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Elevator Pitches: Rule 1, Don’t Hang Your Pet By Its Tail, Even On TechCrunch!

July 19th, 2008 | 2 Comments | Posted in Blogging, Entrepreneurship, Robots, Silicon Valley, Social Media, Startups, Video, Web

TechCrunch has set up a community video project called Elevator Pitches. Limited to 60 seconds these pitches are voted up or down by the community.

It looks like a fun way to get entrepreneurs to hone their pitching skills and get some coverage. Below is the video from Ugobe‘s CEO, Bob Christopher – it’s an interesting take on the whole elevator pitch by a company with a great product and by the sounds of it, great vision.

But Bob – holding the Pleo by the tail until it squeals breaks the first rule of pitching — keep the focus on your venture and its value proposition…

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Robots: Life-Size versus Life-Like

March 29th, 2008 | No Comments | Posted in Gadgeteer, Gadgets, Robots

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I  showed my 10 & 11 year old sons the Today show clip of Ross Dawson stroking his Pleo and thought this is my answer to their continuous requests for a pet. They were both instantly besotted with this ultra cute, life-like baby dinosaur. Compared to the plastic coldness of the Sony Aibo, the Pleo exudes cuddliness. Out of the box, its big blue eyes form an emotional tie in a nanosecond.

But what I hadn’t factored in was my 10 year old’s deep connection with anything and everything Star Wars-related. He took one look at the life-size reproduction of C-3PO and was instantly torn: life-size versus life-like.

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The human connection will win out in the end. A cold-hearted fibreglass replica is neat, but it has no chance against a cute pet… that doesn’t need toilet training.