Interesting Reads Around The Web
Apr 18 2009

Here are some links to some interesting reads relating to entrepreneurship, people, parenting, and even Oprah!  I’m mulling over a couple of other blog posts in my head but until then check these out:

The Fine Art of Catching Liars – an interesting read on Time.com about research done by a psychologist on how to determine if someone is lying.  Might be useful for those of you who have older kids.  My kids haven’t started lying yet as far as I can tell.  My son just told me that he told some people at last week’s Easter Egg hunt that he ate some candy in one of the eggs when he didn’t.  I asked him why and he said he didn’t know but he seemed to think it was funny.  I’m honestly not even sure why he confessed that to me randomly.  I told him well that could be lying unless he was joking around with the other kids.  I think I’ll have an easier time detecting if my son is lying than my daughter.  I can already tell she will be pretty good at spinning a believable story and hide her true feelings.

Venture Capital Down 50%. It’s Not Just The Recession Folks – an article on TechCrunch analyzing how the decrease in venture investing is different this time around than in the post bubble bursting era of 2001-2002.  They say that clean-tech investing is down because so much more time and research is needed.  Health care investment is holding or not falling as fast.

Susan Boyle – The Biggest YouTube Sensation Ever? – an article on Mashable that links to the most viewed YouTube video of all time.  It’s of Susan Boyle singing on Britain’s Got Talent.  She shocked the world with her voice given her age and appearance.  A true “you can’t judge a book by its cover” story.  What an amazing voice.  She’s 48 years old, never been married, and his been taking care of her mother for quite some time.  Even Simon Cowel (American Idol judge) was blown away.  Go HERE to see the video.

Capsula Music – My brother-in-law sent this to me.  It’s an album of funky, psytrance music that is supposed to work in the background of your mind while you go to sleep.  I’ve listened to it while working on my computer but haven’t tried it yet before going to sleep.

How To Nail An Interview – for those of you looking for a job.  This was linked to in a post by one of my favorite bloggers, Seth Godin.  It lists 22 tips on how to do well in an interview.

Ashton Kutcher and Evan Williams (Twitter Founder) talk on Oprah – a post on Mashable about how last week Oprah joined twitter.  She interviewed Ashton who became twitter’s first user to gain 1,000,000 followers!  He was competing with CNN and he won.  Yes, I followed Ashton and Oprah!

Enjoy the videos and articles.  There is so much going on in the world and probably these links are some of the more trivial pieces of what is truly happening but that’s what I see and what people are sending me.

Making Breakthroughs In Your Life and Career
Feb 9 2009

Back in December 2008 I participated in a workshop called the Landmark Forum.   It has been one of the most profound educational workshops I have ever taken in my life!  I went in skeptical but willing to learn since I have met one former CNN executive who took the course and read that many other successful business people have taken it as well.  You can read the post I wrote after taking it called A Transformation in Process.   Just as with anything worthwhile in this world, there are no quick fixes.  You get out of it what you put into it.  I can honestly say that participating in the Forum has given me a different perspective on life, myself, and other people.  It has also given me the tools (they call it technology) to have extremely different and highly authentic conversations with people I care deeply about and has helped me be more productive in my two jobs and frankly even more connected as a parent.

After completing the forum, there are a series of meetings that occur weekly or bi-weekly with the same people that took the forum.  In those seminars we discuss what we’ve learned and how we are implementing that learning in our day to day life.  We also formed groups, and I have some pretty cool people in my group…two doctors, one musician/artist, a financial adviser, a person who works at an interesting non-profit, and another mom/professional worker like me.

The one thing I don’t like about Landmark is the sometimes ‘hard sell’ of the program.  As a business person, I understand the business behind why they feel they have to do the ‘hard sell’ but as a participant, the first time I attended an introduction, I was actually turned off by it and decided I wasn’t going to sign up.  Only after hearing about it several times from a person I grew to trust and respect did I suspend disbelief and sign up for the course.  So when our seminar leader, Scott Shirey, said he was going to do something different and break away from the typical ‘bring someone to the seminar and then we’ll take them to another room and tell them about Landmark‘ and instead have a mini-Landmark experience with a known Austin individual, I told him I would be happy to promote that!

If you want to sign up, that’s great but I’ve been assured that no one will be taken to another room and educated about the benefits of Landmark.  New people will have the opportunity to experience the activities and the discussions that occur in the Forum and in the seminar meetings.

So if you are in Austin and would like to find out how you can make breakthroughs with money, the economy, and your career as well as make an impact on your and other people’s lives, please come to our February 16, 2009 seminar meeting.  They will even be giving away a free scholarship to an upcoming Landmark Forum valued at $385.  Honestly $385 is not a lot of money when you take into consideration to the time (a 3 day weekend and the 7 to 10 seminars that are included) that is provided to help you realize results.  I hope to see you there!  Details below:

How to Gain an Edge That Lasts a Lifetime:

Creating Unpredictable Results in Today’s Challenging Times
Breakthrough your concerns with money, the economy, and your success.
Consider this a friendly invitation for an evening of possibilities featuring:

Kirk McDow
Business Coach and Professional Musician
http://www.kirkmcdow.com/inthemedia.html

&

Scott Shirey
Seminar Leader  Landmark Forum in Action Series

7:00 P.M. – 10:00 P.M.
Norris Conference Center
2525 West Anderson Lane
Austin, Texas 78757

Map: http://www.mapquest.com/maps?city=Austin&state=TX&address=2525+West+Anderson+Lane

Because of construction/destruction it is easiest to get there from Burnet (behind Panda Express and Sonic) as the conference center is behind what was/is North Cross Mall.

