There are many awesome Saas-based screen capture & share services in the market today. Typically they offer a client-app that, when installed, listens in the background for all your screen captures. Once a screen capture is taken, the app seamlessly uploads the image to the cloud and provides the user with a URL (added to their clipboard) that they can easily share with others. (For example, you can checkout two captures I’ve taken with Sketch and CloudApp.)
I love those apps! 99% of the time they fill my use cases perfectly. However, recently I was working on an intranet with hundreds of users and no access to a public internet. Of all the capture & share services I knew of, none could accommodate a closed network system. Do to that environment, I was forced to manually upload my screenshots as attachments when massaging my peers – which was a real PIA!
I created GoGong as an open-source project to provide those working on a closed network access to a screen captire & share system; without concern of having any copied material exposed to the outside world. You can read more about the project, download the server and mac DMG, and contribute to the effort here:
How it Works:
Each team attempts to play a secret song on the provided keyboard (via a simple play-by-numbers music score). The player gets no indication towards the timing or rhythm of the song, just the notes. The team must figure out what the name of the song is before the 30 second timer runs out.
Updates/Feedback
First time use of app user is very confused as to what to do next. Usually they click solo first, and skip over instructions.
Potential Solutions: A intro screen and walk through of the game would be helpful. Though that could be skipped too. So offering an “easy” version of the game that grows in complexity over time may be more helpful. e.g. less keys, keys to play light up etc
Note: Users wanted to keep the keyboard as the point of interaction.
Even when the instruction are read there is a lot of confusion on how the workflow of the game works. This was expected as Jackie and I even got confused playing it ourselves. Just didn’t have ideas yet.
Potential Solutions: One user used the game in a way that gave me an idea. Before I thought the lack of providing a rhythm would make the game fun, ergot I set it up so the player didn’t know the song name before playing (this add to a very complex workflow).
This user wanted to know the song name they played ahead of time and seemed to have a lot more fun trying to communicate the song name through the keyboard, to the other players. This workflow would be MUCH easier to present and understand. I’m just not sure if it would be too easy. Maybe there are other ways to add complexity over time (per #1)
People who have never played the piano have no idea what “#” means. Though I suspected it wouldn’t matter since all the keys are labeled, it was to much information to digest on a first time use.
Potential Solutions: per #1. A “how to use the kayboard and music sheet” before presenting the keyboard would help. As well as lighting up the keyboard for first time game use.
Keyboard was a bit too small
Potential Solutions: Not sure how I can have many song with few keys. The original keyboard had bigger keys but couldnt get much out of it. This could again play into harder level, more songs and smaller keyboard.
When the game got going people had some laughs and fun, so the potential is there, just needs a much smoother and well informed experience.
More About the Inspiration and Background for Why I Chose to Build BitLang:
While on our “year long trip around the world” I found myself going back and forth between Duolingo (a language learning app) and Google Translate (a phrase translation app). While I love both products, they had a few shortfallings when it came to a couple of specific needs I had.
First, I wanted to learn from a pre-organized set of phrases that pertained to my immediate needs. I would then want to build upon that set of phrases with custom phrases of my choice.
Although I enjoy the general Duolingo-made learning process, it is built with a long-term lesson plan in mind. I am required to learn phrases like “Your horse ate my apples” to get familiar with the grammar of a language. What I want, however, is to learn phrases I can use for my one week tour through France. For example, due to travel plans this weekend I may just want to prepare myself to say, “May I have a local beer on tap?”, “Check please”, or “Two more red wines.”
Of course, I can accomplish my phrase-by-phrase translation needs using Google Translate, but it doesn’t do a great job organizing the translations by category or language. Also, it isn’t built to help me practice the phrases once I’ve looked them up.
I was frustrated by those gaps left between my favorite products. So, I posted feature requests to both product’s sites and got a “[not in our roadmap]” answer. (Which I completely understand and respect.) At first I was disappointed, but then I realized, “Hey, wait a sec, I know how to build things. Maybe I should just create a solution myself.” And so, BitLang was born.
