"A few years back, we decided to try something new. A potential client approached us and rather than preparing another project proposal, we offered the client what we now call a “Project Evaluation.” We charged them a fixed price for which we promised to evaluate the project, in all of our areas of expertise, and give them our recommendations."

"Strategic pricing helps your brand and helps you to make more money. Issuing a price is like handing out a business card -- it’s a great branding tool, but be careful about what it says to your market. Beginning relationships with customers at a high price makes the statement: 'we’re good at what we do and we know it.' Fighting with a competitor over a low price says 'I’m uncertain about my abilities, so I’ll take what I can get.' Failing to use a considered pricing policy will leave you treading water in a sea of design mediocrity, allowing you to just stay afloat while you sell commodities."

"But the web is not just some kind of magic all-absorbing meta-medium. It's its own thing. And like other media it has a question that it answers better than any other. That question is: Why wasn't I consulted?"

Questions about Apple, New York Times dealings.

"... there is one compensating advantage for the people who escape the old system: when the ecosystem stops rewarding complexity, it is the people who figure out how to work simply in the present, rather than the people who mastered the complexities of the past, who get to say what happens in the future." (The Vision 20/20 group should invite Clay Shirky to speak.)

"Here’s my point: businesses don’t get to pick the timetable for when their preferred model takes a permanent dirt nap. It’s insane to me that these businesses’ fans see this so much more clearly than their actual stakeholders do. The fans want desperately to see these places stay alive, and many, like me, pay tons of actual cash every month or year to support that."

Reference matrix.

How to graciously contact strangers, from Bobulate.

"The round was led by Betfair, which runs a legal online gambling business for betting on horse races." (Watercolor develops sports-related social games and already offers more than 600 apps, mostly for American sports teams.) "The deal also shows that Betfair, which has 1,600 employees, is still focused on a U.S. expansion." (And that it will be aggressive in pursuing that expansion through social media and fantasy games. Contrast: Youbet's Whodoyoulike?)

"Email newsletters may not be sexy, but they are profitable, work well, and provide a ton of value to their readers."

Betfair's smart approach to the US market: "The technical team he is building in Silicon Valley is therefore taking a very modular approach to what its building online so that various components of online gambling can be turned on and off depending on the laws in individual states (or even countries). So that might mean poker and horseracing in one state, and sports betting in another."

Six milestones from 30 seconds to three years.

Because if you don't, your business/web site/service is invisible. [I'd add that it's not enough to have a Twitter feed or a Facebook page; your social media presence is only as engaging and responsive as the person(s) behind it.]

"Running a little company is frickin' frightening." Perspective for the entrepreneur in need of bucking up.

"Management imperatives for unlocking participation." All the jargon necessary for making the social media case to execs.

"It’s a beautiful dream, enough to make one hope that these experiments will kick-start -- unlike so many online renaissances -- a sustainable new model, giving journalism itself an opportunity to spark back to life. What is a front page, after all, other than an aggregator? Why does an article read the way it does -- lede, nut graf, quotes? If that pyramid structure was designed for the physical facts of print production, what new structures will match the new technologies?" And the right-on response: http://spiers.tumblr.com/post/69979490/sigh

"Do whatever's best for your users. You can hold onto this like a rope in a hurricane, and it will save you if anything can. Follow it and it will take you through everything you need to do."

"This round is over. Journalists lost. But lucky for journalists, there are plenty more rounds to come."

In a post-print NYT world, "Times readers might actually end up getting more exposure than they currently do to reporting resources scattered around the globe, and to areas and issues that are difficult to cover in a general-interest publication." Off on some of the numbers but larger point about future of news holds.

Of all the blog posts I have read about start-ups in a downturn, this is one of the best ... and oddly, despite the stresses and uncertainties and weeping recounted, not dissuasive.

"Frequently, stories aren't right for TechTicker or BusinessWeek, but might work for this blog or a freelance project or maybe even (hint?) a new book. I can't tell you how freeing that is after years of laboriously pitching stories, writing stories I didn't care about and having to play the newsroom game. You can't put a price on autonomy."

"First, the market and the internet don't care if you make money. That's important to say. You have no right to make money ..."

Twitter for companies.

"The book business as we know it will not be living happily ever after. With sales stagnating, CEO heads rolling, big-name authors playing musical chairs, and Amazon looming as the new boogeyman, publishing might have to look for its future outside the corporate world."

October conference on the economics of digital sports media. Features keynote by MLB AM head.

"Today, if you're not staying current with Web 2.0 technologies' impact on business, then you're just not staying current. Period."

"There are a number of subtle cues that you can get, even from the CV, to figure out whether someone’s a great programmer."

"The ultimate flaw in the company's logic regarding its pay scheme seems obvious."

Very good advice: "Solve a problem, not a class of problems."

"Simple, effective and affordable small business marketing."

Killer resources for entrepreneurs

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"Simply put the entrepreneurs who are aggressively open in describing their plans seem to do better than the ones who are cagey."

"How does anyone actually leave the corporate world for a start-up?"

Links for documents, funding, taxes, and accounting

"If you have a team of two or three and you bring in $1M in revenue per year, I’m guessing you’ll be pretty damn happy with your earnings. And to do that, all you need to achieve is 2000+ accounts at $40 per month."

"Some are great but most are not."

"The internet is a copy machine."

Should the Internet even be viewed as an ad medium?

Another scam, I mean, innovative community-driven way to score cheap creative work

Hand-holding for the sen-execs, still yields some useful nuggets

Almost persuasive, but doesn't address social networks' declining page views or usage patterns that might contradict