Geekdom.com is the latest co-working space in San Antonio, Tx. Backed by some Rackers and other small start-ups and individuals Geekdom.com is a refreshing co-working space that shows promise. I look forward to doing a full article on them soon!
Hello from San Antonio. This is joey phd checking in! The tech scenes here in Central Texas has been developing at a rapid pace. With all sorts of professional and non-professional organizations meeting weekly, it has been exciting to be a part of it. From Rackspace’s announcement that they will be hosting TechStars in San Antonio to the Occupy Austin and San Antonio movements that were stemmed from an glocal group of hackers, activists and as Lessig would says “Citizens“, tech culture and business has been growing in all directions.
Facebook recently announced it would be expanding it’s office space in Austin, San Antonio’s and Austin’s hacker spacers are fully active and vibrant!
Datafoundry is finishing up construction of their new Data Center, which is an impressive operation.
Life in the central Texas tech scene is happening. GeekAustin, Dorkbot Austin, Austin Tech Happy Hour, co-working groups such Conjunctured are all helping to create a melting pot of technology savvy, nerds, geeks, hipsters and white collar squares (in a good way of course) in Austin.
People like Todd O Neil, Jennifer Navarrete, Luis Carlos Sandoval, Kaye Crux, Christian Rios and many others who I am failing to mention are out there shaking things up here in San Antonio.
As a hybrid citizen of Austin and San Antonio, it has been interesting to see the flow of talent, ideas and initiatives between the two cities.
Recently I had my students take a field trip up to Austin to attend the EFF Austin meeting where Sandy Stone gave a talk about identity and cyberspace in the 21st century. It was great to see Austin geeks out in full force chatting up what identity means these days in the age of Facebook Twitter, smart phones and GPS. Brandon Wiley talked about peer to peer wireless networks to distribute data through geographical spaces.
I even added in a couple comments about the idea of the 6th layer of the internet being the human social networks (i.e. I mean people not facebook) and how this technology wave of ubiquitous computing is combined with the social networks’ (layer 6) ability to correlate and cognitively agree on cultural significance as a rhizomatic structure. And how this is beginning to be the norm and accepted way of creating significant pieces of culture on the fly (more to come when I release my full article about living in the Post Information Age).
Well that last part was a breath of Academic techno-babel, but none the less the point is, things are happening in and around Central Texas in terms of technology, geekness and more, so keep your eyes and ears open, it is just starting to get good!
Check it out, Dorkbot has started back up for the season:
http://dorkbot.org/dorkbotaustin/
I hope to make it to one in the spring when I am not teaching.
On April 19th at the University of Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Brandon Wiley and Dustin Younse will be presenting their takes on the future of media, technology and culture. Be prepared to be wowed! Here is the Facebook Event.
In Austin that morning (April 19th), Elizabeth Quintanilla will be giving a talk hosted by the Greater Austin Hispanic Chamber of Commerce about Social Media and Facebook know-how. You can RSVP here , also check out their FB Event.
This year has been hectic for us all here at Austin30.org. Our co-founder Kristine is on route to finish graduate School and Dustin Younse, one of our contributors is on track as well. I (joey) have been working non-stop at my new job at UIW starting a Convergent Media program. It has been a lot of work, but very rewarding. Recently I have been working with students on a tribute video for Math the Band, a Providence, Connecticut 8bit geek band, this video should be pretty epic in terms of geekyness and grit, so be prepared. Also I have been attending UTSA’s New Media director’s, Leslie Raymond, Colloquium put on by her group Potter-Belmar Labs and it has been amazing to see all the unique artist work being done around San Antonio.
And last but not least, for the true geeks out there, here is a video a student of mine (The Infamous Phillip James) made about a follow focus system he designed for one of my classes using an Arduino:
Hey Everyone!
Well as you may or may not know, things are going full bore in Austin, co-working has taken off, Facebook is now in Town, there are a slew of for profit and non-profit groups, initiatives, events and more reshaping our community.
Conjunctured recently expanded and now has two houses for co-working.
Personally my life has taken an interesting twist. I have now completed my PhD and was hired by the University of Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas to start a Convergent Media program. Since landing here in San Antonio I have been working non-stop with monthly trips to Austin. I have put together a talk series down here that I will be continuing in the spring that consists of Convergent Media innovators, from DJ’s, VJ’s, Technologists, Makers to Chicana Feminists. My students are awesome, here is an example of a video one of my students made about XBox and Modern Warfare II:
We are doing all kinds of interesting side projects, both creative and business venture style, it is fun to be in a position where so much revolving talent and excited people are present.
I was also able to make it to the TEDx San Antonio conference which was interesting to say the least. Lawerance Lessig gave a stunning talk about the idea of being a “citizen”. I am interested to see what kind of other social events are created out of the TEDx gathering and I look forward to future collaborations.
Another note worthy mention is the fact that I am typing this article up at C4 Workspace, a co-working space located in downtown San Antonio, specifically in the King Williams district. The space is pretty killer, I hope more people find out and utilize this place as it has a very good feel to it. If you are interested in having a co-working meet up day, contact me and let’s see what we can put together. While at the C4 Workspace I had a chance to meet up with the women from the Media Justice League organization and had a wonderful talk about net neutrality. It is great to have such an organization here in San Antonio out making some noise 
So since I will now be able to better cover the happenings in San Antonio and Cecy, Dustin and our other contributors are still up in Austin I have decided to change our name to:
The name is a reflection of our Central Texas coverage, and goes along with the naming theme I have used for two other Blogs I manage: ctxcarscene.com (A car enthusiast site) and ctxgrooves.com (A music / hi-fi enthusiast site)
We hope that with our expanded coverage we will provide some cross pollination of the San Antonio and Austin geek/tech/artist/nerd/business venture/etc community.
