I have hatched as many as five grand plans whilst scorching my shirts, yet few come into fruition. This, as you are about to discover, is a very good thing. What follows are two mad business ideas I dreamt up, pursued for a while, and promptly abandoned. I share them because I believe that airing your failures is more important than polishing your trophy cabinet.

eWoks: cookware for the Star Wars generation

Who said that selling cookware couldn't be an adorable business venture? My plan involved selling quality woks online by drop shipping them from a German manufacturer. I had drafted the identity and mapped out the logistics when I approached a solicitor to check some minor points:

'You'd get away with calling it eWoks so long as you avoid any mention of Star Wars,' he said. 'But that packaging with the furry ears is pushing your luck.'

I'd spent two weeks in fits of giggles designing the packaging. On top of a plasticard hoop that surrounded each wok, two ears would be punch cut, scored, and folded to stand up. Each ear would be covered with a furry slip. Were I to pitch my eWoks to a department store, they would stand out on the shelves as an army of delightful creatures appealing to be carried home.

Hearing that my design might land me in hot water, I did what any self-respecting entrepreneur would do: I approached a sexy London packaging firm to produce a prototype. They, too, thought the concept both charming and ridiculous, and were happy to provide me with an estimate to produce my idea in bulk. Sadly, the cost of my furry wraps would be three times the price of the woks themselves. I was devastated.

One week later, I was losing sleep over the legal issues again. I dreamt that George Lucas, on a visit to the UK, had walked into Selfridges to buy an onion¹ only to see 40 of my eWoks on a stand, each one pleading with him not to overreact. He'd taken out a mobile phone and made two calls: first to his legal team and then to a Jedi Knight, whose instructions were to 'make it look like a nasty accident with a Wii remote'. This was the wake up call I needed.

I considered other branding ideas², but wasn't willing to drop the eWoks name or license it from George and his onion -- it would have taken the fun out of the whole thing for me -- and I reluctantly abandoned my dream of making gimmicky cookware for good.

NaviCart: GPS for shopping trolleys

Ever spent 30 minutes in a new supermarket trying to find maple syrup? You're not alone. I thought that bringing turn-by-turn navigation to the shopping trolley was a great idea, but not everyone shared my enthusiasm.

'How would it make money?' said one family member I entrusted the concept to.

My thinking was that supermarkets would pay me to fit customised GPS units to a percentage of their trolleys, collect the data in a central command unit, and help to rearrange their stores to make more sales, all while enabling customers to find that elusive ingredient.

The idea began to droop when I discovered that global positioning technology is accurate to within 15 metres or so, and that it rarely works indoors. Telling people they're between six and 40 aisles from the chocolate ice cream doesn't hold much appeal. What's more, it occured to me that the wobbly wheel effect might produce plotted journey data that looked like a minor earth tremor at a Spirograph convention.

Confident I could overcome these tiny flaws, I contacted a senior manager at a British supermarket chain, whose attention I secured by telling his assistant that I'd discovered a major bug in their online grocery site that had allowed me to order 12,000 pork pies without paying for them.³ To my delight, I was put through straight away.

The store manager pointed out that attaching expensive GPS devices to shopping trolleys -- which he cruelly dubbed 'getaway vehicles' -- represented a considerable security risk, and that his customers, loyal patrons all, would swipe the lot before lunchtime. I countered that when they inevitably did, at least we would know where they'd taken them.

In reference to my suggestion that he might improve sales by better understanding his customers' habits, he said that they employ discreet teams of undercover people watchers whose job it is to determine how customers move through the store; they also do things like timing purchase decisions with a stopwatch, he boasted. I found the news creepy,⁴ but commended him for going to great lengths to collect data at the expense of a little thing like his customers' rights to privacy, and that -- for this reason alone -- my NaviCarts might be right up his aisle.

Finally, I mentioned that my turn-by-turn trolleys would be a useful service for his customers. He countered that every one of his 'team members' are trained to know the location of all items in his store. He recommended I stopped to ask one of them so I could see how helpful they were. 'Try something obscure,' he said. 'You'll be surprised.' The following weekend, I did just that.

'Excuse me,' I began. 'Could you direct me to your y-shaped coaxial splitters?' To my horror, the reply came back without so much as a puzzled look:

'Follow me!' said a helpful team member, who ended each sentence with an exclamation mark. 'They're in aisle three! Opposite the sat navs!'

