The BCS is WAC

Congrats, Kyle.

2008 2nd-Team All-American Returner (SI.com)
2008 1st-Team All-WAC Defensive Back
2008 2nd-Team All-WAC Special Teams

And WAC Player of the Week

The End of Wall Street

Wall Street is dead! Here's an example of the subprime debacle told by one of the few hedge fund guys who made money during this collapse.

One day, his housekeeper, a South American woman, told him that she was planning to buy a townhouse in Queens. “The price was absurd, and they were giving her a low-down-payment option-ARM,” says Eisman, who talked her into taking out a conventional fixed-rate mortgage. Next, the baby nurse he’d hired back in 1997 to take care of his newborn twin daughters phoned him. “She was this lovely woman from Jamaica,” he says. “One day she calls me and says she and her sister own five townhouses in Queens. I said, ‘How did that happen?’ ” It happened because after they bought the first one and its value rose, the lenders came and suggested they refinance and take out $250,000, which they used to buy another one. Then the price of that one rose too, and they repeated the experiment. “By the time they were done,” Eisman says, “they owned five of them, the market was falling, and they couldn’t make any of the payments.”

Read this article in Portfolio ..... it's long but will certainly satisfy your curiosity.

Swagger like us

Yes, I know it's been awhile. Enjoy for the time being.

The largest, and most intimidating

But don't take our word for it. I'm just reporting the facts.

What the hell was this cop thinking?

I leave NYC for 2 weeks and this is what happens. This is why I don't ride bikes in the city. Like always, parental discretion advised.

Who knew Mardi Gras would influence the election?

What other presidential candidate can inspire this!

Getting fired on my first day wasn't so bad after all...

at the very least it got me an article in the Wall Street Journal this morning.

A Learning Experience

Professionals urge people who have been laid off not to lose perspective, and to try to grow from the experience. That was the case for Gerry Wilson, who says getting laid off turned out to be a good thing.

Mr. Wilson graduated from Princeton in 2000 and took a job with MicroStrategy Inc., an Internet software company. After two months training at company headquarters in Virginia, he headed to New York to begin work. The first day, he was told that his consultant position was being eliminated.

Mr. Wilson parlayed his expertise with MicroStrategy's software into another consulting position, making nearly double what his salary would have been. He later started consulting on his own and saved enough money to attend business school. There, he developed a plan for his own business, yoonew inc., an online exchange that lets sports fans bet on a shot at Super Bowl or World Series tickets, long before the event. He raised funding from angel investors and now runs yoonew.

"All I have done has been because I was laid off on my first day," he says.

- From, "Turning That Layoff Into Career Catalyst", WSJ

My acting debut

I'm sorry, but we're going to have to let you go. (Hiring for a startup part 1)

It may seem trite, but when it boils down to letting someone go......there is no pleasant way to say it. Firing employees is not an easy thing to do, especially if you were the one to hire them in the first place. HR classes and "soft skills" were things I thought were BS in bschool, but in the real world they are very important, especially at a startup.

When you're running a team that is small, every new hire can and will dramatically affect the rest of the team. If there are 10 people, just adding one person will increase your costs by at least 10% as well as change the team dynamics. Hopefully this change is positive, but many times (especially in the early stage of a company) it can be destructive. This is why it is extremely important to do your due diligence before hiring anyone (including part-time employees). Even more important is letting someone go immediately after you realize they are not contributing to the team and/or are not the best person for the job. Allowing mediocrity is the ultimate downfall of any ambitious startup. If you're striving to be/beat the best, you must hire the best. There are NO shortcuts. This may mean that you have to pass on really good candidates.......only the best and that includes part-time employees.

Large companies have the luxury of keeping people on board and helping them find "alternative" opportunities within the firm. In the case of a startup, if an employee cannot find a way to create value in such an open and ripe environment, he/she is probably not built for working in a startup. What does that mean? Not everyone has the physical, psychological, and/or physiological capacity to work at a startup. The hours are long, the work is hard, the problems are complex/never ending, the pressure grows daily, the pay isn't wall street, and nurturing/hand holding is nonexistent. Individuals who need a lot of direction/coaching are not built for working at a startup in the early stages. I've learned that the hard way. We've a number of positions that have been open for well over a year. This is not because individuals lack competence; some candidates have tremendous backgrounds and skill sets. The reason why these candidates are not built for yoonew is because they typically lack the testes/ovaries to believe in themselves and take the road less traveled. In theory it seems cool and sexy to work at a startup, but for those who live it.....we know that the GOOG brick road is a long term goal, not the short term reality.

