by Willy Franzen on November 20, 2009
We’ve looked at plenty of Internet video companies in the past, but we haven’t spent too much time looking at companies that provide the underlying technology that drives Internet video. DivX is a San Diego, CA based company that develops and licenses video codecs. Codec is short for compressor-decompressor, which is essentially technology that allows you to more efficiently transfer data. In DivX’s case they provide a codec that allows high definition video to be compressed without sacrificing quality on the other end. They’re a big part of why Internet video finally works so well. Transmitting uncompressed video over the Internet takes a huge amount of bandwidth, but using a DivX codec significantly decreases the amount of bandwidth necessary to transmit your favorite time wasting video.
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by Willy Franzen on October 29, 2009
It took long enough, but Internet video is everywhere. Yes, we had online video 10 years ago, but now it actually looks good—and works. The main reason for this is that end users (you and me) finally have technology in their homes that can handle playing online video. This means high speed Internet connections and computers with enough processing power to not crash when a website uses a Flash video player. The issue for content creators is that delivering video still poses some challenges. Sure, I was able to produce an online job search training course that relied heavily on video with little trouble, but I wasn’t delivering video to thousands or even millions of people (I wish I had the problem). As your use base increases, the challenge of delivering video increase exponentially. Moreover, managing video content in an organized fashion is a completely different challenge than organizing text and images. Brightcove is a Cambridge, MA based company that provides an online video platform for many of the worlds biggest brands.
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video,
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by Willy Franzen on October 7, 2009
One of the more effective ways that I’ve found to teach online job search tactics is to use screencasting. I do a number of screencasts in Found Your Career, and they seem to work really well when walking people through how to use sites like Google, LinkedIn, and Facebook for job search. TechSmith is an Okemos, MI based company that is “the world’s #1 provider of screen capture and screen recording software for the individual and professional user.” They’ve been in the business since 1987—which is an insanely long time for a company in their industry, and they’ve actually been doing screen capture for most of that time. I’ve never used any of their products, but I’ve heard from a number of people who rave about Camtasia, TechSmith’s main screen recording software.
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by Willy Franzen on October 2, 2009
I think that e-mail is still the king of social media. We have all of these fancy social networking accounts, but they all send their notifications to our inboxes. If you want someone’s attention, e-mail is the way to go (assuming your message doesn’t look like spam). Heck, you’re probably reading this in your e-mail. That’s why e-mail marketing continues to be a rapidly growing industry. We’ve already taken a look at jobs with Constant Contact, Aweber, and e-Dialog, and now we’re going to look at an industrial strength e-mail marketing company, ExactTarget. They’re based in Indianapolis, and since 2000 they’ve been focused on “providing the most powerful on-demand software for email communications and finding the best and brightest marketers on the planet to revolutionize the way people think about email.”
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by Willy Franzen on June 6, 2009
Most scientific literature isn’t what I’d call an easy read, so I wouldn’t be surprised if most of you aren’t beating down the doors to get your hands on the newest research papers. Unless you are a big consumer of research literature, then you probably don’t care much about the openness of scientific and medical publishing, but you should. Open sharing of information can significantly promote innovation, and who can argue against wanting more advances in science and medicine? The Public Library of Science is all about open sharing, as they are a San Francisco, CA based “nonprofit organization of scientists and physicians committed to making the world’s scientific and medical literature a public resource.” They were founded in 2000, and since then they’ve been pushing for scientific and medical journals that “are immediately available online, with no charges for access and no restrictions on subsequent redistribution or use.”
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by Willy Franzen on May 19, 2009
If you’re an Internet geek like me, then you’ve probably noticed all of the buzz around Wolfram|Alpha. Some have dubbed it a “Google killer,” but as far as I can tell, they’re way off the mark. They’re wrong because Wolfram|Alpha isn’t a search engine – it’s a knowledge engine. The goal is “to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable by anyone.” The concept is kind of hard to grasp until you try it, but once you see how it works, I think that you’ll be impressed. So, who is behind Wolfram|Alpha? Wolfram, of course! They’re based in Champaign, IL, and they’re “one of the world’s most respected software companies–as well as a powerhouse of scientific and technical innovation.” They’re the company behind Mathematica – a software package that excels in ” computation, modeling, simulation, visualization, development, documentation, and deployment.” I’ve never had the pleasure of using it, but I know math teachers who think it’s pretty awesome.
