Ready Steady Invest

Internet entrepreneurship isn’t some new trend it has been around from the very beginning. How these businesses grow has changed in a minor way (snowballing along with the change in technology available). One of the major changes in enterprise is now how you obtain creation capital; this is one aspect of E commerce entrepreneurship that has indeed changed drastically! Before it was you had to eagerly approach you bank manager with a your concept with the high possibility that you may be rejected. Now you may eagerly approach thousands of investors all at once. This is through the medium of Kickstarter.

(dramatic I know)

Starting an Entrepreneurship over via Ecommerce is an expensive route to take. I recently partook in an innovation creativity and enterprise project in NUIG, whereby my team and I designed a mobile application that along with a business plan for the app. The financial resources needed to set up the business were exceptionally high. Kickstarter is an online investment site that aims to aid in the initial start up capital funding for a business and or project. There has been a lot of skepticism about the site since its creation in 2009 (as you are not entitled to any dividends) although it has risen over $470 million dollars for projects around the world.

Rob Trump has a very interesting article on the subject in the New York Times and how there is now a changing mindset involved in presenting your hard earned money to these projects.
Your dividends are in a non financial sense, a sense of giving no a fulfillment.

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Open source collaborative mediums are, it seems to be the next ‘big thing’ when it comes to information sharing. When you think of open source you may just instinctively think of larger software companies and providers. IBM’s think place program is allowing smaller companies access to the types of software that they could only dream of!

This collaborative community approach to this sharing of information is basically what the internet is all about. It is proving fast tracked innovation in a highly competitive sector. The transparency and scope of reach being the main advantages of the new trend. Cloud computing is a medium of open source that is becoming more and more popular, that we are using nearly everyday.Reddit is another medium of open source which works off the same collaborative approach.     

We can see huge steps being taken in the growth of open source and the rights that come with it. Google have just pledged not to take legal action against users, developers and distributors of certain open source software, unless they are attacked first, this reasserts there previous pledge to ‘’a commitment to an open internet’’  check out Googles open source blog here.

So we hear about the benefits of open source but are there disadvantages to this? Have a look at this documentary by Erin Lee Carr. 

When the information is released so freely what is to stop persons from acting maliciously with it? But that s the internet thought isn't?

E-Governance = Corporate governance?

Internet censorship and governance is a key topic today, is our original content being illegally downloaded? Organisations seeking to protect their profits margins are going after the very downloaders today.  We saw last year the backlash when the US government tried to introduce the SOPA mandate. The stop online piracy act was met with huge resistance from internet users from around the world and brought forward the question again how much control should the government have over the internet?

On the other hand according to professor David G.Post ‘It’s a worthwhile goal; nobody can deny that there are an enormous number of such sites, that many of them make a great deal of money by trampling on the legitimate rights of copyright and trademark owners, and that the consequent damage to those rights holders is substantial’ the idea that a government body could have legitimate power for the first time over users action was a sharp wake up call to the community as a whole. And as with most governments there services rendered will go to the highest bidder.

It is clear that some interaction is needed on the part of regulation; I believe that a completely transparent process/body should be put in place. Favor should not be shown to one particular party. I.E the entertainment industry.

The vast ocean that is the internet which we surf more or less freely every day should be monitored to a certain extent. In terms of online protection we have all heard of trolling, internet users abusing content and content makers online. Well now Irish minister Pat Rabbitte wants to introduce a law that will protect users from abuse online. (Claims that it is a form of self-defense for himself and his peers go unanswered,) How far they can go with this it yet to be seen.

Link to Irish times article on protecting users.

The debate on E governance and corporation’s involvement will go on for the foreseeable future so long as organisations profits are being plundered.

And that's the way it is. (for now)

  

Vote for Pedro

Everybody wants to be the popular guy at the party, the trend setter, the trailblazer. This follows true in the business world too (exception being that glorious accounting profession, they are destined to hold onto their colorless, monotonous casting).

Whether you are an established brand or a basic start-up company it is a daunting challenge when you first try to become ‘known’ on the World Wide Web. It is very much so a David vs. Goliath battle in terms of the amount of content out in cyber space vs. standing out from the crowd. How can one simple idea/venture/ campaign get noticed to such an extent that benefits the firm?  Apart from using the obvious tools such as social media, online competitions and the use of blogs to promote your online entity how can one emerge into a party and become an instant success? The holy grain of online advertising you say? I say quiet simply the analysis of online trends!

I recently organised the NUIG Law ball with a friend of mine, we went online in order to come up with ideas for a promotion video. The storm that was the Harlem shake had broken the day before so dramatic as it sounds we knew we had to act fast if we were going to beat the trend. Two hours later our baby was born..

Our imitation being the first Irish version to be put online, made the front page of popular Irish current affairs website www.joe.ie the next day and the day after made Tv3 news show FYI  and now has over twenty thousand views online. 

While this may not be a ground breaking event in terms of the evolution of E-business and advertising, it shows the power of online trends and how fast they can come and go. Getting noticed can be as simple as being the guy at the party who can dance!