Jeremy G.'s Profile

Am I the only one who finds reading Supreme Court opinions interesting? Here's a link to the most recent ones: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/09slipopinion.html

Love him or hate him, Scalia's opinions can be awfully entertaining...

I've found Vision Direct to be slightly cheaper than 1800contacts and the other major competitors when it comes to ordering Acuvue Contacts - make sure you always get at least 15% off and free shipping (there are coupon codes they email out if there isn't an offer on the site itself). Much cheaper than getting them from your optometrist. Only downside is they send you a lot of annoying emails, but I have otherwise found them to be reliable and cheap.

I'm writing this review as a consumer who has received spam from customers of eztexting.com (from some "event promotion service" that I did not sign up for). At least with email spam, you can mark it as spam and in theory not have to deal with anymore unwanted emails. However, with text message spam, it's very unclear (at least to me) how to block them. I tried responding with text messages saying "remove" and "don't text me anymore" but the only one I could get to work was "unsubscribe." The problem is, there are no instructions in the text message on how to block them. This should be fixed and is not consumer friendly.

I have no idea how effective eztexting is from a marketing standpoint, but any company that uses this service should be aware that they are putting their brand at risk by sending consumers unwanted text messages.

I try to check my credit report every 6 months just to make sure no one has taken out any fake credit cards, etc. In the process of doing this, I've found many sites provide misleading information and try to trick consumers into paying for their own credit report (including mainstream banks and credit card companies).

However, we all have a right to see our credit report for free. Annualcreditreport.com will help you do it (they do it through Equifax, Experian, and TranUnion which are the three US credit reporting agencies) entirely online. It's pretty easy and only takes 10 minutes or so. Just be careful because the site will try to upsell you on paying for your credit score (which is different from your credit report) and other services you probably don't need.

The FTC also has written about this http://www.ftc.gov/freereports

The website isn't much to look at but Dr. Candace Kuo is by far the best optometrist I've ever had. She's smart, she remembers you, she cares about your vision (gasp!), and she doesn't try to sell you stuff you don't need (rare). I'd recommend her to anyone living in the Bay Area.

Cenegenics seems like a scam - cheesy website, treating people with hormones to try to slow the aging process - but surprisingly, it's not. Several well-known Harvard-trained physicians are associated with it (Drs. James Katz and Bob Nadelberg's involvement was featured in the Harvard alumni magazine) and these types of clinics aimed at slowing the aging process seem poised to be a big part of the future of medicine.

I stayed at Shoreline Cottages for the weekend and had a good experience. The cottages are simple but well maintained, and the owner is friendly and accommodating. Overall it's a great value. The site also has some useful links for activities in the Fort Bragg/Mendocino area which has some amazing hikes, beaches and restaurants. Definitely worth checking out.

If you're swamped by email or a fan of Timothy Ferriss's 4 Hour Work Week, you'll appreciate AwayFind. It's a tool which allows you to "escalate" important emails to SMSs, phone calls or IMs so you can have piece of mind that you're not missing anything important when you're away from your email. And for email addicts, it offers you a way to prioritize email that can help you be more productive.

Yokum Taku, a well-known start-up lawyer in Silicon Valley, has packed his blog with practical insights into useful topics for entrepreneurs, including filing 83(b) elections, founder vesting schedules, and financing terms. The blog is a great resource for anyone starting a company.

Often, Pitchfork is so pretentious I can barely read it. However, I can't think of a better site to read music reviews (suggestions?). Can't live with it. Can't live without it.

Good Pitchfork calls:
10.0 - The Soft Bulletin (Flaming Lips)
10.0 - Aeroplane Over the Sea (Neutral Milk Hotel)

Amazing live shows of mostly indie bands. Some of my favorites are Grizzly Bear, Beirut (Nantes), and Architecture in Helsinki.

Here's actual page: http://www.blogotheque.net/-Concerts-a-emporter-

The only downside is the videos are a little slow to load. You can also search for them on YouTube.

Great way to stay on top of and listen to what's being talked about on music blogs. I'm found there's a bit of a bias towards indie and electronic music, but I don't mind too much.