I've abandoned close to a hundred concepts like these. My advice to anyone who's full of ideas is to keep having them, exploring them, and going back to the ironing board when you must. But, for goodness sakes, be sure to follow through with one or two. Someone out there's mad enough to buy into your daft idea: water wings for poorly ducks, perhaps, or -- might I suggest -- an ironing board with an area for notes.

"Don't tell me you’re starting a bloody rock band."

I told her I’d defected to the guitar because it doesn’t have a nine-inch steel spike in one end, a missing fret board, or a sad role in a Bond movie where Timothy Dalton uses a £1.4m Stradivarius to steer a makeshift toboggan. The truth is this: the Cello got tough at around grade six, so I switched to an instrument that any talentless shitbag can play.

I have always been fickle: flitting between phases for more than 20 years; purchasing the most expensive thingamijig to pursue each new craft; being careful not to startle those close to me by using it more than once. Imagine my delight, then, to hear Ira Glass attest to the importance of giving things up:

"Not enough gets said about the importance of abandoning crap."

In a must-see clip¹ produced by current.tv, Glass sheds light on the process of creating remarkable things. Turns out it's a tip of the iceberg equation: his greatest work -- the stuff that airs -- only exists because he abandons over half of everything he starts. How refreshing it is to hear a long-time hero admit that their successes are little more than lucky ducks bobbing in a sea of abandoned crap. How I wish that part-time action hero Seth Godin² had written The Book about quitting 20 years ago.

In the Dip³ -- a short book about ‘the extraordinary benefits of knowing when to quit (and when to stick)’ -- Godin puts it this way:

Quitting is difficult. Quitting requires you to acknowledge that you’re never going to be #1 in the world. At least not at this. So it’s easier just to put it off, not admit it, settle for mediocre. What a waste.

Abandoning your dwindling hobby, business, relationship, blog, or other pursuit is tricky. Sometimes, though, giving up can be exactly the right thing to do. The thing to take-away from Glass and Godin is this: killing a failing project isn't an act of destruction -- it's a powerful creative force:

“It’s time to kill and it's time to enjoy the killing because, by killing, you will make something else even better live.” ~Ira Glass

And that, for me, is the key. Anyone can make something. But to make something great, you have to find the courage to ditch the things dribbling along at half-past average. I've spent the last few years juggling projects and hobbies, abandoning a few to let others shine. It hurts to give up, but I know that my small successes wouldn't have happened otherwise. Sometimes, the right thing to do is to move on and not hang on.⁴

Abandon your crap. You'll be amazed at what thrives in its place.

A new look

I've redesigned Put Things Off to make it more readable, usable, and enjoyable. The new design includes some daring changes: I've removed the site's header completely from all subpages to let the content speak out, for example, and typeset each post title by hand in a striking display font. I've also unified the look and position of the illustrations, made it easier to move between posts, and given articles a handy summary beneath each header.¹

I hope the new design feels more like leafing through a magazine than it does trawling through a website, and that the art direction looks more cohesive and considered than before. I've been back and edited a lot of the old posts to fall in with the new style too — you can find them listed in the new articles index.

A shift away from productivity

Since starting this site I've had a steady stream of requests from kind people who've asked to read 'other stuff from you that isn't about productivity'. I've slowly come to the conclusion that few people with a balanced lifestyle care enough about being productive to read a site about productivity, so I'll be dropping the theme that once tenuously linked my posts. The good news is that you probably won't notice the difference, because it's always been a little wacky anyway.

A move away from blogging

I dropped the word 'blog' from the subtitle too, and now think of Put Things Off not as a blog but simply as a website, and myself as a writer and not a blogger. The difference is small but important.

I've turned comments off² and abandoned all calls to promote my posts via Twitter, Digg, or MyFace.³ I've dropped the splattering of banner ads that littered my sidebar (also gone) and placed a single rotating ad at the foot of all pages instead. I think it's made the place a lot smarter already.

But the real reason I've abandoned the blog format and blogger moniker is this: I feel that they often hurt site authors more than they help them. You can read more about my thoughts in Rise of the Tablog.

