potentially affect millions of people positively, the sheer thrill of anticipation before launch can keep you working otherwise unrealistic hours.

I am part of a team that's working on www.agloco.com - personally I have had a great time workng with the team and though the midnight lamp burns often...its worth it.

Phone calls should be Free

Interesting comments by Google CEO.....If ads can make your phone calls free....there is a lot of value on the Internet...I shall comment more soon enough..... :)

"Your mobile phone should be free," Schmidt told Reuters. "It just makes
sense that subsidies should increase" as advertising rises on mobile phones.

He was interviewed following a speech on the theme of business innovation
organized by Italian student groups and the Graduate School of Business at
Stanford University.

Schmidt also said his company was working on how to allow users to maintain
basic control of their personal data.

Currently, Google stores consumer data on hundreds of thousands of its own
computers in order to provide additional services to individual users. The
company is looking to allow consumers to export their Web search history or
e-mail archives and move them to other sites, if they so choose.

"We are working to ensure that as long as it is yours, we want to give you
the equivalent of number portability," Schmidt said at another conference
earlier this week. Portability is a government-mandated program that allows
consumers to retain their mobile phone numbers when they switch carriers.

This undertaking is both a recognition of users' right to control their
personal information, an effort to head off regulatory action and a response
to an increasing trend on the Internet toward openness rather than
exclusivity, he said.

"Data should never be held hostage. We might as well get ahead of it before
a law gets passed forcing us to do that."

Tech blues

Our tech team has done a great job so far, especially since we keep throwing challanges at them.....sometimes though reality comes through when they say NO you cant have that right now...makes you want to say hey I will give you my liver for that one :)

Countdown

The team did a lot of work over the weekend....we now are so close to launch everyone is both excited and nervous. Start ups are interesting creatures, especially Internet ones....you never really know what will happen....

and it begins

Finally! Since AGLOCO will probably attract a lot of attention, I decided to start a blog.

I will probably write more on the company blog than on this one, but who knows :)

stay tuned....or not....