If I really want to listen to some new music while I'm working and I don't want to pay attention to how I get it (ie, read articles) I use Last.fm. For me, it's better at finding obscure new music than Pandora. Although I find some of the pay upgrade prompts annoying (you have to pay if you want to hear a radio station based only on your favorite songs) and you have to download a client, which often crashes on my Windows Vista. Net net - not bad.

There's a special place in my heart for NPR's music site. It's got a ton of great free live shows and all kids of new music. The editorial staff is very good at choosing an eclectic mix of new music so I don't keep listening to the same indie bands. And I even feel a little good about myself because by visiting and supporting the site I'm supporting public radio instead of just padding the wallets of rich people (e.g., Apple, Pandora or Last.fm).

99designs is a cool idea - put your graphic design project up for bid, get a bunch of submissions, give submitters feedback, and then choose the winner. The pros are: you get to set your price upfront and you get to choose from a number of ideas/designs. This can work well for an isolated project - there are some talented designers. Where 99designs runs into trouble is if complicated branding is needed or if the project is closely tied to other design projects that need to be coordinated.

So net net, I would use 99designs for a one-off logo or other simple design projects - you can get a great deal for your money (by California standards). However, if you have the budget and want something more complicated, it's most likely worth paying a traditional designer. And I have to add: good designers are under-valued assets.

I've never used Spoon's primary service, but they offer a useful and free browser simulator: http://www.spoon.net/browsers/

It's great for developers who need to test their sites in a variety of browsers (IE6, old versions of Safari, Firefox, Opera, etc.).

I've been using Google Wave for the last week, and I have to say, I don't yet see the magical applications that will make people use it over email. I feel like using a combination of Google Docs plus Gmail, you essentially get the same functionality. And unless everyone starts using Wave I don't see it gaining the critical mass it needs to succeed. But maybe I'm wrong and developers will come up with amazing applications that cannot be foreseen...will have to wait to see. But so far, "Meh."

I admit it. I don't often post to my personal blog [read: ever]. However, if I ever start posting more frequently, I will use Posterous. It's the simplest blogging platform I've seen and it's impressively easy to post things via email. You just email them what you want to put up, and Posterous will send it to your WordPress blog, Twitter account, Facebook feed, Flickr photostream and whatever other social yada yada you can think of. It's nothing if not elegant in its simplicity.

I'm not much of a consumer, but I like a good deal, and Mertado has of lot of them. They also have a good return policy, which is important because I'm kind of capricious. The only downside is they don't have a big selection of products yet, but if you like what they have, you're in luck because it's cheap. Fans of Woot will like this.

Sick of the NYTimes travel section ruining your favorite vacation spots? AtlasObscura.com provides a more unusual list of destinations. Personally, I'd like to see the Garni Gorge: http://atlasobscura.com/places/garni-gorge

The Consumers Union, the non-profit publisher of Consumer Reports and other consumer information services, has been standing up for consumers' rights since 1936. As consumers gain greater access to a broader range of products and services online, Consumers Union's information products become more and more valuable. Hopefully, SiteJabber can make a meaningful contribution here as well.

Even if you're sick of The Family Guy, Seth MacFarlane's website has some funny stuff. Mario flipping out at the Princess is pretty awesome, as is the beaver that likes to say "broheim."

Great blog providing a unique and entertaining perspective on China's economy. It's written by Tom Orlik, a frequent contributor to the WSJ China, and former UK Treasury official and IMF economist. His latest article looks at the percent of Shanghai men who said it was unacceptable to help their wife by washing underwear in 2003 (41.5%) versus 2008 (only 10%!). The times they are a-changin.

One of the best websites I know of for US political news. During and after the election, I found myself using Politico, much like I use wsj.com for business news, for a single glance at the most important US political headlines. Mike Allen, formerly of the Washington Post and Time Magazine, leads a talented group of political reporters that, I believe, provide more insight into US politics than most major US newspapers.

