Autumn challenges

Summer's almost over and I've had a chance to chill out a bit and reflect on progress. The final version of the site is nearly complete and I'm testing a new module: speed dating. The idea behind the speed dating module is to let people who are not connected through friends (ie. strangers) get to know each other through an online conversation without committing to a date. I plan to offer speed dates to different types of users so I might offer e.g. 'extreme sports weekenders' or 'tired medics' or 'fed up with the rat race' etc; etc; so that people with similar interests can meet in a controlled, safe environment. Users will get a couple of minutes to read another person's profile and then scribble a conversation to them. I could have blown the bank and offered on-line streaming video but the feedback I get is that people prefer to have a safety net between themselves and the person they're talking to and in your face video would scare a lot of people off. Anyway, so you get your 2 minutes with 10 - 20 different people and you can do the whole thing from home with a pizza and a glass of wine for fortification. At the end, you can give comments and a thumbs up / down and if you get a match (2 thumbs up) you can pay to get the person's details. The module is being tested and looks a bit clunky at the moment so I think they'll probably be a lot of shining and polishing to do to get it really functional but I really like the idea of it and I hope it will give lots of people the confidence to meet a whole chain of nice, recommended people without the stress of face to face contact.

The changes to the existing site will go live in the next month (I've given up putting dates on these things!) and then it's a case of planning and implementing Phase 2 which is all about improving functionality, polishing the existing navigation of the site and adding a payment layer. Then I can finally remove the beta label from the title and start publicising the site to the wider world. Who would have imagined this would all take this long? For anyone thinking of setting up their own company, you need a lot of patience and resilience. Ironically, I think it will prove to be a good thing in the long run because the very slow timelines from conception to implementation allow you to make strong decisions based on a lot of reflection instead of pure gut instinct (fear or greed depending on the circumstances).

I'll post again when we get the changes live so please come and check them out and send me your feedback.

Week 1 - smingl

A year ago, I had an idea for a business. I mulled it over, talked myself out of it a couple of times and sidelined it for better times. But the better times didn't come - in fact, as we all know, things just got worse and worse from April 2008 onwards. So one morning I woke up and made a DECISION. Spend my rainy day money / my hard earned capital /my mortgage reduction fund / my pension and give it a go. I figured it would take me a few months to get a site designed and built and I'd be up and running by Christmas. Err ... Christmas 2008. So here I am in April 2009 and quite a lot has happened. I'll save all that for another post but the summary is it took a long time, there were a lot of pitfalls and stuff didn't work out the way I thought it would. But this week, I'm ready to test the site with a couple of my friends. So I decided to write this blog - a warts and all account from launch to err ... float? failure? and see where it takes me. I'll be updating this blog with any major developments and letting you know how it feels to watch your life savings pinned to a few giant underwater cables connecting the networked world.

Week 1 - here goes!!