Watch out Satellite and Terrestrial Radio, Here comes the iPhone

I have not been fortunate enough to get myself a new 3G iPhone, but I did get to upgrade my first generation iPhone to the 2.0 firmware and have been completely impressed with the apps so far in the App Store.

The developers have done great work and I look forward to many more great titles to be released in the coming weeks.

I did have a thought today while at work about some of the apps, in particular AOL Radio and Pandora.  I totally love the regular Pandora site and when at my desk at work, this is the web site I always have up, playing a never ending stream of music I like.  Well with their great iPhone app, I now get that same experience on my iPhone.  I was hesitant at first, wondering how the music would stream over the “slow” Edge network, and was surprised by the quality.  It played without pause.

So as I sat at work, I wondered to my friends, “Do you think that the Pandora app will play through the fm transmitter in the car ??”  We thought about it for a moment and talked about how cool that would be.  So after work, I gave it a go and was pleasantly surprised that Iwas able to stream the AOL and Pandora apps right through my fm transmitter !  What a cool surprise.  I sat in my car and thought about this for a moment.  I have had Sirius radio for about that past two years and I love it.  I have not looked back to terrestrial radio in the least bit.  But now it occured to me that this may being another turning point.  Besides my Sirius I listen to my iPod/iPhone for mainly podcasts since I catch most of my music on Sirius.  But now what if my iPhone could go so far as eliminate the need for Sirius, music and talk.  With Sirius, I bounced between several stations for my music and would catch some talk shows no and then.  Well now with my iPhone, I not only get my fix of talk shows that I want to listen to through podcasts, I also get a music station that is totally personalized just for me, without a single commercial !  Pandora’s algorithm is such that is finds music you like and adds it to your station.  I have several personal stations set up, an Alt Indie, Jazz, and so on and the Pandora app lets me play any one of them.

This is an interesting time for both the satellite and terrestrial radio businesses.  Traditional radio has been looking in their rear view mirror as the new kids on the block, XM and then Sirius crept up to take a larger and larger share of the market.  And now those same satellite providers are trying to merge in order to not only stay alive, but also to continue to fight the traditional outlets for listenership.  Well now with the ability for a platform like the iPhone to stream content you want with no commercials for free, those new kids on the block better watch their mirrors as well.

The Age Old Question: East vs West

As many of you know, I am an east coast guy (although I would leave you all for a job in the bay area .. sorry) and I am always looking for other’s insights into the differences between the startup scene between the east and west coasts.  The other day, I came across another great piece written by Tim Marman, co-founder of Notches,  on CenterNetworks called “Here’s Why You Shouldn’t Start a Tech Company in Silicon Valley“. 

Tim brought up many great points to include:

Money

The more relevant piece is that there is more early stage capital available. The area is stock full of entrepreneurs with previous successes willing to pump that money into potentially new successes. But there’s also a dark side to this. First, Silicon Valley is one of the most expensive places around  - and if you factor in the need for a car (or two, if you’re a married couple and work in different place) and so on, it can even be more expensive than New York (which is usually one of the biggest knocks on our beloved city). Contrast this to raising a small friends and family round in Austin, Pittsburgh, or Colorado – you may have less available cash, but talent and office space (by far the two biggest drains) are a small fraction of what they are in NYC or Silicon Valley.

Talent

Again, though, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t great technical talent elsewhere. The cities I mentioned before - Pittsburgh, Austin, Boulder - all have great engineering programs producing local, young talent.

There has been a lot of talk about talent.  What I think is interesting as noted in another one of my posts is the fact that talent is really scarce in the valley.  Not only that, but the talent there is a little jaded as well.  Everyone is out for the quick hit, come on and get your options and hope they make it big.  Not that we all don’t want to make it big, sometimes you need talent to be with you for the long haul, and I think that you find that more outside the valley.

Tim makes some other great observations but the one I thought was most important was to “Avoid the Echo Chamber”

It’s really no secret that the tech community – and Silicon Valley especially, it seems – are huge echo chambers.

