Sup Hongli

 

https://bit.ly/2I89nwk

 

 

Hong

good afternoon Hongli


https://goo.gl/YSihtc





Hong

Hi hongli

good afternoon hongli

http://asheboromotors.com/pleasant.php?well=zgkw1z32g9pxvw0




Warmest
Hong

Now 64bit Ubuntu 10.04 on Thinkpad T61

Time flies. I got my Ubuntu 9.04 last Aug now almost a year later, I just have Ubuntu 10.04 64-bit installed. (I upgraded to 9.04 from 8.10 but this 10.04 is a fresh install. Super smooth..)

Following is a list of post-installation things I have done to make Ubuntu works for me:

1. install Chinese input method.
No need to add Chinese font. Ubuntu by default displays Chinese web pages ok. You need to go through the following to add Chinese input support: Click System menu=>Preference=>iBus preference=>Input Method=>Choose Chinese Pinyin-vi (my choice) from the list then click "Add". That's it. You now can click the small keyboard icon at the top right corner to choose Chinese method.

2. install Firefox Flash plugin
Click System menu=>Admin=>Synaptic Package manager=>Search "nsplugin". Then select both Nsplugin and Flashplugin-installer. Click "Apply" to install both. Restart Firefox. Done.

Will update later if I find anything else.

KDE Ubuntu 9.04 => Gnome Ubuntu 9.04

After using Kbuntu, the Ubuntu bundled with KDE Desktop environment, for about 3 months now. I decided to switch back to the Gnome version, which I used with 8.10, 6.04.

Kbuntu is quite disappointing. A few examples:

1. the desktop widget panel is a joke. Very unstable.

2. cannot connect to hidden wifi

3. cannot apply diff resolution to my external 20" LCD monitor which support 1680x1200. Instead, it can only support 1440x1024 for my 14" thinkpad and the 20" LCD



So just reinstalled the Gnome version of Ubuntu 9.04 and here are extra steps I need to take after the installation:

1. Install VPN support
http://www.cs.umn.edu/help/offsite/vpn.php#ubuntu
aptitude -y install network-manager-vpnc vpnc

2. Install VirtualBox

3. Install must-have Firefox plugin
http://delicious.com/help/installff
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1117

4.install flash player for Firefox
http://nxadm.wordpress.com/2009/04/26/install-64-bit-adobe-flash-player-on-ubuntu-904/

A made-in-china browser

JLM Pacific Epoch said Sina is working on a in-house browser based on IE w/ help from Microsoft China...

I remember when I was working in Richsight right after college in 1998, we have a star engineer team working on a Chinese browser with funding support from China's NSF as part of the 863 project. Sadly the executives dismissed this team quick after acquring with sinanet.com to become sina.com...What a short-sighted decision...

Browser is the gate-keeper for Internet, dude!

Ubuntu 8.04=>8.10 upgrade

Steps to upgrade from Ubuntu 8.04 to 8.10:

Menu: System>Administration>Software Sources>Updates

Click the "Release upgrade" drop down menu and choose "Normal Release". Click OK to close the configuration window.



Now manually run the Update Manager and you will see the 8.10 upgrade is available. No need to backup anything. Very smooth process. Just make sure you have enough disk space to download all new packages. 5G should be enough. My total upgrade only needs two clicks to confirm the replacement of few config file under /etc I've changed. That's it. Total progress pretty much depends on your Internet speed to download 1000+ new packages...

ByeBye Babson

Really a post I should write months earlier. I've graduated from Babson full-time MBA program in May, 2008. Now I am working in a promising startup in San Francisco area as Sr. Product Manager.

It's a pity I was not be able to launch a startup with my pal at Babson before the graduation. But I am happy to be still within the startup world. Just make a one-step plan a two-step one...

Thank you for visiting this blog! I may not update this blog since my Babson journey is over.

Welcome to msg me at twitter

It's better than email...

Test the Group Blogging feature of Blogger.com

OK. See it works. Blogger.com or Google Blog allows :

Your blog can have up to 100 authors.

Cool thing.

But the only limitation is, quite obviously, that every of those 100 authors must have a google account to be able to login.

How Net-Temps can improve its CrossRoads career newsletter

Though  Net-Temps.com hasn't find much Product Manager opening I am looking for, or at least Indeed search engine hasn't any from it, it does send weekly "Crossroads Jobseeker News" email with many interesting articles (even though mainly serving the advertising purpose for many recruiting consultants and firms).