I hope to add a couple of bloggers down here in San Antonio soon.
So stay tuned for a report on the Austin Hacker Space and San Antonio’s Hackerspace as well as much more!
Check out Austin’s new hacker space this Saturday, for more information please visit:
http://www.atxhackerspace.org/index.php/Launch_Party
We will be providing further coverage of the Austin Hackerspace so stay tuned!
So I made it down to the Belmont bar along with Cecy to see what the buzz was with Facebook’s event. The Austin Young Chamber of Commerce hosted the event. One of the first things we noted was that Facebook didn’t realize that when you thrown an event at 5pm on top of a bar in Texas summer heat everyone sweats a lot!
However, the show went on and Sarah, the spokesperson of the event for Facebook (and Austin office manager) gave a great speech about Facebook wanting to hear and see what Austin techies have been up to. They emphasized their plan to have an office of over 200 people in a few years and that they wish to create a fun work culture that encourages innovation.
For more information check out their Austin job openings.
On a personal note, I was excited to see a former student of mine from the ACTLab as one of the Facebook Employees, I made him take a photo with his boss, I know I am cheesy!
I just wanted to plug ProductCamp 2010 and remind people to check it out. It has grown from a small grass roots effort into a large unconference that I believe is a good example of a barcamp that balances corporate sponsorship and community participation.
Also I would like to give a shout out to Lynn Bender and crew for hosting Linux Again Poverty for a second year. It is amazing to have people in our community doing such projects. Make sure you stay tuned for the next LAP event.
So to say things are brewing in Austin would be an understatement. With the arrival of Rackspace and Facebook in the past months/years and Samsung’s announcements for new hires, combined with the great barcamp and startup scene (and by startup I am throwing you boot strappers in there!) I would venture to say Austin is moving again.
And it should be mentioned that this movement isn’t just in part to the traditional large business savior situation, but the great attitude and creative space that Austin geeks and social media nerds have fostered over the years. It is truly amazing!
With such a great network setup it has been amazing to see how small businesses, consultants and corporations alike have begun networking in such a way as to create opportunity at all levels of participation.
So if you are new to Austin, take a look at our links page and our calendar, there are things going on almost everyday. This is a renaissance time for the web 2.0 and a time to look and see what the next.
Over the next couple of months we will be having guest contributors offer their ideas of what is “next” both technologically and socially for Austin and the central Texas region. So stay tuned and enjoy the ride!
You might be wondering who the hell I am. I’m Cecy Correa, and I’ve known Joey and the ACTLab peeps for a couple of years now. Joey asked me to do some write-ups for Austin three-oh (it’s not Austin thirty), so here I am!
I attend Refresh Austin pretty regularly. Refresh Austin is a monthly meet-up of developers and designers in the Austin area. We meet at Buffalo Billiards the second Tuesday of every month (you can check out the Refresh Austin site here.)
This past Tuesday Michelle Greer kindly organized an excellent panel on start-ups and how to get funded our acquired. The panel included Jason Cohen (SmartBear software), Pat Condon (Rackspace Hosting), Jim Curry (Rackspace Hosting), and Josh Baer (OtherInbox).
The panel was excellent! We’re about one month away from SXSW, but the quality was on par with SXSW. Video of the panel should be posted soon, so here are a few interesting bullet points I took from the meeting:
Bootstrap: Most start-ups thrive due to bootstrapping. It’s not greed! Bootstrapping builds a good sense of what’s really important in your business, and allows you to focus on what matters. Once you make it as a successful business, what you have learned from bootstrapping will keep you on the right track.
Don’t get VC unless you need it: Sure, Venture Capital is great. Someone gives you money and you get to work on your business. However, you should not rely on VC. If you can get started on your business, get started! Don’t let the wait for capital freeze you and keep you from even starting your business. Acquire a couple (or a few) clients to get you enough of a cash flow to stay afloat. Having a small number of clients will help you focus your business, while proving to a potential Venture Capitalist that your business is worth it and can make money.
The business plan: Most panelists agreed that a business plan is not important: You can’t predict where your business will be in 5 years or 10 years. Moreover, you can’t predict how your business will change in 5 to 10 years. That said, I think a business plan is important because it allows you to sit down and write down your ideas concisely. Writing a business plan will allow you to articulate your idea for your business, which in turn should enable you to give a good business pitch when the opportunity arises. Ultimately, panelists seemed to agree that a business plan should not be longer than 2 pages.
NDAs: Should I sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement and what are the rules for disclosing information in a business meeting? No! First of all, a Venture Capitalist is not going to sign an NDA, so why should you? Just keep it simple and refrain from disclosing secret information about your business. You can discuss your business at length without revealing anything that you feel would compromise your business. Do keep in mind, however, that if you think your idea is too good to be revealed, it probably isn’t. Think about it: if your idea is that easy to steal, you probably need to move on to another idea, or fine tune your current one.
That’s it! That’s what I took from it. The next Refresh Austin for March 2010 will be a lightning speed round for those lucky souls presenting at SXSW who want to practice before the big event.
For a link to more panel information, click here.
