thehustletownchronicle.com » Interviews & Reviews

Is It Impossible to Create a Black Tech Startup?

Iceman Baldy — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 14:24:45 +0000

Courtesty of Black Web 2.0

Wayne Sutton, one of the founders of NewMe Accelerator, published an opinion piece on Black Web 2.0 that confronts the harsh reality and difficult challenges of starting a black tech company when funding and experience are in short supply or not optimal as it relates to minority entrepreneurs. Is it impossible to create a Black tech startup today?

The harsh reality for black entrepreneurs in the web/tech space. Your chances of raising startup capital are slim to none. Someone prove me wrong please! (socialwayne.com)

FastCompany.com Interview with Allhiphop.com’s Chuck Creekmur

Iceman Baldy — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 01:34:29 +0000

The site www.allhiphop.com (AHH) is arguably the biggest news brand in the Hip-Hop arena. Today we talk to cofounder and CEO Chuck Creekmur about the evolving trends within the rap industry and how AHH plans to stay strategically ahead of the curve.

Productivity Software Reviewed: RescueTime

DaVaun Sanders — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 10:18:17 +0000

Effective time management is a true artform with the myriad distractions we face while handling business. Email or social networking leaches away at the work day, employees spend more time on YouTube than completing an upcoming project–the list goes on. To identify problem areas or tweak your online performance, the Hustletown Chronicle recommends giving RescueTime a look.

This software tracks your usage in a variety of ways, providing data sets for months, weeks or even a single day. The free version only tracks your past three months’ worth of data. Conveniently, RescueTime will run in the background, and idles when you step away from the computer. You can disable it from your system tray, should you need a break or day free of monitoring.

The graphs on the main dashboard will quickly show how a given computer is being used. You can sort the data into categories or even by individual websites and computer programs. One feature that I particularly enjoyed was the ability to assign positive or negative values to different websites.

RescueTime’s paid version offers added functionality for groups and offline work tracking, but for the typical entrepreneur or blogger, there is still plenty of functionality in using the free version. If competition fuels your work, the software also scores your productivity against the average of RescueTime users.

Hustletown readers: Do you use RescueTime or a similar time tracking tool? What measures up the best in your experience?

Mobile Product of the Year: Apple iPad 3G | Wired Magazine

Iceman Baldy — Sat, 06 Nov 2010 19:37:21 +0000

via wired.com

Are you an iPad user currently or thinking about getting an iPad for business or personal use? Whether you have one or not, the folks over at Wired have shared a bit about why they think the era of laptop computing has come to an end and how the iPad changes everything. Take a look at the article and let us know what you think.

Apple iPad 3G Is Wired’s Mobile Product of the Year (wired.com)

Black Comic Book Creators and Social Media Pt. 1 « Black Web 2.0

Iceman Baldy — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 20:45:02 +0000

via blackweb20.com

You can’t be a tech-loving geek and not be a fan of comic books. Black-owned web comics represent a niche that has been around for a while and is now making its way front and center via social media. Read this article by Black Web 2.0 where several of the best black comics writers and illustrators tell you how they are using the internet to reach a new generation of fans and admirers.

Highlights from Interactive One’s Digital Summit « Black Web 2.0

Iceman Baldy — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 01:08:21 +0000

Highlights from Interactive One’s Digital Summit « Black Web 2.0.

BlackWeb 2.0 has published a brief summary of the inagural multicultural digital summit. The event was hosted by Interactive One and The Council of Urban Professionals and featured the current thought leaders of multicultural and black online media. Take a look at their recap video as hosted on the link to the BlackWeb 2.0 site above.

Behind the Click: Wayne Sutton (from The Atlanta Post)

Iceman Baldy — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 03:04:04 +0000

Wayne Sutton is a consummate geek turned social media influencer that deserves your attention if you want to improve your business efficiency and professional relationships using social networking as an effective tool. He took some time out of his busy consulting and presenting schedule to share his prospective with The Atlanta Post on digital diversity and the urgency for African-Americans to use the space for business and brand building.

Hustletown readers should link and learn from Wayne. The advice and insights freely available from his weblog and via his network profiles are priceless.

PayPal, Credit Cards, and Debit Cards: Best Practices for Online Payments by NYT

DaVaun Sanders — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 19:45:10 +0000

The New York Times posted an article about making payments online, and contrasting the merits of credit cards, debit cards, and online services such as PayPal.

None of these options are entirely full proof from hackers, malware and phishing sites. Credit cards still garner a top recommendation because of the laws protecting against fraudulent charges:

“The strongest protections are when you pay by credit card,” says Carole Reynolds, a senior lawyer at the Federal Trade Commission. Under the Truth in Lending Act, consumers’ maximum liability for unauthorized use of their credit card is only $50, and when a card is used online, it’s zero.

Visit here for the rest of the article.

Top Cloud Apps for Your Business

DaVaun Sanders — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 05:06:10 +0000

There are cloud apps for just about everything these days, all designed to keep you one lost flash drive away from disaster. Check out this list of top performers, courtesy of the Elance blog.

Office Suites

Google Docs. No surprise here, what doesn’t Google do? Draft documents and collaborate online in multiple file formats. Also supports a mobile-compatible version for the deadline that truly sneaks up on you.

Zoho: offers similar features to Google Docs and additional applications for database management, reporting, project management, customer relationship management, wiki, chat, and more in its suite.

Office Web Apps: Features web-based versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote, and allows for document sharing.

Storage

Box.net: Storage from 1 GB to unlimited web-storage for yourself, mobile app access to your files to share and view, third party widgets and applications, and more – depending on paid or free version.

Windows Live SkyDrive : Allows anyone with a Windows Live ID access to 25 GB of personal storage with public share options. Active-X is an option for drag-and-drop file management similar to your home PC usage.

Multimedia

PicNik: Basic image editing tools: rotating, cropping, and resizing, sharpening and red-eye removal. Also supports import from Flickr, Facebook, and MySpace. The free version doesn’t even require registration.

Adobe Photoshop Express: Similar in nature to PicNik, also offers robust features such as saturation, white balance, sharpen, and black and white filters.

Vimeo: stores content and can stream to anyone in high-def. Embedding and preview thumbnail editing are included, with more features for paid users.

Hustletown readers: What Cloud apps do you prefer? Let us know in the comments section!

“28 Days of Diversity” SocialWayne.com Showcases Minority Webpreneurs

DaVaun Sanders — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 13:21:55 +0000

Black History Month is upon us, and is without doubt a meaningful time to celebrate the ancestors who provided for our present day success and opportunity. Yet in the information age, we often forget the flesh and blood peers among us who are not only making history, but also writing our future.

Entrepreneur Wayne Sutton’s inspiring project is bound to ensure that Black contributions continue to be recognized, through 28 Days of Diversity.

Sutton’s goal is to highlight people of color who are impacting the social web. “As someone in the technology/web/social space, I often travel and attend various events in the industry and notice a huge lack of diversity,” he says at SocialWayne.com. “When it comes to getting attention from mainstream media/tech blogs it’s almost impossible.”

Thus far the 28 Days of Diversity has featured the CEO of Black Web Media, a Stanford-bred tech entrepreneur, and a filmmaker/best-selling author.

Diversity on the web is strong in 2010–and February is just getting warmed up! Check out SocialWayne.com for a daily dose of inspiration.