Now, for a long time I’d had a problem: I still use FTP. Don’t get me wrong, I understand what version control is, but I’m just too lazy to use it for small projects, which is what most of my web design clients end up being. I currently host around 80 odd domain names on a Media Temple shared hosting plan, all of which I access using FTP. None of this is backed up, ever. Big problem.

Backup Box v1

For whatever reason I decided that it was time to back things up. A bit of research determined that I either had to set up custom server-side scripts to automate an rsync job, or download some software that I run on my computer to backup my domains on a schedule. I tried the software, it was clunky and complex and I ditched it quickly.

I’m an avid user and fan of Dropbox. I knew there were lots of third-party apps out there and I was hoping there might be something to help me out. Searching through the forums I discovered that there was a lot of conversation happening around the whole FTP to Dropbox problem. Lots of conversation, yes. Solutions, no. Word on the street was that Dropbox would never support FTP connections and yet nobody was addressing the problem!

Needless to say, this was a lean startup dream! I had a problem, which many other people do too. My very first assumption was satisfied, that I’m not alone in needing this service. But I still needed more validation before I start coding.

Backup Box V2

So I threw up a landing page. I wrote a cute description of the problem, slapped down four payment options, and recorded what you clicked, and then asked for your email address to be notified when we launch.

I posted a few times in the Dropbox forums letting people know I was going to help solve their problems, and I weaseled an AdWords credit out of Google. Forums worked, AdWords were useless.

From October 16th to March 8th we had over 570 unique people sign up to use the site. I was ready to build it at 50 signups, but real-life and our other startup got in the way. Plus I was still in Chile and we were travelling around!

Backup Box Launch

The very night that I returned to Canada I went to the second hackathon put on by Startup Edmonton. Mark, my partner, and I had decided that this hackathon would be a good place to start our Backup Box development. We built the prototype in roughly 15 hours. Over the next four weeks we revamped the prototype and prepared it for users and accounts and automation, etc. That’s what we launched with.

So here we are. We launched with a few posts in the Dropbox forums and emails to the early signups. Albeit we didn’t have our screencast up at the time, but it’s up now. We’re tracking conversions on almost everything our users click. Looking forward to what the future holds with Backup Box!

Anyway, again, I’m still here. Midterms are done so I guess there goes my excuse for not posting. The cafe is still hanging in there and the Free WiFi Project is slowly growing. I need to really pound the streets in order to get some more nodes out there but finding the actual time during regular business hours is pretty tricky.

In other news I started yet another company, this one is named Campus Cards. We specialize in business cards for students. Cool idea, eh? That’s what I thought. I think that student business cards is a pretty untapped market segment so we’ve got a pretty good chance of doing well. The cool thing, in my opinion, about Campus Cards is how I set the site up to use fillable PDFs embedded in the page. Students fill these out and then pay through PayPal and I get a nice email with a PDF attached which is all ready to hit the printing press.

I started Campus Cards when I, in my position as “Director of IT” (yes, that’s in quote because I really just look after the website) with the School of Business at the U of A, was asked to look into helping our students get business cards. Realistically there are no printers around that will give you less than 250 colour cards for less than $30. Even if you find someone who is willing to do meet that price point you are still going to get dinged with design fees when your print ready art isn’t perfect and also shipping if they aren’t local. At Campus Cards we are offering students across Canada 100 colour business cards for between $15 and $20, inclusive of all GST and fees, and shipping is free.

This is sort of a unique opportunity. Doing the cards manually is time consuming, but I’m doing my best to streamline the process. Outsourcing isn’t really an option because of shipping costs. That’s one thing you can count against globalization: small transactions won’t survive international shipping fees.

Anyway, back to work at my new “home office” in the condo I recently moved into.

First off, this thing was cheap. We shopped around and found a cutter from US Cutters on eBay (don’t buy from their website). After negotiating my own shipping the end price door to door was around $505. Not too shabby for a 36″ vinyl cutting monster.

The cutter itself is about 50″ long and it comes with a stand. Along with the tiny little cutting blades there is a pen plotting attachment that you can use to draw with.

We’ve cut a few things already, mostly stuff for Rob’s farm as you will see in the pictures.

Applying vinyl is pretty straight forward as long as you think things through in advance. It’s really sticky and once it’s on whatever surface you are using it’s not really coming off without being destroyed.

Anyway, with the amount we spent it’ll save us a fortune in sign making costs. Since cutting a few yards of vinyl ourselves will cost about $4/yard and having a shop do it would cost 10 times that.

This is a prime example of why I don’t care if a company has my demographic information. It’s not even that personal. Hell, there needs to be some sort of “OpenCookie” standard where I can plant a cookie in my browser that says I’m 23, male, and from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada so that the next time I search for coffee equipment I’m not being hit with bra advertisements that are completely irrelevant to me.

That’s really the goal that myself and Rob and going for, speed. We’re aiming to create inexpensive, customized, and well designed websites for small businesses and organizations. In order to keep prices down and profits up that means we need to be fast. I think that using a CSS framework will help me out.

I watched Yahoo’s YUI introduction video by Nate Koechley and it taught me a lot. Yes I have to submit to their div names and whatnot but I think it’ll speed things up.

Not so simple.