So why in the world would one work @ a startup? I don't think you can truly appreciate the freedom, excitement, and teamwork evolved with working at a startup unless you have some corporate work experience to compare. At my first job out of undergrad I was laid off on my first day in the office. At my next job, I was dumbfounded by the number of seasoned employees who literally spent 45 minutes out of an actual work day to do real work. That's less than 10%. I would argue that this is the norm and not an exception for many "blue chip" companies. When you subtract minesweeper and solitaire, lunch/smoke breaks, personal phones calls, web shopping, and company gossiping you're left with 45 minutes of productivity. That CANNOT happen at a startup. When the system administrator's main role is to stock the refrigerator with Snapple, you know the company is in trouble. (These are NOT hypothetical examples.)

When making early hires, you're going to make mistakes. As difficult as it may be, you must man up and handle your handle immediately. I've read a lot of literature on when to fire (day of week and time). Contrary to popular belief, the best time to fire someone is immediately, even if that falls on a Monday at 9am.

After saying all of this, here's what can happen if you don't handle a firing professionally.
(If this ever happend in our office, let's just say the monitors would have had friends who came to their defense.



From another angle (in color)



(Btw, to answer everyone's curiosity, NO we did not have to let someone go recently. I wrote this post long time ago and just saw these videos. I felt it was time to give my 2 cents.)

Fastest man of all time

As a former sprinter in college, I've always loved the 100m dash. There's nothing like having the ability to say, "I''m the fastest man in the world." Yesterday, at the Carl Icahn Stadium (literally right in my backyard), Usain Bolt broke the world record and ran the fastest 100m dash time in history (9.72 seconds)! What's even more amazing is he is only 21 years old and is 6'5". Let the steroid allegations begin....thanks Marion.

I've heard of Tyson Gay (gold medal winner in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay at the 2007 World Championships) and Shawn Crawford (gold medal winner in 200m in 2004 Olympics) and Wallace Spearmon (second fastest 200m @19.65 only behind the track god) and Asafa Powell (former world record holder at 9.74). These are world class athletes and Usain made it look like a race in elementary school. He's tall, long, and has great turnover. If he develops a better start out of the blocks, he could run a sub 9.70 in the next couple of years.

He may very well be the fastest human ever to live. Michael, we know you're worried. But I guess records are meant to be broken.

How much lower can the time go? Here's the progression of the 100m over time.

Time	Athlete	Nat	Location of race	Date
9.95	Jim Hines	United States	Mexico City, Mexico	October 14, 1968
9.93	Calvin Smith	United States	Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA	July 3, 1983
	Carl Lewis	United States	Rome, Italy	August 30, 1987
			Zurich, Switzerland	August 17, 1988
9.83 [3]	Ben Johnson	Canada	Rome, Italy	August 30, 1987
9.79 [3]	Ben Johnson	Canada	Seoul, South Korea	September 24, 1988
9.92	Carl Lewis	United States	Seoul, South Korea	September 24, 1988
9.90	Leroy Burrell	United States	New York, New York, USA	June 14, 1991
9.86	Carl Lewis	United States	Tokyo, Japan	August 25, 1991
9.85	Leroy Burrell	United States	Lausanne, Switzerland	July 6, 1994
9.84	Donovan Bailey	Canada	Atlanta, Georgia, USA	July 27, 1996
9.79	Maurice Greene	United States	Athens, Greece	June 16, 1999
9.78[4]	Tim Montgomery	United States	Charléty, Paris, France	September 14, 2002
9.77	Asafa Powell	Jamaica	Athens, Greece	June 14, 2005
	Justin Gatlin	United States	Doha, Qatar	May 12, 2006
	Asafa Powell[5]	Jamaica	Gateshead, England	June 11, 2006
	Asafa Powell	Jamaica	Zurich, Switzerland	August 18, 2006
9.74	Asafa Powell	Jamaica	Rieti, Italy	September 9, 2007
9.72	Usain Bolt[6]	Jamaica	New York City, New York	May 31, 2008

2008 Jamaica Invitational 100m Male Usain Bolt 9.76 Sunday, 04 May 2008


2007 Jamaican National Championships 100m Male Usain Bolt 19.75 Sunday,24 June 2007

iam sterdam

For those who missed me this weekend, I was out of town. By the title of this post and the shirt, you should be able to guess my destination.

