Navsports update no# 1088

Navsports update no# 1088, just kidding.

Thou it does feel like that sometimes.

Seriously I could not be happier with how Navsports is going, with all the ups and downs the future gets clearer every day.

Chief information officer and all round nice guy Marcelo, is powering ahead with the Navsports build. Functionality wise we are in a very strong position, In between snowboarding in the Japanese Alps he is fine tuning our awesome platform and is nearing the goals we set early last year.

So what next, I am glad you ask.

I have set in motion a series of events that will hopefully have Navsports Australia and Navsports North and South America fully operational by mid 2009.

Before I talk about those events I want to tell you a little story.

I have been coaching tennis for over 18 years now and early on in my coaching career I develop certain philosophies, one of the philosophies was to bring in not just better players to train with my students but professionals. Guys and girls that have been there and done that before.

Professionals that were not going to win 6-4 or 6-3 against my students but players that could flog them 6-0.

Why would I do that, well I did that to give my students a reality check for they would have to make a decision after the flogging “Do I give up and take up some other sport or do I train harder and be determined to come back another day and fight once more”.

I would never let my students play these matches without me being there as I had to observe how these professionals broke my students down and then we could work hard on them if that’s what the student wanted.

Well it works; I trained a player this way all the way to multiple Australian junior championships, a junior grand slam (Australian Open) doubles final and on to a world ATP ranking.

How does this relate to Navsports, well in a very big way it does.

I have been hitting with players of my own ability and sometimes with players that could just beat me (metaphorically speaking). I have been too blinded and scared of reality because I really did not know the reality of where I was with Navsports.

So I have taken the leap of faith and called in the big boys the guys that could flog me 6-0.

At first I was scared of getting a flogging because I thought I was already good, but I realized it’s the floggings that can make me great.

Enter Demonz Media http://www.demonzmedia.com/index.html headed by the charismatic David Barrett an IT specialist that has been there and done that.

David and his team at Demonz Media have given me that flogging I sorely needed.

Bruised and nearly broken by the brute reality of where I was with Navsports David showed me the weakness in my game, his honest opinion and belief that Navsports can be a world beater has given me the strength to hold my head high and fight on, not blindly, not ignorantly but with clarity.

Navsports weakness is neither in its ideas nor its team but in its knees and its mobility around the court.

Getting a little lower to the ground and strengthening our speed around the court would improve Navsports game tremendously and that’s what David and the Demonz crew are currently helping us on.

Making Navsports simple on the eye (getting closer to the ground) and developing a better User interface (faster navigation around the court) are the areas we are now working on.

Demonz Media are the professionals and I am so glad to have them on our Team.

Stewart

Demonz logo – Check out their website its cool

Japan

It`s funny where life takes you isn’t it?

One minute I am dreaming about making a big internet sports business the next thing I am in Japan.

Well the trip to Japan was all in the aid of developing the business, you see Marcelo our chief information officer and creator of all Navsports great functionality has moved to Japan.

One would say that distance when it comes to developing an online business is no problem, but I say unless you can talk eye to eye then things are sure to fail.

Marcelo is married to a fantastic woman and her parents just happen to live in Japan, Marcelo told me months before that he was moving, so I had plenty of time to organize a business trip with Navsports other director Mark (my brother).

We arrived on November 21st for a ten day trip. It turned out to be a great journey. Marcelo and his wife Telma chaperoned us all over Japan, without Telma`s grasp of the Japanese language we would have seen only a quarter of what we saw.

We travelled daily, using the super efficient local rail system and the awesome bullet trains (270kms hr) for longer distances to places like Hiroshima, Osaka, Kyoto, Hamamatsu and Tokyo.

At night we would work on the site.

We achieved so much in Japan, getting the site online and strengthening our friendship.
I must tell you the things that really stood out for me was the amount of vending machines (they are everywhere), the amount of restaurants (again they are everywhere) the urban sprawl (not much open area) and the most striking thing was how polite and respectful the Japanese people are.

I will never forget my trip to Japan; it was really special made even more special because of the people I shared it with.

Bye for now…Stewart

Dodge Ball Tournament for Charity

Back in 2005 Tony Destefano (owner of Body WorksLife Gym) and myself put together an awesome event. We put together a fancy dress dodgeball tournament with imported sanctioned dodgeballs from America all just for fun and now on February 8th 2009 we will be doing it again this time with the help from the Rotary Club of Wetherill Park and Navsports. The ultimate fancy dress dodgeball tournament and all in the aid of Breast Cancer research.

Music, BBQ and lots of fun await all participants and spectators.

Keep tuned as more details will be available of the coming months.

Check out the photo below from our last tournament in 2005.

