How many RSS feeds do you have in your reader?

How many more would you need to add to be on the absolute bleeding-edge of thinking in your field? 50? 100?

How many more people do you need to follow on Twitter?

How long would it take you to read all that content each day?

I can see that the people who strike real success usually do it by a combination of doing their own thing and striking it lucky - not necessarily by following the trends.

I think that there are a lot of people that spend a lot of time staying on the absolute bleeding edge of technology and web business trends, potentially at the cost of creativity and time to commit to developing and improving their own original products.

I think there is value in learning lessons from others and knowing where the market is going - but I think that one of the things that the most successful products have in common is that they all stood up to lead their chosen market in a particular direction at some point.

And you can’t do that until you quit following the established leaders for a second or two.

4 random words:

• China
• Attic
• Ladder
• Sneeze

Thoughts…

• Ladder is like a service for starting entrepreneurs to make their elevator pitches to the larger business community.
• Making the service in Chinese language would allow it to tap into the burgeoning entrepreneurship that is currently happening in China’s growing economy.
• A sneeze is mechanism of the body to clear obstructions that would get in the way of normal breathing operation. In the same way, the service would link startup businesses to the services they need at the most competitive prices to make sure they get their products to market in shortest possible time.
• An attic is a place where you put things that you want to be safe, but you don’t need to access frequently. In the same way, the service could provide a set of tools for idea management, managing patents, trademarks and non-disclosure agreements often used in the lead-up to the launch of a new product or service.