<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span id="docs-internal-guid-70125b16-e27e-ca25-ed79-93adfe31c333" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Courier" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><TLDR></span></font></div></span><blockquote style="margin: 0 0 0 40px; border: none; padding: 0px;" class=""><span class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Courier" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">In 2012 I founded a business, easyBacklog (</span><a href="http://easybacklog.com" style="text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">http://easybacklog.com</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">). It’s growing rapidly, but as I am in the process of launching Ably (</span><a href="https://ably.io" style="text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">https://ably.io</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">) I can’t invest the necessary time in easyBacklog. I want to see easyBacklog succeed so I am looking for a business partner who wants to stop exchanging time for money and own a business that provides ongoing recurring income.</span></font></div></span></blockquote><span style="font-family: Courier; font-size: small; line-height: 1.15; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""></TLDR></span><br class=""><span class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Background</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">10 years ago I founded an agency that later became Aqueduct</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">. Although I stopped working in the business 5 years ago (see ‘About me’ below), as part of my ongoing development work I was looking for a problem to solve. One of the problems we had in Aqueduct was that we were practicing Agile, yet our clients could never quite fully adopt Agile in the way we would have preferred. </span></font></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Our solution was to practise what we called ‘Fixed Cost Agile’ or ‘Agency Agile.’ Although our clients were willing to roll out a project in an ‘Agile’ way, they still needed to agree to a rough time line, and most importantly, to a cost that fitted with their budget.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Our original solution was to create a backlog. We story pointed the entire backlog and, together with the client, we worked out the cost based on our experience of the expected timescale. Once the project started we could always change the backlog, but were able to keep the price stable by keeping the number of stories consistent. </font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">easyBacklog was born out of this concept. easyBacklog is simply a backlog management tool designed primarily for Scrum Masters & Product Owners. It helps with estimation and cost control. Through the concept of snapshots & diffs, you can see how the backlog has changed and evolved over time and what impact that has had on timings and costs. I have not come across another product like it.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Business progress to date</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">For the last 1.5 years, easyBacklog has remained largely dormant in terms of development, yet its uptake and usage has consistently grown at an exponential rate. 2 years ago we had around 160 new users per month, 1 year ago almost 450 per month, and in September this year, we had 1,000 people register in one month alone. Projecting that rate 2 years forwards means we could potentially expect over 6,000 people to register each month.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">And this is where things start getting interesting.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">I ran a survey a few weeks ago with our customers to find out some ‘facts’ about easyBacklog. I found that: </font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><ol style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;" class=""><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">easyBacklog is useful to 84% of users: 44% of users said that easyBacklog was critical to their job, with a further 40% saying it was useful.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">60% of users said they would be willing to pay for easyBacklog, ranging from $5 to $25 a month.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">There are several features that we could add to improve easyBacklog which would be relatively easy to implement.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Our user base is international, with 27% of users from the US, 9% from the UK, and 6% from Holland & Germany respectively. Our growth potential is therefore global.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">We have an amazing spread of companies using the product. Lots are individuals but we also have very large companies with over 50 people using a single account and sharing backlogs.</font></span></div></li></ol><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Outlook</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">I truly believe this product has potential to make some real money. With almost no effort to support it, evolve it or even market it, easyBacklog is a scalable, international product with a high proportion of users willing to pay to continue using it. </font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">I estimate based on the current rate of registrations that we should have 100,000 users within the next 2 years. If only 5% of those users pay $10 a month, easyBacklog will generate $50,000 a month. Given the business has just been myself so far, I believe there is real potential for the business with a full time team working on the product.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">My business proposition for you</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">The reason I am posting here in LRUG is that I often read conversations on HackerNews and speak with people who talk about how they are willing to exchange time for money. A common complaint however is that the money they are making is not in proportion to the time they have invested.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">I am offering you a way to build a business that will make you money without having to work each day, but it will require some level of sacrifice. I don’t have the time to develop easyBacklog right now, but I can’t bear to watch this opportunity go away.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">What I am offering is:</font></span></div><ul style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;" class=""><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">I can help personally fund future development and can inject cash for marketing, design, materials if required. </span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><br class="kix-line-break"></span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">Equally, I have a genuinely interesting idea on how we can fundraise some initial working capital and raise most of the needed capital quickly.</span></font></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">I am happy to provide a very healthy chunk of equity in this business for someone who can make this business grow.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">I will help with marketing, product development strategy, UX & UI, and technical discussions, although I cannot work on this full time.</font></span></div></li></ul><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">What I am looking for is:</font></span></div><ul style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;" class=""><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">A strong full stack Rails developer who is not shy to think beyond code. The user experience, support, and communication with customers is paramount to the product’s success, so unless you can think beyond the code you deliver, this is not for you. Our stack is primarily Rails & BackboneJS.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Someone who is willing to earn a modest income while we build a business so that they can truly free themselves of the time for money burden. I am not interested in someone who is not willing to sacrifice something for this long-term goal.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Someone who can focus on this full time for at least 18 months to fully gauge if we can turn easyBacklog into a profitable revenue generating business. I appreciate everything needs to have a time limit, so my expectation would not be beyond that period if we have not been able to make it work.</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Someone who has the stomach to participate in both the upside and downside of growing a business.</font></span></div></li></ul><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Next steps</font></span></div><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">If you are interested, please contact me and lets chat.</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">Email: </span><a href="mailto:matt@easybacklog.com" style="text-decoration:none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">matt@easybacklog.com</span></a></font></div><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Skype: freeflymatt</font></span></div><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Phone: 0793 534 713</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">**NB: Recruiters, please do not contact me**</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="font-weight: bold; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">About me</font></span></div><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><ul style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;" class=""><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><span style="line-height: 1.15; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">Co-founder and ongoing </span><span style="line-height: 14px; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">shareholder</span><span style="line-height: 1.15; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""> of Aqueduct, </span></span><a href="http://aqueduct.co.uk" style="line-height: 1.15; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">http://aqueduct.co.uk</span></a><span style="line-height: 1.15; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""> </span></font></div></li><ul style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;" class=""><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: circle; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">CEO & CTO of Lemon from 2003 to 2007</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: circle; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Acquired by Aqueduct and become CTO from 2007 - 2009.</font></span></div></li></ul><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">Co-founder of Econsultancy, </span><a href="http://econsultancy.com" style="text-decoration:none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">http://econsultancy.com</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""> </span></font></div></li><ul style="margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;" class=""><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: circle; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">Sold to Centaur in 2013</font></span></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: circle; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class="">CTO from 1999 to 2007, and then again from 2013 - 2014</font></span></div></li></ul><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">Founder of easyBacklog, </span><a href="http://easybacklog.com" style="text-decoration:none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">http://easybacklog.com</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""> </span></font></div></li><li dir="ltr" style="list-style-type: disc; vertical-align: baseline;" class=""><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">Founder of Ably, </span><a href="http://ably.io" style="text-decoration:none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">http://ably.io</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""> </span></font></div></li></ul><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><br class=""></font><div style="line-height: 1.15; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class=""><font face="Arial" size="2" class=""><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">Linked in profile: </span><a href="http://linkedin.com/in/lemon" style="text-decoration:none;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(17, 85, 204); text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class="">http://linkedin.com/in/lemon</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""> </span></font></div><div class=""><span style="font-size: 15px; font-family: Arial; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;" class=""><br class=""></span></div></span></body></html>