Category: Marketing/Business

It’s one thing to tell people, “Yeah, I am planning on starting my own business.”

It’s another thing, you know, to start.

Almost two weeks ago, I made an appointment with SCORE, which is a resource partner of the Small Business Administration. SCORE stands for Service Corps of Retired Executives, and it is made up of volunteers who help existing and emerging small businesses. A few people had suggested I talk to the SBA to get free information about starting and running my own business. It was slightly frustrating since their websites don’t make it easy to find the information you want. Some of it is outdated, as SCORE lists Triton College as a location. When I called, I was told that office closed two years ago. Whoops. I made the appointment for the office located in downtown Chicago. It turns out that it is also in the same building that the train station is in, which is convenient.

Usually a meeting is for an hour, and the mentor will provide feedback on what it is you want to do. In my case, I wanted advice on what I needed to do to form my own company. I had read articles on the subject of legal entities, such as subchapter S Corporations and Limited Liability Companies, but they were always generalized for the United States and not Illinois. It’s good general informationt to know, but I needed specifics. I wanted to know what I would have to do to incorporate GBGames. I can fill out forms and even pay another business to do it for me, but what then? Does GBGames have any obligations as a business? Do I have to prove that I am trying to make money? Do I have to actually show revenue within so many years? Profit? Can my business be revoked if I don’t meet some simple requirement? Taxes? Startup costs? What can I write-off as an expense?

The mentor said that he was surprised that I had as much knowledge about the subject as I did. Apparently most people come in with an idea for a business. The mentor usually provides guidance in the form of “Well, did you think about this aspect?” and otherwise points out potential pitfalls. Still, he did give me a bit to think about. He handed me a number of pamphlets, articles, and government tax form instructions.

For some reason I haven’t written out a business plan yet. Part of it is probably because I only recently decided to actually start my company, and so I am finding a lot of thought processes that need to be changed. I find I am still in the mindset of “someday” on some issues.

A budget should be written out. I have some money in the bank, and I have some idea of what my expenses will be, but I really should try to get the details. I only have so much money in total, and some of it will have to go to non-business expenses. I’ll need to worry about food and rent among other expenses, and so knowing how much I can dedicate to my business will be very important.

In any case, it is good to know that I can get free information on the subject. SCORE allows walk-ins as well as appointments for after-hours. My mentor said that I seemed very enthusiastic and that I appeared knowledgeable at least in the types of issues I might have to deal with as a business owner. That’s much better than finding that I am seriously lacking. B-)

I have a few more things to read, but it seems that forming a business won’t be very difficult. If I ask for professional assistance it might just be to verify that the forms are filled out correctly. I’ll likely make another appointment for next month. Nearly unlimited, free, and professional advice is a great deal.

The Social Customer Manifesto has a post about Lego(R) putting up a notice if you go to legos.com that the name that people have commonly referred to its products might not be preserving the brand. We are not supposed to call them Legos. They are Lego bricks or Lego toys.

The comments also mention that the use of the word Google as a verb also apparently dilutes the Google brand.

Hah. Hahahahahaha.

Come on. It isn’t like someone will call a competing product legos (lowercase). It isn’t like I will tell someone to Google something and watch them bring up Yahoo! or MSN without a second thought. How does it dilute your brand when they use the name for YOUR products?

When people say want to eat Chef Boyardee, are we going to go find them and teach them to not dilute the brand because they are really eating a Chef Boyardee food product? What about when someone says “Check out my new Nikes” when they are referring to their Nike shoes? Doesn’t “Dude, you’re getting a Dell” dilute the Dell brand since you are really getting a Dell PC?

Of course, there are some concerns. People DO call competing products Legos even though Lego doesn’t make them. People do refer to all tissue paper as Kleenax. People xerox copies of paper on non-Xerox copiers. So maybe it isn’t so funny.

But I still think of them as Legos and I’ll still google.

10 Steps to a Hugely Successful Web 2.0 Company has some of the same points I’ve read in many different places distilled into a single list. It touches on topics that have been covered in greater detail on blogs like Creating Passionate Users, such as the idea that people like to tell friends about cool things to show that they are in the know.

In The Escapist’s Casual Friday came the article So What’s It Worth To You. I agree with the main point. Voting with your dollars is important. When you pirate a good game, you basically send the message that the game wasn’t worth paying for and so more good games won’t get made. I appreciate Blancato pointing out that major piracy that involves companies trying to make a quick buck are the major problem, not necessarily Joe Schmoe Gamer who got a copy from his friend. I also like how Blancato mentioned that draconian anti-piracy measures will turn off paying customers. After all, if you pay for something and have to jump through hoops to play it, but the person who pirates a copy gets to just play it sans hoops, isn’t there something wrong?

All well and good, but I am still getting pretty upset that people will equate software piracy with theft. The two are not the same. Even the courts say that they are not the same. The only ones who claim they are the same are the companies who gain an advantage in making you think that copyright infringement is the same as theft. Oh, and the people who hear this kind of thinking and start to think that way as well.

One problem is that people like to make analogies with things that just aren’t like software. People compare software to cars. If I take a car, that’s theft, so why isn’t it theft when I “take software”?

It’s because you aren’t preventing someone else from “taking” software. When I take a car, there is one less car for the car dealership to sell. That’s actually stealing something. When I “take” a game, it’s theft if I literally steal the box from the retail shelf. If I instead make a copy of a CD from a friend, I didn’t steal anything, and no court will ever allow the prosecution to claim it was an actual theft. When someone makes a copy of a game or music CD, it’s illegal because of a violation of copyright. It’s an infringement on the copyright holder’s rights. Of course, if the ESA, MPAA, and RIAA all complained about the “rise in copyright infringement” it wouldn’t invoke as much feeling as “they are stealing from us!”

Software piracy isn’t as cut and dry as some would have you believe. The way some people argue it, when someone pirates a copy of a game or movie or music, it directly equates to lost revenue. It would be true if every pirated copy would be paid for by the infringer, but in reality, come on! Let’s ignore the real criminals who make many copies for the purpose of selling them since they are clearly a separate case. Let’s focus on the casual pirate. He/she might make copies of every game simply because he/she likes the idea of collecting all these games. Take away the possibility of pirating those games, and I really don’t think this pirate will have the ability to pay for it all. This pirate will just not collect as much. Pirated copies of games like Catwoman wouldn’t magically turn into revenue, I’m sure.

I’ve yet to see a real study on this issue, but I wonder just how many of these non-professional pirates would be forced to buy a game that he/she couldn’t pirate. I think that most people would just not play the game, but that’s just my hunch.

Still, you can’t say “theft” and mean “software piracy”. Yes, software piracy is serious. Yes, it can mean that a developer might make less revenue. I do not deny that it can have very real effects. But let’s call it what it is and stop trying to manipulate people. We’re grown ups now. We can handle the truth. Software piracy is copyright infringement, but it is not theft.