In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, “to be or not to be” was the question. The first line is so familiar:

To be, or not to be: that is the question:

and the first section adored, and often memorized by adherent high schoolers:

To be, or not to be: that is the question: Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing end them? To die: to sleep; No more; and by a sleep to say we end the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep; To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause: here’s the respect that makes calamity of so long life;

Scholars and academics continue to study and interpret Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Many a Ph.D. dissertation has focused on it, and sometimes the interpretations stretch pretty far, making for entertaining reading. For the rest of us non-academics, and especially those of us living the definition of web entrepreneur, I think Hamlet should be re-considered. If I could be so bold as to suggest a modification to Shakespeare’s work (and I’ll only change the first line), I think it fits our modern age perfectly. Because I see this behavior over and over in potential entrepreneurs, I’ll take license and change “to be or not to be: that is the question” into “to be or to not be: that seems to be the question“. The rest remains appropriate.

Over and over I meet potential and moderately successful entrepreneurs struggling with the question Hamlet raised. Their actions are well described by that entire section above. But I suppose that is my interpretation of Hamlet. It differs from most I have read (I haven’t read many, mind you). It fits an inordinate number of entrepreneurs I meet. What drives your passion? Is it to Be, or is it to not be?

There are  few ways to think of this. The obvious : “Do you really want to succeed, or do you simply fear failure?” does indeed apply sometimes. But so does the less obvious (but more prevalent) “do you have a target for what you want to be, or are you working hard trying to not be something else?” I see a lot of people holding back in order to not be something.

There are plenty of psychologists ready to discuss your personal self image, your mental imprint of the meaning of life, the baggage you bring from your past relationships (including family) and your “inherited” fears and quirks. All good stuff that needs to be tidied up. But what I see is more specific: I see people who say they want to “succeed”, but are quick to point out negatives with a follow-on “but I don’t want to _____________“. The blank filled in with characterizations of ugliness. They want to sell a lot of product, but don’t want to cheat anyone. They want to market their services, but don’t want to be too pushy. They want to sell, but don’t want to lie. They want to innovate, but not be unethical (or immoral). They want to succeed, but…

To be or to not be. Where is the passionate energy going?

The biggest successes wanted to Be. They were after achievement. They wanted, whether that was a benevolent want (Mother Theresa wanted to help others?) or a selfish want (Malcolm Forbes wanted to be rich and famous?). For many, the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” were unfortunate side effects to be suffered, or corrected after the fact through philanthropy.

“Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles” perfectly describes what some blossoming entrepreneurs go through. Considering “outrageous fortune” to be wealth, is it more noble to get rich (despite the scorn some may cast upon you for being “filthy rich”) or is it more noble to deal with life’s burdens like everyman must? Maybe Hamlet’s “sea of troubles” is the common man’s suffering. The bills that need to be paid.

Entrepreneur Hamlet continues to suggest that quitting, or accepting common suffering, leaves one ultimately defeated (since without wealth one simply cannot defeat an economic system designed to enslave him). But he astutely notes that the desired peace and calm associated with having given up a struggle, will never arrive. And that’s the rub! Once you give up, you don’t find peace (as if to die) but instead you start to dream again. Free of the struggle, you are once again not only able to dream but you can’t help but dream. Because you are an entrepreneur. And what do you dream of? Potential success! Ahhh.. life is a cruel mistress!

“to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub;”

Hamlet understood the curse of the entrepreneur. He referred to the calamity of a long life. The desires don’t go away. An entrepreneur will always see a different path, and want to follow it. An entrepreneur wants to know how deep the rabbit hole goes.

Enough about Hamlet; what about you?

• You say you want to sell Widgets. But you rarely speak to your potential customers, rarely influence them to buy, and spend most of your time in XHTML or re-design meetings. You don’t like to be pushy, apparently. To be, or to not be?

• You say you want to rank at the top of search engines, but when shown that better or more links are needed, you choose instead to re-design your home page (again). You don’t want to violate Google guidelines with questionable links, you say, as you double up your design efforts. To Be or to Not Be?

• You recognize that you need to build relationships in the marketplace, in order to succeed as a leader, so you join Social Media. And then you follow everyone. You don’t want to be an attention whore, apparently. To be, or to not be?

and my favorite…

• You say you want to be #1 in search engines for (generic word) but you don’t want to change your site so it represents a comprehensive and definitive answer for searches for (generic word).

