December 2011
1 post
“A few weeks ago I told a man who worked at a big company about watching...”
– Marshall Kirkpatrick, Technology Journalist
October 2011
1 post
WatchFancy Hands mention on TV! (Check out how awesome the site renders in their browser too!)
September 2011
3 posts
1 tag
Hiring, Hiring, Hiring
Fancy Hands is growing. While we always need assistants, we need some more specialized employees as well. Do you know anyone near New York City who is ready to work with a fast growing, totally awesome company? Please get in touch. If you refer someone that we hire, I’ll give you a jar of pickles, or a beer, or a cat*. Heck, if you refer someone who applies, I’ll give you one of those...
Check Out My Fancy Hands →
msg:
I’m a big fan of Fancy Hands, a service that allows ppl to outsource tasks.
I’ve created a new tumblr that curates somes of my task requests.
I’m always looking for new ways to train my brain to ask for more requests; would love to hear some of the tasks you request/would want to request. Please submit them here.
August 2011
5 posts
“Ted Roden, a former technologist for The New York Times, developed Fancy Hands...”
– We made a small appearance in The New York Times on Sunday.
July 2011
3 posts
“You learn their names on the way up, so when you need a help on the way down,...”
– Joan Rivers (on Louie) about learning people’s names and the arc of success.
May 2011
8 posts
“Rock bottom became a solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.”
– J. K. Rowling
GTD: How to delegate tasks →
“The dirty little secret about being a blogger for Apartment Therapy — or...”
– 8 Services That Claim to Make Life Easier for Busy People Shopper’s Guide
Fancy Hands in Forbes
“I only really opened it up to other people because I couldn’t get the assistants to hang around very long with only my few tasks per week. So I figured if there were more people using the site, I’d get better assistants,” said Roden, who primarily uses it to avoid making phonecalls. ”Phone calls are terrible. I don’t like making them because they take up a lot of time. At least two people have...
April 2011
1 post
5 tags
March 2011
1 post
February 2011
3 posts
The Fancy Hands iPhone App
I haven’t actually announced an iPhone app, but you can imagine it’s been underway. Well, starting today, it’s officially cancelled. I can’t make the financials work while giving Apple 30% of the revenue. I try to provide amazing service at a somewhat unrealistic price and I can’t make it work while splitting much of that price with Apple. So it won’t launch.
...
Using Fancy Hands to name your... →
jacksonh:
I recently read this awesome article on coming up with product names. The article details how Lexicon, a boutique naming firm, comes up with product names. The basic process used by Lexicon is something like this: A team learns about the product
The team lists concepts they’d like to convey…
I gave a big presentation today today in front of a lot of people. I won’t bore you with the details, but during the demo, I called Fancy Hands and asked them to find a video of me from that very presentation and to tell me if my fly was open. It was a joke, but I forgot to cancel the task. Here’s part of the response:
I am watching the live stream, but I’m assuming...
January 2011
5 posts
Warts and all.
When we’re good, we’re great. Here’s what an actual client had to say with regard to a specific task, unedited aside from changing names. (Posted with permission)
Dear Ted,
I am writing to commend Fancy Hands Assistant Shannon for her astonishing efficiency, thoroughness, and thoughtfulness.
My brother, who lives in Georgia, was miserable — he had slipped on the ice...
Fred Wilson "IMTerview" - Transcribed
Ted Roden [Note]: This interview between Fred Wilson and Nicholas Carlson appeared in the form of an image on Business Insider - http://read.bi/i0fXzC
Ted Roden [Note]: I Found it hard to read (and annoying in the format it was posted in), so I had Fancy Hands type it out. Here it is...
Nicholas: Hello, Fred!
Fred: Hey
Nicholas: Skype, eh? I’m an iChat user mostly
Fred: I like skype. I find more people use it internationally
Nicholas: ah, makes sense.
Nicholas: So ok, we are on the record
Fred: got it, so I can’t say anything I would regret
Nicholas: :)
Nicholas: OK, so, let’s begin!
