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Self Employment Rage

July 07, 2011

There is something to be said about a boss who doesn’t cuss at you. There is something to be said about not being harassed in the workplace. Conflict at work is a serious issue.

I’ve experienced the drain on creativity. I’ve experienced the need for utter relaxation from my job, because each day is a chore. I know how it feels, and because I do it makes me that much more hesitant to create conflict in my current work environment. Which sometimes makes the stress create poorly timed bubbles ready to blow.

When working from home it also makes it that much easier for the work, and subsequent stress, to never leave you alone. As the stress never leaves, you have to learn the things that help you let it go. If you don’t, you’ll soon be no longer self-employed. If you have the patience, self-employment is one of the best techniques for forcing you to learn to deal with your anger.

I do have to say, however, that when self employed you only have yourself to blame if the work isn’t getting done. You put the hours in. You know what you need to work well. Does that afternoon coffee help a ton? Well, you’re at home and on your own schedule, make sure to take that break. Does writing about your frustrations and allowing yourself the time to deal with the anger make you more productive and do the things you really want to do? Deal with the anger, have the needed discussion. You set your priorities, you finish the details, you make the choices as to what a good product is and whether it’s good or just good-enough.

Parting words: try to never stay at a job that makes you unhappy or makes you think less of yourself. A job should encourage you to grow and make you confident that you can do so. It should not make you feel less able, ever...

Curvy In Html5

July 06, 2011

This past weekend has been exciting. Just another to add to the exciting and surprising lists of days lately. It seems that someone recommended us on Stumbleupon. We’ll that started a slew of traffic on our Curvy in HTML5 game. As our normal trends go, we went from around 5000 page impressions on Wednesday the 22nd, to around 700 impressions on Thursday the 30th. This, of course, started us thinking about what we would need to do to bump up our page impressions again. Then someone made a recommendation on Stumbleupon and we shot up to just over 50,000 on the 2nd of July. As things tend to go we do slowly go down again, but so many people know of us now we keep getting a Facebook ‘Like’ or a Tweet and more people show up and check out our site.

We’ve also been getting great feedback. Notes with recommendations for game play as well as bugs as they come up. Those are highly appreciated. So for those interested, here is a list of what updates are expected to come in the near future:

Local High Scores
Preferences - Color choices like with the Android version
Highlighting Mechanism for completed tiles

If you have any suggestions feel free to send us a line or link or whatever. Have a beautiful July day!

Late Night Tuesdays

July 05, 2011

Sorry everyone, I was out for the weekend in HIllsboro. Back in Corvallis, but not up to speed on things. It's amazing what great weather and heat does to ones ability to focus on work. I'll be posting again tomorrow, see you then!

First Glance Google Plus

July 01, 2011

Thanks to a good friend, @ottonomy, I was able to check out Google+ today. First glance reaction? Amazing.

The organizational structure is so much better than Facebook. I hope that everyone goes this way, because it’s seriously the best way to go. Not only is it more organizationally easy to use, it’s extremely easy to prevent certain groups from getting updates you don’t want them to see.

They use a function called the Circle where you just drag the name of the person in the different groups you want them to be a part of. Then, once it’s done, they go away. You never have to select groups again. You can also create multiple types of circles

You can easily import contacts from Gmail. It looks like you may eventually be able to import contacts from Facebook and Twitter, so you can simply manage the whole kit-n-kaboodle from Google+. That, would be a god send.

What could be added to this to make it the best?

Allow Multiple Gmail accounts, and the ability to show email to certain circles and not to others. I would love to be able to manage work and personal emails all through this one Google+ account.
Allow import of videos you want to associate with yourself from Youtube, as well as images from Imgur and Picasa and so on. I’m sure it will happen, but it doesn’t seem to be in place just yet.
One major failing of most Google docs, and other byproducts after Gmail is the inability to really customize your items. It would be truly great if we could more easily customize these different products like Gmail. Even simple change of background colors and whatnot.
It needs an event option like with Facebook, but it needs to make it better. As Facebook doesn’t have a calendar, if Google can create an Events option like Facebook, and make it easily streamlined to your Google Calendar then I’m hooked.

I’m already hopeless hooked to Google though. Hope to see you on Google+!

Anger Management Discoveries

June 30, 2011

Sorry folks, today is not a blog post about my weird little side notes about our business, or my education towards programming. It’s been a hard half-week. Painful memories abound here.

I’ve been relapsing a bit back into my ultra fear mode from when I worked at my previous job. For the past two mornings I woke up and all I could think of was my former boss, how angry I still was at her, at some other people at my old place of work, and how I am still not over it. I’m still not over it. I’m still ridiculously angry some days. It’s very few and far between when those days arise, but I still experience them.

