Graeme Thickins on Tech

Reflections & analysis about innovation, technology, startups, investing, healthcare, and more .... with a focus on Minnesota, Land of 10,000 Lakes. Blogging continuously since 2005.

Tag: Graeme Thickins (Page 22 of 55)

Minnebar ’08 Schedule Announced – It’s Hot!

May 7, 2008 / / 1 Comment

The program for our annual Minnesota Barcamp — Minnebar — was just released late yesterday. The event is being held Saturday, May 10, at the Coffman Union on the U of MN campus. Here’s a look at where things are so far, and note that it’s subject to change.

Minnebar08sched1

Don’t miss the panel at 12:00 noon: "State of the State: Technology in Minnesota" in the theater on the first floor. Panelists include:
• Doug Olson, who heads a Microsoft developer team in MN
• Jamie Thinglestad, Mpls-based CTO of Dow Jones Online 
• Michael Gorman, Partner at VC firm Split Rock Partners
• Robert Stephens, founder of Geek Squad (a unit of Best Buy)
• And Dan Grigsby, our infamous local rabble rouser at Unpossible.com 🙂 and original lead organizer of Minnebar/Minnedemo.
Minnebar08sched2_3
Note the "Lightning Demos" at 4:00 and 5:00 — which I think will be especially good!  These are five-minute presentations available to new or existing startups, or anyone who has a new idea or favorite topic to talk about. If you want to add yours to the list (which is not yet published), just send an email to event co-orgnanizer Luke Francl at look (at) recursion (dot) org — telling him your name, company name, and what you’ll be talking about. Minnebar08sched3_3

See you Saturday! This will be fun — how could it not be, with a frenzied crowd of some 400 of your fellow MN tech enthusiasts? 🙂

I’ll be there Twittering and shootin’ pix all over. And I’m also part of the Minnov8 team, who’ll be Twittering as well. But, trust me, there’ll be plenty of hot networking in between!

Geeks, Entrepreneurs, Designers, Angels, VCs, and Marketeers ….. Let’s Mix It Up!

May 4, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Minnebar is Saturday, May 10!  MInnesota’s all-day annual Barcamp event is not to be missed.  New venue this year (bigger and better): the gloriously redone Coffman Union at the U of MN (cool place if you haven’t checked it out yet). To sign up, just go the event site (a wiki page), hit Edit Page, and add your name and links. Minnebar(Minnebar is held once a year, while evening "Minnedemo" sessions are held in each of the other three quarters.)
Already, almost 300 of your compatriots have signed up for this year’s edition of Minnebar, and many more will be as the week progresses. It’s free! That’s right — the whole damn thing! (thanks to the sponsors) … including breakfast, lunch, reception and beers following. You even get a free event t-shirt! And you can come and go as you please, choosing just the sessions that interest you — though I would highly recommend hanging out all day for the networking, which is really the biggest benefit. You can do your own session if you and/or some colleagues have something to say (and if there’s still room). Hit the link that says MinneBarSessions, click Edit Page, and add your title and session description while you still can. In the coming days, the organizers will be cutting off new entries and publishing a full schedule with all the breakout sessions. That should then be available at the event site, or you can pick up a hard copy on your arrival. Come early — the event kicks off at 8:30 am.

Attention Startups and Angels: Note the "Lightning Talks" Session
On the MInneBarSessions page, scroll down and look for a link to apply to give a five-minute pitch.  Ideal if you’re a startup, whether just forming or further along. An entire hour is being devoted to these rapid-fire presentations. This is a great way to see what’s going on out there in our state, hear the latest business concepts and startup ideas, or get updates on the progress of local startups you may have already heard about. [This will be like the DEMO conferences I know so well. My advice: hone the message hard, and practice well!] Minnebar07crowd

This event is gonna be killer, I promise you. If you want to know what’s really goin’ on in tech in Minnesota, you have to be here. Bring lots of business cards, a camera, your laptop (we’ll have mondo wi-fi!), wear your favorite tee, and get ready to learn, share, network, gab, blog and Twitter your brains out, and meet tons of fun, like-minded people.

