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<rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" version="2.0"><channel><atom:link rel="hub" href="http://tumblr.superfeedr.com/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"/><description></description><title>Jared Franklin</title><generator>Tumblr (3.0; @jaredfranklin)</generator><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/</link><item><title>Gamification as a Staple in Health</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Since being posted yesterday, I’ve read &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/#!/vkhosla/" target="_blank"&gt;Vinod Khosla’s&lt;/a&gt; guest post (“&lt;a href="http://techcrunch.com/2012/02/19/unhyped-internet-and-mobile" target="_blank"&gt;The ‘Unhyped’ New Areas in Internet &amp; Mobile&lt;/a&gt;”) on Techcrunch twice and several parts of it 5+ times. We should feel pretty fortunate to be able to obtain this type of information for free. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Of the 12 opportunity areas that he details, Health 2.0 excites me the most (for now). I’d love to take a stab at working on something in this pool in the next few years. I think devices and apps that let you measure for the sake of improving are really neat and could be extremely important in advancing us to the next step in preventing health problems. Apps and services that really excite me include &lt;a href="http://jaredfranklin.com/post/12820195617/jawbone-up-review" target="_blank"&gt;Jawbones UP&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a href="http://www.glooko.com/" target="_blank"&gt;Glooko&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a href="http://www.withings.com/" target="_blank"&gt;Withings&lt;/a&gt; connected devices, &lt;a href="https://carezone.com/" target="_blank"&gt;CareZone.com&lt;/a&gt;, and &lt;a href="http://www.healthrally.com/" target="_blank"&gt;HealthRally&lt;/a&gt;. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;My &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/#!/CapriTheDog" target="_blank"&gt;dog&lt;/a&gt; has been having a lot of health issues lately and I’ve already trashed a bunch of the paper receipts and didn’t keep a log of each problem, vet visit and medication administered and I’ve only had her for 6 months. I started using &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/#!/evernote" target="_blank"&gt;Evernote&lt;/a&gt; to keep track but it’s just not made for something like this. Then I thought about how important this would be for people as well. The next day, Techcrunch wrote an article about &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/#!/carezoneteam" target="_blank"&gt;Carezone.com&lt;/a&gt;. I think that’s why this space is soo exciting. It’s relatively easy to find problems and think of solutions. As usual, implementation isn’t as easy but I can’t help but think that I’ll dedicate some of my time to working in this space in the next few years.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I think Vinods article had an important and probably overlooked common theme. He mentioned gaming and gamification almost 10 times. For several months now, &lt;a href="http://jaredfranklin.com/post/5459239989/enjoyable-ted-talks-gaming" target="_blank"&gt;I’ve been realizing how important and powerful incorporating game mechanics&lt;/a&gt; into pretty much everything (along with a strong emphasis on design) is and will be in creating rich and engaging experiences that are fun and instill trust which will be extremely relevant in “Health 2.0” and “mhealth.” Just the other day I thought of a game that incorporates a lot of the game mechanics in popular Zynga Mobile games (Words With Friends &amp; Scramble) such as Catch Up, Turn Play and Randomisers that I believe would get many people to do a few more exercises each day. I think the average person would play/exercise on average for 2 minutes a session, 3 times a day which could result in an average of 100 push ups (or other exercises) per day more than that person previously would have done. That’s only 6 minutes a day but that equates to over 36 hours a year and over 36,000 push ups. I truly believe that a game and fun factor could be the difference in somebody cranking out thousands of push ups, sit ups and other exercises each year versus not.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Straight from Vinod himself:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;“&lt;span&gt;Both gamification (separate from gaming) and social may become basic tools that enable many of the areas I mentioned.&lt;/span&gt;”&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;“&lt;span&gt;One could reasonably put gamification of everything from health to education to training to shopping as a new emotional tool for applications.&lt;/span&gt;”&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;“&lt;span&gt;This is starting to change; it makes me optimistic that what has not worked so far can now work, especially given the role gamification can play in increasing student interest and social can play in increasing peer and teacher support and assistance.&lt;/span&gt;”&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;“&lt;span&gt;Alpha geeks have been hacking together solutions to track various types of personal data for years, but with the advent of open source hardware, cheap sensors and smart mobile applications, we believe that there will be a new class of applications unlocking the value of this data. And, in doing so, they will reshape the understanding of our own health and the health care industry as we know it and probably provide a lot of fun, games and motivation along the way.