I never imagined I would find myself in a situation such as I am today. Working on building my own business while recovering from such a serious violation of self worth. My daily reflections tend to be filled with serious, angst’y issues. How do I let go of anger and pain? How do I forgive when I simply want to hurt myself or someone else during those reflections? Especially when I hear these suggestions most of the time:

Go workout
Talk to someone about it
Talk to the person involved
Deal with the problem surrounding it
Simply deal with it

I don’t know about you, but I’ve found that working out doesn’t help. If anything I linger on the issue and don’t actually deal with it. Talking with someone doesn’t always help because it can often make me angrier, but it can help sometimes so I’m not totally knocking it. Talking with the person at hand almost always makes me angry, or makes it harder for me to actually deal with the issue (at least this particular issue). Dealing with the problem surrounding it, that doesn’t always solve things, and sometimes also makes me just as angry. This is specifically in reference to situations where your supervisors at work are inclined to believe a boss who tells stories differently than you do. To simply deal with it; that’s a phrase for someone who just clams up and doesn’t ‘Deal with it’ as far as I’m concerned. Or it’s someone who doesn’t want to listen to you.

I did, however, just hear one of the best suggestions in a long while: write a story about it. Although Robey mentions having suggested this in the past, it really clicked when I received this tweet:

And now I’m off to do just that. I’m going to write a short story, and let the good times..... = a delicious salmon sandwich. Seriously hungry.

How to sustain your business; views from a budding entrepreneur

June 29, 2011

There are tons of bloggers out there who would give you a list. They would try to sell you on how to do things to make your business work. I don’t really care about making your business work, sorry to say. I’m more concerned with making my own work. I’ll let you know what seems to work for me, but I’m not saying this will help you in any way.

Get up before 8am. That helps a ton. I don’t do it every day. I’m not always consistent and I seriously see the drain it has on my own work and abilities to focus. But when I wake up before 8am, and I attempt to work for a while, there is a greater chance that I will feel excited and proud of my day’s efforts.

Don’t own cats. They are incredibly distracting creatures that always show up right when you get settled. They want to be petted, or fed, or paid attention to, and it’s always when you were just getting into a serious work groove. That said, we own two. Work can be frustrating at times because of cats jumping onto desks and almost knocking over coffee on a daily basis.

Organize. If you don’t have some semblance of organization, you’ll never get off the couch/ground. Seriously, if I start my day with no idea what I’m exactly doing, then I have serious issues getting anything done. If I haven’t already organized my day, I simply start by reviewing my ‘To Do’ lists and identify my targets. I also answer any emails and write a blog entry. Have a couple of things, and get them done. That way everyday still feels productive.

Don’t expect to move the world each day. This one is always the hardest for me. You can expect to get work done, but don’t expect to see ridiculous movement. You cannot move the world in a day by yourself. When you’re running/attempting to sustain your own business it makes it even harder. Just make sure you have some focus, keep working, try to get up before 8am if you can and let yourself take mental breaks.

Albeit I'm not always great at doing these things everyday. I’m definitely not a guru, I just know what I need. It works for me, mayhaps you can find it useful.

Return of the....Mondays? :(

June 27, 2011

Sorry I was out Friday, and missed posting an entry. It’s been a long, long weekend. It was one of those weekends where you want and attempt to get thousands of things done, get hundreds done, and see the subsequent leftovers in guilt. That on top of other aspects and pains in my life has me at a ridiculous standstill today. I simply cannot find any motivation.

This is exacerbated by the fact that I need to get on the triangle of learning (like being on the ball but traditionally more difficult and with less options). Without more learning I continue down the path of unable and non-programmer. Without it our business continues at the pace of one fast programmer without a buddy to decode his stuffs.

Totally random thought; one thing I truly dislike is the fact that so many bloggers out there make money off of people looking for solutions, when the solutions are already inside of them. They don’t need bloggers to tell them what to do. Sure, they can get ideas, but there are so many useless bloggers out there.

I know that last little set of comments isn’t going to make me any friends out there, but honestly. For those who blog or read a lot of blogs, is it not quite crazy how many of them write about stuff you really don’t care about? Things that are so cliche, marketed, and annoying? Someone told me once that the idea is to stay focused on being unique. Be yourself, because you’re unique. Learn from your own uniqueness and others will soon enjoy it as well. Do you really need to say the things people understand, or is it more profitable to continue to be ‘that weird guy/gal.’

Back to the former topic. I’m still having troubles finding motivation despite that this past month has been our most profitable yet. I think the thing that freaks me out a bit is that I’ve already sent out Press Hooks to a variety and non-small list of places to get it reviewed and we’ve only been really noticed by the UK. How often can you send notices to Newspapers and other such review sites without driving them crazy?

Back to finding motivation. I’ve requested that motivation come back and join me for some more regular work hours. I need you to hang out this time, not visit for a free beer and then skedaddle. Motivation should come and replace my current house guest, depression. Yes, it’s back and in full force. It’s included in it’s arsenal some hate filled sayings, cruel words, and a deep hankering for cheese and chocolate. You might throw dill pickles in that mix as well.

So what do I need?

Food will make the depression only take hold even more firmly. Cruel words and sayings are already out, so the only thing I’ve got there is to decrease the amount of horrid things that make it out of my thoughts. Took a bath; that was no help. For today I’m going to go with just knuckling down and getting some work done. Part of that might include writing more blogs. In the face of failure, don’t fail.

