Archives for November 2010

20 Things I Learned About Browsers and the Web

November 19, 2010 by Leave a Comment

What’s a cookie? How do I protect myself on the web? And most importantly: What happens if a truck runs over my laptop?

In an attempt to teach the average person about the fundamental of browsers and the web, Google has released an interactive online book that explains concepts like, TCP/IP, HTML, browser extensions and malware.

The short book, 20 Things I Learned About Browsers and the Web, is a step-by-step explanation of the web and how it works. It was created by the Google Chrome team using HTML5, but it also features a lot of clever illustrations by award-winning German illustrator and children’s author Christoph Niemann.

The focus of the book is on 19 different topics (plus a recap, making for 20 things). It starts with “What Is the Internet?” and then dives into cloud computing, web apps, web programming languages, browsers, privacy, security and open source.

Source: Mashable

In your quest to do business online, is there anything that you do not understand about the web? This is your chance to learn:

20 Things I Learned About Browsers and the Web.

Filed Under: Cool Sites, Internet Culture, Small Business Tagged With:

How to Start a Successful Web Business

November 19, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Ever dreamt of making millions on the Internet? Then this is for you.

This is a series of “lectures” making up over 12 hours of audio on how to start and grow your web business into a multi-million business. It covers the following topics:

  1. Deciding on an idea
  2. Building your idea
  3. Launching and marketing your idea
  4. Turning your idea into a $1M/year business
  5. What to do after you’ve made millions

You can find all this information here: How to Start a Sucessful Bootstrapped Web App Business.

Filed Under: Small Business Tagged With:

5 Reasons Working From Home is a Bad Idea

November 18, 2010 by 3 Comments

Thinking of starting your business by working at home? Here are 5 reasons why that is a bad idea:

  1. Productivity – You’re functioning at about 75 percent productivity in a coffee shop or at home. The distractions are everywhere. At the coffee shop it’s the annoying person on the phone; at home it’s the cat, the dog, the neighbor, the internet is down, the TV is on…
  2. Space to think – If you’re serious about building a company –a real company, not an app or a feature – than you’re going to need space. You’re going to need whiteboards and desks and printers and stable Internet service and phone booths and meeting space.
  3. Don’t lose that third space – Without space, your boundaries between work and play dissolve to the point that you don’t know how to work and how to play. When you live in coffee shops or work at home you tend to go at one speed, whether you’re crushed for time or not. When you have an office with a product deadline looming, you stay there until it’s done.
  4. World-class teams don’t work from home – For a little while you can get away with attracting people to your kitchen table, but very soon you’ll be competing with other start-ups/companies for talent – and your comfy couch is not going to get it done.
  5. Space is cheap – Office space is cheap and plentiful assuming you don’t need super nice digs. It’s also surprisingly cheaper than you think when you do a fully loaded cost analysis. When you’re not at the office, the chances of you bringing your lunch are probably lower and the coffee is definitely more expensive.

Adapted from VentureBeat‘s “5 reasons working from home (or Starbucks) is a bad idea“.

Filed Under: Small Business

Screw it, Just do it

November 16, 2010 by 4 Comments

Over the weekend, I had the good fortune to to have a very interesting conversation with a very successful Internet entrepreneur (he makes upwards of 2 million Euros a year from his websites). This fine gentleman told me something that really got to me.

While I was telling him that I have not yet launched the project I am currently working on because of X or Y, he cut me short and said:

“That’s not being entrepreneurial. You should just start! Before you begin anything you actually do not have any problems – do not think of how this or that may go wrong. The only thing that is wrong is that you have not yet started doing it (your project). And the only way to know if there are actually any problems that need fixing is to start doing something, not planning endlessly. As they say: Screw it, Just do it.

Sir Richard Branson wrote a book titled: “Screw It, Let’s Do It: Lessons In Life“. Is that a coincidence? Or are both of these successful gentlemen trying to share on of the secrets to their successes? If you are thinking of starting something – a new project, a new business, whatever – then just go ahead and do it. Stop dilly-dallying and wasting time. Just do it.

Peace.

Filed Under: Miscellaneous, Tips Hacking and Reviews

PayPal Stops Working For Equity Account Holders

November 16, 2010 by 12 Comments

In what may be a bizzarre outcome following the rumours that PayPal and Equity have been working together for a more streamlined service, holders of Equity bank accounts can no longer pay via PayPal by using their Equity debit/credit cards.

We’re not sure why Equity Bank decided to block payments to PayPal but this probably means that PayPal account holders in Kenya will continue to suffer (by not being able to withdraw to a local bank) for the foreseeable future.

What do you think of this development?

Filed Under: Internet Culture

Winners of “Blue Ocean Strategy”

November 16, 2010 by Leave a Comment

From the competition that we had announced last week, we are pleased to announce that we randomly picked the following winners:

All three receive a free copy of “The Blue Ocean Strategy“. Kudos to them.

Watch out for more and better competitions from Like Chapaa. Before the next one comes around, have a look at the Chapaa Shop.

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Tagged With:

Interesting Kenyan Sites #13

November 14, 2010 by 2 Comments

Communications Commission of Kenya – it is not often that you get a website done by the Government of Kenya that stands out for being well done. The CCK website does just that! The site design is well thought-out and the information on the website looks fresh and well managed. Kudos, CCK! Every other Government webmaster should look up to this!

50-50
NiKenya.com – an interesting domain name. But sadly, we do not think the idea behind this site is well executed. I still cannot answer these questions: “What is the purpose of this site?” “Why should I sign up?”. Hopefully we’ll get an answer soon.

Flops
McDave – this is an Online Fresh Fruits and Vegetable Shop Based in Nairobi. I personally think that such a business, if well done, can be very successful in Nairobi and other major Kenyan towns. Sadly, McDave does not seem to be well done. First, their design seems to be “all over the place” but the main problem is this: When you see an online shop put, on their website, advertisements from Google Adsense, then you know the online shop is suffering from a lack of purpose. If this goes on, it will not be long till you see McDave go down in failure. This would be sad. McDave should either focus on their stated business of selling fruits and “veges” online, or change their focus to something else and do that.

Global Essence – I’m not quite sure what this site is supposed to be all about. It looks like some sort of music related information website. Their footer says “Copyright 2008 Globalessence.net All rights reserved” so we know the last time anyone put some effort into this site was way back in 2008.

Communication.go.ke – another week, another site by the Government of Kenya down. Sigh. We do not know how long this one’s been down, but its pretty clear no one is interested in seeing it get back up. Sigh.

communication.go.ke website down

communication.go.ke down, and out (click for larger view)

Rumours
Word on the street is that a bunch of Kenyan have just received a considerable amount of funding to build a high class Kenyan porno website. The website is to focus on amateur pornography (where you are encouraged to upload your own clips of the stuff). While I think that this website has a good chance to become wildly successful, I wonder if it is right to go ahead and do it. What do you think? Do you know of any other similar Kenyan websites?

Filed Under: Cool Sites