Every now and then, I get a letter in the post from the Mt Victoria Resident’s Association about Brothels in Mt Victoria.

I have a bone to pick with these people in the first place, because I am dead certain one day when I was walking up Majorie Banks street in bare feet after swimming, the lady that followed me up berating me was a card-holding member of the Association.

Last night I received a petition, complete with newspaper cut outs from the ladies advertising their services in OUR neighborhood. Claire and I wondered who would go to this extreme to keep brothels out of our area.

I have various moral qualms with prostitution, but the fact that it is or isn’t in my street doesn’t really affect me.

For some reason, it sparked my interest. After quickly calculating the economics last night:

• Prostitutes probably work 5 day weeks like the rest of us
• In each day, you’d probably hope to see about 3 clients (I think this is conservative, but am thinking that their work is somewhat more demanding that most of ours
• In a month, this gives you 20 clients per prostitute. (UPDATE: Actually this is 60. I am unsure where I got 20 from)
• How many would be repeat customers? I have no idea, but lets say once a month is average
• Now for this ‘commercial sized’ brothel, we are petitioning against, you would assume, there must be about 4-5 prostitutes working? That’s like 100 unique people a month

Would the customers be local or not? I assume that convenience is probably rated lower than discreetness with this form of client, but you never know. However, given that rents are so high in my area, you would assume any brothel in Mt Vic is fairly high class.

Lets say 100 people a month visit the brothel. Lets say they are all fairly wealthy individuals, given the area (This is an assumption). Chances are, they know a lot of people in Mt Vic (for goodness sake, you bump into everyone you know in Wellington weekly). Would you still go to the brothel?

I suspect people probably would. And I suspect the reason the rich residents get all up in arms is because they can no longer pretend there is this social underbelly they are not part of.

So I welcome Brothels to my backyard. I hope they set up shop and shutdown myths we have that allow us to close our eyes to their existence.

I also hope that as good neighbors, we watch out for the people working in them. They are not the problem, they are simply fulfilling a demand.

And because of my own, personal beliefs, I hope that the fact they are situated in among families makes people who use them think twice before entering, about what they are doing and why.

I played (and won) a poker game in the weekend. There were about 8 of us and we all put $5 kitty into the middle, which we then turned into several thousand dollars worth of poker chips each. The stakes were high ($40) and as the tension mounted, I realised that poker games create a mini economy.

Forgive me for reading waaaay too much into a simple game.

In poker, we all start equal, but in the end, there is only one winner. Some people safely amass wealth, others kind of tick along for a while, some make dramatic wins and losses and all our morals and ethics were brought into question.

As I started to win. I started to feel guilty. Here I was with all this money that I knew I had won through a mixture of making good calls, but more importantly, large doses of LUCK. As you get further into the game and convince yourself this is real life, it is hard to see people lose everything, through a mixture of bad calls and BAD LUCK.

So, we introduced charity to poker. This was started by someone who had relatively little. She felt bad for the guy who had even less and put aside a large portion of her wealth for him to buy back in. While I ended up putting more in, proportionately, I didn’t feel nearly the same hit as she did. This makes me wonder if it is the poor who are the most generous. Maybe because they know that life really is lived on the roll of a dice and you gotta hope that when yours goes the wrong way, there will be someone there to back you. The rich just see the dollars they give, even though the dollars they give don’t even make a dent in their own wallets.

Some people were annoyed that by helping others, we were reducing the other winner’s chances of winning the whole game. This, to me is capitalism. We LOVE losers, because, that makes us winners. The class gap works for them, because it is better to be lower middle class if there is a lower class, than it is to be lower-middle class when that is the bottom rung. These people did not take part in the charity aspect. This is where it gets weird though, because in real life the ring wing conservatives of the game are some of the most liberal people I know.

Others claimed that the charity side was merely providing a fish, rather than a fishing rod, and was doing absolutely nothing to help those who were struggling (The fact that one of my charity cases ended up a close third, I feel broke apart that myth). But it was interesting that I could give the same amount to two people, and one made a go of it, while the other crashed and burned equally as badly as before. This to me, suggests that sometimes, people will never get ahead, other times, they just need a little lift and they will sort themselves out. It is, after all, a game of luck.

Because the game quite quickly turned into a question of what was right and how the world should work, I was accused to only doing PR work for myself - I had huge amounts of poker chips and if I was truly a good person, I would just give them all away or divide them equally among the entire table. The fact that I gave away money was not enough, hat only made me look good, but didn’t really mean that I was a good person. I realised that my heart is not as pure as I would perhaps like. Because I LOVED being rich and I didn’t WANT to give the others my money. Despite the fact I know I only got it through luck and I knew I didn’t deserve it. I wanted it.

The funniest part was that in the end, the two with the most wealth, were me, who had played a fairly conservative game, but had good luck, and Verity, who had awfully bad luck the entire time, but took massive risks and managed to bluff her way into wealth.

She lost it all on the last hand.

I reckon she is more the type to become a Richard Branson or such like, while I am destined to live in the comfortable security of moderate risk.

The Decisive Flow team headed along to the Webstock mini conference on Tuesday night.

