I’ll be working from home and on vacation this week, so I don’t expect to put a lot of new stuff up.  Have a great week!

Contradictory articles: How to bullet-proof your startup How not to bullet-proof your startup

From MSN: Six Steps to being your own Boss Get some experience Yup, totally agree here. Build a winning team Probably the hardest part, all things considered. Fight inexperience with advice Looking at successful young entrepreneurs, they almost always have… Read moreSix steps to being your own boss

After watching this on Comedy Central, I read a blog post that pointed to the real origin of the term “Dismal Science.” I never realized that Economics is considered the dismal science because it argued that all races were equal…. Read moreThe Dismal Science

Greg Mankiw discusses whether Economics is a science or not, in response to this post from Don Luskin. Don has two points. The first is that Economics is not a science because there is no ability to repeat experiments (which… Read moreIs economics a science?

Dave Pollard writes a great overview of “Your Genius At Work”, with some pragmatic comments of his own. If you’re not familiar with “Your Genius At Work”, it is a book that helps you identify what you are good at,… Read moreGreat article on finding fulfillment

in What Would Google Do, Derek Powazek makes some interesting claims: Google succeeded despite the sparseness of their interface, not because of it. It worked because Google’s service was easy to understand, and sparseness was different, and cool Being sparse… Read moreContrarian View on Google’s design

http://www.motivation-tools.com/elements/seven_rules.htm Very short, so I won’t bother summarizing, since I’d essentially be copying the entire thing. Worth a thought or two.

I just stumbled across a great new business blog: Escape from Cubicle Nation. Some of the recent best entries include: Open Letter to employees across the corporate world Open letter to CEOs across the corporate world. Too much to do,… Read moreNew Blog

Probably out of scope for Pico Businesses, but still an interesting list of ideas around how to sell enterprise software. All of these ideas seem quite solid. In my experience, however, if you can make your enterprise software “trial friendly”… Read moreEnterprise Software Sales

You cannot reason a man out of something he did not reason himself into If you’re into Socialism vs. Capitalism, this is a great read.

J Timothy King – Why small is better than big. I know exactly how he feels. I haven’t had to work for a large company in 9 years, save for a brief consulting contract. I started working at a big… Read moreBonus Link

Ten ways to improve your (small) business – This is a decent list, with some solid suggestions. It is well-targeted towards PicoBusinesses. I liked the “Write with a twist” especially. Successful sales tips for the technically gifted. C’est Moi. I… Read moreCool Link Roundup

The very cool people at 800 CEO Read sent me the book: “Whatever You Think, Think the Opposite” so I could write a review of it. I thought I would share my review with my loyal readers. In some ways,… Read moreBook Review – “Whatever you think, think the opposite”

You get to feel smug All those people who criticize the masses of humanity for being docile sheep, who live life on everyone else’s terms? You’re not one of them. You learn more about business than all of your friends… Read moreTen Reasons to be an entrepreneur

Keith Robinson writes about his experiences starting his own company, what he’s learned, and how it has benefited him. It’s not terribly long, so go ahead and check it out.

Today is May Day, and people all over the world are celebrating and romanticizing an ideology that killed 110,000,000 people over the course of 90 years. I know this is going to upset some people. I don’t plan on making… Read moreMay Day

Paul Graham writes another great article – The hardest lessons for startups to learn. Release Early Honestly, this is the ongoing mantra of everyone in the startup community. The entire Agile Development community is built around releasing early, instead of… Read moreStartup Lessons

Stromcode, the guys behind free image hosting site glowfoto, wrote a well-written article on how he makes money. It’s a very interesting read, and has given me a bunch of interesting ideas for Bellygraph.