Can You Bootstrap? – Harvard Business Review

During this economic downturn, many of us have faced similar circumstances. In trudging through a gloom-and-doom atmosphere, there have been things we wanted to get done, businesses we wanted to expand or start, but couldn’t. At least not the way we’d originally envisioned.

No doubt the best and brightest went after funding, but it wasn’t available. So they started anyway, knowing that it was do-or-don’t eat, and were thus highly incentivized to get the business model right. Right enough that 61% of the entrepreneurs turned a profit after only a year.

I agree with this, especially now that I’ve headed back into the hardcore bootstrap mode. I’ll be putting a post together to outline my recent experiences, and how they look to have come out for the best in reality. I think the major point in all of this, always look for the best alternative within a situation, especially when it doesn’t go as planned.

Gartner Highlights Key Predictions for IT Organizations and Users in 2010 and Beyond

By 2012, 20 percent of businesses will own no IT assets.

By 2012, India-centric IT services companies will represent 20 percent of the leading cloud aggregators in the market (through cloud service offerings).

By 2012, Facebook will become the hub for social network integration and Web socialization.

By 2014, most IT business cases will include carbon remediation costs.

In 2012, 60 percent of a new PC’s total life greenhouse gas emissions will have occurred before the user first turns the machine on.

Internet marketing will be regulated by 2015, controlling more than $250 billion in Internet marketing spending worldwide.

By 2014, over 3 billion of the world’s adult population will be able to transact electronically via mobile or Internet technology.

By 2015, context will be as influential to mobile consumer services and relationships as search engines are to the Web.

By 2013, mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access device worldwide.

Go to the article to view more details

Interesting read, and mostly nothing crazy… but 20% businesses with no IT assets in 2 years though, really?

Always Be Testing: 8 Services For Usability Feedback – ReadWriteStart

This is an excellent list of the various sites that are related to testing and feedback. Click thru for detailed summaries of each.