If you are interested in entrepreneurship of any sort I urge you to check out kiva. Kiva is a place where people can get on the world wide web and help to fund the dreams of entrepreneurs from all over the globe. With a donation (repaid by entrepreneur) as low as 25 dollars, donors are able to help entrepreneurs start there own businesses in order to come out of poverty. This site is a wonderful way to network and help out people around the globe. The best benefit is that it comes at no cost to you seeing that you will get your money refunded in time! This is a wonderful idea! Check is out….
Ever feel like you’re simply wasting time surfing the internet? Of course you’ve felt this before. Why is this? Because most of the times you are surfing the net, you are not helping your productivity.
Well, the next time you need a break and want to surf the internet, why not surf something a little more useful? Try Lifehacker.com, a wonderful blog that is filled with millions of random tips to make your life a little easier. One article might be about how you can use a walnut to eliminate scratches in wood furniture while another article might provide you some helpful tips about navigating Windows 7. The articles can be from any area of life, but they are always helpful.
Check out these Lifehacker articles for a taste of what the website offers:
Let’s think about the present here for a moment folks. If you want a computer, you find a computer and buy it. If you want a TV, you find a TV and buy it.
Now lets think about the future. If you want a TV or if you want a computer, you’ll probably buy one product to get both.
Today, it is normal for a household to have more than one TV. It is now becoming more common for a household to own more than one computer. As computers begin to replace TVs in households across the US, you will begin to find that you’ll have computer access in many different areas of your house. Look farther down into the future and you might find computers in every room. Many people today already carry computers around everywhere–their smart phones.
There’s a cool article on TimesOnline that seems to indicate that computers are already becoming more popular media sources than TVs. In my opinion, this is a good thing. It will be nice to not have to worry about buying a new TV.
Here is something I think will (eventually) become a tool for large online stores: 3 dimensional room decorating and design. As the technology continues to become both better and cheaper, setting up 3D room design applications online for companies like Ikea, Home Depot, or Lowe’s will become big business. This virtual tool would allow the online shopper to pick out wallpaper, paint, wood flooring, kitchen tables, light fixtures, and all kinds of home decor, furnishings, and appliances from the company online store and then click and drag them into the 3D room to get an idea what it would look like.
The trick here is that the “3D room” could be edited to look similar to the shopper’s home or office. This could be done by entering the dimensions and basic specifications of the room being altered. Eventually it may be possible for online shopper’s to scan in a photograph of their room and then alter it digitally online with items from the online store – basically creating a fun, efficient way to shop.
While there are some applications out there that do some of the things discussed above, no single site has done quite what I’ve described. Check out this link for a top ten list of virtual room design tools and sites: 3D Room Design
I was never much of a youtube user until I came to college. Now it seems like friends of mine put stuff up there and send me links all the time. It’s incredibly fun to be able to do this – and is also ridiculously easy. Below is a particularly fine example. This video was produced by Tim Palma for a video editing course he is taking at Grove City. The “actors” are all senior students at the college…and are hilarious. Enjoy.
I’ve recently been hooked on the idea of renting things online for some reason. To go along with that theme, I decided to see if there was some way to rent camera lenses online. Turns out there is!
RentGlass offers lenses and even bodies for your film or DSLR cameras to be rented and shipped to you. This way you can test out a camera or a lens you want without having to buy it first. You can just pay on a per-week basis to test out which ever item you like. Great idea huh?
I encourage you to check it out, along with a very helpful review.
No one can argue that Netflix hasn’t taken a striking command of the movie rental industry. In fact, they have become the world’s largest movie rental service.
Some say they have become too powerful and that even the idea of a monopoly comes to mind when thinking about Netflix. In fact, a man sued Netflix for obtaining patents that supposedly deterred competitors from entering the market. One of the patents was for the “method and apparatus of renting items” which covers “a computer-implemented approach for renting items to customers (in which) customers specify what items to rent using item selection criteria separate from deciding when to receive the specified items.”
This patent would effectively turn all of Netflix’s competitors into paying licensees or just completely run them out of business.
As a result of the Netflix lawsuit, this patent was found to be violating the Sherman Antitrust Act, and therefore was not allowed.
Now we can analyze tweets as data. The value of this is that tweeting is no longer just social. It can now be a way to collect and evaluate data. Here are two options that come to mind:
1. time-tracking — track your daily activity by the minute; use excel to make charts; categorize tasks
2. idea-bank — tweet ideas; categorize them; see related threads
Business was quick to adopt technology. Government finally follows suit.
5. Nextgov — news on government technology
4. Govloop — social networking for government
3. MAP Light — compare votes for a bill with $ contributions for that same bill
2. Sunlight Labs — develop software for government
1. Open Congress — track congressional bills
We are a different class of college students every Spring. Together we explore what it means to do business in a "Web 2.0" world. Technology, new businesses, cutting-edge trends, we cover them all!
We are a different class of college students every Spring. Together we explore what it means to do business in a "Web 2.0" world. Technology, new businesses, cutting-edge trends, we cover them all! 