Apart from now knowing more about tag clouds than we ever thought we would, we also learned about living on the fringe. And the fringe is an exceptional place.

I loved the quote “We didn’t think we’d make any money off it, and we didn’t think it would last”

What a brilliant way to form an idea or start a company. I’m not being sarcastic. To do something purely for the love of it. How could you not be successful? Despite the fact Wellington is so small everyone is like your next door neighbor, the world is quite large, large enough for other people to share your passion and buy your stuff.

People who live on the fringe don’t start something for the sake of the ability to call themselves an ‘entrepreneur’. In fact I don’t even think they would consider themselves entrepreneurs.

People on the fringe don’t care about success. Success to them is living the life we all dream of.

People on the fringe, it seems, very quickly get off the fringe, upon achieving traditional success (Bill Gates was a fringe dweller, now his company is a fringe blocker)… Unless they are a special type of person who was born to decline adoration in favor of a good time.

People on the fringe probably can’t smoothly get their ideas across and charm investors (Which I DO believe was the point of the CodeBlacks team in the Half baked Challenge), but they prove that slick presentations mean nothing in comparison to just going out there and doing it.

Despite what the speaker said (and I’m sorry, I’ve completely forgotten his name, I’m terrible with names), I don’t believe companies CAN harness the fringe. It’s like when people catch hackers and try to train them up to work for the ‘good guys’. You gotta numb the fringe and tame the beast before they can work in your world. And when you have done that, they are no longer what you are after.

What I love about the people on the fringe is that you probably will never pick them. They wont be at the very events we go to to figure them out, they don’t talk up a storm about their achievements - they don’t even look at their achievements as achievements, just something they love to do. I think that’s what I found funny in the speech, the very concept of this type of person flies in the face of coming up with any strategy to harness their power. We know they are there, but no one can do anything about it. That must freak out the big guys.

I used to love reading Creating Passionate Users but now am sure that it wasn’t actually Kathy Sierra writing it at all, but Giles Crisp from iPayroll.

I LOVE that it only takes me 5 minutes a week to do my payroll. It’s ingenious. It’s an application I love NOT to use - it’s brilliant because in order for it to be uber useful, I hardly have to even login.

I recommend them to all in sundry because I love the service.

But for now that’s beside the point because iPayroll has the edge on customer service.

Giles just arrived with 2 complimentary tickets to a business growth seminar AND (most importantly) a box of chocolates in thanks for me recommending the service. We we’re all a little surprised. Actually we we’re shocked.

We really didn’t feel like we deserved the chocolates (But 15 minutes later they are all gone anyway - it’s an office full of girls). There service is so good, you can’t help but talk about it.

But the fact that he took the time out of his day to not only come past, but BRING US GOODIES has taken me from enthusiastic customer to passionate customer.

In fact right now, while I’m eating a chocolate fudge, I am considering changing this entire blog to my love for iPayroll.

I just didn’t think companies that good existed. I hope they are making a fortune.

I LOVE holidays. I don’t love my business failing because I’m on holiday. This is an interesting point in life.

As you get bigger, I suspect there are people there to back you up and take over, while you are small, your business is kind of dependent on you being there ALL the time. And since I’m not sure IF we want to get too much bigger, I want a solution that doesn’t require size.

I am off to Vietnam in September. I’ve done 1 week trips before. This is looking like 2-3 weeks. I don’t need a full holiday - I’m totally happy to work my way around but worry that some days I wont be completely there and don’t want everything to fall apart at the seams.

I know when you own a small business, you’re meant to grit your teeth and bear it, but holidays got me thinking…

At my age, people start talking about babies. I am a female, so chances are, I’ll be the one doing the pregnancy and birth thing. The current theory among people I trust is that it would be best to start on this plan before 30, for health and lifestyle reasons (I would love it if someone could say this is wrong and in fact you’re as safe having children at 40 as you are at 30, but for now accept this fact).

So sometime in the next 5 years, I’ll be having some big time off. I need to start the planning now in order to ensure my life remains as cool as it is now.

So the next few months will be spent planning how to:

a) Get 2 weeks off on a working holiday this year
b) how to ensure within the next few years this can extend a lot further or my role can be far more flexible

Isn’t that awfully sensible?

I hate public speaking, which may sound weird given that in private, you can’t stop me. Over the years I have come to realise that the ability to clearly articulate your ideas in front of an audience is a key to success… You can quite literally have a average idea that is presented well, and it will be worth a lot more than a great idea without the charismatic unveiling.

It kind of makes sense, but is unfortunate for those of us who go weak at the knees at the thought of getting up in front of an audience. If you can’t talk it up in front of an audience, you create your own glass ceiling.

If you can… You can successfully cover up a lot of your weaknesses and have a very strong impression on people.

At the very least, in the next year I will be talking at a wedding. This has prompted me to figure out how to not feel like my stomach has turned into a butterfly farm for the weeks leading up to the event (I do not want to sacrifice my time as chief bridesmaid!)

So what are good techniques? I know it’s simply a confidence thing and have heard that:

• Going to a professional public speaking course can change your life
• Force yourself to just do it and it will get easier
• Just imagine you’re talking to a couple of friends

But am wondering if anyone has experienced a breakthrough ever and how it happened?