Perhaps Were Just Confident Not Over Confident

June 23, 2011

What is my generation defined by? By it’s tenacity, and it’s want for change. It’s aided by our confidence, provided by our parents. What does this mean? What problems does it create? A variety, and painful ones at that. Does that mean we can’t be successful, or that we complain more than other generations?

My generation (I’m 28 I remind you), was brought up to change the world. To save the whales and rainforests, cure AIDS, beat cancer, and establish full fledged equality. To do so we were told to go to college and get a degree, because without one we would be unable to pursue our dreams or get a decent job. Thus we accrued debt like our parents accrued mortgages.

Then we attempted to pursue our dreams, and save the rainforests, or we tried to get the jobs to learn how to cure AIDS. Then we learned that there wasn’t enough funding in the world for us all to do that, so some of us got other jobs. Jobs to pay the bills, which often resulted in us going into positions we were over educated for. This created a large pool of dissatisfied workers who knew they were smarter than their boss, or more capable. Many times they were even told by their superiors that they knew they were smarter than them.

Many didn’t get jobs at all. They then moved back in with their parents who were paying mortgages. These parents started to get nervous. “What happens if my child doesn’t get a job? Will I have raised a slacker as a kid? Obviously they’re not trying hard enough.” they think. Then they start to complain about their children at work. Sometimes to the others in my generation who simply got a job to pay the bills.

That leaves even more young people feeling suddenly disillusioned about life. They had been brought up around totally different values and ideas. Now my generation is being shunned by the same people who told them to believe in the world. What our parents were really saying was believe in us. Well, I’m here to say we still believe in you. You just can’t stop believing in us. We believe in you. We want to make this world a better place. You can’t choose to stop putting in the effort now. We’re here. We’re educated, and we want to make a difference. USE US. Don’t let our talents and abilities go to waste. Don’t assume we don’t know about the way the world works. If we don’t, talk to us. Explain to us why. Don’t just stop thinking that since we’re young adults it means you no longer have to care about teaching and educating us.

Does this mean we’re over-confident? Perhaps we’re just confident. Perhaps we haven’t lost our passion. Perhaps we were taught that this is the way to make things happen. Look to our educators. Don’t simply blame us for being over-confident, entitled, and a generation of complainers. We were taught to believe in the world, and to believe in you.

Where would we learn to complain from? Perhaps the Internet, or perhaps our educators and our parents. Where would we learn to feel entitled? From our educators. How could a whole generation have too many people feeling entitled? Where would that come from if an entire generation started doing it? It surely couldn’t be genetics, it must from those who raised them. Where would we learn to be confident? From our parents and educators. They taught us to be confident. Is this bad? I would vote no.

To blame us for our failures is blaming a generation for something you helped to create. This means you must take part of the blame, OR you can simply learn the attributes we’ve developed and learn to use them and interact with them. You can learn to not discriminate against another generation, a younger generation, simply because they’re different. Simply because they don’t share the same immediate values that you do. And if we don’t share those values, well, that sounds like it’s time for us all to have a large family discussion about that fact. Treat us like equals and we’ll do the same. I dare you.

Curvy now in HTML5!

June 22, 2011

Today was another exciting day. It started out with weeding and watering the garden. Then it shifted into hanging the laundry. Then our weekly coffee meeting. At our weekly coffee meeting we were presented with a pleasant surprise. Our game, Curvy, in the HTML5 version had just been tweeted by someone with quite a few followers and we were sky rocketed in facebook ‘likes’ and ‘tweets’. This bumped our total page views up from the 400 a day over the past few days, to over 4000, neigh on 5000 in 12 hours.

So, Curvy in HTML5! It’s awesome! Once we’re more finished with the development, we’re hoping to have the Android version and the browser version both containing the same attributes. Currently Curvy in HTML5 has an additional aspect, in that you can create a puzzle of almost any size (aka distribution or grid size). We hope to add in color choice aspects, and local high scores for more fun. These are ideas on the horizon that we have, and we’ve gotten more suggestions from some wonderful people on Reddit as well.

Here are some screenshots of the game.

If you have any suggestions, you’re more than welcome to shoot us a line via our feedback form, or simply email me (rachael.bergstad (at) flaminglunchbox.net). Thanks for all the support out there!

The Chrome Web Store, an insufficient option for HTML5 games

June 21, 2011

Google’s Chrome Web Store is great. It allows for a more public viewing of HTML5 and Flash games. It creates a hub for those games, and it allows for an interested person to go and find, well, something via Google. The name of the game, really.

One would think this means that the Web Store is providing an outlet for independent developers. But it doesn’t. It doesn’t allow for a serious search of all the games on their site. You have to use their search engine, there is no other way around it. This leads to no one learning about the game because they’re browsing the puzzle section, as there is no brain and puzzle section beyond the main page. They only learn about it if they actually search for our games name, or they view the small featured and popular section. This allows for little to no visibility for smaller game developers.

It also has no real rubric for counting how the weekly installs or total users are collected. We have no idea how those numbers are made. I’ve watched our own numbers, and I think the names (‘users’ and ‘weekly installs’) are incredibly misleading. It’s really quite too bad, because I used to think that the Chrome Web Store was a great option for our games. Now I’m wondering, especially due to the lack of ability to browse, if it’s even worth our time.

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