Hey, in my book, it definitely beats sittin’ on some cold lake fishing!  🙂

Best Surfing Video I’ve Seen in a While

May 3, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Current TV sent me this one, called "Pipeline Posse," earlier in the week. You talk about your gnarly… As I said when I Twittered this link a couple days ago: if you think surfers are crazy, this will definitely prove your point. [And if you missed that tweet, you can follow me on Twitter by just clicking at the right.] Okay, some would call them crazy, but surfers are really a special breed.  Especially the ones who frequent the ultimate wave in the world…along with the massive amounts of other guys competing for position there.  Warning to viewers: this is not for the faint of heart:

This post is part of my continuing objective to take a break from blogging about tech once in a while to pay tribute to my favorite sport. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, as they say. In that same vein, and speaking of the "extreme" side of surfing, I want to say-hey to my buddies up on Lake Superior, who give an entirely new meaning to yet another kind of gnarly. Yes, they surf on Gitchigumi — the ultimate (dangerous) freshwater wave in the world.  If you want to some see Minnesota gnarly, check out the awesome photos on the Superior Surf Club web site.  And here’s a video on spring surfing on Lake Superior, shot by surfer Brian Stabinger in April 2008, I believe featuring one of the top surfers on the Big Lake, his close buddy Bob Tema:

By the way, I want to try to get up to Duluth again this year to watch and shoot pix at the annual "Coldwater Surf Fest" at the Park Point Pavilion — it’s Saturday, June 7, 2008. If I do, I’ll for sure be blogging about it, as I did last year.

UPDATE (5/3/08):  Another great shot on Lake Superior, taken at Thunder Bay, is this one I sent to my buddy at The Surfrider Foundation, Jim Moriarty, who blogged it recently. He blogs at Oceans Waves Beaches.

Tim O’Reilly Asks Jonathan Schwartz the ‘Missed Questions’

April 27, 2008 / / 0 Comments

In case you didn’t catch this, a couple of days ago Tim O’Reilly asked the Twittersphere if they’d like to put any questions to the CEO of Sun, about an hour before he was to interview him on-stage at the Web 2.0 Expo in SF this week. 2441268833_fee85854a1
(Photo by James Duncan Davidson.) Well, Tim was wondering why he wasn’t seeing any questions coming through on Twitter, till he realized (too late) that he had his Twitter app settings wrong on his smart phone! (Unfortunately, he was only getting replies from those he was following.)  Well, I wasn’t on Tim’s follow list, so my question, which I submitted within minutes of when he Twittered about this, was missed … along with a whole bunch of other people’s questions.

A few hours after the session ended, I saw a tweet from Tim where he graciously had decided he would do a blog post to ask those Twittered questions of Schwartz via email, after the fact. That exchange took a day or so, but Tim just posted the resulting Q&A yesterday, here: Missed Twitter Questions from Jonathan Schwartz Interview at Web 2.0 Expo.

So, as you’ll see on Tim’s post, my question (about blogging and Twittering, of course) did get asked, and answered — and, thanks to Twitter, I didn’t even have to go the conference! 🙂  There were several other good questions that Schwartz answered as well. The hint about what’s to come regarding Sun’s "network.com" offering is especially interesting. Thanks, Tim, for the great recovery — you’re forgiven!

This Blog’s For You, Bud

April 26, 2008 / / 1 Comment

I love this blog post so much, from my other blog, that I just have to post it here, too.  Well, a least a link to it.  Put it up a little earlier today.  I’ve never done such a thing before, double up like this, but I just have to make an exception for this one.  I mean, how often does a guy get to talk about beer and blogging in the same sentence? Hmmm, I wonder how many beers the employees get to have every day at Miller Brewing?  Okay, excuse the day-dreaming….

Anyway, read the full post — it’s a great social media and marketing story.

Nmwthisblogsforyou

« Older posts Newer posts »

© 2024 Graeme Thickins on Tech

Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