Posts Tagged ‘beerchief’
that’s my bouncer!
A couple of days ago, lifehacker (massive tech blog) posted an article about google wave. The first thing that caught my eye in that article was the image used and more specifically, this;
That little profile icon used by someone is one of my BeerChief bouncers which were designed about two years ago. Upon further investigation, it seems my bouncers have become pretty popular…
When i first came up with the idea for BeerChief, bouncers were a key part of it. I ended up paying for custom designed bouncers and those guys above were what i ended up with. I’ve put them up on this blog and on BeerChief too over the last couple of years so it just goes to show how these things can get around…
Will i go after the sites that have the bouncers? No, even though i could. Bottom line is i have the originals, higher quality versions and i can prove they’re all mine 
So although BeerChief is still under construction, it seems the bouncers are becoming mini celebrities in their own right…
It’s been a while since i’ve spoken about BeerChief. These days i seem to be working on everything BUT BeerChief so no doubt people will be wondering what ever happened to it.
I have said this summer is make or break time – either it’s done now or it’s never done. So behind the scenes i’ve been gearing up for a massive BeerChief redevelopment.
My initial target was to have it ready for this September – by the time i head back to college. College destroyed my work ethic last year and i’m determined not to let the same thing happen again this year. If i can get BeerChief ‘launch ready’, it will be a huge weight off my shoulders and it will also allow me to focus on promotion.
I can promote the site if i have 10 minutes free. I can’t develop or create anything if i’ve 10 minutes free and that’s what killed my work rate last year during college. I needed to create, but i didn’t have the time or equipment to do so.
This summer just gets busier and busier for me. I’ve been working harder than ever before online. I’m involved in so many different projects at times i literally lose count of how many i have on so i need an excel spreadsheet detailing them all to keep me on track.
BeerChief has been under construction since February 2007 on and off. We’ve launched it twice in that period but both were low key affairs – really two BETA launches and we weren’t confident enough to go full stream ahead and go crazy promoting it.
Despite being busy with other projects, BeerChief is slowly getting more of my time these days. I’m not necessarily physically doing anything with it… i’m just spending more time thinking and planning.
Right now, i’m 100% confident it will be ready for September and as Michael Jackson would say ‘this is it’. It will be the latest and greatest BeerChief thus far and it will finally have reached a stage where we can promote it, safe in the knowledge we have a strong, quality social network to back us up.
Expect big things this time around. BeerChief will be launching for the 3rd time in the not too distant future and this time officially, this time publicly… no holding back.
9 days ago, i was contacted through this blog by someone who liked the blog, liked the concept behind BeerChief and who also expressed an interest in investing and partnering up on BeerChief.
photo credit: thinkpanama
I’ve said before, this summer is now or never for BeerChief – i’m determined to finish it and get it to the stage where I am happy with it. After a bit of thought i decided i’d listen to any offers and open up to the idea of more partners. I’d be an idiot to turn down investment and an extra pair of hands at this moment in time, especially when i’ve been banging on recently about how great partnerships are.
So a few days ago i talked on the phone for about an hour with… lets call him ‘mr x’ for now and we agreed to hook up today face to face. I believe our 3 hour conversation today went well Nothing has been agreed, nothing has been signed and because BeerChief is already a 2 man team, it’s a bit more tricky to make decisions as they have to be joint decisions.
But i’m confident we can strike a deal and turn BeerChief in to a 3 man team. More contacts, more cash, more ideas… it can only be a good thing for BeerChief even if my own share will be diluted further.
So the future is looking good for BeerChief. It should be all systems go after we launch ‘version 3′ late this summer and it will be very interesting to see how it takes off as we’ve never promoted it really. All i’ve done is blogged about it and created the odd social networking profile – i haven’t blitzed the web at all to my potential and i haven’t even touched on offline promotion.
However, i can’t (or won’t) promote a half finished site and that is what BeerChief is at the minute. It needs work, it needs money, it needs more hands on deck and hopefully it’ll get all of that this summer and re-launch with bang.
Had it not been for this blog though, there would have been no contact, no meetings, no discussion. Blogs open up doors and they help establish and reinforce real world connections. This is a perfect example of that and i’m pretty sure it won’t be the last either.
I’m happy with my own rate of development at the minute. So long as there’s visible progress i’m always happy.
Last night, i created the bones of a new portfolio section on this blog. I’ve split it up in to ‘current projects‘ and ‘past projects‘ and stuck them in under a ‘portfolio’ heading in the main menu.
It’s very important i have a place where i can keep track of my projects and look back on past projects. I can then see visible progress. So can you. Nobody can then accuse me of slacking off or not doing enough – i’ve nowhere to hide, nowhere to run. If my sites aren’t improving or my portfolio isn’t being added to, then people can start asking questions, i must also start asking myself questions.
There is always a quantity -v- quality debate but i’d like to hit that balance right between the eyes I can’t look after a dozen sites myself, but if i have help and partners on certain sites, it lightens the load (plus motivates me as i don’t want to let the other person/people down).
So that’s why i’m getting involved in more and more partnership sites. It’s also for the experience, the contacts, the fun involved in creating a new project and bringing an idea to life. I’ve got 6 exams starting the week after next, but after that it’s plain sailing until September – i can do what i want when i want.
BeerChief will be taken care of and i’m eager to bring it up to standards… you can expect more massive, sweeping changes as things begin to get a lot more serious, a lot more often. By September, i don’t want to be heading back to college still needing to carry out work on BeerChief. I want to be in a position where i can simply promote it and focus on getting members signed up and using the site.
So in order to get to that stage, work must be carried out over the summer. And it will be.
Whilst the world may be falling apart and most people (and economies) are in a state of depression and recession, i’ve never been more optimistic…
photo credit: {Guerrilla Futures | Jason Tester}
- Charity Bypass will be launching on Thursday and it’s looking really well.
- There’ll be a new portfolio section coming to this blog over the next week or two.
- Work will start on a new .ie project shortly too…
- I’ll be kicking things up a notch on irishgolfer.ie
- Plans will be put in place to bring BeerChief back to life with a ‘version 3′.
- Work will begin on wifimapper.com too.
Surrounding myself with work and projects seems to be paying off. I’ve got so much to do, i really shouldn’t writing this blog post or taking time to think But that pressure is what fuels me. Without it, i’d probably be playing games or just surfing the internet… The pressure of more work forces me in to getting rid of a backlog of work.
BeerChief remains my most exciting project, my largest project, my most expensive project… we launched it last summer publicly and it’ll be the same story this summer, only this time it’s all systems go and it’ll be make or break time. So long as i’m working on it, it’s only going to go in one direction. It may take a while, but it will get there.
College got in the way twice of BeerChief in the last 12 months… going back to college after summer and christmas holidays reduced my work rate and at times, i ended up being shut off from the internet all together, much to my frustration.
What will be different this summer? I’ll just be much more motivated and focused. I know more, i can do more, i have more experience than this time last year. College will get shoved in to a corner of my brain and it will be replaced once again by BeerChief and my many other projects.
