Meet the Entrepreneurs Who Are Reinventing Philadelphia
Rather than regurgitating 9hrs worth of Founder Factory live blogging, I thought I’d just let one of today’s Founder Factory organizers share his excitement in his own words.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhEOu3ECQeU
Dave Speers is an online marketing consultant and start-up junky that has worked with a wide variety of Philadelphia businesses. Dave spends most his time annoying really smart people at Indy Hall co-working collaborative.
One of my pet-peaves with the whole trend from traditional desktop software to a brave and virtually unrestricted world of Software-As-A-Service (SAAS) is the specific and painful process of bridging the gap between the two. Viewing documents that we’re created to be viewed offline on the web has not been fun. Adobe has used it’s market share to push a bloated PDF viewer on the world, that quite frankly causes problems with many browsers. Google got into the game a little while ago with Google Documents and was even able to launch supporting Microsoft formats like .Doc , .PPT and .Xcl . . . and Google took over the world and we all lived happily ever after . . . not quite. Creating and collaborating online is one thing but opening up .Doc, .Docx, .PDF. , .Xcl documents in your browser is another. If you’ve ever tried to view a document through Google docs you can attest to the frustration. Well, it turns out that Philly startup Vuzit has relieved my suffering with it’s new product/project called Nodobe.
What is Vuzit?
Vuzit (pronounced “views-it”) is an online document platform that utilizes web services and AJAX technology to create a best of breed web platform for distributing and displaying documents.
Vuzit allows content publishers to embed documents in their web pages, similar to how YouTube distributes video, thus maintaining consistent branding and site navigation. Vuzit provides publishers with tools to display documents alongside other web content and systems (e.g. advertising and analytics)” - Vuzit website
What’s new?
We are happy to announce that the Nodobe Firefox extension was approved for public consumption by the Mozilla AMO editors this weekend. It’s been downloaded over 500 times in the past couple days, despite a total lack of promotion on our part. We created this plugin so we would use Vuzit in more of our daily activities. We’re hoping that this product will show others the flexibility afforded by the Vuzit platform.” - Vuzit Blog
Go install it now and check it out out for yourself. Nodobe online document viewer for Firefox.
A little while ago Phillypreneurs was able to spend some time with the Vuzit team and get to know more about how they got their start and what’s next. Check it out:
Dave Speers is an online marketing consultant and start-up junky that has worked with a wide variety of Philadelphia businesses. Dave spends most his time annoying really smart people at Indy Hall co-working collaborative.
Ignite Philadelphia: September 23, 2008. Doors open 6PM. Talks start 7PM. FREE (be early)
Yes, ‘atwitter’ is a word and yes, I know what it means and yes, it is the inspiration for the naming of Twitter.
For you non-wordies, ‘atwitter’ means ‘Being in a state of nervous excitement’, but you don’t have to take my word for it, skeptics can verify for themselves here, here, and here.
If you didn’t have a conference in San Francisco and you were able to make it to the last Ignite Philly in July, then you know exactly why there’s a buzz; Ignite Philly is a vein thumping dose of ‘change-your-city, change-your-world’ inspiration! Let me be more specific: “Ignite is a series of speakers talking about inspiring projects for 5 minutes. The presentations can be serious, funny, or somewhere in between.” As its name alludes, Ignite Philly has become the touch-point for an explosion of innovative and cutting edge projects, and companies and social experiments in Philly, if not the country. But again, you don’t have to take my word for it: Ignite Philly Recap (by Kevein Lee), Ignite Philly Recap (by Philebrity), Ignite Philly Recap (by Orielly) .
The equation for combustion is simple: Rub a bunch of smart/creative/motivated people together in a jam packed bar (heat), add alcohol (fuel) and the synergy of a social network (oxygen) and WHAM! you’ve got a fire that can turn a city upside down. I’m just kidding about the alcohol, the real fuel is passion (but the alcohol certainly doesn’t hurt).
The better question is ‘how can you not be?’. With Josh Kopelman from First Round Capital introducing an all new crew of presenters sharing everything from grass root art initiatives, to University experiments, to innovative corporate projects, it’s going to be another amazing (and probably sold out) night.
