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TEL•A•VISION Launches

October 7, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Nothing happens without a vision. Nothing gets created, built, or moved forward without a vision of an end-state or an outcome. It’s been said that we create and achieve what we focus on — whether that focus is on the positive or on something negative — and if we invest our conscious hours in focusing on positive visions, we’d be healthier and, most importantly, far more likely to realize our dreams and live a life aligned with our strengths, purpose and passions.

In this time of economic upheaval rippling across the globe, fundamental political and systemic change in the US, and a struggle to find good news or positive information amongst the hundreds of TV stations and tens of thousands of websites and publications available to us all — including our kids — the world needs to see possibility, hope, and visions of the future that accentuate and focus on the positive.

Any leader will tell you that vision is the most important first step to take before anything else happens, whether it’s a startup, a product, project or initiative, or anything else we strive to accomplish. Leaders will also tell you that the next great leaps in creativity and innovation will come from those that see the possibilities instead of downside, risk or failure, and empowering kids to see possibility, feel hope, and create, communicate and absorb a vision for their lives, for humanity and the world, promises to be incredibly profound, world-changing and an imperative for our future…

…if only there was someone with a vision about what could help our next generation create and live their own vision stories and celebrate their dreams, hopes and goals for themselves and the world.

…  [Read More…]

Filed Under: MN Entrepreneurs, Startups & Developers

Richard Stallman at UofMN

October 7, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Controversial free software advocate Richard Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation and the GNU project, will speak at the University of Minnesota at 6:30 p.m., Tuesday, Oct. 21 in Rm. 175, Willey Hall, 225 19th Ave. S., Minneapolis. The event is free and open to the public.

Stallman pioneered the concept of “copyleft,” the practice of using copyright law to remove restrictions on distributing copies and modified versions of a work for others and requiring that the same freedoms be preserved in modified versions. Stallman is the main author of the most widely used free software license, the GNU General Public License. Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and CEO Steve Ballmer have publicly criticized the GNU General Public License and some software companies have likened it to a virus that will “destroy the software industry.”

In Stallman’s talk, “The Free Software Movement and the GNU/Linux Operating System,” he will discuss the Free Software Movement, which campaigns for the freedom of computer users to cooperate and control their own computing activities. 

Stallman’s lecture is sponsored by the University of Minnesota’s Software Engineering Center. For more information, visit this page.

Filed Under: Events

2008 Investor Fraud Traps

October 6, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Whether you’re an angel investor listening to startup pitches or an innovator considering funding sources, now is a time to be extra careful with anything related to money, credit, lending or capital of any kind — especially if you’re a participant in a social or affinity network or if you’re transparent with your blog and other online participation (which give scammers lots of ammo to use to pitch you).

The Minnesota Department of Commerce just released this 2008 Investor Fraud Traps listing (in alphabetical order) and offer it as a warning:

Deficient Disclosure: The recent investigations by state securities regulators related to auction-rate securities (ARS) have reinforced that investors should remain cautious when pitched complex investment products accompanied by deficient disclosures or when advised to concentrate their investments too heavily in one investment product. It is best to avoid investment pitches that would lead you to put all of your eggs in one basket, especially if it’s a basket you don’t fully understand.

Energy Scams: The substantial increase in energy costs has made scams related to energy more prevalent. State and provincial securities regulators are seeing not only shady oil and gas investments, but also scams that promise the development of new technologies to increase the efficiency of energy consumption or to extract energy from sources previously thought too expensive to develop.

Online Affinity Fraud: In a new twist on affinity and online investment fraud, Tyler said NASAA members are concerned that unscrupulous individuals are trying to use social networking websites to lure people to meetings that may promote fraudulent or unsuitable investment products. “Social networking websites create an environment ripe for affinity fraud,” Tyler said. “Fraudsters can take advantage of the fact people freely share information with both their real and ‘virtual’ friends by posting it to their profile,” Tyler said. “Communication tools provided by some social networking websites make it easy to advertise and promote investment scams to a wide audience for free.” Investors need to do their own research before making an investment and should not simply rely on ‘expert’ advice given at a seminar or meeting.