Fred: ok
Nicholas: congrats on the new round! TargetSpot seems to be doing well
Fred: they are doing well. It’s a category that has been ignored by most entrepreneurs and investors. It’s not very sexy. But I think it’s a big opportunity and they are proving that out
Nicholas: it’s true. People know you for your big wins in Twitter and zynga. How’d you find TargetSpot and why are you sticking with it for another round?
Fred: david goodman, who runs CBS digital music business and used to be one of the top execs in their radio business is a long time friend of mine. He basically invented the idea of targetspot because their radio stations were streaming but not monetizing
Fred: CBS funded the creation of the targetspot platform and then they decided they wanted to spin it out into a standalone business. They asked us if we wanted to fund it and we did
Nicholas: interesting! I was going to ask why companies like CBS Radio or AOL don’t want to own what TargetSpot does instead of outsourcing it...
Fred: it’s a network. When you aggregate inventory across multiple radio stations, you can offer marketers both scale and targeting at the same time.
Nicholas: is streaming radio very big?
Fred: TargetSpot has something like 100+ inventory providers in their network. You can get the exact numbers from the company
Fred: its huge. I stream hours a day myself. I vet I stream 40 hours a week if not more. I think something like 75mm internet users in the US stream regularly. And mobile streaming is taking off. This is a gigantic market
Nicholas: I was actually listening to some of it earlier today. On my iPhone I have a “Radio” folder with two apps in it AOL Radio and Pandora. Pandora is the biggie in the space, isn’t it? Are they a TargetSpot customer?
Nicholas: Let me put it plainer: Pandora is the giant here. Is that how big an online streamer has to be to not need TargetSpot? Or are they actually a potential customer?
Fred: Pandora is the biggest “pure internet” audio streamer out there. But I bet they represent less than 20% all of minutes listened. It’s a highly fragmented market. Just today I’ve streamed at last.fm, ex.fm, hype machine, fredwilson.fm a couple CBS radio stations, and wearehunted
Nicholas: Last Question: Who’s TargetSpot CEO Eyal Goldwerger? What’s his story?
Fred: I think Pandora will join an audio ad network at some point. Or own one. Or both. The amount of streaming inventory is so large that no one sales organization can move it all. it is just like display
Fred: Eyal is a serial CEO. He’s been working in online advertising for a decade. He’s got a great combination of advertising, technology, and management skills. I really like working with him
Fred: we also have Eric Ronning and Andy Lipset at TargetSpot. They invented the streaming audio ad unit at RL, which they sold to TargetSpot. They are the best audio ad sales guys in the world
Fred: I have to go now
Fred: see you later
Nicholas: See ya Fred! Thank you
December 2010
1 post
November 2010
5 posts
"Cables"
This was killing me. I read articles about the “cables” released by wikileaks and everybody just pretended that “cables” was a perfectly acceptable term for… whatever the heck it meant. I wasn’t sure if we were talking tight-rope walking or cable cars, so I had fancy hands look into it.
To “Cable” as a verb meant to send a message through...
“1) Keep one to-do list.
2) Do the most important thing first.
3) Schedule...”
– 3 Tips for Increasing Your Productivity
October 2010
11 posts
“Don’t give up on being clever”
– Mark Zuckerberg (to Tumblr’s own David Karp)
“Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.”
– Dwight D. Eisenhower - Wikiquote
Why I suck at delegating (and why you might too) →
Delegation is not natural, it’s a skill and an art. Some of the most successful and note worthy people got to where they are due to their ability to let go of control and delegate.
Learning how to let go is one of the hardest things for us to do. That’s why great things happen when we do.
Read the full article, it’s a great primer on how to let go.
1 tag
“Productivity is being able to do things that you were never able to do before.”
– Franz Kafka
3 tags
“If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you’ll never get it...”
– Bruce Lee
topherchris:
Do people ever use something like Amazon Mechanical Turk to outsource common but amazingly frustrating tasks? This has to be a thing.
Without even blinking, I’d pay $50 right now for someone to get on the phone and deal with a certain establishment to either get me a refund or get me the product I ordered.
This is exactly what we do. Get in touch.
September 2010
4 posts