The app is still a work in progress and is growing from its humble MVP beginnings. Here are the designs I mocked up for the first few iterations. Currently it just looks up phrases and allows the users to bookmark them into a single folder. It currently only translates for three languages: French, Spanish and German.
In the next few versions users will be able to login, view pre-made translation packages, and bookmark those packages. Beyond that I will start digging into deeper learning based workflows (quizzes and tests) as well as some community based features.
You can read more about the iterations I took in fleshing out the BitLang concept below.
Phase I
At first, I focused heavily on the learning part of the concept. Trying to simplify the lessons into premade (but pertinent) Q&A with very simple phrases. Users would translate a phrase one word at a time.
Phase II
Phase I became very complex, and the questions ended up getting pretty redundant. Also, I was missing the whole aspect of being able to generate a list of phrases that interest the user the most. For it all to work, the system would have to be made up of a custom lesson, not UGC. So for the next iteration I focused more on the “looking up of phrases” side of things. To make things even more challenging decided to build it while learning Polymer 1.0.
It was starting to come together, but as I mentioned in my key learnings for iOS development, I was forcing a web app model in what was obviously better suited for a native app. My lack of skills to develop in iOS has annoyed me for years so I figured it was time to make the move. That is when the BitLang app became to be.
Updates/Feedback
Is really looking for a tool that provides gender along with translations. e.g. spanish: Cup -> Taza … should be … La Taza
Is looking forward to the helpful learning side. One users suggests getting notifications for any words looked up. The interesting thing he asked here is: why should I organize things – If i’m looking it up I want to learn it so assume it.
Big win: Tons of people find the same holes in language learning tools. I’m not the only one. People urn for crash course mixed with lookup.
If you haven’t picked up any iOS development skills yet, now is the time. It’s never been easier. Below aremy reasons to finally take the plunge (successfully), followed by some helpful links to help you learn to create your first app too.
Contrary to popular belief, I’ve never coded up an iOS app myself. My excuse? For one, hiring great iOS developers gave me more time to focus on building great teams and products for my startups. In addition, Objective-C has a unique syntax and requires a deeper understanding of handling memory, which demanded even more learning time. Finally, there was an immense level of complexity involved in testing, certifying and delivering native iOS apps to market. As a matter of fact, those higher than normal learning curves inspired many startups (including a few that I launched) to focus on making developing apps easier.
Since I already had a strong web development background, I always found it easier to build prototypes for my ideas using the latest web-based, app-building, technologies. Year-after-year a new product claimed to have “the right stuff” needed to create an iOS app that felt fully native, without needing to learn to code directly in Objective-C. Year-after-year I found those claims to be more wishful thinking than reality. Although quicker to develop, those technologies always left the final product feeling hacky, unresponsive or limited, and, in order to go full steam ahead with a project, a fully native version would be necessary.
Earlier this year I took another shot at using a new piece of web tech to build out a mobile app idea I had. This time I learned Polymer 1.0. I loved it as a web framework, but my hopes that Google had managed to finally develop an SPA framework that translated into a smooth functioning mobile app was, yet again, overly optimistic.
It isn’t really the technology’s fault though. The rendering mechanisms for HTML/Web (et al.) just weren’t made to process smooth app-like features. It renders top to bottom, grabs all its assets remotely, makes a lot of inferences, is based on standards that try and work across an array of products made by a variety of companies, and manages general security measures that must be spread across every site. In the web world, the browser is the ad-hoc gatekeeper, and its fighting to keep up. The mission of a browser is critically different to that of apps: to allow a user to serendipitously browse a large breadth of sites in a single view, all the while protecting the user from exposure to malicious pages that are inherently sprinkled into a user’s browsing session. Native apps are different. Both the user and the developer have a strong working agreement between what the developer would like you to see and how the user would like to see it. With that level of trust the developer is able to confidently create an experience specifically tailored to the goal of the app and the interest of the user; the OS can focus on greasing the wheels.