The Holidays Are Coming…
Dec 19 2008

Blogging will be light. Many online creatures will be stirring, even late into the night.

I have two paid weeks off from my day job, which is one of the benefits of working for a University. But true time off is still not in sight. With two kids, an existential crisis, and Babble Soft, I’ll be working some days and nights.

So until I am able to blog again, I’d like to leave you with links to two thought provoking articles on leadership and management:

• A Harvey Mackey, founder of Mackey Envelope, column called Praise gives a psychological raise about the power of encouraging and acknowledging others in the work place especially during these tough economic times.

• Leadership As Creativity: Finding the Opportunity Hidden Within Decision Making and Dialogue by John McCann, Professor of Linguistics and Antiquities at the Trinity College in Dublin. It’s about the Creative Leader and starts with this quote “I must follow the people, am I not their leader?” — Benjamin Disraeli.

They are both great reads on management and leadership and you will not be disappointed if you click the links above.

So Happy Holidays everyone!  I’ll try to get a few more posts out before the New Year.  I wish you all peace, comfort and the possibility of living a fully expressed life no matter what joy, pain, happiness, sadness, or life changes that might bring…

Nacho The Party Puppy!
Dec 14 2008

Now for a post on the lighter side of life.  I’m sure my reflective/transformational posts might be too heavy for some readers.  Lord knows when I re-read them, they remind me of my roller coaster ride called life.  Did I mention roller coaster rides make me sick? 🙂

So now for something fun!  This post is about a book about Nacho, a dog who apparently likes to party.  Two people I know (Janet Mitchell and Bonnie Caver) are friends with the writer (Emma J. Virjan) and gave me a copy of the book.  It’s such a fun read and both my kids enjoy reading it.  They think it’s funny that this puppy has a party in a tub, in a box, and eats hot dogs.  It’s a flip book with colorful pictures and cute sayings.

My kids love this book and it could make for a great stocking stuffer or Christmas gift!

Are Your Children’s Identities Safe?
Nov 16 2008

The following is a guest post by a friend and fellow entrepreneur Julie Fergerson.  We met several years ago while each of us was in the middle of our very own first high tech start-up.  Julie is currently a VP at Debix.  Debix provides services to help you monitor your credit.  My husband and I signed up a while ago, and we recently signed up our kids.  We were at her daughter’s 5 year old birthday party that she mentions below.  We just got the results back for our kids who were part of a batch of 83 kids that were evaluated.  Thank goodness our kids are safe but 3 of those kids had compromised credit.  Check out Julie’s post below to learn more about how to protect your children’s identities.

Are Your Children’s Identities Safe?

Hi, my name is Julie and I am a mother of two little kids, age 2 and 5.  I am also an executive at Debix, the Identity Protection Network, and have been chasing criminals and stopping fraud over the past decade.  Recently, I helped design a new product to protect children’s identities.  As usual with any new product launch (July 28^th, 2008), I asked my friends at my daughter’s fifth birthday party to enroll and give me feedback on what they thought. 

I was stunned to find that two of the fourteen children at the party (age 4 and age 9) had someone else using their identities.  This hit so close to home that I decided to research the size of the problem.

So we scanned 500 children who were under the age of 18, and found that 1 in 20 kids (5%) already have someone else using their social security number.  To put that in perspective, that means about one kid in every classroom in the US is a victim of identity theft.  Worse yet, the average child victim had over $12,000 in debt and 12% of the child victims are age 5 and younger – shocking!

To ensure the results were accurate we hired Javelin Strategy and Research, a top-tier analyst firm to analyze the results and report their conclusions.   You can download the research report here: www.debix.com/research.

You can hear stories from the parents about their children being victims at (http://news.debix.com/index.php/categories/child-victims/).

As I talk about this problem with other Moms, the first question is always, “what does it mean that their kid is a victim of identity theft?”  It means the child will not be able to use his credit when he needs it for things as important as college loans, first apartments or even a first job.  As part of my research I met Lindsey, a college student at Texas State, who is living this problem.  When she applied for her first internship competing against 400 other candidates, she was thrilled when she got the job and received the company welcome gift.  Unfortunately a few weeks later, she received a letter rescinding her job offer – she was told she was not hirable because someone else was using her social security number.  After what she calls “a full time job” of working to clear her name for six months, she was able to restore her identity and get the job.  

