Cameesa - The Blog

My wife, Ariel, and I went to CarMax tonight to sell her 1999 Oldsmobile Alero.  We’ve had the car about 4 years, and it is fully paid off.  I’ve attempted to sell my own used car in the past, and it was a terrible experience.  The biggest issue for me was determining value, and getting someone else to agree with that value.  There are things like the Kelley Blue Book, to use as a starting point, but the unique deviations in a car’s history make the price vary greatly.

In general, the CarMax experience was very pleasant.  Disclaimer: I am not a natural salesman, and I don’t enjoy haggling.  If you enjoy the thrill of talking someone down (or up), then CarMax is probably not for you.  What I actually love about CarMax is how systematic the entire experience is.  There are soo many human emotions present in a private party sale which are absent with CarMax.  This makes the transaction swift and painless.

You walk in and a receptionist greets you, puts your name in a salesman queue, and you go watch TV.  Five minutes later, you meet Steve who walks out to your car with you.  Steve doesn’t actually do the inspection and put a price on your car, he just makes sure that you have the keys.  You go back inside with Steve and he tells you how they value cars.  He enters an inspection work order in the computer with you, and someone who you haven’t met yet actually performs the inspection to value your car.  You go watch Dancing With The Stars on an LCD TV.  Twenty minutes later, Steve comes back and you walk with him back to his desk.

Now this is the most volatile (and well thought out) point of the transaction, because, chances are, you will not be pleased with the offer.  Here is how they reveal their price: you sit down with Steve at his computer and he brings up your car details.  Then he clicks a button to reveal the offer, and it seems like he is now seeing it for the first time with you.  If you don’t like the offer, you can’t really be angry with Steve, he has just received the same information you have.  In addition, he is not the person who made the estimate, so it doesn’t make sense to project your disappointment on him.  And the best part: if you don’t like the offer, then tough crap, there is no negotiation.

The point I am getting at is that CarMax has successfully systematized a once soft and wild varying process.  In the past when I was selling my own used car, it took 30 minutes to advertise it, plus four 40 minute meetings and plenty of awkward negotiations to actually sell it.  Then I had to deal with actually getting the money in a guaranteed form and depositing it.  Such a waste of time and brain power.

I think there are huge opportunities in developing systems which remove the guess work and systematize traditionally “soft” markets.  I love the thought of data acquisition and data mining of areas with currently little metering.   CarMax’s appraisal system is just one example.  I know plenty of developers who work at futures trading firms here in Chicago who develop automatic trading systems.  Is there a CarMax for homes?  Would any company be so bold to assume that many liabilities?  Can the algorithm be developed?  Does it make sense to remove the human element from all transactions?

Just thinking out loud, incoherently.  Time to sign off.

Andy, Arie (Andy’s wife), Stan (former co-worker from Bank Of America) and I had a chance to see Jason Fried of 37Signals this past Tuesday night.  Jason is a simple, down-to-earth, intelligent guy who GETS IT.  Jason is the president of 37Signals, and the owner of 6 web applications that have overtaken the software world with simplicity.

The most important lesson I learned from Jason was to: “Talk. Share. Contribute. Teach.”  I believe that people are providers, and givers by nature; hence, we provide to our families, friends and then our children throughout our lives.  So, how can you improve your business?  Start caring about people….which translates to talking, sharing contributing and teaching more.

Of the four points mentioned, I believe that I Talk and Teach well.  I Talk about what is happening in my life, and in the Cameesa world; moreover, I Teach how to improve ourselves, and our businesses. However, I feel that I am lacking in the Share and Contribute points.  I don’t feel that I Contribute to the community and I don’t feel that I Share on a consistent basis.  What does this mean?  I am not really sure.  After Jason’s talk, Andy asked me “Kamil, what can we teach within they community?”  I answered Andy that we can teach the community whatever we are good at: art, self-development, software, and probably some other things that I can’t think of right now.

So, I will make it a personal mission to start sharing and contributing more…but what does this really mean?  How and what can I share and contribute?????

Thanks to all of your feedback and requests, we have decided to implement the Multi-Part Support System.

