Archive for the ‘business’ Category
Le plus beau technoparc au Québec?
October 6th, 2007
La ville de Trois-Rivières espère créer le plus beau technoparc au Québec. Nul besoin de mentionner que les coûts de vie sont très bas mais que la main d’oeuvre qualifiée n’est peut être pas aussi abondante que dans les grands centres. Déjà certaines compagnies locales on fait part de leur intéret dont Xittel, une firme en télécommunication.
Trois-Rivières est stragégiquement placée entre Québec, Montréal et Drummondville ce qui en fait un endroit stratégique pour une petite entreprise désirant rejoindre un grand marché local.
Trois-Rivières héberge également TimmyOnTime, qui présentera leur produit au prochain DemoCamp à Montéral.
Posted in Startups, Technoparc, Trois-Rivieres, business, investissement, jobs | Comments (4)
The end of the Internet..?
October 6th, 2007
Facebook is at it again, an article on Slashdot mentions about the firm’s plan to implement an IM client in their site. They are also building an empire with many functions and applications for their users. I don’t see any stop sign ahead for Facebook. Many other sites (Google, Myspace, etc.) are implementing “local only functionalities” that are somehow similar to early BBS’es (ah the good old days..?).
With all those companies fighting for a larger userbase, are we entering a new era where there will be many “Internets”?
Posted in business, facebook, internet, social network | Comments (0)
Web 2.0 obsolete?
October 2nd, 2007
Interesting article in TechWorld where K2 (a software maker) argues that web 2.0 is irritant and irreverent to most companies. Is “web 2.0” really a throw away term used too loosely today? Perhaps. Irreverent? I think it depends on your sector. Banks for example are rarely a leader in any technology. They will be “web 2.0” when everyone is “web 5.0”.
K2 doesn’t explain their definition of web 2.0 but I think you can compare this to fashion. “Cool” people tend to wear the latest designs while conservative people rarely move away from the usual blue/black/white/brown palette. How would you feel if you were to visit a lawyer wearing flashy Puma’s and designer jeans? You might feel more comfortable visiting one whose attire is more conservative (although we all know it doesn’t automatically qualify him as competent). How about visiting a lawyer’s website, filled with pastel, oversized fonts, speech bubbles and, of course, a beta label? Doesn’t that sound strange? At least in this century? If I look at most bank sites, they are not cool and they are not meant to be cool anyways (although some could say that an update is well due for most of them).
What about if you sell jeans to kids? Would you want a bland site or a “web 2.0”-ish site with blogs, profiles, widgets for your blog (i.e. This is the jeans that I want – buy it for me) and some viral marketing stuff on it? I’m sure that even a local plumber would benefit from having a blog. By answering free questions, he could quickly become a star in his hometown.
So… It really depends who you are and who your customers are. I think that K2 went a bit too far by using the term “most”. It’s like saying most companies don’t need computers. Maybe they didn’t 10 years ago but most companies use them nowadays… I suspect same will happen with “web x.0”
Posted in Innovation, business, internet | Comments (0)
Blog widgets and new mini project
September 20th, 2007
I’m experimenting with BlogRush so do not panic if you see this big ugly window at the bottom right of my blog. I want to see if I can get decent links out of it. I’m not a fan of the (un-customizable) widget. If anyone knows a good RSS widget for Wordpress then please let me know as I’d like to keep the focus on local feeds rather than international feeds (and possibly spam).
I’m also working on a new service for startups in Quebec. Basically it’s a clone of CrunchBase (although slightly improved) for companies in Quebec. And yes, I know YulStart has a list as well, I wanted to make it very detailed and keep control of it. Wiki’s are nice but are too easy to modify (in a malicious way). If you have any feature requests then please go ahead and let me know. It should be ready soon. Just trying to juggle with work, projects, blog and a sick child 
Posted in Blogs, Quebec, QuebecValley, Startups, business | Comments (1)
Looking for start-up founders / Recherche des entrepreneurs
September 19th, 2007
Je suis en train d’écrire un article sur les startups au Québec et je recherche des fondateurs désirant être interviewé. C’est une excellente chance pour vous de faire la promotion de votre compagnie, peu importe le statut de celle-ci (ex. : more « stealth » ou en roulement). Si tout va comme prévu, l’article sera mis sur un site ayant beaucoup de visibilité.
Si vous êtes intéressé, contactez-moi (denis@quebecvalley.com) et je vous enverrais un questionnaire à remplir. Veuillez noter que les réponses devront être en français.
—
I am writing an article about startups in Quebec and I’m looking for founders willing to be interviewed. This will be a great chance for you to promote your company regardless of its current stage (i.e. stealth or running). If everything goes as planned, the article will be posted on a site having a lot of visibility.
If you are interested, please email me (denis@quebecvalley.com) and I will send you a small questionnaire. Please note that the answers must be in French.
Posted in Quebec, Startups, business | Comments (3)
The story of Plenty Of Fish
September 13th, 2007
I already mentioned about the founder of Plenty Of Fish and I wanted to point the readers to a very interesting story.
Markus Frind is basically a one man company and earns from 5M$ to 10M$ per year running his web site. Very inspirational and motivating story.
Posted in Startups, business, ideas, internet | Comments (0)