Short URLs to share

The intellectually astute among you will notice that every post in the new site features a tiny link in the top right. These short links, constructed by Nepalese beavers and chewed to within an inch of their lives, are there to aid you in sharing my drivel should you find yourself moderately inebriated on a lonely Friday evening with nothing better to do.

New subscription options

Email subscribers will now receive a monthly summary of posts in a fresh new format that looks more like the updated blog design. I'm using MailChimp to deliver email updates to you and Mint to gather statistics.

Twitterers can now follow @putthingsoff to get new post notifications. I'll no longer be tweeting about new articles and stories via my personal account, @nickcernis, unless they're impossibly brilliant.

What's coming next

I've written a horde of new articles, and am seven eighths of my way through a short story titled "Total Recall" and subtitled "A short story about Eddie, the goldfish with a photographic memory and a remarkable gift." I'll be drip-feeding these soon.

A big thank you

All that remains is for me to say thank you. Thank you for sticking around despite the long gaps between my posts. Thanks also for stomaching my occasional rants. And thank you for supporting my various side-projects. Most of all, though, thanks for pretending that you care as much about my little site as I do. Please check out the homepage if you haven't already. I welcome your thoughts as ever, which you can send to me on the new contact page.

Such healthy disrespect for all things buzzing is what keeps me alive, despite a niggling urge to try cleaning our blender in the bath; I have a long-standing theory that electricity and water would mix just fine if you did it fast enough. It may surprise you, then, that I've liquidised my scruples by doing what everyone in my position fears will one day come to pass: I've bought an iPhone.

Even as a part-reformed nerd who's wary of getting suckered by hard tech once more, it's impossible to watch one of those Apple ads without stopping to consider whether, this time, the New Thing, this Holy Grail amongst handheld thingamibobs, this Golden Apple in an otherwise rotten bunch, could finally be The One: The One that proves that tech can be fun instead of faulted. The One that makes you thank your sock drawer full of discarded shiteboxes for leading you to this moment. The One that changes everything. The One that doesn't disappoint quite as eagerly as a Hugh Grant film.

Advertising works

Perhaps you have noticed an iPhone billboard and paused to admire the object in its svelte, come-hither casing, designed in California, land of sun and sand, but made in China, land of pandas, pork ribs, and exciting retail opportunities.

Or, worse still, maybe you've visited an Apple store and been wooed by the sheer theatre of it all: the almost irritatingly helpful yet never knowingly attractive sales people; the array of over-polished products on small marble pedestals; the hallowed Genius Bar; the gathering hordes updating their FaceSpace accounts. Perhaps, at the exact moment you noticed that the staircase is fashioned entirely from glass and floating on the sighs of angels, you uttered the same question I did:

Will this bingling box of crap you're trying to flog me solve any of my troubles?

Well, after many months with mine, I'm delighted to tell you that it's solved so many of my problems that I've started trawling the App Store in search of new ones.¹

The verdict

The iPhone is the first unnecessary overpriced pocketbox I've owned that lives up to more than 14% of the lies I was sold. Not only is it far easier to use than the crap I've been tricked into buying before, but it's one of the few gadgets that answers everyday questions. Questions like "What's the capital of Narnia?", or "Where did we park the golf buggy?", or "What's that terrible music?", or "What can I throw at a civic leader that isn't a shoe?"

And that's before you start downloading apps. You'll soon find one for everything. There's an app that lets you take photos of a book jacket, then check to see if it's cheaper on Amazon to aid in the demise of your local bookstore. Another tells you where your nearest payphone is, in case you need to seek shelter during a hailstorm.

Others can be quite useful -- take the National Rail one, for instance, which tells those of us in the UK where our nearest station is via GPS, what time the next train home is supposed to arrive, and how many minutes after that it will be at the platform.

The mobile revolution

So, I've started to realise that there's little point in resisting. The mobile revolution is here, and it's time to make a half-arsed effort and pretend we're on board. Paper, while I shall always cling to it lovingly, is being left behind. What's more, so is conventional desktop computing.

The mobile phone is gradually overlapping the realm of the desktop and laptop. Not enough to replace them entirely just yet – maybe not ever – but enough that there is now a growing generation who access the internet exclusively by cell phone; a generation who may never experience the Web on a big screen.²

The next big thing

More exciting still is the latest update, iPhone OS 3.0, which promises to connect willing goons with even more costly gadgets in ways they've never experienced and probably don't feel entirely comfortable with. On the plus side it means, for example, that you could control your bluetooth-enabled microwave using your iPhone from a separate room where it's safer. Better still, it means that the phone can do genuinely useful things, like monitor a diabetic's blood sugar level and alert her parents by text message should the fruit of their loins rapidly consume 16 Snickers bars to spite them.

