I’ve been getting lots of useful feedback from people about my business plans for Grasshopper New Media. I’m grateful for all of it. (Though I willingly admit that I think the role of Devil’s Advocate is not helpful, doesn’t add to the picnic, and gives me nothing actionable to move forward with.)
One thing I’ve noticed, and maybe I imagined this would be different, is that when you go out there pre-launch and start trying to operate, there are lots of expectations that you’ve got it all together already. For instance, we’re still working out the terms and conditions around contributions of content. I imagined this would be very similar to what happens between podcasters. We swap bits for each others’ shows all the time. Only, if I did things right, I’d find a way to get people paid for their bits. Seemed like a nice idea.
People we’re approaching to submit are (probably rightly so) very interested in terms, rights, etc. The irony, I think, is that if I’d put up one of those huge, rambling legal Terms of Service types of pages, and you had to click “Agree” to get to the next page, you probably wouldn’t read it. (Most folks, this is, including me).
Clearly, I was silly in this assumption that it’d be an extension of what we do between podcasters.
I get a lot of underground blogosphere commentary about my negative posts. The purpose of showing you everything here at [chrisbrogan.com] is to tell the story as it unfolds. That means the warts along with the shiny things. I could certainly keep this blog as an information-only resource, and maybe lots more people would find lots more of the stuff here useful. But that wasn’t the plan.
This is about self-improvement and creativity. There’s a lot of creativity required in launching a business, I’ll tell you that. I’ve had to think on my feet more often in the last several days than ever before.
So, stay around for the ride. I’m doing new things all the time. There’s all kinds of things you might find here to think about.
But please, if you’ve got thoughts and opinions on what I’m doing, try to give me something actionable. Telling me it’s not going to work is tits on the bull at this point, kids.
I love you all.