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October, 2009:

New NASDAQ social app is all a Twitter

Oct 26th, 2009
by Michelle Heath.
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TechCrunch reported yesterday about an interesting new iPhone app they came across in the App Store. It’s an official app made by the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ), the American stock exchange. In the words of TechCrunch writer, MG Siegler, “That itself is interesting, but perhaps even more interesting is a key functionality of the app is to highlight tweets about various NASDAQ stocks.”

Wait, this is the NASDAQ, right?

Here’s the scoop. The app is called NASDAQ Portfolio Manager and, according to TechCrunch, it’s pretty slick. In addition to providing all the real-time quotes and data you’d expect, it also has some pretty cool charting features and, IMHO, the most interesting part of the whole app is that it has a special view that integrates all the latest tweets about that stock, coming in from StockTwits. If you don’t know about StockTwits and you’re a Forex trader, you need to Picture 22check it out. The service is organized in “streams” and they recently launched a Forex stream, where you can see all the latest Forex tweets. A Forex tweet is denoted with $Currency pair (i.e. $USDJPY), and what’s even cooler is that you can sort the Forex stream by pair. Say you’re only interested in tweets about USD/JPY, click on the pair and just see that stream. We use StockTwits with our @Currensee Twitter stream to connect with influential Forex traders from around the world.

I love that an institution like NASDAQ sees real value in social data. Their new app shows the innovation that comes when you blend the conversation of the crowd with traditional data. The world is moving to a place where “how we always did it” just doesn’t do it anymore. In the old days, if the chart said go long, I most likely would. But today, if the chart says go long while everyone on Twitter is going short, I just might reconsider my position. It doesn’t mean the crowd is right, it just means I have more information and more resources to help me make a much more informed decision. Nicely done, NASDAQ.

Just say no

Oct 21st, 2009
by Michelle Heath.
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We live in a society where everyone says yes. Can you stay late again tonight? Yes. Can you shave two weeks off that project deadline? Yes. Can you stop and pick up milk even though it’s pouring rain and the store is in the opposite direction? Yes. Would you like more pasta with your pasta? Yes. Can you make lemons out of lemonade? Yes.

No.

I know the drill. I get it. I used to want you to say yes too. But there’s a time and place for you to say yes and there are tough calls when you tell me yes but Picture 40you really should  just say no.

I don’t want you to try to figure out intricate ways to do it. I don’t have the budget for you to source it out to a freelancer or find another guy. I can’t spend the time project managing the vision and task-mastering the execution. That’s why I asked you to do it. Duh.

You see, I have high expectations. If you tell me yes, well, I start thinking about how great the thing is, how much it’s going to rock my world and how excited I’ll be when I have it. I know, there’s therapy for issues like this, but I can’t help it. My expectations are what they are. So, rather than selling me on the fact that you can do it either A) just do it or B) just tell me you can’t do it. I will still love you if you choose option B. Actually, I might love you even more.

What I want is for you to know your limits. Know what you can do and how that’s different from what you think you can do. People worry about letting other people down when they say no. I say show your cards and let me down early. Please, I beg you, if you know it’s no…just say no.