How does this affect you?

Currently, when you support a design with $40 you receive one free t-shirt and earn six cents for every shirt sold.  With the new and improved, Multi-Part Support System, when you support a design with $40, you will receive two free t-shirts and earn six cents for every shirt sold.

How is this different?

You will be receiving a free t-shirt for every Part ($20 increment) that you support the design with. So, 1 Part will get you 1 shirt, and 2 Parts will get you 2 shirts, and so on.  Note that we will be putting a limit on how much you can support a design with, somewhere around $80-$120.

Since, with this new system, we will be giving out more free t-shirts, we will now be rewarding the Artist with $400 cash, and $100 in their balance, once their design is fully supported; instead of $500 cash.

If you would like to be a beta tester for this new functionality, please email me at kamil@cameesa.com.

Please let us know what you guys think of this.

The Vinyl Lounge was fully supported today. I was very excited and proud of this design’s success. There is a significant story behind The Vinyl Lounge:

The Vinyl Lounge store, located in Oakville, Ontario, was owned by our best friend, Gino. Gino unfortunately passed away on June 29th, 2008. He was a happy, music-loving individual who was always a team-player and had an endless caring for others. Gino had asked Ryan (aka CAMCALI) to design the original logo for his store, The Vinyl Lounge.

Ryan willfully accepted and designed the first vinyl lounge logo. 

The Vinyl Lounge was your local independent music store that sold new and used vinyl/CDs. In remembrance of our dear friend Gino, Ryan decided to submit the design to Cameesa.

Thank you Ryan, and thank you friends for putting this design into print. A great memory of our friend, G. We love you and miss you very much.

From Left to Right: Ryan (CAMCALI), Gino, Andrew and Erin…..The Killers on Halloween ‘07

There are many different types of people in your workplace; however, all of these people use their time in only 1 of 4 ways:

First, you have Daniella, who gets into work early and leaves late.  Daniella is the type of person that averages a 12-hour work day, and is usually seen walking around the office making jokes and sending random e-mails, and IM chats. Daniella’s work habits, and time management skills, may be described as not-efficient and not-effective.  Daniella is rarely promoted and receives low-to-medium reviews on a yearly basis.

Second, you have Ricky who also puts in long work days; however, Ricky sticks to himself and is usually busy all day.  He usually ends the day off by saying “I was so busy today I just couldn’t seem to catch my breath, but I still didn’t get much done.”  Do you ever feel like this?  Ricky’s work habits are the trademark of high-efficiency, and low-effectiveness: lots of action, but lack of results.  Ricky receives medium reviews and is promoted at a rate similar to the majority of his co-workers.

Next comes Rob, who is a part-time DJ that loves to mix Hip-Hop. He is the guy who takes a couple of extra breaks every day, and takes a nap after his 2-hour lunch….every day.  After his nap, he puts on his headphones and gets in the zone for about 3 hours.  So, in Rob’s typical 8-hour work day he does about 3 hours of actual work.  The amazing thing about Rob is that his work is always of high-quality.  Rob gets phenomenal reviews from management, and is promoted more often than others in the office.  Rob is the epitome of a highly-effective, but not efficient worker.  When all is said and done, Rob gets his shit done and still has time to throw the Frisbee around.

Finally, you have Wayne who is known around the office as “The Machine.”  Wayne comes into work for eight hours, puts on his headphones, and takes care of business.  All of his projects are on-time, on-budget and always of high-quality.  Wayne is constantly being promoted, and is an amazing asset to every team that he works on.  Wayne is a highly-efficient, and a highly-effective individual.

     Efficiency: the process of staying busy all the time, with no idle moments.

     Effectiveness: the process of producing the maximum results, in the minimum time, with the minimum effort.

Which person are you? If you are not Wayne then you definitely have room for improvement.  So, you’re probably wondering, “How do I get to Wayne’s level?”

You become effective by working smart instead of working hard.  To double your effectiveness apply the 20/80 rule, where prioritized tasks always come first.  In your life, 20% of your activities will produce 80% of the results that you are after.  Just 20% of your listed activities will take you faster and farther than others.  So, focusing on these 20% is what transforms energy-wasting efficiency into results-producing effectiveness.