…  [Read More…]

Filed Under: Internet & Society, Social Media, Startups & Developers, Tech Investors Tagged With: angels, early-stage investing

Minnov8 Gang Podcast – Episode 9

October 4, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Based upon feedback we’ve received from you and many other listeners, the Gang is increasing the pace of the show and getting to areas of interest in a tighter show format.

Keep letting us know what you want!

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins, Phil Wilson

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The Podcast
https://media.blubrry.com/minnov8/minnov8.com/site/wp-content/uploads/podcasts/20081004_M8_Gang_9.mp3

Podcast: Download (Duration: 33:55 — 19.6MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS | More

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In today’s show, a few links mentioned include:

+ Minnesota Interactive Marketing Association (MIMA) Summit

+ The concurrent UnSummit that occurred for those unable to get into the MIMA Summit

+ TechCrunch article on the credit crunch

+ “With credit tight, young companies keep closer eye on cash” by Katharine Grayson, Twin Cities Business Journal

+ RangeBuzz, “...the Iron Range MN online guide to northern MN dining, nightlife, music and area events. RangeBuzz.com makes it easy for you to discover what’s happening on the Iron Range in Northern Minnesota!”

+ Next Social Media Breakfast on October 31st at Deluxe Corp. (watch their site for details to appear).

Filed Under: Minnov8 Gang Podcast Tagged With: cloud computing, MIMA

Next MinneDemo

October 3, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Next MinneDemo to be held November 12th at 7pm and will be held at: Intermedia Arts, 2822 Lyndale Ave South in Minneapolis. (via MNInteractive).

Filed Under: Developer Hub, Emerging MN Companies, Events, Startups & Developers

Innovation 2008

October 1, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Here’s an announcement of a conference that’s not specifically focused on internet and web technology, but instead is one that undoubtedly would be of interest to Minnov8 readers, people who compete and participate in areas in which policy and thought leadership set the course.

This conference, held on the Twin Cities campus of the University of Minnesota, will bring together academicians, policy makers, business leaders, scientists, educators, artists, students and the public to discuss solutions to the major challenges facing the United States revolving around science and technology policy, including innovation, energy security and sustainability, health sciences policy, and our ongoing economic competitiveness in a high-tech, highly-educated global marketplace.  

The goal of Innovation 2008 is to bring scientists together with policymakers and the public, to help move the United States toward policies that are better informed by scientific realities, and to help scientists, engineers and the scientific community as a whole become more engaged in the political process.  The conference will also explore ways to bridge the divide between science and the broader culture as a way to broaden public appreciation of science.

Learn more and register here.

Filed Under: Events

Minnov8 Gang Podcast – Episode 8

September 27, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Graeme Thickins, Garrick Van Buren, Phil Wilson

Scattered geographically once again, the Gang comes together for another show where we chat about:

+ Our potential economic meltdown and what it means for internet and web startups and companies

+ What’s up with Best Buy? We chat about how this behemoth retailer has now suddenly burst onto the scene with a whole range of internet-centric initiatives (see Minnov8 posts here and here)

+ Tim O’Reilly’s Web 2.0 Expo keynote where he denigrates developers seemingly focused on trivial applications like throwing sheep

+ The “Unsummit” going on as an alternative for those unable to get in to the MIMA Summit (it’s sold out).

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The Podcast
https://media.blubrry.com/minnov8/minnov8.com/site/wp-content/uploads/podcasts/20080927_M8_Gang_8.mp3

Podcast: Download (Duration: 33:26 — 19.4MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS | More

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Filed Under: Minnov8 Gang Podcast Tagged With: Best Buy

Visi: A Minnesota Provider Growing to Meet Demand

September 25, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Visi logoVisi, a company many of us are familiar with since their founding in 1994, is Minnesota’s largest locally-owned managed hosting and connectivity provider (11,000 business and residential customers which includes thousands of DSL customers). What most don’t know is that they’re expanding right here in Eden Prairie, with a Tier III data center, in order to meet growing demand.

A Tier III data center has 99.982% uptime, backup power, and other infrastructure that ensure mission-critical serving continues with only minor downtime (To learn more about data center tiers, view this article or this PDF from Minnesota telecom company, ADC).