Since I am searching opening as Product Manager, I've found a few things Net-Temps can improve its Email Product:

1. Change the title of each article from default "Crossroads Newsletter and Career Development Center" to the ACTUAL title of each article. This will not only help reader like me to search previous article from Firefox History much easier (from usability perspective) but also improve search engine ranking (from SEM/SEO perspective) and better ROI for its consultant customers so a higher fee or more customer may sign up (from Revenue perspective).

click the following two links and you know what I mean:
http://www.net-temps.com/adcgi/banner.cgi?ref=crnews&ch=2898&id=crs_2898
http://www.net-temps.com/adcgi/banner.cgi?ref=crnews&ch=2899&id=crs_2899


2.  Increase the integration with consultant customer's website

Take this article for example, "How to Avoid Laundry List Resumes". Like many other articles from Net-Temps, at the end of article, it will display a link to consultant's website and a brief intro of the service.

It's OK but why doesn't make it better? At the end of this article, it reads:

Heather Eagar is a former professional resume writer who provides job seekers with current, reliable and effective job search tools and information. Compare top resume writing services to find the best one for you at www.resumelines.com.


Cool but I may only become Heather's client if I do click the link to her website. But why should I click the link? Because I am searching job? That's a too-naive assumption. Rather, maybe Net-Temps can display a simplified version of the comparison chart at the end of this article. Just like a free trial, if a reader can see what it is, the chance to click will be greatly increased. How much %? Not sure but that's also part of Product Manager's job, is it? Creating a series test to see the best approach.

3. Shorten steps to acquire a potential customer/buyer

At this article, Soaring On Your Strengths Lands the BIG Job ,Robin Ryan is trying to sell his newest book "Soaring on Your Strengths.". And at the end of this article, his personal website, www.robinryan.com, is logically provided. So the purpose of this article is really to bring potential buyer of his book to there. I didn't visit his website at all but could imagine some marketing practices may be adopted there such as offering a chapter to dowload for free (too bad if he doesn't)... But if the possibility for a visitor to buy his book is highly correlated to the dowload of the free chapter, then why not offer the download link directly here at the bottom of this Net-Temps article? After all, the purpose is to SELL the book but NOT adding one more visitor.

There are a few more areas I think can be improved but I have to stop my creative mind here as a Product manager but back to the process of searching a Product Manager role. Sadly, after checking current opening at Net-temps corporation, there is no Product Manager opening...

Technorati Tags     career,book,job,manager,product,ryan,net-temps,robin

2008 Babson College Entrepreneurship Research Conference at UNC Chapel Hill

Seems most posts after graduation here are recovering things happened earlier. Nonetheless, this one is talk about the 2008 Babson College Entrepreneurship Research Conference at UNC Chapel Hill from 06/03 to 06/07 this year.

My fellowship professors at Babson College, Bill Bygrave and Julian Lange, are kind enough to put my name at a research paper that I've worked for as a research fellow at Blank Center of Babson College.

It's a very unique conference. First of the kind to me. Definitely I was the only one there with a master degree but not in a Ph.D program.  There are a large turn out of Chinese scholar and Ph.D students. Surprisingly, female was in a dominant position of Ph.D student, percentage wise. The only male Chinese Ph.D student is from Syracuse University who is originally from Taiwan with startup experience.

My biggest surprise is how far from or how little interest many academic researchers have from the real entrepreneurship activities, or connect with the real startup world. Bplan related research is one of the biggest example for it.


For those of you haven't been such a conference before, here is a list of materials from the conference:

2008 BCERC-1- UNC Schedule.pdf 


2008 BCERC-2- UNC Doctoral Consortium.pdf


2008 BCERC-3- UNC Conference Summaries.pdf

2008 BCERC-5- UNC Conference Directory.pdf  

2008 BCERC-4- UNC Authors & Titles.pdf


This conference is sponsored by Kauffman Foundation and UNC at Chapel Hill

Btw, I also think BCERC could use a service like Box.net to store/distribute above pdf files without bothering with CD. Less cost. Less waste. But may not be good for Mixonic I've interviewed at SF.


Technorati Tags     entrepreneurship,phd,unc,conference,babson,bcerc,kauffman

Trip planning for 2nd California interview trip and Micro-Economy thought deriviated from it

Just spent about 2 hours to figure out how to take public transportation in San Jose area using, Google Transit, and The trip planner offered by 511 Transit for Bay area.
Why? because I was shocked that Car rental companies want to charge me for $150 for a 2-day rental while I only paid $171 in total for an one-week rental just two weeks ago. Rip me off, eh?

