Take losing in stride...

[Chris]

I suppose this could come across as condescending, but if you lost,
pick up the pieces and move on.

I've been working on our product from a business standpoint for over a
year, and for many many months, I suffered one rejection after
another. Instead of talking about what was unfair, I looked at the
feedback I received and took it to heart whether I agreed or not. A
year later, now we are finally getting attention from investors and
partners. If it was so easy to make millions of dollars building
software, everyone would be rich. Most of the phase I winners will
still probably lose in the real world; that is life.

I know the counter to this post will be to say that Google was running
a black box and we aren't getting feedback, but if you look at many of
the posts on this board, you will see you can get great feedback from
the community here. There were many arguments about what the judges
were looking for, and different camps with different opinions. Now
that the winners have been announced, you can look back on this board
and see who was right. Clear patterns will emerge. Perhaps the most
ironic thing is that the most confident people didn't seem to win,
because they were likely closed to the fact that someone else's
opinion could actually be useful.

The judging process has been a microcosm of the real world. If you
can't get the judges excited about your idea in two minutes, you
probably won't be able to do the same with consumers. The real world
is harsh, so build a product with that in mind.

As a perfect example of the right way to lose, look at the Duo team.
If anyone on this board got screwed it was them. Did they start
complaining? No, they did an excellent postmortem, and will probably
be in great shape for ADC 2 and the commercial market.

[Muthu Ramadoss]

If I had lost, here's my possibilities:

Individual:

1. Will look for participating in P2, since the top 50 will be hiring.

Team:

1. Will have an honest discussion, with the other team members and make a decision to continue or not.
2. Will look for participating in P2, since the top 50 will be hiring.

Company:

1. They know what there doing.
2. If they don't, will look for participating in P2, since the top 50 will be hiring.

--
take care,
Muthu Ramadoss.

http://mobeegal.in
find stuff closer.

[vetch]

Hello,

> Instead of talking about what was unfair, I looked at the
> feedback I received

> [...]

> I know the counter to this post will be to say that Google was running
> a black box and we aren't getting feedback,

So what are you writing this for ? For what purpose ?

Fact is, that we got NOTHING. Not only, no feedback. We got no
official ranking, and many people reported no testing their apps at
all !
We can assume, that judging process WAS UNFAIR, that's all.

I'm right with criticism, but I need factual arguments, not just "you
lose, because we said that".

Because this is not about losing. This is about thing, named HONESTY,
so stop telling me how to do drive my business.
Instead, advise the Google, how to be HONEST to people working so
hard.
But they won't listen to you, right ? We know that.

greets,
peter.

[efon...@gmail.com]

Chris,

You of all people should know that people need to talk to work things
out.

Attributions are often wrong.

Google is putting winning entries up post haste for several reasons.
The best reason I see is that those examples will provide data to the
non-qualifiers about what was required to qualify. This is not a
substitute for rankings - that just beg people to argue - but rather a
superior form of feedback: examples of what works.

For our team the challenge was a chance to mature the idea. We got a
lot out of that, and will benefit going forward. It was a 'chasing
the bus' windsprint. Even if you don't catch the bus you end up
stronger.

Ed

[Cow Bay]

i cannot but second most of what vetch has said.

when you perform diligently on "american idol" stage for few seconds and
suddenly stopped by the judges, at least they will tell you what's wrong
with your performance. but, here, we got nothing.

we got no idea what has been wrong and what to do next. it can be a tragedy
to most non-winners.

[javqui]

I enter into this challenge late, so I didn’t have the opportunity and
time to read all posted messages at early stage.

>We got no idea what has been wrong …..

This discussion group (android-challenge) has enough data to
development a master degree in social human behavior. I learn a lot
with this experience.

Two winner examples:
I take my time these days to read the entire winner Chris comments on
this discussion group. He made and excellent work from the beginning,
with excellent strategies.
Everyone knows the winner Muthu, and all support and always positive
messages that he give to this community.

I request in some discussion the opportunity for a feedback from
judges. The data on this discussion group have a lot of elements to
get an excellent feedback.

>what to do next…..
ADC1 is only the beginning.
Help, learn, prepare.
The easy way to learn is help others.
Prepare for ADC2.
I’m not a winner for ADC1, but I have more elements today to share
with this community and be prepared for ADC2 with the same idea.

javqui

> > peter.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Cow Bay]

w/o any feedback to our failed app, isn't the attempt on adc ii another
try-and-error?

worse, this time we must buy one or two gphones to prepare the attempt. w/o
masss production the phones can be very expensive. w/o service commitment,
the phones can only for adc ii.

with similar cost and risk, is it more practical to buy a mac mini and make
our apps for 20m iphones by end of 2008?

i am thinking seriously in this direction, though i really love android but
i must love my app more.

