Month: September 2010

Young Involved Philadelphia State of Young Philly Entrepreneurship panel take aways

Audience at YIP Entrepreneurship event.

Tuesday night was the Business and Entrepreneurship portion of a two-week event series called State of Young Philly hosted by the sprawling and popular Young Involved Philadelphia. (The event series closes this tomorrow, Friday, Oct. 1, with its showcase.)

I reported on this week’s entrepreneurship event for Technically Philly, through whom we co-sponsored the event.

The night, held at CBS 3 Studios north of Center City and drawing upwards of 60 young professionals, featured a half-hour panel discussion on the state of business in Philadelphia today and a half-hour breakout session in which smaller groups discussed actionable steps about improving the entrepreneurship climate here.

To close the event, panel moderator Bernie Dagenais, the former editor of the Philadelphia Business Journal and now CEO of the Main Line Chamber of Commerce, assessed that the sentiment seemed to be that public schools and the perception and practice of the city’s startup scene needs the greatest focus to grow Philadelphia’s business climate, but there was more to it.

A handful of important thoughts I took away from the panel discussion didn’t make it into my TP story, so I wanted to share them, which I will below.

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Switch Philly: the startup presentation event from Technically Philly

We’ve always said a niche news site has to look beyond advertising. We at Technically Philly have toed the water of events before. Well, we’re jumping all the way in now.

Earlier this month, we announced Switch Philly, a new business presentation event where five local companies will each offer entertaining seven-minute demos of their new products. Find TP coverage of our event here.

The event will be held Oct. 6, 2010 at 6 p.m. inside the Levitt Auditorium of the University of the Arts at Broad and Pine streets in Center City Philadelphia. Tickets for $9 can be purchased here — which helps us throw on the event, have others in the future and supports a niche news effort.

Much of the coverage goes to my colleague Sean Blanda, who is leading this initiative for TP.

The presenting companies at the inaugural Switch will be the following:

  • Azavea, the GIS-software firm based in the Callowhill neighborhood, will present sustainably-minded mapping and direction application CommonSpace.
  • P’unk Ave, the Passyunk Square-based web development company, will share innovative content management system Apostrophe.
  • Orpheus Media Research, the Old City tonal research project, will share music comparison software Myna.
  • Zecvozi, the stealth Northern Liberties sustainability tracking company, will launch at the event.
  • Packlate, the West Conshohocken discount vacation planning startup, will share its new deal-finding search engine.

Find the official press release here [PDF].

‘Barrel of a Gun’ Mumia Abu Jamal documentary premiere thoughts

The middle of the center section on the lower level of the Merriam Theater Tuesday night seemed well-acquainted.

Across rows, middle aged men with ruddy cheeks talked about seeing each other last on trips to Key West, sneaking a six-pack into the historic theater and shared the kind of general chatter of people who knew each other well a long time ago.

The lights came down around 7:15 p.m., too early to know exactly how well or from when they knew each other. It would only be a guess that they all came from the same neighborhood, but that was how the audience felt last night at the world premiere of the ‘Barrel of a Gun,’ the feature-length documentary from Tigre Hill meant to finalize the 30-year-old controversy around Mumia Abu-Jamal’s convicted killing of police officer Daniel Faulkner in December 1981.

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The Wire: yeah, the HBO Baltimore drama is mad decent

I take something of pride in sometimes indulging in great cultural luxuries long after their novelty has waned.

With that knowledge, I’ll share my thoughts on finishing the complete five-season DVD set of celebrated HBO drama ‘the Wire‘ to encourage readers to watch it again, assuming you’ve seen the show at some point since it first aired in 2002.

It’s not difficult at all to piggyback that suggestion onto the concept of the state of media and the future of news.

David Simon, the creator and primary writer of the serial drama based on the inner-workings of drugs, policing and politicking in gritty post-industrial Baltimore, was himself, quite famously, a newspaper reporter for the Baltimore Sun, giving him a career of insight.

Notably, each of the five seasons take on a different focus of the Baltimore city structure — from the drug trade, to unions to policing to, yes, reporting. So in the past few weeks after finishing the final season, I’ve delved into writing, stories, concepts and conversations. Even if you know the show well, it might be worth seeing what’s out there and, yes, connect it to media.

Continue reading The Wire: yeah, the HBO Baltimore drama is mad decent