DC Government Looks to Social Media

I saw a really interesting post this morning about a local DC Government agency that is reaching out and starting to use social media to reach its audience.

The DC Department of Community and Regulatory Affairs has started a blog called thisshouldbeillegal.com to address Collegiate Off Campus Housing Safety while students attend school in the District.  The site is looking to

provide a central location where you can request free services that can make your life safer if you live off-campus. We also want to make the information available where you are. We have created a Facebook group so you can get immediate online and mobile updates. We’re also on Twitter so you can ask questions and post links from wherever you are.

It is a great service they are providing to the off campus student population and what is even better is their desire to reach them where they are at.  I have been talking to some people in the DC Office of Technology recently and I was shocked to see and hear at some of the initiatives they are working on.  (Stay tuned for a post on this).  So Iw as not terribly surprised to see this iniative take off.

It does not seem like we should be surprised.  To reach college students go where they are, right?  But that is not always so obvious in some circles, especially government ones.

The post on Shannon Paul’s blog included a great interview with Mike Rupert, communications director for the DCRA.  I wanted to highlight a few points he made

Q: What is the goal of the D.C. Department of Consumer & Regulatory Affairs (DCRA) social media outreach with ThisShouldBeIllegal.com?

Mike Rupert: The goal of ThisShouldBeIllegal.com is to ensure all off-campus housing in the District of Columbia is licensed and has received a recent city safety inspection.

Q: How did the idea evolve to use social media to raise awareness about off-campus living conditions in D.C.?

Mike Rupert: My boss, DCRA Director, Linda Argo was quick to recognize, and become enthusiastic about, the potential of social media to reach students directly. One of the great things about socialmedia is that a true conversation can happen on many levels.

You should really head over and see the full text of the interview, I enjoyed the insight. Hopefully this idea can spill over into some of the other departments to use to reach out to the city residents.

600Block: Lets Show Our Support

Some of you may remember the review we did on the Baltimore start up, 600Block.  It is a great local resource for the local Baltimore area.  Now they are in a competition in City Paper’s Best Baltimore-Related Website.  So I got a note from the 600Block team looking for our support and I am happy to give it.

So lets everyone head over to vote

Vote for 600block as Best Baltimore-Related Website

600Block is a local review and discovery site for the Baltimore area only in its current 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.

Why Won’t Apple Let Me Turn Location Services Off ?

As a recent iPhone 3g owner I have been careful to cut off some services that I don’t need all the time in order to conserve the crappy battery life.  One of those services is the Location Services.  For one, I do not necessarily need this on all the time, and two, I am a little leary of my location being “known” all the time.

So I went into the system preferences of the phone and cut the Location Services off.  Here is a screenshot of this option.

What kept confusing me though, was why the services kept cutting back on …

I started to do some investigation and noticed that even though I would turn the service off, if the phone was powered off and on the services come back on by default.  To me this is a pretty seriouos issue.  If I want to cut this service off, there is a reason for it and I do not want them to decide that it is only a temporary things and cut it back on…

Has anyone else noticed this ?  What are your thoughts ?

Lets Save Pandora !

I am sure many of you know about the online music site Pandora.  It is a awesome musins site that examines he music you listen to and figures out other music you may like.  In any case, according to this Washington Post article, the company may be on the verge of stopping the music.

Last year, an obscure federal panel ordered a doubling of the per-song performance royalty that Web radio stations pay to performers and record companies.

Traditional radio, by contrast, pays no such fee. Satellite radio pays a fee but at a less onerous rate, at least by some measures.

As for Pandora, its royalty fees this year will amount to 70 percent of its projected revenue of $25 million, Westergren said, a level that could doom it and other Web radio outfits.

So to try to battle this the people over at Clearspring have developed a widget for people to put on their blogs to spread the word.

Head over and grab one to fit you blog/web site and help spread the word!

trooQ, The New Internet Marketplace

Clearly with the rise of sites like Ebay we have seen the immense popularity for online marketplaces and the ability to buy and sell goods online.   But along with that has come a list of issues ranging from security to just plain fraud.  How many stories have we heard, or been witness to, where someone was scammed out of money or merchandise on Ebay ?  Let me answer that for you, A LOT.  Services like Ebay are impersonal and create a chasm between buyer and seller leading to distrust of the community and the system.