…
Sorry, I digress. Point is, yet again I was disappointed in what the web (and web wrappers) could offer, and, almost as a yearly tradition, I took a stab at learning how to develop directly in iOS again. This time, I’m glad I did!
Maybe it was due to all the free time I had while on our year long trip, but I doubt it; it came rather easily this time around. No, I think the main contributor to my smooth transition is that Apple has done a stellar job incrementally improving the life of an iOS developer over the years. I think the real turn was the release of Swift in 2014. The language is a natural leap from other common languages, as compared to its Objective-C counterpart. Also, there is no longer a heavy requirement to understand how to manage an app’s memory and delegations. The other power ally in creating ease for iOS developers is XCode’s more powerful yet simplified environment, along with interactive interfaces like Storyboards, segues, IB Designables and more. In addition, now that TestFlight is fully integrated with iTunes Connect and Xcode, testing an app on a device, releasing it to external testers, and pushing it to the App Store is only a few clicks worth of effort; fairly brainless really.
All this added up to a surprisingly easily made V1 of my very first fully native iOS app! Yay! This will be fun 😀
Links to Learning iOS
Here are some key links I bookmarked while learning Swift in Xcode 9.0, including: vides, Q&As on StackOverflow, and tutorials. I strongly recommend learning the language by working toward implementing an idea you want to bring to life. Not only does it give you an inherent direction in what needs to be learned, but it also helps you push through the tough parts of learning that would otherwise spell defeat. The app I built used APIs, JSON, CoreData, Table Views (for listing data), Audio, and more. Hope this list helps!
Trusted house sitter (Founded 2010) This is probably the most valuable site we’ve used on this trip. The idea is simple, people have houses with pets and when they go on a trip they need someone they can trust to watch them. The trade is almost always even-steven. We got matched up with a wonderful family and a dog we love (Dexter) in a posh area of London for two weeks.
Rome2Rio (Founded 2010 in Melbourne AUS) Trains, planes and automobiles, getting from point “A” to point “B” can end up using them all. This site does a great job of giving you all of the options for your trip and includes options you may not have thought of.
XE Currency (Founded 1995) The objective is simple: Show how much you can get for $1USD in another country. The live updates, ease of use, and inline calculator makes it a solid app. What I especially like is the feature that tells the difference between what you got and what you should have got.
Hotels .com (Founded 1991) This isn’t a new site but we have become loyal users ever since our incident in Kyoto. Their phone support has been the nicest we’ve ever used for a product (and we have used it on more than one occasion). Their coupons, discounts, and one night free after 10 nights of stays makes it the kind of product that gives you no reason to search for others.
Google Photos (Released 2015) We take tons of photos and movies on our trip and finding a place to store them use to be expensive. I was ecstatic when Google released this new tool. Unlimited storage FREE and it is a better photo management tool than most paid ones likes Amazon. I go into detail on how Google Photos is better than Amazon here.
Ookla Speed Tester (Founded 1994) This app doesn’t do any miracles by any means. That being said, internet is terribly inconsistent from country to country. With gigs of photos to upload it is a nice way to get an idea whether or not you have a shot of getting any of them to the cloud.
Uber (Founded 2009) By now everyone is familiar with Uber, even internationally. The reason why it deserves a place on this top travel products list is the peace of mind it has given us in foreign countries. Getting ripped off by cabs is an international phenomenon. With uber we will not only get a fair price, but a less expensive one too – and in a nicer car.
Fitbit (Founded 2007) It takes a great deal of steps to tour a country. The actual number of steps would be a mystery without this app. There is a sort of satisfaction in justifying your aching feet when you see that you’ve hit 20K+ steps in a single day.