The next question I get is “how can this happen?  Surely companies know the social security number belongs to a kid.”  The answer is no.  There is no system in place to warn companies and the Social Security Administration does not publish a database of social security numbers with names and ages of kids.  The social security administration has a formula for issuing a social security number, but you can’t tell the difference between a number that was issued to a 39 year old immigrant to the US and a newborn.  About all you can tell from the number is the year and location it was issued (check out SSA Algorithm for issuing SSNs.)

It is our job as parents to protect our children and give them every possible advantage when they become an adult.  We have to protect our kids as best we can so when they start out they have a clean record and aren’t starting adult life at a disadvantage.

The solution I built at Debix finds the problems and restores the child’s identity for $20 per year.  While we try to keep our pricing affordable, we also took the time to publish the steps a parent would need to do if they wanted to protect their kids on their own at www.childrenscreditcrisis.org. 

I also worked with the FBI to produce a webcast to teach parents how to protect their kids from Identity Theft.  Feel free to pass this information along.

*******
Do you have any stories to share about identity theft either from personal experience or a friend’s?

Making Things Convenient
Oct 11 2008

How important is it to make things convenient for your customer, your friend, your boss, your co-worker, your employees, your spouse, your family?  Do people even think about that?  Do people wake up every day and think to themselves, “How can I make life easier for someone else?” I know that I don’t wake up every day thinking that, but I have seen the positive results when I accidentally or on purpose try to make others lives just a bit easier and fight some of their battles for them so that they don’t have to. 

Sometimes people notice and other times people do not.  Sometimes they say ‘thank you‘ and sometimes they say nothing leaving you wondering if they noticed or not.  I’m probably guilty of not noticing what people might be doing for me because sometimes I get too caught up in moving from one thing to the next to appreciate the little things.  The busier we get sometimes the harder it is to notice except for when your expectations are exceeded. 

I recently had my expectations exceeded (nay blown away) and by a government entity no less.  It almost made up for my traffic court tribulations!  I recently received the annual mailing about renewing my car registration.  I’m already grateful that I can pay $1.00 extra to do this by mail.  This time I saw that there was a notice on the renewal form that said something like “You need to order new plates.”  It was in all capital letters but no where on the notice could I find instructions on how and when I needed to get them. 

First, I wondered why the heck I needed new plates even though my current ones were 7 years old.  I guess I haven’t owned a car for 7 years before and it didn’t (and still doesn’t) make sense why I needed to replace perfectly good plates.  I groaned inside thinking that now I’ll have to figure out how to get new plates.  I decided not to think about it and mailed in my check.  I figured I’d deal with the bureaucratic mess of calling and/or going to multiple government/city offices to get these new plates sometime in the not so distant future. 

To my absolute amazement and utter surprise, I received in the mail from the County Tax Collector – Travis County, Nelda Wells Spears, two new plates!  I almost fell over with excitement because I was now relieved of having to figure out how to get them.  I could literally feel a small weight being lifted off my mind.  I can only hope that whoever wins the next US presidential election, they wake up every day thinking about out how they can make all of our lives just a little bit easier!

As a busy, working-mom, when someone makes my life easier I am ever so grateful.  I don’t know how to personally thank the Tax Collector’s office so I’ll thank them with this blog post.  Maybe Nelda has a Google Alert set-up for her name, and she’ll see this post. 🙂

So if you have nothing better to do or even if you do, go try to make someone else’s life just a little more convenient…even if they don’t say anything, I bet they smile a little inside.

Seth Godin and Squidoo Raising $80,000 for Charity
Oct 1 2008

I saw on Seth Godin’s blog today that he and Squidoo, the company he founded, are raising money for charity and giving away $80,000.  All you have to do is vote by visiting the post I just linked to for the charity you like on their list.  Each vote counts for $2 and they will take up to 40,000 votes (yes, fairly simple math).  Go check it out and use that voting finger and contribute $2 wisely!  Voting will be open until October 14, 2008 and they appear to be almost half way there…

Household CFOs – Take Charge of Family Finances
Sep 14 2008

All of us managing households during these challenging economic times, should read Mechel Glass’ guest post below.  Mechel is Household CFO’s Director of Education. 

On top of the other things I do, I manage the finances in our household, and I can appreciate the time and thought it takes to make sure your finances are in order.   It’s even more important when you have a family and kids to plan for.  I can’t say that I’m an expert at it and I’m sure I could do better if I had more time sit down with my husband to think about it, but we do the best we can.  Thankfully, I had a mother, who like Mechele, taught me the value of saving, budgeting, and not overspending when I was young.  I also had the inner drive to work hard, be independent, and support myself.  So it wasn’t so hard to live within my means as I got older.  Thanks Mom!

**************************************

My daughter, Sarah Amirah, has had a piggy bank since the day she was born. Of course, it took a few years before she was aware that it was filling up with coins and bills. But now that she’s four, she’s on her second piggy bank and is somewhat aware that she is accumulating some serious coinage with the change I let her have from trips to the grocery store. 

Her first piggy bank is one of those old-fashioned ceramic ones that you can’t sneak into. I think the only way to get at the cash is to smash it. Smash the pretty gift from her grandmother to get the cash? That won’t be an easy decision! 

