Blog / Entrepreneurship / Tips

Four counterproductive myths about entrepreneurship, part I

[This post is part of a series on four main myths that discourage entrepreneurship and how to overcome them. If you don't see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you'll get more value than reading just this post.] Many classmates in business school said they wanted to start businesses yet few did. For that matter, many people in life say they want to start businesses yet few do. I asked many why they don’t. Four reasons dominate my non-scientific survey, all of them myths. Myths aren’t necessarily problems, but each of these discourage people who want to start businesses from doing so, so they are counterproductive in most cases. Also, since entrepreneurial behavior and beliefs are useful…

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February 22, 2011
Blog / Tips

How do you keep going in the face of adversity?

Here's a model for you: think of a baby learning to walk.No baby learns to walk right the first time. Not even the tenth time. So-called failure for them is not just figuratively painful, it looks physically painful. Yet babies learn to walk. They try and fail. And try and fail. And try and fail. For months they try and fail.This model alone shows how poorly the popular use of the term failure describes that part of the learning process. Failure is inevitable. Failure teaches. Failure is what experience means. Babies build experience when they fall. That's how they learn to walk so well.Can you imagine if after one fall a baby said, "Oh well, I tried my hardest. I just can't walk. I'm not…

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February 15, 2011
Art / Creativity / Education

Parsons Class

The Parsons Class I'm co-teaching this semester has a blog.So far it just has a few pictures from the zoetropes a few students did. The results from that first assignment were incredible -- tremendous variety of solutions to the various challenges of physical animation devices and animations: materials, sizes, quality versus quick and dirty, colors, contrast, motion, repetition, etc.I can't wait to see the results of the later projects, which will be substantial efforts.Correction: There are already many images and animations, I was just blocking javascript. Enjoy the class site!

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February 7, 2011
Awareness / Blog / Tips

Responsibility versus blame

The following statement has become a personal guideline since I first came up with it. It's served me well. Don't look for blame but take responsibility for making things better to the extent you can. You can always find someone to blame if you want. Blame is fundamentally about the past, which you can't change, and judgmental, which repels people. But the main issue is that when you blame someone else for your situation you reinforce a belief that their influence on your life is greater than yours, likely in a situation you consider important. We usually blame people for things that affect us significantly. The problem with blaming Blaming, therefore, disempowers us and and reinforces unrewarding feelings. Guilt is blame directed toward ourselves, usually…

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February 5, 2011
Blog / Education / Nature

The best book on the environment, economy, and ecology

Everyone has something to say about the environment, the economy, and ecology. People believe in human caused global warming or they don't, but they have something to say about it. They believe improving the environment will ruin the economy or save it or something. Everyone has something to say. One major trend I see is based on the interests of the source. If the person speaking comes from the business world there is a good chance he or she will communicate that others' environmental concerns are overblown, things aren't as bad as they say, you should keep doing what you're doing, and buying his or her product or service will make things better. If the person comes from a science or nature focused world, he…

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January 30, 2011
Awareness / Blog / Freedom / Tips

Crowding out beats letting go

I have a friend who says he can voluntarily let go of emotions he doesn't want to hold on to anymore. I've let go of many things, but never in the moment from conscious intent. He sounds sincere, but frankly I doubt him. Like telling an angry person to calm down, suggesting someone let go of something is counterproductive advice. Trying to let go of something voluntarily focuses your mind on it, often achieving the opposite of your goal. Whenever I've let go of something important, I've always noticed it after the fact. One day I realize I haven't been thinking about some girl or dwelling on a past event for a while. I can't identify the time of letting go. To let go of…

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January 24, 2011
Art / Creativity / Education

Joshua Spodek’s Art Resume

Joshua Spodek EDUCATION 2006 MBA, Columbia Business School New York 1999 PhD, Astrophysics, Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences New York 1993-94 MA, Physics (Completed at Columbia), University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences Philadelphia 1993 BA, Physics, Columbia College New York 1991 L’Institut Brittanique, University of London Paris EXHIBITIONS 2017 The Museum of Math, Dance New York 2011-12 District 36, Elements New York 2011 Union Square Subway Station, Union Square in Motion New York 2011 Crossing Art Gallery, Motion in Stillness New York 2011 Parsons the New School of Design, Expressions (group project with students) New York 2010-11 Bryant Park, Bryant Park in Motion (with MTA Arts for Transit and NYU/Tisch) New York 2011 Leaders In Software and Art New York 2010…

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January 10, 2011
Art / Creativity / Education / Favorites

New Bryant Park in Motion Videos

First, here is MTA Arts for Transit Page on Bryant Park in Motion (EDIT: Arts for Transit changed the page to one on Union Square in Motion) -- created by me and four students and NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program:  Molly Schwartz, Igal Nassima, Brett Murphy, and Eyal Ohana. Below is an overview of the piece, starting from Bryant Park at the corner of 42nd and 6th, then entering the station and viewing the piece. By coincidence, a family of five happened by the piece while I was taping. All five, especially the three kids, are fascinated by it, peer in it, and enjoy it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIfi71_ffG0 Below is just the kids and family from the previous video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwg1BhkAFU Below is a common viewing pattern involving an…

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March 10, 2010
Art / Creativity / Education

Public Art

My first big public art piece is up: Bryant Park in Motion, co-created with four students -- Brett Murphy, Igal Nassima, Eyal Ohana, and Molly Schwartz -- at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP), supported by MTA Arts for Transit and Submedia. The piece was created at no cost to the MTA. BPIM will be on display March 2010 at the base of the northeast entrance/exit stairs to the 42nd St Bryant Park subway station. The works consist of animations activated by viewers motion past the display, recalling zoetropes, early animation devices, and the MTA's own Masstransiscope. As with Summ Kunce's nearby permanent installation, Under Bryant Park, also commissioned by MTA Arts for Transit, each animation is inspired by a…

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March 2, 2010
Blog / Education / Entrepreneurship

Get out what you put in

[In response to some alumni on the Entrepreneurs' mailing list complaining the school wasn't helping alumni enough, proposing a "nuclear option" of talking to the press about it.] If anyone thinks "we have little to lose" and that the "greatest risk is that nothing will happen anyway" of a process called a nuclear option, they should sit down and think more. If you prepare for war, you'll get it. War means loss of control (to the press, who promotes conflict), factions form, people get hurt, conflict escalates, nobody wins. I wasn't going to participate, but people are pushing increasingly extreme viewpoints. I am concerned one or two people may decide for everyone they'll take the matter into their hands and complain to the press. Bad…

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February 12, 2008

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