Admittedly, Skimbit is still in beta phase. So it shouldn’t really be totally humiliating to have a bug.

But, in the last month, Skimbit’s traffic has tripled, so suddenly, bugs are a bigger deal, as they can potentially affect more of our users. And I LOVE my users, truly! I can’t describe it… but to have complete strangers want to use, and benefit from, something that I have worked on so crazily hard for so long, is the deepest compliment coupled with the deepest responsibility.

And so, when something goes a little wrong, I can’t abide that people who have put their faith in me and my product are experiencing any type of inconvenience. I am so prepared for them to rush off and never come back, or to be angry, or even worse, to just leave and never come back or think of Skimbit again.

Imagine, then, my joy this week to meet a user who not only has come to my site because he has a genuine need to use it (as opposed as a mild curiousity to see what my site is vaguely about!); but he also notified me of a bug, and helped me solve it. What a blessing!

Yes, there was a slight bug in the way we sent invitations to friends from the Address Book, and it took a while to find out the root cause of the bug. I kept expecting the user to get fed up and throw his hands up in disgust and frustration, which terrified me because he was a true advocate of the solution. But to my immense joy, he not only persisted, helped find the problem, tested it, and kept sending me updates, but he also - bless - apologised for hassling me! What an angel!

Thankfully, we have now corrected the bug, fixed a misunderstanding on the site, and somehow still have the attention of a user who invited 20 of his friends to use the site - what an amazing man. I can’t stop with the superlatives, it just completely blew me away how kind and helpful strangers can be.

It takes me back to those web 2.0 seminars, where all the speakers raved about "Your users will tell you when you are doing something wrong, they will be passionate advocates of your site!" and I kinda doubted it could happen. But, I just experienced the charity of users, and feel even more passionate about doing a good job for them!

My favourite saying at the moment is this:

"I can either work myself to the bone, and not get everything done that I need to; or I can NOT work myself to the bone, and STILL not get everything done that I need to…. so there is little point in killing myself in the process."

I say this, yet here I am, its half past midnight, my eyes are so blurry I can’t focus on the font before me, my back is screaming in agony, and my tummy is not at its prettiest after too much toast… and STILL I haven’t got everything done that I need to.

Some more exciting news for Skimbit… Web Mission 08 is a competition for the top UK based start-ups to head over to Silicon Valley to promote our businesses and form strategic partnerships. Initially I didn’t think it was for Skimbit - to enter you had to indicate how ’socially sustainable’ your business was, and if selected, had to contribute a sizeable sum of cash, certainly more than flights and hotels in San Francisco would have been if I bought them directly. But - I reckoned - it was a great opportunity and worth the effort, so I entered.

And when I found out I was accepted, although I was pleased, I do have to admit I had a fleeting moment of thinking "Well, I bet not many people applied, its not such a big deal…"

So imagine my surprise when I found out that over 100 start-ups had competed, and only 20 were selected! And that the judging panel included Doug Richard and Mike Butcher! And that there is huge press coverage of the event: Skimbit even managed to appear on TechCrunch US!

And looking at the agenda, I now totally realise what a fabulous opportunity this is! I’m busily trying to organise meetings with potential partners in the Valley and San Fran (if you are one, or know of one, let me know!), and am meeting with some US-based PR firms to help my ‘launch’ in the US. Very exciting stuff!!

One of the reasons I knew many years ago that I had to become an entrepreneur, was that I wanted the ability to dictate the terms of my life.

I hated HAVING to be at work at 9am, and feeling guilty and stressed if I was running late. I hated having people silently judge me if I was writing a personal email or reading a blog during work hours, and the challenge of having to always book things like dentists and home deliveries in my pre- or post- work hours. Its not that I have an aversion to work, far from it, but I hated that the times I was not performing in a ‘normal’ business way would be judged negatively. And perhaps this is more an indication of my inherent guilt, as possibly I was imagining these silent frowns of disapproval, but nevertheless, I hated feeling that way, and knew that being my own boss would be the only solution.

And I feel very lucky to have achieved my goal: I am my own boss, and I am more or less master of my own destiny.

Of course the irony is that far from working less, I am now working MORE than I ever did, when I was a normal employee. The beauty of my arrangement though, is its on my terms, and every day that passes I savour that feeling. I love that because I work best in the evenings, if I choose to start work at 10:30am, and work til 9pm, that is fine. If I need to go to the doctors, I can book at whatever time I like, and work from home til that time comes. What freedom! And if the way I work best is to stop every hour for a game of Spider Solitaire, no one is going to ever judge me. Brilliant!

The one big challenge though, is that this freedom requires a great deal of self-discipline. I love working and I am inspired by my work, but sometimes, my inherent laziness gets the better of me. Never is this more apparent than when I ‘work from home’. Now, don’t get me wrong, my working from home is vastly productive, and I enjoy the solitude to focus on something complicated. But… the lure of tempting procrastination is strong, and I find it hard to resist even though I really really want to, without the power of the guilt I feel when I am working in an office.

So, although I work for myself, being in an office with lots of other super dynamic people not only motivates me, but dispels my desire to procrastinate. I actually find the rigours of my training as a 9-5 employee actually helps and gives me discipline to go to work early, work hard, etc. I know some people are brilliant at working hard at home, and are great with self-discipline, but I have come to terms with the fact that for me, I need to almost trick myself that I am going to a normal job, in order to get the most out of my time. Of course, I do give myself some of the flexibility I have aspired to, and in all, this proves a healthy workable balance.