In today's business podcast, we will review the meteoric rise to fame and fortune that Flickr creators have enjoyed, and why Smart Homes won't ever really take hold.

The reason behind the success of the first idea in a way contributes to the doom of the second one. One plays on heart strings, while the other one ignores them - hence explaining why Flickr has become an icon, and the Smart Home is just a technological dream.

I love the Flickr story, because it's real, and they never intended it to happen this way!

Their original plan was to create a neverending game, not a photo site. But thanks to an epiphany while vomiting (yes, vomiting), they changed business directions, taking the best of their creation thus far, and decided to make their site a place where people share pictures. It was so popular, that Yahoo bought them out for $30 million dollars within 4 years of starting their venture from scratch.

What do we learn from this business adventure?

Lots of stuff. We learn that flexibility can make a huge difference, especially when you see things NOT going as planned. We learn that technology doesn't sell nearly as well as heart-strings and passion. We learn that even though you've been turned down for a loan once, that same company may give you money the second time around.

And what about the business of Smart Homes, and their inevitable doom?

We find out that the Smart Home concept is founded on very faulty ideas - that the home is a place where people want to be efficient. Well, they don't want to be efficient there. And more importantly, every culture has their own idea of what a home should be (and interestingly enough, none of them have to do with efficiency either).

If you are looking for more information about business, and how you can grow and build your own, I invite you to come to the online Business Podcasting Expo (BizPodExpo.com).

This will offer around 40 online seminars - mostly about business, with an introduction to podcasting added in. You can check out the present speaker schedule at http://www.BizPodExpo.com.

Penny Haynes, 1st Podcast Publishing & PodcastDirectories4Sale.com

Click here to listen to the podcast.