Enter Trooq.

trooQ is the social marketplace. We give you a place to find what you are looking for, by giving you the ability to leverage your existing social networks to create networks of trusted people to buy and sell with. Not only do we provide you with the level of trust that helps make the purchasing process easier, trooQ is reliable, cost-effective and fun. And, who doesn’t like a little fun!

trooQ is the brainchild of one our very own local DC tech crowd Will Kern, Director of Product Management at Mixx, and Bill Kocik, Principle Software Engineer at Mixx as well.  I was really excited when I learned of their new effort and have been patiently waiting to get in and try it out.  I cant help but tell you the more and more I poked around, the more I began to realize what a huge impact this could have.  As I stated above, buying goods on a number of other online marketplaces is just plain scary.  You have no idea who you are doing business with.  trooQ aims to change all that with the ability for you to create a more social network of trusted people with whom you can buy and sell goods with and trust that you will get what you pay for and also get for what you sell.  It takes that impersonal issue out of the way and allows you to just worry about what you want to buy or sell.

The sales concept is unique as well.  It is kind of like a quasi auction you see on Ebay, but better.  When the seller places an item for sale, they list things like description, condition, tags, shipping costs, and a price.  Buyers that are interested can then Make and Offer.  Posting and item for sale could not be easier, with a simple one page view and viola, item for sale !  Of course there is a means to message the sellers to ask any questions about the item as well as simply place it on a watch list.

Another really cool idea that I love is the use of communities.  What a great concept to be able to not only build a broad network of friends to buy and sell good with but make it even more granular by using communities.  There are a few set up on the site now, one being a Mountain Bikers Community.  Now insode of your broad social marketplace you have these other niches that are a great resource to be able to buy and sell to like minded and trustworthy members. Brilliant !  Have a old bike you are looking to sell ?  It very well will get lost in the wash on other sites.  But in the trooq community, you have an immediate and willing audience.

And finally they have a really cool widget for you to spread the word about your inventory you need to sell.

OK, in English now. To put it simply, the trooQ widget is a little snippet of code that you can copy and paste onto your blog / website / group that gives your viewers the ability to search your inventory on trooQ. But wait, it gets better, not only does it give people the ability to search your inventory, but also all the listings of your friends, as well as all of trooQ.

Overall I think there is huge potential for trooQ to fill a void that honestly I hadn’t thought that much about until I began playing wth the site.  So many times we all just consider the incumbent and stray very little, but then an innovative idea comes long and knowks the big kid on the block right off his bike.  trooQ is that idea and I think they can and will make an impact in the space.  Head over, sign up and report back to let us know what you think !

Good luck Will and Bill …. thats a funny one to say huh .

Local Design Firm JESS3 Delivers CSPAN Convention Coverage Design

One of the big stories this week on Techcrunch was CSPAN’s launch of two websites to cover the upcoming Democratic and Republican Conventions.  The sites look really cool and look to incorparate a lot of great content.

Techcrunch seemed pretty impressed

But today C-SPAN gets fairly cool with the launch of two new sites dedicated to the upcoming Democratic Convention in Denver and Republican Convention in Minneapolis. C-Span is still workingout some technical issues, but TechCrunch readers can get an early preview by clicking on these links for DNC08 and RNC08. Both are similarly formatted sites that incorporate citizen journalism via blogs, Twitter, YouTube and Qik into portals to cover convention and related news. They will complement the existing C-SPAN Politics site.

So why are we interested here?  Well it’s obvious of course.  The local Creative Agency, JESS3 was the driving force behind the deign and branding of the initiative.  The entire team over there, Jesse Thomas, Leslie Bradshaw, Zvi Band, et al, are doing great things from what I hear, and see.  This was a big deal on a national level and should do well to bring them a lot more notoriety.  Check out a shot of the design integration they worked on.

Great work !!  So now as we are all watching our respective conferences … we wil think “Heh Jesse did this desgin”

Event: Growing Your Business Through Social Media

The Tech Council of Maryland has been doing some incredible work and will continue to do so.  Most recently they battled and won in Repealing a local tech tax in Maryland.  Here is a little about the organization:

The Tech Council of Maryland (TCM) is Maryland’s largest technology trade association which brings its 500 plus members access to technology industry leaders in Maryland, DC and Virginia. TCM has two divisions which provide valuable resources and benefits to help businesses succeed. The Tech Alliance serves the advanced technology community and MdBio serves the Maryland biotechnology community.

I have been fortunate enough to come to know some of the poeple over there and they are really working hard to do great things for the Maryland technology space.  I got some exciting news the other day of a great event they have planned coming up in early September.  The event is called “Growing Your Business Through Social Media” and looks to be a great primer for some local Maryland companies as they stick their toe into the new landscape we find around us.