It also has some more sinister implications in the realms of national security. Starting today, various inebriated world leaders will be launching nuclear missiles via iPhone with a dedicated interface that looks every bit as menacing as the closing scene from Wargames.

Crawl out from your caves

And so, my hope in writing this is to persuade the many waverers and outwardly tech averse to join me by crawling from your caves and giving this exciting new wave of gizmos a go. It's safe to come out now, I promise. The iPhone's slowly changing the way I feel about gadgets for the better, and I think it could do the same for you.

And, even if you don't fancy one, I hope you'll agree to join in by feigning excitement at the possibilities up ahead -- even if, like me, you will always carry a pencil.

When paid content became free and easy to access, ad revenue dropped like a shrink wrapped goose in a hailstorm. Ask the average blogger how much they make by giving their content away. Then ask your local newspaper editor the same. Both will sheepishly display their net worth: some crusty epidermis from the pit of their belly buttons topped with an economy-sized serving of Polyblend.

Change is in the air

Small independent content creators who long to write for profit as well as pleasure are slowly coming to the same conclusion as big publications: to build a healthy business with their slaved-over content, they need to start selling some of it. Sadly, there are two cracks in this otherwise rose-tinted dream:

1. It's tough to set up a paid subscription service.
2. It's even harder to get people to subscribe.

Faced with the reality that most readers would rather take up the French Horn than pay a monthly subscription for stuff that was once free, many bloggers and corporations are falling back on two tried-and-tested models:

1. The advertising model
2. The cross-selling model

Sure enough, some have found success with these, but there's a different and much underused way to make money with content that I'd like to air today. It's one I've been considering myself, and that I think could prove to be a great option for you too.

The truth about earning a living online

The reality is this: while many people are building profitable businesses by leveraging their content, hardly anyone is profiting directly from the content itself. To me, that's a real shame. More importantly than that, though:

Traditional online business models force a conflict of interest: they must accommodate advertisers and spin-off product offers whilst attracting visitors who care about neither.

If you don't think that building a business around your output instead of with it is odd, stop and think for a second. If you go to Apple's site today, they'll sell you a Mac. If you visit John Varvatos, they'll sell you a suit. If you go to Hotel Chocolat, they'll sell you their fancy choccies. Then visit The Guardian, who'll happily give you all their output for free and then try to flog you a solar powered torch.

When it gets really silly

Weirder still are the sites that try to flog you a metaproduct from the top shelf of the Irony Store: Brian Clark sells a course about selling courses; Alexis Dawes sells an ebook about how to sell ebooks; Yaro Starak makes money online by selling access to a site that teaches you how to make money online; I even have the audacity to sell you a book about paper trumping technology that's only available as an electronic download.

It's pretty harmless to poke fun at these things, but -- in truth -- leveraging your content to draw an income through other products and services is probably the best option available to anyone hoping to build an online business right now, which is why we're all trying it. If only there was another way...

The other way

Isn't it time that people in the business of content creation started selling content? I'd like to see online publishers building businesses with their content – not on the back of it. I have a lot of respect for any online publisher who can make a living using the regular models, but I can't help wonder: Why not just sell some of the content that people are already coming to your site to read or download?

The new model: micropayments

The new model is simple. Continue to provide free content just as you are, but sell your more unique content for a small one-off fee or 'micropayment'. You choose what you sell, your audience still gets a stream of free stuff, plus they get to support you by buying paid content if it's relevant to them. Hopefully, everyone wins. With me so far? Read on to learn how to make it work.

Hang on! Does micropaid content as a business model work?

Sure! The truth is that it's already catching on fast. Micropayment is the same concept that's rapidly turning Apple's App Store into a billion dollar business,² and it's been trickling down to other forms of content for a while.

A great case in point is Peepcode, which sells video and PDF tutorials for programmers at $9 a shot. They've chosen to only market paid content, but I think it's a model that would work well with free content mixed in too.

How do you sell content online?

