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Matt Abrams
- Home page
- http://www.linkedin.com/in/mattabrams
- Member since
- 2007-07-13 15:10:43
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Posts
“The End Times”
Thursday, Jun 11th, 2009
Filed under General and tagged with newspapers.
Podcast #1 – Talking Tech Ecosystems w/ Forrest Rodgers
Monday, Jun 1st, 2009
Our experiments continue here. At this juncture Robert and I may change the name from BendTech to BendTech Labs – well, more on that and our little incubator here later perhaps. That said, Robert and I are always discussing new ideas for BendTech and we’re actively trying to expand our technology communication and the “community”. So, without further adieu, we’d like to introduce you to the BendTech Podcast medium.
As with all things we’re experimenting with here, our first podcast is a little rough around the edges (you might will hear a bit of background noise). That said, for our first go-around, we were privileged to have Forrest Rodgers join us and, frankly, volunteer to be the test subject. For those of you who don’t know Forrest a bit of background. Forrest has over 20 years of experience in higher education and economic development throughout Oregon. Most recently, he was the Executive Director for the OSU-Cascades Foundation. And, prior to that, he was the Chief Executive Officer of the High Desert Museum for seven years. He has three wonderful daughters and is an active contributor to our Nancy P’s Saturday morning coffee’s.
In this podcast, we discuss our various perspectives on growing the technology ecosystem in Central Oregon. It very much ties in with a few of our recent blog posts and we believe you’ll find it timely and topical. We hope that you will find this new format engaging, informative, and a bit entertaining. If you have suggestions or comments, please do let us know. And, as Robert always likes to say…”It’s an experiment.” Enjoy the show!
[podcast]http://blog.bendtech.com/wp-content/podcasts/BendTech%20Podcast%201.mp3[/podcast]
Our podcast feed.
A special thanks to Forrest Rodgers. And a shout out to Sarayu
Intro music: “Sad Robot” by Pornophonique (found at Jamendo.com – a community of free, legal and unlimited music published under Creative Commons licenses)
Crossing the Chasm – Part 2: Government
Friday, Apr 10th, 2009
In my first piece on “Crossing the Chasm” I laid out the fundamental definition as what it meant to “cross the chasm” and the areas I see as instrumental for redefining our Central Oregon economy. Unwittingly the second area I referred to in my initial piece was: Crossing the Chasm – Part 2: Government. I say unwittingly because we are in the midst of a transformative period that has created strong opinions, as well as fear, as to the role of Government in our society. I am a fundamental believer that Government is not the solution to our problems, but it is part of the solution. Indeed, depending upon the era, the situations, the issues at hand, Government I believe, can act much like a faucet – sometimes you need more water, other times less, and then, in between, we need to vary the temperature accordingly. It is not a black and white issue as many would like to paint, or rather, it is not so simple as “Less Government vs. More Government”. That fundamentally dumbs down the details into nothing more than a beer commercial that, perhaps, the under-average voter can consume. I do believe that, as President Obama discussed in a recent speech, that Government can be a “catalyst”.
But what does that mean to be a catalyst for our local government? What can our local government do? Where do we start? Let me simply outline what I would consider to be some of the low-hanging fruit that we can tackle within the Government of our own community.
Read the rest of this entry »
Filed under General and tagged with government.
Congratulations…to my friend and welcome Dashiell!
Sunday, Mar 29th, 2009
Two nights ago, on March 27 at 21:54, Robert Kieffer and his wife Christene welcomed to the world Dashiell Robert Kieffer at 8.44 lbs, 21″. That means that, well, the blog posts might be light for the next bit of time and/or I need to get my act together and do some additional posts that Robert has been hammering me on. That said, I could not be happier to see two wonderful people and dear friends, become proud parents – they will most certainly be wonderful parents. I know I’m looking forward to having a little “brother” for my own son, West, who recently turned 2. In the meantime, congratulations to Robert and Christene and welcome Dashiell. You have a wonderful life ahead of you and plenty of people who already love you dearly.
NOTE: the following pictures have not been approved by the subject(s); however, I have on good authority that someone going by the name of Bobby Kieffer has approved the second picture in the series below.
Crossing the Chasm – Part 1: “Rebooting Central Oregon”
Saturday, Jan 3rd, 2009
In 1942 Neal C. Gross and Bruce Ryan began work on a sociological model, now formally known as the Technology Adoption Life Cycle (figure 1), with the original purpose to track the purchase patterns of hybrid seed corn farmers. A few years later, in 1957, Joe M. Bohlen, George M. Beal, and Everett M. Rogers took this a step further and wrote a paper documenting their study around what is known as the Diffusion Process or Diffusion of Innovations. Their paper outlined how farmers accepted new ideas or innovations into their community and was later formalized in Everett Rogers book which outlined the “theory of how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread through cultures.” To further clarify this, their work documented what is known as the “Roger’s Bell Curve” along with their summary findings as shown in figures 1 and 2 below:
Figure 1
Figure 2
Their study fundamentally outlined how farm people accepted new ideas and the break-down and the demographic mix that outlined how and by whom new ideas were accepted. Fast forward almost 50 years to 1991. Geoffrey Moore took this original theory and model of Diffusion and the Technology Life Cycle and put his own take on it in his book Crossing the Chasm. Read the rest of this entry »
Filed under General and tagged with bend, education, government.
