Just to get everybody up to speed on the new boutique agency I’m setting up with two friends: We can now officially announce all names involved.

So besides me it’s going to be two close friends of mine:

Igor Schwarzmann (at the moment still at KetchumPleon‘s Düsseldorf office). Some links to introduce him:

• Blog: Wiredvanity.com
• Twitter: @zeigor (that’s “ze igor” with a German accent)
• US election blog (German): Amerika wählt
• Tech event blog: Berlinblase.de
• Tech and urbanism blog: Cognitive Cities

Johannes Kleske is currently at Neue Digitale/Razorfish Frankfurt. Some might have seen him recently on a BrandEins cover or in the German Apple ad. Some links to introduce him:

• Blog: JohannesKleske.com
• Website (German): tautoko.info
• Twitter: @kleske
• Inspiration: Inspiration Curation
• Tech event blog: Berlinblase.de
• Tech and urbanism blog: Cognitive Cities

Not only are they two close friends of mine, they are also two of the fittest people I know in the industry. Needless to say, I can tell you: I can’t wait to get this thing rollin’.

Images (not to be taken too seriously): Rajue, myself

Why? Not only is it a good magazine. They also got the web part exactly right: The layout adjusts fluidly and smoothly to all screen sizes (including mobile). The web version is playful and gorgeous. There’s feedback buttons on every page. And it’s all shareable. In fact, it’s all made to share. There’s the standard tweet & “i like” buttons, but you can even (like I did above) embed the whole magazine in your website (embed codes).

The whole thing is one consistent experience across all platforms. Great, great, great!

There is no right timing. Move. Move now.
When you’re ready to go, you go. There’s always something in the way, at any time: a conference, something you organize, a pitch, a client project, a move. Do it anyway, now, because otherwise you’ll just keep postponing.

For example, between my two co-founders and me we have on our list: organizing a conference (two, really), two moves to Berlin, potentially another one within Berlin, work, vacation. Just to name a few.

When the time is right, it’s right. You’ll know it. Do it.

Parallel processing is key
Sounds awkward, what I mean is this: Setting up a company (at least in Germany) means having to do all kinds of paperwork and organizational stuff. There’s the founding contracts, Terms of Services, work contracts to draft. You have to choose the type of company. Branding and website. Client acquisition. Your regular work. Maybe funding to find. Also, while all of this is going on, you need to get into your workflows, so it’s a constant negotiation with your partners about who’s doing what and how. This is the practice period. Use it to learn about each other, to get to know each others’ workflows. Establish the best communication channels, particularly if you don’t work in one spot at the beginning. At times it will feel like juggling with a few too many balls. Then one by one, the pieces start falling into place. When they do, it’s incredibly rewarding.

Inform yourself
I can’t over-stress just how important this is. Before you embark on a business journey with others, inform yourself about the implications of what you’re doing. Learn about pros and cons of different types of company. Learn about your duties and rights within these types of company. Learn about insurances. Make damn sure you know about your strengths and weaknesses, and your partners’. (Also make sure they know about yours!) If you fumble later because you didn’t inform yourself, don’t come cryin’, it’s your responsibility, and yours only.

Stick to your plans. Screw your plans.
Uh, right. Here’s the thing. You’re moving fast, because you have to. That means you won’t always have the time to really explore all the options you’d like in-depth. Sometimes you have to make a call with limited information. That’s fine, it’s how it works. Don’t let yourself get too distracted or intimidated by others’ horror stories. You made your decision, you stick with it. Chances are it’s a good call. But every now and then you’ll learn something new, either because the circumstances changed or because something just slipped by unnoticed before. In that case, don’t be stubborn: re-evaluate, make a new decision. Your plans are guidelines. Adapt them as you learn new things. (We went full circle on the type of company we are setting up, yet now we’re ready to go and I wouldn’t want to miss out on the thought process that lead here.)

Plan ahead, then improvise.
The better you plan, the more steps you can anticipate and lock in, the easier and smoother the process will be. There are plenty of touch points with folks and organizations outside your company. Make sure there’s enough time buffer for them to do their job. This is especially important for those who are helping you! (Don’t stress them out, they deserve all the respect you can give them.) You’ll find it’s a lot of touch-and-go.

Example? Before reaching certain milestones (signing a contract, opening a bank account etc) you can’t do certain things. Before the process of registering your company is kicked off – which happens surprisingly late in the game – you can’t really sign any important paperwork or contracts without getting into serious legal grey area. That’s something you want to avoid, right? Well, yes. On the other hand, you can’t sign any client contracts either, as your company doesn’t legally exist yet. Again, it’s touch-and-go: you talk to those clients, you explain the situation. You sign letters of intent. As soon as you’re good to go, you sign the contract. Not having these contracts signed and sitting on your desk can be somewhat stressful; don’t sweat it, there’s nothing you can do at that point. Relax and make sure to work only with great clients.

