Banky For President

Elaine Ellis of Metzger Associates posted this blog about social media and the associated risks of posting information about yourself online. She surmised the following:

The question becomes how much information do you put out there, and then ultimately, how come men don’t have to worry about this like women do? You’ll never see an article on “How to Stalker-Proof Your Life” from GQ or Men’s Health. That by checking in somewhere or broadcasting their location, that they’re potentially putting themselves in danger.

My first inclination was to throw the Bullsh*t flag. Men do have to worry about bunny boilers as much as anyone or so I thought. I’ve been creeped out by a few women I’ve dated. One in particular would send me text messages and buy me gifts long after “she” decided we shouldn’t see each other anymore. When I didn’t reciprocate her attachment she eventually went away.

I searched GQ and Men’s Health and lo and behold, not one article related to stalk-proofing one’s life. Then I found this article from January of this year entitled, “Stalking Victimization in the United States” created by the Department of Justice. It appears that both men and women are as likely to experience harassment from another person. Women however are more likely for harassment to morph into “stalking” by a factor of 3. And women are also far more likely that their stalker have a substance abuse problem and a criminal record than men. In short, women have a better reason to be afraid that harassment will turn into a stalker. The good news, if there is any, is that women are less likely to be stalked the older they get and the more money they earn.

Consider this Banky’s Five-point guide to stalk-proofing your life (for both men and women):

1. If you have to publish, don’t publish where you are, but consider publishing where you’ve been. If you use Twitter, Brightkite, FourSquare et. al., consider checking in at the end and not the beginning. If one of your friends are in the area, you can still make the decision to get together assuming you both have time.

2. Don’t date them in the first place. Let’s face it. Needy people can be kinda fun at times. They give lots of attention and ego stroking particularly when we need it most. That might explain why we gravitate to them in the first place. Don’t delude yourself into thinking that it is good or normal behavior for someone to supplant their own self-esteem for a chance to “be” with you. Just sayin.

3. Wherever you life-stream (Facebook or Myspace) only “friend” those you know. Lots of times you’re faced with choices of accepting a friend request from someone you either don’t know or don’t know very well. Just say no. It doesn’t make you a bad person. It makes you smart. And in the long run you may avoid whatever headache “de-friending” them causes. And remember you can keep your profile private to only those you friend.

4. Find a new way to meet people. There are other ways to meet people than to hook up at a bar or online. Get involved in professional organizations. As we learned earlier, the more money you make, the less likely it appears that you will be stalked. Finding ways to better your financial situation AND finding quality men to date don’t have to be mutually exclusive.

5. Growing older has its challenges. We also learned earlier that the older you get, the less likely you are to be stalked. Men and women view age differently. I am infinitely more attractive now than I was twenty years ago. I don’t know that many women feel the same. Many of the attractive women I know generally judge themselves with the glasses belonging to Twenty year old men. Fix that ladies. Your value is not how pretty you are. By not fixing your self-esteem, you are susceptible to the wiles of preying men who might not harass you after the relationship, but will feed off something (ANYTHING) you consider precious.

Feel free to add to the list.

Sometimes, things live up to the hype. Sometimes, things are all that you hoped for and more. Sometimes you get more out of something than you put in.

Such is the case with Startup Weekend. Here’s how it works.

You show up on Friday night with 80 of your closest friends (of which 90% are strangers). You take turns listening to those pitching ideas (the pitch can take no longer than one minute). When everyone is done pitching (there were about forty in all), you vote on the idea you would like to work on for the weekend. At that point, you and your team start working together day and night until 4:00pm on Sunday afternoon.

At 6:00 pm on Sunday, you show up at the Kaufman Foundation building to present your idea and hopefully demo your product. Below I captured behind the scenes video from our startup and Reed Porter captured the demo.

My takeaway: It was easily one of the most fulfilling experiences of my professional life of fifteen years. The team really came together and our collaboration created a kind of alchemy that we used to fuel each other and our success. As Simon Kuo said in the video we went from “0 to code in less than 50 hours,” and it I’m really proud of what we accomplished.

Check out TopChirp.com

Before the New Year started, I was speaking with The Thunderbolt and told her, “We’re going to be challenged this year, my dear.” She looked at me strangely and said, “Is there something you want to tell me?” I told her, “No. I just know its going to be a difficult year.”

Here is why:

I lead a fairly indulgent lifestyle (My friends are laughing really hard right now because “indulgent” is an understatement to them. “Spoiled” and “selfish” are other adjectives I’ve heard used). I think what people don’t realize is that I’ve been pretty smart with my career as well as some financial decisions and that translates into a bit of disposable income. That, coupled with the fact that I don’t have any children (that I know of, at least), means I pretty much do what I want to do.

I see where my life is headed though, and in twenty years, I doubt I’m going to have the type of retirement I’m going to need to continue to be indulgent.

And I like being indulgent. It’s fun. I have a good time.

But if I’m wanting to truly live the good life in my golden years, I should probably start working on it now (before now actually). So I’m doing a couple of things. I’m starting back to school and starting up a new business.

I’m starting back to school in April with the Aji Network. It’s a business certification and I’m excited to shore up a part of my life that, heretofore, my knowledge has been lacking. I’ve been impressed with the people I’ve talked to (those in the program and those that have passed) and it comes highly recommended. But, more importantly, I’ll be able to use this knowledge to help build a portfolio of business ideas that I’m hopeful will sustain me in the future, the foundation of which I can share with you now . . . LightThread.

What is LightThread? We’ll leave that for another post.

So with going back to school, starting a new business, some uncertainty in my day job, one might think that might be enough stress in my life. But that’s not the way life works.

You see we are all born into a family. Sometimes families are close and sometimes they aren’t. But even when families suck, we still care. It’s a weird truth but still valid. Sharing a common bond of parents shapes us, sometimes for the worse and sometimes for the better. I happen to be born into a close Irish Catholic family. I’m the youngest of six by quite a bit actually. And as the caboose, my brothers and sisters loom large in my life. In many ways they are bigger than life. When I was younger I looked up to all of them as they were all out of the house living big lives while I worried about getting homework done or if Tia Alberti would ever dream of going out with me. They were all older and smarter than me and I love them dearly.

More background: My father died when I was 13 at the age of 58. My oldest brother Johnny died when he was 58. And so I was shaken over the holidays when I found out my brother was diagnosed with Stage III cancer over the holidays. He is in his mid-fifties. I’m not worried so much of my own mortality. I just care for my brother and his family. And I’m fearful of the idea of living the rest of my life without him. I was shaken by this news in a way I’ve been shaken in a long time.

And I’ve come to realize, after 42 years, a couple of things:

1. All the bullshit things I’ve surrounded myself with don’t really matter.

2. I want to live happily, comfortably and without compromise well into my sixties, seventies, eighties and beyond.

And being able to live the second point, doesn’t happen without a plan. What’s yours? I’m actively looking for ideas.