Maya Elhalal’s Blog

A close friend of mine, Lital Kfir, just shared this powerful video with me. How very true it is…

Avi Barliya, a good friend of mine who is a pianist (and also one of the brightest people I know), noticed I need to “chill” and shared this beautiful concert with me. It’s like a magic stress remedy, try it…

For instant stress relief click here…

Above is the second movement: 08 Piano Concerto No. 5 BWV 1056, II

This is the first: 07 Piano Concerto No. 5 BWV 1056, I

and this the third: 09 Piano Concerto No. 5 BWV 1056, III

I’ve started working on a joint venture proposal today, one thing led to another… and I ended up pondering how a person’s impact on humanity can be measured. What do you think? Answer this question in Seesmic (above), Yahoo! Answers, Facebook, or click this image to take my 100% hassle free, no registration required, poll…

Here are some suggestions I got:

Mike Emery says:

Maya

Easy-peasy - is there a prize for this, dinner perhaps?

Impact = PAT: Impact is equal to Population size, multiplied by per capita consumption (Affluence), in turn multiplied by a measure of the damage done by the (any) Technologies chosen to supply each unit of consumption.

Basically, each person that consumes (only) approx 1-3Kw energy presently has a positive impact on humanity - anyone above that doesn’t. If expounding that (little) energy then creates something positive, then that’s also possibly a measurable bonus. The more one creates from utilizing such little energy, the better.

and more comments taken from the official poll in Pollsb.com:

Payzlee

Israel

posted Jul 20th, 2008 at 07:55 CDT

I think the real question is do we, as mortals, really have the ability to make an impact on humanity, or are we lucky if we can make an impact on just a few people (% wise). If we can, how could we possibly measure it? As each individual perceives the world through a different lense, any type of metric would have to take into consideration indivualities and thus ultimately cancels out any measurable impacts.

-

I would create a combined index of your suggested criteria in addition to a vote by people about whether someone affected their lives.
-
Osh

New York, United

posted Jul 20th, 2008 at 03:16 CDT
the amount of results you get when you google his/her name…
-

Romk

Israel

posted Jul 20th, 2008 at 01:48 CDT
By the leadership he acted in his and other people’s lifes. Leadership in this context means how did he help other people to achieve their goals.
-

Raz

Australia

posted Jul 19th, 2008 at 20:03 CDT
By the way they conduct their own life. It matters not the quantity and publication, but more the quality which is immeasurable.

-

Mscrowe

Florida, United

posted Jul 19th, 2008 at 18:50 CDT
By the number of lives he or she has impacted in a positive way, like helping an elderly neighbor or saying something that will make someone feel good about themselves.

Soundview is a great site I use for summaries of mostly business books. They offer highly professional and intelligent 8 page summaries of new books every months. I use these summaries to decide if the full book is worth a read and then keep the summary with the book for quick reference.

The summaries come in various formats, audio included.

Firefox 3.0 has officially been released today and it’s going for a world record for software downloads in one day. Last I checked it had 6808455 and counting…

You should see the count here, it’s amazing!

So if you have yet to upgrade, or worse, yet to drop Internet Explorer, now would be the time to learn what browsing should really feel like.

You can get this amazing open source browser here.

Google’s recent introduction of Gmail Labs takes it’s already developed perpetual beta approach a step further.

Gmail Labs is a way for Google to take ideas that aren’t quite ready for prime time as well as ideas that wouldn’t normally be picked and let Gmail users decide whether they’re good (and should be further developed) or not (and should be dropped).

Perpetual beta, is a term used to describe software or a system that never leaves the development stage of beta. It’s often used by developers in order to allow them to constantly release new features that may not be fully tested. The term represents one of Web2.0 key application development practices to “release early and release often”.

By adopting this approach of treating users as co-developers, Google significantly reduces development risk and costs. Many product development decisions are based on user feedback and help Google “make what it can sell”.

Gmail Labs currently tests 13 new features. One of them is “Random Signature” which adds a random quotations to your email signature.

I’m the first to say that quotes are a great way to offer recipients of your emails a peek into who you are and what you believe in. But, an irrelevant or inappropriate, randomly selected quote can do more harm than good. Imagine a vegan signing with this quote by Homer Simpson: “If God didn’t want us to eat animals, why did he make them out of meat?”

A quote that’s hilarious to some, isn’t that funny to others… What is funny though, or not, is that countless jokes that made only me laugh, and remarks that backfired, still haven’t taught me that lesson.

Sure enough, following the launch of Gmail Labs, many requests for better quotes feeds for the “Random Signature” feature have been posted. We heard the call and now, instead of the default quotes feed, you can use QuotesDaddy’s customized quotes feeds by any tag, author or best, your own personal favorite quotes.

The other thing that currently still holds many users from using Gmail Labs Random Signature is that the quote + author is limited to 96 characters. Even for the most succinct authors that’s not enough and the quote ends up being automatically truncated half way thr…

Our most recent addition to QuotesDaddy is Flash video greetings that can be personalized for a specific person. Users just enter the name and the video is customized to that person. You also get a personalized sub domain link of the personal greeting.

Here’s how a greeting customized to my name looks: http://maya.elhalal.quotesdaddy.com/

You can customize the famous quotes flash greeting
and if you like it you can digg this story here.

In this very entertaining TED talk, New York Times food writer Mark Bittman weighs in on what’s wrong with the way we eat now (too much meat, too few plants; too much fast food, too little home cooking), and why it’s putting the entire planet at risk. I was surprised to discover just how disastrous the industrial growth of live stock is.

Most certainly an idea worth sharing.

About Mark Bittman

Mark Bittman is a bestselling cookbook author, journalist and chef. His friendly, informal approach to home cooking has shown millions that fancy execution is no substitute for flavor and soul.

This presentation, used in a recent New Media Entrepreneurship Workshop for Israeli Startup founders, covers:

1. The pros and cons of different equity capital sources (financing by founders, friends and family, angels and Venture Capitals).
2. How to create and deliver effective investment raising presentations.
3. The big DOs and DON’Ts of investment raising presentations.

This presentation was featured in Slideshare and you can view it in full screen by clicking the view button below.

| View | Upload your own

Here’s a list recommended resources for entrepreneurs looking to get deeper understanding of the subject:

1. The Startup Company Bible For Entrepreneurs: The Complete Guide For Building Successful Companies And Raising Venture Capital
2. Angel Investing: Matching Startup Funds with Startup Companies – A Guide for Entrepreneurs, Individual Investors, and Venture Capitalists
3. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Finance & Business: Wealth Creation Techniques for Growing a Business
4. The Art of the Start: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything
5. The Four Steps to the Epiphany
6. Deal Terms - The Finer Points of Venture Capital Deal Structures, Valuations, Term Sheets, Stock Options and Getting VC Deals Done (Inside the Minds)