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Since this week I focused a lot on gaming (because of the panel I moderated at TechHub on Creating Killer Games), I thought it’s only natural to close the week with a video about gaming.

The following video is on of the lectures available from Casual Connect. What makes it different is the fact that it is a panel of real gamers, real fans of Candy Crush Saga, that tell the audience what makes the game so addictive. And, for a game developer (especially for a mobile/Facebook/casual games one) is pure gold.

So, take 50 minutes and go through it. It is worth it.

Moreover, if you have the time, look for all the Casual Connect videos (or GDC videos, but they are not usually available publicly).

Freshome is one of the most well known design blogs in the world, reaching 4 million pageviews monthly. I’ve known Mihai since before starting it and I was able to follow the entire adventure of the site and I often talked to him asking for tips on blogging :)

I’ve read today an interview with him for the design and tech blog Hongkiat. Here are some ideas I thought they are worth mentioning (with italics from me):

It’s a good thing to do something you like, you are already involved in:

I wanted a dream house, so I started checking out different sites for inspiration. I started finding different ideas for furniture and interior design stuff and I noticed that the guys running those sites were actually doing it as a business. I thought hey, I could do it too. So it all started with me trying to imagine my dream house.

It’s great, as an entrepreneur, to set your own working hours, but it’s still more than 9 to 5

The site isn’t on auto-pilot. I carry the weight for different updates, ad optimization and sales. I don’t see anyone replacing me yet. There’s no fixed schedule, I couldn’t say how much I work daily, but I would say it’s more than a normal 9 to 5 job.

Blogging as a business might not be the best idea right now, look for better opportunities (mobile?)

So to answer your question, no, I wouldn’t start over. Today there are better opportunities, especially in the mobile world. It wouldn’t be wise for me to invest in blogging today when you have areas in which those resources would be put to far better use and enojoy a faster growth. I always try to find a rising industry.

Before starting something new, think of a “transition business” (great term!):

Well, if you’re a freelancer wanting to become an entrepreneur, start with a ‘transition business’. For example, if you’re a designer, you can easily stop selling your time for money and instead go to themeforest.net, where you can transform your skill into a passive income by creating and selling themes. That’s one example of a ‘transition business’.

Read the entire interview here.

A month ago I read an article on a friend’s blog (here, in Romanian) in which he was saying he wrote daily on his blog for the last 3 years. And he started from a post I’ve written 4 years ago on my Romanian blog.

And I remembered that I loved writing on the blog. Until I didn’t. The reasons are different and unimportant right now.

Anyway, last month I had an epiphany. I remembered I loved writing and I remembered having fun writing. So I decided to start writing again. This time, though, in English. I wanted to improve my English and blogging seemed as good a way to improve as any.

Still, it’s not the first time I thought of writing again. I’ve always found reasons not to, though: it takes a lot of time, I don’t have what to write, should I write long or short articles? The reasons not to do it are so many, I will stop here.

And then, I just started to write. I wrote one day, the second day, then I decided to write daily for a month. And that was a month ago. Now I want to write daily for another month. And so on.

It wasn’t easy. Finding time was the most difficult of all. Especially finding an hour or so, as it took me initially. Then I decided on 30 minutes. If an article is not ready in 30 minutes, I publish it as it is.

Then finding a subject to write about. This had become easier now, since I know I will write articles on the blog and, actually, I had plenty of ideas, I just forget them easily. So I write them down (I send myself an email, most of the times). And it’s easier.

Finally, the 30 minutes are almost up (I still need to find a photo for the article). I am just glad I’ve been able to find 30 minutes to write every day. Now I need to find an hour to do some sports :)

Photo credit: Doug Wheller

I used to play online poker. Like almost anybody I know that had a business online, as a matter of fact. I wasn’t the best player, though. I never had enough time to actually understand the mathematics behind. Or, better yet, I never had time to apply the mathematics I knew.

Don’t get me wrong, I still like playing poker, I just don’t feel I have the time to afford playing 8-10-12 hours in a tournament (if you got in the late stages). Especially since MavenHut became such an integral part of my life.

Still, I always follow the World Series of Poker, I follow Daniel Negreanu on twitter (he is one of the best players in the World, Canadian of Romanian origin), I play with my friends from time to time. Not as much as I would like, anyway.

One thing I noticed when I started to play poker is that it is a lot like business.

First of all, you need some luck in poker. Yes, almost everybody thinks you need a LOT of luck in poker, but that is not true, otherwise there would be no “good players”, just “lucky players”. And those players that win tens of tournaments can’t be THAT lucky. Still, there is an element of luck. You can play the perfect game, but your opponent might hit a “miracle hand” (like a royal flush, a hand that comes up once every 649,740 hands). Nevermind, though, you will be good at poker just by understanding the game and the mathematics behind it and putting in the time to play. So work and effort will help you win. Luck is important, but not that important. It helps, though, even in business.

