Don is #2 on my list of speakers from Business of Software 2009. Don forces you to understand how people are using your product. It sounds simple, but most companies have a different outlook on their product than their customers. Here are his 10 rules for successful products. Everything is a product. Everything is a service. You can’t have one without the other. The software you create is a product, but the experience you provide is your service. »
And now for #3 (I paused for a few days over the holidays), Jennifer Aaker at the Business of Software Conference, 2009. Jennifer is a Stanford professor who researches what happiness really is and how we can achieve it. She gives the middle finger to opinions and has a ton of data to back up her thoughts, which is what I found the most interesting. Immediately, after I got back from the conference I asked myself two questions Jennifer recommended. »
Joel ends up #4 on my list of Business of Software speakers. Here is my take on his talk. Have you ever wondered why UAC in Windows Vista/7 annoys you so much? Joel tried to delve into this topic and uncover why users hate this kind of behavior. To Joel, it really boils down to one thing, Design is the art of making decisions. Good design means the decisions were right, whereas bad design means the opposite. »
Ryan is #5 on my Business of Software top five speakers, and the first to be reviewed. Ryan reminds me of a gentle Jason Fried. His outlook on life and software is very similar to Fried’s, except he throws in words like love and treats his customers like gods. Ryan had a lot of great things to say, some quite obvious but good hear. Here are a few highlights from my perspective. »
I just got back from the Business of Software conference in San Francisco. It was a great time and I wanted to share it with the world (or those few poor souls that read my blog regularly). There were a ton of great speakers, but I wanted to highlight who I thought were the top five. Over the next few days, I will be posting about a specific speaker and why I liked them, so stay tuned. »
Right now, I am sitting in a huge room with hundreds of amazing entrepreneurs, developers, founders, etc. I am at the Business of Software conference in San Francisco. In the next few day’s, I hope to have a few posts up about the conference and specific presentations I really liked. Stay tuned. »