Top Startup

It’s time to Thrive.

Amidst the financial crisis and impending fire and brimstone of the economic apocalypse (isn’t the media great), I’ve started a new chapter in my journey towards a Top Startup. Thrive.

Avi Karnani, our tenacious CEO convinced me to forgo dreams of the west coast and join the team in New York. I started in the beginning of September as the Product Manager.

What are we doing?

…we’re building the first on-line, 24/7 financial advisory for young adults. We help people in their twenties and thirties gain control over their financial lives by helping them figure out what to do with their money-aside from spending it!

The Loudwater Labs team had been hard at work with Thrive before I joined, and I’m honored to be working with such a talented group of people. The website is ready for you to use it, so try it for free and tell me what you think in the comments below.

p.s. We’re also looking for talented software engineers to join the team.

Popularity: 17% [?]

Bootstrapping 101 – take a little off the top

Bootstrapping is generally applied to self-funding your startup. However, you can use the principle to apply to any facet of your life. Bootstrapping helps you identify and eliminate waste. It forces you to make hard decisions on what’s really important and what isn’t. Whether you’re starting a business, trying to get your finances in order or save for retirement. There are times when anyone will want to bootstrap. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 17% [?]

Better bus service to New York with Wifi

I recently wrote about taking Greyhound rather than the Fung Wah to New York. Believe it or not, there is an even better option. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 11% [?]

Greyhound matches Fung Wah for cheap fares to New York

At a secret part of the website, only found by searching for “esavers greyhound” on google, you can find cheap fares for greyhound to NYC.

Unfortunately, I can’t afford to fly like those damn consultants I hung out with the other night. Nor can I justify the price for the luxury bus from boston to new york. I also value my life, so I wont take Fung Wah. I’ll take Greyhound!

Popularity: 11% [?]

Take over the world using Amazon AWS

Amazon is making an infrastructure play that will rule the web.

Web 1.0 was all about buying 100 servers and having your own techs in data centers. How big was your rack? Companies today are moving to VPS providers like Slicehost. VPS have a fantastic role in providing hosting for your small to medium site (like this one). But what about if you want to build the next facebook? One of the presenters at Amazon’s AWS event “The Start-up Project” showed us this chart: Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 11% [?]

Skype – Software for business people in startups

Unless you’re living under a rock, you know Skype. Skype lets you call other people free using your computer. Im going to show you some ways to use Skype in your startup to maximize your effectiveness. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 21% [?]

If its broke, don’t scale it!

Im reading the 4-hour work week by Timothy Ferriss. Seth Godin recently touched upon a point Tim Ferriss talked about in 4HWW. Tim used a quote by the infamous Bill Gates to explain it. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 9% [?]

When food is fuel.

Let’s face it, you don’t run a Boeing 747 on regular unleaded*. The damn thing wouldn’t fly! You don’t run an entrepreneur on McDonald’s either. You just can’t get the energy from a greasy burger, fries and soda to build a new company.

Eating Right

You can save money on office supplies, clothing, drinking, women, but don’t skimp on fresh food!

When at the supermarket, your best bet is to buy lots of fruits and vegetables and make your own meals. If you can’t cook (you should learn), try and stay away from the frozen food that is heavy in potatoes, pasta and other starchy carbs. Smart Ones has many options that skip the starch for green veggies. Also, try different things out to see how they make you feel. Personally, I feel better when I substitute rice for wheat. Accordingly, I prefer to eat rice cakes instead of bread. I substitute oatmeal instead of a wheat based cereal. Quinoa is another great alternative grain to have with meals. It’s higher in protein than wheat and has a balanced set of amino acids! Now that your belly is full, we’re moving on to jump-starting your mind.

Brain enhancing drugs

We all need to perk up and switch our brains on now and then. For an alternative to coffee, try Yerba Mate. Mate is a great alternative to coffee that doesn’t make your breath or pee strange. I usually drink it with honey and milk. My colleague Ryan seems to drink a lot of sugar free red bull, but that makes me feel a little too wired. If you do opt for coffee, I saw on the today show that unfiltered coffee (aka the expensive stuff) causes high cholesterol.

Eating out

This is the hard one to do well. Generally, it is hard to eat balanced on the cheap when eating out. Generally, I try and avoid eating out because of it. My budget for a meal out is generally $10 a head or less (which is also what I would be willing to spend on a good meal at home). Occasionally, we go out for a nice dinner. You can take a look at the places I like to go on my Yelp! profile. Also, to see where I head when Im too lazy to cook, check out my Cheap Eats list for boston!

*Speaking of flying, I just got in to London this morning and was met by my dad and good friend Shawn at the airport. We grabbed some breakfast at the airport and it was then proven to me that it is STILL possible to get bad food in England. It was one of these british chains – the name slips my memory. I got the traditional english breakfast – fried egg, bacon, sausage, tomato, mushrooms (It was terrible). So, the point is – do as I say, not as I do!

Popularity: 7% [?]

Send a fax for free

If you can stomach having an advertisement on the cover page, check out FaxZero to fax for free! The service allows you to send a fax to anyone in the united states or canada and even attach a PDF or Word document to send to the recipient.

On another note, if you need to combine two PDFs on your mac, check out this hint on how to do it using Automator

Popularity: 7% [?]

A dollar fifty in late charges at the public library

We’ve received good advice from many people on books we should be reading. Books are expensive, and this advice will save you money. It is rather obvious, but I wasn’t taking my own advice (I love amazon!).

Quote from good will hunting (said with Boston accent)

you dropped a hundred and fifty grand on a f***in’ education you coulda’ got for a dollar fifty in late charges at the public library.

Unless your startup is rolling in the dough, get a library card. The library has a wealth of books – especially in larger and academic cities like Boston. Use these resources to get the knowledge you lack without forking over dough.

Popularity: 7% [?]