Although it may seem like I started financial education very early with Sarah, I think there is no reason to postpone teaching children little lessons about saving. Truth is, many adults these days are putting themselves at risk because they never developed savings habits. 

Through my position at Consumer Credit Counseling Service (CCCS) of Greater Atlanta, I talk to people everyday who are so overwhelmed with handling day-to-day finances like paying bills and managing bank accounts and credit cards that they can’t make plans for unexpected emergencies or long-term needs. Adding even more stress is the increased cost of groceries and gas, which has led many of these families to the verge of financial crisis. 

The reality is two in three “Household CFOs” – those primarily responsible for the household finances – do not have an emergency savings account, putting them at financial risk in the event of a crisis. Our recent national survey also found that nearly one in three households has not prepared a will, purchased insurance of any kind or made other preparations for a significant life-changing event. Yet, almost half of those surveyed have already experienced some sort of financial setback within their household in the past year.

In response to our survey findings and the current economic conditions, we are launching a national financial awareness campaign, “Household CFO” and enhancing our CredAbilityU online education program to offer free on-demand courses, interactive webinars and financial management tools. Through this program, we hope to provide tangible solutions that real Household CFOs can use in today’s economically challenging times. 

At CredAbilityU.org, online classes are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, on a variety of topics – from homeownership to money management to dealing with bankruptcy. Live webinars on special topics are also scheduled throughout each month. You can also sign up to receive the Household CFO Report, our free newsletter, which offers monthly tips and advice on how to take control of family finances. 

But don’t stop at CredAbilityU.org; there are a host of free resources available that offer practical information and helpful tools, including:

• Ÿ Consumer advocate Ilyce Glink’s site, www.ThinkGlink.com
• Ÿ Credit score-reporting site, www.MyFico.com
• Ÿ Free credit report site, www.AnnualCreditReport.com 

And, don’t get discouraged – it’s easy to get overwhelmed, but there is help out there and it won’t take long before you feel more capable and confident in your role as the chief financial officer of your household.

Hurricanes and HARO
Sep 11 2008

Photo by Sandy Blanchard

There’s a little hurricane heading our way here in Texas called Ike.  Many places along the coast have been issued mandatory evacuation notices, including Houston, one of the largest and sadly also one of the fattest cities in the country.  Houston has also still been working on integrating all the permanent victims of hurricane Katrina (2005) that evacuated to their city since then. 

The schools here in Austin are closing early tomorrow, airports are in a muddle, and far more importantly for all of you college football fans out there, they have actually rescheduled the UT Austin vs. Arkansas football game that was going to be held this Saturday!  Of all the things that have been happening, I think rescheduling a college football game in a college town that’s not directly in the landing path of the hurricane speaks volumes about the fears and concerns of the people around here as well as the anticipated amounts of rain.

So shifting to HARO (Help A Reporter Out) and it’s relation to hurricanes, it might be a stretch but Peter Shankman (the founder) seemed to bring it out from nowhere a few months ago and now he has tons and tons of subscribers — both reporters and sources.  He’s managed to make ProfNet/PR Newswire nervous because he’s giving all his leads out for free and us resource and money constrained entrepreneurs are loving it.  He even got on the radar screen of Seth Godin who mentioned Peter and linked to HARO on a recent Getting reporters to call you post.

I can quickly scan the queries and make a decision as to whether to try to pitch based on my company and my personal background.  Because of HARO, I don’t have to pay tons of money to get access to these great queries from reputable sources.  I have had couple of people interested in learning more about Babble Soft (mostly bloggers) and am crossing my fingers that I’ll soon have the opportunity to share with national/international reporters my ideas on how the world of parenting is changing and how technology can support that transition!  I guess I’m hoping that by using HARO I can eventually create a hurricane of activity around my company.

So may you all be safe and avoid the disastrous effects of Hurricane Ike but also take advantage of HARO (tell your friends). I, for one, am glad the last two big hurricane’s have male names instead of female ones like Katrina.  I was getting a bit tired of all the jokes/innuendos surrounding the big hurricanes being referred to as feminine and destructive.

Traveling With Children – Know Your Rights and Limitations
Sep 1 2008

And now for a fabulous guest post from the ex-general counsel at Expedia, Mark Britton.  I wish I had known about his site, Avvo, before I experienced my Traffic Court Tribulations! 

Being the ex-general counsel at Expedia and now running Avvo and its free legal advice Q&A forum, I get a lot of questions about travel-particularly travelers’ rights and responsibilities.  As a parent of three rambunctious little boys, I offer this post to help traveling parents everywhere.  On that note, I am reminded of one of Expedia’s great early ads which said something like, “Whoever said getting there is half the fun has never gotten there with a screaming two year old.”  

So, in that spirit, here are some nuggets of knowledge for your next child-laden trip: 

1.  Traveling with kids doesn’t give you special legal rights.  A lot of people assume that because they are traveling with kids they have special rights and preferences granted by the Federal Aviation Administration or some higher authority.  The reality is that your rights-with or without children-are largely whatever the airline chooses to give you.  Don’t think you can be involuntarily bumped with children?  Oh yes, you can.  Outraged that the airline denied you early boarding with your pokey young children? Tough beans.  Not able to avoid your child’s tantrums by letting her run up and down the airline aisle? It’s the flight staff’s call. 

