Archive for the ‘QuebecValley’ Category
To copyright or not to copyright?
September 28th, 2007
Sylvain Carle woke me up yesterday (not literally) about copyright issues. During a discussion regarding the startup listing initiative, he brought an interesting point that my blog had a copyright on it. To be honest, I haven’t really paid any attention about this when I installed the template, which funny enough, was an open source template. I guess we could argue about why the designer used a copyright instead of a Creative Commons license but that’s not the point.
This made me think seriously about the implications of having a copyright on my site. My vision when I started this blog was to help people like me who basically had no where to turn to and to help the community grow. Sounds good and fair, no?
Quick parenthesis, I’m a fervent defender of free information. Information wants to be free. Information IS free. I’m also totally against software patents, which is basically information processed in a particular way. I’m not a lawyer and I don’t know the implications of having a copyright while some of the information on my blog is “crowdsourced”. What about comments left by users? Can I claim these as “mine”? I don’t think so. I don’t want to anyway. Is this even enforceable if I wanted to?
Copyright issue is hard and I was actually looking into different licenses for my social news startup (for obvious reasons). However, for reasons that I cannot discuss now, I couldn’t find a license that protected the users the way I wanted to while being inline with the business model that I had in mind. What I need is a mixture of Copyright, Creative Commons and a license between two entities. Information wants to be free but no one likes it when it’s stolen away from you.
Back to my blog, I decided to remove the copyright and to use the Creative Commons “Attribution Share Alike” license. It gives flexibility to the community by allowing everyone to re-use information on this blog.
So if you haven’t really thought about it, I suggest you think about it for a second and rethink the way you control your information. Thanks Sylvain for noticing this!
Posted in Blogs, QuebecValley, Social media, YulNews | Comments (0)
New custom search engine
September 27th, 2007
I started experimenting with Custom Google Engine and decided to add this functionality to my blog. I created a “custom search engine” and hand-picked only relevant web sites in Quebec, mostly blogs at this time. The results are interesting and I will try to work a little bit to expand the site database. And this is where I need you. I added sites which I regularly visit but if you want me to add your blog or site, please email me. The only restriction is that your site fits in the current theme of this blog (i.e. startups in Quebec) and is informative and relevant.
And before you ask, yes, I decided to put ads to the search options. I thought about it for a while and I think that Google ads often shows relevant links which might not be in the database and would otherwise not been found by the user. Tough choice but in the end, I believe the end user experience will be better and the few cents I receive will help pay the hosting fees. 
To use it, simply use the top right search field. Please let me know what you think about it.
Posted in QuebecValley | Comments (0)
New feature - Quebec startup directory
September 24th, 2007
I finally finished the first part of a larger project. You may now post your own startup profile. I shamelessly stole the basic idea from TechCrunch Base but adapted it to my preferences. Yes I know that YulStart has a similar listing but many more features are coming soon and this is just the tip of the iceberg so to say.
I would like to take some time to ask you what additional features would be neat. Here are some ideas I have in mind:
- A “PR center” where startups can post their own PR, hopefully gaining some local interest
- A listing of resources bringing value to a startup. For example:
- Government entities willing to help entrepreneurs
- Coaches, business veterans, volunteers
- Angel “groups” and Venture capital
- etc.
- Ability for startups to setup polls to tests new ideas
- A jobboard, if heri doesn’t create one
- Help wanted / Looking to help section
So please visit the Startup section and add your own profile!
Posted in Quebec, QuebecValley, Startups | Comments (0)
Article sur les startups au Québec - prise 2
September 24th, 2007
Quelques personnes voulaient savoir quel était le mystérieux site où mon reportage sur les startups du Québec serait posté. Évidemment, le tout sera posté sur QuebecValley mais il s’agit en fait de TechCrunch France ou j’ai réussi à proposer l’article en question. J’ai déjà quelques startups qui se sont portées volontaires mais dépêchez-vous si vous désirez participer à l’entrevue en question. Vous n’avez qu’à me contacter via denis@quebecvalley.com.
Posted in Quebec, QuebecValley, Startups, 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)
Advertise your services or startup for free
September 9th, 2007
Please take a look at the free banner page where you can add your own banner for free (if you qualify). I want to give people the opportunity to get free coverage and I hope others will duplicate the idea as well in order to make the Quebec startup community stronger.
It’s hard enough to spread the word about your service or startup so getting a free ad is always welcomed!
Posted in QuebecValley, Startups, business | Comments (0)
