Alex Greene

Gigaom just wrote an article about my app!

Wow, Huffington Post… I’m quite speechless at the moment.

The Stanford Daily

Hello Stanford,

If you’re reading this, I’ve probably contacted your admissions department to provide this URL, so thanks for stopping by! It’s been a number of weeks since I submitted my undergraduate application to attend your school, but I wanted to add one thing that I think you may enjoy! I built an iPhone application to show how much I would love to attend Stanford, and I’d like to show it to you. I couldn’t wait to show you, so I made a video demonstration of the application for your viewing pleasure!

I don’t want to give it all away- so take a look!

Thanks for your time,

Alex Greene
alexgrn7@gmail.com

Entrepreneurs, developers, designers, and all those with creative personalities usually have too many ideas to handle. “Should I work on this project or that one?” or “I made that design already, but I just thought of something that might work better” – both are often heard from these people. But sometimes, no matter how creative you are, you run short of ideas. You hit a drought, per say, and you have nothing to work with. I’ve just gone through one myself. Here are some tips to help get your creative mojo back on:

1. Doodle on a piece of paper. Sometimes I like to take a clean sheet of paper, draw the first thing that comes mind and then go fro there. Don’t think about what you’re drawing, just sketch it out, whether it be a cube, a tree, or any bizarre random thing that you never thought you’d be drawing. While this probably won’t directly provide you with the next huge idea (who knows?), it will definitely get your creative juices flowing. Along the same lines, if you know your way around photoshop, just try and design random objects. Look around the room, choose something interesting you see, and recreate it in Photoshop.

2. Browse for inspiration. I regularly visit sites like Forrst, HackerNews, and Quora for different perspectives. I also like to look at peoples websites and portfolios. If they’re really good, you can learn from them. If they aren’t you can think about how you’d improve upon them. There are tons of places to search, just find sites that interest you. If you’re an app developer, feel free to stalk the app store, that’s what I do sometimes. As long as you don’t spend too much time browsing other people’s creations/ideas, I find it to be a valuable technique.

3. Forget about brainstorming. In my opinion, brainstorming is meant for expanding upon an existant idea, or a seed idea. If you just had a ‘brain blast’ for a great new product, that’s when you would brainstorm to expand upon that idea. But I’m stuck without any clue on what to work on next, I find that trying to think of an idea is least effective in giving me an idea. You’re much better off going outside for a walk and forgetting that you’re stuck.

4. Take a break, dive into other hobbies. I just mentioned it, but I’ll go into it with some more depth. Sometimes taking my mind off things works wonders. If you have any other hobbies, delve into them and have fun. You might encounter a problem while doing so and be motivated to solve it. After all, the best ideas would come from an area you are more experienced in.

5. Revise someone else’s idea. Sometimes you see a project that’s really cool and wish that you’d been the genius behind it. If there’s a problem or flaw you see in their approach, why not fix it? Sometimes we are put off from building certain ideas because “that’s already been done”. I’ve said it to myself a million times. We look at successful entrepreneurs and think of how amazing they are for making something new or original, but many times they’ve just taken a different approach to a problem that had already been tackled before. They just saw a better way to do it. If you’re really interested in a space and think you have what it takes to put something cool out there, don’t be deterred because something else is already there.

Hopefully some of these tips help you get back to building awesome stuff. If you think I’ve missed something- let me know!

Due to school and college applications, I haven’t had much time to post updates on my flipping experiment. However, I have still been making slow progress. I’m not going to list out all of the transactions here as I usually do, but I did sell the rest of the McCovey card lot, and acquired a vintage bicycle for free and spent $60 fixing it up.

I will be posting updates on this experiment at the end of each month, instead of each week. Rest assured, after this semester of school ends, I will have much more time to work on this project!

EDIT: I’m ending the flipping journal in order to focus on other projects. I’ll still be flipping every now and then, but I won’t be posting regular updates. You can check my progress here.

Third week of flipping is over, and it was a bit better than last.

