jdg

As someone that has traveled from Kansas for many years for conferences, it's wonderful to see friends from the coasts coming to Kansas!

On the other hand, if you're an entrepreneur, you don't live in SF and you're building a consumer internet startup, you're fucked. Primarily because your access to capital is so limited it's ridiculous. Most people that live in the midwest aren't able to put in the time required to build out the relationships needed to successfully fundraise in the Valley.

And then back to another startup. ;)

"Eating the same diet, just a lot less carbs"

If you're eating less carbs, that's 4 calories less for every grab of carbs you've cut out. If previously you were eating around 200g of carbs everyday (probably on the low end, honestly) you've now removed around 800 calories from your diet.

You're still cutting calories.

His best work has yet to be done.

Because of a good graphic designer, sure.

KISSMetrics, visually, kicks ass. What sucks about it? It's not real-time. No simple real-time data export/querying API.

The latter is nearly a show stopper. I mean, really? No export/querying API?

Since then we've grown to 1M+ users and have delivered 2B+ push notifications. We're a team of 4 now.

For mobile apps, your tools are basically decided for you already. Eclipse for Android, Xcode for iOS. The goal of an MVP is to keep things as stupidly simple as possible. Use external APIs if they already exist, use services like Parse, etc, to give you a leg up.

MVP is less about code and more about results. If you can get away with no coding at all, that's the ideal situation. :-)

I wouldn't worry about it too much.

And we'll have a blog post up at http://blog.boxcar.io here soon too. It's a bit easier than the above now, as you can just choose "Sparrow" from the list of Installed Clients to have it work.

-jdg

FWIW, we also push Github notifications.

Please help spread the word in return. :)

We would love to have you as a customer.

Now we have a great team, have raised a seed round and are killing it in general!

We do have a WebSockets API that OP could hit and write a Chrome extension against. E-mail me (jonathan@boxcar.io) if you'd like access to it.

* I learned that you're up some years and down others. The trick is to just keep pushing forward.

* Some people have it, others don't.

* You won't be able to recognize whether you have it or not, until you're actually doing it.

* Marry the right person (and make sure they have health insurance that covers you and your family).

* Keep your personal expenses low and maintain the ability to live off of your partners salary while you're bootstrapping, if that's the path you take.

Bonuses:

* You get to have great discussions around the business every time you're together.

* You're able to lean on your dad (or mom) and ask for advice about what they would do in particular situations. Basically a built in mentor.

* You have a #1 fan that in some ways are living their own dreams through you. And they actually "get" what you're doing.

You have to be careful though that you don't fall into some of the same traps that they may have. As a great example: the typical small business mindset is to never, ever give up equity. For what we do here, it's silly to think that way. Equity is another tool in your toolbox, and should be used when appropriate.

Billing is.

Why would you EVER invest a ton of time in a billing system when you're just starting out? Billing is a HUGE time sinkhole. That applies to integrating with another provider (Chargify) just as much as it applies to not rolling your own.

Billing is not your product. Billing WILL make or break your product though, so once you've figured out that a reasonable number of people are willing to pay for it, then make sure your billing works and works well.

Also, if you can't afford $39/mo on a SaaS billing provider, then you're not serious about your startup and it's still just a hobby.

I had just turned 19 (2 months) before my son was born. Never married, but made the choice to stick around and make sure I was there every other weekend (and more, if allowed). I didn't have the "normal" college life, because I was gone every other weekend.

I've stayed in the midwest because of my son, rather than moving out to CA or NYC. For the first 6 years of his life, I never missed a weekend visit. For 3 of the 8 years he's been around, I drove 6 hours roundtrip every other weekend. The rest of the time it's just been a 4 hour roundtrip.

And, I've yet to regret it. I've been shown more opportunity than I could have ever dreamed of. No idea if that's karma, but it wouldn't matter anyway because the time with him is time well spent.