2.  Add 30-60 minutes to get to your gate.  Let’s face it, kids take their time.  That dead cockroach en route to your gate may be disgusting to you, but it absolutely requires closer inspection by a five-year-old.  I learned long ago that rather than trying to whip your kids into an adult pace, allowing more time to get to your gate preserves family harmony.  Just going through security is stressful for a kid-take it slow and make it fun. 

3.  Reserve the allowed seats for your kids.  One place that the feds do get involved is where your children may sit on a plane.  They may not sit in an exit row, and if they are in a car seat, they must sit by the window.  So don’t think you will book your young child in an exit row and the airline will have to live with it-they won’t.  The flight attendants will move you-I see it happen all the time.  Also, don’t book two aisle seats-one for you and your car-seated kid.  Just take it for granted that your child will be sitting by the window and you will be sitting in the middle by the big hairy guy who hogs the armrest. 

4.  No need to smuggle your baby food.  Keep in mind that while you are not allowed to take liquids on a plane, you may take liquid-based baby food.  Many people don’t know this, and so they attempt to come up with creative ways to smuggle on formula or the always-popular peas and carrots.  Stow your criminal tendencies, and simply declare the baby food.  You can take up to one-day’s supply on board, but I have found that TSA personnel are always very sympathetic and accommodating when it comes to food for your infant.  

5.  Kids can get the boot too.  Finally, keep in mind that an airline can deny you boarding-or even ask you to deplane-if your kids are disorderly, abusive or violent.  This goes for adults too, but people are always surprised that it pertains to kids. 

I could go on and on (bring a DVD player with headphones, seat your child behind a parent, etc.).  However, I think I have already exceeded my word limit.  Of course, if you have any more legally related travel questions, we are always here to answer all of your questions.  You can go directly to our free legal advice Q&A forum to ask your personal legal questions- anonymously if desired-and real attorneys will answer them. 

Travel sanely. 

Mark Britton
Founder & CEO
Avvo, Inc.

Accredited Online
If you are interested in the law and your rights and want to interrupt the status quo, consider earning a law degree online. Taking courses online allows you to set your pace and live your life as you choose.

Blog Action Day 2008 – Poverty
Aug 27 2008

If you haven’t heard, they are already signing up people for Blog Action Day 2008 and the topic this year will be on Poverty.  If you are a blogger and have thoughts to share on the topic of poverty, go sign up now!  The only requirement is that you do a post on October 15, 2008 on the topic of poverty.  I posted last year for Blog Action Day and the topic was the environment.

My post last year was called Rock. Paper. Scissors. How Do We All Win?  I wrote about ways we could reduce the amount of paper we use by cutting down the paper we receive.  Since last year, I called up and cancelled several of the catalogues that we randomly received, made sure we were getting e-statements instead of paper statements, etc.  We have drastically reduced the amount of unnecessary mail we get, but we still get things that I haven’t figured out how to stop getting!  But I’ll keep on trying.

Check it out, sign up, and share your entrepreneurial and parent related thoughts about poverty!

Traffic Court Tribulations
Aug 23 2008

The other day I went to traffic court for the first time in my life.  I got a ticket back in May for ‘disregarding a right turn only’ sign on 4^th and Lavaca in the downtown area of Austin.  [I couldn’t find a right turn only image, but it looks similar to the ‘left lane must turn left’ image I put at the beginning of this post except for the fact it said ‘right’ instead of ‘left.’]

At the time, there were three cops pulling over people for doing the exact same thing I had done.   While they were giving us tickets, at least 5 more cars drove by who did the exact the same thing the three of us had done.  I had not seen the sign just like the others and it was obvious to me this was a ‘right turn only trap!’

I’ve never contested a ticket in my life, but this time I felt it was obviously a set-up and I DID NOT ‘disregard’ the sign because I didn’t see it.  How can you disregard something you don’t even see?  So thinking I might have a chance to make my point and get it dismissed, I pled ‘not guilty.’

Now I’ve had a few speeding tickets in the past…not many.  I’ve never (knock on wood) had a ticket hit my record because here in Texas you can take a Defensive Driving course and a) the offense won’t show up on your record and b) you can get a discount on your insurance premiums.  I believe you can take the course no more than one time per year. 

I’ll admit on a couple of occasions, I deserved a speeding ticket so I took the course.  On only one occasion did I consider a ticket I got to be unfair and again it had to do with a traffic signal issue.  They changed the timing of the signal and several people who normally drive that way accidentally ran a light.  The cops even said that was the case, but I was in college and too afraid to contest anything back then.  But I digress…back to the ticket at hand.

