Things remain interesting around smashLAB. (Interesting is code for “really great and also really fucking hard”.) Lots of new lessons for us, including some that have taught us a little humility, which I’ll talk about in a future post. That being said, here are a few more random observations.

I have a theory. It could prove incorrect or even shortsighted, nevertheless, it’s a bet I’m willing to make. I think businesses on the web are going to get a lot smaller. In the web world, we’re currently experiencing the fallout of the second of two tidal waves. The next one, however, will be slower, more distributed, and come with far less of a shock.

The past few months have been full of wild ups and downs. My wife has been privy to me coming home and looking like I’m going to fall down from exhaustion, freak-out completely, or dance on the ceiling. (Oh, what a feeling!) I’ve made note of some points for myself, and thought I’d share them with you (you can also read #1, #2, and #3). Here goes…

Every week I receive a handful of emails from PR firms, wanting me to write about something they’re helping promote. I rarely do so for them, but it’s not that I wouldn’t. It’s just that their tactics suck. They sell their clients on the notion of “blogger relations” but in fact, they’re treating email like a fax machine. They send the same generic message out to a ton of bloggers, piss everyone off in the process, and then bill their client for doing so. (Nice.)

Somewhere in the back of your mind, there’s likely an idea for a startup that rears its head from time to time. Perhaps it’s an iPhone app that reads minds, a search engine that’s better than Google, or it could even be the best way to buy music online. I can’t tell you how to make it a success, but I can share a few obstacles that you should be mindful of before starting out.

I’m going to risk alienating some of my readers today; nevertheless, I believe this to be an important discussion, worthy of a few ruffled feathers. As I write this, American auto-makers are scrambling to tap TARP funds that might keep them on life-support, and I believe their wish will be granted. I also think it’s shortsighted, disastrous and highly un-American.

I bought a house in 1995 for $98,500. I was 22, and living in my hometown, Prince George. In my mind it was an investment; strangely, however, it never struck me that there was any possibility of not making money from the purchase. In the years that followed I decided that I wanted to move somewhere more metropolitan and I learned just what an anchor a house could be. The market was flat, and no one wanted to buy a home.

It’s a September Friday and it looks as though the sun may make an appearance. I’m in one of those “places” where everything seems to be moving along pretty nicely. As such, I thought I’d share another set of random observations (there are others here and here).

In the past year we’ve been approached by six different agencies wishing to acquire smashLAB. Some were big players, two were regional firms, and the others were working as agents for other operations. Needless to say, we found all of this quite flattering, even if it wasn’t really on our agenda.

A while back I posted Random observations – Part 1. This is a follow-up. As noted earlier, these are personal ruminations on patterns I’ve uncovered through my professional practice. Some are topical, while others may feel rather disconnected. That being said, they all circle around the same things in my mind.