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Watch my interview with Hermione Way from TheNextWeb.
June 2011. San Francisco

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My interview at the VIP dinner, Israel channel 10, June 2011

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Once I wrote:

"To be human at any level has changed. The Web ecosystem     places the individual's mind directly onto the human stage, so that all individuals can now collaborate, with their private thoughts entering the space of digital humanity. And now we can observe the behavioral madness which has always existed around us".

People want an echo a mirror to their existence by sharing their minds, ideas and their thoughts on the stage of the digital space. This existence created by the power of words and by the power of words only as it has being written in the bible.

People want to share something of themselves and this is only one small reason why they write, blog, talkback, write status updates and tweet. They draw their fingerprints on the dust of the bits and bytes of the virtual humanity, and if they don’t have the mind set into it, they re-use other people minds.

They do the magic of reusing, re-tweeting, re-sharing the same info over and over again. This is the best swamp you can imagine, words and words cover with water. 

I call it the wonderful information swamp, and that’s the internet.

In the modern western society we cherish the value of freedom, Individual’s freedom.
In order to maximize the freedom we have, we need to maximize the choices we have.

When we go to a store, we have more kinds of breads, numerous kinds of milk, juice, pants, shirts, drugs, news… and lots of information.

The freedom of choice leads us to the difficulty of choice. It’s getting harder and harder to know, what we want to do, where we want to go, what speaker do we want to listen to? And what blog we want to read?  (I guess you chose my blog at this moment of time). 

The option to choice gives us better results, because we have more and better products that could suits us as individuals, but it leaves us with a big hole of frustration. It costs us time, but more important we pay for it with our level of happiness.

We could have dig deeper, we could have read more, we could have done better, we could find a better shirt, better price and now... I have all the options available, and I’m the one making the decisions, I’m the only one to blame for only the good and not the perfect choice. The choice is so much better but we feel so much worse.

The freedom of choice, is it good for us? Yes. Is it bad for us? Yes. 

We want an automatic machine, to choice for us, but we want to keep our freedom for possible experiences. People now call the automatic machine of choices “personalization”. A set of algorithms that chose for us based on our past behaviors.

You would think they give us what they think is the best movie, book, music, and information recommendations, but instead of predicting a person's choices they filter choices from us, they hide objective truth on the information that’s really out there.

The world is missing the point; the world is trying to understand what’s relevant for us based on secret mathematical numbers which is hidden from us.

Relevancy shouldn’t mean what you don’t see is invisible for you; relevancy shouldn’t be about what we want to see but rather about what we need to see.

Personalization shouldn’t be the promise to filter our universe. Personalization, or should I say, the filtered web that generate personal universe of information based on relevancy isn't the way to go. It should be a balanced of automatic choices from our private and public life and it must include a reflection of our random thoughts. 

Now, could we really create that?

A combination of different algorithms in order to bring us personalized experience without isolating people in their own islands of information is what Genieo does. This is our secret sauce.

You are welcome to try it out yourself: www.genieo.com

Genieo, is a personalized newspaper styled homepage, that generate news page based on each individual. 

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Phone conversation about startups, the motivation and inspiration behind Genieo, what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur, important factors in choosing employees, differences between men and women doing  business... 

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Filtering the web to generate personal universe of info based on relevancy isn't the way to go. News streams should give us a little bit of both; algorithm that filter news based on who we R but also keep a balanced flow of news from our public life. A combination of different algo in order to bring us personalized experience w/o isolating people in their own islands of info is what Genieo does. 

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Show your love!

Please Nominate Genieo as Best Productivity/Web Tool Site

Genieo has been selected as a finalist in the 2011 About.com Reader's Choice awards, please help us win!

 

 

Readers’ Choice Awards 2011

Please make sure you you vote for Genieo into the right space " Best Productivity Site!

http://websearch.about.com/b/2011/02/11/voting-is-now-open-for-the-about-web-search-readers-choice-awards.htm

 

Between now and March 8, our readers will be voting for their favorite sites across ten different categories and we'll announce the winner on March 15.

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Talent is most of all about faith, will power, practice and a hard work.
So yes, one can live up to his dreams by having strong faith, powerful will and
diligence. I keep reminding myself that every light, bright or faint, begins with a spark of the freedom of dreaming, and the courage to believe. That is the difference between the creator and his opposite, the
eliminator.