&lt;/span&gt;”&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;“&lt;span&gt;One of the evolutions we will see is that these utilities (and other real/virtual crossover areas like gamification) will require less, not more, input from us as they evolve – as the virtual bleeds into the physical, the enhanced experience will become more seamless and a natural part of activity&lt;/span&gt;”&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;“&lt;span&gt;There will be both large permanent innovations and categories established as well as passing fads (especially in gaming). I don’t list games as a “new pond” here, though it will continue to grow and surprise us in categories—whatever the next Angry Birds/Farmville phenomenon will be—while gamification will become pervasive in everything from education to health to shopping.&lt;/span&gt;”&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Sadly, I haven’t been to a doctor in months or maybe even years now that I think about it. I can’t help but think that I’d go at least 1 more time a year if it were more fun, rewarding, and less of a pain in the ass. I’m sure the wave of advancements that will come with “Health 2.0”, “mHealth” and gamification will do just that. Or better yet, create solutions that prevent me from physically having to actually go to a doctors office for 2-3 hours at a time to get a 20 minute check-up and get some tests ran that only take 10 minutes especially when those tests will just be sent somewhere else.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/17975171044</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/17975171044</guid><pubDate>Mon, 20 Feb 2012 18:19:00 -0500</pubDate><category>gamification</category><category>vinod</category><category>khosla</category><category>techcrunch</category><category>health 2.0</category><category>health</category><category>tech</category><category>article</category><category>unhyped new areas</category><category>internet</category><category>mobile</category></item><item><title>"Defend and respect the user’s voice"</title><description>“Defend and respect the user’s voice”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;One of Twitters core values&lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/17683287020</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/17683287020</guid><pubDate>Wed, 15 Feb 2012 19:28:12 -0500</pubDate><category>Twitter</category><category>Value</category><category>User centric</category></item><item><title>"we frequently make product decisions that may reduce our short-term revenue or profitability if we..."</title><description>“we frequently make product decisions that may reduce our short-term revenue or profitability if we believe that the decisions are consistent with our mission and benefit the aggregate user experience and will thereby improve our financial performance over the long term.”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;I love it. Excerpt from Facebooks S-1. &lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/16931159397</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/16931159397</guid><pubDate>Thu, 02 Feb 2012 14:53:47 -0500</pubDate><category>s-1</category><category>facebook</category><category>ipo</category><category>excerpt</category><category>product</category></item><item><title>My Nest thermostat. I’m wondering what the faint blue...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://28.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lye1427yZs1qaqjuqo1_500.png"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;My Nest thermostat. I’m wondering what the faint blue light at the top is for… It’s only visible via the iPhones camera and not the naked eye.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/16506225387</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/16506225387</guid><pubDate>Wed, 25 Jan 2012 23:14:00 -0500</pubDate><category>nest</category><category>thermostat</category><category>electronics</category><category>house</category></item><item><title>"Incentives matter and if you can figure out what peoples incentives are, there is a good chance..."</title><description>“Incentives matter and if you can figure out what peoples incentives are, there is a good chance you’ll figure out how they’ll behave”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;Freakonomics&lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/15213635724</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/15213635724</guid><pubDate>Mon, 02 Jan 2012 20:06:00 -0500</pubDate><category>quote</category><category>freakonomics</category><category>incentives</category><category>people</category><category>motivation</category></item><item><title>"We’re not social. We’re not viral. We just focus on trying to make a product that’s great for us...."</title><description>“We’re not social. We’re not viral. We just focus on trying to make a product that’s great for us. And be as open and transparent about it as possible.”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;Phil Libin - CEO of Evernote&lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/13919695452</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/13919695452</guid><pubDate>Thu, 08 Dec 2011 08:27:37 -0500</pubDate><category>phil libin</category><category>evernote</category><category>ceo</category><category>quote</category></item><item><title>Jawbone UP Review</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_luogxmoVxa1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;The lack of Jawbone UP reviews has inspired me to write my own. I’m hoping other early adopters will find this and share their thoughts. The inability to find many reviews also shows that either the product isn’t considered to be as “cool” amongst the tech world as I had anticipated, that people are skeptical of its accuracy, or that it’s priced incorrectly.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Note:&lt;/strong&gt; I’ve only had the wristband for a couple of days and I’m not using the social/team features or food tracking.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Is it “Cool”???