Books
- The Lean Startup (Eric Ries) – if you have not read this yet, please do so immediately. I will wait. Ok, all done? This book will solidify the idea of minimum viable product, iterative development, and the concept of solving business problems.
- O’Reilly Media – this is not a book per se, but it is consistently the best provider of technical and business books that I have found. They tend to have very little filler and a lot of useful content. All of my dead-tree reference books that I use to have on my desk while programming were O’Reilly ones.
Podcast
- Startups for the rest of us – Rob and Mike provide weekly doses of great, pragmatic startup advice.
- Connect, Engage and Inspire – Danny Ivy runs Firepole Marketing, a business that focuses on building audiences and providing online marketing help and understanding. This is a great podcast for the business side – for understanding what and who your audience is, how to reach them, and how best to monetize your services and products.
- Silver Bullet podcast – from Gary McGraw at Cigital, this monthly podcasts focuses on current and emerging trends in IT security and governance.
Software/Web Applications
- Apache foundation – this is the main site for the Apache software foundation. It encompasses a large degree of software applications that can run an entire business, with minimal other applications.
- Microsoft – home of the Windows operating system. Of interest to startups and small business will be the BizSpark site, which provides access to the various pieces of Microsoft technology stack at a very reasonable price for a small period of time
- Apple – home of the Mac, iPad, iPod, and iPhone. Using the recent Mac laptops is a great way for a startup to get access to the command-line with a great user experience.
- Linux – there is no one link for Linux; one of my favorites is www.linux.org. My favorite distro is Ubuntu
There are a large number of links that I visit and/or use on a regular basis.
IT Security Organizations
- (ISC)2 – home of the CISSP certification
- ISACA – home of the CISM certification
- SANS – one of the best security education sites available
IT Security Blogs
- Bobbear – ugly site that has a comprehensive list of money laundering and reshipping scam domains
Writing
- CopyBlogger – of inestimable value in creating, planning and writing market copy
- Professional Writer’s Association of Canada – very useful professional organization
- Rates for writer’s activities in Canada from the PWAC professional writer’s association
Project management
- PMI – the project management institute, home of the PMP certification
Freelancing
- Freelance Switch – a great site for information about freelancing, by freelancers for freelancers