Insight and instincts - your guides on the journey Whenever I felt I had a good idea, I used to go to people I admire and consult them upon it, in hope to get some kind of approval to my insane concepts. 100% of the time, the feedback I got was that it's impossible to technically do, impossible to monetize, impossible to raise the money for it... So what was it that made my friends tell me my ideas were impossible? Was it me? Maybe I failed to communicate my thoughts properly? Or was it a matter of bad timing?
In fact, throughout the years I began to realize that many of my ideas involved instincts, instincts that kicked so strong and became in away part of reality - a reality I saw but others sometimes did not.

Your peers can never be a good starting point. They are working for all those great corporations, and are imprisoned within this false transparent wall which prevents their minds from roaming free. Your peers can become innovators, they can be creative, they can posses a great variety of skills, and they can be very willing - But they too often will lack faith.
But don't get me wrong, I do think that one should seek other people's opinion, learn from it, embrace good advice as one lives through this journey. However, one should never lose his faith and should always listen to his inner voice and let
himself be guided by it.

keep our eyes wide open and move very consciously step by step, from one point to the next; most of the time, the idea we've started with will become something else along this journey; a product may turn out to be quite different from the one we've thought of at the beginning; we may come across a
different methodology of solving the problems we set out to solve. 

So let the world surprise you, let people around you become creative and innovative, let them grow and spread with the seeds you plant. It will make the things you yourself do even better.

Convincing others - Being a humble CEO
For many years I loved working for Microsoft, I loved the people around me and I loved dealing with great challenges. Too often I found myself frustrated and thinking: "Oh well, when I have my own company I'll be the one making the decisions, and I'll lead all my people to the Promised Land, in my own way."
Years went by, and ironically I must admit, I've learned that in order to be
a good leader one has to sometimes let other people lead.

If you choose to work with great and smart people, you must allow
them the freedom of choice; otherwise you will only find yourself building
another corporation, with people taking forever to convince you and each other
before actually beginning to build the product.
Startup companies do not have this time to waste, and as the leader of such a company you must hire great and creative people, and make sure you allow them the space and freedom to spread their wings and take you up.

Raising Money
It took me a while to understand that it is not the idea I'm selling in order to raise money, but it is rather me and my skills. When you go around raising money do
not fix yourself only on the idea or on its potential. Investors are after
the full package, they are looking for the right people who can make it
happen and which increases their chance of success.

I never spend extra money on a business class ticket when I travel around the world, I never buy fancy stuff to make me feel like a successful CEO, but I do try to spend a fair amount of money on my employees. This is the wisest investment I can make with my investors' money.

Find your partner
Never start a company by yourself. A great partnership and collaboration will always prove more beneficial than anything you can do on your own. 
The greatest challenge when starting up a new company is finding the right partner. A person to walk with you all the way.
You must find the person who will complete you, fill in your weak spots, encourage you when you lose faith -- a person with whom you can share all your intimate thoughts on your path to success. It may be hard to do but you'd better find that great partner for this journey.

Remember that you are not defined by what you do or don't do, or by what you achieve or do not achieve. You are the reflection of the strength of your faith, and of the power of your will and diligence. This is what makes you who you are and it all has to do with the freedom you give your mind. You are the dreams you dare to dream. 

Never save the best for last
Don’t ever write long answers, no one actually read it. You may lose the opportunity to mention your company brand, BTW, it's Genieo (product). 
Remember, It’s all about Messaging and Marketing! Marketing! Marketing! ;-)

Read full discussion on Quora.

You can also read my full blog post on this topic:
 

Starting up and Startup (Part 1)

 

Starting up and Startup (Part 2)

 

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Please Nominate Genieo as Best Productivity/Web Tool Site

Readers’ Choice Awards 2011

Just fill out this form in its entirety and click "Send Feedback" to have your favorite Web sites counted for our 2011 Readers' 

Please make sure you you insert Genieo into the right space " Best Productivity/Web Tool Site"!

http://websearch.about.com/library/blnominate.htm

2011 Readers’ Choice Awards will showcase the best products, features and services in multiple categories, from technology to hobbies to parenting to religion. Nominations are now open, and will be accepted from 12:00 A.M. EST on January 13, 2011, until 11:59 P.M. EST on February 4, 2011.