SOLD:

1952 Bowman Enos Slaughter – $13.65 after eBay fees and shipping costs (sold for $15.50)

Matchless Clubman vintage motorcycle poster – $25

PURCHASED:

2011 Topps Tier-One Dimaggio bat relic /399  - $26

Schwinn Cruiser Extreme – $100

Happy to get rid of that motorcycle poster. It looked rally neat and all, but I’m trying to move some of the yard sale items. It seems the yard sale items get me a higher profit, but take much longer to sell. The ammo can is hopeless at the moment. I was really hoping to get $20 at the least, but I suppose I can put it down to $15 if nobody grabs it after I repost the ad one last time. The lunchbox is even more hopeless, I can’t ven get it to sell for a couple bucks. Maybe I’ll try and trade it for something else of slightly higher value. That would be a first for this experiment. As you can see, I did lose money on that 1952 baseball card. I thought it would sell for at least $20. Maybe I should have tried selling it on a card forum first- if it weren’t for the eBay fees, I would have broken even with a few pennies left over- which is much better than losing almost $2. I suppose the motorcycle poster made up for that loss, however, bringing in $21 profit! I picked up another card off of Blowout Cards Forum for I guy who needed PayPal. With all my bad luck with baseball cards, I don’t know why I keep on putting my money back into them. This DiMaggio card is really nice though, the Yankee market is huge, and it seems they are going for $35 on eBay. I might be able to make a few bucks. Maybe if the Yankees don’t screw up this ALCS the value will go up. I’ll list it as Buy It Now and wait for someone to make an offer. Another card I have listed is the Miguel Cabrera card. I said last week I hoped to get an offer this week, and I got two! One of them was too low, I might have broke even, and another might’ve made me $2 profit. This might be a good card to hold on to, but I need more cash for this experiment. I think it will go up in value over a long period of time, but I’m already sitting on the Jackie Robinson stuff, so I don’t want too much money tied up. I’ll see how well Cabrera and the tigers do in the postseason. If the move on to the World Series and possibly win it, then I’ll sell it. If the Yankees beat them in this series, I’ll sell it sooner and I’ll be happy that my team is moving on. Wow, this a long post. With as well as I’m doing with the bicycles, I decided to pick up a new-school Schwinn Cruiser, probably mid 90′s, for $100. It had new whitewall tires, but I switched them out for the red cruiser tires I had from another project, which I didn’t factor into the price, because I figure the tire sets were of equal value. They look great with the red brake cables that were stock on the bike. I cut off the black foam padding on the handlebars so you can see the nice chrome bars now, and using my eBay bucks (from all of my baseball car spending), I purchased a pair of comfy red handlebar grips. The bike looks sick! I figure I can net $199 max, but wouldn’t take less than $150, which is what I might get considering it’s the end of the season. After all of the selling and buying, my total is only $43.88. However, I figure the conservative value of my inventory is about $383. So I’ve done okay so far. Hopefully once I get my cash total up, I can buy some higher value items that will get me some better profit. I’d like my flipping to get a bit more consistent.

(note: I did buy a GT Outpost bicycle, but couldn’t include it because I didn’t have enough money from this experiment to do so. I bought it for $60. It will be listed in my bicycle flipping post once it sells!)

The second week of flipping is over, but was quite miserable.

SOLD:

1970 Topps #65 baseball card 1969 Home Run Leaders – $1.86 (card 1/15 from McCovey card lot)

Topps McCovey Sporting News baseball cards 1969 #416 1970 #450 – $2.72 (cards 2/15 and 3/15 from McCovey card lot)

PURCHASED (pictures coming soon):

