I haven't been writing here for almost a year now, and I had many reasons, albeit not many of which I could be proud of, but still many "legitimate" reasons why this was so.
And while I'm pretty sure not even a dead soul will be reading this anytime soon -- not that it ever did but here it goes...
The other day I realized the true reason for not writing, or at least the major one. Excitement, or rather a lack of it. I believe I hadn't written anything because, well, there wasn't much that happened in my life that excited me to even think of sharing it with the world, or you, probably my sole reader.
That has all changed now. It started with my participation in a contest of writing business plans at my college. That had me excited for quite some time. I realized it's been a long time that I have been so much excited about something for so long. Well, not counting the amazing Palm Pre-mania lately.
This all excitement got me to plan two business projects, and think about a dozen of them. While some of the initial ones are pretty much dead now, I'm not sorry - because I'm still pursuing one, one about which I will be sharing more later. Basically, it should make me rich... hehe... ;)
So let's take things in order...
This is probably the culprit for all the excitement. And I have my friend Dominik to thank for talking me into applying for the contest. And it was literally 5 minutes to midnight on the deadline day that I have applied.
At first I was reluctant to apply because I didn't have any idea that was obsessing me at that time from which I could be making a business plan for the contest.
Even though I usually have many ideas in my head, what general ideas (think innovation), what business ideas which I store in my Ideas Journal, at that point I was just not in the right state of mind, obviously.
Next thing I know, after applying for the contest, without a clue as to what I'll be writing about, the ideas just came pouring in.
The excitement started.
First thing I had to was open my Ideas Journal to store some of the ideas because I couldn't do them all at once and I had to choose one to go with. I didn't know with which plan I will be contending until the very last moment when I just didn't have any more time to think.
Now, as it turns out, after the final versions of business plans were in, I actually wasn't even in the contest. Yeah, it's embarrassing to admit but I was too late to bring my plan in due to my mistake. Had to make it perfect or not do it at all. The clock was ticking and I was running late so I couldn't pull it off in time.
Embarrassing as that was, it didn't - it couldn't - put me off the tracks. Of course the prize would be nice but in the end, the execution of the plan is what I'm after, not the contest prize.
Even though I said the excitement was initiated by applying for the Business Plan Contest, the Pre has got me a bit excited all the way back from the start of the year (Yes! That long!).
That sheer excitement about a consumer device that came almost to the point of obsession (never have I been even remotely excited about a consumer device before, except when I'd wait something I bought ;)) certainly has a part in the reason I'm mentioning it. Ever since the CES in January, I've been reading, watching, commenting and thinking about this device. Crazy, crazy world!
However, part of the reason I mention Palm Pre here has to do with my current business plan that I intend to carry out in the very near future. (And given that I'm nearly obsessed with the freaking thing, I plan to write much more specifically about it... but now's not the time...)
Palm Pre has not only brought some major advancements in the mobile world, especially the smartphone world, after the IMHO not-so-much-a-smartphone, Apple's iPhone, who nevertheless brought big advancements in the mobile industry and become a worldwide hit. But as a long time Palm (of both devices and the Palm OS) user and fan, it got me excited because this is very likely going to be the next phone I'll get (I use a Palm Treo 680 at the moment). But it got me excited even more because I should be able to develop applications for it.
It's really exciting because I've never even thought of writing apps for the PalmOS but now that Palm has made it easier for even web developers to develop applications for their system by using HTML/CSS/JavaScript, I'll just have to give it a try. I just have to brush up my JavaScript skills until they publicly release the SDK.
If you didn't get a clue, writing Palm Pre applications will be the basis of my business plan.
So the plan is simple: ;)
What else do I need? There's even a how-to article for that last goal. :D
I can't say this wasn't heavily influenced by the iPhone App Store gold rush. Sure it was. And while I don't think I have an idea for an application that could make me "rich" quickly, having a company that produces software has long been one of my dreams. I decided that I just can't miss an opportunity like that, to learn how to develop and pull this whole thing off, since it was never easier for a guy like me (with only a poor background in web technologies) to develop for something that I truly believe will become the biggest mobile platform in years to come.
P.S. I will be writing more about my excitement about the Palm Pre, my plans for the startup, how I cope with development of apps and also how I'm learning to develop in this altogether... so stick around, subscribe to the feed or bookmark the site...