&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;If it’s not cool then I’m a much bigger dork than my girlfriend claims. I’m fascinated by the product and I’m super stoked for the future based on this first gen. Being able to analyze your life (activity and sleep) is very fucking cool and quite frankly, I’m shocked it’s not something that most common folk have been able to do until now. The products tagline, “Make Healthy Living Fun &amp; Social” doesn’t actually interest me. I’m more interested in just knowing and being able to quantify my daily activity (or inactivity) for no other reason then the fact that I think it’s cool to be able to do so. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Why I Bought It&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;The cool factor obiously played a role in my purchase decision. If I could have bought a $100 iPhone app, $100 ankle band or a $100 business card sized device that offered the same ability to track and analyze my activity and sleeping ‘performance’ than I would have. However, I was not interested in the identically priced &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.fitbit.com/"&gt;Fitbit&lt;/a&gt; because I knew I’d wash the clip in the washing machine or forget to attach it on a daily basis.&lt;br/&gt;I wouln’t have bought the UP and wouldn’t find it nearly as “cool” if it didn’t track my sleeping patterns. In fact, I may have bought it if the only thing it did was track my sleeping patterns (which shows that there’s a unique market opportunity there). Sleep interests me because it’s mysterious… we don’t know much about our own sleeping habits or what goes on while sleeping. I’ve long suspected that I’m a light sleeper and hopefully I’ll be able to quantify that soon.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Secondly, I wanted (and still want) to see how they incorporated game mechanics into the UP experience. As I disclaimed earlier, I have not taken advantage of any of the social features (which itself looks like the primary game mechanic). I’m a true believer that everything we do in life will be ‘gamified’ over the next few years because games are true motivators. It’s hard not to believe this after watching &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.ted.com/talks/jane_mcgonigal_gaming_can_make_a_better_world.html"&gt;Jane McGonigal&lt;/a&gt; or &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_priebatsch_the_game_layer_on_top_of_the_world.html"&gt;Seth Priebatsch&lt;/a&gt; speak. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I primarily bought it because of a developing personal fixation to work on things that improve peoples lives (which involves incorporating gaming). This is a fire that has been slowly spreading inside and products such as the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://jawbone.com/up/product"&gt;UP&lt;/a&gt; wristband and the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.glooko.com/"&gt;Glooko&lt;/a&gt; glucose monitoring solution make this seem like an area I could realistically work in because I know I could help improve the applications by making them more useful and user friendly. As an old mentor had written on his whiteboard for over a year, “Data, data, data.” Collecting this data is the first step but making it pretty and helping its owners visualize it and make meaning of it is extremely powerful. This is a world in which I could make an impact on technology and peoples lives while thoroughly enjoying doing so. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Product Improvements&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;The majority of my recommended product enhancements are obvious and shared amongst the other early adopters’ reviews that I’ve found.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ol&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;An accompanying Website - &lt;/strong&gt;The current website allows you to sign in and manage your Account Info (Name, Gender, Address, Password, Email Preferences, etc.), and … Oh wait, that’s it. I’m assuming Jawbone will roll out a full fledged website to accompany their native app before the next gen wristband comes out but I’m pretty disappointed that they don’t already have one, considering how underwhelming the native iOS app is. I want to see detailed reporting including actual analysis with intelligent tips. I want to be able to export data and add notes inline with the graphs. Data, data, data… I bought this to track and make use of data so please help me do that, or better yet, analyze it for me. Also, what is a step exactly? What exactly is light sleep versus deep sleep? According to my math, a step has been 2.5 feet for me but I want to be told this by Jawbone. Please improve your help and education.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Ability to Set a Default Sleep Time Range -&lt;/strong&gt; I and 75% of other UPers will forget to manually put their wristband in sleep mode at least once a week. I’m rarely awake after 1am and sleeping past 7am so let me set my default sleep mode to those times in case I forget to push the button one night. If I manually throw it in sleep mode then great. I’m pretty sure Jawbone could roll this functionality out with a software update.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Wireless Syncing - &lt;/strong&gt;This seems to be the most common complaint but if you bought the first gen, you shouldn’t be complaining… It’s not like Jawbone didn’t make this known ahead of time. I’m assuming that bluetooth or wireless hardware would either not have fit inside the wristband, and/or would have blown up the price. Either way, I understand it and accepted it but most consumers won’t. Wireless syncing isn’t just becoming expected anymore, but more importantly it improves the overall experience. It’s about creating magical products that just work the way they’re supposed to without any human intervention. Consumers don’t want to think. They want and need their interaction with products and services to require little to no thinking. They have to be effortless. You look somewhere and you see what you want. Not, you plug in, look, and see what you want. Not a huge deal when reading it in a blog but it becomes one when you’re interested in seeing your data several times a day but need to plug it in to do so. Like I said, I accepted this by buying it but completely understand why most people will wait until the second gen comes out with wireless syncing capability.