[vetch]

Hello,

> w/o any feedback to our failed app, isn't the attempt on adc ii another
> try-and-error?

exactly. Another waste of time.

> with similar cost and risk, is it more practical to buy a mac mini and make
> our apps for 20m iphones by end of 2008?

of course. I am individual, and safer for me is to buy WORKING iPhone
with full support, than BETA-gPhone for twice the price with almost no
support.

Everything I learned about Android, done by myself. Sorry, but groups
reaction
is simply too slow. So, learning, testing, finding bugs, reporting
f*** issues..
thousands of hours. And now even no clear explanation "why your app
stinks".

> i am thinking seriously in this direction, though i really love android but
> i must love my app more.

good point. Love my app and love my precious time.
Besides, "pizza's are not for free"...

greets,
peter

[Cow Bay]

is it really so difficult for google and judges to treat us as friends for
advices not beggers for prizes?

a word like "your idea is useless", "your implementation is broken", "your
look-and-feel stinks", "your app is not indispensible", ,,, or "your app is
unfortunately 51-th" can vitalize many fading ardors.

destructive or constructive feedback is all non-winners need.

please....

----- Original Message -----
From: "vetch" <OldPe...@gmail.com>
To: "Android Challenge" <android-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, May 11, 2008 8:08 AM
Subject: [android-challenge] Re: Take losing in stride...

>

[Muthu Ramadoss]

I agree.

Some sort of the feedback to all the participants will do a whole lot of good for Android.

[Chris]

I'm not saying feedback wouldn't be extremely helpful. All I'm saying
is that you should work with what you get, and there is a lot to work
with. The people who start throwing their hands in the air won't do
as well as the people who are more reserved and analytical.

So Google, please give us feedback! But to everyone else, if they
don't do it, you should be able to get pretty good feedback from using
the board.

[Kev Gman]

As always, I'm a broken record.  My app, and apparently many others, never really got looked at.  Two people opened it, neither completed the user setup.  Nobody logged in as the complete user I provided.  So, feedback would be very helpful to explain why that happened.  Otherwise, I feel like I blew a whole lot of time for nothing, and certainly wouldn't consider moving forward for the next challenge.  If nobody looked at it this time, why would they next time?

I am moving forward, but not on Android.  At least not till next year.  See if it gets any support.  Best of luck to everybody else.

[Kev Gman]

The forum is only useful if you want to post your idea to the world, which isn't really a great plan if you don't want somebody else to pick it up.

We did, however, let a group of people in on our ideas and review them.  That feedback would be very useful.

I would assume we get no feedback.  It will invite response.  I think it would help people digest the outcome of the contest better, but I may think that because I am a participant and I want the feedback.  A disinterested third party might conclude that it will just make people more angry.

[q2dm1]

Well said. I don't intend to waste my time for their success and get
nothing in return. And I'm not talking about money here, I'm talking
about transparency of the judging process, with clearly stated rules
which can be verified by anyone. That's why I don't give a shit about
the opinions of some "judge" or "industry expert" until I see 4
evaluation mails in my inbox with detailed explanations and scores in
all 4 judging criteria. Which isn't gonna happen because nothing has
been evaluated.
I don't see any evidence that ADC2 isn't gonna be the same charade.
This is why I won't participate and why I will encourage every
developer I know to stay away from it.
Only if Android somehow turns out to be a success will I release a
version of my application for it. My good will is lost and now I'm
only driven by business calculations, as is Google. I'm turning to
other platforms where the most important asset Google can hope for -
the developers - are treated with more respect.

On May 11, 6:37 pm, "Kev Gman" <kgalli...@gmail.com> wrote:
> As always, I'm a broken record.  My app, and apparently many others, never
> really got looked at.  Two people opened it, neither completed the user
> setup.  Nobody logged in as the complete user I provided.  So, feedback
> would be very helpful to explain why that happened.  Otherwise, I feel like
> I blew a whole lot of time for nothing, and certainly wouldn't consider
> moving forward for the next challenge.  If nobody looked at it this time,
> why would they next time?
>
> I am moving forward, but not on Android.  At least not till next year.  See
> if it gets any support.  Best of luck to everybody else.
>

> On Sun, May 11, 2008 at 12:28 PM, Muthu Ramadoss <muthu.ramad...@gmail.com>

> wrote:
>
> > I agree.
>
> > Some sort of the feedback to all the participants will do a whole lot of
> > good for Android.
>

[javqui]

I agree that feedback from judges will be wonderful
I vote for a judge’s feedback early, before winners announcements. I
want feedback!!!!.