I think this is a really important point and a trap that many of us may fall into.  As we have seen in the local DC area, we have fallen into a dual ecosystem noted in a recent Washington Post article.  We tend to circulate inside our own ecosystem without venturing out to get a broader view of the scene as a whole.  Peter Corbett of iStragegyLabs is looking to help mitigate this with the Twin Tech event coming up this week in DC.  We need to remember that a better gauge of our ideas can be gotten outside the chamber we have created.

Event: Web Content Mavens

The Web Content Mavens consistently puts on great events with some really good thought provoking content, hence their name

In any case I wanted to pass along to all of you the details for their next meetup.  On July 23rd Kevin Novak, the Vice President for Integrated Web Strategy and Technology for the American Institute of Architects, will be presenting “Why Every Organization Should NOT Focus on Creating Communities”

In today’s world, people are more and more pressed for time. The explosion of the web and web services and sites creates opportunities and demands on an individual’s time. How much free time do they have? Can they carve out time to participate actively in new communities or should organizations adopt a distribution strategy where they are meeting users in the space and communities that they are already in?

Kevin Novak will provide background on several initiatives where users aren’t coming to communities despite large investments in infrastructure and marketing. He will also discuss and highlight several distribution strategies that can lead to success in expanding existing communities while serving and meeting an organization’s objectives.

Head over to the Meetup.com link to RSVP and get the location details.

PolicyMap, a Wealth of Data at Your Fingertips

At the recent SocialDevCamp, one of the great points by Dave Troy was that we must really start to think a littel more broad about the tech scene in our area.  He proposed a term “Amtrak Corridor” that basically represents the tech communities along the east coast to include Philadelphia, Baltimore, and DC.

So while the stuff I cover here is really centered around the DC area, I took that to heart and was happy to see recently when a reader from the Philly area tipped me off to a new product released by TRF, The Reinvestment Fund, a leading non profit in revitalizing neighborhood revitalization.  The new product they released is called Policy Map, and their tag line:

All the Data You Need

All In One Place

All Online

is absolutely true.  I got in and registered and played around and was amazed a the data I was able to pull together in such a short amount of time. In a matter of seconds I was able to outline my local Congressional District and layer on the per capita income.

Many in our area are in the PR, Social Media relations, and other fields where having good demographic information at their fingertips would be awesome.  Well now they do.  It is hard to even describe all that you can do, but the good folks at Policy Map have put together a great video demo of the featureset.

Go HERE to check it out.

Local Startup: 600Block, Discover Baltimore !

Recently while attedning SocialDevCamp in Baltimore, I met up with the founders and creators of a new local review site called 600Block, Patti Chan and Tom Poe.

Patti took some time to tell me about the project and what it was all about.  It sounded really cool and I was anxiouos to learn more.  600Block is a local review and discovery site for the Baltimore area only in its curretn state.  There is a social aspect to it, as you can add friends to see what they have discovered and reviewed in their area.  In addition there are some really cool features, like Daily Specials.  This is a listing of specials places are offering that you can take advantage of.  It may be $1 drafts or a special on steaks.   Check out the video here with an overview of the site and all the features.

As you can see there is some really cool ideas packed in here.  I think they are onto something really cool and look forward to them succeeding in Baltimore and adding new cities, maybe DC ! soon.

Our area has some people doing some really great things, like the Loladex guys and their Facebook app for local “trusted” reviews, the Localist team (also from Baltimore) which we reviewed recently.  I think Patti and Tom are onto a good thing here and I ask you all head over and support them in their beta and forward.

Need a Business Document? Try Docstoc of Course

I can tell you from personal experience that finiding good business documents can be hard to say the least.  As someone who has started a business in the last year, launched a small web service, performed some consulting work, and a variety of other things, I could have used a service like Docstoc long ago.

I think as with many new business owners, the maze of contracts, NDA’s, and other business docs can be a little daunting.  I remember my first conulting gig, trying to come up with a contract that looked and felt professional.  I wish I had known about Docstoc back then, and I am happy to be passing it on to you all now as a resource for you to use.  Here is a quick overview of the service from one of their training videos.

I hope you all find this useful, I know I did.

Let us know any other good resources you have for us fellow entrepenurs

Event: Twin Tech Party !