There are a wealth of services that will help you sell downloadable goods online and automatically deliver them to your customers. You'll need a bit of patience to set something up, but once you do, it's usually plain sailing. Here are a few worth exploring:

1. E-junkie offers a cheap, standalone service that includes an affiliate scheme, anti-fraud measures and automated delivery.³
2. Shopify lets you list electronic goods, and Fetch can help you to distribute them automatically.
3. Magento is a powerful open source e-commerce solution that lets you sell electronic downloads and much more.
4. Shopp for WordPress is a beautiful option that's designed to be quick and easy to setup and manage.
5. WP e-Commerce for WordPress is a popular solution that offers electronic downloads, though I've not tried this one myself.⁴

The bad news is that selling downloadable goods is still much harder than it needs to be to become ubiquitous. The good news is that, with more people taking an interest in selling files online, I think we'll start to see other solutions emerge soon. (If you use and love a different one, feel free to add a note in the comments.)

What might a micropaid content site look like?

You're reading one right now. Check out the Put Things Off homepage to see how I've tried to cleanly split free and paid content. The mindset I adopted when redesigning my site for a micropayment model was to start thinking of it as a business instead of a blog; I removed the usual clutter you see on popular blogs and pushed the content to the forefront, then charged for some of it. It's been working well so far.

What's in it for you?

• Potential to earn more;
• Spend more time writing;
• Fewer (or zero) ads;
• A stronger bond with your readers;
• You're helping to cultivate a content economy.

What's in it for your readers?

• No subscription fees;
• Fewer (or zero) ads;
• They pay for the valuable content they choose;
• They're helping you to build and improve your site;
• The warm fuzzy feeling that they've made your day by supporting you.

Isn't there a chance that some of my readers will go elsewhere?

Sure. It will probably happen. Kevin Kelly argues that you only need 1,000 true fans to build a business, and I think he's right.

Some of your audience won't want to pay for stuff, and there's nothing wrong with that. As long as you can build a core fan base who truly value your output, you'll do OK by selling content.

Isn't the Web supposed to be about free content?

It's a lovely myth, isn't it? Turns out that Ted Nelson, who invented hypertext in the 1960s to link Web pages, originally intended them as a way to take micropayments for content.⁵

I believe that paid content and free content can peacefully co-exist online -- the answer isn't to adopt an all or nothing business model. As such, I'm not proposing an end to all free content. Just some of it.

What about search engines?

Some people will be put off by protecting content because they'll lose search traffic that they might have got. My advice is not to worry about it too much. Just provide a summary of your paid content openly in a dedicated page about that product.

Besides, search engines have been piggybacking your free content to make money for years.

What type of content sells best?

From my experience so far, the content that people will pay for falls into one of these categories:

• It solves a problem. (How-to guides, tutorials, screencasts, video info...)
• It entertains. (Music, poetry, short stories, novellas...)
• It provides current, valuable, inside information. (Reports, survey data, tips...)
• It helps people to make money. (Without being too trashy.)
• It makes people look better in the eyes of their peers or customers. (Project management web apps, for example.)

How much should I charge?

Tailor the figure to your audience. If you're selling short stories via the iPhone App Store, you might struggle to charge more than about £1 per copy. If you're Tim O'Reilly and you're selling targeted PDF reports from an established and well-respected platform, you can comfortably command $399 a copy.

How do I get people to buy my stuff?

Provide something of value. Then simply ask them. Failing that:

• Limit the number of steps between page load and checkout.
• Try not to force people into cost-value decisions with multiple purchase options.
• Highlight your paid content in a site-wide sidebar and page footer as well as on your homepage. Many of your visitors will arrive at your subpages first, and a lot of them will never see your homepage.
• Give people something to take away -- downloads are probably better bets than selling access to content with passwords and logins.

Closing thoughts

Of course, there's no great harm in continuing to develop your own products and services and sell them alongside your free content, ((Read as: I'll probably flog you more of my crap before the year ends. )) but I think there's a strong case for building an economy based on content too.

If Joel Comm can sell over 39,000 copies of his iFart application in one day,⁶ there must be some hope for the rest of us.

Charts are everywhere these days, and few of them do us much good. But the most abominable thing about charts is this: creating a good one when you need some quality document padding in a hurry is impossible. Like me, you probably spent years scribbling all manner of pointless line graphs and bar art at school, but you'll now find it tough to rule two lines, plot some points, and stick a best-fit curve through the whole merry lot without making it look like a car crash in flatland.