But read the comments after winner announcement.
If you are a judge, you will release comments or feedback?
Its like put more gas on a fire. That is the problem

If you release any comment, many people like yours and mine will see a
constructive feedback, even if it is not too much favorable, and use
it sagely.

Think about many other people that will use this feedback against
Google. You read many crazy reactions. Everyone believes that have the
next multi trillion dollar invention.
Is not easy, so my alternative for now is use the challenge discussion
group as and interpreted feedbac
javqui

> > > find stuff closer.- Hide quoted text -

[javqui]

Sorry for my spelling errors. I speak Java, C and derivations, HTTP,
Spanish, some Portuguese, Assembly code, Android and other languages.
I try to speak English.

Javier Quintana

> > - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

[Apache787]

True, everyone could have gotten a little feed back, but everyone
needs to realize that Google is a business, not your mother.

There are 2 things that comes with a business, success, and failure.
In Google's eyes, this competition could have gone a lot smother than
it had, but overall it was a success. 1788 UNIQUE submitters(Correct
me if I am wrong) and many of the submitters made more that 2
applications. So how can anyone organize GOOD feedback for more than
2000 individual submissions? In small scale operations, things can be
controlled easily, while such a large operation that was ADC could
barely meet it's Week of May 5th deadline.

So instead of complaining about how you didn't get any feed back from
the OHA judges(It was not just Google running the show here), can it
really hurt that bad to ask for suggestions from the community where
you can most certainly get great feed back from people like Muthu and
Chris(Even though I'm going against his post right now.)

PS. I and my team didn't win, no feedback, no server to even know that
it was being looked at. Congratulations to the winners, and ALL
participants of the android community. You do not know how much every
one's questions and answers have helped us.

[Chris]

Kevin,

I think the feedback would be you made it too difficult to get up and
running. You didn't catch their attention within 30 seconds. I don't
think you need the judges feedback to come away with this conclusion.

This was an area our team spent a lot of time thinking about. We are
a bit hush hush about our strategy, but email me and I can tell you
how we addressed the issue.

Chris

On May 11, 9:37 am, "Kev Gman" <kgalli...@gmail.com> wrote:
> As always, I'm a broken record. My app, and apparently many others, never
> really got looked at. Two people opened it, neither completed the user
> setup. Nobody logged in as the complete user I provided. So, feedback
> would be very helpful to explain why that happened. Otherwise, I feel like
> I blew a whole lot of time for nothing, and certainly wouldn't consider
> moving forward for the next challenge. If nobody looked at it this time,
> why would they next time?
>
> I am moving forward, but not on Android. At least not till next year. See
> if it gets any support. Best of luck to everybody else.
>

> On Sun, May 11, 2008 at 12:28 PM, Muthu Ramadoss <muthu.ramad...@gmail.com>

> wrote:
>
> > I agree.
>
> > Some sort of the feedback to all the participants will do a whole lot of
> > good for Android.
>

[beauforthax]

> Some sort of the feedback to all the participants will do a whole lot of
> good for Android.

You are of course right. But, I'm afraid that it is not possible
to get feedback since judges in many cases even did not
read readme, did not run applications or did not use applications :)
Such feedback would be just a blank file :)
I think that we all had precious lesson: not to take part in any
Google's competitions in the future and to focus on the other
mobile platforms.

Regards,
Beaufort Hax

[Cow Bay]

i forgot to list the 2-year service fee of owning 1 or 2 phones to develop
android apps.

that can be couple of thousands $. gosh!!

thousands for nothing as in adc 1???

[Cow Bay]

diagree.

my mother cannot comment on anything of adc.

why not release scores? there seems no politics or business issue.

if the judging process is as automatic as google declared, publishing scores
of top 50 and releasing scores to all losers is not hard at all.

losers can compare scores of each criterion to learn where to improve or
discard. it is positive to android app development.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Apache787" <Apac...@gmail.com>
To: "Android Challenge" <android-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, May 11, 2008 11:18 AM
Subject: [android-challenge] Re: Take losing in stride...

