Yellow Ball Has Been Cloned!

Hundreds of Yellow Balls at yellowball.com!!!

Darth Vader on the Water Slide

History of the Startups.com Domain

• Startups.com domain 1996
  Wow. Net Masters. That site is "so 1996"!
• Startups.com domain 1997
  Net Masters massive redesign.
• Startups.com domain 1999
  A New Hampshire company takes over the domain!
• Startups.com domain January, 1999
  Someone's hosting the site on Verio.
• Startups.com domain April, 1999
  The first glimpse of the "Ultimate Dot Com Startup".
• Startups.com domain October, 1999
  "Get Ahead of the Curve", a preliminary site.
• Startups.com domain May, 2000
  The official site launches.
• Startups.com domain February, 2001
  Beginning of the end...
• Startups.com domain 2002
  Farewell Startups.com (for now).
• Startups.com domain 2003
  No signal.
• Startups.com domain 2010?
  Can someone buy it from Donna?

Yellow Ball With Friends

Yellow Ball with friends...

Madlib: Business Plans for Startups

Madlib: Business Plans for Startups

Running Around On The Roof

One day in the Spring of 2000 I was busy working at Startups.com and I noticed Andrea, who was the admin at the time, opening a storage closet in the hallway just outside of the main office. From my vantage point I could see that there was a built-in ladder with roof-top access. This seemed like a good opportunity to go on an outside adventure. There was nothing Andrea could do to stop me. I walked into the closet, up the ladder and before I knew it I was on the roof.

Freedom! Whoo Hoo!

I then began to run laps around the roof which spanned the entire company at the time. I had a wonderful time Running, yelling, skipping and jumping for joy!

Meanwhile downstairs in the conference room there was an important meeting going on.

After I became tired of running around the roof I came back down the ladder, through the closet and into the main office to sit at my desk and get back to work.

It must have been obvious who had been the one running around on the roof because just then Danny came out of the meeting and gave me quite an earful.

But it was all worth it.

I apologized and the next time I went roof-top exploring I was sure to do it in stealth mode.

Startups.com Stock Options

Every dot-commer dreams of purchasing stock options at a very low price and selling very very high when the company goes public or is acquired. Or at least somewhat high after the investors cash out and the employees can finally be rewarded months later.

Unfortunately none of those scenarios happened at Startups.com. I'm not sure why...

But I actually purchased my options (for a very low amount) just for the keepsake.

3,333 shares of nothin'!!!

30 years from now on eBay, they could really be worth something. Or not.

Hey Nice Peanut

So I USED to have this piece of poo doll named "Mr. Hankey" who would sing songs when squeezed. You know, Mr. Hankey The Christmas Poo of Southpark fame. Man Southpark is like so 90's dude (so passe). Anyway, I HAD a singing Mr. Hankey doll that I brought into the office back when the Tech Team was still in the front section (suite A) of the corporate headquarters.

Donna noticed this doll and said, "Hey Nice Peanut". Those who heard this got a good laugh.

So then I put the "peanut" on her computer monitor in her office since she enjoyed him so much.

Shortly after, a film crew from a local news station came to give Donna an interview in her office. Guess who was in frame just behind her sitting on the computer monitor?

Wish I had a copy of that video...

Note: I no longer own a Mr. Hankey Poo doll. Believe it or not I think he ended up at Good Will with a bunch of monkeys. I do still have monkeys but not as many as I did at one time.

Where is Everyone?

Was it all just a crazy dream filled with flying monkeys, a tin man, a scarecrow, a large yellow ball and munchkins? Is anyone there? Does anyone else remember what happened?

Casting for a Startups.com Movie

There is already a documentary movie called "Startup.com" that came out a few years ago. It definitely wasn't about the "Ultimate Dot Com Startup" and was kind of slow. Our story which was much better, and at one time we thought of who might play our parts if a blockbuster movie was to ever be made.

Tech Team
Mike Shane -- Joe Pesci
Brian Faeh -- Michael Keaton (or) Tom Hanks
Angelique -- Julianne Moore
Dave Orr -- William Hurt
Mike Lewis -- Alan Alda
Ted Lee -- Chow Yun Fat
JJ -- Eddie Murphy
Guert -- Adam Sandler
Veronica -- Veronica from Archie Comics
Adam -- Heath Ledger
Josh -- Matt Damon (or) Treat Williams
Winston -- Al Pacino
Winnie -- Michelle Yoh
Daniel -- Danny Devito
Steve Taffe -- Jack Nicholson (or) Harry Morgan (Col. Potter from M*A*S*H)
Karen Smith -- Julia Roberts
Nancy -- Molly Ringwald
Authur -- Dudley Moore
Tuka -- Jamie Farr
Gavin -- Liam Gallagher (from Oasis)
Venky -- Robin Williams
Shiv -- Robin Williams
Inder -- Daler Mendhi
Analog -- Robin Williams
Ming Woo -- Long Duck Dong
Yellow Ball -- AS ITSELF

Tech Team For Sale On eBay

I suppose Startups.com was doomed from the start, but when it was obvious that the company was going to go out of business for sure we thought we could at least sell our services on eBay. I made it until the 3rd round of layoffs as did most of our Tech Team. It was a large tech team for a small company and you will read much more about it I'm sure. In May of 2001, I posted the following ad on eBay. We didn't have much luck but did actually get an inquiry or two...

Tech Team For Sale