Since I don't have time for an appropriate blog post, I thought I'd set the stage with an early quote.

amsterdam reminded me of firenze, but "cooler" and more diverse.


(Keep in mind that florence is one of my most favorites cities.)

We stayed at the Swissotel near the Dam Square. Yes, the hotel was very, very nice, but for some reason I don't recall our hotel looking like this.

That's all for now......Stay tuned.

I told you on Bloomberg

No one believed that I "predicted" that all four number 1 seeds would reach the Final Four. Thanks MonsieurCactus for your excellent analysis.

"You know, the no. 1 seeds are probably the best pick."

Look here to read the full transcript.

(And no, that is NOT the same tie.)

We're moving on up

We were recently awarded one of the top 100 private companies in the Northeast according to AlwaysOn.

Thanks everyone for all of the support. You can check out our presentation at the Venture Summit East, Boston.

Click on the image below to watch the video.

Ads and ad networks

Who knew there were so many ad networks?

But that begs the question; are there that many ads?

Which leads to the biggest question of them all, who is paying for all of these ads?


I'm trying to figure it out. I'll let you know what I find.

Cramer's 2 cents minus your $2 leaves you broke

The Madness Market

Only in suburbia

You have to love it. These kids' parents are paying for dance school..........a school that teaches them how to do the soulja boy dance. What is this world coming to? Instead of dance lessons, they should have purchased the instructional video.



Capitalism at its finest.


UPDATED*******************

I guess it goes beyond suburbia.

Who wants to be second?

....when you're already first.

I don't really get into politics, but the nonsense has to stop.

Talking about change is worthless.

Just f#$%ing do it!

Obama X

I can't believe it. I just can't believe it. Obama is going to #*!^ around and win the election. For all we know, it could be the biggest landslide in presidential history.

Now, I've never understood why people would talk to peers about personal issues, but don't feel comfortable discussing their voting preferences. (So I was #$%ing my wife in her @$$ last night.........you have to love Chappelle).

I digress.....so anyway, I'm voting for Obama. Yeah, I said it. I'm voting for Obama.

Will he really make a difference? I don't know. Are all of the other contenders, pretenders? I think so. Either way, nobody can stop his momentum or find any meaningful dirt.

Republican front runner, John McCain, is having problems. First, he allegedly has/had infidelity issues. Then, he basically
acknowledged losing the race. "Sen. John McCain said bluntly today that he will lose the presidential election in November if the Iraq war goes badly, then quickly tried to walk his own comment back." Good thing the Iraq war is going smoothly.

The whole Republican party is in disarray.

Hillary is running around like a chicken with her head cut off.



Ralph Nader is throwing his hat in the race. (Why waste your money. AGAIN!) Must be a Hillary conspiracy. ;)

Even the "honorable" Louis Farrakhan hearts Obama.......WHAT IS GOING ON?

I think it's called.................CHANGE.

If I ever decide to change my mind, I'm going to vote for Dave.

Kimbo slicing up the Tank

I've been following Kimbo for a minute and his progression has been amazing. Here's a clip of his fight yesterday against MMA vet, Tank Abbott.

Thanks, Bas.......you've created a monster. Unleash the beast!

19-0, the Perfect Season

Buy your Perfect Season Waterford Crystal XLII Super Bowl Champion Football for only $185.

On a serious note this erroneous momento is probably worth MORE after the Patriots loss. I'm going to pick one up.

I guess the trademark on 19-0 the Perfect Season isn't going to cause too much trouble after all. It's the 18-1 trademark that will be problematic.

That's why they play the game! You gotta love it.

Super Boring (My first Super Bowl experience)

I'll first start by saying, this was my very first Super Bowl experience. I've gone to a number of Super Bowls, but never actually inside the game. Well this year, I could finally afford tickets (I'll post later about the ticket market crash).

