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At Chide.it, we deal a lot with Federal and Provincial Governments in addition to Universities and Colleges. One of the first questions that prospective customers ask us is, where is your data hosted? FluidSurveys is our Online Survey Product and the good news is that all of the survey data is stored in Canada.

You’d think that where your data is stored is not such a big deal. However, this very concept is taken very seriously amongst Canadian Institutions. As a matter of fact, the British Columbia Government has taken extra measures to ensure that institutions in its province do not use web services that store their data in the United States as a result of the US Patriot Act. For more information, check out this article from Osler.

Was wondering the other day… of the people who visit this website, how many people are male and how many are female? Take the poll and let me know!

Click Here to take this poll…

Powered by FluidSurveys.com

Today we heard of the news that pop icon Michael Jackson died of Cardiac Arrest. The news was shocking since he was only 50 years of age at the time of his passing. He was definitely one of the most famous people alive during his time and it goes to show that you never know what’s coming, even if you are an icon with millions of fans out there. Hearing stories like this really gets you thinking about life and your loved ones. Amelia Burr once said “Because I have loved life, I shall have no sorrow to die.” With that said, it’s important that we all do what we love and enjoy it to the fullest while we can.

This week, SuitUpp is back to Sean John. I can’t help but look at this and think that this is something that a mobster would wear… but, that’s just me.

I bumped into Natasha D’Souza the other day and she told me about her new Social Media Company. Natasha’s a social media wiz and if you’re looking to make your presence known on the internet, you should absolutely consult with her. You can check out VirtualEyeSee (the company) here: http://www.virtualeyesee.com.

A bit late in writing this… but, might as well put it up. I made sure to set 3 different goals for this year (each with measurable benchmarks). The goals are all-encompassing enough that I can relate almost any activity that I partake in daily to one of them.

The idea is that whenever I look at the time (watch, clock, cellphone, tv, computer), I’ll have to remember to ask myself “is what I’m doing right now the most efficient way of spending my time in accomplishing one of those 3 different goals”. Answering this question over and over again daily should “theoretically” help me keep the resolutions. Let’s see how it plays out.

Aydin.

Selling software is a very interesting process. It so happens that its really not just about telling interested parties about all of the features that you have and how using the software can make life so great. Yes, this is part of the process too. But, the reality is that all this will do is get people interested in your product. There are so many other factors that come to play in selling and it would be difficult to talk about them all.

However, I will say that not only is it very important to tell potential customers how using your software will make their life better, but you also have to let them know how disappointing and difficult their life will be if they don’t buy your products. Most people will do more to avoid the negatives resulting from not buying than they will do to gain the positives from buying.

Aydin.

I have a lot of meetings in Coffee Shops. Yesterday, as I was chatting away at a meeting, I noticed a really fancy phone in the hands of a guy who seemed to be intensely coding away. He was a RIM developer. Of course, I had to ask him to let me play with the phone he was programming (which of course was the good old BlackBerry Storm – i.e. first ever touch-screen BlackBerry).

I won’t repeat all of the information that you’ll be able to find on the internet, but, here are some new things that I learned about the phone:

1) It has copy and paste.

2) It doesn’t have wifi!!

3) The touch screen is actually tactile. In other words you have to press down the screen for a button to be pushed (unlike the iphone that simply detects touch).

4) When the phone is held in the vertical direction, it doesn’t show the full keyboard. When the phone is shown sideways, then you can see the full keyboard. That’s smart

5) The browser is not nearly good as the iphone’s. However, it’s better than that of my BlackBerry 8830. In order to zoom in, you’ll have to double tap the screen rather than using the two-finger zooming procedure in the iphone.

6) Its a world phone (like the 8830).

It seems like a great phone and I’m really hoping to get my hands on one as soon as I can (I’ll write more when I actually can use one for daily use).

Aydin.

New weekly suit is up on SuitUpp.com. This week its a Sean John Charcoal Pin Stripe suit. The list price on the website is $495. However, just type in the code “giveme200″ (without the quotes) on the checkout page as the discount code to get $200 off the purchase price. At $295, this suit is a steal… We have very limited quantity of this one available. First come first served

This is a major step for Ottawa!

I did a blog post about this on StartupOttawa.com which you can check out here: http://www.startupottawa.com/?p=284

congratulations to Luc Lalande, Dr. Tony Bailetti, and Ian Graham!

Aydin.