The Fringe Festival is pretty tied up in sponsorship commitments and our group approached them relatively late in the game. So being officially supported isn’t in the cards. Don’t get me wrong, the powers that be are encouraging and wish they could help us out, but it’ll be next year if anything. Also, the businesses in the area either don’t have an Internet connection, or are too far away. Or, if you’re a business with many partners you can’t make a decision to share your Internet connection without talking to all 7 or them. I’ve found that the less understanding about the Internet and technology people have the more they have to validate a request with everyone they know. Not so surprising after all.

So what was our solution? Why WiMax of course Having friends in the countryside I had used a Rogers Portable Internet solution before, with reasonable results. It’s not the fastest thing on the planet but with good reception you can comfortably browse the web and check your email. The problem was aquiring one of these devices.

Yesterday I went to THREE Digital Communications stores here in Edmonton. I’ll never go back. The first place I visited had the only person knowledgeable about the product out walking about the mall. Coming back later I find that their computer system is down and he can’t access the company intranet to actually sell me the device. Oh, and this manager tells me the device is a piece of crap to boot. Thanks but I’ve used it.

So I mosey on over to their head office where they should have some of these devices. “There’s NONE in Edmonton” were the first words out of the bosses mouth. Great. I make her check her computer anyway and low and behold there’s one in a kiosk in the same mall I was just at. Oh, and she also tells me it’s a piece of crap. Smrt.

Back at the mall I talk to this guy at the kiosk. Nice enough guy and he’s trying to sell it to us. Although he starts off by telling me it’s not very good and he doesn’t even try to sell it to anyone else because they all come back. That’s funny, if they all came back there wouldn’t be a shortage… Anyway I insist on buying the piece of crap and once again their system won’t sell it. This is four hours later, good job Rogers.

Fed up with Rogers (Digital Communications) I head to a Bell store the next morning. The guy sells me it without a hitch and I get two months free with 15 days to bring it back. Better deal than Rogers would have given me. Plus this guy was nice and didn’t downplay the product at all. Go Bell.

Other than activation, this thing is a no-brainer. I had to call in to activate and that took all of five minutes. After that you just plug in an ethernet cable and away you go. I slapped a switch into the box and a mesh router into that and boom, I now have wireless Internet wherever I’ve got a power cable. The modem has 5 lights on the top that indicate signal strength and it’s a matter of just turning it a little to get the best signal.

A nice business on the edge of the Fringe grounds, named Grateful Threads (go check them out, they deserve my plug) was gracious enough to let us put the setup in their window. In fact they were quite eager to help out from the very beginning. I slapped on a 7dBi omni-directional antenna that confero24.com sent me to test and away we went. Fairly decent range, all the way across the park, and the speed isn’t too shabby.

Back at homebase (my cafe) I prepped some more routers to be deployed as repeaters. Unfortunately we only got two out today, as Mack’s followers on Twitter pointed out. We’ll deploy some more tomorrow and hopefully get a bit more coverage.

All in all I’m fairly satisfied with the Bell hotspot. If it works out we’ll probably keep it around for various events around town. I’m stoked!

If you want to get involved or if you have a business in desperate need of some free community wifi give us a shout over at http://free-wifi.ca/contactus.php.

An article was published in today’s Journal about the Free WiFi project I started.

An Old Strathcona cafe owner hopes to blanket the area and eventually much of the city with what’s apparently Edmonton’s first free wireless Internet network created by a private group.

Eric Warnke of Free WiFi says the group has set up at least seven locations since June from which people can access the Internet with laptops, cellphones, new iPods and other equipment…

Read the whole thing

I certainly hope it’s a stop-gap before a better logo because this one looks like someone spent five minutes learning Photoshop while making it.

To Mike and anyone involved with Open-Mesh, I suggest you check out Worth1000. It’s an awesome site where you can get a really quality logo for only a couple hundred dollars.

A picture of the schedule is here:

I went to

• Financing an Idea
• What Problem Does The Semantic Web Solve?
• Angel Fund, U of A, Robert
• Evolution of Nexopia
• Why Twitter Will Rule The World
• Emerging Mobile Platforms

I also led a session on Edmonton Wireless & WiFi Mesh Networks with Mack Male.

One of the most interesting conversations I had was with a fellow named Clark Murray. Clark and three other guys have created a great product called dub5 which stands for the 5 W’s in everyone’s life, the Who What Where When and Why. Essentially dub5 is a new take on scheduling and calendar management. Their major advantage over competitors like Outlook and Google Calendar is their text message integration. Personally I love this and I hope to be using it as soon as it’s ready.

Since all the video I took of my sessions ended up being like 300mb a piece and 20 minutes long I haven’t finished uploading them to Google Video yet. However, check out the quick demo I had the dub5 guys give me.

I am starting with Whyte Avenue, where my Internet Cafe is located. I have 20 Open-Mesh routers that need deploying. I will be going to different businesses along the avenue where I feel the network needs a boost and asking them if they will help out.

If a business hosts a repeater they will get a mention on the website. If they host a gateway they will get a specific ad on the front page indicating they are helping out.

In order to generate money I’ve put a simple 160×600 skyscraper ad on the right hand side of the splash page. For $75 a month an advertiser will get equal rotation on the front page. These are just rough numbers to start. As traffic and advertisers grow I’ll make adjustments. Right now the most important thing is to get people to carry my routers.

My buddy Mack was visiting with me the other day and we were doing some crazy brain storming into the future of a free network like this. We both think it has amazing potential and I can’t wait to see this thing explode.