I was assigned a date to show up at the court to hear my options.  The prosecutor, who had an attitude of “I’m smart. You’re dumb. Don’t waste my time.” did not tell me anything more than what was on the paperwork I had.  He asked me if I wanted to waive my right to a trial by jury.  I told him I wasn’t sure and asked his opinion.  He had no real opinion other than to say if I wanted a trial jury I would most likely be in court several days because the jury trials run over time often and are rescheduled for other days.  He told me if I picked a trial by judge I would most likely get it all over with during the set time.  So being the busy person that I am, I picked the trial by judge.

I don’t have any traffic lawyer friends so I kind of hoped the cop wouldn’t show up.  I did try calling the University of Texas Law School to so if they had any students who could help me only to find out they only help other students or possibly indigent citizens and they were backed up for months.  If the cop doesn’t show up, the ticket is usually dismissed.  Well in my case, the cop did show up. 

So the day of the trial, I called the traffic engineering department of the city because a co-worker of mine said he thought the sign had been changed.  I figured if I could get proof that the sign had been changed, I would have a chance to prove it was poorly designed and the charges should be dismissed.  They faxed me over two documents showing the intersection and one a work order that was called in by a police officer in June to make the street painting/marking clearer to indicate that lane was in fact a ‘right turn only’ lane and to add a sign to the traffic light (where MOST people look) that indicated the right most lane was a ‘right turn only’ lane.

The cop was fair in his description and admitted they were performing a ‘traffic initiative’ (nice way to say ‘traffic trap’ if you ask me) and indicated the painting on the street was faded.  I didn’t know what rights I had in an ‘entrapment’ situation so I had no idea what questions to ask!

I attempted to submit the work orders and other paperwork I had received from the traffic engineering department of the city and the prosecutor immediately started saying things like ‘that’s hearsay, she can’t tell another person’s story‘ before I was even able to say anything.  I said ‘how can written documents be hearsay?‘  The judge then said he wouldn’t allow the documents and he wouldn’t even read them!

He instructed the court reporter to make note of them and for me to show them to the prosecutor.  I tried to show them to the judge but he refused to look at them.  He kept asking me if I had further evidence to submit.  Now, my degrees are in business and my only experience with lawyers is with corporate attorneys or TV shows like Boston Legal so I wasn’t sure what else I could present as evidence.  I wasn’t even told I could bring witnesses.  Even if I knew I could bring witnesses, I don’t know who I could have brought that would have been credible to the judge.

I was TOTALLY unprepared to represent myself in this matter and yet I was probably more prepared than 90% of the people who enter that courtroom!  I could tell I threw them for a loop by actually bringing in paperwork that demonstrated the KNOWN safety hazard that intersection presented.  They seemed at least momentarily perplexed.

So, I was found guilty and sentenced a fine of $101 ($1 above court costs) plus $25 in filing fees of some sort.  Of course I was annoyed but was slightly distracted by the splitting headache I had started to get a couple of hours before arriving at the courthouse.

In my summary, I asked the judge to consider the fact that I did not have a ticket on my record (due to taking defensive driving and it being years since I received my last one anyway) and have never appeared in court.  Apparently, that didn’t matter.

I asked the judge, unfortunately after his verdict, about deferred adjudication, and he said I should have been offered that earlier and I said I had not been offered that.  With an attitude of ‘oh well,’ he then said that since he had already ruled that was it and he was done with the case.

As I was leaving, the cop told me I had done a really good job in presenting and he agreed with me that the intersection was badly marked and should be fixed.  He was nice enough, and I know he was doing his job or doing what he was told.  But it does beg the question why these cops didn’t just call in this problem years ago since it’s obviously a ‘violation’ that happens often.

I was, as I mentioned, annoyed and angry, but those feelings were tempered because I got to see the case right before me that had to do with a taxi driver.  [I found it odd that everyone can come in and watch the cases to know what you were accused of because not only because that could be uncomfortable for the defendant but also might make the judge feel like he has to be a stickler to show he’s not weak.] 

This poor woman was a single mom who drove a taxi in the evenings to make ends meet.  She mentioned she had even put her daughter through college and had another kid at home.  After listening to the case, it was unclear to me what she was accused of and I think she did a good job of telling her side of the story.  However, it didn’t seem to matter because they believed the cop, who had his partner with him who said she could see everything (highly doubtful) and found her guilty and fined her $164.

There were a few more guys waiting to do their trial when I left.  There was another woman waiting outside who said she’d been there since that morning because she was accused of outstanding tickets that she claims she never did.  She said she was living in another state during the days they accused her of certain tickets.  She said she had $7K in fines and no way to pay them and would have to sit in jail for 30 days to serve her time and take a leave of absence from her job.  Crazy!

They gave me a hard to understand document about appealing but given the time I’ve already spent on this and I’d have to pay about $110 just to get the transcript made by the court reporter if I wanted to use it in an appeal, I’ve decided not to appeal and reduce my chances to get more headaches.

I know this post is long, but I had to get it out in case it helps someone else.  My key takeaways:

1. Request a trial by jury and make every attempt to have a flexible schedule around the time of your jury trial date.

2. Take pictures (i.e., evidence) of the site

3. Find a witness. I had thought about asking the two other drivers who were pulled over to contest with me, but I was afraid to get out of my car for fear the cops would think I was doing something crazy and they would shoot me or something.