For those attempting to stave off the signs of mental aging, there is no better way to waste your time than brain training. Sure most of it's in Japanese, but the games aren't too bad and it's free. Here's the English version: http://flashfabrica.com/eng/

Great online game for geography nerds. It's pretty simple - the computer gives you a name of a city and country (say, Xi'an, China) and you click on a world map where you think the city is, and the computer tells you how far off you are and then gives you points based on how close your guess was.

To play the game go to www.geosense.net and click on the "visit" link on the bottom of the page. If you want to play against a friend (more fun if you play for money), just have them sign on at the same time and "link" them.

Big Book of Lies - a very funny new online series - Andrew Leeds, a product of Stanford and Desperate Housewives, stars in this funny and quirky online series. Big Book of Lies works like a good combination of Swingers and Curb Your Enthusiasm, with an added air of sincerity and sweetness. The show is broken up into 8 parts (so far), each about 3 minutes long, so it's easy to watch the whole series in one sitting. You can watch the first episode here:http://www.historyandtheuniverse.com/bbol/1

If only the major TV networks would pick up more shows like this one...

If Ernest Hemingway were a news magazine, he would be the Economist. Filled with tough, terse articles, the Economist's weekly news publication provides articles which give, on average, more background, analysis, and perspective on how an issue fits in with the rest of the world, than any newspapers or news magazines. While the Economist does have a libertarian bent, its analysis of the news is balanced. And because it's only published weekly, the Economist is better able to prioritize the most important issues. If I could read only one news source, it would without question be the Economist.

A very good wedding photographer in the New York area - Minwin photographed my friends' wedding and did an amazing job. I didn't hire him, so I don't know about his rates, but the picture quality was great, and he took pictures of literally everything. Also, he was very easy to work with - flexible, creative, easy-going - and really went out of the way to do a good job and accommodate the couple's needs. He also took the time to learn everyone's names in the wedding party and families and integrated himself into the event (I thought he was a family friend until someone told me otherwise). I would recommend him.

Greg Mankiw writes one of the best economics blogs. - Sure he was on Bush's CEA, but Harvard's Greg Mankiw is a good and rational economist whose blog provides a mostly balanced analysis of current economic events. It's a great resource for anyone interested in the economy.

I've found that mainstream tech blogs have become increasingly boring. ValleyZen is something different. Artist/journalist Drue Kataoka brings a flavor and texture of Silicon Valley personalities that isn't found elsewhere. For example, in this interview (about 4 min in) you will see Drue being flipped by Tim Draper. Maybe I missed a post, but I've never seen Michael Arrington to do that.

Whiteboard Friday SEO instructional videos are very useful - Rand and company give very useful SEO topic overviews in their Whiteboard Friday videos. Particularly useful are: Site review overview: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-friday-seo-site-reviews-stebbystep On indexing problems: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-fridaysolving-indexation-problems

GoDaddy domain registration is spammy and has very poor customer service. - I've been using GoDaddy for domain registration, and they've been awful. 1) GoDaddy has continually tried to up-sell me on products and services I don't need. They spam my inbox daily, and if I unsubscribe from one list, they seem to put me on another. 2) When I have signed up for a service, GoDaddy has made it very difficult for me to cancel the service by requiring exorbitant documentation 3) In particular, do not sign up for GoDaddy's Domain Protection. GoDaddy claims it protects you from spammers. This is not true - I still got spammed and the service masks your whois information (which is bad if you want to establish a good email reputation). And when I tried to cancel the service, GoDaddy would not let me. I won't bore you with the details, but it took 6 phone calls, 30 emails, and 5 faxes over the course of 3 weeks for me to cancel a service for which I paid $25. Complete waste of time. 4) GoDaddy customer service is as bad as it gets. My phone calls were answered by rude and unhelpful operators. When I asked them how to cancel my Domain Protection service I was told "we don't do this" and to "ask an attorney." Over email, customer service was also unhelpful and it typically took them over 24 hours to respond to my questions. Overall, using GoDaddy has been a terrible experience. If you are looking for domain registration and related services, I would use almost any other company (I used Verio in the past, and found them to be acceptable). Some companies care about their customers, GoDaddy does not.