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statistics,
United Kingdom,
user experience,
writing
by Willy Franzen on April 14, 2009
When I started this business, I focused almost entirely on the web for networking – a LinkedIn connection or an e-mail address was all that I needed. However, my mom (who is also my graphic designer) had other ideas. Right after she designed my logo, she sent away to VistaPrint to get me business cards. Although I didn’t use them right away (I was glued to the computer screen and not talking to many people in real life), eventually they became a necessity. Those business cards also came with the one and only One Day, One Job t-shirt (a free gift from VistaPrint). They are the place to go for customized stuff (there’s no better way to put it). You can get business cards, pens, checks, banners, postcards, lawn signs, rubber stamps, mouse pads, magnets, and much much more. The best part about it is that you can do it all online and get a really great price. VistaPrint is definitely achieving their goal of “making high-quality graphic design and custom printing convenient and affordable for everyone.”
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Spain
by Willy Franzen on April 9, 2009
Remember The Jetsons? They were my first indication of what the future would look like – flying cars and video phones were my favorites. Apparently we aren’t much closer to flying cars, but video phones are here – sort of. We’ve had the technology for quite a while, and many of you have probably used video chat at some point, but it hasn’t caught on quite like the creators of The Jetsons thought it would. I’m sure that you can come up with a number of reasons why, but I think the big thing holding us back from more video communications is the lack of a common platform. If I want to call someone, I can pretty safely assume that they have a phone that I can call. If I want to video chat with someone, I need to make sure that they not only have the right hardware but also that they have software that is compatible with mine. TokBox is a San Francisco based startup that is using the common platform of the web browser to enable video chatting. When you want to video chat, you just go to TokBox and they’ll give you a link. You send that link to a friend, they click it, and assuming that both of you have webcams and fast enough connections, you’ll be video chatting in no time.
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by Willy Franzen on March 16, 2009
I’m an iPhone guy, so I tend to feel sorry for people who are constantly thumbing away on their BlackBerries. That’s just my being a smug Apple user though. I realize that a lot of people love their BlackBerries and for good reason. They’re pretty remarkable devices, and they’re perfectly tailored for business use. (Although not as perfectly tailored as my iPhone! Ok, I’m done.) That’s why Research In Motion, the company that makes BlackBerries, has a 16.6% share of the smartphone market. They seem to have hit a bit of a rough spot lately (at least their stock price makes it look like they have), but their market position is still very strong. That’s why it’s no surprise that they’re doing a good amount of entry level hiring; however, the real reason that I wanted to feature Research In Motion here is that they chose an unfortunate, yet inappropriately hilarious domain name for their Jobs site (it redirects now, but I think that you can figure it out).
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Texas
by Willy Franzen on March 10, 2009
I remember the days of browser wars. It was Netscape vs. Internet Explorer, and it was ugly – the Internet that is. Back then it was all about whether or not your browser displayed pages properly, and people were passionately in favor of one browser or the other (or maybe some weird 3rd option). Now it’s all a lot simpler (unless you’re still using Internet Explorer) – your browser probably displays most sites just fine, and you’re more worried about speed and bells and whistles. That’s where Mozilla shines with their Firefox browser. They’re absolutely dominant with web savvy users (except with me – I still use Safari), and they are constantly making their products better. The Mozilla Corporation is a Mountain View, CA based wholly-owned subsidiary of the Mozilla Foundation. The Foundation is a non-profit, while the Corporation calls itself a “public benefit organization.” That means that they are “dedicated not to making money but to improving the way people everywhere experience the Internet” – even if by definition they’re still a for profit.
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by Willy Franzen on March 5, 2009
One thing the Internet has done for us that doesn’t get talked about a lot is that it has made it so much easier to organize real-life events. You can send a meeting request, create an event on Facebook, organize a Tweetup, or a Meetup. It’s amazing that phone calls and invitations are nearly obsolete when it comes to organizing an event. With that said, there’s still a lot of room for improvement when it comes to online tools to getting people together. That’s what Meetup, which is based in New York City, is all about. They provide a place for people to organize meetups and to share them with the rest of the world. Whether you want to join The Chicago English as a Second Language Meetup Group or The NYC Cranium Meetup Group, you can do so with the help of Meetup.
