entrepreneurship

Search for the word ‘pilot’ on this site. That is an interesting search – pages and pages of Start Me Up pilots in tech, programs, initiatives large and small, all linked, no doubt to corresponding media spend and press releases.  Think back on the cycles of tech deployment.  Remember the Alpha test, when the product barely worked at all.  After those bugs were uncovered by testers who had scripts designed for successful outcomes, it is time for the Beta test – where selected prospective users are identified, put the offering through its paces, under an assumption that the pilot will be converted to permanent deployment. 

From the universities and their affiliates – research about older adults.  Since this website was launched in 2008, periodic looks at who is doing what in the area of research on aging have repeatedly revealed little in the way of commercialization determination or practicality of offerings.  But funding is found – and several of these programs seem driven to reward innovation that can be commercialized – or they are funded by organizations that want and need results.  Here are four from a recent scan -- there are more, of course, and if you know one that is more robust, please send it along or provide a comment:

What is a Silicon Valley unicorn?  In case you didn't know, that's a startup valued at more than $1 billion. No surprise that the original definition references a mythical animal.  Perhaps the essential characteristic, then, may be that it was mythical.  Let’s consider that in December, 2015, the $66 billion market cap of one of these app-based myth-makers had exceeded that of 80% of the companies in the Fortune 500. Okay, so following a recent trip to Silicon Valley, it seems important to snatch reality back from the jaws of terminology buzz, recognizing that: 

Will the next mid-life crisis be at 75?  Sixty is the new sixty, says Marc Freedman. Attending a recent event, I was an audience member exhorted to consider the ever-greater expansion of time available to make sure that it is time well-lived. What does that mean in the context of life’s purpose, whether we are prepared to competently approach our very long retirement years with not-enough-saved or will we have an encore career or two? He quoted the comment of an older adult about their potentially very long future: "I’m on my next-to-last dog." Working part time – is that a next-to-last career? Volunteering – is that a career?  In one session I heard the word 'work' used for effort that is "paid or unpaid."  How mangled is our language that volunteering without pay is now called working?