Here’s a taste of the line up for IP 2.0:
Don Miller (NO CARRIER) Beth Van Why (Design Philadelphia) Jameson Detweiler (Drexel’s Smart House) Stu Hankin and Will Robinson (IdeaBlob) Kristin Groenveld (ArtSphere) Stan Pokras (Nonprofit Technology Resources) Whit MacLaughlin (New Paradise Laboratories) Jen Yuan (jenlists [at] gmail.com) Pamela H. Zimmerman and Kiki Bolender (Parking Day Philly) Howard Blumenthal (MiND TV) Geoff DiMasi & Paul Wright (Open Source Philadelphia) Jason Allum (RipIt) Mark Yim (University of Pennsylvania GRASP Lab) Jim Stogdill (Accenture) Adam Turkelson (Neat Receipts) Harris Romanoff and Dana Schloss (MakePhilly) Steve Welch (DreamIt Ventures)
Whether you’re atwitter or not atwitter (I’m so done with this word) you should defenitely plan to be at Johnny Brenda’s next Tuesday, just so you can say you were there 50 yrs from now. See you there!
Dave Speers is an online marketing consultant and start-up junky that has worked with a wide variety of Philadelphia businesses. Dave spends most his time annoying really smart people at Indy Hall co-working collaborative.
Ignite is a series of speakers talking about inspiring projects for 5 minutes. The presentations can be serious, funny, or somewhere in between.
Speakers include: The iSepta guys, Kristin Thompson, of the Future of Music Coalition, NO CARRIER, 100K house, Pete Tridish of the Prometheus Radio Project, Alex Hillman of Indy Hall, and several more. The speakers are all doing exciting and inspiring things in Philadelphia.
Here is a taste of what you can expect courtesy of Ignite Seattle:
1. How to buy a car
2. Make Art, Not Content:
You can check out a whole bunch more Ignite videos on Youtube here.
Read more here:
http://ignitephilly.org/
http://window.punkave.com/2008/05/30/ignite-philly/
http://www.johnnybrendas.com/calendar.php?y=2008&m=6&display=1
https://twitter.com/ignitephilly
The coordinators of Ignite Philly are Geoff DiMasi & Alex Gilbert of P’unk Avenue and the JuntoVanja Buvac & Far McKon of The Hacktory and Make:Philly.
Dave Speers is an online marketing consultant and start-up junky that has worked with a wide variety of Philadelphia businesses. Dave spends most his time annoying really smart people at Indy Hall co-working collaborative.
Girlfriends
3502 Scotts Lane, Bldg #16
Philadelphia PA 19129
You are a smart, savvy woman who believes she can have it all and is willing to do what it takes to get it. Here’s your chance to meet other women who love to get together to talk about business and success.
In addition to networking, this upscale experience will include signature cocktails and incredible hors d’oeuvres. You will also have your choice of a luxurious chair massage or a funtastic belly dance class. You don’t want to miss this event.
Cost:
$50 for Gold level members of the Wealth Success & Women VIP Girls Club
$60 for non-members
Register online before June 18, 2008
thanks Always Fabulous Events for the heads up.
Dave Speers is an online marketing consultant and start-up junky that has worked with a wide variety of Philadelphia businesses. Dave spends most his time annoying really smart people at Indy Hall co-working collaborative.
Students from Philadelphia and Camden, N.J., public high schools will flex their entrepreneurial muscles at The National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE) Philadelphia’s First Annual Citywide Youth Business Plan Competition, to be held May 29 at the Temple University Student Center, from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. Over the past year, nearly 500 students from eight NFTE partner schools have learned basic business concepts and developed business plans. Now one competitor from each NFTE partner school is eligible to present their business plan before a panel of seven judges. The student who delivers the best business pitch will win a laptop and a $1,500 venture capital grant; and the top two winners will move on to compete in NFTE’s National Business Plan Competition in New York City this fall.
Each student will have eight minutes to present their original business plan to a panel of seven judges. The judges will then ask each student a series of questions about their plan during a five minute session. Serving as judges are Judy Spires, CEO of Acme; Melinda Emerson, President of Quintessence Multimedia; Regine Metellus, CFO and VP of Operations of the Urban League of Philadelphia; Tara Weiner, Managing Partner of Deloitte Philadelphia; Terry Hicks, Vice President of Ben Franklin Technology Partners Investment Group; Kimberle Levin, President & CEO of Teknuko; and Kenyon Hayward, CEO of Redlasso. In addition, Pat Croce, author, entrepreneur and former president of the Philadelphia 76ers is also participating by awarding the grand prize winner a business coaching session at his/her school. Best Student Business Plan Wins $1,500 and Chance to Compete at National Level.
For more info or questions please contact Lori Perlow, Philadelphia Program Director (Lori.Perlow@NFTE.com)
Dave Speers is an online marketing consultant and start-up junky that has worked with a wide variety of Philadelphia businesses. Dave spends most his time annoying really smart people at Indy Hall co-working collaborative.