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Usually, when people mention information overload, they think of smart filtering of their news stream based on their own behavior.
I agree, this is a great step moving forward to a full personalization concept, but filtering alone won’t give me the magical experience I personally looking
for when I’m looking for a better way to catch up with my online world.

Filtering is only one approach dealing with information overload (and a good one!).
I must agree with Robert Scoble note:

“It's not that I'm overloaded. It's that to get to the things that make my life magical I have to swim through a ton of crap.” 

It’s not a media tsunami of content, It’s not even a matter of quality, but also duplication of same content from different great sources. 

Once I use to subscribe to many RSS feeds, now days I think twice before I do. I use to follow lots of people on Twitter, now I think before I do.
When dealing with the quality and quantity of information, when good content is everywhere, the question “will RSS feeds live or die?” is writing is on the wall.
RSS aggregator usage has slowed significantly, although the value users gain from it is significant.
I believe that RSS usage will increase dramatically, but in a different way than today.

At Genieo (www.genieo.com) we built a personalized aggregation tool that not only filter news stream for you but also automatically discover and manage RSS feeds based on your own behavior.
Why should I think before I add RSS feeds? I would love to have a tool that will automatically discover feeds based on my browsing habits and will add them to my RSS reader while it filter posts based on my dynamic and changing interest. If some of those feeds didn’t match my interest for a while, how great it could be if a smart assistance will automatically opt me out of those feed.

Example of a day to day scenario from my life:
I open Quora, and find an interesting question. Without doing a thing (I don’t even need to follow this great question on Quora) Genieo (product) will automatically find the RSS feed of the topic/user related to that question and will start following it and it’s topic for me. When it find a relevant answer, Genieo will pull it out and bring it directly to my RSS reader, fully automatic without lifting a
finger. 

So, it’s not that I’m overloaded with information, I only look for a better way to
consume all this great data without working so hard to catch up with my Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, news, videos and cool stuff I find on the web.

Read full discussion on Quora

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I use Genieo as a recommendation engine to filter Quora's topics, in order to see them directly on Genieo homepage.

When I follow new topic on Ouora , or even when I only read a question or an answer on Quora, Genieo automatically discover the RSS feed related to that question, also to the best questions RSS feed on each topic. Then Genieo automatically opt me in to that feeds without any specific user inputs or manual pre-configuration.
Based on my interest Genieo filter and promote Quora post on my personalized homepage.

Genieo also, automatically discover and subscribe to the RSS feed of each users I follow on Quora and filter his post based on my interest.

The cool thing is that Genieo knows when to opt me out from specific feed (user or topic) based on its behavioral algorithm

See an example from my feed. 

My Genieo Homepage

I thought you will find this input useful.

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Philosophy of technology

The Web ecosystem places the individual's mind directly onto the human stage and now all individuals can collaborate, their private thoughts entering into the space of digital humanity. And now we can observe the behavioral madness that has always existed around us.

Our mind is our private domain. Sometimes we rule and hold the scepter; sometimes we are the slaves of our own mind's creation. Whatever may be the case, the thoughts that we care about the most are almost always with us. We have "privileged access" to the contents of our minds.

Web 2.0 procreate bloggers and more content on the wire, people shared their opinion, emotion, thoughts, we created haven for psychologists that used to only seen a glimpse of humanity; but now they can play in the sands of our minds throughout digital space. Nothing is virtual anymore. What was virtual has become part of our reality; part of who we are.

Social Networks has started a new revolution. Within a fraction of a second, everyone can reach out to many other minds in real time. On the digital stage in view of an online audience, we can create life and act our role. The pieces or parts of minds create the power of many and the net defeat history and can save our tracks forever.

But what’s next? We all want to be heard but do we really have something to say? I ask myself how often I retweet something I see, how often I Like and share vs. really spread my own ideas and perspectives? Does it really matter? how come most of us just increasing the noise, generate buzz and follow the flock as sheep instead of walk free as a wolf. Do we all just turned into lazy monkeys imitate other people in the wild web zoo 2.0 in order to feel our existence, to feel alive?

(This is why I like Quora, unlike Twitter, it is a great platform to share your ideas, thoughts and knowledge). 