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by Willy Franzen on February 11, 2009
It’s pretty easy to tell when a startup gets a new round of funding. If you look at startup job boards like Startuply on a daily basis, you’ll notice that all of a sudden there are a ton of new job listings from a single company. A quick Google search will usually confirm that the company just closed a new round of venture capital. That seems to be the case with Oodle. News recently broke that they scored $5.6 million in funding from existing investors to get working on social classified ads through a deal with Facebook. The resulting action is that they have 8 new jobs posted on Startuply, yet they haven’t even updated their own Jobs page. I realize that this post is a little backwards, I usually introduce the company and then talk about the jobs, but I think that it’s important to understand that if you hear that a company just secured funding, you should check to see if they’re hiring immediately.
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by Willy Franzen on February 10, 2009
How much energy do you use every day? I’m not talking about Calories, although I’d be surprised if you knew that, I’d be shocked if you could tell me how much energy you consume on a given day. You might know how much you spend (and that might be more important), but as energy becomes a bigger and bigger issue, you need to be an informed “consumer.” Everybody needs a little Positive Energy, right? Well Positive Energy is an Arlington, VA based company that is working to “engage the 300 million Americans who are in the dark about their energy use through a combination of cutting edge technology, analytic direct marketing, behavioral science and world-class design.” Sounds pretty cool to me.
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by Willy Franzen on January 30, 2009
As we noted when we featured Blizzard’s entry level jobs, video game sales tend to do really well when unemployment is high. This is one of those times that you’re probably thinking about buying a Wii/Xbox 360/PS3 and forgoing the job search for the comfort of your parents’ basement. As much fun as it might be for the first 6 months, that’s not the answer. That’s why Jason Seiden and I are announcing our 21 day online job search training course today. It’s called Found Your Career, and it’s open for enrollment. We’re offering an introductory price to the first 100 students to sign up, so get in before the price goes up. It’s a great way to put all of that video gaming energy to good use (and it’s much more affordable). Another way to put that energy to use is by considering jobs with Santa Monica, CA based Activision, the company that is behind Guitar Hero, Call of Duty, and many more games. Video games are hot now, but now’s not the time to hone your expert level skills on Guitar Hero, it’s time to hone your job search approach by developing new skills and focusing on industries that are still growing in tough times.
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by Willy Franzen on December 12, 2008
Social media. Social media. Social media. If you’ve been spending much time on the web lately (or listening to me), then you probably keep hearing how social media is the next big thing. The only hitch is that social media isn’t new. The Internet has been social almost from its beginning – we just have new tools to make the interactions happen more easily. A lot of people will say that the next step in the growth of social media is corporate adoption. That’s why we see cutting edge companies hiring for positions like “Community Manager.” Well, what if I told you that there’s a company called Lithium that has been helping companies adopt social media for more than 10 years? You might be surprised by that, but when you start to think of social media as more than blogs, Twitter, and Facebook and start to include chat rooms, forums, and other “Web 1.0″ technology, it’s not hard to imagine that the principled behind corporate adoption of social media have actually had some time to mature. Lithium is based out of Emeryville, CA, and they build “successful communities on-demand.”
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by Willy Franzen on December 2, 2008
When I was a senior in high school (2002), I thought that my class was cutting edge to include a CD with our yearbook. Then I was greeted by “The Class of 2006 Website,” a site very much like Facebook (before there was a Facebook) for my incoming Freshman class at Cornell. Finally, Facebook arrived on the scene in 2004, and the idea of a yearbook was forever changed. At least it was for college students. Facebook didn’t open up to high schoolers until September of 2005, and in that time both MySpace and myYearbook had already started tapping the high school social networking market. You may not have heard of myYearbook, but you should have. They have the 14th most pageviews of any site on the Internet, surpassing both Amazon.com and Wikipedia. What makes this more impressive is that New Hope, PA based myYearbook was founded by a 15 year old and a 16 year old brother and sister during their Spring Break.
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by Willy Franzen on November 25, 2008
I have a first generation iPhone, and despite the fact that it uses cell towers and Wi-Fi hotspots instead of GPS for location, I have still become entirely dependent on using my phone to find my way. It’s blatantly obvious that the cell phone is the convergence point for all kinds of technology – cameras, video cameras, computers, GPS devices, voice recorders, address books, and video games now exist in one device. The next step is tying location awareness into all of these functions, and that’s what Sunnyvale, CA based TeleNav is all about. They were the “first to launch a GPS navigation and mobile workforce management service on a cell phone in North America,” and they’re also the “fastest growing company in Silicon Valley” according to Deloitte. They’re partnered with “every significant wireless carrier and device manufacturer,” and they’re primed to make the most of the GPS chips that are now found in most phones.
