I've always been very, very cautious about intellectual property rights (IPR) for Semacode. I have a good background for it. I took an IPR law course at university, and I managed the Darwin 1.0 program at Apple, which required a strong understanding of IPR as it relates to open source. Also, I actually have a bit of a flair for writing contracts. For example, I once managed to avoid a nasty situation for the company by writing a few terms on the subject of IPR ownership into a contract myself. At the time I was just being careful, but it wound up being a very important three paragraphs.

The problem is that small mistakes can amplify at critical moments. Let's take a real-world example from Waterloo. Gary Will documented a situation where a customer (UBS) sued their former consultants (PixStream) and got a hefty $25 million settlement . Broadly speaking, the pre-cursor to PixStream did some work for UBS which was unsuccessful. But it was a good idea, I guess, because PixStream then went and built an actual working technology along the same idea lines.

This is one of your classic scenarios. Someone who thinks that they have a claim on your IPR waits until just the right moment — usually just before you're about to raise money or get bought or IPO — and then pops out saying that you owe them money. The reason they do that is that you really, really want to close the deal and you don't have time to actually fight them in court. So, instead of drawing it out and ultimately winning (but losing the investment), you make a quick settlement to make the problem go away. Which is what PixStream did. They got the Cisco money, and the UBS people got $25 million that they probably didn't really deserve.

IPR problems can also drag down projects before they even get started. Make sure you have good IPR agreements with everyone who contributes to your technology from the very start. It's a lot easier to do it when there isn't a lot of money on the table. I heard of a story where some student who was involved in a project at an early stage found out that the others were about to raise VC money and demanded a huge stake — something really outlandish — and wouldn't back down. Ultimately the whole deal broke and nobody got any money and the tech was never commercialized, just because one guy was an ass. I can't remember any of the details, but this scenario can happen, and probably does a fair bit.

Lilia Manguy is inside another academic IPR alligator swamp. In her blog she describes her problems with iBuyRight , "a mobile phone application that displays social and environmental information about a product, enabling consumers to make purchases consciously aligned with their personal values." Similar to AURA but specifically about CSR .

But who owns her work? It's complicated but important because the prof involved wants to commercialize. He had the idea and contributed content but nothing else, so in this case Cal regulations state that Lilia + the 3 other students own the IPR. Poor prof — he should have sat down with university's experts and the students and worked something out in a fair and reasonable manner. Instead the prof went forward without any paperwork and it wasn't long before he and Lilia got into a conflict: he wanted everything to be a secret; she had to post her project online per university regs. He tried to get it taken down by the university. In order to protect her academic work, Lilia rightly refused to sign anything with the prof, and she got help from friends, academics, etc (including someone at EFF) and got the backing she needed to keep her work online. I don't know what's happened to the company but without her signature they'd have to start over from scratch.

And then there's also patent issues but that's enough for one post...

I heard this military expression a while ago "hurry up and wait". Apparently, if you're in a military operation, you have periods of intense activity followed by long periods of boredom while you wait for the next order to move. Now, I'm not military, and I can't stand the use of war jargon in business (like beachhead, attacking your competitors, etc., etc.) but I think this is an appropriate expression for the process of raising money.

For example, I spent quite a lot of time preparing a detailed financial plan. Everything seemed smooth, my advisors had a look at it and checked it off until my principle advisor — a former accountant — noticed that it was missing (cough) a balance sheet. I spent an entire friday, saturday and sunday adding a balance sheet. Partly because it wouldn't balance. My advisor (I'll call him Paul) actually worked on the weekend to make it balance properly. That weekend was crazy. Then monday I handed off the FP and basically it was in the hands of the investors until they got back to me.

I'm not saying they weren't prompt. What I'm saying is that I had to work like a dog — and FAST, because we need to move this along! — and then had nothing to do (on the investment) for several days.

And it just happened again, except this time with some details on the technical plan. And now, I'm trying to get a hold of the one guy who can be most helpful, and I can't reach him, so finding this one guy is suddenly my #1 priority. I can't do anything until I hear from him. So it's hurry up and wait.

I'm co-hosting (with Jesse Rodgers ) the next BarCampWaterloo and it's going to have a DemoCamp format! I'm totally pumped about the DemoCamp format because I really enjoyed the one I went to in Toronto over the summer.

You ARE going, aren't you? All the cool kids will be there. And if Jesse gets his **** together we'll have some free food as well :-) It's going to be at the Waterloo Accelerator Centre which is literally just north of campus (in the "innovation park") so there's no excuse not to go, it's a 2, no, 1 minute walk.

And this isn't just for students. We're throwing open the doors to everyone. Local techies, business people, even investors - come and see what's happening and get inspired.

Sign up at the BarCampWaterloo wiki page .

It's been a while, and my excuse this time is that I've been spending 90% of my time raising money. So far Semacode has been funded from my own cash ("self, friends & family" in the jargon, except in this case, just me, because I want to keep my friends even if the business crashes) and from revenue. But I want to grow Semacode much more rapidly than revenue will allow at this point, and that means going on to the next stage, which is angel funding.

We had a really interesting session at the AC (Waterloo Accelerator Centre) (which included a commanding performance by Charles :-) about "why angels invest" and what it boils down to — in my own opinion — is these two points: (a) it's a way to have the entrepreneurial experience without going through all the stress again, and (b) to give back to the community that helped them in the first place. All angels, or at least all good angels, have founded companies or been involved in key roles early-stage companies. There is just no other way to do it. Nothing substitutes for actually starting a company. I would say to stay away from an "angel investor" who hasn't done it themselves.

Another thing someone said at some presentation I've been to is that if you want to get someone's money, ask them for advice. I think it's a fair comment. My meetings with angels have mostly started out on the basis that I'm working on my business plan and can they help me? And the awesome part is, that they have helped me. Through the advice of maybe 1/2 dozen entrepreneurs and angels I've taken my new business plan (I call it 1.3...) through seven revisions from being very vague to being snappy, sharp and to the point. And it also contains sound business planning I think. Of course, you have to be capable of listening and taking advice too.

A bunch of prospective investors have banded together to investigate the company, and I may be meeting with them later this week. If so, that will be I think a good solid move forward. I have no idea if they all want to invest together or if they're just together to check things out (a la Dean Kamen in "Code Name Ginger"). I'm not too worried though. These are smart people and they've done it before. And, my advisors are smart people and they've also done this before.

Aside from that I'm giving a talk tomorrow to the AC's EC. The Entrepreneurship Council that is, a top-secret body of local important people who signed up to help the AC and this is their first meeting together since it opened about a year ago. And then lots of networking and stuff after that.

And, although I said I wasn't going to do it, I put up a listing on UW's co-op board for a software developer for January. I expect to be inundated by resumes at any moment. If you're dedicated enough to be reading this, the best thing you can show me at an interview is great code you wrote for some kind of open-source project.

PS I swear I'll answer your email really, really soon!