Don’t demand support. Accept and embrace it.
One thing is incredibly important to remember: during the founding period there’s a certain chance that you’ll annoy the hell out of your social environment. You might be nervous, or stressed out, or constantly focused on your own business and not realize that others have stuff on their minds, too.

What does that mean? First, try to go easy on your friends and family.

Second, don’t demand support. There’s absolutely no god-given right to receive support from others, mental or other. Asking others support is one thing; demanding is a different thing altogether.

Third, if someone offers help of any kind, treat the folks helping you with the respect they deserve. Someone just went out of their way to help you, just because they decided you’re important to them. Show them all the love they deserve. Thank them, and make sure you don’t forget it. We’ve been incredibly lucky that way, getting so much support from so many people in a whole lot of ways. I hope I can make up for all of it someday. Until then, I’ll try to just stay grateful. Thanks, guys!

Oh, there’s one more thing. The probably most important of all, a mantra to get back to if things are getting too hectic (I stumbled over it on Alexander Ljung’s tumblr):

On a side note, I have to say I really enjoyed particularly the discussions with these students. We talked a lot about privacy on social networks and the implications of using these online services. I was surprised on more than one occasion: Not a lot of the participants use smartphones, which may be a budget thing given they’re all still studying. The crowd was much more critical of online social networking than I expected. (There was a strong split in the group, with those seeing chances rather than risks on one side and those highly critical of social networks on the other.)

Two things became very clear, though: (1) Just like German society overall this group had a significant part of online critics (with varying degrees of informed argumentation). (2) All of them are acutely – almost painfully – aware of the role of privacy and how it’s being affected by voluntary participation in online sharing behavior (social networking, Twitter etc), involuntary sharing (government involvement) and commercialization (all major actors are international corporations).

While I wished the overall discourse (on a societal level) about the complex issues of privacy/ownership/control of data online was based on a more informed basis, it’s very clear that we’ll be having this discussion for awhile to come. And that’s good: Keep thinking, discussing, debating. Just please make sure to stay away from panic and fear driven rhetoric as well as hyperbole. And if you happen to encounter such arguments, feel free to drop in some facts and see the fear go away.

And boy, are people in Germany going crazy over this.

On the one hand you have those who thing that having public spaces accessible online is a good thing (including yours truly). One the other you have those who claim that it’s the end of privacy, illegitimate commercialism by a global corporation or that it helps burglars.

These critics spread – or buy into – a hyperbole like I haven’t seen in a long time. They are, I daresay, going absolutely nuts.

Why is this important? Because there’s practically no privacy risk, the burglar argument is completely bogus (not even burglars are so stupid, and statistics show that there’s no correlation of Streetview and break-ins) – while on the other hand a service like Streeview is incredibly useful for all kinds of legitimate uses.

DW-World sums it up nicely:

“Behind all of these criticisms here in Germany is the fear that Google might be too powerful, while being too strange and intransparent,” [law professor] Hoeren told Deutsche Welle. “It’s not really about data collection, telecommunications and privacy and such.”

If you understand German, Mario Sixtus wrote a fantastic piece on the subject. His take: trying to restrict a service like Google, including giving house owners the right to have photos of their houses removed from the service, is an attack on all our rights to the public space.

I couldn’t agree more.

The fact that many media outlets and politicians chime in with the rest of the criticism (or rather, take a lead in the fear mongering) doesn’t make their claims any more substantial or legitimate. Either we protect those rights, or we’ll lose them. And I’d like to keep living in a country where everyone – yes, even large corporations – are allowed to pick up a camera, take photos of buildings* in public and share these photos online.

(*Photos of people are a different matter altogether, but that isn’t what Google is doing here.)

Full disclaimer: I’ve worked with Google before and I’m a member of the Google Internet & Society Collaboratory. I still think that Google’s new stance on Net Neutrality sucks.

Big news (for me) – I’m founding a company. More concretely, I’m setting up a boutique agency with two partners. And heck, I’m excited!

Basics first:

Who? At this point I can only name one of my partners – my long-time co-conspirator and close friend Igor Schwarzmann (@zeigor). Our third man is still bound by contract so we cannot disclose his name until the last minute. But worry not, he’s a heck of a guy too. Update: Our third man is our good friend Johannes Kleske (@jkleske).