3 comic books – Flash #136,137 JLoA #50 – $4

Once again, the prospective buyer of the ammo box is hard for communication. He reminded me he is interested in the box, but hasn’t replied to anything else. The sad thing is, he is the only one interested, so unless I want to lose money, I have to waste my time trying to bother him until he buys. Another flop this week has to do with those three comic books I bought. After looking at the craigslist ad, I matched the cover of one of the comics shown in the ad with a listing on eBay and soon found it was going for hundreds of dollars. I biked over quickly to snag the comic and two other for a small sum of $4. After arriving at home, I realized it was not the same issue. The covers looked nearly identical and anyone in rush, like myself, could easily have mistaken them. Now I’ll be lucky if I can find a way to make my money back. On the positive side, three of the fifteen Willie McCovey baseball cards I bought have sold, though the profit is small. After my experiences with baseball cards the past few weeks, I think it’ll be much more  efficient and rewarding to buy lots of higher end cards that I know will sell. To have to spend so much time listing these small value cards to make a dollar profit, if that, after shipping and fees is just not worth it. In addition the McCovey cards, I listed the Cabrera jersey card with a BIN price of $29. It already has one watcher, and as Cabrera has won the triple crown and will most likely bring his team to the ALCS, I’m almost positive someone will make an offer in the next week or two, hopefully above $23. I also have a few bicycles I’m looking to pick up, though at my current $ total, unless I can sell a ton of stuff in the next two days, I may only be able to include one of them in this experiment. Bicycles have made me good money from my experience with them (for the most part…), and they are fun to work with. Hopefully this week will be much better. Thanks for reading!

The first week of flipping is over, and I made a little progress.

SOLD:

1987 Schwinn World Sport Womens road bike – $125

Sector 9 longboard – $25

PURCHASED:

Lot of (3) movie posters (Batman Begins, War of the Worlds, Star Trek) – $0.75

1952 Bowman Enos Slaughter – $15

Matchless Clubman vintage motorcycle poster – $4

I had hoped to sell the ammo box, but the buyer won’t respond all of a sudden. That’s what I don’t like about Craigslist. So much spam, and even when you do get a buyer, the chances that they have intentions of actually going through with the purchase are not so great. I listed the McCovey and jersey baseball cards on eBay, so hopefully someone bids on them by next weekend. If not, I’ll relist them each for a dollar less. And if that doesn’t work, I’m going to have to rethink my baseball card flipping strategy. I’m not sure what to do with the lunchbox. I can hold onto it for another yard sale, or I can just try and sell it for $5 and make a $2 profit. I’m also not sure about the movie posters, but at least my risk is low, at a quarter under a buck-  the batman poster is pretty cool, I just have to find the right buyer, even though the profit will be small, though large relative to the investment. All the other items I am pretty confident about, I am just thinking I should aim to sell quick rather than tying up money in investments like the Jackie Robinson items. It may be good in the long term, but not when I need the money for this experiment to buy more stuff and grow. And seriously, if you’re taking the time to read all this, thank you, and I hope you find this enjoyable and/or useful.

I’d like to start a logbook/journal of everything I flip and see how far I can go. For those who don’t know, flipping is when you take buy something, sell it for more money, and have a nice profit. For this experiment, I think my main focus will be on baseball cards and bicycles, as I’ve demonstrated interest in both through my last two posts. However, I won’t limit myself to anything- I can flip stuff I find at yard sales or good deals on eBay, anything really, just as long as it will turn a profit. I think this will be fun, and hopefully I’ll have a bunch of money to put towards college (and more flipping!). The only rule is that I cannot invest anything more than what I start with.

I’ll start out with the following things that I bought with intentions of flipping anyway, just to get the ball rolling:

Lot of (15) 1960′s Willie McCovey Topps baseball cards – paid $15.12

Lot of (5) 2009/2010 Upper Deck jersey cards – paid $3.99

2012 Topps Triple Threads Miguel Cabrera MVP jersey card #34/36 – paid $15.73

Jackie Robinson business card – paid $10.95

1950 Sport Life Jackie Robinson magazine – paid $19

Topps 1955 Jackie Robinson baseball card – paid $59.05

Harry Potter Quidditch Cup TCG booster box (36 packs) – paid $18.50

Vietnam-Era 30 caliber ammo Box – paid $3

Dennis the Menace lunchbox – paid $3

Schwinn Women’s 17″ World Sport road bicycle – paid $70

Sector 9 Longboard – paid $0 (someone was throwing it out!)

