MusicConnect - Final Project
Over the course of four weeks, our team created a new platform that fosters fan-fan and fan-artist connection. We differentiate ourselves by offering a free and / or low fee platform where fans can support artists directly through donations, merchandise, or ticket sales. Our team had over 80 interviews, and a progress report each week. With the help of our mentor, Cleveland area serial entrepreneur Sam Gerace, we had a minimum viable product. Early feedback was good. People wanted a way to support their favorite artists directly. If we had more time, I would have liked to look more thoroughly into how to disrupt the music ticketing industry. This could have been a vital next step for Music Connect. Attached is our filmed presentation and slides.
Failure through the Lens of Success: An Entrepreneurial Story
"No one said that being an entrepreneur is easy. Three months ago, when I started a macro course in entrepreneurship, I did not really know what to expect. Over the ensuing weeks, I began to discover some of the most important qualities of being an entrepreneur. Our class has completed four major challenges: helping a furniture startup, a revolutionary food waste collection and composting company, and a coding boot camp focused on addressing systemic tech industry issues. For our final challenge, we were tasked with creating our own company. This was no small feat. In four weeks, we had to discover a problem, validate an idea, prototype a solution, and finally receive feedback on our solution. My learning in this class has been cumulative, we applied lessons from our first three business challenges to our last. Even as the challenges have differed, the entrepreneurial mindset remained constant, a through line that stitched the whole experience together."
The Outlook of an Entrepreneur
"At its simplest, entrepreneurship is solving world problems. The scale of these problems differs, but constantly problems are solved. It is more than just making the next new gadget. At its best, entrepreneurship addresses and solves real world problems. For my work over the last three months, we looked at problems ranging from the small: helping a start-up furniture maker to reach more people, to the large: trying to solve the issue of food waste and tackle global climate change, helping to destigmatize and diversify the tech industry, or trying to secure better pay for musicians. Entrepreneurial studies require you to broaden your worldview, to look for issues that plague you, your community, or even the world. Over the last three months studying entrepreneurship, my worldview has broadened and changed immensely. The purpose of this reflection is to highlight some of the most meaningful projects, talks, and news sources that truly impacted how I think about entrepreneurship in the world."
Lessons from "let my people go surfing"
"Yvon Chouinard’s Let my People Go Surfing is a poignant reflection on the right way to do business in America. Chouinard chronicles his story, starting as a vagabonding outdoorsman, penniless but thirsty for adventure. Chouinard sensed a need in the climbing market for high quality pitons. Years later, he was the first to denounce them after seeing firsthand the environmental damage that they caused. Chouinard also discusses how he sees corporate culture, and how he made Patagonia different. Let my People Go Surfing is a timely read, addressing how to overcome the apparent paradox of businesses and conservation."