Some Honorable Mentions
Startup Travels (Founded 2014) If you are interested in getting to know entrepreneurs and startups on your next visit check out this site. I have made some great connections that have turned into amazing stays from this site.
Bla Bla Car (Founded 2006) We haven’t ended up using this app yet, but we can see where it may come in handy. For far less than a train or plane ride this ride sharing site is available all over europe.
AirBnB (Founded 2008) Just about everyone in the world knows about AirBnB by now. The reason this didn’t make the top 8 is that we have had a few unsavory stays using them and when you are dropping in on a country for a few days not getting what you expect isn’t easy to deal with. That being said it is an awesome product and we intend to give it another chance in the coming weeks now that we know what to look out for.
Duolingo (Founded 2011) If you are planning on making your way to another country it may help to learn the language. Duolingo is the best way to learn a language I’ve come across so far – and it’s free. The only thing its missing is a crash course version for people who aren’t trying to be fluent. Since I couldn’t find one I started building one for myself. Check out my casual language learning app Bitlang.com for a crash course.
Google Authenticator – In order to keep your data safe these days 2-factor-authentication is the way to go. However, when you’re traveling you don’t have a home number to complete the text verification part of the login process. That’s where authenticator comes in. It provides your verify passkey without the need for an internet connection or phone number. Be sure to set this up before you go!
Tripadvisor (Founded 2000) A trusted brand, we saw the Tripadvisor sticker placed on every store window we came across around world.
iMovie – The iPhone app lets you merge and annotate your video directly on your phone.
Hyperlapse – There is a lot of video you’d like to share, with Hyperlapse you can share more in less time. Videos shot include video stabilizers to make your videos even smoother.
Units Plus – This app has every possibly conversion type you can think of.
Since starting this trip about 2 months ago we’ve taken an average of about 50 photos/videos a day, between our two iPhones and our Coolpix Camera. A month into the trip my external hard drive was filling up fast and I began to worry about how I could keep our growing collection of photos safe without spending a ton of money.
When Amazon offered its unlimited storage CloudDrive product for $55/year (with a 3 month free trial) I jumped at the chance to get in. I’ve uploaded about 70 gigs of photos and video since then and have dealt with some annoying features along the way. I just brushed the annoyances off because I figured A) Amazon would keep iterating on the product to improve it over time and B) there wasn’t any deal out there as good as theirs.
Then a few days ago Google released their unlimited Photo storage product too. Damn. At first I felt as though having options made things worst. Now I had to decide which product to go with, and, if I did change products, I had to download 70+ gigs of data from Amazon over these shitty hotel networks and reupload them to Google.
I started uploading our new pics to Google this week to give it a whirl and the differences have been fairly major. Google seem to me to be the clear winner for me so far, here’s why.
Amazon Cloud Drive (ACD)
Problems I have with ACD
You can only share a couple photos/videos at a time
The web interface fails if there is a disconnection or network problem.
The desktop interface was not better than the web – so why have it?
The download of the thumbnails on the media viewer were slow and many photos didn’t ever make it down.
Sometimes the video didn’t play or trying to enlarging photos for preview wouldn’t work.
Search rarely worked.
The good parts of ACD
I liked the folder system to organize things manually
You can store ANYTHING with unlimited storage. Files or Photos.
There are no limits on the size of your media you upload
They were first?
Google Photos
Problems With Google Photos
Can only store photos and video
There is a limit on the size of the photos and video you upload.
At first that concerned me but none of my media hits those limits so it is moot.
No file system.
Though, now that I have used it for a week I don’t think I really needed one.
Not really sure what the “Assistant” can do for me.
It does a few cool things but not all that valuable. Like it created an animated gif of random files in case I wanted them….Maybe I will dig it down the road…
What I love about Google Photos
It organizes my photos/videos into locations
I can share entire collections or individual photos. I can easily manage those shared photos easily through a management console.