The first thing that struck me as different was the "die hard fans".....or should I say.........lack thereof. The biggest game in the history of the NFL and there was dead silence. Silence all around. No tailgates, no horns blowing, no painted faces, no car flags, no yelling, no beer, no screaming.......it was all too "civilized" for the preceding hype. Then inside the game, it was more of the same. There was little cheering, no team chants, no human body "waves", no passion, just pure silence and fake clapping. I could not believe it. I was in the very same stadium one year earlier for the Boise State Fiesta Bowl, and it was a completely different experience. I should have known what to expect when everyone was sitting in their seats during the first quarter. (You don't sit for big games. That's football fan 101.)

The first 3.75 quarters of play was probably the most boring football I've ever witnessed live. After reading all the news about the record breaking numbers (97.5M viewers), I would have liked to be in bar in NYC... with beer spilling all over and high-five cacophony and boisterous yelling.......you know.....a real football crowd. It was certainly a football that I was not accustomed to watching. I felt ambivalent the majority of the big game.

I will say, however, that the best part of going to the game live was watching the faces of the incredulous fans. That goes for Pats fans and Giants fans alike. There were a number of NY Giants fans LEAVING the stadium after the Randy Moss score. #@!*ing idiots. You come all the way to AZ and pay thousands of dollars only to skip the last 4 minutes so you can save time avoiding traffic. To those fair-weather fans, I'm glad you missed history. Hope it was worth it.

While I was bored out of my mind (literally falling asleep in my seat) during the first 55 minutes of play, the last 5 minutes was absolutely ridiculous. I wish I could have taken a photo of all of the Giants fans with 4 minutes left. They were in disbelief.....some sad, some shocked, and some down right mad. The Pats fans on the other hand were laughing and smiling.....they could sense history in the making. And then:



You should have seen the Giants fans lift their heads from between their legs and start to cheer.....with 2 minutes left in the game. At the same time, the Pats fans were devastated. You just had to be there and witness the extreme spectrum of expressions.

In a matter of seconds, everything changed. The score, my opinion of Eli, my opinion of Brady, my expectations for next season, my feelings about the "boring" Super Bowl..........everything changed.

Here's to change!

And another one

yoonew on Fox Business

What's with the name?

Whenever we tell the yoonew story, the interviewer always asks, "What's with the name?" Our response is simply, "Because........you knew!"

We were sitting in an apartment in Cambridge and wanted to come up with a clever name that was unique, easy to remember, 2 syllables (like all popular web domains), and a name that could easily be turned into a verb. After several ridiculous names such as uture.com (your future), Hagos suggested, "you knew!" Without even blinking, I thought it was brilliant.

You knew your team was going to make it. You knew the price was going to go up. You...just...knew! We consciously chose the unique spelling, Y-O-O-N-E-W. Why? BECAUSE WE ARE DIFFERENT. When developing a brand, you have to think about all of the elements. How it sounds, how it looks, how it feels, what it symbolizes. yoonew is more than just a name. It embodies the culture of the company. We don't follow the trends. We blaze our own trails and do not accept "No" or "I can't" as an answer. Anyone true entrepreneur understands that.

Having said that, there have been some domain "experts" who question the "misspelling" of our name. I find the critique somewhat laughable, especially coming from non-operators. Squatting on generic domain names and exploiting google may be a very profitable business, but in terms of creating real value, nothing is like starting from scratch.

We dreamed up the idea. Invented the name. Coined the phrase "ticket futures". Pioneered the industry. Built a futures exchange from the ground up. Put simply, we created value from thin air. The name "yoonew.com" is more than a domain. It is a brand and a lifestyle. So much so, advertisers bid on the keyword, "yoonew". That is quite a rewarding feeling!

With regards to "When the Smart do not 'Get It'", opinions not supported by facts are about as good as the stuff on the bottom of my shoe. I would never post an opinion without doing proper due diligence. That would be amateurish at best. And on another note, no need to add insult to injury.


Let's try:

www.yoonew.com

www.younew.com

www.youknew.com

www.yooknew.com

www.ticketfutures.com

No one said it was going to be easy changing the world. No one initially agrees with a maverick. If things were that easy, everyone would do it.

-gw

$15 Billion?

The proof is in the pudding........and I don't see Bill Cosby anywhere in site.

Who's really your candidate?

Take this quiz.

You may be shocked.....and possibly appalled......with yourself!