Later this month a group of entrepreneurs will gather at Think Tank in Del Mar, California. I think Hamlet should come to Think Tank, and stand on the rocks of Del Mar beach reciting his soliloquy out loud (with my modification).

If you want to achieve, you can be who you are, or you can work to become who you want to be, but you must be someone. To be no one, unhappy as yourself, dreaming of being different, while holding back for fear of becoming something, is to waste your life.

Hamlet suffered for us already, and explained it clearly. Take his advice. If you have the passion to Be, do what it takes to become. If you feel in your heart that you were meant to be someone, then it is your destiny to give up convention and try to become who you are meant to be. Forget what others think. Forget the rules. Suffer the slings and arrows if necessary. Note the unfortunate side effects, to be managed later. But be true to yourself. For those given the gift, there is nothing nobler. The rest need you to try, and will reward your success.

It seems Palm has decided that they are OK with being slimy about undisclosed privacy and user tracking. Give a chance to comment on the recent expose about detailed user tracking buried inside the Palm Pre, they tell us (paraphrasing) “everybody does it” and “we’re happy our users trust us”.

MobileCrunch re-highlighted this news from a CNET article, but goes easy on Palm, while exposing how they track users location, what applications they have been using, what applications they have installed on the Pre (including those not authorized by Palm), and other personal data unique to the user’s Palm Pre. If you read the article literally, it is almost as if they had been threatened by Palm and were treading lightly.. exposing but being careful to not openly suggest the Palm Pre was a privacy-invading abuse of consumers.

The Economist wrote about cell phone tracking, and location-based services do indeed need to report back location in order to deliver maps, directions, etc. But they don’t need to report back all that other personal data that Palm is collecting from Palm Pre users.  According to the MobileCrunch article:

When it comes to location tracking and device activity, you must alert the user and specifically request permission. If you don’t, you are spying, plain and simple. Regardless of what Palm is doing with this data, the user needs to be completely aware that it is being sent.

Palm seems to disagree. See this excerpt from Palm response (emphasis added):

…Our privacy policy is like many policies in the industry and includes very detailed language about potential scenarios in which we might use a customer’s information, all toward a goal of offering a great user experience. For instance, when location based services are used, we collect their information to give them relevant local results in Google Maps. We appreciate the trust that users give us with their information, and have no intention to violate that trust.

They have no intention to violate your trust! How re-assuring, no? How about if a vendor asked you for your social security number and mother’s maiden name, and assured you they had no intention of violating your trust?

I have a follow up question for Palm. One day, when a Junior Marketing Executive at Palm gets a brilliant idea to exploit some of that juicy data, will Palm notify me of their new intent to violate my trust? I know they don’t have to, that’s the whole point.

Believe it or not, they’ve got that covered in the Privacy Policy as well. The default is that they can do whatever they want under that elastic justification “to enhance your device experience“. The lawyers make it sound less abusive by adding “For changes that are materially less restrictive or protective of your personal information than the privacy policy in place at the time of collection, we will seek your consent before implementing any such change.” Hard to imagine a case where they make an open, elastic data use agreement more restrictive, if that is even possible.

Scrutinize the Palm Pre Privacy Policy here, but be careful because Palm lawyers are just as clever as the rest of the lawyers in this industry: “We reserve the right to change our privacy policy. Please check our website periodically for changes…“

It seems every week some hustling web entrepreneur publishes a new “blog post” about how to be a better entrepreneur, how to be more successful, how to make more money, etc. These are expensive if you read them — they waste a lot of your time. Success is not about money, but they don’t know that, and so they are not really worth listening to, are they?

I just revisited an old Jason Calacanis comment about SEO / affiliate people being really smart but small time… that in his eyes, they were not really successful because they didn’t make the big plays (like he does?). Sad… really sad.

I suppose not everyone appreciates that there are plenty of words of wisdom already published by masters of language and communication, often packaged in enjoyable wrappers. You can get them on your Kindle, or at your local library if you area small-timer like me.

Here’s one of my favorites:

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build ‘em up with wornout tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And - which is more - you’ll be a Man my son!

That’s “If” by Rudyard Kipling.