But finally, I've figured out how to do so, to travel between San Jose Airport and My friend's place in Cupertino, as well as between my friend's place in Cupertino and Redwood Shore that my 2nd round interview will be held.

What's the ROI? So assume a typical hourly rate for a recent MBA graduate like me is $25/hour (can also be $0 since I dont have a job yet), so 2 hour is $50 and the public expense is by caltrain is about $5.75x2=$11.5 + bus fare so about $70 in total which gives me a 30% saving.

Then, will it be good to get the same result from people living in the Bay area? Yahoo! Answers is cool but not real time and  you don't know what you will get since it's a free service. Calling friend is another option but not helpful as most are driving. Ideally, there should be  marketplace of micro-economy that serving those small needs. I am happy to pay $5 to get a detailed How-To for my need, which is very much like what Marin had described before as an idea. (He is smart!)


Anyway, get ready to go back to California for the 2nd time in



Technorati Tags     job,travel,interview,jose,san,california,caltrain

Trip in the Valley -05/26

(some posts I want to write way earlier but almost no time during my trip in the Silicon Valley two weeks ago. so tired everyday after meeting 3 to 5 people then got K's place at 9 something...But it's a great memory so I am rebuilding my trip with the  help of my Google Calendar)


So I am in the Silicon Valley now. Sitting in the starbucks at Cupertino for its paid wireless service. Ironically, I cannot find a free wifi from my friend's neighbourhood after the Verizon technican accidentanlly disabled his phone and DSL service though he is just asking for disabeling the phone service so that he can switch to 100% IP phone service. So how much productivity I am loosing because of that? I could be an amazing number if we add from all the other people facing similiar problem. Maybe that'd be big enough to persuade city hall to push forward the free citi-wifi program but it also may be the reason for carriers such as Verizon to use to defend their hostile against those program internally. If the city hall understand how important it is, they should do it definitely. I am also wondering if every other region wants to duplicate a similar or something close to Silicon Valley's success, they should focus on building a world-class infrastructure service first. Wifi/WiMax everywhere. waive tax on "enabler" devices (or more accurately, platform devices) such as iPhone or XBOX 360/PS 3 game console. Why? Because those devices can create a enough demand for a new starutp. It's stupid to treat those as treating dumb electronics such as microwave or toast. How much new service can 100,000 microwave generate? But 100,000 iPhone may be good enough to support a iPhone game company to develop something...

Anyway, today's plan is to meet Su from HP and Zhu who had own startup in the Bay area. I am having lunch with Su's family and it's a very nice thing. He is happy to refer me to some opening position at HP and I very appreciated. (Update: I do receive email from HP HR division for a follow up talk but my first reply seems missed the point. anyway, back to this later when I blog about my lunch with Kent from Pond Ventures). Zhu is also looking for good opportunities to monetize his patent in the mobile video area and checking possibility to do it in China. My comment is maybe can do something to improve user experience with his patent.

(Two meeting today but then later on you and me will realize it's  a very "light" day!)

Technorati Tags     valley,cupertino,califronia,silicon

Trip in the Valley - 05/25

Starbucks at Cupertino Village is just too crowd so I have to sit outside in my rented car around Starbucks to continue using the Tmobile Internet we just paid. Sitting inside my car with two laptops on mademes me feel like two hackers trying to crack the starbucks wifi here.

Then I strongly wish that Clearwire/Spring can make the pan-US WiMax network happen asap, esp. after they got $1B funding from Google, Intel and etc. That's such a nice move and will help every such strategic investor to gain significant leverage in the market. The WiMax will just make B2C wifi device manufactures such as NetGear, LinkSys etc an irrelevant player because no wireless router needed at every home. No need to search/pay for wifi network like what we are doing. No need to buy/install/download various wifi USB adapors. Wow. The get-rid-of-linksys reminds me a cool saying I read from Paul Graham's post: Startup redefine the problem to make status quo irrelevant. So this will also make Qualcomm irrelevant so Nokia etc may integrate Intel's WiMax chips into mobile directly.

WiMax aside, yesterday I'd met two (group) of people in this Cupertino Village. J is talking about an investment opportunity in China and I wish him the best luck. He also talked about the missed opportunity for him to help EA exploring the online game market. Every opportunity has a window and the fast pacing just make every window smaller and smaller. Less and Less time for all of us to wait for a "better" time which usually means less risk.  There are always people want to take more risk than us such as younger, or single (vs. married), linving in rented place (vs. on mortgage) etc. Wait is ok but if the wait will not create any additional value for the opportunity, we lost the opportunity.