And so, without further ado or feeble trumpeting, I've created a bunch of mostly useless graphs, charts, and slightly sideways document fillers for you to employ in your own tedious reports, essays, and other dull grey nonsense. I hope that they prove both useful and serve to highlight the cosmic pointlessness of writing cabinet padding that no-one will act on anyway.

The emergency stick a chart in it kit

Nobody looks at these things closely, so feel free to use them wherever you like. Bonus points for getting all of them into one report without a) getting fired or b) running out of cyan ink.

Good customer service trickles from the shiny sales people and free coffee right down to the bathroom floor, suspicious puddles and all. And, while many will be tempted to cut costs by downgrading or neglecting to replenish such minutiae as toilet paper in these troubled times, my hope is that the following exposé on loo roll horrors will deter you, lest we all have to carry a monstrous arse rash in addition to our other varied troubles.

Oh, and yes – there is some advice at the end of all this nonsense, in case you thought I'd misplaced the brighter half of my antique spoon collection.

So called because it doubles as an emergency kit should a tradesperson misplace a tool of their craft; a belt sander or electric buzz saw, for example.

Pubs normally use this to encourage you to hold it in until you get home. Sadly, the tactic's becoming more popular at other venues too.

Closely related to The Builder's Friend, The Carpenter is a slightly refined version that's perfect for smoothing paint between coats. You'll find it in public libraries to discourage people from reading on the loo.

The king of false economies, economy paper is based on the idiotic notion that dispensing sheets in ultra-thin single ply units will use less material overall. Instead, the companies who use this thrice-cursed roll have outsourced the labour of toilet paper manufacture to their customers by providing you with the raw materials to make your own.

Faced with the sad notion of having to assemble your own bog roll, you'll happily take three more sheets than you need just to spite the cheap bastards, which only serves to augment their exercise in futility.

There isn't even a holder there, let alone any loo roll. As you frantically wave your arms around hoping for a solution to appear by the same witchcraft that powers those new fangled flushers, you'll realize that this company couldn't give two shits about you. Which is lucky, because you're in enough of a quandry as it is.

The previous occupant was the type who leaves the final biscuit in the packet because they think it makes scoffing the previous 19 perfectly acceptable. As such, there's just enough paper on the roll for you to carry out your business, but not enough to make any mistakes.

This reeks of bad washroom management. If the company can't cope with basic hygiene, I dread to think what else was in that burger you just ate.

Ah, The Quilted! Possibly the only thing on Earth that makes it worthwhile eating bran flakes. Pure bliss on a roll, and the choice of bears everywhere. This belongs in a separate list away from the horrors, but I include it here for balance. And because I don't intend to write about toilet paper ever again.

You can see a huge roll of blue paper in a fat perspex box, but you'll be a llama farmer before you can get at it. You've tried everything you can think of but it's practically caged in. Just when you were about to give up and use your left hand, the infernal contraption snaps open and drops the entire 50 metre roll into a puddle on the floor.

To business owners worldwide: if you must buy oversized rolls in bulk to cut costs and reduce maintenance, at least make sure the giant dispensers they require were designed to serve loo roll, and not to prevent lizards from escaping at high security zoos.

It may surprise you to learn that the toilet paper in British private schools is atrocious. This, of course, is by design: nothing quite prepares young minds for the harsh realities of adult life like attempting to mop your bott with tree bark nailed to paper. I've only ever seen this stuff in one other establishment, which went out of business last year. Enough said.

The message in this madness

The moral is a simple one: think twice before you cut the small stuff.

Think you can drop your advertising budget to save some cash? Think again. You might not notice it after the first month's sales, but it will hit you around month three. I know this first hand.

Think you can stop innovating and just coast along with your existing products and services? Maybe. But don't expect to be able to hold your position in the next downturn. Apple increased their spending on research and development in the previous recession. The outcome? The iPod.

Think you can swap your luxury loo roll for a strip of Builder's Friend? For the love of bottoms everywhere, think again. A friend confessed to me that she never goes back to a local restaurant because "the loo roll they use is naaaasty". I asked her what the food was like: "oh, it was great -- I'd go every week if they did takeaway". Lesson learned: when it comes to repeat business, bums trump tums every time. Insert your own joke about bottom lines here.

