The Internet is a cess-pool

Running the web site for Beeston Cycling Club has been a real eye-opener as to the crap that stands in the way of legitimate use of the Internet.

We run the site with a Wordpress blog at it's heart. Allowing our members to post and comment on rides, events and anything that takes their fancy, sadly it was thigh diameter last night, is key part of what makes our club different.

Problem is the couple of us that administer the site have to deal with pages and pages of spam comments.

Link building detritus that I'm amazed if it serves any purpose other than to keep several thousand Internet Cafe users the world over meagrely employed.

I guess this is what it was like during the Victorian era in Britain. Rich people able to pay others to mask them from the abject poverty and open sewers running in the streets. Anyone trying to work their way up, beset on all sides by scum.

Ain't progress brilliant.

A view on the economy

A healthy stats obsession is no bad thing when running a business. Measurement, metrics, feedback, refine is all part of the rhythm of improvement.

The great thing about our stats is that they also give us a view on the economy in each of our markets. Our focus on business messaging and the size of our customer base means we see, first-hand, how busy an economy is.

Our traffic reflects the pace of business. The number of grocery deliveries, new furniture purchases, broadband installations, car sales and a whole host of other business transactions.

So, what's the news?

Business is looking good. I'm no economist but based on what I'm seeing, maybe this is a V shaped recession afterall.

Nott Tuesday - Where did all the geeks go?

Last night we had the fourth Nott Tuesday event and from the feedback it was a success. However I've been left with the feeling that something wasn't quite right.

The start-up pitch competition was a new format for the evening and we had some great judges and great companies pitching but the audience wasn't the usual crowd.

As @alanodea said to me, he'd told Tadhg (a Nott Tuesday first timer) that this wasn't what it was usually like.

My vision for Nott Tuesday was that geeks and business could co-exist. Sharing ideas, discussing issues and seeing what opportunities materialise was what I hoped people would be doing.

The dirth of geeks at last night's event has made me wonder whether this is a) acheivable or even b) something that people want.

I feel Nott Tuesday is at a crossroads. I desperately don't want it to become just another business networking event for entrepreneurs to sniff each other's arses. I've no interest in committing my time to something like that.

So was last night just an aberration? Am I reading to much into it? Where do we take this thing?