What? A strategy and trend agency.* Not to go into too much detail yet, but think hand-crafted web strategies: top quality, very personal. Our biographies give you an idea, so yes, Social Media will be part of our service, too. (Personally I think that in just a few years Social Media won’t be a separate column any more, but instead be a natural part of all services and products. So certainly we won’t be focusing on building anyone’s Facebook pages ;)
(* edited for clarification – yes, it’s a consulting shop, in case I didn’t make that clear enough ;)

Why? It’s an idea whose time has come, so to speak. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed freelancing over the last few years and really consider myself lucky it’s been working out that well. (Much better than I ever dared to expect!) I’ve been offered great jobs over the years, too, and feel particularly lucky that I could always afford to turn them down to pursue a self-determined career on my own. Now I’ve reached a point where I had to make the call: stay freelance or build something bigger? This is the decision. When the three of us – after a lot of joking around – realized we all had the same urge it was a done deal. My personal goal is not to just start and grow this business, but also to do a few things better than many agencies these days. Most of all, to run an open, honest, no bullshit firm (which in this environment isn’t all that usual, sadly) while having a great deal of fun exploring all possibilities and taking all of this to a new level. (Wondering if we’re serious? Both my partners quit their very good current jobs and are relocation to Berlin for this gig.)

And I can’t wait to work with all the interesting folks out there. This step hopefully allows us to kick off a whole bunch of cool projects, both for and not for profit.

Where? We’ll be based in Berlin. We’re also likely to do a fair bit of traveling. Actually, our office is already all set. Our neighbours are Yourneighbours. (Where I already set up shop today!)

When? We’ll kick off in October. That’s when my partners finish their current contracts. Interested in bouncing some ideas before? Feel free to ping me anytime (my current contact details).

Thanks! We got an incredible lot of help and feedback though out the early stages of our preparations. Thanks to our friends and mentors in all this. You know who you are. We owe you one.

What else? Some great folks are working on our logo and all, and we’re in the middle of the paperwork necessary to register a company. Once we’re set we’ll have a name for you. F*ck yeah, this is going to rock!

Here’s what Igor has to say about it all.
Update: Here are Johannes’ thoughts.

Images (not to be taken too seriously): Visualbug via DefiniteTouch, Rajue

Earlier this year, I went to SXSW without knowing that I’d end up giving a session myself: I was asked (and more than happy) to fill in for Robin Grant and his talk, and judging by the feedback we got I think it worked out well. (With just a few days notice I wasn’t so sure first…) Here’s a write up of my impressions: Lost in Translation: Nuances of European Social Media.

Since there was such a strong demand and the participants all got really involved in the discussion, I’d like to offer a follow-up. Same over-all topic, but a year into the discussion. There’s still a lot of ground to cover. Personally, I’d prefer to do it in the same setting like last year, which was one of the smaller rooms for interactive discussions rather than a big-ass panel. It’s just so much more productive. Like last time when Igor Schwarzmann and Kevin Dykes joined me on the panel, I’d like to

Here’s the official pitch as it is on the website:

Social Media: How to make it in Europe

Description:
You know how to rock Social Media back home in the US. Now what? There’s another huge market just a quick jump across the ocean. Yet, it’s a different world over there. We’ll discuss with you what strategies work in Europe, what you need to pay attention to. And we’ll share first hand experiences of working in Europe. We will bring you a panel of experts from several European key countries who report from the trenches. What are your main challenges when entering European markets? What are your opportunities? Which role do cultural differences play? Will German bloggers really hate your brand and will you get sued in the UK? We will try to dispel a few of the fears and myths often associated with European Social Media, share first-hand experience and give hands-on advice. So you can focus on taking your business to the other side of the Atlantic and rock Social Media over there, too.

Questions answered:

1. What can I expect from Social Media in Europe?
2. How do I avoid major pitfalls when entering European markets?
3. Your experiences with Social Media in different European markets?
4. What are the first steps we should take when planning to go to Europe?
5. Is Europe really an overregulated, scary place for startups? (Don’t worry!)

Tags:
Europe, Localization, socialmedia

If you’d like to support me going to SXSW again, please vote here. (To vote you need an account on SXSW.com.)