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Expose Network Data&lt;/strong&gt; - Jawbone has probably refrained from doing this to push their social features but I still think they should expose top level data. I want to know how I stack up against others in my demographic and across the entire UP network/community. You’re starting to collect a wealth of knowledge so share it! &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Inactivity nudges&lt;/strong&gt; - I literally laughed out loud when my band vibrated while working today. It tickled and I wasn’t getting up to walk around or stretch. Perhaps I would have if it vibrated repeatedly until I moved around but since it was one quick vibration, I wasn’t motivated enough to remove myself from my computer screen.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Improved Native iOS App - &lt;/strong&gt;The app has a loonnngggg way to go (even though I think it’s a great start). Considering there is no web app yet, I’ll put all of these recommendations under the native iOS app but I’d expect them to persist in the website as well once it’s up and running.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;Actual Analysis and Tips&lt;/strong&gt; - I got 1 hour and 28 minutes of deep sleep and 5 hours and 28 minutes of light sleep last night. Awesome. That’s great to know. It would actually mean something if I knew that was average (or good or bad) from a medical point of view. It would be great to know how I stack up against other 24 year old males. It would be great to know how I may be able to improve it. Thanks for telling me that my sleep quality is 69 but what the hell does that mean? Tell me all of that!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_luokm8K8h31qa8r1o.png"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;I walked 4.6 miles today… Awesome. How far did I walk at 7:34pm? How does that compare to the same time the previous day or the average for the same day the entire month before? How does this stack up against the rest of the network? I have no clue because the app can’t tell me any of that.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_luokrsm4Lg1qa8r1o.png"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Recommendation&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;Don’t buy it. “WTF, Why not!” …&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Despite my abundance of excitement, I don’t recommend buying the product yet. I’m soo happy with the first generation that I’m convinced the next generation will be worth the wait. Jawbone doesn’t need to make many improvements but the few they can (and I think will) make will be worth the wait. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;With that being said, this market is extremely young and I’ll be proud in 5 years when I say that I bought and still own the first generation UP wristband and am thrilled (but not surprised) by how far we’ve come since then. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Holes&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Because of the fact that I’ve only had the wristband for a few days, I didn’t talk about a lot of things including but not limited to the social and gaming elements (challenges &amp; goals), food tracking, or accuracy (which is probably more important than anything else). More notably, I didn’t talk at all about whether I feel encouraged to live healthier. I can’t yet say that I want to walk 100 more steps tomorrow than I did today or sleep for 10 more minutes. That’ll determine the true verdict. If that happens then the $100 price tag may be a bargain and this thing will really take off. Until then, I’m going to continue collecting my own data and thinking of ways that I can make positive impacts on peoples lives with unobtrusive technology.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/12820195617</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/12820195617</guid><pubDate>Mon, 14 Nov 2011 22:16:10 -0500</pubDate><category>UP</category><category>UP by Jawbone</category><category>Jawbone</category><category>wristband</category><category>fitness</category><category>review</category></item><item><title>Domains for Sale</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;offerpon.com&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;jaredfranklin.com&lt;/li&gt;
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&lt;li&gt;baltimorebuilds.com&lt;/li&gt;
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&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/12194182655</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/12194182655</guid><pubDate>Tue, 01 Nov 2011 08:06:00 -0400</pubDate><category>domains</category><category>jaredfranklin.com</category><category>offerpon.com</category><category>sale</category><category>irequire.it</category><category>baltimorecodes.it</category><category>baltimorecodes.com</category><category>baltimorebuilds.com</category><category>igambled.it</category><category>unitedstatesbuilds.com</category><category>floridabuilds.com</category><category>sanfranbuilds.com</category><category>sanfranbuilt.it</category><category>sanfranbuilds.com</category><category>bmorebuilds.it</category></item><item><title>When I was born, I was the 5,019,416,216th person alive on Earth and the 79,933,496,802nd person to...