If you’re not familiar with the Glif tripod mount for iPhone and the Cosmonaut stylus, well, you should be. They’re some of the most useful tools that I own for use with my iDevices and they’re both made by one company: Studio Neat.
Now the gents behind the company, Tom Gerhardt and Dan Provost, have published a book about how they got their idea for a physical product off the ground in an environment where software startups are all the rage. The book details their advice for budding entrepreneurs and people who want to make things for a living.
The topics covered in “It Will Be Exhilarating” include Kickstarter, where both the Glif and Cosmonaut were successfully funded, as well as running their business and the experiences they’ve had so far. The company was bootstrapped for several years and still maintains a sense of focus on useful and well-designed products.
I’ve had the pleasure of chatting with Gerhardt and Provost, both of whom are very smart cookies and, as a bonus, nice guys. I haven’t read the book yet, but I will for a variety of reasons. I have a young daughter and I’m personally incredibly excited that she gets to grow up in a world where it’s possible to imagine not just software but physical objects and manifest them based on human effort and product merit.
Sometimes a great idea is better served by bringing it to market outside of a traditional corporate monolith and the Glif and Cosmonaut are great examples of that. If you’re also interested in this modern culture of ‘think and make’, then you might very well want to check out the book, which is available now for $5 in DRM-free ePub, Mobie and PDF.
For more on Studio Neat:
How iPad app Paper helped boost Cosmonaut stylus sales almost tenfold
The Glif, a tripod mount for the iPhone 4, raises $137,417 on Kickstarter
The sweet Glif tripod adapter for iPhone just got keychain and stabilizer add-ons
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