So technically, I started with $218.34 worth of goods. I would have started with a lower amount just to make it more challenging, but I was planning in flipping these items anyway and would like to keep one definitive list of my flipping transactions. Let the flipping begin!

EDIT: Rather than having the whole log on this one post, I’m going to break it down into smaller update posts, just because this post would get way too long. For example, once I’ve had a few flips/transactions, I will make a post titled “Flipping Journal: Update #1″ and so on an so forth.

Recently I’ve regained interest in baseball cards. I had a Yard Sale last weekend (which was very successful) and I had my baseball/Pokemon/harry potter cards up for sale which I’ve collected. I sold a binder of baseball cards and a binder of Pokemon cards, and it wasn’t until after the sale that I regretted it. They were pieces of my childhood, and the Pokemon cards especially defined my childhood. But what’s done is done, and I can always buy some more on eBay and try to rebuild my collection.

As per the baseball cards however, I still have a ton left, and will hold on to them (though most of them are worthless 80′s cards because of the baseball card bubble).

I looked on eBay a few days ago and found that there are tons of lots of baseball cards up for grabs, but the ones that are the best values are the vintage cards. Cards from the 80′s and 90′s are worthless, but anything from the 70′s and back could be worth something. I started researching baseball cards on eBay, and other sites to see if it was possible to invest in baseball cards. It certainly is, as long as you know what you are doing. Going to Target or your local store and buying a pack of cards is a waste of money. Your chances or making a profit are slim to none, and even if you get an autograph or jersey card, sometime they are barely even worth the price you paid for the unopened pack.

So I’ve probably spent about $200 so far on eBay. The items I’ve purchased range from lots of vintage cards to Jackie Robinson memorabilia to modern day autograph/insert/jersey cards.

You may be thinking, goodness, this kid wants to get back into baseball cards and so he spends $200 on eBay? Baseball cards aren’t even popular anymore!

But like you always should, I did my research and I know what I’m getting into. I spent the past few days looking at completed auctions on eBay to see what certain cards were going for. I made sure that when I looked at an interesting lot of cards up for grabs, I looked at each card I could see and look up the going price for just that card alone. When I did that for as many cards as possible for that lot and added up the total (minus shipping and fees), I would have the estimated value of the lot if each card was sold individually. Then I would determine how much profit I thought would be reasonable based on the cards and the time and effort I would have to put into reselling them, and come up with a max price I would pay for the lot. The most important thing is to NOT go over this number. Although bidding is fun, you will end up wasting time and money and may just break even if you aren’t careful. In any regard I personally find it more exciting to scout different auctions on eBay and search for the best deal, not just bidding on the first one that seems good.

Now I have certainly bought a lot of cards, but none of them have been shipped to may yet- many of them will be arriving this week and into next week. Worst cases scenario, if all my cards spontaneously burst into flames, I’m out $200. But I will have gained experience, and learned a lesson. Otherwise, if I find selling them isn’t worth it, I will have a nice collection of baseball cards to keep/show off/hope they increase in value. But for the most part, based on my research, I will be able to turn a modest profit doing something interesting and fun.

As per reselling them, I could obviously resell them on eBay. The advantage to this is that many collectors scout eBay, so they will snatch up higher value cards. The disadvantage is that they know when a card is worth a lot less, even if it appears rare (such as a jersey or auto card). My plan to take advantage of this is to resell the higher value cards (worth > $10) on eBay, and then keep the lower value cards and sell them at yard sales, on Craigslist, or just keep in case the player suddenly becomes really popular. There are also a couple card shops and consignment shops nearby that might take them and sell them for me. This way instead of getting $1 per card for the auto/jersey cards of lesser known player, I might be able to fetch $5-$10 minus the shop’s percentage.

