Been a long time, been a long time, been a long... you know the rest. -- Aug 13, 2010
Hoooooooo Lee.
Regular (or, at this point, formerly-regular) readers of this blog know that I'm terrible at updating while I'm on travels. Well, I just spent 24 out of the last 27 days out of town.
"But wait," you say, "that only takes us back to the 18th! Your last post was on July 9th!"
True that. But the week of the 12th was also the primetime of the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal. And people who know me know that I have very close ties with said festival. So any non-working time was spent either at shows, or reuniting with ye olde family at the Hyatt bar. Which didn't leave much time for nightly self-reflection (who'd'a thunk it?).
BUT I'M BACK!
(Not quite. On a train at the moment. But we're ~20 minutes out of Montreal's Central Station. Which means I'll likely be posting this just as we pull in...)
"What have you been doing, Aidan? Where have you been?"
More good questions. In the interest of brevity, I'm'a post this in bullet points. It will likely still be long. And not at all comprehensive.
- July 12-17: Montreal, Just For Laughs
- Took Robin Ahn to see John Leguizamo. 'Twas a splendid affair!
- Went with three friends -- one of whom recently left to Zambia for a worthy cause and is blogging about it here -- to see Noel Fielding, then to the Hyatt.
- Organized an event for Montreal's under-30 entrepreneurs. We had an awesome time and a nice turnout at Kenny vs. Spenny, then at Benelux, then at the Hyatt. And I was super-humbled at a special entrepreneurial celebrity's guest appearance!
- Took Jeff Talajic to "A Late Afternoon With Kevin Smith." And afterward, he taught me a bit about harnessing the power of Google Analytics! Woot.
- Went with my brother to see Steve Martin. We even got to meet him!
- July 18-24: NYC, New Music Seminar
- Thanks go to the amazing David Chaitt -- and his awesome roommates -- for hosting me :)
- Hung out a bunch with Dave and Landon, particularly at the New Music Seminar
- Got to chat -- for nearly 2 hours! -- with the infamous Nikke Slight
- Met with some of the lovely folks at Indaba about how we can work together and use our respective takes on online collaboration to enhance the current ecosystem.
- After a meeting was postponed, I managed to spend a full day working! Imagine that.
- Saw some awesome bands, and missed out on a Brooklyn Bowl experience because the wait was ridiculous.
- Caught up with Arkadiy! It had been ages.
- July 25-27: Montreal
- July 28-Aug 2: Toronto, meetings + fun
- Thank you, Zac, for letting me sleep on your couch yet again. Your parents are slowly becoming mine :)
- Met with an awesome label rep about using YouPhonics for an artists' upcoming album -- note to self, need to follow up!
- Met with some peeps about SR&ED credit applications. 'Cuz apparently what I've been doing is applicable to get 42% of my development costs back from the government! Imagine that...
- Met Oleg Kostour and spent pretty much the entire day with him -- including a meeting with Jeff Anders -- because he's an awesome, awesome guy. No joke -- we planned a lunch at noon, and only ended up splitting around 10PM.
- Chatted with Alkarim and Logan (two of the folks at BNOTIONS, my developers) about a couple of enhancements YouPhonics needs before we blow the doors wide open.
- Saw off two friends -- independently -- who were leaving to England shortly (in fact, one has already).
- Spent an entire day with only three people, in ~4 hour increments each. The breadth and depth of the conversations was fantastic, so thanks Zac, Caitlin, and Frieda!
- Had a call with Tom Silverman about using YouPhonics with some artists' promotions -- note to self, need to follow up!
- Met up with Gabriel Nijmeh for drinks... which was supposed to be 2 hours, but ended up being 4 (in a very good way).
- Aug 3-10: San Francisco, meetings + fun
- MUCHOS gracias to Andrey (and Tracy) for putting me up (and putting up with me) while I was around! They move me.
- Virgin America (and Klout) gave me a free trip! So I went with a group of 10 others (who also had the trip), and met up with 4 other Toronto-ites down there. #ryanginger for life.
- Met with James from Atomic PR about PR, music, and where YouPhonics needs to be in order to make use of his company's services. Within the first 3 minutes, it was clear that Atomic -- and James in particular -- are great people.
- Went to the KloutUp and met the amazingnesses that are Megan Berry and Gregarious Narain (among many other awesome folks).
- Had hilarious post-KloutUp shenanigans with Satish, Verne, Jon, Jo, and Ben.
- Missed a chance to meet Debbie Landa -- note to self: need to send her an apology note, now that I have freedom to think -- because deadline'd work had piled up.
- Went to see Phish with 7 of the guys.
- Random road trip to Santa Cruz with Alkarim, Mark, and Guy. AMAZING.
- Spent a day recuperating and working. Huzzah!
- Asked a couple of questions re: a job I may soon be interviewing for (don't worry, it's very relevant to YouPhonics, and they won't be angry if I spend my spare time working on my baby).
- Was interviewed for Hwanho's Masters thesis on Social Media + Music. 'Twas amazing.
- Got to chat with Andrew Chen and David Hornik about their histories, what they're up to now (and/or what's exciting them these days), and what I'm up to. I felt stupid for not having anything really to ask of them, but I just wanted to meet them and hopefully start a friendly relationship. Plus, why spend favours while growth and progress are more or less on track?
- Aug 11-13: Toronto, meetings + fun
- Caught up on email on the flight back! HUZZAH!
- Met Noah Godfrey for an hour-long chat. Him and Jeff Anders give me such faith in the Canadian web-entrepreneurial scene. They also set the bar nice and high for what success should look like. #mushyfeelings
- Had a call with the always-splendid Mark Macleod -- note to self: I have a question to ask him that I forgot to pop yesterday. Email! -- about where I'm at with YouPhonics, and where him and the gang are at with Real Ventures.
- Mike Krass interviewed me for his Anti-Resume Blog! Two pieces were recorded, and one's already up at Mike Krass Dot Com. Check it! (There may even be a third one on the way...)
- Caught up with my old roommate and Zac over lunch before rushing to the train station to get home!
- Aug 13: Montreal, back to work
- Well, not tonight. Going to chat with my brother for a bit, then head out to see my friends (many of whom just returned from Europe!) and spend time with Rebecca, ze birthday girl.
- Work on Monday, Vancouver on Tuesday!
I'll try to post some actual thoughts this weekend. And a to-do list. :)
