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From StoneHome

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Oh right, I'm supposed to be updating this thing. What month is it again?

Sorry I've been absent. About a month and a half ago I wrote a really, really long blog entry, then managed to accidentally lose it, since my mediawiki hack didn't really allow for the saving of prototypes of blog entries (this has since been fixed.) I lost many a self-entertaining turn of the phrase as the result of that, combined with my Memory Of Great Selectivity (+2, vorpal.) As an upshot, though, I got angry at my blog, and didn't touch it for a few days. And then, well, a few days turned into a few weeks, and now it's been a hair over a month. The stuff I've been needing to read, lately I've been throwing it on my bookmark toolbar, where I usually keep the web things I need to do; as a result the blogging link got scrolled off of screen. I've been so face down in getting things done that I didn't even notice, and as such, I've built up a streak of lag.

Ze streak! She is the broken!

I'm gonna try using this blog to release stress, because for one I've got it in spades - yay for starting corporations - and for two maybe if it works, I'll start being a little bit more regular with my posts. Besides, that'll give me some content to discuss on a regular basis other than my roguelike Southgate. This is important, because now that I have about sixty five full time jobs, I rarely get out of the house anymore. Hopefully that'll change once the company's off of the ground.

So, what to talk about? I still can't talk much about that; the patents are only partially underway, and I'm being a total secrecy freak. All I'll say is that it's for the Nintendo DS, that it's a huge risk, that the reward is gigantic, and that if I somehow manage to pull this off, things are going to change in a relatively surprising fashion. I'm not one prone to hyperbole, so people who know me, maybe pay attention. I really believe that if this works, it's going to be a capital b capital d Big Deal. Of course, in order to get that initial capital I have to give half the horse away, which tehsux. Also, I have to give a big chunk to my new business partner, because she's making this, um, what's the word, possible. That all said, I talked to my friend Brooke about this (luckily he doesn't give a damn about my blog so he'll never read this,) and he says the deal I'm getting is actually pretty sweet, and that I'm offended by the numbers is me just being a business noob. Sure, from my perspective the equity I have to hand out - approximately two point three bujillion dollars for every peso invested - seems a mite on the high side. Apparently though, this is the norm, as much to recoup investments into other companies which failed for a given investor as because they have barrels with which to bend people over.

I still want to keep 110%.

I'm kind of excited in that several of my friends are among the initial investors. That I didn't expect, but when I've mumbled about what I was doing, several people whose opinions I value have done the instant messenger equivalent of the pants crappery dance, and have requested to jump onboard. This means that some of the people who I'm making Bruce Wayne rich in exchange for handing me the price of an extra value meal will actually be people I give a damn about. This, it turns out, is double-awesome.

Y'see, if someone had asked me before this all started whether I'd ever take money from a friend, my answer would have been a flat no. Totally not about the spreading of the risk to people I care about. Not into the whole notion of if I go down, I drag my friends down with me. That's something you expect from scumbags who care more about getting ahead in the world than their interpersonal relationships or their honor.

Or, at least, so I would have said. Then, I started telling one of my dear friends what I was up to, and I swear to god I could hear him hyperventilating over the internet. He all but stuffed a wad of money in my face, and then told me he was going to get his brother in on it too. And, combined with a different one of my investors, who was once a professional gambler and gave me a very clear view of things as his not investing money he couldn't afford to lose, it turns out that my beliefs about appropriacy in investment are starting to 180. I used to think friends and family stock was generally morally bankrupt. I'm starting to understand it now, and why it's there, and I'm starting to think about maybe offering it. Being able to support one's family's fiscal development by directing capital into things you have faith will grow turns out to be a warm fuzzy feeling, not a cold clammy feeling. And, to be quite clear, that's a big surprise to me.

So, I've now opened investment to half a dozen friends. Three months ago I would have been appalled by the notion, and would have insisted I'd only accept investment from professionals. Now, I'm starting to get out of this kneejerk reaction I have of preventing people from getting into danger. To be plain, my friends are adults, and they don't need my watchful eye. If they believe in what I'm doing, I'm starting to believe that they should just be allowed to take the risk with me. Hell, one of my friends is going on a private crusade for me; he grew up in one of those Money areas of the United States, and he's gone back to talk to the people with whom he grew up, who can throw around six digits without much concern.

Only takes one, right?

Anyhoo, that's why I've been gone for a month - I've been stupid, I forgot, the reminder I made for myself disappeared until just now, and I've been so far past nose to the grindstone that the inside of my skull is getting grindwheel marks. I've been whoring up initial funding, setting up services, registering a corporation, filing for patents, getting patent lawyers, getting IP lawyers, getting marketers, and even occasionally working on the actual product. It's kind of nice that the actual product is already done; that way I don't have to feel like this is all bass ackwards. I can just watch a real businessperson do her thing, and learn from it, instead of indulging in second guesses the whole way.

More on how lucky I am to have found my business partner another day. She's awesome in the way that my artist is awesome, except with spreadsheets instead of pixels. She sees the potential and she's just working on making it happen, because she knows I'll do the right thing and make the bootstrap people rich with me. She's been working hard, too, and with nothing more than the promise of the company output itself. Sure, this is what you always hear about in the stories of people having made it work, but actually landing someone like that turns out to be a whole different matter.

Anyway, here's some Charles Bronson Murderology for the palette.

And, I'm back.