Z and G are a team trying to explore the opportunity in the wirelees space. We talked a lot about the most reasonable path to get started for a pure engineer team like them. Three typical risks need to be addressed regardless from investor's or entrepreneur's point of view are technology risk, market risk and management risk which I list in a series of importance for such an engineer team. (Again, entrepreneur and investor like VC are no difference. Entrepreneur invests time and opportunity cost such as resigning from current job. VCs invest in money and network/experience. No one wants to waste time on a bad idea. Pardon the ego.) Alwayse focus on the point where a founding team can demonstrate the most strengthen/value. So an engineer team should not (IMHO) focus on write biz plan, building financial forecast etc. Why? because at the end, the financial forecast will be very likely laughable since you may never have the experience to do so before. And that won't be the point VC may want to check either. Rather, an engineer team may focus on developing a demo to address the technical challenge they identified. Then using own contact in the industry to validate the market need which is the MOST important here for the investors. VCs may not understand the technology but they clearly see the business opportunity when the potential customer, say Verizon here, said yes we are having this difficulty that affects $100M worth revenue and would like to give this technology a try.


Looking forward to meeting more people in my calendar!

Notes taken from Boston Harbor Angels

I was sitting in the monthly meeting of Boston Harbor Angels, a leading angel group at Boston area that hosts monthly meeting at Babson College. The meeting is invitation-only but they give guests invited by Babson or other members opportunity to audit the meeting twice. For those of you from Babson that wants to enter VC industry then remember the managing director of BHA is a Babson MBA alum, Aleksandar Mollov.

 

 

So during the meeting I had talked with couple of angels about the current status of angel investment in China and their take for investment opportunities there. Feedbacks are:

 

Candida Brush, Director of Blank Center for Entrepreneurship at Babson College

- Usually angels invest around $20K-$50K of this group, how much money you want to raise from agenl investors may bring a lot of investors to deal with

- Should talk to Professor

Jeffrey E. Sohlis Director of the Center for Venture Research and Professor of Entrepreneurship and Decision Sciences at the Whittemore School of Business at University of New Hamphsire - Resources: Angel Capital Association and Angel Capital Education Foundation   Ben Littauer, Founder, President, and CTO of Baranof Software 1990 – 1997. Self-funded, profitable from year two. Sold to Tally Systems. - Angels want to be close with their portfolios to be actively involved so China is too far away - Angels want to leverage their knowledge/network for their portfolios but few angels have intl. experience - Regulation risks? For US foreigners invest in oversea and in China? - Your advisory board will be as attractive as the fund and GPs   Others I'd talked to include:     Ronald Murphy, VP of STDMED, rmurphy at stdmed com - We are raising a $50-$100M venture fund now with in-house research & development & manufacture capacity to fund ideas in the life science field   Andrew Stern, astern911 at comcast net - "An agressive angel investor"   Martin Lowenthal, martin.lowenthal yahoo com - the angel member with the most international experience and background     Update of 2008 ACA Summit at San Diego, CA hosted by Angel Capital Association - Angel investors can only succeed with a portfolio including certain number of companies. less than 8 is very likely to loose money, 8-10 is reasonable return, for spectectular return need to be around 25 or more   Conclusion? - Angel investors in the US may not be the right group to approach but US angels in China could be the best target

Also seems the Boston Harbor Angels is strengthening the tie with Babson. In the meeting, I see a team of 7 first-year Babson MBA student from the VC/PE club is auditing the meeting and will help pre-screening bplans received.

Technorati Tags     aa,brush,babson,boston,angel,BHA,sohl,littauer

Three Upgrades, Two results: Ubuntu, Virtual Box and Firefox

Recently I had made two significant upgrade for my laptop. One is to upgrade Ubuntu Linux from 7.10 to 8.04 and the other is upgrade Firefox 2 to Firefox 3. Since I almost spent 99% of my time on those two piece of software, it's very significant. Turn out to be very different experience.

Firefox 3 even though still in beta stage, it works perfect. Firefox 2 is a memory hog  and I tried to switch to Opera browser but weren't satisified so have to stick with Firefox 2. Now the firefox 3 is a great product. It's not only much faster but also has a much improved user interface and experience. One thing I love the most is even though sometimes I have to power off my laptop abruptively, Firefox 3 can remember any text I'd input in an unsaved web form. You will be very grateful as I do if you know what I am talkinga bout.


