Learn By Doing

[original post here]

Most of my life has been baptism by fire.

I remember my college coach used that term about me as a player at the end of my freshman season, saying I survived their baptism by fire as a rookie starter.

I remember my first internship interview when I had no experience in TV production, but said “I’ll do anything you need” pointed to an unfinished wall and said “I can finish painting that. I’ll learn everything on the fly.”

I remember when I told my parents my plans to drop out of Bucknell and go to Brown… “What if you don’t get in?” and then their reaction after when I told them my plans to backpack around the world and move to Australia. “What are you going to do once you’re there?” 

“I’ll figure that out as I go.”

By now, you get the point. The best way to learn is by doing it yourself. That’s why I am so excited to be involved with E[nstitute], which “is a two year apprenticeship program, empowering 15 young adults to learn from and work with the top NYC entrepreneurs.” 

There are a million things I wish I had known when we started our first company. Unfortunately, most of it isn’t stuff you can just glean from some blog… you just have to do it, but, we can share that knowledge with future entrepreneurs and push them toJFDI with us before they venture off on their own. And to be fair, we still don’t have all the answers - we’re still learning by doing ourselves - so there is plenty of new territory for an apprentice to explore with us.

To put our own spin on things, Dan and I are really excited to work together with an apprentice who wants to learn from both the CEO and CTO of a tech startup. This will be a demanding position as the apprentice will undoubtedly be pushed in all directions - not to mention the inevitable pranks that Dan and I will pull on each other with their help. ;)

Congrats to Shaila and Kane - the founders of E[nstitute] - on launching an audacious program to attack our very own assumptions of what education can be.

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One year ago today you saved a life!

… at least that’s what your Timehop email will read one year from Saturday.

Shelby, and TechStars and SXSW, oh my!

ok kids… time to blindly RSVP to every SXSWi invite you get! especially this one!

shelbytv:

SXSW Interactive. The infamous weekend where techies the world over collide in a BBQ-sauce-covered shouting match of startup ideas and marketing spend.

Am I mocking it? Yes.

Will I be there shouting just as loudly? Yup. ;)

But I won’t be alone! Instead, I’ll be hanging with 1000 of my closest friends as TechStars teams from NYC, BOS, SEA and even the original gangsters of Boulder throw down for a party that will make sure you start the weekend right. RSVP below to hang out with the likes of these geeks.

Remember @garyvee’s popup party last year? So fun the camera got drunk… See you in Texas!     -Reece

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Join the team building the future of video on iOS

I wrote this. I mean it.

I know you’re out there future-Shelby-iOS-developer. I know you’re listening. You’ve been looking for this opportunity and here it is, right in front of you… all it takes is one single email to get started… 

shelbytv:

We. Love. iOS. 

iOS has changed the way we will compute for generations to come and enabled developers to build apps that made us fall in love with our iPhones, our iPads, and soon… our iTV’s. 

Believe the hype. Apple will build an amazing TV experience, we have a good idea of what it looks like and we want Shelby to be the best social video experience out there. F that… we want Shelby to be the best app. Period.

So far, we built an iOS app that is insanely easy to use, elegantly designed and has some features that are first of their kind. Now we are looking for the iOS developer who will take Shelby iOS to new heights of function and form, while delighting users with serendipitous video discovery.

Why?

Because we love video. It is an amazing medium—that is so powerful and yet so nascent online—and we believe that 1) video deserves its own home and 2) that home should be built socially.

Who are you?

You are—first and foremost—a great person. You are also an iOS developer who believes in building simple, beautiful products. You can code with the best and have great taste for design. You are curious about the world. You are not one to just do what you are told. You are not one for being managed. You are one for video.

Who are we? 

We are not a team full of “rockstars” or “ninjas” or “wizards.” We are not high on ourselves. We are just a team of passionate people who love building great products. We love to learn and we have a ton of fun while we do it. We may dabble in ping pong. We may play music from time to time. One of us may wear jorts. Most importantly, we love video. More on us here.

What will you do with us?