Moreover, as a poker player you learn not to put the blame on somebody else. Yes, bad poker players always say the other ones got lucky when they lose. Not the good ones. The good ones improve. And the same is true in business.

There are more things to say about poker and business (I once wrote about poker and life), but nothing is as important as making the +EV decisions. EV means Expected Value. And it is one of the most difficult concepts to understand in poker. Because it makes you make decisions that may seem completely nuts. While they’re not.

A while ago I’ve found online an article about how to make +EV decisions in business (and life). And it also explains a lot better than I could what EV actually means. I forgot about it until last week.

Many +EV spots seem risky at first glance, and that’s a big reason why they’re +EV in the first place. Most people are avoiding these opportunities, which often means the price for some of them is lower than it should be because so many people are afraid of short term variance.

Read the full article here (it’s a pretty long read) and also read, from the same blog, How to buy a Ferrari for $20,000

Photo from Shutterstock

I am design challenged. I can look at great design and admire it, but I can’t really point what makes that design great.

Because of this, I always looked up to those that seem to just create great design, like it’s a native feature (and maybe it is). Looking at our designer at MavenHut while he creates different things for us to take into consideration I see that design is more than just putting colors and lines on a screen or piece of paper, though.

And, of course, I am thinking of digital design (web, mobile, tablet, whatever). Functional design, the design helps you get more work done, doesn’t get in the way of the fun of games, just great design that you absolutely don’t notice. And I don’t mean it in a bad way :)

Good design is invisible.
You don’t notice air conditioning when it’s set just right, only when it’s too hot or too cold. We don’t notice good design.

Read more about the concept of “good design, invisible design” here or here (on UI). Quote from here.

Just a Thursday evening epiphany.

Image from ShutterStock

I don’t like zombie movies. I don’t really like horror movies, to be frank. Still, there are two zombie games that I loved playing this year. One of them is The Walking Dead (I loved the story driven game, played it on the iPad on a transatlantic flight) and the other one is the one I am gonna tell you about: the PS3 game Last of Us.

I’ve first heard of the game about 2 years ago (a little bit less, maybe), after playing Uncharted 2. The same studio that did Uncharted, Naughty Dog, was supposed to build a really interesting zombie game, that would take the work from the Uncharted series to new heights.

The thing is, though, that a zombie game wasn’t exactly what I expected. Still, I some more trailers and screenshots from the game, as well as some info on the plot made me interested in the game.

So, finally, in the summer of 2013 Last of Us saw the light of day. And it’s one of the most gripping stories I’ve seen in a video game. You start with a loving father and end playing with a bitter killer. Still, through the entire campaign, you might not love the guy, but you will enjoy the father-daughter relationship that grows between the two characters.

The actual graphics and animation are some of the best I’ve seen in a game. Even Uncharted 3, made by the same studio, feels worse when compared. You will see the wildlife in the cities of USA (Saint Louis, among them) and you’ll feel that you are looking at a documentary of a real event.

Unfortunately, the game is only available to PS3 owners. If you have the opportunity, borrow the PS3 from a friend, take 2 days free and play the game. Last of Us is the best combination between a book and a movie I’ve ever seen. How about the zombies? Well, they are some of the enemies. The most difficult ones, actually, but I feel that they are just the setup of the story. Otherwise, the game is about what we do for the things we believe in.

Just look at the trailer and the extended presentation from E3 2013 below:

I’ve had the opportunity to see Phil Libin live on stage last year at How To Web (btw, How To Web 2013 is close by, don’t forget to be there, I will also be talking :D ).

Anyway, back to Phil Libin. He is the founder of Evernote, the “dump your memory in” app that I use every day. He is interesting though because he is not interesting in selling his company (he is not interested in an exit). Even more interesting, he recently got some investors in just so he was able to pay the early investors, that wanted faster results, so he may be able to focus on long term results, without feeling the need to do an IPO.

Below you’ll find the most interesting and complete interview I’ve found with him: This week in Startups, with Jason Calacanis. The video is about an hour and a half, while you can also read the transcript here.

Some years ago I’ve read for the first time that, in order for something to become a habit, you need to do that specific thing for 30 days, constantly, every day.

I’ve tried several times to do this, but I’ve never got to the 30 days limit :) Until recently, when I decided I wanted to write for 30 days on my blog. And I keep doing it, 30 days after that. It kinda worked: last Saturday I remembered I didn’t write at about 10pm, so I actually stopped doing what I was doing and I wrote a blog post.

Since it seems like a good idea, I am actually trying to do 30 days challenges every month from now for the next 3 months (small steps, ok?). What I’ve noticed is it’s better for me to have simpler tasks (not “write a great article, 3000 words long, daily, on your blog, for a month”, but “write a 200 words article daily”). So I am not trying to move mountains yet, a thing that will hopefully change after several completed 30 days challenges.