4. Find a lawyer friend who knows something about traffic law to help you or show up with you at a jury or judge trial

5. Bring headache medicine with you!  My headache medicine of choice is usually something laced with ibuprofen like Advil.

6. Bring someone with you for moral support if you don’t have a lawyer or a witness.

7. If you have the opportunity, take a Defensive Driving course even if you feel wronged and avoid the whole experience all together

I don’t regret contesting the ticket because it was a learning experience for me and interesting insight into our legal traffic court system.  Live and learn as they say. 

If you think this post could be helpful to others, please Stumble, Digg, share, etc.  If any of you have experiences with the traffic court system, please share in the comments below.

Building A Web Business After Hours
Aug 14 2008

Earlier this year, I had such a great time at SXSW Interactive 2008, that I submitted a panel idea for SXSW Interactive 2009 called Building A Web Business After Hours and more people than I thought are interested in seeing it happen! 

Panel Description: Many businesses are built after-hours or during odd hours of the day and night. Join us for a panel discussion by entrepreneurs who built (or are building) their Web/E-commerce/Other business while holding a day job, multiple jobs, or who are currently balancing two+ career options. 

For those of you who don’t know, I am attempting to build a web business (Babble Soft) after hours and lets just say it has it’s ups and downs but mostly it’s really hard and challenging with a big upside bejng that in my day job I get to be around other entrepreneurs.

How many of you (or people you know) are building sites and businesses in their spare time (on the side)?  What kind of businesses are they?  Many great businesses start with tinkering on the side…

I’ve started to assemble a great group of panelists including: 

• One of the co-founders of BlogHer, the top female blogging site in the world that has partnerships and customer relationships with some of the top recognized brands in the world!  Elisa Camahort Page, a co-founder, awesomely mentioned my panel in her Time to vote for SXSW panels post.  Check out Elisa’s post to see the other great panels she’s recommending.
   
• Thom Singer is the director of business development for Austin based vcfo.  Additionally he is the author of four books about the power of business relationships and is a professional speaker.  With the support of his employer, he successfully manages his job and his own business, speaking to companies around the country on how to network.  He blogs at Some Assembly Required.  

• Karen Bantuveris, Austin founder & CEO of VolunteerSpot, knows firsthand what ‘juggle’ means.  She’s built VolunteerSpot from the ground up while running a successful management development and executive coaching business, and being active in her daughter’s school PTO Board and Scout troop.  She even manages to sleep, occasionally.�
   
• Jeremy Bencken, co-founder of ApartmentRatings.com, Tenant Market, and PR for Pirates.  Jeremy and his wife, Katie, founded ApartmentRatings.com in 2000 out of their one bedroom apartment in Mountain View.  They bootstrapped the site while attending business school at UT-Austin and then during full-time jobs for 4 years before selling the company to Internet Brands in 2007.  Along the way they grew traffic to over 12M unique visitors per year (without an ad budget), built a base of advertisers, fought off frivolous lawsuits, and got their site featured on NPR Marketplace, and in stories in the NY Times and AP.

• Gretchen Heber is CEO and co-founder of NaturallyCurly.com, a multi-dimensional company for people with curly hair she founded with business partner Michelle Breyer. She and Michelle founded NaturallyCurly while holding full time jobs as a journalist for the Austin daily newspaper.  NaturallyCurly.com is an online magazine, social network and shopping boutique dedicated to curlyheads. The site came about, in part, because of Heber’s having been told as a child: “It looks like you combed your hair with a stick!” among other beauties. She is married, has three boys, and resides in South Austin. She is active in her neighborhood association and not much else because she’s an entrepreneur and has three young boys, and goodness, who has time!?
   

Please, please, please go vote for the panel by clicking on this link: Building A Web Business After Hours.  I believe 30% of the weight on whether a panel is chosen is from people like you voting.  The only downside is that you have to create a log in, but the upside is that you will be in the SXSW system and see all the other cool panels going on and vote for many more! 

Thanks and I look forward to seeing some of you at SXSW next year. 8)

Movie Fun for the Whole Family
Jul 18 2008

Now for a fabulous movie-related guest post by Film.com’s mom blogger, Sue Harvey!

Movie Fun for the Whole Family: Trust Mom on Film, and Your Instincts

Mary Poppins photo from film.com credit to Walt Disney
The best piece of advice my husband and I received before the birth of our first child was fairly simple; trust your instincts. Now, this advice was given in the context of when to pick up a crying baby, but we have found it to be just as effective and useful in many other aspects of parenting as well. While plenty of studies, guidelines and groups exist that are ready and willing to tell parents how to raise their children, I believe nothing trumps parental responsibility, engagement and instinct. That said, I’d like to offer a little more advice – advice about movies suitable for families with small children. 