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by Willy Franzen on November 24, 2008
I don’t recall having any friends in college who sent out their own holiday cards, but if you’re planning on sending out cards, you better get on it. Christmas is 31 days away. My family always tried to send out Christmas cards, but it usually resulted in a fight between my sister and me over which picture to use – if we could even get along long enough for a picture to be taken (yes, we were both in college at this point). With my sister’s and my being difficult and my mom’s procrastinating ability, Christmas cards almost inevitably became New Year’s cards, which typically arrived well after New Year’s. I’m not sure that Mountain View, CA based Tiny Prints could have helped with conflict resolution between my sister and me, but they can make it ridiculously easy to produce a beautiful holiday card.
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stationery,
user experience,
web development
by Willy Franzen on November 6, 2008
You may not think of it this way, but every time that you visit a website, you’re downloading files from someone else’s computer (server). The server that One Day, One Job is hosted on is shared with quite a few different sites (including One Day, One Internship). Even though there are thousands of people coming to our sites every day, they’re only downloading text and images, so it barely puts a strain on our server. Facebook, on the other hand, has millions of people on their site who are doing hardware intensive things like uploading photos and searching huge databases. They need thousands of their own servers to handle all of the activity. Somewhere between the server needs of One Day, One Job and Facebook is a middle ground where many businesses find themselves. They have major server needs, but they don’t need to do it all by themselves. That’s where Rackspace comes in, they are an “IT hosting company that delivers enterprise-class web infrastructure and hosting services to businesses of all sizes.”
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by Willy Franzen on October 29, 2008
One of my favorite movies is Trading Places
. I was introduced to the movie by my Econ 101 professor when he played a clip in class, and it still amazes me how much fun it is to learn about the world of high finance and commodities markets from Eddie Murphy and Dan Aykroyd. These days it seems that entire markets are as volatile as the concentrated frozen orange juice market was in the movie, but that just makes things more interesting. Trying to play the markets right now might be fun, but there aren’t a ton of companies in the financial industry hiring right now, and you don’t need that stress anyway. If you’d still like a front row view of the daily excitement that is capitalism, then you should consider a job with the CME Group, “a combined entity formed by the 2007 merger of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) and the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT).” Instead of playing the market, you can be the market.
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by Willy Franzen on October 22, 2008
Despite what you might think from looking at the logo to the right, Chumby is not the first cousin of Gumby. Chumby is a startup that makes a real-life product that bears the same name. Their product is an “internet radio, digital picture frame, alarm clock, and more.” The “and more” includes news, social networking, weather, and games. It’s a dead simple Internet device that seems perfect for your bedside or the breakfast table. I’ve never actually tried a Chumby, but the reviews are glowing. At the very least it’s a cool niche product, and there’s certainly the potential for a Chumby to replace the alarm clock.
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by Willy Franzen on October 13, 2008
Ok, it may be politically incorrect to celebrate Columbus Day, but it’s just about the only holiday that I had off in college. Maybe it just happened to be a convenient weekend for Fall Break, but I still can’t believe that I didn’t have class on Columbus Day, but did have class on Labor Day (when I went to a School of Industrial and Labor Relations). Anyway, Christopher Columbus wasn’t much of a navigator. He had no idea where he was going, and he tried to take the long way around the world. Still, his ineptitude was the reason that he “discovered” the Americas. Had Garmin been around in the 1490s, Columbus never would have ended up where he did. Then again, the existence of a company built on GPS technology would have changed a lot of things for famous explorers five centuries ago. (Much like the existence of iPods – like the one we’re giving away – would have changed the world for musicians back then.)
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California,
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Oregon,
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by Willy Franzen on October 9, 2008
Did you know that the invention of the portable clock was mainly driven by the need for ships to measure longitude? I bet that you didn’t. I did because I was forced to read a book called Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time
during the summer before my Sophomore year of high school. For most of nautical history, one of the most challenging problems facing mariners was figuring out where they were at a given moment. Now companies like Veson Nautical provide software solutions that “allow users to manage and share information efficiently across Chartering, Operations, Trading, and Accounting departments—streamlining workflow, cutting costs, and optimizing profits.” If Christopher Columbus had software to optimize profits, he certainly never would have “discovered” America.
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is the funniest, most in-your-face career guide on the market.