A lot of people I talk to want to “come online”. They always come with “a new twist on an old industry”, with “I will do it totally different” and so on. A friend of mine wanted to create a content site about the financial industry. I told him there are countless and that he might want to niche the approach a little bit. Well, I wasn’t too convincing, apparently, and the project never took off. Even now, every time I meet with him, he tells me what the world missed, how innovative his project would have been.

When we started rpmgo.com/autounleashed.com (me and my cousin) there were lots of car sites, starting with autoblog.com and jalopnik.com and continuing with smaller blogs, not to mention the millions of splogs around. People said we had no chance, since the car industry was really competitive (it was before World crisis, ok? ). What we did? Well, basically we wrote (well, my cousin more than me) and promoted the s#$t out of it through social news sites. Nothing innovative, nothing completely new. We didn’t become the best in the industry, but it is a project still growing, with mentions in forbes.com, links from the aforementioned big car blogs aso.

Pat, that I talked about in the last blog post, didn’t innovate: he actually stumbled into something (a LEED exam site created from the notes he took while studying). He then put in some work to create a product and started to make money. Innovation? Not at all. Work and smarts? More so.

So, basically, what I was trying to say is that you don’t need to begin a project thinking about ways to innovate. You just need to do the things that everybody does, but better. And you will be in front of 99% of the competition. Afterwards, start innovating. But until then, why lost nights over it? Just use the systems already in place a lot better than anybody else.

What is your experience?

The only thing that actually makes me smile lately is that the year comes to an end and that next year I will start the adventure of my life so far: going around the World.

So, first stop: Austria. I’ve never been there, but heard a lot of great things about it. And some pictures I have found around the internet show me it is true (click on the photos to see them bigger).

I also have a full set of photos of Viena from a very good friend (ro only) which I will add to the site in the days to come.

So, what do YOU, the ones that had the pleasure of going to Austria, suggest I visit?

Since I didn’t find the Blogging Geek, I decided that the one most close to what I am is the Podcasting Geek (because of my radio show) and the coder geek (though I do not code as much anymore).

What kind of geek are YOU?

What do you do in these kind of moments? Or, better yet, what would you do if you were the dog? Tell me, tell me

(ok, this post was only a pretense to put the picture, but it made my day, it is so funny! we need to laugh as much as we can…)

“Working with girls is a lot better than working with guys!” (shut up!!! it’s not about THAT!!!)

Here is why:

1. Girls are more dependable.
2. Girls do it more thoroughly
3. Girls are more willing to take suggestions

Can you tell me I am wrong? Try!

So much truth in this. Red eyes, headaches, sleepless nights? You were probably a project manager (or in love )

Anyway, the world doesn’t stop spinning, even if I would want to, so I am invited to talk about political blogs at one of the national TV stations in Romania, Antena2, tonight at 9pm. The reason for this invitation is that on the 25th of November there are euro elections in Romania and a lot of politicians started blogs during the last months, the last one being former president Ion Iliescu.

You can watch the show here, but it is unlikely you will understand anything, unless you speak Romanian or Italian (you will understand about half, if you do speak Italian).

Ah, I hate civilization sometimes (I have to go to the bank, meet with people…). Give me a laptop, a cabin in the mountains, high speed internet, snow, the girl I love (even if she doesn’t like being cold too much) and I will not bother you for half an year

Later edit: I’ve added the show here. It is in Romanian, sorry, folks.

My visit to Antalya helped me find one of the “non-existent issues”: you are missing people. People around me seem to like me (beats me why ) and I get quite attached to people in a short period of time. Yes, I know, I shouldn’t do that, but this is who I am and I feel good the way I am. More, you have to get attached to people, or else we would be living in small boxes, alone, not in communities.

Before leaving for Antalya, Daniel, the guy that “forced” me into JCI, told me that people may start crying when leaving the World Congress, but I made fun of him (sorry for that, man). I didn’t really believe you can get so attached to the people around you during such short periods of time. But, man, was I wrong. I didn’t really see anybody crying, but now I can understand what he was talking about.

So, what do you do when you realize that you cannot leave a city for the next destination, just because there are people you feel you got attached to? Of course, think not only about being in love (which only takes one glance, doesn’t it? ) or some summer fling, but about all the friends you might make there. What will happen then?

We live in a global village, we communicate faster than ever before. My best friend from childhood lives in a city 400km from Bucharest, we see each other 2-3 times a year, but I know everything about his family, about his work, I see live images of his newly born boy a.s.o. Still, I would love to be able to stay and talk over a beer and some pizza more than 2-3 times a year.

It is not as bad as it may sound. You still have options: you may decide to stay there longer, you may take the person with you (if you fall in love), you may come back from time to time. Unfortunately, when you will leave, some part of you will remain there and it will follow you a long time.

So, do YOU miss anybody? I would love to hear what you did in similar situations.

I try to be objective but I can’t: Bulgaria, build a f$%#in’ ROAD to cross the country. Romania might not have the best roads, but at least they ARE there, without holes, with signs and paint on them.

I have to say thanks to all the people that helped us there, overcoming the language barrier and putting us on the right track (yes, GPS and maps didn’t help, since the roads were presented as good roads).

When I got in Romania I felt like getting out of the car and kissing the road. Finally, at around 2 am, I was home.

See some videos: