Aardvark

Bruce Simpson · Site Admin Joined: 02 Jan 2005 Posts: 6060

This column is archived at: http://aardvark.co.nz/daily/2008/0516.shtml

What do you think of start-up.co.nz?

Do you make good use of your server's error (and other) logs?

Should entrepreneurs be wary of compromising their focus for a chance at TV stardom through a reality TV show such as the one proposed?

What are the odds that the producers of such a show are more interested in creating "entertainment" than a useful and informative documentary on the experiences of and problems faced by budding entrepreneurs?

Start-UP · Joined: 16 May 2008 Posts: 1

Hi Bruce

Thanks for the post this morning, to date I have had exactly 30 click-throughs, much appreciated. If you'd like some for accurate information regarding the actual format of the series please feel free to contact me as you make a few assumptions in your post that are not accurate. Also thanks for picking up on that link (fixed now). Sorry you didn't see the tab at the top of the homepage page that reads, Start-UP TV, maybe that wasn't obvious enough, please feel free to make a suggestion of what it could be labeled to make it stand out a bit more

I also found a page on your site with a very weird message on it. I found it while registering for your forum, it reads;

"Aardvark forums have recently been upgraded. Apologies for any inconvenience. Forums will be live again on 5th January 2005."

You might want to look at updating that message from 2005 (I know how it gets when you're busy though). Anyway thanks once again for the post and I look forward to hearing from you when you want a bit more info on the TV series.

Cheers
Pat - Founder Start-UP

Bruce Simpson · Site Admin Joined: 02 Jan 2005 Posts: 6060

Good stuff Pat, I didn't try "Start UP TV" because my bandwidth is a little limited here at the moment and I assumed it was going to be a video (never assume eh?)

I'd say it's probably a good idea to make the link through to that more obvious from the front page -- since I suspect a lot of people will be coming from the Stuff story and looking for "Sign up for the TV series" type links.

And it's good to see you checking your server logs -- that's excellent Smile

As for the forums here -- well I don't run those, they're provided by Greg who very kindly donates the server-space and bandwidth. It's free to all so I'm not complaining -- as I said, this isn't a business so I don't aspire to maintain professional standards at all time or I'd run right out of time in a day.

Now if you *really* want to sponsor a tech-challenge idea with global potential, drop me an email and we'll talk.

Bruce Simpson · Site Admin Joined: 02 Jan 2005 Posts: 6060

It seems that Peter Griffin is having trouble too. From this piece on the NZ Herald website:

tim norton · Joined: 16 May 2008 Posts: 1

Bruce,

Totally understand your concern over the TV series being about providing entertainment or actually documenting the stories of entrepreneurs as they try and make it happen, and I've been talking to Patrick founder of StartUp Media and the producer about this for months, and I can confirm the following.

The series is all about supporting and driving growth and profile of the NZ online community, and will be a positive series all about raising the profile of the online community in NZ and giving some PR and media experience to the companies and entrepreneurs involved.

Everyone in the community developing online businesses are very serious about where we're heading as an industry and what sort of smart things we can do to raise the bar, get more high quality entrepreneurs and global businesses up and running. We're all building our own businesses and don't have time to create entertainment, the entertainment will come naturally from the real experiences that people go through starting and building their online businesses. There's no shortage of natural controversy, fun and madness in the process of starting an online business, and after months of discussion with the producers in planning this I am certain that this will be the approach thats taken, and it will be something pretty cool for the industry...

Lets keep the dialog going on this as a community and this will evolve as something that we all want,

Greg · Posted: Sat May 17, 2008 7:11 am Post subject: Re: Thanks from Start-UP

Greg · Posted: Sat May 17, 2008 7:23 am Post subject:

Gijoe- · Joined: 30 Mar 2005 Posts: 306

hmmm so flicking through the content, they would have trouble getting into google news as they would be classed an aggregator,

I know this because i look after a site in a diffrent industry that gets its content more or less the same way.

in regards to video a fair bit of it is coming straight out of utube, im also pretty much doing the same thing for my own webapp.

if i was them id be very careful on the ole copyright because word for word news replications get pretty damn pricey quick, and so do news republishing licenses.

however if its anything like the site i look after, it can be successful, however its very labor intensive to find, filter and post stories on a daily basis.

One other thing thats always a problem is user submissions can be pretty pitiful as a means to generate content. like our response rate on submitted articles is less than 1 user submitted article for every 1000 we post.

web audiences are always so passive and are essentially read only.

web 2.0? more like lurker 2.0