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Having great networking skills can do wonders for your career. Or so I’m told, since I don’t claim to have any notable skills in that area.

 Here’s a great post with tips on networking, How to Work The Room.

One tip I would add to the list is: try to remember the name of the person you’re speaking with, even though you’ve already forgotten it.

Business is easy. I learned all about it on stage in the dingy haze of rock clubs. Let’s picture a business personified as a rock band… 

Sales reps are singers. They are your company’s public face. They get (and take) most of the credit. They are prima donnas, prone to tantrums when things don’t go their way. The rest of the band kind of resents them, and likes to spout off that ‘anyone could do that’, but let’s face it… if you could sing, you’d be a singer.

Marketing people are guitar players. They create the catchy licks, they establish the tone, and they give the singer something to spout off about.

Accountants are bass players. It’s not always apparent what they’re doing, unless you really pay attention. But the moment they stop, everything falls apart.

Engineers are drummers. They set (and keep) the pace, and they determine whether you finish in time, out of time, or early. If the show goes down to flames, you always blame the drummer first.

Bosses are managers. They collect a disproportionate amount of the profits, contribute little of value, and if things head south, they’ll skip out on you in a heartbeat and go work with another group.

Production workers are roadies. No disrespect intended! They are the unappreciated VIPs whose efforts determine whether the show goes on or crashes and burns. If it does flop, they’re the first ones to get canned. Nothing happens without them; it’s not like the singer is going to break a sweat hauling amplifiers.

Your customers are the audience. It’s all about the audience. They buy the tickets and pay for the whole shebang. If they like you, you’re on your way. If they don’t, pack it in. You should figure out what kind of a mood they’re in before the show, so that you can play a few tunes they like. Maybe hold off on the Mr. Robato covers until you get to Tokyo.

Coffee is beer. It lubricates the whole creative process. Have some more to keep the ideas flowing.

Before opting for any ip phone service, it is important to know if your internet telephone service is compatible with your host. Once off that issue, voip can be used to its fullest. For business voip is of utmost importance. This is why every internet phone provider deals with its serious clientele in a different manner. For personal users, skype phone also works as the best internet phone.

And lo it was written:

In those days it will be as if all the nations of the world were at war, and men shall wipe the sweat from their brow and cry out: “It is warm, and getting warmer”. But their women shall hear them not, as static shall intervene and corrupt the menfolk’s calls.

But it is then that he whom has been foretold, Jobs, the resident of Infinity Loop, shall emerge from the hallowed halls with the One device to save them all. It shall gleam and glisten in the light, It shall brighten the dark corners of men’s minds, It shall promise better communion with the bearer’s acquaintances, not to mention the facilitation of physical relations with they of the Hottie-tites. He who bears the One shall be adored by the Fanboy-tites and the Gadget-tites, and shall reap the benefits sown by the Mega-bites.

Cry ye out in joy at the appearance of the One, and pray that ye be graced with Its presence, when ye shall call out to your loved ones in rapture.

Regular readers of this blog (hi Mom!) may recall a post I did a few months ago titled 3 ways to create attention-getting copy, where I talked about how people seem to love lists, and seem to be irresistably drawn to lists of things. Once you see the title ‘Top 10 ways to do such-and-such’, you just HAVE to read the rest.

Well I just learned of a social networking website which is 100% designed around a) the gravitational pull of lists, and b) people’s innate need to share their lists with others.

It’s called Meosphere. Here’s the concept: you make lists of stuff. Any kind of stuff, places you’ve been, things you’d like to do. You share your lists with others, and you check out their lists. That’s pretty much it.

And in this strange web 2.0 bizarro world of ours, the people behind this site are likely soon destined to be kabillionaires. With their soon-to-be received billions of dollars, I hope the meosphere folks spend a few bucks working on their interface, because it’s a little strange. Based on my thorough 2 minutes of research, you can’t do some of the things you would think you could, like see a list of people who have completed the same list as you.

And you can ’share’ your meosphere, but it apparently has to open as a pdf. What’s up with that? Everyone should have a dedicated html page for each of their lists– these guys would have a billion pages out there for Google to index in no time. But the kernel of the idea behind this site is great. If you’d like you can check out my ‘meosphere’:

Lots of articles floating around lately touching on a) rise of the open source movement, and b) move away from patents. I read one article talking about how the patent office is starting to take a more restrictive view of patent applications, the gist being that it’s going to be hard to lock up your ideas with a patent.

I think one very good question is: is open source limited solely to internet/software-related ventures, or can it extend into the bricks and mortar world? Open source pharmaceuticals, anyone? Along these lines, here’s an interesting article I came across, might stir up some thoughts in that direction: Open Source Life: How the open movement will change everything.

I’ll probably have more to say on this down the road since I’m still thinking about the possibilities, but it seems like open source could add value beyond the virtual world. It’s certainly worth keeping an eye on if your livelihood depends on intellectual property.