My favorite early-stage cancer company - Infinity Pharmaceuticals is my favorite early stage cancer company. Drug development is headed by Julian Adams - a very bright scientist who ran the Velcade program for Millennium Pharmaceutics. And while their pipeline is still quite early, Infinity has high potential drugs in the Hedgehog Pathway, Heat Shock protein 90, and Bcl-2 and have signed some high-quality (lucrative) partnerships with large pharmaceutical companies. Moreover, their early stage HSP-90 data in advanced non-small cell lung cancer was very good: http://biz.yahoo.com/pz/071025/129710.html - note: Infinity has recently discontinued a trial in an a particularly aggressive form of prostate cancer - while this is not good news, it probably doesn't tell us much about whether the drug will work in other tumor types. From an investment perspective, Infinity is attractive because they are still small enough to be below the radar of most fund managers and analysts. If they show good results in one or more of their phase 2 trials, they should get a big bump up in valuation and will probably be an attractive takeover target, especially for Astra-Zeneca who already signed a lucrative deal for Infinity's lead product. Also, because of Infinity's small float, it's hard for large funds to move into the stock without moving the market, which also advantages smaller investors. As always, you should invest with caution - Infinity is a highly risky investment. Statistically, there is probably a 30% chance of its lead drug being approved. However, if this occurs, the company would be worth many times what it is today. (disclosure: I own shares in this company).

Compare cell phone plan costs, features and coverage - Slick site lets you compare the features and prices of cell phone plans. Great way to save some cash before you get locked up in some crappy 2 year contract. Also screens for best cellular coverage in your area.

You might hate Mark Cuban, but you have to appreciate his blog - I've got no idea if Mark Cuban is good guy. But his blog is honest and often insightful. Cuban talks about sports, politics and other random topics, but he frequently provides useful commentary on technology and starting companies. Good posts include: the internet is dead and boring http://www.blogmaverick.com/2007/08/24/the-internet-is-dead-and-boring/ on starting companies and failing http://www.blogmaverick.com/2005/05/30/success-and-motivation-you-only-have-to-be-right-once/ and on raising money http://www.blogmaverick.com/2008/01/02/the-best-equity-is-sweat-equity/

The Aspen Ideas Festival is yet another event that brings together thought-leaders to talk about big ideas. The website is not bad though because you can watch coverage of the conference here: http://www.aifestival.org/audio-video-library.php Interesting clips include David Brooks talking about neuroscience: http://www.aifestival.org/index2.php?menu=3⊂=1&title=320&action=full_info

I'm not a huge fan of RS's music reviews but I love Peter Traver's movie reviews. He's got great (smart, but not stuffy) taste. My only complaint is that he doesn't review enough movies, often leaving out many good foreign and independent films. Travers' reviews are here: http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/movie

If you care about the future of education, you should read this - Clay Christensen is known for introducing the idea of "disruptive technology" to business. Disruptive technologies are typically products that disrupt established markets by providing fewer bells and whistles than existing products but do so at a lower cost. An example of this is flash memory (more info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disruptive_technology ). Disrupting Class (the book and the blog) applies the concepts of "disruption" to education. Christensen and co-authors Michael Horn and Curtis Johnson, provide a vision and strategy for how technology can personalize education for the needs of each student, and perhaps most importantly, how disruptive innovation can overcome the many obstacles that have heretofore prevented reforms in the US education system. Administrators, teachers, parents, and policy makers would do well to read Disrupting Class. The authors approach education with the perspective of an outsider - business person, technologist, entrepreneur - but the knowledge and thoughtfulness of an insider. Instead of offering didactic or hubristic "fixes" for education, the book provides a framework for thinking about education that is fresh and practical. Note: the blog is quite good as well - interesting articles on how technology is being used in the classroom, like this post on adaptive learning software that optimizes the way each student learns, while keeping them in the same classroom: http://disruptingclass.mhprofessional.com/apps/ab/2008/06/03/lilla-g-frederick-pilot-middle-school/