Brian Parks


Resurrecting the blog ... in a way

25 May 2011

I haven’t written anything in a while — in case that wasn’t already blindingly obvious. The fact of the matter is that I originally started the blog to catalogue my social life, or what of one I had when I first came out here. The amount that I’ve written over the past year should be telling, but I’ll elaborate.

Writing a blog (or anything, for that matter) implies that there is some readership that has both access and interest in the material being written about. Access, in this case, is no obstacle, but interest is lacking. I don’t blame the readership (if it exists), nor do I blame the non-reader. How am I supposed to write something to interest the reader when even I have no interest in the material being written about?

As such, the resurrection of the blog is not really a resurrection so much as a transformation. This blog at this URL will cease to be and a new blog at an only slightly different link will appear. In addition, the subject matter and content will change, the reasoning being as follows:

Almost a year ago I started a company with my friend and colleague Anthony Magee under the moniker Synaptogenesis, Inc. Since neither of us could consistently spell the name (and thus, how could we expect any potential customers to be able to?), we started operating under the name Synapse Software. Starting a company is a bunch of work, so I rapidly ran out of time to do social things. As such, the potential subject matter for the blog dried up and with it the flow of new posts.

As it turns out, the more important thing was that the things I did to retain some semblance of a social life turned into our first business opportunity with the release of the FRBBQ iPhone App and subsequent projects. Since then, we’ve pursued several projects to varying degrees, all of which require a significant time commitment.

Instead of slowing down when the opportunity came, excited by the innovation spirit that Dr. Terry Boult and the Bachelor of Innovation program at UCCS strive to instill in the curious undergraduate population, I got involved in the management of another fledgling company, which only increased my workload. The amount of time I spend doing the research I originally came to Colorado to do has suffered severely, but helping companies grow causes a much larger release of dopamine and is far easier (at the present moment) to get excited about.

I don’t plan on slowing down anytime soon. Ideas abound, both among people I’m already in business with and among the more entrepreneurial BI students. There’s a wealth of potential here and I’d like to follow in Terry’s footsteps as an Innovation Evangelist.

In a roundabout way, that describes the new direction for the content of my blog. Occasionally, I have thoughts about business and innovation, particularly when it pertains to technology, and I’d like to share them. The first post will have something to do with pidgeonholing and how it stifles innovation. I don’t know exactly what it will say (I haven’t written it yet), but I’m sure I’m just as excited as you are to see how it turns out.