I also mentioned I picked up some Jackie Robinson memorabilia. Remember how I said it was possible to invest in baseball cards? For example, I am thinking about picking up a couple of Derek Jeter rookie cards. They are very expensive (some are nearly $100) but he is most certainly going to make the Hall of Fame and the prices of those cards will skyrocket. This morning I watched a trailer for the upcoming movie “42″ due out in April. It is basically the life story of Jackie Robinson and looks like it’s going to be a fantastic movie. Not only is the trailer super high quality, but the movie will have some big stars, including Harrison Ford. This means that the movie will have baseball fans and non-baseball fans interested. Upon watching the trailer, I thought it might be smart to invest in some Jackie Robinson items, with the hopes that value will increase around the time of the movie release. More interest in Jackie Robinson means higher prices, and this movie looks like it’s going to garner some huge interest in Jackie Robinson. Most importantly, the trailer is just a few days old, so prices for Robinson items haven’t gone up yet, meaning I got decent deals. I bought a 1955 Jackie Robinson baseball card in good condition for $60. I bought a 1950 magazine featuring Jackie on the front for $15 and I paid $11 for a mint condition original Jackie Robinson business card. I may not hit it big with any of these items, but I’m hoping that I can double my money.

I’m not sure how many of you are interested in baseball cards, but if you aren’t this same tactic could be put to use for any multitude of items. There are a ton of general ideas here that can bring you profit if you resell/invest smartly. Here’s a more general outline of what I’ve said that can be applied to different products/interests:

(1) Buy in bulk and sell for profit. The larger the quantity, the cheaper the price per item, and therefore higher profit margins. However, if you invest in a risky product, higher quantity will give you more risk. Nevertheless, “no risk, no reward”.

(2) Read the news, study trends (google.com/trends works wonders) and research when an item will have the highest amount of interest. Inversely, find when it will have the least. Buy the product during this time. Optimizing these times will make you the most money, but it will also take more time and research. Seasonal items are a great, simple example – buy Halloween costumes after halloween and through the rest of the year, and then sell them in September and October.

(3) Invest in something that interests you. For example, baseball cards are something I am interested in at the moment. For as long as I have fun and can make a decent amount of money relative to amount of time I spend, I will continue flipping cards for profit. However, I have other interests that will be more profitable, so I will reserve time for those as well. The key here is to enjoy what you are doing. Don’t try and flip surfboards if you are afraid of the water; don’t try and flip cars if you don’t know how to work on cars.

(4) Consider if it’s practical. Baseball cards are easy to sell in terms of process- they are small and can easily fit in an envelope. I might need to insure more expensive cards, but otherwise it will take relatively little time to ship out cards. This is great because I still have school to worry about and I especially hate spending lots of time and money shipping larger items. That said, if you can get a bunch of perfectly sized boxes and perfect the shipping process down to a science (which is entirely possible), go for it! Just don’t start trying to sell surfboards on eBay if you’ve never shipped anything before in your life. It will be a nightmare.

(5) I thought it would be really nice to have 5 tips, but I managed to pack it into four. Therefore, leave a comment down below if you have an idea or suggestion for tip #5!

While I’m currently working on a secret project ( a.k.a. my startup), I’ve been thinking of pursuing another venture to have fun and make a little extra cash.

I’ve always liked the idea of flipping things for profit, whether it be Pokemon Cards or Websites. Recently I’ve taken an interest in vintage bicycles, although I don’t own any myself. I’m not sure where it can from, possibly just my love for all things retro and vintage mixed with an interest in bicycles.

After some thinking, I’ve come to the conclusion that it could be fun and profitable to refinish and customize vintage bikes and then sell them in my local area. I don’t have an official business plan, but I think I’ll start by restoring one for myself and then continue from there if that goes well.

I figure the following are a few key points:

- Stick to vintage bikes, nothing modern, Otherwise I won’t have fun restoring it and the profit will be wimpy or nonexistent.