I was totally excited when I saw the invite for this one pop in the inbox the other day from Peter Corbett of iStrategyLabs.   It is fresh on the heels of the Scoble and Vaynerchuk event last week at 1223.  That was supposed to bring a cross section of the local tech community out, but as we saw later from a post in the WashingtonBiz Blog of the Washington Post, there is still a divide between the two cultures.

So Peter has taken the next step:  bring those two worlds together and see the sparks fly.

It’s ‘very special’ because we’re going to bringing together what the Washington Post has called “Washington’s Twin Tech Towns”. You can read what the Post has said here and here

By mixing together the so called ‘new tech’ crowd with veterans in the industry, we think sparks will fly: deals will get done, startups will get funded, partners will meet, companies will find talent and our tech ecosystem will become stronger as a result.

We’re happy to have the support of the Northern Virginia Technology Council in bridging that gap.

I am really excited about this and I hope all of you are as well.  GO HERE TO REGISTER to make sure you get in !

Here are the details thus far:

What:

The Potomac Region’s technology community keeps growing and innovating with each passing day. Keep the pace by grabbing a drink with the leaders in broader technology community: do a deal, find some talent, or just hang with your friends on July 17th at TBD location in the metro area.

Please make sure to RSVP now as you’ll need to be on the list to get in and we may run out of room!

When:

Thursday, July 17th, from 6:00pm-9pm

Where:

More than likely a bar/lounge with a roof top (TBD based on RSVPs)

Need Some $$ For Your Startup ? Start Here

I came across a great post today over at Jason Nazar’s blog about raising money for a startup.  Jason is the founder and CEO of Docstoc, an online repository of professional documents.  Docstoc looks incredible and I am going to explore it some more and report back to all you budding startups out there on how to utilize it well, but in the meantime I wanted to pass along Jason’s post on rainsing money for startups.

As Jason notes

I had selectively helped some folks raise money for their companies in my last consulting business. The truth is, no one should ever be a better fundraiser for a startup than its founders. And if you are relying on an outside 3rd party to “raise you money”, you’re likely in for a huge waste of time.

In any case here is a link to his full document, Raising Money for a StartUP Company.

It is a good read, let us know what you think.

Summer Meme

Ok, so I looged into the old East Coast Blogging admin page today and saw I had been tagged in this summer meme deal by Maddie over at the Diary of a Reluctant Blogger … This should be short considering i HATE the summer.  I wish it could be late fall/winter all year around and I would be happy as a clam …

That being said, lemme try to answer these questions.

SUMMER MEME

4 things you like about summer

1. cold beer
2. non humid summer evenings

Sorry I could only think of 2 ….

4 of your favorite vacation destinations

1. San Fran
2. Monterey
3. San Fran
4. Monterey

4 of your favorite summer foods

1. Dry rubbed ribs
2. Grilled Ribeye
3. Blue Crabs
4. Nathans Hot Dogs

4 concerts not to miss

I’ll be totally honest … I can miss them all.  No time for concerts

4 things to avoid during the summer

1. sweating
2. ticks
3. the beach
4. pools

Do you get the idea I am not a summer person …..  lets try again in the winter !

So now is my turn to tag some others right ….  hmm here we go

1. Chris Parandian - Mobile Diner
2. Jeremy Epstein - Igniting the Revolution
3. Qui Diaz - Evange.List

Searchles Gets Second Round of Funding

Local DC search and social networking startup Searchles has secured a second round of funding.  A post in the Washington Business Journal notes that the newest round is for $300,000 bringing the total they have raised this far to $2 million.

This round will help fund their new social technology developed for online media companies, called Searchles Discovery.

“We took note of the disconnect most online publishers are experiencing in networking their like-minded users and set out to develop a set of tools that provide a ready channel for this social discovery,” said Elias Shams, chief executive officer of Searchles. “As proposed partnerships with a few major media properties move forward, this additional funding will help us in keeping pace with demand for these dynamic and customized social solutions for online publishers.”

So far all funding is by angel investors, but they are looking for another $3 - $4 million to build out, but as many have found, they are finding the going a little tougher here on the east coast.

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