New blog application

Hey, Just found a new blog aplication (Thank you Iain for the tips!), which looks brilliant.

I'll give it a try. It is in perl (never used it before). As soon as I get a crack on it, I write a little tutorial to let you set it up easily too.

In the same time, you can check the site out : www.movabletype.org

Microsoft and Google - same colours!

I was running an adwords report today .. when.. all of a sudden - Well, just see by yourselves :



Intriguing isn't it ...

creatmosphere

Just created a new blog for my Friend Laurent : creatmosphere. Just amazing how easy it is to set it up, change the style and design ... and explain to a novice how to update his own blog!
 
His logo is quite cool too :
 

 
pppfu, I need to finish my logo for my business cards! Just uploaded photoshop CS, will give it a try - £100 for 500 business cards (London). Not too bad he - and who gave me the tips : Laurent from Creatmosphere ;-)

Business Thoughts

This week has been one of the "plaque tournante" for the Jazar business. We have started defining the business plan ... basically how we will make money!
 
Here is the plan for all the new internet projects we will develop in the future:

1. 30% go to Jazar (20% for charges, 5% for administration, 5% to R&D)
   
2. 10% do to Olivier as royalties for the system he has built from scratch, the current Jazar's flagship!
   
3. The rest (65%) go to the different players having a role to play in the project : Sales,  Webdesigners, Web architects, Designers, Testers, etc ...

You'll tell me : and the profit - well, no profit this year : we just make sure that we are profitable from day 1, and that the cost we agree with the client covers the resources cost.
 
The funny point is that our salary then depends on how much sales can make out of the deal + how much time each has spent on the project - kinda communist way to distribute revenue :
 
X = amount paid by the client
Y = total number of hours spent on the project
 
=> hourly rate = X/Y - commission on sale
 
x = number of hours I have worked => I then get x * (X/Y - commission on sale).
 
Now just think about it - most of you will tell me - this doesn't work, people don't work well if they don't receive an incentive on what they do. What prevents me to say that have worked 20 hours instead of 10? Sales may sell something too cheap, which would give an hourly rate to low?
 
Well, the answer to the first question is: you don't work for Jazar, we recruit only genuine people and make sure they don't think this way - the moto at Jazar is: we make money with others, not against others.
 
The answer to the question is that if you trust your people in a first place, everything is then down to the process. And to improve the process, you need first to test it. It will improve by itself, as long as you make sure that you measure everything from the beginning => project management, testing, etc ... is as important as the developement itself since it is the only way to enhance the production process. 
 
This is not more complicated than that. As long as you keep the right people, and an eye on your process, all you need is then ... to sell.

Advice for designers

I have been to see Rachid yesterday, the owner of "La menara restaurant".

I came with my laptop and a first design for his website.

He had given me a few example of websites he liked. And given the quality of these websites...I was pretty confident : he would be amazed by the design I was about to show him.

Well, fortunately I had not spent that much time on it - defined:
1) The layout (monitored by CSS)
2) 4 master colors (monitored from the CSS too - very classy - deep browns combined with ivory and black)
3) navigation

He was not very happy by the color - We have changed them on the fly. So far...so good. But I made a mistake. The mistake I will never do again : feeling an excess of modesty, I admited that it would probably not look as good as if we had hired a professionnal designer ....

MIS-TA-KE!!!!!

He will now keep that in the back of his head, and whatever I come up with, he will never feel completely satisfied.

Advice : never turn yourself down. If the guy is looking for a very high quality work, he will look around anyway, and compare your portfolio with others. You need to do the same! You need to look out there, and compare the work you can provide with what can provide others.
You have got a "market value", and whatever you can provide, you have to know the value of the "work" you can produce.

Sex as the best indicator on the Web

Just a thought today - how hard is it to find free sex pictures/movies on internet now.

