Growing DC Tech Scene

Well it seems as if we may have hit a Tipping Point as Malcolm Gladwell might say, or I have finally come out of my slumber.

I started this blog some time ago to try to shed some light on the community that was forming here on the east coast. Unfortunately, I got very busy at work and was unable to keep the inertia going. So recently I have been trying to get back into the swing of things. One reason is my desire to continue to look at the growing community and the other, a bit more selfish, is the fact that I have been working on my very own self funded startup and have been trying to get some low level network building started.

I must say, I have honestly been bowled over by the flourishing of the community that is taking place right here in DC. My eyes began to open while wading around Facebook and coming across the likes of Ann Bernard, Nick Oneill, JD Kathura,, and Peter Corbett just to name a few. Then today I seemed to stumble on a treasure trove of stuff. I know I am probably late to this party, but I was just so excited I wanted to take a minute and give some credit to some where credit is due. I have to say I have been totally impressed by what I have come to find.

Justin Thorp has done a great job on The DC Technology Network, a great Ning network that is bringing together a load a local resources. I was totally excited to see everything going on there. Great Forums and great people making everything run along. I also saw a ton of people who I have seen and met on Facebook, etc. Some great groups inside the network have been created and it looks like a great resource and meeting place for the DC tech community which I hope to become a larger part of.

As I was perusing around the members of the DC Technology Network, I started checking out some of the members and heading over to their blogs/webpages and I found some great ones. It was all very random, and one thing would lead me to another and soon enough I found an entire folder (DC Tech) filled with great content from terrific content providers here in the area.

One I was really impressed with due to her great writing and insights, and being very diverse was Leslie Bradshaw . She has everything from a great post on Oregon Pinot Noir wines, which was great, to her in depth coverage of “Citizen 2.0: Radically Rethinking Democracy in the Digital Age, hosted recently at The Willard. She also has a great write up on the DC Startup Weekend. I look forward to reading more of her work.

Another great resource I found was dc tech beat, founded by Greg Gershman. It is as it’s names implies and look into the local dc area tech scene.

At dc tech beat we’ll be covering companies, developers, applications, events: anything to do with the web and the DC area, which includes Maryland and Virginia. If you’re here, we want to write about you. So if you’ve got something you think we should know about, please let us know.

So if you have any news or want to be covered, let them know.

One of the things I was also trying to do was pull the events of the east coast into google cals and present them in a combined fashion to the audience. Well a year ago it was not that easy, but it looks as if no there is a solution for the DC area. DC Tech Events is a great weekly guide to the technology happenings in the DC area. Just head over, subscribe to the page and never miss another event ! And I suppose if you have an event you want advertised, that would also be the place to go.

Ross Karchner has a great blog, rossnotes, about technology and culture around the DC area, alon with a long blog roll of cool area blogs he keeps up with. Stop by and give him a read.

Refresh DC is another cool “new” (new to me) place I found.

Refresh is a community of web designers, developers, and other new media professionals working together to refresh the creative, technical, and professional aspects of their trades in the Washington, DC, area.

Our goal is simple: bring together the best and brightest new media professionals in the DC metro area so that we may learn from one another. Our industry is too rich for any one person to “know it all.” That’s where we come in.

They have a great forum with lots of great topics and information.

I am currently reading Malcolm Gladwell’s “The Tipping Point”. He writes that in many things it takes only a small number of people or impetus for small things to become big and effect big changes. I think as I look around I am beginning to see those few people who have begun change. I hope that we have hit that crucial point and the inertia will lead us to create a great community here in the are. One day I hope to read about artcices about how the east coast has overtaken Silicon Valley

blogging, DC, DC TEchnology, East Coast Blogging, technology, The Social Times, Web2.0, WhyGoSolo