So what do you cut out?

Cut stuff that your customers won't notice first. Then - and only then - cut the rest. Every business will be different, but there's no doubt about it: if it matters to you, you'll find ways to save money without your customers noticing. But, whatever you cut, guard the posh loo roll with your life.

Welcome to the war zone

Backed up by origami F16 Falcons, a battalion of paper clip paratroopers, and a bumper box of Maltesers, rival workers are conducting desktop warfare using graffitied staple guns and rubber band bombs, their skin etched with Tipp-Ex tattoos. If John Woo made stationery commercials, this would be his film set.

Now, for the first time, there's a way to safely determine how far towards anarchy the workplace has slipped. Let's hope it's not too late for yours...

The OFFCON scale

The OFFCON, or office terror condition scale, is a colour-coded chart showing the workplace threat level, similar in nature to the system that the US government employs to provide disco lighting at the Pentagon in the event of sudden breakdancing.

How it works

Download the OFFCON PDF, print it out, and place it in a high traffic area in your workplace or home. Once a week, mark the current threat level in the appropriate box with a pin or magnet. (5 is low risk. 1 is extreme danger.)

The scale will not only warn co-workers of the general state of alert, but also serve as an indication of whether or not your boss is likely to sign-off on that pay rise, sanction your 2-month vacation, or let you call her "sugarlips" without losing your job.

The alert signs

How do you tell which alert level your office has reached? It's easy -- just follow the signs for office or home workers below. A warning before we begin: if you're not already a decorated workplace veteran, the following paragraphs paint images of a bleak future.

OFFCON 5: office 'normality'

Office workers:

Work is getting done, and some of it's interesting. You like one of your clients, and you don't really mind going into work every day. If it wasn't for the fact that the pay was so bad, you might even feel motivated. Surely this can't last. Or can it?

Home workers:

Things are normal. You're getting up after 11pm and working in your pyjamas. You eat whenever you like and have topless webcam meetings with your clients. Life feels good. You're reminded every day why you left your real job. Most days, you can smile at least once without faking it.

Don't make any false moves. Boat-rocking will end in tears.

OFFCON 4: covert slacking-off

Office workers:

This is the most common state of alert for office workers. Due to the fear of being discovered browsing eBay for cut-price sock monkeys outside of your Prescribed Lunch Break, your mouse pointer forever hovers over your browser's "close" button. You're as primed as Optimus waiting for the Decepticons to attack. When your boss walks through the door, you'll spring into busy mode.

It was a close one, but you got away with it. You return to eBay to bid on an early warning alarm system that you can rig in the corridor to alert fellow slackers of future interruptions. Next time, you'll be ready.

Home workers:

You're weaving a web of deceit. You kissed your better half goodbye as they left for their 'proper job' this morning. It's now 6pm, and you're preparing a story about all the productive things you did today.

Should they discover that you spent 7 hours playing on the Wii, you'll suddenly look exhausted and palm it off as 'fitness training' without feeling the tiniest pang of guilt. You hope they don't see that Mario Kart is still in the drive. You make a mental note not to be so careless in future.

If you've not got enough work to stay busy now, you'll struggle later.

OFFCON 3: stress balls of fire

Office workers:

OFFCON 4 took its toll. Now the work's piling up. Suddenly, everything's an emergency. Stress levels are rising. Arguments are common. One or more stress balls, NERF guns, or mini flame throwers have appeared in the office. It's no longer safe to ask your boss for time off, more money, or a dinner date. If you don't flag up the problem now or get some outside help in, you're in for a rough ride.

Home workers:

You're busy. Your laundry is piling up. But work no longer interests you. You've discovered that your true calling lies in watching films and submitting continuity errors to the Internet Movie Database. Weeks pass, and even faulty plotlines fail to capture your imagination. Frustrated, you barricade yourself in your room and think of a new occupation. Assassination perhaps?

Disenchanted with the idea of killing for a living, you turn your thoughts towards happier dreams. You start planning a move to Amsterdam, where you'll open a coffee shop that specialises in hallucinogenic cocoa. You practise grinding coffee beans and melting chocolate with your thighs. You scrawl "not crazy" on your forehead to prevent anyone asking.

