I’m typically a positive sort of individual and recently I’ve had even more reason than normal to have a smile on my face. Is it the fact that the next Bladerunner movie is coming out soon? As good as that will be (fingers crossed) it’s not that. So what’s got me so upbeat?

For a start, after working on it for over 2 years, ParkLogic is migrating the last of our clients across to the new Next platform this week. It’s been a heck of a journey where we rebuilt our entire platform from the ground up……and yes, it’s a million times better! It also means that we will shortly be focusing on a single system rather than two (the old one and the new one) which will free up so much time for the team to continue to add value for clients.

I’ve also been working on a platform for developing websites on the fly. It evaluates, tracks and scores everything a user does on the page (leaves Analytics for dead!) and will be the basis for our next generation of ParkLogic products aimed at both the sales and development market segments. So far we have several million pieces of traffic a day moving through the system and it performs brilliantly…..so all is good and my smile is expanding!

Are you driven by fear? Some would say that more than any other time in human history we are captured in a grip of fear. If you really think about it, we’re scared, worried, and stressed by about everything.

Before you say, “Michael, I’m pretty relaxed about life”, let me lob a few fears at you.

Will I keep my job in these uncertain times? I’m feeling older, will my next medical checkup reveal anything? Do my kids really love me? Why can’t I find the special someone to spend the rest of my life with? Is it safe to travel? Will Google stop paying out on traffic domains? Why haven’t I had a domain sale lately? Will I have enough money for the mortgage this month? The list goes on and on…..and at the heart of it all is fear.

Let me share with you some good news. Compared to any other time in human history we live in the most remarkable. We live longer and have better standards of living. Go back less than 100 years ago and having a toilet inside the house that flushed was a rarity. Many diseases still ravaged the majority of the people on the planet and the wonder drug called penicillin had only just been discovered (by accident).

The 2017 Industry Leaders survey responses are continuing to come in and the top three contenders so far are Frank Schilling, Rick Schwartz and Jothan Frakes. If you haven't filled in the survey then make sure you share your opinion.

Click Here to do the Industry Leaders Survey

I've had a number of questions raised since I launched the first industry leaders survey a few days ago and I thought that it would be worthwhile answering the questions.

How long will it take to fill in the survey?
There are only 10 questions with a slider from zero to ten next to each so it should only take a few minutes.

What if I don't know how to answer some questions?
The questions look at how YOU feel about the person that you are nominating. This means there are no wrong answers. Also, if you don't know how to answer some questions then just move the slider to zero.

Since the survey is looking at your experience with the person then this would be a reasonable response if you have not had any personal business experience with the nominee but have viewed there community activity.

OK, I admit it that I’m guilty. Yes, I’m guilty of watching a Netflix series that would be typically more targeted at my daughters rather than their fifty something father. The show is “Girl Boss” and if you ask me it’s a great study (grey hair words) of an Internet powered generation, a bootstrapped startup and mushy girly stuff.

The main character is a twenty something girl that is about to be evicted from her San Francisco apartment (I use that term loosely) and dumpster dives for food because she has no money and no idea about life. After visiting an “op-shop” she finds a leather jacket and pays $9 for it and this is where she gets an epiphany (another old timer word).

She takes her jacket, puts it up on Ebay and sells it for more than $600. So now she knows what she has to do…..get more clothes to sell online. The 25-minute episodes unfold with her discovering a lot of things about business amidst the turmoil of her relationships with the other characters. She’s a pretty volatile character with a wicked temper but now focuses her energy on building her online business.

So why do I like the show? It reminds me of my own experiences in the domain industry. Building my own portfolio, having people around me tell me I’m nuts and then proving them wrong. It was an incredible journey and one that I will never forget.

I recently wrote a number of articles on my thoughts on how to assess who is the "greatest domain industry leader." Rather than just thinking about who is the greatest I decided to put some thoughts into action and develop a very simple survey.

The real question that should be asked is who, in your opinion, is the greatest in the last 12 months and why you think so. To really simplify things I’ve boiled the survey down to ten questions that are in three distinct categories:

1. How successful are they in each of the 4 primary domain business model(s) ?
2. How much have they contributed to the community?
3. How do they conduct themselves in one-on-one business?

The questions can be answered with a slider on a scale of 0 to 10, where 0 represents “not at all” and 10 “very much”. The totals of the different questions are then summed together to create a rating. This means that we can easily see who people believe is deserving of this year’s honour.

I’ll be the first to say that it’s not perfect but I think that it’s a step in the right direction. I should also mention that in order to view the results you will need to login to whizzbangsblog. So, the only thing that is required is for you to spend a few minutes reflecting on who you think is the “greatest”.

Click here to view the survey.