Author Archives: Brian Alvey

Here’s what happens when I explain SpokenLayer to most people: “SpokenLayer turns blog posts into audio.”“You mean they transcribe audio?”“No. They do the opposite.”“Why would anybody take perfectly good text that Google can see and turn it into audio? Is this just for blind people?” Good questions. The best answer I’ve seen is that at some pointContinue reading “SpokenLayer: now hear this”

I pointed out that I’ve got a signed program from the Broadway show First Date on my desk. Niki and I saw First Date for our 15th anniversary back in July and we loved it. When tightly wound Aaron (Zachary Levi) is set up with serial-dater Casey (Krysta Rodriguez) a quick drink at a busy New York restaurant turns into aContinue reading “First Date on Broadway”

I advise a bunch of companies, mostly startups, and some of them are in the middle of negotiating acquisition offers while they are raising money. At some point they’ll have to choose one over the other. It always happens that way. If your startup isn’t interesting and you haven’t created any value, investors and acquirersContinue reading “The four ways a startup can go”

I do a lot of sitting in my home office, so a month ago I decided to get a standing desk. Before I even started researching them, I saw my Magento genius friend Bart Mroz post a picture of his new Kangaroo desk on Facebook. So I compared a bunch of solutions and ordered a Kangaroo Pro from Ergo Desktop.Continue reading “Kangaroo standing desk”

I talk about this a bit on my home page, but a lot of people still ask me where the comment forms are on my posts. I don’t have any. I won’t have any.

A few weeks ago in Beverly Hills, Maker Studios CEO Ynon Kreiz gave a talk on the viability of YouTube businesses and multichannel networks. It’s a fascinating space right now, with no shortage of strong opinions from people like Jason Calacanis, Mark Suster and Jason Calacanis. Maker’s network is on track to pass 5 billion monthly video views by the endContinue reading “Audience engagement”

A few weeks ago, I saw Willie Nelson at the Capital Theater in Port Chester, NY. It’s a great place to see a show and I’m a huge Willie Nelson fan. It was a great show. I sat right across the aisle from Mary-Kate Olsen and her boyfriend Olivier Sarkozy. It’s pretty wild because my kids watched a FullContinue reading “Mary-Kate Olsen and Uncle Jesse”

I’m in SF for the LAUNCH Mobile conference and my hotel is just a block away from the Automattic office, the headquarters of WordPress. I visited the old WordPress HQ at The Embarcadero on the waterfront the day after I pitched Crowd Fusion at TechCrunch 50 back in 2009, but they had to give that space up. I’dContinue reading “If Nick Bradbury can work from home, so can I.”

My wife’s cousin Alexis gave me Michael Bublé’s first CD about a decade ago. Mixed in with traditional standards it had songs like Moondance and Crazy Little Thing Called Love done big band style. I loved it! But his original songs are even better. Haven’t Met You Yet and Hollywood were two of the highlights from Z100’sContinue reading “It’s a Beautiful Day”

Two weeks ago, my wife made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. She suggested I watch The Godfather. For most of you that wouldn’t be worthy of a blog post. But I’m 43 years old and I had never seen The Godfather. And it’s not just that movie. Most of the biggest movies ever have eluded me.Continue reading “Leave the gun. Take the cannoli.”