Our minds tend to take the path of least resistance.  I will be the first to admit that, on a To-Do List, I will start off by tackling the easiest tasks first.  I think to myself…”well, i’ll get more of these quick-hitter tasks out of the way, and then get to the important ones.”  This mentality is not following the 20/80 rule, and is incorrect.  In what order do you attack your To-Do List?  Therefore, in order to transform efficiency into effectiveness, you must write a To-Do list, prioritize your tasks, and stick to their order.

In my first few weeks working for Cameesa, I used to program every day because I wanted to improve the website. However, once I learned about, and applied, the 20/80 rule, I realized that programming was not in the top 20% of tasks.  Although, we needed to improve the Cameesa site on a daily basis, I found out that we needed to bring Cameesa to the world and, at that point, the 20% of my most important activities became: reaching out.  Communicating to the world, and spreading the word of Cameesa, will bring me 80% of the results that I am looking for.  Since then, I spend a lot more time reaching out to t-shirt blogs and other potential Artists, Supporters, and Shoppers.

The 20/80 Rule will allow you to do twice as much in half of the time, so start using it today.

This 20/80 Rules comes from Charles Givens’, SuperSelf.

Found the mag at my local bookstore. Being the T-Shirt fanatic that I am I had to buy it after I saw it. The Australian based T-World is published bi-annually by Eddie Zammit and is currently on it’s fourth issue. I wish it was printed quarterly. Keep up the great work Eddie, the fourth issue looks awesome.

You can find T-World online at Uniform

Black Rock Collective is a collaborative design team composed of illustrators and apparel designers who are successful on sites such as Threadless and Design By Humans. As I look through the list of team members some familiar names appear. Particularly Priscilla Wilson and Tom Burns. Probably from their work on Threadless. I did take a look a through some of the portfolios and there’s some awesome work there. One I portfolio I was impressed with was Aeiko’s (aka Pete Harrison). Very versatile!

I noticed that one Black Rock Collective member has registered on Cameesa, Luke Wisner. I can’t wait to see a submission.

BRC has an awesome submission over at Design By Humans, Altitude Sickness. It looks like they are creating some awesome work together. BRC is another great example of the power of teams.

This post was initially titled “Productivity Tips for Entrepreneurs Who Work at Home”.  But after thinking it over, these tips could be applied to anyone who works at home, even Moms in Utah.  These “tips” are just things that have helped me be more productive and focused since launching Cameesa and going full time in July.  They all may not apply to you, but don’t knock it till you rock it!

#1: Put pants on.

I am all for a casual work environment.  I loved to dress casual back when I worked at Motorola, even though many around me were wearing ties.  I don’t think that putting on a tie makes me any more productive than putting on a tuxedo t-shirt.  I think suits and ties are good for enforcing a hierarchy among employees.  I generally prefer a flat organization, where hierarchies are constructed naturally based on respect and work performance, rather than fashion.

That being said, I think that there is such a thing as too casual.  I draw the line at wearing pants.  I work at home, and I could go around in my boxers all day long if I pleased.  However, I noticed that I am 17% more productive* when I take the time to dress myself in the morning.  Jeans and t-shirt do just fine.  Maybe a pair of Bonobos if I am feeling especially classy.

#2: Zone out.

This is something that Kamil taught me, and proves especially valuable when doing detail oriented work like programming or financial modeling.  The basic idea is to shut off your contact to the outside world to remove interruptions.  Being on the computer offers a myriad of interruptions just waiting to pop up in your face: Thunderbird pops up new emails upon arrival, Twhirl pops up new Twitter messages all day, Pidgin delivers instant messages from several networks (gChat, AIM, MSN, etc), Skype pings me for incoming call requests, and the list goes on…  Don’t forget the cell phone, which is always there to interrupt you.