In the digital age, our psychoanalyst is the data mining system that observes our click streams and figures out our thoughts, feelings, interests, passions, loved ones, our friends – all those out there in the digital atmosphere. The truth about us has yet to be realized.
With so much retweets and shares we start sinking into the content pan.

Now let’s flash the toilet and start thinking again....

Our mind is our private domain.
Sometimes we rule and hold the scepter; sometimes we are the slaves of our own mind's creation, our parents, environment, biology... whatever may be the case, the thoughts that we care about the most are almost always with us. We have "privileged access" to the contents of our minds.

The fact that we can now easily share our thoughts, by for example anonymous talk-backs, by creating a new identity in a second and become or make believe we are someone else, open a new play-ground. virtual worlds, is also a great example.

We are humans and everything we think and do is part of being a human being, but it is so much easier now than ever to observe the deeper side of humans. The freedom of existence now has a new meaning.

Read full conversation on Quora

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My answer on Quora

Genieo is a super useful desktop application marks a new era in information consumption - "Mashup Personalization".

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My answer on Quora 

Personalization is not about filtering the web, it’s not about a process or a concept but experience. The experience of personalization by real flesh-and-blood people; it cannot be reduced to a statistical model of future behavior based on probabilities and prediction alone. It must be lived, experienced, felt. 
It is an existential realm, complex and verging on the chaotic, not a formula that can be reduced to an algorithm. 
I believe it’s a full spectrum of technical solutions to answer one philosophical experience; whether I feel the overall experience design specifically for me and for my needs.

People are so accustomed to do so much in order to get what they want, and personalized solution should answer those challenges. 

With this in mind we created Genieo.com, a personalized newspaper style homepage that design to each individual. We are using different kind of technologies and technics instead of just filtering the web for you based on your online behavior. 
You are welcome to give it a try and see the results right after the installation process (no need to wait few days…) 

Read full discussion

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For those of you who have been asking me about my take on life in the startup lane, this is all I can say: "Watch a day in the life of Genieo"

Genieo Company Event. Summer 2010.

Hope you will enjoy the video! 

Sol

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The first fully automatic personalized homepage called “Genieo” is coming out in a few weeks for the Mac. 

This is one of those unusual rumors that makes sense, Genieo coming soon to Mac.

Next month on LeWeb conference in Paris, I’ll give an exclusive access to Genieo Alpha version for Mac (few months before the official launch) to special people with addictive personality :-)

See you at LeWeb!

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To be human at any level has changed.
The Web ecosystem places the individual's mind directly onto the human stage and now all individuals can collaborate, their private thoughts entering into the space of digital humanity. And now we can observe the behavioral madness that has always existed around us.

Our mind is our private domain. Sometimes we rule and hold the scepter; sometimes we are the slaves of our own mind's creation. Whatever may be the case, the thoughts that we care about the most are almost always with us. We have "privileged access" to the contents of our minds.

Web 2.0 procreate bloggers and more content on the wire, people shared their opinion, emotion, thoughts, we created haven for psychologists that used to only seen a glimpse of humanity; but now they can play in the sands of our minds throughout digital space. Nothing is virtual anymore. What was virtual has become part of our reality; part of who we are.

Social Networks has started a new revolution. Within a fraction of a second, everyone can reach out to many other minds in real time. On the digital stage in view of an online audience, we can create life and act our role. The pieces or parts of minds create the power of many and the net defeat history and can save our tracks forever.

But what’s next? We all want to be heard but do we really have something to say? I ask myself how often I retweet something I see, how often I Like and share vs. really spread my own ideas and perspectives? Does it really matter? how come most of us just increasing the noise, generate buzz and follow the flock as sheep instead of walk free as a wolf. Do we all just turned into lazy monkeys imitate other people in the wild web zoo 2.0 in order to feel our existence, to feel alive?

In the digital age, our psychoanalyst is the data mining system that observes our click streams and figures out our thoughts, feelings, interests, passions, loved ones, our friends – all those out there in the digital atmosphere. The truth about us has yet to be realized.

With so much retweets and shares we start sinking into the content pan. 
Now let’s flash the toilet and start thinking again.

P.S I love monkey-people please retweet this post J 

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See also:

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/genieo_a_recommendation_engine_that_adapts_to_your.php

http://www.genieo.com/company/press/

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Facebook-vs-Who-Users-Stay-prnews-1138017708.html?x=0&.v=1

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