- Be creative. I’d rather not splurge on customizing a bike if the ROI won’t be good, but if I think the bike is special and deserves it, it would be really neat to put on some fancy handlebars or seats. Otherwise, I can get most creative with paint. I wouldn’t ruin original paint if it’s in great condition and adds value to the bike, but I figure the crazier I can get with the colors and designs, the more unique the bikes will be, and the more money I’ll get for them.

- Advertise right! I can post ads on craigslist of course, but I can also see if I can post flyers near the bike path down the block. There are tons of people that ride bicycles on the path every day, and the exposure would be very beneficial. Even better, once I finish working on the first bike, I can ride it along the path, and/or park it on the side with a for sale sign. Great publicity! I’ll just have to check that I’m allowed to do that. I can also display the bikes unfelt of my house (I live on a busy road) although I have to make sure they don’t get stolen.

Buy cheap, save money to fix up the bike. After looking on Craigslist, I found a ton if great vintage bikes, but the prices were quite high. Unless I can shimmy down the prices for a few, I might have to start searching at yard sales or Good Will. Unlucky for me, there don’t seem to be any yard sales nearby soon…

Transportation is probably the biggest issue. Most if the bikes I found on Craigslist were 40 minute bike rides away, and unless I can get a parent to drive me, riding my bike there would be necessary, because I don’t have a car myself. Otherwise I walk there and ride the bike back, but if its rusted and needs work, that would be quite difficult. I’ll have to think this over…

UPDATE: I’m going to be regularly updating the list below with the bikes I’ve bought/sold.
1964 Schwinn Typhoon — bought for $80, currently restoring it, painted white, new seat, red tires, hoping to sell for $250
–> Typhoon Update: fork stuck in frame for good, selling AS IS or just keeping the parts…
Bianchi Bici II Road Bike –> bought for $30, sold at yard sale for $50
1987 Schwinn World Sport — bought for $70, sold on Craigslist for $125
Schwinn Cruiser Extreme — bought for $100, put on new red grips and red tires, hope to sell for $190
GT Outpost All Terra — bought for $60, wheels need truing, hope to sell for $125

I meant to write this post during the summer, but I never really got the chance. This past summer, I decided to start building a mountain bike trail in some unused woods down the road from our home in Pennsylvania. Mainly because riding on the gravel roads around our home is tough, not because they’re rugged, but because you can barely go 15 seconds without having to pedal up a relatively steep hill. Building a track in the woods would mean not only less of that, but more technical riding where I could get creative. I spent about a week total on the trail, and while it came out pretty nice, I realized two things. One, you need to spend a lot more time than a week if you are just one person and a shovel, otherwise the trail will never be lengthy enough to enjoy without going back and forth repetitively. And two, building trails is not as easy as it might seem. I found over the course of the project that the best time to work on the trail was early in the morning or in the evening , or even better- after a rainfall- when the ground is moist and easy to sculpt. Unfortunately with a moist forest environment comes a ton of bugs, in quantities that would make a can of bug spray useless. However, The 250 feet or so of track that I did build came out quite nice. If the forest floor had fewer roots and better dirt, I might have been able to make a longer trail, but it was still fun anyway.

a new place to ride my mountain bike!

The trail starts by leading through some mud and woodchips, and dips across a narrow creek (yes, through the water!), over a collection of stones, and the down a little ways running along a dryer up creek bed. After it turns across the creek bed, it winds in between some tree trunks, and after a sharp turn lined with logs and branches, leads into the final section containing a little mound that’s more of a bump than something to jump off of. Whilst it takes only about a minute to complete on my mountain bike, it turned out to be much nicer while riding my pit bike. The trail I built ends in the middle of the forest, and while the mountain bike couldn’t handle anything not groomed and cleaned like the trail I built, the pit bike has the power to endeavor outside of the trail, over logs, on top of rocks and up steep hills.

It might not match up to a trail found at mountain bike park, my trail was fun to work on, still can be worked on further, and most importantly , gave me