>

[Chris]

I at first thought releasing scores could be a good idea, but then I
started thinking of what some people would think when they sawthey got
a 2.4/10. Of course it would be the judges fault, and of course they
would demand recourse, and it could just turn into more of a mess than
leaving it confidential.

[Cow Bay]

disagree.

being afraid of a mess cannot be an excuse of hiding truth and masking
efforts of participants.

[efon...@gmail.com]

The best feedback is that which informs judgment going forward. There
is no purpose in developing something identical to something now well
funded.

What matters to our team is: what needs are left unaddressed? What
needs to be done?

Understanding the winning entries and assessing clarity of vision is
the next step.

Ed

> > > one's questions and answers have helped us.- Hide quoted text -

[Cow Bay]

to help clarify the vision, i guess that an idea to win adc 2 must be one as
odd as how to kill an e.t. by android phones instead of how to maximize
daily use of an android phone >:-|

[gtandon]

I believe there were 1788 apps, so probably about a 3000+ developer
community who participated ? The Challenge is a double edged sword for
Google. On one hand Google gets to test the waters with an
enthusiastic developer community even before a handset is available.
And on the other hand there is a chance that the 2700 odd developers
that didn't win get disappointed and disillusioned and move on to
other platforms that already have handsets in circulation. But I
believe most of the developers entered the Challenge not only for the
sake of the Challenge; but because they saw promise in the platform.
And I think on that count Google and Android hasn’t disappointed
anyone.

On the Challenge front, I agree with Chris that if it didn’t catch the
judges’ attention in the first 30 seconds (I was hoping it would at
least be 5 minutes for the 1000s of hours of work people have put in),
it is out. You could have a great idea, even a high quality app, but
for a challenge what matters is how you present it.

I realized that we focused on conveying “completeness” of the concept
rather than conveying the gist succinctly. (ofcourse we didn't win).
For teams and individuals that are primarily developers, one aspect
that can be easily missed is usability. Another area where the early
adopters with original and innovative ideas may have a slight
disadvantage, is the judges’ inclination towards matching the current
competition rather than understanding and introducing a new concept.(I
sincerely hope that I continue to think this way even after Google
announces the application list of 50.)

For applications that didn't win, and are good quality and carry mass
appeal, Google's gallery will be a good place to start. For others,
they already have a head start on the next mobile revolution (iPhone,
watch out ;-) ).

I appreciate Chris’ initiative in showing the glass half full. It is
difficult coming from someone who has won the competition.

[ajd]

The unfairness, if there was, started when they extended the original
deadline.

[Hong]

totally agreed.  one of the reasons i didn't submit my entries.
it was unfair since then...

[ncsolution]

test message, pls ignore.. i haven't post for a while so just trying
to figure out how to post

> > deadline.- Hide quoted text -

[ncsolution]

Now that I figure out how this works :)

At first, I'm thinking scores + feedback would be good for both
winners and the rest. I meant more is always good right? And we all
want more from life :)
For winners, it would definitely help with preparing for Phase II, and
for the rest...well I'm sure you read previous posts so no need for me
to go further.

But then I thought about one of my job interviews about 10 yrs ago.
It was a perfect interview I thought. I did everything right, showed
up on-time, showered :), answered all questions "correctly". I was
even surprise at my energy level, and my enthusiasm at the interview.
I even sent thank you note and was so sure I get the job, I almost
turn down one previous offer (good thing I'm always slow at making
that kind of decision :)). Well I waited 3 days and nothing from the
company. Each passing day, my confident went a little south, and my
anxiety went up a notch. By the 3rd day, I got upset with the delay
and accepted my first offer. Figured if they take that long to
respond and didn't keep their promise of calling me in 2 days, it's
not a good business to work for anyway.
However, deep down, I'm still hopeful that there is some logical
reason why they didn't call and totally forgivable. So I called them
by the 4th day and left a VM.

Well, the 5th day was probably the best day of my life. I got a
letter in the mail stating they found somebody else whose better fit
the position and will keep my resume in their DB for 6 months. I was
pretty upset at first and went through the interview in my head at
least 20 times. Still I didn't find any flaw and the experience match
perfectly with the job. I guess I was upset of not knowing what went
wrong? By dinner time, I calm down a bit and took a different
approach. I thought about all the possible things that could have
gone wrong. Turned out there were plenty of them. And then,
something hit me, what if I get a letter stating the exact reason why
I didn't get hired? Would I gracefully accept and move on? Or would
I disagree with their opinion and offer a counter? Would it ever
end? By the time I go to bed, I realize I learned alot from not
knowing the real reason. and I had a much restful sleep that night.
I guess I'll have a much restful sleep tonight as well.


