“Big D” is not just
“Big Tech” anymore.
The North Texas area is on everyone's top five list of
technology communities. We have made it on that list by having companies with
names like TI, EDS, Perot, and Nokia. They produce hundreds of thousands of
jobs and billions of dollars in revenue for the area. But as I sit here looking
at the biz cards on my desk from DOT COM’s I see names like elogo, memorial,
uBundle, efanshop, cpaQuest,
FurnitureGuide, and BigFatWow and I cannot help but think that
the tide is changing. I could fill this page with the names of companies from
which I have met people and still not get everyone. Yes Big D may still be Big
Tech but the big guys better watch out because these new folks are serious
about what they are doing and they're out to change the world.
It’s the law
Thursday night at The
Dallas Internet Society meeting Robin Brooks and David Willie of the Baker Botts Law Firm walked an attentive
group of over 100 members of the Dallas Internet world through the some of the
legal issues related to doing business on the net. They did a wonderful job of
breaking down the legal issues concerning such things as cybersquatting, metatags,
smart banner advertising, and framing. They also discussed issues relating to
need for well-defined privacy policies and the legal/political environment in
which privacy is being addressed.
Thou shall not talk biz
Paige Dawson one the founders of iThought.com, my wife and I meet Marianne
Radwan of the VC firm Sevin Rosen and a
few other local tech types for drinks on Friday. It was a new experience because everyone decided
that we could not talk biz so it was an evening full of food, drinks and darts.
In case anyone is curious “There is life without work”.
Hump Day High Tech Happy Hour
Wednesday night was my weekly GeekMeet.com “High Tech Happy Hour.” We had
about 115 members of the local Internet community show up for this week’s Happy
Hour. CB Richard Ellis Real Estate hosted the event that was held at the Cool
River Café in Los Colinas. We had free pool and darts plus drinks so it was
hard not to have fun. I had a chance to
talk to Christal Aycock the biz dev manager of bigfatwow and Casie Caldwell of scient. Was able to meet the other co-
founder of servicelane, Venkatesh
Kumar who showed up with his VP of engineering Mark Ellis, and Jennifer
Thompson who handles the HR department. Tom Howard a senior developer for satamausa showed up and we talked about the need to
get more developers involved in the group.
Microsoft Network buys breakfast
The MSN breakfast series rolled into Dallas on Thursday
morning. MSN treated the local Net Heads
to breakfast and Mark Wright of @plan did a presentation on “Effectively
Harnessing the Power of the Internet as an advertising, marketing and retailing
Medium”. Dave Manchee the new District Sales Manager for MSn was busy meeting
the new faces. I finally had a chance to put a face with a name when I bumped
into Grace Chang. Have you noticed how you think you know someone in this wired
world and then one day you really meet the person face to face.
As always “I am having the time of my life”.
Gregg Wetterman