• Revolutionize the way people discover and enjoy video
• Work with great people on a lean, agile engineering team
• Be challenged to build the best stuff you have ever created
• Kick a dent in the universe

We are super excited about building Shelby—as a product, company and brand—and we are fortunate to have the support of some of the best investors in the game. We offer healthcare, we work on the best equipment, we hang our hats in our own office at 23rd and Park in NYC, and we believe in G.S.D., so our PTO policy is more of a policy than a practice…

If you are interested, we would love to meet you. Please get in touch. Email hiring+ios@shelby.tv and please include links to any apps you built.

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Foundation 01 with Jack Dorsey

Yesterday morning I woke up, grabbed my iPad and caught up on some videos on Shelby, in particular this Kevin Rose ”Foundation” interview of Jack Dorsey.

Sure, the video is more than two years old, but that doesn’t mean Jack isn’t still really inspiring to startup guys like me. [Further, I love the long tail of video. Mark Cuban argues that online views are not the equivalent of TV views (he’s probably right), but I think that long tail of video discovery is a beautiful thing for new audiences].

In the interview, I was struck by two things that Jack said that really hit home with a few of my core beliefs…

1. Jack says we will start to see ‘more real-time filters.’ Again, this was two years ago, so we’ve already seen tons of services pop up around this, but I think this trend will continue and the definition of a ‘real-time filter’ will evolve as some will be features of larger services (Summify was just bought by Twitter for example) while others may stand alone (ahem… Shelby.tv… for example). 

2. Jack mentions ‘recognizing fortunate situations.’ For anyone who’s read this blog for a while, you know I love to remind people that “Luck is when preparation meets opportunity”, so Jack’s statement rings true with me. There is tremendous opportunity opening up around us everyday. It’s your job to put yourself in a position to take advantage of that. As I tell my team, we are really fortunate in terms of our timing for Shelby.tv and I couldn’t be happier about that.

If you’ve got 30 minutes today, watch the interview. And if you don’t have the time, just mark it to ‘watch later’ on Shelby. ;)

8 tips for a kickass Saturday at work

I’m just going to come out and say it - I love working on the weekend. Maybe it’s because I was trained for it growing up in the restaurant business (weekends = $). Maybe it’s because my high school had Saturday classes or because weekends meant game-day in college. Or maybe it’s just because weekends generally mean no meetings, no phone calls, no interruptions. Yeah… that might have something to do with it…

But not everyone’s wired like me and it’s sometimes hard to motivate to work on a Saturday, so here are some pro tips for having a productive day at work on the weekend.

1. REST

Get sleep on Friday night. For me, that means 8 hours. I function fine on 6, but 8 really has me rested and ready to charge hard. Doesn’t hurt to take it easy on the booze Friday night, too. 

2. REFLECT

Take some time to get inspired with some reading, reflection etc to get your brain warmed up and ready to go. It’s just good for you. I started today with an interview of Jack Dorsey.

3. FUEL UP

Get a good healthy meal in you so you won’t get hungry easily later. Bring dinner/next meal with you. Get a giant jug of water so you don’t have to get up for a drink.

4. CAFFEINATE

I know everyone has their struggles with caffeine. I generally stay away from it, but if you don’t consume it daily, it is a great way to supercharge when you want to crank.

5. CHANGE YOUR SEAT

I love our office and my usual standing desk, but today I opted to sit in the engineering room (thanks Henry). If you don’t have that option, then hit a coffee shop or something. The change of setting is fun and pulls you away from the crap at your desk that can distract.

6. IGNORE

Your phone. IM. Etc. Duh.

7. EXERCISE

Get some. Sometimes I get this done in the morning, though I prefer later in the day as a way to get me up and out of my seat and get the blood flowing for a second wind. 

8. TIMING IS EVERYTHING

Answering email on weekends is awesome because almost no one responds right away and usually by Monday the email doesn’t need a response. I also like to do big whiteboarding exercises on the weekend when no one can interrupt and influence.

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None of this is rocket science and none of these will fix a job that you hate, but most of us startup people love what we do already, so this stuff should be fun, exciting, challenging, hawtsome anyway. And despite my lack of a degree in rocket science, I think these tips will probably work any day of the week (except maybe changing your seat… I dunno if Henry would like me stealing his seat during the week).

Yours in productivity,

reece

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