Remind yourself what you loved about your work. Forget Amsterdam, and find happiness in something you love. Maybe taking up a new hobby would help fill the gap, too.

OFFCON 2: all-out warfare

Office workers:

It's all-out warfare. Your 9-5 has descended into a series of petty thefts, mindless squabbles, and general heel-nipping. Small skirmishes break out for no apparent reason. Gangs form and leaders are chosen. Territory is divided with invisible tags. The watercooler becomes no man's land. Nobody dares enter the stationery cupboard alone, and all sharp objects are removed by office security.

Your building is declared to be on "lock down", and chocolate biscuits become the new internal currency. In an effort to reduce the threat level, Health and Safety are called in. You promptly staple them to the wall by their safety ties, expelling a lifetime of pent-up anger for having to fill in "Form 37B: Permission to Move My Pencil Pot".

If you can't walk away today, at least start job hunting.

Home workers:

It's become impossible to work from home. Driven by a belief that working undisturbed is your divine right, you confront your cats to establish some ground rules. As you round the corner into their lair, you feel a soft thud as a Buzz Lightyear action figure spins through the air and hits you on the temple. Darkness falls.

When you awaken, you find yourself in the kitchen bound to a chair. A kitten sits at a distance, eyeing you menacingly and armed to the teeth with nut crackers. You look down to see the job listings pages open on the table in front of you. "Cleaners wanted" is circled in red pen. Someone is trying to send you a message.

It sounds like you need some space. Try working from the library or coffeeshop for one day a week. Make sure you earn a living too.

OFFCON 1: evacuation!

Office workers:

Chaos rules the workplace. All attempts to reduce the threat level have failed. Chocolate biscuits have run out, and no further supplies are forthcoming. Fights to the death have broken out with the office smokers because they get 10 extra breaks a day. There is much talk of office privileges (such as smiling) being withdrawn for good.

Your boss escapes to the golf course, where she now spends all her working hours. All matters of importance have been delegated to you. When faced with a room full of angry board members and asked to explain why the company's stock price has plummeted, you frantically tell them that you need more biscuits, and that you're running low on origami air support. They don't look impressed.

Perhaps it's time to take that job abroad or start your own gig.

Home workers:

You've tried working from home. It's been tough, and you're wondering if you made the right choice. The distractions are numerous; the quality working hours few. You won't let your dream of independence die, and you'd hate to get a job, but you're struggling to find another option.

Perhaps you could rent a small office or lease a hot desk in some shared office space. Alternatively, convert your garage, lock yourself in, and swallow the key. Just create your own working sanctuary, and you'll be fine.

What happens instead is this: The Plan consumes them. Their business becomes the business plan. Their company, grand scheme, or trip around the world never happens.

The problem with planning

There are times when plans are worth making. But, more often than not, they're simply a waste of time. There is no watertight plan. Leaking is part of life.

A week after you've stapled your 50 pages of slaved-over manuscript complete with five-year projections, it will be almost meaningless. Planning is a dynamic thing – there is no such thing as a finished plan. You can't print it out and be done. You have to plan while you're running your business and adapting to the environment, not before you even know if it's going to work or not.

A week after you've 'finished' your plan, your competition will have adapted; that ski resort will have been booked up; a new product will have changed the game; those designer stilettos you saw in Oxfam will be out of fashion.¹

How to launch faster

Forget great big lists. Forget what you know about business. Forget start-up school. Forget plans. Forget endless preparation. Forget the "what ifs?" and the "but what abouts?" When it comes to launching fast and reducing fear, there's only one rule you need to remember.

To make it easier, I've cut it down to three words and spent four whole seconds of my life making sure that the only rule you need to remember very nearly rhymes:

Less is best.

It couldn't be less complex, could it? But it's true: less is best. Here's why.

The magic of less

When you reduce your launch time to one month and force yourself to start thinking in terms of less instead than more, the magic of less flutters into life:²

• Less means no excuses to sit around dreaming
• Less means you can make it better later
• Less means less unnecessary planning
• Less means less emotional investment
• Less means less procrastination
• Less means less perfectionism
• Less means less upfront costs
• Less means less to go wrong
• Less means less questions
• Less means less decisions
• Less means less features
• Less means less risk
• Less really is best

What are you waiting for? Dream. Scheme. Simplify. You've got a month to launch something. Anything! Just make it something that you love.