Have you ever wondered what a group of highly talented and motivated people could accomplish in a weekend? Could they start a company from concept to completion?
Startup Weekend answers that question and more. A unique three-day experience, Startup Weekend brings the best and brightest people together in a local office space to select the concept, break into teams, and develop the product, marketing and revenue model.
Bloomington Startup Weekend is coming February 8th - 10th!
…and I’ve got a golden ticket! Well, it isn’t golden, but it feels golden! I am incredibly psyched up about this unique experience. Probably because I only found out about it a few days ago and signed-up almost immediately, and realize that the last thing I can afford to give up is an entire weekend of not working my side business. But, for some reason, this is making me just crave the experience more.
In all honesty, some of the execution that has come out of past Startup Weekends have left me a bit underwhelmed. I’m sure I’ll change my tune a bit after having gone through the experience. I just had hoped to look back at previous events and seen bigger, more financially viable ideas. I understand it is only a weekend, but if 75+ great minds can develop an amazingly great idea, and crank out a rough, working prototype in 3 days, and emerge with a core group of determined individuals to push the company forward over the next 6 months, I think it has great promise. Alternatively, trying to crank out a finished, polished product in 3 days kinda forces you to set your sights a bit lower. So, I hope at the Bloomington event we can aim high and leave with (at least) half a product instead of a half-assed product.
If you are in driving distance and are so inclined, I highly recommend joining me in a couple weeks at what should be a very memorable event. Look for live updates and likely some streaming video on this blog during the marathon weekend.
I’m very pleased to say that Smaller Indiana is one of the local sponsors of the event!
Just a quick word to the wise: AVOID NETWORK SOLUTIONS LIKE THE PLAGUE.
Sorry if I’m being a bit dramatic, but I tend to get a bit sensitive over companies that behave badly the way Network Solutions is. The DomainTools blog is covering the shady tactics that NetSol is now employing. It appears now that when you search for an available domain name at netsol.com, if the domain is unregistered NetSol will register it within minutes!
They will place a 4-day hold on the domain and then release it back into the wild. The major problem with this tactic is that it:
- Forces you to buy the domain from Network Solutions (they are expensive compared to most)
- Makes the domain you wanted available to any number of domain tasters and generally anyone watching expiring domain name lists waiting for good ones to drop.
If you lose a good domain name this way, the odds are against you that you’ll manage to recover it without having to buy it from Network Solutions.
I tried this just 10 minutes ago with a not-so-nice domain name with a few numbers thrown in. I made sure it wasn’t registered. I checked it’s availability on NetSol.com, and within 5 minutes it had been registered by Network Solutions. Unbelievable.
I’ve lost domain names by not registering them fast enough in the past, but this is to the extreme.
This is only an educated guess based off some exploration of Mosh Mobile’s “temporarily offline” website and a small scoop (if I’m right), but it looks like Indiana-based Mosh Mobile might be offering Blackberry Pearl service as a part of their free cell service offering. They will make an official announcement later today at 1:00 PM.
Their service is still in closed beta, and their service area appears to only be northern Indiana and much of Michigan. However, their potential service model is quite interesting. Through agreements with their service providers, they can offer free mobile phone service in exchange for sending you up to 3 “dialogs” from one of their sponsors. The “dialog” could come in the form of a survey, a free game or a video. All you have to do is “answer” these dialogs to maintain your free service.
You can learn more at this page that, for some reason, is still online despite their site being down until their 1PM announcement today: http://www.moshmobile.com/learn.php.
So far, everyone’s feedback has been very positive about hosting a blogger conference in Indiana.
If you are visiting this page and want to attend an Indiana Blog Conference, we need you to sign-up for this campaign! We need our initial 200 attendees in order to raise the funds to start making this conference a reality.
There is no risk. If you pay, we have a (great) conference! But in order to get there, we need everyone interested to sign-up! You’re credit card won’t be charged unless we meet our goal. If you have questions about how your credit information is handled, please read this FAQ.
Post any questions or comments you have. Let us know if there is a topic you really want covered at the conference!
Thanks to all the support so far!
Take 2 minutes and sign-up today: https://www.thepoint.com/campaigns/indiana-blog-conference
Tired of seeing all those great, but expensive blogging and social media conferences everywhere else but Indiana?
You can help change that starting today!
A small group of local bloggers have been tossing around the idea of holding an Indiana bloggers conference for some time. It’s time to either make it happen or forget about it.
The biggest hurdles? Initial funding and initial interest. That is why we have decided to use ThePoint.com to rally support for this great idea. If you are interested in attending the conference, all you need to do is sign-up and agree to pay the steeply discounted registration cost ONLY if we get 200 people to sign up. That’s right, if there is not enough interest and we fall short of our goal of 200 early registrations, you don’t pay a dime.
Here are the big picture details:
- Two-day conference to be held in Fall 2008 in downtown Indianapolis
- Session topics will include various current issues relating to blogging and social media, such as: political blogging, ways to make your blog and blog writing better, website analytics, blog and social media marketing techniques, business blogging, citizen journalism, creative commons, social networking, monetizing your blog, and local topics. This is a very early and rough list of topics that will become much more refined as we move forward–your input is appreciated.
- Estimated registration cost of $99 (you only pay $49 total if you register early through ThePoint.com)
What we need from you now:
If this sounds like something you would like to attend, please sign-up today. You will only be charged the $49 early registration fee if we get 200 people to sign up. At that point, we will have enough to make the 2008 Indiana Bloggers Conference a reality. Registration will cost everyone else $99 (estimated).
Also, in order for this to have a chance, we need your help to spread the word. Post about it on your blog, share it with your fellow bloggers–we can all make this happen.
And finally, your feedback is greatly welcomed–especially on the session topics. What do you want to hear/learn about at an Indiana Bloggers Conference?
To sign up and get the latest, visit the sign-up website.
I was reading the latest headlines on CNN.com earlier today when I came upon a story about a plane carrying 10 skydivers that had crashed. 3 of the people on board were currently missing, but presumed dead. As I’m quickly scanning the details of the story, I notice the flash-ad next to the story is depicting a person free-falling in the air, hurdling towards the ground.
Take a look at the story, and then the ad to the right side of the page:
Now, I know this wasn’t on purpose. But, it brings up an interesting issue of what happens when unrelated ads are put randomly next to content that causes unintended connections to be made.
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