Interview with Adam Smith, Hackepreneur Extraordinaire

We’re back with a brand new episode (direct download, subscribe in iTunes or RSS, or stream below) featuring a conversational-style interview with Adam Smith, founder and former CEO and CTO of Xobni. Adam left Xobni over a year ago to start looking for his next great software startup idea.

We had a great conversation with Adam which lasted about an hour and a half. Unfortunately, the show doesn’t allot itself to including an interview that long. Which is a shame because there was so much useful information… So, we plan on releasing the longer version which includes more thought-provoking discussion around software patents, speech recognition technologies, identity (not calling it 2.0 or 3.0) and more! Big thanks to Adam for coming on the show! You can follow Adam on twitter (@asmith) and definitely check out his blog for some great information on startups, recruiting, life-hacks and more.

Some of the topics discussed & included in Episode #2 are:

• The problems with speech recognition (hint: academia, patents and more)
• Y Combinator
• Whether there’s a model for something (program?) that lies between starting a company versus joining a startup
• Solving the problems associated with pairing up people with ideas with the hackers who can turn it into a product
• Issues with the current business models in the recruiting and online dating markets — both share similar structural properties — and what signals that are already available (but ignored) that could be used to create better business models
• Spectrums of software business models (scratching a small niche vs big itches that can create a sustainable business)
• The #1 reason users don’t want your product.
• A whole lot more

Don’t forget to listen for the Dysfunctional #Fractoid trivia question which Adam comes up a fun question for anyone that has been in tech for a while. The first person to send the answer (Jeopardy-style) to @thedocrep using the hashtag #fractoid wins a free license for Smart Diary Suite Home Edition, an awesome app that not only helps you get organized — it helps you track and understand the patterns in your life.

Techies Treasure Chest

Ryan’s pick was another awesome web-comic for developers. This time it comes from Component Owl (makers of Better ListView for .NET) called “Owl’s Components”. Meanwhile I choose Belarc Advisor and AppCrashView (from Nirsoft); two great free applications that software developers, support staff, IT pros, and techies can use to get the information needed for troubleshooting application crashes/problems — in those cases where a screenshot isn’t enough.

Helpful how-tos

Ryan discusses using the acclaimed screenshot tool Screenshot Captor by Mouser of DonationCoder.com to create infinitely better screenshots than Windows’ built-in print screen utility ever could. Plus I talk about using Join.me for those times when you’re trying to help  someone fix a problem with your software. Join.me is a free remote access product from the makers of LogMeIn. I’ve previously written about it in a blog post about teleworking and productivity called: “5 Apps that Make Collaborating & Working at Home More Productive”.

That’s it for this show! Tune in in two weeks for another show with yet another interview you won’t want to miss!

Let us know what you think in the comments or send us your question/comment via mp3 (or text) to loopback at thedocreport dot com for the Worldwide Loopback segment!In the meantime, please make sure you subscribe to the show in iTunes or using your RSS reader.

Dr. Apps & Ryan “Renegade” Smyth

Special thanks to SweetLabs (makers of OpenCandy and Pokki) for providing the support necessary to make the show happen!