This is a little belated, as Alex has been heads down working with us for a couple of weeks now… But welcome all the same!

Alex is currently studying Digital Media and has fallen into her role here as resident flash guru and provides another pair of skilled eyes and hands to ensure nothing leaves this office before we’re 100% happy with it.

Alex came highly recommended and we can already see why… It’s been a great start!

I was talking to Claire last night about her work with transport behavior change. She was interviewing some people yesterday who most need an alternative to cars… Their pockets just aren’t coping with the rising petrol prices. Claire was very enthusiastic about the results and said they had brainstormed many cool options. I said “Like what?”

She said. “Like WALKING”

I had to laugh at the fact that these days, we are so intent on overlooking the solutions right in front of us, that something as age-old as walking becomes the best thing since sliced bread.

Today, I read Springwise and saw and article on this super awesome guy who has developed a see-saw that generates electricity. His target market is Africa:

“It would take just five to 10 minutes of play on the see-saw to light a classroom for a few hours, BBC News reported, though the energy gets transferred to an electrical storage unit via underground cable, so it would be up to the school to decide how the power is used.”

I love how much sense this makes and I love the fact we overlook it as a solution for any country, developing or developed:

• Children play on see-saws
• see-saws generate electricity
• Children learn a little about electricity and feel great they are contributing
• The need for external electricity is reduced
• Countries like NZ who are becoming ‘more happy with the idea of Nuclear power” may re-think our immediate need

I know it takes more than see-saws (although 10 minutes equals a couple of hours? I want to install one in the office!)… But there are so many practical solutions that simply make sense. If we can harness more of the power we create through the things we do all day, we will be LESS reliant on major power plants. And if African Villages can afford this particular see saw, why doesn’t every primary school in New Zealand look at getting one?

After a 6 week battle with Paypal, my account limitation has finally been lifted. I had almost $7,000 in there sitting for 6 weeks with absolutely no security that I would get it back. Unlike other annoyances I write about, this really freaked me out. That is a lot of money to me and my business and even though it was rightfully mine, I was powerless to get it.

The thing is, I don’t actually really mind that Paypal limited my account. I would rather they did that than find out they welcomed in some fraudster with open arms, but the way they go about it makes their customers feel so vulnerable, I now completely understand how those people who create ‘I Hate Paylpal’ sites feel.

1. It is Paypal POLICY to limit EVERY new account that received a large amount of cash (and $7k is determined to be large

This is to stop international thiefs and suchlike filtering money around the world and I think that is probably a good idea.

BUT

If it is policy, maybe they would like to TELL me it is policy, so I can do a couple of small transactions first or decide to use another method. Even if they don’t tell me before hand, when the account is limited, maybe that would be a good time? The most frightening thing for me is simply the not knowing and the fact if they chose to, they could wipe all record of me and my money and WHAT could I do??? Take them to court? If they JUST let me know. I wouldn’t panic.

2. Paypal Doesn’t Communicate

When a large company has stopped you accessing your own money for about 3 weeks and you have done everything they have asked of you and you STILL haven’t heard from them… You start to wonder if this is about security at all or if it’s really about getting interest on someone else’s money. Because I’m not in the mood for conspiracy theories, I will put this down to bad communication.

I emailed sooooo many times. I called even more times and was faced with the MOST ANNOYING mechanical answer service I have EVER experienced. I received a list of options, none of which was what I was after and none of which led to an actual person. I literally spent half an hour figuring out how to hunt down an operator on each phone call and if I made the wrong choice, I’d get “Paypal thanks you for your call… Goodbye.” … And be forced to start the process again.

When I ever got through to an operator (I think that was 3 times) I ALWAYS got hung up on while they transferred me between departments. It was a nightmare and more so for their operators who surely must answer calls to find their customers not only with their initial complaint, but a barrage of abuse about their phone system.

On the upside, every Paypal PERSON I talked to was very helpful… Even if they didn’t always do what they said they would.

Paypal also requires a fax machine to use (yes for an online service) I don’t even OWN a fax. They also don’t email you to tell you if the documentation you supplied was incorrect and even when you specify on your fax that you have uploaded the documentation to the correct place, they don’t check, so you have to spend another week going through the heirarchy just to point out that it’s where they wanted to to be all along… Man oh man. Just remembering those times makes me frustrated.

3. Paypal Loses Customers

I’ve used Paypal before, I haven’t really thought about it, and I assumed the weirdos with their weird hating Paypal sites were just idiots who mucked up somehow. Now I know differently. If I ever do use Paypal again, it will be hesitantly. I’d rather pay the extra $25 fee banks charge for international payments (which is a crime in itself) than risk losing my money or not be able to access it.

Which is a shame, because it’s such a good theory. On the upside, I now completely understand my parent’s generation and their nervousness at trusting “the internet” - this will surely help me do my job better?

Check this out. Normally I just listen to TED talks while I design, but this time my eyes were glued to the video.

My big deliberation for the weekend will be:

Which is smarter, a Squid or an Octopus? Or those THINGS at the bottom of the ocean?

WOW