The image viewer loads super quickly. Same network, no missing images thumbnails
Search works great and you can use it to find more than just file names.
It recognizes THINGS! Like “ruins” and “beaches.”
I don’t know how I will use that, maybe when writing blogs and I want to find something quickly. More importantly, who cares how I use it – it is freaking cool!
Smoother flowing design. Not fancy, just clean.
The web uploader is way nicer than ACD.
It shows you thumbnails of your photo and video being uploaded. You can pause it. And when you lose connection it just holds its current upload position until it gets a connection again (even when the computer sleeps.) I have not got an error yet – and with ACD it was always an issue.
I can organize my albums visually.
With ACD I had folders (w/ a listview of the files) or a photo view with ALL of my media by date. With Google my collections are as easy to skim through.
Overall the UX of ACD was clunky and the service was more expensive. So, I guess I don’t have that hard of a decision to make after all.
One thing I wish they both did is allow me to use my cloud stores images as IMG’s in my website. It would be great not to have to upload them twice for display. It seems like they provide only a temporary link for the photo itself.
On our trips to locations around the world our family and friends want a way to get an idea for what we are up to. Like most people, we post pictures to Facebook that try and capture the essence of our trip but video is so much better at truly capturing the 3-dimensional realities of what we experience.
Now, with tools like Hyperlapse and iMovie on iOS, you can create a video that summarize an entire site in a timely way for both the creator and viewer.
Here is an example of a video of our trip to Cappadocia I created entirely on my iPhone:
Not only does hyperlapse allow you to capture a sped up versions of your video, but it adds a layer of stabilization so to reduces camera shake.
Hyperlapse’s home page, recording and saving screens
Use Hyperlapse to shoot some video.
Even though there is built-in stabilization, it behooves you to try and keep the camera as steady as possible.
I often save my video at “2x.” Half the size (in time and memory) as a regular video and, as you will see when we edit in iMovie, you get a wider range of fast-forward-play options.
Once you finalize the video it is saved to your photo library for later use.
Follow the instruction to start a new movie or trailer, and select “movie”
Choose a theme (I usually just choose simple) and select “create”
Follow the instruction to add “video, photos, or audio”
Select one of your Hyperlapse videos from your library
Tip: Pressing play will allow you to preview the video before adding it. The arrow pointing down will import it into your project.
Drag and drop your movie clips in the order you want them to play
Tip: Taping a clip once selects it for editing. If there is a yellow border on the clip, you are in edit mode. If you want to move the clip, tap outside the clip so it is no longer highlighted and then tap-and-hold the clip until it is draggable.
Add transitions between the clip by tapping the small square box in between each clip.
Tip: If a clip is too short the transition options will be grayed out. You must have at least enough time in a clip to allow a transition to complete in order to select it.
Tip: Some transition have multiple modes. After choosing a transition by tapping it, tap the transition again to get the different variant. Eg, fade to black or fade to white.
Tip: This is one of the places choosing a theme in the “create project” options will have an outcome. See the “theme” transition. That will change based on the theme you chose. Tap the gear icon in the bottom right of the application to change the theme after a project is created.
Edit the the duration of a clip
Once a clip is selected, and highlighted with the yellow border, you can drag the ends of the clip to shorten or elongate the duration of the clip.
Speed up some “in between” clips
Some clips will still run a bit slow due to things like how long it took you to walk to the end of a block or to pan 360 degrees. You can speed up segments of these clips to move the video along.
Tap the clip to go into edit mode.
choose the meter icon (directly to the right of the scissor icon.) You will then see a meter labeled 1X
Drag the knob on the meter to the right to speed up the clip. You can move it to a max of 2X (which is why saving the clip as 2X allows you a range of 2X to 4X which.) There are ways around it I will go into later.
If you only want to speed up a segment slice the clip into more segments (explained below) and speed them up without transitions at their ends.
