Sunday, May 08, 2011

Social Media And StartUps: Striking The Right Balance

Barack ObamaImage by jamesomalley via FlickrI don't apologize for my active social media presence. But I have to be careful not to take my eyes off my two startups. The startups are where the action is. It is not like I am worried. It is not like I feel like I am losing the balance. For much of 2009 and 2010 I really did not have the option to do the tech startup thing. And then it made a ton of sense to focus primarily on things like tech blogging and networking. But those things don't go away. You don't switch. You learn to juggle a few balls.

Gonna Write For Technorati

I am particularly fond of blogging. My blogs feed into my Twitter and Facebook streams. I set the same for my Tumblr stream, but Tumblr has been messing up the past few days. Many things I read online I have a tendency to tweet out. So if you follow me on Twitter, you get a pretty good idea about what I am blogging and what are some of the things I am reading that day. I read a lot of tech news. And I follow the democracy movements as closely as I can. I was Barack Obama's first full time volunteer in New York City, maybe even the country. (Switching To Obama, Jupiter And Obama, 30 Points Down In The Polls) All that work I would like to cash out on behalf of democracy. I feel very, very strongly about democracy.

Immigration Limbo
Immigration Mess/Humiliation And Window Shopped Tech Entrepreneurship
Immigration Status
My Non Personhood Of 2009, 2010
In South Africa They Had Apartheid, In America They Got Immigration

My use of social media, my attempts at tech startups, my choice of career paths, at some level it feels to me like I am trying to become whole. I want people who visit my tech blog - this blog - to also be able to drop by my blog Barackface. I want the Barackface visitors to also drop by my Nepal blog. Nepal is where I grew up. The place where you grow stays with you.

And all that work that I poured into Nepal's democracy movement a few years ago - almost two full years - has come full circle to become relevant to my two current startups. My idea of whole is global.

My Failures
Larry Ellison's 1995 Network Computer Vision

It is not one or the other. If I were not actively into startups, I might not have a whole lot to say at my blog. And I can't imagine my startup work without my social media presences. One feeds the other.

You just get better and better at it. Early in 2009 I used to wonder what it might be like to blog daily. Now I blog several times a day and don't even think about it.

The UN is not it. The US is not it. The Internet is it. My passion for social media is my vote of confidence in the Internet, in the promise the Internet holds to have massive implications for the Global South, in terms of democracy, in terms of prosperity, in terms of social progress. (The Institutions Of Globalization Will Be Built On The Internet) Saudi Arabia is super rich and super sexist. Prosperity alone does not cut it.

Microfinance Alone Can't Cure Poverty
The Google/Facebook Of Microfinance

But my primary passion is to do. To do the tech startup thing. If I were just a writer, it might be the legislative branch of government that might most fascinate me, and it does not. It is the executive branch. I like the idea of some hard core action.

Third World Guy
Passion For Microfinance, Passion For Social Media
Rudiments Of A Corporate Culture

All tech startups are like each other. They face similar issues. That is why I can be reading about tech startups far flung from the microfinance industry and still not feel out of place.

Doing Two Tech Startups
Two Upheavals Already
The Two Poles Of My Social Reality
A Life Of Poverty
Larry Ellison's Personal Life
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