Here is a little bit about the event

Learn everything you could ever want to know about Social Networking at the Tech Council of Maryland’s Social Networking Conference. Learn how to leverage a blog, how to build an account on Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, or upload your video on YouTube to drive traffic, interest and money to your business! We’ll teach you how to enhance your company’s reputation, connect with customers and build trusted relationships like never before.

They have some great speakers lined up on some great panels and it looks to be a really informative to the local businesses.  Here are the details:

September 10, 2008

08:30 am - 12:00 pm

Johns Hopkins University, Montgomery County Campus, Academic & Research Building, Room 106-110 9601 Medical Center Drive, Rockville, MD 20850

Register for this Event

Member Plus (Individual) $49.00, Member (Individual) $60.00, Non Member (Individual) $129.00

Lets help spread the word !  Please visit the following sites to help out

Facebook http://tinyurl.com/6rao65
Twitter http://twitter.com/TCMMdBio
Meetup http://education.meetup.com/97
LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=54564
Upcoming http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/1019883
Digg it http://tinyurl.com/69yoom

Look forward to attending and seeing many of you there.

Startups: 10 Documents No Startup Should Be Without

Of course you can probably tell from previous posts, we love Docstoc here at East Coast Blogging.  It is such a great resource for any documents you can think of, for your startup needs or just your personal ones.

Another great resource of information over at Docstoc, is the blog of the CEO, Jason Nazar. His posts never disappoint.  I came across another one the other day titled “10 Incredibly Awesome Documents to Help You Start a Company“.  Jason has compiled a list of 10 docs found in the Docstoc repository of douments to help you out in starting your business. Heres a quick list:

1. Non Disclosure Agreement (NDA)
2. LLC Operating Agreement
3. Sample Convertible Note
4. Board of Advisor Agreement
5. Financial Projections Template
6. Financial Model Projections for an Internet Company
7. Application for Employer Identification Number (EIN)
8. Start Up Pitch Presentation
9. 10 Questions to Consider When Start a New Business
10. Business Plan Presentation Template

Make sure to head over and check out the collection.

Jason is a really funny guy it seems, so I will close with his words

Oh yah, I should probably have some legal disclaimers around the use of these documents…. use your best judgment and hire a qualified professional to review or customize where needed. Or don’t.

Startups: Demo Tips

So you have taken the first step and made your dream into a reality.  You have a product to show off and now you just need a little help.  Many of us are good at one thing, like ideas, or coding, or at demos, but not at all of them.

At the recent START Conference in SF, one of the last panels of the day was some critiquing of some demos.  Chris Sacca of Google was awesome and provided some really good advice.

Anyway, I came across a great post over on Web Worker Daily with some tips on how to pitch and demo your web application.

Head over to the full post to check out the details but here is a quick list.

1. Know my style.

2. Know my OS.

3. Target your pitch.

4. Use a scheduling app.

5. Identify yourself.

6. Go straight to the demo.

7. Kill the slides.

8. Keep it brief.

9. Be open.

10. Keep in touch.

Aliza makes some great points and points out that much of the impiration for the post came from Jason Calcanis’s post in his email newsletter on Demo’ing Your Startup.  Its a lot of great info you should take a minute to check out.

StartupTweet, An Awesome Resource for Startups

I had seen this post in my feed reader the other day and had starred it for later reading. Let me just say this, I Love it. It is a great idea. And BTW, the logo was done by none other than our very own Zvi Band !  Great work Zvi.

Anyway, startuptweet is described as a social bookmarking site for startups and entrepenuers.  And the best thing is, anyone can post items that they find interesting and would be useful to the community.

And unlike other “bookmarking” sites, you are able to basically create an entire blog post around what you are posting.  You can include media, links, etc.  And then all the other readers can see and comment and contribute themselves.

According to Sam, the creator of startuptweet

Think of StartupTweet as a cross between Del.icio.us, Mahalo and Hacker News. My idea is for a ‘better’ social bookmaking site specifically targeted at entrepreneurs and startups. Probably ten times a week or so I end up intensely searching Google for resources, recommendations or advice. Help is out there, but it’s scattered across blogs, video sites or hidden in interviews and PowerPoints. My goal with StartupTweet is to have a community help neatly assemble all that great content, advice and resources in one spot.

It is really a great concept and I can totally see utilizing this each and every day to find great resources to write about and share.

So if you are an entrepreneur, or just looking for great resources for startups and new businesses, you have to head over and check it out and let us know what you think.  Even better start posting content to share with the rest of us.

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