The functionality of iMovie is limited. Most of the effects you will create work off of the duration of each clip in your project. Therefor, you can manipulate your effects by slicing your clips to suit your needs.
How to slice a clip
Scrub (meaning, slide the white line A.K.A the video head) over the moment in the clip you would like to split into two.
Select a clip for editing (make sure the scissor tool is highlighted.)
Choose “split”
Now you have two clips for the same scene. As long as there is no transition there will be no visual result on the video due to the “split” you just made. Like I mentioned before, you are merely using the split to tell the effects we are about to add when to start and end. Eg, the titles and captions.
Adding a Caption or Title
Select a clip for editing
Select the large “T” (third icon to the right from the scissor.)
Select a caption type
In order to edit the text for a caption or title you will need to tap the video player, above the film section of the application.
Tip: After choosing a theme, extra options will display above the edit tray such as “Center”, “Opening” etc. These will position some titles, as well as change the format for others. Play around with them all to get a feel for the options you have.
By now you should have a video. To get a smooth video will take practice but now you will have all the tools and tips to do so 🙂
To save the clip as a video you can post to Facebook, go to the movie listing (if you are editing a movie project now you will need to tap the back arrow at the top of the application.) There you will have options to save the film to your library.
Tip: If you want to speed things up or make more advanced transitions you can save the edited video to your library and then create a new project with that saved video. You will than be able to speed segments up by another 2X or add transition to clips that may have been too short in your original movie.
Before we go, here’s a bonus tip …
How to rotate movies
I originally stumbled onto using iMovie when I accidently recorded a video vertically and needed to rotate it. Here’s how to rotate movies:
Open a movie in iMovie (if you do not know how to do so read the tutorial above.)
Pinch the movie preview viewer (the area above the clips and play head line) with two fingers and rotate them (like screwing off the top of a bottle.)
You will then see an circle arrow appear on the video. Once you see that remove your fingers from the screen.
Here is a quick video of some of the features in practice, as described above.
Originally I bought a Deuter 50L bag (in the SF REI) with an attached (zip on) daypack. It came with a harness that had thick cushioning straps and a strong frame for back support.
Luckily, we decided to test the bags out on our final trip to DC to visit family and friends. During that test I realized that the daypack wouldn’t fit my 15″ macbook pro. To be honest, it was too small to fit just about anything. I went to the VA REI where I found the 70L (50/20) Osprey bag I ended up with. They happen to be the same price; it was an easy trade.
Each bag had its merits and faults. The Osprey had very little cousin on the straps and less support on the back and waist. On the other hand, it had an extra flap on the bottom that that folded into itself and allowed you to zip up your straps while checking the bag on a plane (see animated gif below.) This ended up being super handy. For example, with Jackie’s bag, we ended up having to tie up all the straps every time we checked it to keep the straps from dangling. Of course, that zip cover came at the cost of losing the pillow compartment that was on the bottom of the Deuter bag.
It took me a few hours to make my pick (hats off to the patient staff at REI,) but it has been about a month and I’m very happy with what I got. Since we are in hotels most of the time, and mostly flying, the features of the bag I got have been exactly what I needed. As a note, I rarely have the time to zip the daypack onto the bag. I probably could have got a cheaper large bag and a cheap small day pack for my laptop and have been fine.
Concerning the costs that comes with checking a bag, almost all of our flights so far had a one checked bag allowance. Now that we are about to hop through europe, discount airlines will charge 20-40 euros per bag; almost the amount of the ticket themselves. After 10 flights it will cost an extra 200 euros to check our luggage. I’m not sure how I feel about that yet. Regarding our fear of losing our bags, we’ve only had one narrow escape. In Turkey, on a speedy transfer between flights, our bags got delayed. We were able to have the hotel concierge call the company to have it expedited to the hotel, so no harm no foul.
A few more bag selectin tips:
Parkinson’s law of space: If you have the space you WILL fill it. Don’t convince yourself to get a bigger bag “and just not fill it all the way.”
