How to avoid being blinded by the idea aura | VentureBeat

(Editor’s note: Brant Cooper is an independent consultant specializing in marketing and product management. He submitted this story to VentureBeat.)

The glow of a new, sure-fire idea is a wonderful feeling. You feel you’ve discovered something (or some angle) that no one has ever imagined before.lightbulb

As you expose that idea to the light of the day and begin vetting it and taking it to market, though, that enthusiasm can dim. In fact, one of the most difficult dilemmas entrepreneurs face is determining whether fading excitement is part of the natural decay of the creation process or because the idea – ultimately – is a bad one.

Good, concise article.

Legal and law resources for startups and entrepreneurs | The Startup Lawyer

{ December 7th, 2009 }

25 Startup Law Resources

The following is a list of 25 legal websites, blogs, and articles related to startup company legal issues. Even though this site is listed first, the list is not intended to be a ranking by any means. And as a blanket provision, none of the sites or articles represented by the following links are intending to provide you with legal advice.

1. The Startup Lawyer. <–You are here.
2. Important Questions Startup Co-Founders Should Ask Each Other. Article by Dharmesh Shah at onstartups.com
3. Startup Company Lawyer. Startup law blog written by Yokum Tatu, partner at WSGR.
4. Term Sheet Series. Classic series on term sheets written by Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson.
5. Model Series A Docs. A “template” set of model legal documents by the National Venture Capital Association.
6. Q&A: Small Business and the SEC. A guide to help you understand how to raise capital and comply with the federal securities laws.
7. The Option Pool Shuffle. Article by Venture Hacks about the need to keep your eye on the option pool while negotiating valuation.
8. WSGR Term Sheet Generator. Tool by WSGR that will generate a venture financing term sheet.
9. Start-Up Forms Library. Startup Legal forms by Orrick.
10. Orrick Term Sheet Creator. Founders, Bridge Financing, and Preferred Stock Term Sheets.
11. Emerging Enterprise Center Blog. Startup law blog by Foley Hoag.
12. Global Startup Blog. Global startup law blog by Reed Smith.
13. FINRA’s Broker Check. If you must use a broker to raise funds, make sure they are registered. (Check your state, too.)
14. Venture Law Lines. Canadian startup law blog.
15. Startup Company Law Blog. Startup law blog by Davis Wright Tremaine LLP.
16. How to Fund a Startup. Great Startup Essay by Paul Graham.
17. Startup Law 101. Written by George Grellas.
18. 5 Reasons Convertible Debt Sucks. Written by Furqan Nazeeri.
19. The Top Ten (Sixteen) Lies of Lawyers. Written by Guy Kawasaki.
20. Splitting the Pie: Founding Team Equity Splits. Written by Noam Wasserman.
21. Why you shouldn’t keep your startup idea secret. Written by Chris Dixon.
22. Making an IRS Section 83(b) Election. Detailed article on 83b elections written by David Naffziger.
23. Startup Tools (including calculators) from Fastignite.com
24. My High Tech Startup Startup law blog by Eric Koester of Cooley.
25. Entrepreneur Resource Headquarters by Morgan Lewis.

This is a good list covering a wide range of topics. Some of these will be US centric, but many of them are still useful.

Slashdot Search Story | Google Unveils goo.gl URL Shortening Service

Google Unveils goo.gl URL Shortening Service
eldavojohn writes “The Sultan of Search is unveiling a new service (currently only available for Google Toolbar and Feedburner) that will tackle a very old problem usually solved by bit.ly or tinyurl — URL shortening. Now, we’ve heard cries for sanity to prevent potential issues (like what if tr.im had shut down and broken millions of links?) but with one of the goliaths of the industry jumping in the ring it looks like URL shortening is here to stay. And a quick note for people who enjoy privacy, goo.gl explicitly states: ‘Please note that Google may choose to publicly display aggregate and non-personally identifiable statistics about particular shortened links, such as the number of end user clicks.’ You didn’t think Google was going to sit back and let bit.ly harvest juicy data on 2.1 billion links that were clicked in November without trying to corner some of that action to make their ad suggestions more accurate, did you?” Google’s shortening service is called Goo.gl.

Ok, so let me get this straight, they have your email, DNS, documents, and now links you share. Thank goodness they are not evil.