Btw, I'm in no-way comparing the interview with the hundreds of hours
we developer put into this project (although i did spent alot of time
preparing for the interview). it's just a small story i wish to offer
and hope you get something out of it .. if not .. ohh well...we all
want more from life :)

> > - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

[gtandon]

Great example ! Those who are not in the first 50 definitely need a
closure. And this is a great way to look at it positively.

Hope google would put out the list of the first 50 without any more
delay.

[Cow Bay]

shouldn't google reveal rankings or scores to the losers to help them look
at their failure more positively???

most of them will look into the data and take it as advice for adc 2.

----- Original Message -----
From: "gtandon" <Gauri....@gmail.com>
To: "Android Challenge" <android-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 7:08 AM
Subject: [android-challenge] Re: Take losing in stride...

[ajd]

On May 11, 9:54 pm, Hong <lordh...@gmail.com> wrote:

> > deadline.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

And I still believe that the extension was granted to favor some of
the winners (who cannot complete their entries to beat the original
deadline). I din not submit either since my team felt it was too late
to shift to a more sophisticated application.

[Chris]

I'll admit..our team could not have finished by the original
deadline. But, we took a gamble early on (in January) that the
deadline would be extended. We were prepared to not be finished.

[gtandon]

I think rankings and scores would only confuse matters more. My guess
is judges didn't spend more than 5-10 minutes per app (maybe even
less) - what feedback can we expect? That judges were not "impressed"
by your app? Or that there were other apps that impressed them more?
In my mind, a raw score won't help too much either. But that too is
subjective, and google should release the raw scores if the developer
wishes to see it.

Looking at the winning apps will definitely help understand the judges
mindset. The best way would be to look at your own app objectively and
see how it could be made better. Maybe even find out if one of the
"winners" would give you an objective assessment. If you still feel
that your's is better than any on the first 50, put it out in the open
market. And most importantly not to refer yourself as part of "losers"
but amongst ones that didn't win.

We knew from the beginning that Individuals, teams and businesses
would all be judged on an equal footing. We also knew the criteria
that our apps would be judges by. And I am sure everybody knew why
google was running ADC. Nobody said "unfair" until the results came
out; we all gave our best shot for whatever it was worth. So I guess
its best we keep it that way.

[ajd]

On May 12, 8:52 am, Chris <crhu...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'll admit..our team could not have finished by the original
> deadline.  But, we took a gamble early on (in January) that the
> deadline would be extended.  We were prepared to not be finished.
>

Wow, that sounds prophetic. I might gamble to beat the deadline (it's
in your control) but definitely I will rarely gamble that a deadline
will be extended (google's control). Did you also guessed right that
google will not have a second deadline?

I do believe though that you won fair and square Chris (basing on your
past posts even before you knew you're one of the winners). You were
just an un-intended but willing recipient of that extension, which to
me and many others were unfair. Google should have not change the rule
in the middle of a contest. And I think this is one of the reasons
there are doubts now in the judging process. Who knows, they may have
changed the rules while in the process of judging the entries?

> On May 12, 8:34 am, ajd <doming...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> > On May 11, 9:54 pm, Hong <lordh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > totally agreed.  one of the reasons i didn't submit my entries.
> > > it was unfair since then...
>
> > > On Mon, May 12, 2008 at 12:29 AM, ajd <doming...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > > The unfairness, if there was, started when they extended the original
> > > > deadline.- Hide quoted text -
>
> > > - Show quoted text -
>
> > And I still believe that the extension was granted to favor some of
> > the winners (who  cannot complete their entries to beat the original
> > deadline). I din not submit either since my team felt it was too late

> > to shift to a more sophisticated application.- Hide quoted text -

[Cow Bay]

i am depressed with the word "impressed". there is no criterion such as
"impressed" in adc judging rule....

does popular utility apps like "word" or "firefox" impress you now?

they are most freqently used -- most "useful". i saw "useful" in adc web
page.

usefulness should be the perch of adc. i dont want an app that impresses me
for 30s but not afterward -- "indepensible"!!!

let's see how many of top50 are indepensible!!

[Free Tibet]

Everything here have been subjective.

Revealing some data for the losers to know how far they were from
success and how far they can be from success can make the thing
objective.

Why so many people refuses truth while they want truth of poor Tibet???