</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;When I was born, I was the &lt;/span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span&gt;5,019,416,216th &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;span&gt;person alive on Earth and the &lt;/span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span&gt;79,933,496,802nd &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;span&gt;person to have lived since history began&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;span class="pc-text"&gt;Thanks http://bbc.in/rXYCff&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/11997117058</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/11997117058</guid><pubDate>Thu, 27 Oct 2011 14:25:23 -0400</pubDate><category>bbc</category><category>where i fit into 7 billion</category><category>person alive</category><category>earth</category></item><item><title>Steelers suck!</title><description>&lt;img src="http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lrbwqlp5rh1qaqjuqo1_500.png"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;Steelers suck!&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/10054635280</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/10054635280</guid><pubDate>Sat, 10 Sep 2011 18:49:00 -0400</pubDate><category>capri</category><category>puppy</category><category>dog</category><category>ravens</category><category>steelers</category></item><item><title>Bye PayPal. Hello Millennial Media</title><description>&lt;p&gt;After 4.5 years at Bill Me Later/PayPal I have decided to take advantage of an opportunity to work for an exciting company called &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.millennialmedia.com"&gt;Millennial Media&lt;/a&gt;. Millennial Media is a leader in the mobile advertising space and is headquartered a few blocks from my house in Baltimore. I’m very exciting about the things I’ll be working on and the people I’ll be working with.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I’m very grateful for my experience with Bill Me Later/PayPal and will miss my coworkers and managers very much.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I wanted to go out with a bang and thought it was very rude that &lt;a href="http://www.twitter.com/iheartrendering" target="_blank"&gt;Tim (@iheartrendering)&lt;/a&gt; went on vacation during my last week so I left him a surprise.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr4c0l0Jms1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr4c0w6Hr21qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr4c15wjcX1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr4c1fCiQC1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr4c1xZsrs1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr4c264I6I1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Tims reaction (supposedly stunned)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr7grpGivY1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/9887972391</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/9887972391</guid><pubDate>Tue, 06 Sep 2011 16:41:00 -0400</pubDate><category>paypal</category><category>millennial media</category><category>career</category></item><item><title>Two days ago I picked up Capri Franklin, my new Jug puppy born...</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/R2M0UPgR66s?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;Two days ago I picked up Capri Franklin, my new Jug puppy born on April 19, 2011. She has already learned how to Sit, Stay, and Go Home. Now she needs to learn not to pee in the house.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I’ll continuously upload pics of her &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.evernote.com/shard/s106/sh/12b8901b-500b-4fb0-8bb3-7f80a90c169a/06a891ff0dc6d9dcaba35d4a628139f8"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt;, videos of her &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.youtube.com/jsfranklin221"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt;, and you can follow her on twitter &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://twitter.com/#!/CapriTheDog"&gt;@CapriTheDog&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/9837650790</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/9837650790</guid><pubDate>Mon, 05 Sep 2011 12:36:00 -0400</pubDate><category>capri</category><category>dog</category><category>puppy</category><category>video</category><category>tricks</category><category>jug</category><category>twitter</category><category>video</category><category>youtube</category></item><item><title>Product Management Manifesto via 280group</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lq2wgejuqr1qa8r1o.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a title="Download it" target="_blank" href="http://www.280group.com/Product%20Management%20Manifesto.pdf"&gt;Download it&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/9057607957</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/9057607957</guid><pubDate>Wed, 17 Aug 2011 20:02:05 -0400</pubDate><category>product management</category><category>280group</category><category>manifesto</category><category>career</category><category>values</category></item><item><title>"Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity."</title><description>“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;Seneca&lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/7871204574</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/7871204574</guid><pubDate>Wed, 20 Jul 2011 23:28:33 -0400</pubDate></item><item><title>Steve Jobs: What are the best video speeches/interview by Steve Jobs?</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Steve Jobs: What are the best video speeches/interview by Steve Jobs? 8 answers on Quora&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;span class="qlink_container"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.quora.com/Steve-Jobs/What-are-the-best-video-speeches-interview-by-Steve-Jobs" target="_blank"&gt;What are the best video speeches/interview by Steve Jobs?