I have been a movie lover far longer than I have been a parent, and many of the films my Mom shared with me when I was a child are the same films my children and I enjoy watching together today. The movies that never fail to entertain us all are musicals. The range of topics within the genre is practically limitless, and some of  the musicals that have been hits with my children from the time they were about three years old thru the present (they are now aged 12, 10 and six) include Mary Poppins (it’s “practically perfect in every way!”), Singin’ in the Rain  (it’s funny, has great dancing, fun songs and memorable characters), An American in Paris (remarkable choreography, amazing music, visually arresting, ‘s wonderful!), Brigadoon (mysterious, magical, beautiful), The Pirates of Penzance (silly story with catchy, quick lyrics, Kevin Kline as the Pirate King and Linda Ronstadt as Mabel), Annie Get Your Gun (delightful, fun, and featuring Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show), Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (funny, good music, great choreography), and On the Town  (what better way to introduce your kids to Frank Sinatra?). 

I quickly realized that even they didn’t understand the story upon the first viewing, they generally enjoyed the songs, costumes, dancing and characters enough to want to watch them again, and again, and again. Each of these pictures provides not only good clean fun, exposure to remarkable talent and craftsmanship, but also a cultural education from which they can only benefit. 

Possibly a more obvious choice for family films would be animated features, particularly those produced by Walt Disney’s Studios and, increasingly, Pixar. I own copies of and have seen many of these films more times than I care to recall, as have my children. They, too, are part of our cultural heritage and I would argue that a childhood devoid of  The Aristocats, 101 Dalmations, the Disney Princess lineup, Fantasia, Fantasia 2000 (personal favorites of my tribe), Finding Nemo, among others, would leave a gaping hole in one’s cultural education.

However, I would also suggest that allowing a child to watch any of these films unsupervised, particularly for the first time, would be a mistake. In case you haven’t seen them yourselves or have forgotten, most of these features involve at least one dead parent and mortal danger for the heroine or hero. This is the stuff of nightmares and phobias – not to mention many tears. These may be classics, but they can also be scary. 

If you seek the kind of video fare I fondly refer to as the Electronic Babysitter the pickings are rich. PBS produces numerous shows, many of which are available on video in addition to their daily programming, which are not only educational and suitable for even the youngest viewers; they are often tolerable for adults, as well. 

We are our children’s first and primary teachers. I firmly believe that if we introduce our children to the best we have to offer, be it films, books, food, music or personal habits, they will naturally develop a taste for quality. Deciding what “high quality” means to your family is where instinct, judgment and responsibility come into play. While it can be helpful to consider movies ratings, the only one really qualified to decide what is right for your children and your family is you. So, if you don’t have time to pre-screen a film, talk to the clerk at your local video store or your friends or family, or check out a title on line. But remember, just because the company marketing a film declares it to be “fun for the whole family”, doesn’t make it so anymore than a picture without a rating (as most of the above mentioned musical are) is “inappropriate”; trust me. Or better yet, trust your instincts. 

Sue “Mom on Film” Harvey is a mother of three who shares her passion for film with family-friendly movie recommendations on Film.com, a free online entertainment service on Movies, TV, DVDs, celebrity news and more.

Contest for Innovative Moms
Jul 13 2008

I recently received the following email from one of Whirlpool’s PR reps.  Although I don’t recall being upset (maybe disappointed) about not knowing about the program (which I can’t recall at the moment) she was referring to, I figured I’d share her email about this contest because it seems like a cool idea.  I do have a vague recollection of commenting on a Washington Post article and if I didn’t, she’s a pretty good PR rep to tell me about this contest, because I like to post about programs that support entrepreneurs! 

The cool thing is that if you win you not only win cash but also appliances!  Also, upon reading their site you cannot submit a company/idea for a new appliance.  Your business idea has to be totally unrelated to Whirlpool’s primary business of appliance creation and manufacturing.  

I also noticed that one of the guest judges is Julie Aigner-Clarke, founder of Baby Einstein! 

I haven’t figured out yet if I can apply for Babble Soft (no issue about us being an appliance 🙂 ) but I haven’t read all of the fine print yet.  The application looks pretty simple and straight forward so chances are I will apply.  I encourage you all to check it out too and tell other mom-inventors out there about the competition. 

Hi Aruni,

I saw that you commented on a Washington Post blog entry about a grant program and that you were upset you didn’t know the program was going on.  Just wanted to share with you another grant program that I thought might be of interest to you and your readers.

Whirlpool brand has recently kicked-off the fourth annual Mother of Invention Grant Program. In the past three years, Whirlpool brand has recognized and helped more than 15 moms turn their innovative ideas into reality.

The Whirlpool brand Mother of Invention Grant Program provides seed money and expert guidance to moms to turn their invention, business or service ideas into full-fledged businesses.  Contest winners receive:

• A $20,000 grant for the grand prize winner
• $24,000 in grant money for the four runners-up
• Appliance prizes
• Invitation to business boot camp where winners will receive guidance from Whirlpool and industry experts

This year, we are greening the program by adding a new category focused on moms who create an environmentally friendly product/service or use natural/recycled materials to create their invention. 

More information and entry forms can be found at www.whirlpool.com/moms. Entries are accepted through July 31, 2008.

Please let me know if you have any questions or would like additional information about the program.  I’d also be happy to share information about our past winners, should you be interested. 

Best,

Laura