I wanted to test a few "traffic channels" being as dumb as possible and searching for "sex", single keyword. (you know what I mean. If I look for "sex", you cannot be mistaken: I am looking for free porn video/pictures)

1) DMOZ



I chose dmoz to stand for free and reliable internet directories.
- Society: Crime: Sex Offenses (98 matches)
- Adult: Image Galleries: Hardcore: Free: F (107)
- Adult: Image Galleries: Hardcore: Free: A (81)
- Adult: Image Galleries: Hardcore: Free: H (79)
- Adult: Image Galleries: Variety: Free: F (81)

4 Adults sections out of 5 ... too bad for people looking for "safe sex advices" for instance, and only commercial sites listed in the other categories!

=> Dmoz = 0/10

2) Google



I chose google to stand for free and reliable search engines.
The first 5 results were :

The Safer Sex Page... N-Nitrosamine & Condoms. The chemical bath that is sex gets "richer" all the time. With the incipient removal of Nonoxynol-9 from ...
www.safersex.org - 101k - 7 Jul 2004 - Cached - Similar pages


SEX, ETC. -- A Web site by Teens for Teens... & All of Its Parts Puberty Circumcision Erections/Ejaculation Common Problems Going to a Doctor Kissing Masturbation Orgasms Touching Virginity Kinds of Sex, ...
www.sxetc.org - 81k - 7 Jul 2004 - Cached - Similar pages


HBO: Sex and the CitySex and the City. Sex and the City can now be seen on TBS. ... The Look, The Look UPDATED! Browse fashions from all six seasons of Sex and the City. ...
www.hbo.com/city/- 34k - 7 Jul 2004 - Cached - Similar pages


Sex Pistols - God Save The Sex PistolsSex Pistols the definitive history and latest news of the finest Punk Rock band ever. God Save The Sex Pistols.. the full story and ...
www.sex-pistols.net// - 5k - Cached - Similar pages


Salon Directory... The Salon Directory | Sex, 1089 articles. ... Sex, articles 1 - 13 of 1089 (Next), Filter this topic: This thick excitement The town-hall ...
http://www.salon.com/sex/ - Similar pages

as you can see, a wide range of results, from directories, to tv series (sex & the city), or safe sex products. nothing porn - the opposite of dmoz! not what I was looking for either. but at least some sort of choice is there

3/10

3) www.blogarama.com/



I chose blogarama to stand for free and reliable blogs directory.
The first 5 results were :

Mistress of Mind
"Before you criticize someone you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, you're a mile away and you have their shoes."
Category: Observations - Country: United States
mythoughtsexactly.blogspot.com - Reviews - No Ratings Yet

MilkandCookies.com
An archive of memes for disturbing geeks about sex machines, pop culture, anti christ religions, humor cults, joke news, open source stuff, security, technology, sarcasm and toilet humor.
Category: Community Blogs - Country: United States
www.milkandcookies.com/ - Reviews - No Ratings Yet

Sex Blogger
Rants, opinions, advice, reviews, Blogger Babes, photo galleries, erotic stories and sexual adventures of a photographer that builds adult web sites
Category: Lifestyle - Country: United States
www.sexblogger.com/ - Reviews - No Ratings Yet

Strange Erotic PhotoBlog
Strange Erotic Photos / Links
Category: Sexuality - Country: Netherlands
surrealsex.web-log.nl - Reviews - Rated 10 out of 10

BOOBblog - Boobs, blogs and sex
Sex and blogging- Boobs posted daily! Got nice boobs? Send them to BOOBblog and have them ranked and posted!
Category: Lifestyle - Country: United States
boobblog.blogspot.com - Reviews - Rated 10 out of 10
which were exactely what I was looking for :

=> 10/10

Conclusion : blogs are taking over, and all the fuss made today around google & co may vanish as fast as it started...

google's party in london

I went to the google's party last Friday... It was at the Royal Institute of British Architects, close to oxford circus.

The flyer looked promising :



To be honest, I think the party had been organised by a new graduate ... looked exactely the same as the parties we had when I was at the engineering school...

Google sticks to its moto : all the money they make go to R&D, the rest is DIY.

And to be honest again, well it was not that bad. You don't get much distraction, all you can do is getting pissed (free bar) and you don't feel sorry about it. Everybody stays for the same reason - getting drunk - or it looks like it anyway.

A few business cards exchanged, just "pour la forme", and it was 1am - time to go clubbing...