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!