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/7493492087</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/7493492087</guid><pubDate>Mon, 11 Jul 2011 10:46:10 -0400</pubDate></item><item><title>"…in order to design a tool, we must make our best efforts to understand the larger social and..."</title><description>“…in order to design a tool, we must make our best efforts to understand the larger social and physical context within which it is intended to function.”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;Bill Buxton in “Sketching User Experiences”&lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/6738886966</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/6738886966</guid><pubDate>Mon, 20 Jun 2011 20:02:27 -0400</pubDate></item><item><title>From Ken Norton on how product managers can gain respect from...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_llutxlzCwW1qaqjuqo1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;From Ken Norton on how product managers can gain respect from engineers - &lt;a target="_self" href="http://www.kennethnorton.com/essays/leading_cross_functional_teams.pdf"&gt;Download&lt;/a&gt; the entire presentation.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/5895951830</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/5895951830</guid><pubDate>Fri, 27 May 2011 08:41:46 -0400</pubDate><category>ken norton</category><category>product management</category><category>respect</category></item><item><title>I downloaded 8 TED talks to watch on the plane this week....</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="225" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/dE1DuBesGYM?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;I downloaded 8 TED talks to watch on the plane this week. Surprisingly, my favorites share something very specific…. they revolve around gaming and more-so the intersection or blurry line of gaming and real life.  The video above featuring &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://janemcgonigal.com/"&gt;Jane McGonigal&lt;/a&gt; really got the juices flowing. Tons of ideas started flying around my mind that I was sure to jot down. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Another extremely entertaining and thought-provoking presentation featured David Perry and can be viewed at &lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfv_hOFT1S4." target="_blank"&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfv_hOFT1S4.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/5459239989</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/5459239989</guid><pubDate>Fri, 13 May 2011 17:17:00 -0400</pubDate><category>gaming</category><category>ted</category><category>ted talks</category><category>jane mcgonigal</category><category>david perry</category></item><item><title>Early Career Lessons Learned - Product Management</title><description>&lt;p&gt;With my 24th birthday approaching and a recent promotion on my resume, I’ve decided it’s time to share my early career learning’s with the world. Many people say that 24 isn’t old but I disagree. It’s about 5 years older than when I started working and 4 years older than Mark Zuckerberg when he co-founded Facebook.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;BACKGROUND:&lt;br/&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I was a jock in high school with no clue what I wanted to do or work on as a professional.  I played lacrosse, partied with friends and had a serious girlfriend.  I was a sub-par student that did whatever I needed to do to get by and I was content with that.  I always told my teachers, friends and parents that I’d work hard in college but that there wasn’t a point in pushing myself in high school academics.  Now I disagree and you will too after seeing the grammatical errors in this post, but that’s how I was at the time. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I went to Hobart College for my first year of college.  I chose Hobart because it was the only D1 school I was recruited to play lacrosse at and luckily it had excellent academics.  Lacrosse went well besides several nagging injuries that persisted throughout the year.  More importantly, I did well in school.  I had a 3.0 avg GPA which didn’t surprise me but shocked everyone from home.  I decided to transfer to Loyola College in Maryland my sophomore year.  I knew I didn’t want to play lacrosse anymore because I didn’t feel that the time investment would pay off in the long run.  Also, Hobart (as great as the faculty was) was very liberal and didn’t have any majors that interested me.  At Loyola, I decided to major in MIS.  I had always liked technology and applying technology but never considered myself to be technical.  I knew CS wasn’t for me as I can hardly add or subtract without using my fingers.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I found myself with a lot of free time on my hands when I started at Loyola.  I was used to a very rigorous schedule at Hobart filled with lacrosse practice, gym time and classes but 2/3rds of that didn’t exist at Loyola.  During my second semester, my Intro to e-Commerce professor would announce internship and job opportunities before each class period.  One day, he read one that was for a company I had never heard of called Bill Me Later, said it was in Timonium MD and that they were looking for a Consumer Marketing intern.  If I remember the flyer correctly, I think it only said that they were looking for a student pursuing a CS or MIS degree who was willing to work hard.  Well, that was me.  I called up and interviewed with my soon to be bosses and ended up with the job.  I think I was selected over the other applicant solely because I said I lived in the area and was willing to work during holidays and summers.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Several years later I find myself writing a blog post about the things I’ve learned, in a house that I recently purchased.  