Get a vacuum bag. It doubles the space you do have for fluffy items.
Get a bag that opens horizontally, like a suitcase. The ones that open from the top (for hiking) are pains the the ass to fill and remove things from. If you aren’t camping a lot – avoid the top loader.
Get a bag with zippers. Some hiking bags just have straps, velcro and clips to decrease weight. The added security you get from having zipper is worth the few grams of weight it adds.
The waist strap helps a lot.
Don’t worry about the waterproof cover if it costs more – a plastic bag will work fine for the few times your are walking, with your bag, in the rain for a long period of time.
Make sure your bag has straps in the inside to keep clothes in place. It is a nice way to organize and increase usable space.
Wouldn’t it be nice to make free calls to your home country from anywhere in the world? How great would it be if friends and family at home could call you for free while you travel? Sure you can use Skype or Viber to make internet calls, but with them everyone needs to use the same service; it won’t work well when calling a business or landline. With the method below you can call any phone number directly, be it a home phone, cell phone or app. To do it all you need is a Google Account, a phone number with your local “home” area code (only initially,) and a computer with an Internet connection.
Here’s how to do it:
Sign up for a Google Voice number in your home country before you leave.
Google will provide you a new local number called your “Google Voice Number.”
“Link” your GVoice number to an existing landline or cell number to complete the registration. Note: You can only have one GVoice number for every landline or cell phone you have.
Your new GVoice number will charge you for “international calls” made to area codes outside your designated GVoice’s area code, BUT it will consider any call to the same GVoice area code a “free call” – no matter where in the world you call from! See screenshots and captions below.
In addition to the free calls, you will have voicemail that includes a free automatic transcription service, allowing you to read your voicemail messages. You will also have the ability to send and receive texts. Another great option is to use the Hangouts app. Using it you can make internet based calls to other Hangout user AND direct to local phone numbers from your phone.
For travelers this feature gives you an amazing way to stay connected to family and friends at home while using a local number they can call for free as well!
“I’m looking to start investing in (and learning about) startups. Where should I start?”
I get this question a lot, so I figured a blog post may the optimal way to answer it moving forward. 🙂
Of course, it goes without saying that investing in – well – anything really, comes with its own sets of risks. [Blah blah blah, legal jargon]
For starters, Angel.co is a great launching point (if you haven’t already signed up I suggest you do so.) There you can learn about, and meet, all kinds of startups ranging from super early to the more later types. Meet entrepreneurs, people who want to work in startups, or find a startup or syndicate and place a bet on an idea you love.
To get in on an investment round for a pre-IPO company start with FundersClub.com and EquityZen.com. They’ll send emails intermittently letting you know when a fund is being made available.
If you want to get shares in companies that are NOT doing rounds or looking for an investment then you’ll have to buy shares from current or former employee on a private marketplace. Sharespost.com and SecondMarket.com helps facilitate that process.
If your goal is to just find a way to invest with more upside than a bank and less risk than a stock, I suggest using LendingClub.com for microloan investments. There you give out roughly $25 per person to thousands of people looking for them. You’ll have to keep your money in for a couple years (although there are ways to liquidate sooner if needed) but you can see about 5%-20% annual returns depending on what you set your risk tolerance to.
Tangentially, if you are looking to meet entrepreneurs and get in on a more personal level to invest, become an advisor or just learn about the startup community, there are a few options: StartUpTravels.com that connects you to entrepreneurs around the world (full discloser, it’s a project I am working on now,) FounderDating.com and CoFoundersLab.com where you can meet other founder types to start a business are worth noting.
While on our “year long trip around the world” I found myself going back and forth between 
Of course, I can accomplish my phrase-by-phrase translation needs using Google Translate, but it doesn’t do a great job organizing the translations by category or language. Also, it isn’t built to help me practice the phrases once I’ve looked them up.
Sean Shadmand 