On the other hand, Ubuntu 8.04 is quite disappoining. Namely, it sometimes cannot resume after  I hibernate the laptop. It just hang there after I power up so I have to power off and reboot. What a joke!

At last my upgrade of the virtulization software, Virtual Box from Sun (originally Innotek a Germany company), from 1.5.6 to 1.6 is another bad experience. It cannot enter full screen mode and has difficult to recorgnize my USB keyboard and Mouse.


I understand there maybe some solution to play around with whatever configuration files which is an essential experience with Linux but Ubuntu 7.10 overall is much better a product than 8.0.4.



Technorati Tags     linux,firefox,sun,virtual,Ubuntu,virtualbox,innotek

Where is Del.icio.us plugin for Firefox 3?

I am using Firefox 3 beta for a few weeks and still cannot see updated Del.icio.us plugin from yahoo for Firefox 3. Why? Everyone including developers is pay attention to who will be the next buyer of Yahoo?

It's so sad to see that it's someone else but NOT Yahoo! developed the newest plugin for Firefox 3. Is this what Usmair called death of innovation after promising startups acquired by big guys?

Technorati Tags     yahoo,firefox,plugin,del.icio.us,bookmark

Advertising opportunity in China and more

This is my reply to a recent email from the SVCEF (Silicon Valley Chinese Entrepreneur Forum) mailing list and thought someone may like to read it here. The topic is about advertising opportunities in China.


I would only want to convince all advertisers using AllYes (one of the largest ad network in China, imagine its advertising.com ) now to my platform if my startup can bring clea additinal value to those advertisers. Or put this way, I'd only want to start a company if I am sure this company can bring additional value to advertisers than what AllYes/DoubleClick can offer today. That value should include switch cost for advertisers etc so at the end if my startup can save advertiser $1M per year for the same result by using Allyes or additionally $1M sales by investing same amount of ad $, then I would feel confident to charge a percentage of whatever $1M - 2 x switch cost that equal to.

Behavioral targeting technology, IMHO, is ultimately the data play. Baidu/Google keyword ad is already behavioral targeting technology. Because it display relevant ad based on our behavior (search keyword or URL we are visiting). Their advantage is the huge amount of data that they can run millions of statistics model analysis like using SPSS/SAS which any startup will find very difficult to compete with in terms of efficiency.

That's why Google want to digitalize all books/magazines whatever offline. Because without having those data, Google is just a F22 on the ground running out of fuel. And that's where the opportunity is in terms of offline.

Nokia finally wakes up to formalize its mobile strategy to reinvent itself to be a mobile-centric Google. Google never could get those billiosn of SMS data from China Mobile/Verizon/BT etc but Nokia etc could. Regardless privacy concern, Nokia can easily tap into this Mobile Adword market.


So where is Data? then there is the opportunity.



Technorati Tags     advertising,china,data,svcef

How seriously assumption can impact your life, career and business

Reading a nice HBS paper, "The Real Reason People Won't Change",The Real Reason People Won't Change", for my last Negotiation class with Prof. Landry. It's about the psychologic reason why people are not making changes that they committed to. I found out it's very interesting to read it would apply to any startup/entrepreneur very well. The article said:

 

"

But competing commitments should not be seen as

weaknesses. They represent some version of self-protection,

a perfectly natural and reasonable human impulse.

The question is, if competing commitments are a form of

self-protection, what are people protecting themselves

from? The answers usually lie in what we call their big

assumptions - deeply rooted beliefs about themselves and

the world around them. These assumptions put an order

to the world and at the same time suggest ways in which

the world can go out of order. Competing commitments

arise from these assumptions, driving behaviors unwittingly

designed to keep the picture intact.

People rarely realize they hold big assumptions because,

quite simply, they accept them as reality. Often formed long

ago and seldom, if ever, critically examined, big assumptions

are woven into the very fabric of people's existence.

"

And that's why many times people are passing great opportunities for a startup. Because they accept the reality without thinking the possibility to chance it and the potential outcome that change may bring. Actually, this is also why people call successful startup "disruptive". It's not that disruptive in terms of business/service but disruptive because it changed many people's assumption: oh, I have to pay for expensive telephone service to make international phone call. Then with Skype, you do not.

 

This has the same meaning but just in a different way to explain my belief of "take nothing for granted". If you don't think this way, you may never be able to start a company.

Technorati Tags     course,babson,mba,landry,negotiation

Funding Raising for NGO 2.0

Found this very interesting presentation about fund raising. Not for venture funding for but NGO. Even so, worth a reading.

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Technorati Tags     ngo,slideshare