My next challenge is to stop drinking Cola. Any kind of: Pepsi-Cola, Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Cola Zero, Pepsi Light or anything similar. The reason? I don’t drink coffee so any caffeinated drink is too strong for me and I can’t sleep.

I’ve started a week ago, I am still good. I’ve replaced Cola with light sparkling water (I need to compensate the feeling of the bubbles in the back of your throat more than the taste of the drink).

I’ll keep you updated if anything important happens (like… drinking Cola, for example).

If you like the idea and you think you might do something similar, read here the motivations behind the idea and write down in the comments your challenge (maybe you also give me some ideas this way). Also, I’ve found an interesting TED presentation from Matt Cutts (the head of Anti Spam division at Google) talking about exactly this.

Photo from Shutterstock

School started yesterday. And, for the first time in about 20 years, I’ve been present to the first day of school. Not as a student, obviously, but as a proud uncle.

I was looking at the youngest kids there, the ones just starting school. Everybody was telling them something, everybody was raising their voices to be heard and created chaos. One kid could, at the same time, hear 3 things to do: “Stay here!” (from the mother), “Go there!” from the teacher and “Kid, smile to me!”, from the grandfather (or uncle, in my case) snapping photos.

Obviously, most of these kids look kinda lost. After all, the experience is completely new, they don’t know who to listen to, since there are so many voices of authority there, what should they do?

Entrepreneurship is not that different, actually. And, seeing that, as a kid, you will start listening to your teacher once everyone else is gone, being an entrepreneur might actually be a little bit more difficult. I mean, who are you listening to when starting your first business?

Your friends? Could be, though it is almost common knowledge that people don’t really like change and your friends will not like it either. And it’s not because they are bad people, not at all, it’s because they want things to stay the same. They can also lie to you when it comes to their opinion, so that they do nt hurt you. And this could be even worse.

Family? Well, the people that are most close to you don’t want you to suffer, they want “security” for you. Entrepreneurship doesn’t really sound like a “secure job”, is it?

Mentors? Well, that’s better. But how do you choose your mentor? Is anybody suited to be your mentor? As a kid you are “given” to a teacher, but as an entrepreneur you need to find that person yourself.

Finally, the other entrepreneurs? These are probably the ones you will connect with the most. They are encountering the same issues, they are experiencing the same frustrations, the same anxiety, the same challenges. They might not give you the best advice (especially if they are first timers, as well), but at least it’s some kind of advice that you can use. Of course, if they are seasoned entrepreneurs, they might even become mentors.

I’ve tried to meet as many entrepreneurs as possible (especially when I was just beginning). Now it’s easier than ever, since there are so many meetups and communities (offline and online) that you can join.

If you are a Romanian entrepreneur, I would recommend the Romanian Startups Facebook Group. If you are Eastern European, I would recommend How To Web conference (in November), in Bucharest. Of course, these are some I know of personally, but I am sure you can find meetups anywhere (use Meetup.com and Linkedin groups to find some events in your area).

I remember being so happy that I would go to school for the first time. A whole world would open in front of me. Entrepreneurship is the same thing. Just a lot better :)

Photos from Shutterstock

I read a lot on the web (as many of us do, I am sure). I read on my laptop, on my iPad, on my phone. And I sometimes find some great gem that should be kept, some information related to something I want to do or even something I am currently doing (like the 30 days challenges). Then I completely FORGOT about it until I needed it and I would ask myself where I read it. This is why I needed a braindump app.

Of course, I used to save lots of bookmarks, but my browser has about 500 URLs saved. If the information I look for is not obvious from the title of the page, tough luck.

Finally, about a year or so ago I found an article on how to use Evernote as a life organizer and a braindump app. What you do is that you file everything you have in Evernote: ideas, plans, invoices, roadtrip plans, hotel reservations, flight tickets, images, pdfs, webpages, videos, audio files, everything of interest. When you read something interesting, you use a webclipper and you save the entire page, not only the link.

Weird initially, it has actually become a habit. Now I have everything I find interesting in my Evernote. And the best thing about it? A plugin that allows your browser to search through the Evernote notes when you search Google. This way, if you saved a page or filed an idea or a document related to your search you find it on the right side of the Google page (see below).

Of course, having the app on all my devices doesn’t hurt a bit, as you can imagine. I actually have a premium account that allows me to sync all the notes on every device I use, allowing me to see them offline (great to use while flying).

There are several other ways of using Evernote (GTD comes to mind), but the best usage I could find for it is the brain dump opportunity.

Do you use Evernote? How?

P.S.: You can also see an interview with Phil Libin, the founder of Evernote here, a part of Sunday Videos category on my blog.