It is not hard to zone out, just disconnect the internet and turn off your phone.  That’s easy, but you get the same feelings of anxiety that you do when holding your breath underwater.  You feel that you need to come up for air, but guess what?  You can actually stay under much longer than you think.  Just ask anyone in the Navy.  So the next time you need to use some real brainpower, I highly recommend completely disconnecting yourself.  Just don’t do it for multiple days in a row, people start to worry.

#3. Make Human Contact

Technology is wonderful for communicating over long distances, but nothing is more centering for me than a face to face conversation with another person.  Video chat comes close because you can look the other person in the camera and convey emotions, but still feels vacant to me.  The shared nervous energy and positive tension that comes with a real meeting has yet to be digitized.  I can’t place it exactly, but every time I get the chance for a face to face meeting I come away energized and focused.

When working at home, you often get too comfortable with the calculated responses of a chat conversation.  It’s good to keep yourself on your toes.  Sometimes you have to leave the spare room.

That’s all the time I have for now, and I plan to release tips 4, 5, and 6 sometime next week.  Stay productive, San Diego!

A pelican just came and dropped off a baby in my arms…but by pelican I mean mailman and by baby I mean my new Cameesa T-shirt! Take Me To Your Reader is extraordinary. I am so proud of this T! I have to let you in on my analysis: The shirt looks and feels great. The print is HUGE - and that gives it serious character. The ink feels as if it’s not even there. The American Apparel 100% Combined Cotton is so soft and will just get better wash after wash. It’s breathable and I won’t think twice about sporting it in the Austin sun. The inside print is awesome! I’m already hearing the comments I will get when I wear this… Wait, am I bragging too much about how much I like this shirt? Please forgive me Congrats to vonmonkey and to all who supported Take Me To Your Reader! I’ve been watching my support earnings go up and I know pretty soon it’s going to really take off. I hope all of you who have received your T-shirts, are waiting for yours, or are going to purchase one love it as much as I do!

The first phase of any Agile project should be “Iteration 0.” During this time, all of your main decisions, in regards to technology architecture, should be made.

This post describes the different decisions that should be made during Iteration 0. The choices that you make in Iteration 0 are extremely difficult to revert in the future. For example, deciding which programming language you will use may curse you in the future. Imagine being 8 months into a project and finding out that your programming language is lacking a feature that is crucial in your project’s success. Good luck re-writing 8 months of code.

So, the next time you are creating a website you should go through each one of these sections and make wise decisions.

Crucial Sections (these are more difficult to recover from once 8 months into the project):

1. Programming Language: Do you need a light-weight language that is weak-typed (pHp), or one that is strongly-typed and requires compilation (Java)?
2. Database: Will you use an open-source implementation (MySQL) or will you pay for a database powerhouse (Oracle)?
3. Source Control: Do you have money to pay for user-friendly version control (Perforce), or do you need something that is free, and open source (SVN)?

Easier to recover from:

1. Operating System: Will you host your own servers and run a Linux box, or will you pay for web hosting and use a Windows server?
2. Build Tool: Will you use a formal process to build your source code (ANT, Maven) or will you run a script that copies your source code files to the server (rsync command)?
3. Continuous Integration: What type of system is going to automate your builds when you are sleeping? CruiseControl, or maybe Hudson.
4. Coding-style document: This will keep your code clean and consistent throughout. This is a preference and best-practice for programmers.
5. Bug/New Feature Tracking System: Where will you store your bugs and new features? Jtrac, BugZilla, or JIRA. This is not a crucial category but something that should be decided nonetheless.
6. IDE: Will you use a free IDE on a Linux server(vim) or pay for one with greater flexibility and a better GUI (MyJava)?
7. Testing Tools: Is there software that will help you with Unit, Integration, and Functional tests?
8. Code Coverage: Do you need to see that amount of your code being tested? Something like Cobertura or Clover will let you know how much of your code is actually tested.
9. Number of Environments and their purpose: Will you have two environments? A development one for you, and then your production environment or will you need three environments? Dev, Sit, and Prod, where your business clients view the code in the Sit environment?

Here is a great article on the decisions that EnergizedWork chose for their Iteration 0. Definitely some wise choices. Hopefully this gave you a brief description of what Iteration 0 is about.