I was an intern for several years for Bill Me Later which was bought by eBay/PayPal in late 2008.  I then became a part time employee as I finished school since I was working 30+ hours/week with a full course load.  I then became a full time employee as an “Associate Product Manager” and was recently promoted to “Product Manager.” &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;ASSUMPTIONS:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For you to truly understand what I’m saying, you…&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;You love who you work for… your bosses, your team, your company.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;You’re passionate… about products you work on, and products in general.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Your career is young… &lt;5 years in this field.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Your career is a major part of your life… it’s your other girlfriend.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;You’re a product manager… you have a hard time defining your exact role.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;You work on web products… everything is a product to you. Your product has products.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;You’re not a genius… If you are then congrats but I’m not and I don’t work with any.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;10 LESSONS LEARNED &lt;/strong&gt;(in no particular order)&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ol&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;You need a mentor and you need to surround yourself with smart people who are willing to help you grow.&lt;/strong&gt;  I was fortunate enough to have the same mentor, well, two mentors from the time I began working until very recently.  They have made a tremendous impact on my life, professionally and personally.  I truly believe they’ve made me a better person.  They are/were both the greatest teachers I’ve ever had in my life.  This is invaluable.  You need a mentor.  You also need to surround yourself by people who are smarter than you.  I never like being the smartest person in the room.  I’ve been fortunate enough to work with engineers who are both smart and caring.  They are willing to help me grow and fill the holes where I’m incapable of filling on my own.  This relationship is especially important in product management because it encourages me to prescribe what we want but not in terms of how to do it.  Engineers are very creative so let them use their creativity.  &lt;em&gt;This is life… you need mentors.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;You may not always like what you’re doing but you’re always learning, so deal with it.&lt;/strong&gt;   As a product manager, you will spend a lot of time doing a lot of tasks  that you fucking hate to do.  You won’t always like the projects you’re  working on and you won’t like finding and helping fix a recurring bug  or process.  You may not like focusing on marketing plans or operational  tasks but you need to do them.  Product management is interesting and  exciting because in most organizations, your role is relatively  undefined/broad.  In ours, you’re an athlete and are willing to play any  position at any time if it’s what the coach calls for.  No ifs, ands,  or buts; just fucking do it.  You won’t like everything you do but you  deal with it because you’re passionate about your product and making it  the best it can be.  Everything you do whether you like it or not is a  learning experience that you’ll be grateful for later.  &lt;em&gt;This is life… you’ll need to do shit you don’t enjoy.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Your job boils down to making decisions and exercising good judgement&lt;/strong&gt;.  I’m not aware of a product management school, major, or certification that will make you a good product manager.  It boils down to experiences and judgement.  If you have good judgement (you either do or don’t) and can learn from your mistakes and others mistakes then all you need is to add a lot of different experiences to your repertoire.  Accept mistakes and failures; learn from them.  You’ll get better with time.  &lt;em&gt;This is life… a series of decisions resulting in experiences.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Your career is a top priority.&lt;/strong&gt;  You don’t have kids yet  and you aren’t married.  I have a long time/serious girlfriend but  that’s not the same as being married with kids.  My career is my baby.   Even if you don’t feel like you’re compensated fairly financially for  the time you put in, you will learn twice as many [valuable] lessons  than you would have by just working 9-5.  That in itself will pay off  eventually.  If you’re in product management then your hours aren’t for debate anyway.  You’ll inevitably need to help troubleshoot  an unexpected production issue at 3am on a Saturday morning.  There is  no such thing as 9-5.  Your career is your life so throw the concept of  hours away.  Do what you need to learn all you can while you don’t have  too many other priorities.  I strongly believe your loved ones and  career should be where you focus &gt;80% of your time.  As Mumford &amp;  Sons sings, “Where you invest your love, you invest your life.” Love  your partner and love your career.  &lt;em&gt;This is life… invest in what you love.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Welcome change but don’t bank on it panning out as soon as you expect&lt;/strong&gt;.  Sometimes important people (such as your mentor) leave unexpectedly or a new hire comes on board.  Maybe your lead QA resource has a baby weeks earlier than expected creating a huge bottleneck.  Things happen.  From my experience, you’ll feel negative changes immediately and will need to make a lot of sacrifices and adjustments to counter them.  