That said, there is a number of other panels I’d recommend checking out (there are so many!) from a first glance: There’s Tim Hwang’s The Ecology of Awesomeness. (Tim co-founded the Awesome Foundation, so he knows a thing or two about awesome.) Ray Kurzweil talks about The Singularity. There’s a panel on innovation in Iceland which I think has quite a potential (remember, Iceland just decided to become a safe haven for journalists). There’s probably a great deal to learn in How Good Companies Go Horribly Wrong. The Sunlight Foundation‘s Jake Brewer talks about the Rise of Free Citizen Agents. Tim Bonnemann talks about Open Government through Participation: Designing Successful Online Consultations, an idea he’s been working on for a long time, and I can’t wait to see the results. Why We Frag: Propaganda and Geopolitics in Videogames sounds like a hell of a lot of fun. And of course I’d like to also point to my good friend and Cognitive Cities co-author Igor Schwarzmann‘s panel proposal How Does Scifi Influence Our Future Cities? I have an idea of what this presentation would look like, and I promise it’ll be a treat. (Heck, I even officially vowch for him.)

So, long story short: I’d appreciate any help in getting this panel off the ground. If you want to support it, please vote here.

Updates: As I get to learn about more cool proposals, I’ll list them here. Spread the love!
Soundcloud‘s Dave Haynes will be talking about Love, Music & APIs.

If something bad happens to you and your impulse is to blame someone else (client! colleague! bank! landlord!) for the injustice, then maybe you shouldn’t work as an independent. It seems that to those with a more entrepreneurial mindset it never even occurs to blame others: Your client doesn’t pay you? Your fault if you ever work with them again. Your colleague steals your client? Your fault, shouldn’t have picked them. Not enough work due to recession? Oh boy, should you have hustled more.

I know I’m over-simplifying here – sometimes things don’t work out and it’s out of your hands. But in the reaction you can see who’s what kind of personality.

And just to be clear: I’m not saying one kind of mindset is better than the other. What I am saying is this: If you don’t naturally tend to taking responsibility for all the stuff happening to you, you might not become really happy as a freelancer or entrepreneur.

Of all the entrepreneurs and startup guys I talk to, I haven’t heard from a single one that things aren’t rosy because someone else did something. Instead, they go right at the problem.

Kudos.

It’s a fantastic presentation. Must read.

That said, I’d also consider myself a pragmatic idealist (thanks for the hint, Igor) in the sense that I think to reach certain idealistic goals it’s sometimes necessary (or even ok) to make compromises.

Examples: I use a Mac (closed) to feed my WordPress blog (open); I use Twitter (kinda closed) to promote open web ideals (open: duh!); my phone is powered by Android (open) but uses HTC’s Sense UI (closed).

So when we were about to announce an event that’s promoting the ideals of an open web (Drumbeat), we discussed how to best promote the event. We decided to complement the “official” event page on the Drumbeat site with a Facebook event page.

I insisted on having this second option, and for several reasons. One of those reasons is merely of the practical kind: it’s much easier to organize an event if you have any idea how many people are coming, and Facebook is very, very convenient to use that way. The other reason is more philosophical: I believe to reach out to new people, i.e. if you want to mainstream the discussion and get more people involved, you have to reach out to them where they mostly communicate. Facebook is an obvious choice, as you get access to a whole lot of people.

Like we almost expected, we got into a little flame war over this decision, including all the all-so-common personal attacks and insults. (My favorite being the statement that it’s “people like [me] who destroy the open web”, and that we’re “riff-raff”. I was surprised not to see Godwin’s Law invoked, but maybe that will happen in the next few mails?) To put one thing straight: I’m not even insulted, I find it very amusing to read a lengthy, hand-crafted personal attack. I appreciate, one could say, the effort people like this invest in personal trolling. (As long as – like in this case – it doesn’t even hit the mark and stays within certain boundaries.)

But it did get me thinking, and we discussed this a lot afterwards: To which degree is it ok to use a closed platform to promote an open web? And I stand by my decision, and would like to re-iterate: it’s not only ok, but necessary not to insist on personal moral high ground and being the true believer that knows everything better; but to go where the people you’d like to get involved really are and discuss with them. It’s not ok, and most likely damaging, to just assume everybody on the planet is thinking about these issues all day, and if they don’t leave all their bad habits behind they don’t deserve any better.

This kind of thinking is, from my point of view, arrogant, hypocritical and damaging. It devalues the ideals these same people strive to promote.

(I’m sure many other professions have to make similar decisions every day, like international development aid workers, who buy building materials on local markets to strengthen the local economy, even though they know that a certain share of those revenues go back to funding the same groups that caused the underlying structural problems.)

Long story short: For the time being I’ll keep doing it the way I’ve done it so far. I’ll keep using Facebook to promote events, I’ll stick to Twitter if that’s where I reach new people. But I’d like to hear your take on this!