Below are the candidates ranked by how much you agree with their stances.

Joe Biden
Score: 61
Agree
Iraq
Taxes
Stem-Cell Research
Health Care
Abortion
Line-Item Veto
Energy
Marriage
Death Penalty
Gun Control
Environment
Disagree
Immigration
Social Security
Education

Dennis Kucinich
Score: 57
Agree
Immigration
Taxes
Stem-Cell Research
Health Care
Abortion
Line-Item Veto
Energy
Marriage
Gun Control
Environment
Education
Disagree
Iraq
Social Security
Death Penalty

Hillary Clinton
Score: 54
Agree
Taxes
Stem-Cell Research
Health Care
Abortion
Line-Item Veto
Energy
Marriage
Death Penalty
Gun Control
Environment
Disagree
Iraq
Immigration
Social Security
Education

Barack Obama
Score: 54
Agree
Taxes
Stem-Cell Research
Health Care
Abortion
Line-Item Veto
Energy
Marriage
Death Penalty
Gun Control
Environment
Disagree
Iraq
Immigration
Social Security
Education

Chris Dodd
Score: 54
Agree
Taxes
Stem-Cell Research
Health Care
Abortion
Line-Item Veto
Energy
Marriage
Gun Control
Environment
Education
Disagree
Iraq
Immigration
Social Security
Death Penalty

Rudy Giuliani
Score: 42
Agree
Immigration
Stem-Cell Research
Abortion
Social Security
Line-Item Veto
Energy
Marriage
Death Penalty
Disagree
Iraq
Taxes
Health Care
Gun Control
Environment
Education

John Edwards
Score: 40
Agree
Immigration
Taxes
Stem-Cell Research
Health Care
Abortion
Energy
Marriage
Death Penalty
Disagree
Iraq
Social Security
Line-Item Veto
Gun Control
Environment
Education

.....

Super Deal or Super Swindle?

So.....we popped our Techcrunch cherry today. To be honest, it feels better than I thought. At first glance, I was a bit perturbed by the use of the word "swindle." To me, a swindler is a thief and I certainly don't consider myself a crook. Having said that, I completely understand the point Michael is making and respect his domain expertise. In a nutshell, the ticket industry can be very shady. This I know from first, second, and third hand experience. But this is EXACTLY why I wanted to start a venture in this crazy space. If you can navigate through the minefield with rigor and common sense, there is a tremendous opportunity. One of the main reasons we started yoonew was to bring transparency, efficiency, and integrity to the ticket industry. I'm happy to say we are well on our way. I especially enjoyed the comments (good, bad, and indifferent).

On another note, I'd like to set the record straight on the 401k story once and for all. When Gos and I first started in the summer of '04 we didn't have any money, any tickets, any technology, any office, any employees, any anything. We were 2 guys with delusions of grandeur living in Cambridge.......trying to see if this yoonew thing would grow legs. Our Super Bowl experience worked out great! Made money and everything. 2005 Final Four........a completely different story.

That year was ridiculous. As soon as I got off the plane in St. Louis I got the word that a college coach was publicly arrested for reselling his tickets. The fear of imprisonment dramatically restricted the available supply of tickets. To add insult to injury, Illinois fans were buying any and every ticket available. Sometimes, even out bidding ticket brokers. (Simple ECON 101: low supply meets high demand). At that point we had two options. I could either tell our customers we didn't have their tickets and go out of business. Or, I could do what any confident, dedicated, founder would do. Man up and make $hit happen. I chose to liquidate my 401k and buy tickets for our customers. It was a no brainer.

That incident was March/April 2005. We've since raised millions, developed strategic relationships, and built some very innovative and powerful technology. Although it hurt me financially, it was the greatest crash course into the ticket industry. I literally witnessed the entire value chain of a ticket sale. The chain is soooooooooooo long and soooooooooo inefficient. At the same time, I watched (in amazement) ticket brokers, or ticket traders, buying and selling on cell phones and trading tickets/cash all weekend long. It was a frenzy that could have rivaled the most boisterous stock trading floor. That's when I knew we were on to something.

A ticket is just like any other commodity. People value tickets differently and this value can change at any time for any or no reason. The only true platform to efficiently transfer such a commodity is an exchange........the yoonew exchange.

I love firsts. Can't wait for the next one.