Guy Kawasaki’s keynote presentation (part 1) at this year’s Bend Venture Conference (BVC)
Monday, Oct 22nd, 2007
Check out part 1 of Guy Kawasaki’s keynote presentation from this years Bend Venture Conference (BVC). Part 1 is roughly 32 minutes long. This is a great presentation for this years BVC so check this out and come back shortly for part 2 of Guy’s presentation. A big thanks to the folks at BVC for bringing Guy Kawasaki to town! Stay tuned for additional videos from this year’s BVC, including presentations by the lead companies at this year’s event.
To download a higher resolution version of this video, please select the following link: Guy Kawasaki Keynote Presentation at the 2007 Bend Venture Conference (BVC) – Part 1
Guy Kawasaki’s keynote presentation (part 2) at this year’s Bend Venture Conference (BVC)
Monday, Oct 22nd, 2007
Check out part 2 of Guy Kawasaki’s keynote presentation from this years Bend Venture Conference (BVC). Part 2 is roughly 34 minutes long. This is a great presentation for this years BVC so be sure to check this out. A big thanks to the folks at BVC for bringing Guy Kawasaki to town! Stay tuned for additional videos from this year’s BVC, including presentations by the lead companies at this year’s event.
To download a higher resolution version of this video, please select the following link: Guy Kawasaki Keynote Presentation at the 2007 Bend Venture Conference (BVC) – Part 2
BendTech Overview Presentation
Tuesday, Aug 14th, 2007
Check out the overview presentation of where we’re headed. And, be sure to remember that this is a volunteer effort at this point with folks who have their day jobs. So, in short, please be patient as we roll things out. Thanks!
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Poll
Thursday, Aug 9th, 2007
Vote now on what you would like to see on BendTech. We would like to make sure we create an online technical community that is worthwhile and beneficial to all of us here in Central Oregon. We’ll be polling you often to see if we’re moving in the right direction. And, as always, please feel free to leave comments or get in touch with us directly. Thanks!
[poll=2]
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Buzz…
Friday, Aug 3rd, 2007
Wow – the reaction to BendTech, WoTech, and tech in general in Bend has certainly gotten going in the last couple of weeks. In the last two weeks there have been stories covering Women in Tech (WoTech), The Software Association of Oregon (SAO), and others…all mentioning and discussing BendTech. Certainly all of us are hungry for the online infrastructure and social network to allow us to interact with one another in the community. I simply didn’t realize how hungry! I’ve already gotten several emails asking for contacts, where things are going, how they can get involved, what are we doing, and why aren’t we going faster! Believe me, I wish this was my full time job and we were going faster, but like most everyone else in the tech community in Bend, I have to spend my days focusing primarily on my “real” job…because we don’t have the jobs here…That brings me to one topic that seems to have made it’s rounds in the community…and that is the tech guys vs. the tech girls. First I’d like to say that BendTech is about everyone in the community regardless of gender. Second, Julie Anderson, who is taking the lead on Women in Tech (WoTech), is working with me on developing BendTech. And, important to note, Jen Blackledge, from Edge Wireless and the Central Oregon Web Professionals User Group, is also working with us and is a key contributor to WoTech. Third, the WoTech blog will be launched shortly off of the BendTech site. Bottom line: WoTech is part of the BendTech online community and we will continue expanding our content and our presence as we move forward.That also brings me to the Software Association of Oregon (SAO). Last week, Julie and I met with the folks from SAO and EDCO to specifically discuss how we all work together in broadening the tech community and what our collective future plans are. First, let me simply say that the folks from EDCO and SAO were terrific. They are here to support us, to build and grow the community, and to help us all do what it takes to reach our full potential. So a big thanks to them both! Second, it’s important for everyone to be aware that we are only going to succeed at creating the tech environment we want by working together in a socially responsible manner that benefits not simply the few, but all of us, while preserving the community that we hold so dear. This online infrastructure (BendTech.com) is intended to be the place to bring everyone together online…that doesn’t mean we can ignore the “offline infrastructure” nor are we!Fundamentally, one of the most important goals we have is to be the glue that brings together key tech groups within the community. In this fashion, we will be rolling out content and features in the next quarter on BendTech.com. We’d like to be open and transparent about what we are doing and what our timeline is for accomplishing our goals, so please check back for my next post which will outline our timeline and action items more clearly.In the meantime, if you would like to get involved in BendTech or learn more about it, please feel free to email either Julie or me. You can reach us at:julie.anderson@bendtech.commatt.abrams@bendtech.comThanks…
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