You may have heard about the big TED conferences that are organized around the world every year around the slogan: "Ideas Worth Spreading." At these events, hyper-smart people give talks on cutting edge -- or sometimes obscure but interesting -- topics, and the audience members are given lots of time to talk and network amongs themselves. The talks are video recorded and made available for free on TED's Website.

That basic format is coming to Baltimore's Maryland Institute College of Art, and it's called TEDxMidAtlantic. I wrote a story today that talks about how more than 100 enthusiastic volunteers came together to organize the free all-day event. The photo depicts several organizers, including Dave Troy in the middle, whose idea it was to bring the event to Baltimore.

It's gonna be a packed house. Stop and say hi if you see me!

Posted by Gus Sentementes at 7:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Big Ideas, East Coast, Entrepreneurs & Risk Takers, Events (Baltimore area), Events (DC/No. Va. area), Geeks, Social Media
        

What are you up to Wednesday night? Guest blogger Mike Subelsky wants you to check out Innovate Baltimore.

There's a promising new event debuting on Wednesday October 7th at the Gin Mill in Canton: Innovate Baltimore, described by its organizers as "an evening of fun mingling with other Baltimore area business leaders, entrepreneurs, creative and digital technology enthusiasts". It runs from 6:30 to 9:30 pm. Attendance is free but the organizers say you need to RSVP ahead of time.

Even if you're a habitué of Outlet Baltimore, Refresh, or TechNite, here's why you should check it out: it's organized by two people with a background in the games industry: Benjamin Walsh, a producer at Bethesda Softworks, and Tina Tyndal, a game marketing and brand consultant who writes the blog Girls Who Game. We haven't seen much gamer involvement in Baltimore's tech scene, so I'm betting Innovate will attract some new folks.

I'm totally on board with their mission: "...providing individuals with networking and educational opportunities which will allow them to generate new ideas, foster entrepreneurship and strengthen the professional community in the region. Our meetings spotlight local businesses, talent, emergent technology and trends, all while sharing a drink (or two) with friends."

Posted by Liz Hacken at 4:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Entrepreneurs & Risk Takers, Events (Baltimore area), Geeks, Startups
        

Our guest blogger for today is Mike Subelsky, an organizer with Ignite (which David Troy just wrote about in a BaltTech guest post) and co-founder of OtherInbox.com. Chime in with your ideas on what the Baltimore tech scene needs to thrive.

Anyone who reads this blog knows that Baltimore has a vital and thriving technology culture. We have many good companies, events and organizations in town in various stages of growth, and it's a very creative time for starting new things. The activation energy for a new tech culture project is getting lower all the time!

This is my attempt to add fuel to the fire: a list of things our tech culture would use. I don't claim ownership or authorship of any of these ideas, and I really hope someone will see one of these and get it going. If you do you'll find a great deal of support and encouragement from the whole scene!

Continue reading "What does our local tech culture need?" »

Posted by Liz Hacken at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)
Categories: Big Ideas, Entrepreneurs & Risk Takers, Geeks, Research, Startups
        

Here's another dispatch from David Troy of Beehive Baltimore to shed some light on what Ignite is all about.

If you had 5 minutes on stage and 20 slides that rotate automatically every 15 seconds, what would you say? That's the question that 48 presenters will answer at three upcoming Ignite events in Annapolis, D.C., and Baltimore.

Ignite was started in Seattle in 2006 by Brady Forrest and Bre Pettis, and is overseen by the technology book publisher O'Reilly. Since the founding of the program, hundreds of five minute talks have been given across the world.

Continue reading "Ignite events help build regional buzz" »

Posted by Liz Hacken at 11:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Events (Baltimore area), Events (DC/No. Va. area), Geeks
        

Some fellas have gotten together to form Baltimore Node, a self-described hackerspace where computer/techy-minded people can get together to work on interesting little projects.

(A hacker, by the way, is not necessarily a bad, evil person. Hackers can be good, as I'm sure the folks involved with Baltimore Node are.)

Hackerspaces have been popping up all over the world. Members use the Web to connect with each other and other spaces -- just check out the Hackerspaces.org site for the big picture.

Baltimore Node's first group project will take place tonight, from 7-10 p.m. (Event details.)

They'll be building lamps whose color can be changed by simply Tweeting a hexadecimal color value to it.

Now, hackers, why would you want to do that? Short answer (I think): Because you can.

But, more importantly, it's an excuse to dip your toes into Arduino, a nifty open-source hardware/software programming platform that enables people to create interactive gadgets.

Learn more about Arduino here. Anybody going to build an Arduino lamp tonight? If so, take a few pics or video of your creation and share with us.

Posted by Gus Sentementes at 10:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)
Categories: Gadgets, Geeks
        

It must be a good 20 years since I pondered the (fictional) technological underpinnings of Transformers, which has a new Hollywood sequel out now called "Revenge of the Fallen."

For one: how could the main bad guy, Megatron, turn from an "arm-mounted fusion cannon" (huh?!) into a hulking beast of an evil robot? 

At an early age, I was chalking it up to fantasy and I suspended my disbelief while I watched the cartoons after school while eating a bowl of Froot Loops. But some are more willing to try to explain the technology and science behind the Transformers, I learned this morning. There is a Wikipedia entry on Transformers technology that, right now, is striving to bridge the gap between science and fantasy. One of my favorite sections ponders the notion of death among Transformers:

Death of a Transformer can follow irreversible (mortal) stasis lock or be caused by a sudden traumatic injury (such as a close-proximity nuclear explosion, or spark excision). A few weapons, such as a high powered fusion cannon, are known to be powerful enough to cause severe enough damage to immediately terminate a Transformer. Also, while the utter destruction of a body can and usually does cause death, a Transformer can often survive total dismemberment. Notable examples include Optimus Prime (during the Generation 1 series), Ultra Magnus (during the movie), and Waspinator (repeatedly).

This blogger raises the point that the technology behind Transformers involves advanced nanotechnology and even femtotechnology, a largely theoretically area involving the "manipulation of excited energy states within atomic nuclei."

Hey, we've got a lot of folks in Maryland working in the nanotech field. If using this tech to build robots that change from boring cars to steely warriors isn't likely, then why bother?

Har. Kidding.

Seriously, nanotech is a young but choppy field. There are detractors and skeptics on one side, who either think a lot of it is overstated marketing bunk, or potentially dangerous. (One guy wrote a book called "Nano-Hype: The Truth Behind the Nanotechnology Buzz."

On the other side are businesses, universities and researchers who are pushing for breakthroughs that could be brought to market and maybe save lives, if nanotech gets more incorporated in medical practice. Johns Hopkins' Whiting School of Engineering has a nanotech research area, and the university has its own Institute for NanoBioTechnology, too. And the University of Maryland has its own Nanocenter.

Do they see a Transformers future?

Posted by Gus Sentementes at 8:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Geeks