From my experience, good changes such as new employees joining or positive org modifications take a long time to make a positive impact.  It takes a long time to get people up to speed, no matter how great or experienced they are.  Have patience and do your best to transfer your knowledge.&lt;em&gt;  This is life… unexpected events occur and you need to face them head on, with patience.&lt;br/&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Speak up when you need to speak up&lt;/strong&gt;.  You’re smart and you know when things are going awry.  Maybe your team is getting completely bombarded and you can picture things exploding 1 month down the line.  Maybe somebody isn’t doing their job and it’s creating a huge bottleneck.  Maybe you’re unhappy and think you’re being unfairly compensated.  No matter what it is, if you can prevent something bad from happening or if you have a small fire inside that doesn’t go away for a while, speak up.  I pride myself on being the drama-free, low maintenance employee that managers pray for but this has come to bite me in the ass a few times.  I’ve learned to speak up when needed and it’s the only solution.  &lt;em&gt;This is life… you shouldn’t keep everything bottled up inside.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;It is impossible to stick to a roadmap&lt;/strong&gt;.  This one pains me to say and I know many experienced product managers and visionaries will write me off, but try to hear me out… This isn’t impossible at a lot of companies but it is for many others.  I won’t even say it’s impossible at our company but from my personal experiences and the team I’m on, it is.  However, this is not such a bad thing.  I love that our team still behaves like a startup even though we are a mature company.  Our team is just one group within it and we’re undoubtedly one of the most nimble of all.  I love that we can quickly crank out code and implement a fix or feature within a short amount of time.  With this being said, our abilities and capabilities are sometimes abused and we often get sidetracked, thus diverting from our “roadmap.”  &lt;em&gt;This is life… you can’t roadmap your life and expect it to pan out exactly as planned.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Have empathy for other groups in the organization&lt;/strong&gt;.  Develop relationships with other groups (marketing, customer service, all IT groups, sales, etc).  You’ll work with each of them at one time or another on projects but it’s valuable going further than that to actually understand what each of them do everyday.  What are their problems and what are their goals?  The world doesn’t revolve around you or what you’re working on.  The  entire organization is important and every employee matters. &lt;em&gt;This is life… you need to recognize what’s going on with people around you.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;If you want to know if you’re eligible for a raise as an intern, then ask your boss; don’t go straight to HR&lt;/strong&gt;.  This doesn’t make your boss look great and when you love who you work with (as stated in the assumptions), you can talk to them about these things.  I’ll never forget this one.  &lt;em&gt;This is life… it’s not smart to make somebody (who ultimately controls your salary) look bad.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;You’re only good if you’re a customer/user&lt;/strong&gt;.  The best way to learn about a product is to use it, and use it a lot.  This is not going to help you think like most of your customers since most will only use the product a few times, or only once, but it will help you learn how your product works.  Nearly 4 months of my career was spent conducting UAT, supporting QA and managing releases.  It sucked sometimes but it was extremely valuable.  It kills me when I hear that he/she (an employee) does not have an account and has never used our product.  I want to scream and tell their manager to get their shit together.  You and everyone you work with needs to go further than to “think like a customer”; you need to actually be one.  Product managers don’t only work for a company, we work for our customers.  I think of myself as our product evangelist AND our user evangelist.  &lt;em&gt;This is life… you won’t get too far being fake and you can’t know what you don’t know.  &lt;/em&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;SUMMARY:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I may only be nearing 24 but I’ve learned as many valuable lessons from 19-24 as I will during my career between 39-44.  Work your ass off and do whatever needs to be done to learn as much as you possibly can.  If you aren’t passionate about what you’re working on or who you’re working with then stop wasting time and pursue your passions.  Surround yourself with smart people and work on things that can potentially reach millions of people.  &lt;em&gt;This is life.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/4407554454</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/4407554454</guid><pubDate>Wed, 06 Apr 2011 23:09:50 -0400</pubDate><category>career</category><category>product management</category><category>jared franklin</category><category>lessons learned</category><category>college</category><category>professional</category><category>Professional Development</category></item><item><title>"People react positively when things are clear and understandable."</title><description>“People react positively when things are clear and understandable.”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;Dieter Rams&lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/3054222619</link><guid>http://jaredfranklin.com/post/3054222619</guid><pubDate>Tue, 01 Feb 2011 16:30:06 -0500</pubDate><category>dieter rams</category><category>design</category><category>quote</category><category>kiss</category><category>simplicity</category></item></channel></rss>

