One of my favorite quotes of all times was Ted Leonsis’s statement in the mid-1990’s that "MSN will be Microsoft’s Vietnam."  Ted said this around the time that MSN launched (on a proprietary platform – pre-Internet) to compete directly with AOL.  15 years later this seems like such a prescient statement. I have no idea […]

When I was at MIT, I loved the idea of office hours.  I didn’t use them often, but when I did they were incredibly helpful to me.  When I had focused one on one time with a professor, it took some of the intimidation out of the learning experience and gave me a tight window […]

Last week, while on vacation, Fred Wilson wrote a post titled Working on Vacation.  It began as follows: The title of this post sounds like an oxymoron. But it is a fact of life for me and probably many of the people who read this blog. The idea of a ‘get away from it all’ […]

This rarely happens to me so when it does, I notice it.  And – in my effort to write some of my tricks about work-life balance, I thought I’d call this one out, especially since it was totally my fault. In a board meeting last week, I had a quick reaction to something I saw […]

I was at a board meeting recently and the notion of potentially hiring a COO came up.  I blurted out "I don’t believe in COO’s."  An interesting conversation ensued, including someone pointing out that I’d recently supported hiring a COO at another company I’m an investor in (never underestimate the contradictory nature of a VC’s […]

Yesterday, it was announced that ConocoPhillips is the mystery buyer of the old StorageTek campus.  There was much revelry and prognosticating about how magnificent this is for the universe.  I agree – but only if ConocoPhillips razes the entire grotesque ugly thing and builds something nice and integrated into the natural beauty of the 432 […]

Yes – more Feld Job board.  I just finished up a board meeting in San Francisco for a new company that I’ve invested in (they are launching next week – you’ll hear more on Monday.)  We’re looking for two rock star software product managers.  The company is releasing products at a torrid pace (multiple times […]

That got your attention, right?  Actually I am in a place called “The Palace” – a hotel on New Montgomery Street that I always think of as “the Sheraton Commander” (but am not sure that’s right either.)  I won’t be here for long so good luck trying to find the physical instantiation of me today. […]

Every successful startup goes through it.  I got a note from a friend yesterday in response to an email I sent him about one of his startups where I said “feature X should be a no-brainer to implement.”  He responded “One of my concerns is that much of the focus at YYZ for the past […]