As the awareness and creation of composite applications (i.e., mashups), Software as a Service (SaaS), web applications, mobile smartphone delivery and other internet-connected accelerates here in Minnesota and anywhere else an internet connection is found, it’s a business imperative to have access to world-class infrastructure as well as the service and support necessary to meet our hosting needs.

Beyond that imperative lies something that few understand, let alone have created strategies to meet and exceed expectations: performance and user experience.

When more and more of us either use or deliver applications that have connections to multiple served applications (e.g., your website also serves a forum, wiki, blog, and applications), performance is always critical. But in a Web 2.0 day when data resides in multiple locations; web applications have functionality delivered by multiple providers in different geographies; and people’s expectations are for immediate access to the cloud with snappy performance; a provider that understands the entire chain from you to the cloud and back is a choice to consider relying on.

Fortunately we have a key provider right here in Minnesota that “gets it” and they’re growing and expanding to meet demand, performance expectations and the increasing online emphasis by Minnesotans.

…  [Read More…]

Filed Under: Developer Hub, MN Entrepreneurs

Mashup Best Buy

September 23, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Best Buy has released Remix at the Web 2.0 Expo in New York City, allowing anyone to create a mashup with Best Buy online catalog content. An application programming interface (API) — documented though light on code or examples — allows queries into Best Buy’s online catalog and results to be returned from those queries.

As they say on their site, “Remix is an API that gives you access to BestBuy.com’s product catalog data. What you do with it is up to you.”

Really? I’d assume that some sort of terms of service would be forthcoming. 

Joshua Michele Ross over at O’Reilly Radar (O’Reilly is the brain trust behind the Expo), has this excellent post about the import of Best Buy doing this:

“Best Buy is thinking much more strategically about the value of the Internet by allowing anyone to reinvent their entire online store. With “access to all the data that feeds Bestbuy.com” imagine the potential of creating your own, curated site on top of Best Buy’s catalog and supply chain. Imagine top Blue Shirts running their own online stores with select merchandise that they stand behind or imagine a thousand home-theater geeks and “go-to-guys” (and girls) extending their expertise and word-of-mouth via their own online stores.” 

I’ll throw in one more: imagine you run a price comparison site that allows an online shopper to instantly compare pricing to another (though this can be done with screen scraping, but this API makes it much easier).

I must say that with BlueShirtNation, their prediction markets, what we experienced over at the Social Media Breakfast (specifically with this video), I grow more impressed by the week with the calculated risk, openness and forward-thinking this retailer is pursuing. Kudos Best Buy.

Filed Under: New Tech from MN Companies, News & Events Tagged With: Best Buy

Moodle Makes Its Mark

September 22, 2008 By Steve Borsch

Moodle at the UofMN graphicToday’s accelerating adoption of open source software (OSS), and the shift from desktop to web applications increasingly built on top of OSS, is being embraced by individuals, the non-profit sector, small, midsize, and even enterprise businesses.

As more of us get connected via the internet and through web applications, seek ways to make our collaboration more powerful, shift our old serial and linear processes to ones that are parallel and associative, OSS is a key building block of internet and web technologies and applications. OSS is also gaining momentum globally and affecting all industries and institutions, even educational ones. 

That said, educational institutions often lag the private sector in adopting new technologies until proven, especially the Kindergarten through senior high school (K-12) levels. K-12 is often seen as risk-averse and needing clarity about the efficacy and pedagogy of using any particular technology. It must be proven and the benefits to learning and student achievement crystal clear before any technology is implemented, especially OSS. 

On the flip side, higher education is a hotbed of OSS use and many projects have origins in colleges and universities. One could argue that our public institutions taking risks, researching new possibilities, and pushing against the membrane of the future is at least as important as their educational mission and has contributed code and thought leadership in OSS. 

Though I’ve been aware of the OSS learning management system called “Moodle” (Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment) for some time, I was both delighted at what I discovered at the U of MN and surprised (stunned might be the better word) by its adoption within Eden Prairie schools where my son attends high school.

There are lessons in this story for all of us about how two very different educational organizations recognized that collaboration, human connection, and the move to parallel and associative learning is at the core of education going forward, and took calculated risk with the OSS Moodle to meet new needs.

…  [Read More…]

Filed Under: Edutech

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