Christopher V. Flett

We started Campus CEO on Monday night. We have 25-30 gals out for it. We did an overview of the program, discussed misconceptions people have about starting a business, and what it takes (generally) to make big things happen as an entrepreneur. I got about a dozen emails from ladies who weren’t able to make the intake but want to be part of the program. We’ll be welcoming them to the first session next Tuesday. Overall, I’m really excited how this is coming together. There isn’t anything like this being offered. Granted other universities have business incubators, and business speakers, but this is the ‘down and dirty’ on getting a profit model going. I wish I had something like this when I was contemplating life as a McDonald’s manager, or whatever else an Arts degree offers.

Now on to saving more money this year. All the cell phone companies have $40 dollar plans where you can buy an ‘internet stick’ to surf the internet anywhere you can get a phone call. This is cool, but playing with one, they are slow and…$500 a year in fees. So I’ve been using Starbucks for free internet. If you register your starbucks card, you get 2 hours a day. Most days I don’t use it, but sometimes I run out of time. With the sheer number of coffee shops with free wifi, this might not be a problem, but if you are in the middle of getting shit done, you don’t want to pay $10 for 24 hours of access if you only need 15 more minutes. I should add that this works in both Canada and the US.

So….I finally had an idea. What if I got another $5.00 coffee card, registered it with a different email address. Would I get another 2 hours? Yes. Yes I did. As long as you have a balance on the card, you get 2 hours a day. If you register a second card under your same account as the first, you don’t get two, so you need to different email addresses. With Gmail, this isn’t an issue. You work on one, run out of time, sign in with your second and you are good to go. If you are doing more than 4 hours a day, you have to go to rehab.

If for some reason you are somewhere without a Starbucks (timbuctoo?) then check out these sites to find locations that offer free while you are in the neighbourhood:

http://www.wififreespot.com/can.html

http://www.yelp.ca/search?find_desc=free+wifi&find_loc=Vancouver%2C+BC (Yelp is one of my favorite resources for finding good restaurants, but a friend put me on to using it to find free wifi)

This year, 14,000 McDonald’s in the US are going to be offering free WiFi.

Remember that isn’t only the money you make, but the money you keep that matters.