Close to launch

So here we are after months of hard work at times very frustrating and at others very rewarding. Navsports is less than two months away from launching what is going to be the " Ultimate sports community for news, organisations, teams and friends". That tag line was critiqued by Jason Peck who has now become Navsports North American media contact and sports marketing consultant. I met Jason who lives in North Carolina through http://www.sportsmarketing20.com/ a sports digital think tank. With Jason`s experience and knowledge I believe we have the right man for the job.

Over many months Navsports has been refined and continues to be refined by a dedicated team, no one person can claim ownership of navsports it belongs to all the hard working people like Marcelo, Derek, Kirrily, Ash, Spencer, Kyle, Alfie, Matt, Dean, Mark, Wendy, John and many more volunteers. These are the people that have made Navsports grow from an idea to a reality.

So what ever happens when we launch if its a huge success or not, I want to say thank you.

Keep tuned cause navsports is coming soon.

Stewart

BRW top 100 Australian websites

Last week Dean and I went along to the BRW top 100 Australian web 2.0 company luncheon.
Nice wine and posh food and some very passionate speakers.

What did I take away from the luncheon? I took away the feeling that 99% of all web companies in Australia are struggling and that they are having to go off shore to find any VC firms that may be interested in their venture.

Speakers included Sean Aylmer - Editor-in-chief BRW, John Butterworth - AIMIA CEO, Duncan Riley - CEO The Inquisitr, Malcolm Thornton - Investment Director Starfish Ventures. They all spoke about the online state of innovation in Australia and all concluded that there are many Australian companies willing to have a go no matter how many barriers are in place.

I suppose thats the Australian spirit, no mountain is to high.

From my experience if I did not have such a great supporting wife and a successful business outside of Navsports I would have packed it in a long time ago. Passion is one thing but cold hard cash is by sure a major driving force of the worlds best entrepreneurial ideas.

My mate Mark Chen from Sportslogic sent me an ebook called Good to Great by Jim Collins, I have started to listen to it and it makes a whole lot of sense and is helping me put a lot of things into prespective.

Running a great company is about the people in the company and acquiring great people is a very hard thing to do, finding passionate people with a vision of what can be is hard.

I have come to realise that it takes time, I am glad I have hit hurdles (big ones at times) and some times encounted huge set backs. The vision I have had for Navsports right from the beginning has changed. It has evolved, it had to to have any chance of success and I realize know that its not always about the product but about the company you keep the people you bring along for the ride. Having people that share your vision and get excited about the possibilities is what makes Navsports great to work on, any more from here is just a bonus.

Stewart

Making Meaning

So the other day I came across a video of Guy Kawasaki, Guy was at Apple computers in the early days and help build the company into one of the prominent industry leaders of the day.

But these days Guy heads up a venture capital company called Garage Technology Ventures.

The video focused on his book "The Art of the Start". One of the many great points in this video was this rule for successful entrepreneurs.

Make Meaning

Focus on making meaning, not money. If your vision for your company is to grow it just to flip it to a large company or to take it public and cash out, "you're doomed". Kawasaki says that great companies are built around one of three kinds of meaning:

1. Increase the quality of life. Make people more productive or their lives easier or more enjoyable.

2. Right a wrong. A variant on the above. Be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem.

3. Prevent the end of something good. Preserve something classic or historical. Save the whales.

I believe that Navsports follows this rule and it was great to know that what I am trying to do with Navsports is all about the three points above.

The rest of his video was equally insightful and I pick up some great pointers.

The status of Navsports, is that we are moving ahead swimmingly. Great progress and features are being developed every day.

We are heavily using Ajax throughout the site to maximise the users experience and I must say that this technology is really cool.

Well back to work for me.

Stewart

Top Contributors

The members of navsports are the ones that make the site great. Without their contributions every day the site would not be growing and have the wonderful content it has.

So with that said we have just launched a new feature recognizing the top contributors to navsports.

On the homepage you will find a new section which shows you the top members by "comments" (last seven days), "submissions" (last seven days) and the all time "navpoints" leaders.

More great stuff is coming, our aim is to offer a unique product which is painfully easy to use.

We are constantly talking with national sporting bodies, local clubs and the people that play sport. We are implementing their feedback into what promises to be an excellent resource tool for community sports clubs, participants and fans.

Listening and learning is what I have come to realise as one of the most important things to success, so that is the reason after seventeen years I have finally made it to university, Sydney Uni to be exact.

I am studying web design and programming and gee coming from a sports management background this has been a huge eye opener. I have realised that I can create even better products to help grassroots clubs and anyone interested in sports to truly find out transparent info relating to all things sport.

Back to study for me, bye for now.