News

The topic at hand: Freelance Camp!

We are beginning to put together a bar camp in Santa Cruz on the topic of freelancing and running a small service business. This is a community event and we are actively looking for volunteers to make this kick ass. If you can help find sponsors, spread the word, find a venue, get some grub lined up or perform general geekery - let’s talk. Hit me up by email or respond in the comment, add yourself to the wiki, and we can chat.

Freelance Camp: http://barcamp.pbwiki.com/Freelance-Camp

The Opportunity

We’ve just landed a pretty sweet gig. We’re looking for a AJAX / JSON developer to join our team on a project for the next 2 months starting now. Help build a high profile full-scale Wordpress based site by creating a dynamic interface using the APIs of Yelp, Amazon, Eventful, blip.tv, Wordpress, and bbPress.
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The Opportunity

We’ve just landed a pretty sweet gig. We’re looking for a Wordpress Master to join our team on a project for the next 2 months starting now. Help build a high profile full-scale Wordpress / bbPress site with elements from various 3rd party web applications.
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Hi everyone,

A lot of you probably know that Peter & I have been passionately working on our next adventure, stealing moments of time between clients, travel and family. I am excited to announce that the beta has finally arrived! I hope that you will check it out and give us your feedback. I love the community we have developed along with our blog and couldn’t think of someone I would rather hear from. I trust your opinion and want this to be the best it can be.

Sign Up for the Beta!

So here is what have we been doing off in the bat cave:

Sproutwire came about because I love to read but I am far too busy to go hunting through the internet for the few gems. My RSS reader was overflowing and most of what was in there frankly was underwhelming. In fact, a lot of you know that I quite vocally renounced the use of an rss reader. In the end, I was only reading the links my friends were sending me and started asking them to do it regularly. And so Sproutwire was born. A favorites list from an editorial team of writers and entrepreneurs who really get what it means to launch a startup, grow a small company, run a microbuiness and work freelance.

Peter & I went off and collected a team of up-and-coming and renown business owners and bloggers, who will review and select the best fresh content we can find on the Internet for small business. Blogs, newspapers, ebooks, presentation slides, journals, video, newsletters, anything that we think will help you be better at what you do and live a happier life. Those items that make the cut will be summarized and linked to. Our goal is to keep it fresh, smart and personal.

Sproutwire offers you a daily dose of the best small business articles that the internet has to offer.

We are looking for leads on great content to review, so if you run into something cool that you think truly stands out, email it to contribute@sproutwire.com. If we pick it, we will give you a shoutout and link to your site so include a link.

I want to send a huge thanks to our starting team of expert editors/reviewers: Jarrko Laine, Sara Smith, Jonathan Fields, Naomi Dunford, Christine OKelly, Eric Davis, Brandon Jones. A special thanks to Brandon for the branding and design and Eric for beating the code into submission and late night business chats. Go check out their blogs and leave some intelligent feisty comments for me!

Also, if you know someone you think might be stoked to check it out - please feel free to pass this invitation on.

Now I am off to go work and play in the sun for a long week with our business team in El Salvador! I’ll post pictures when we get back.

-S

The time has come! We posted a challenge to our readers a few weeks ago to interview themselves. Many people responded. Peter & I read and read and laughed and cried. We got some amazing stories and wanted to bring to you a few of our favorites and pass on our congrats to the winners and the community at large. We are giving out 3 prizes. One for our favorite interview, one for the best original question and one award for sheer determination and chutzpa. The winners get to pick one book from my personal reading list. I hope you enjoy these as much as I did.
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We are stoked to add a new W3 award to the 2007 list of achievements. I’d say more, but we just register for these kinds of awards for the party and the networking. Ok fine, maybe we are just a little excited. The 2007 Webby Awards party in June was kick ass, check out the pictures.

The W³ Awards honors creative excellence on the Web, and recognizes the creative and marketing professionals behind award winning sites, marketing programs, and video work created for the Internet. The W³ is sanctioned and judged by the International Academy of the Visual Arts.

We are proud to announce that we have been crunched. Sort of. Our client Blip.tv has earned themselves the attention of the public eye. The flash video player on which we worked has received solid public recognition. And being the choice for the TechCrunch40 is pretty cool. Even their one and only complaint has already been developed and is in testing for deployment.
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I am so excited to post this! Its time for us to get just a bit bigger. At this point, Peter & I need to be able to focus on growing the business and are looking for someone to join the team and support us in day-to-day administration. I am posting this listing in all the usual spots. If you are reading it here, then you know how to get a hold of us.
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The Webby Awards were a total blast! Who knew it would be such a great party and a big deal. We met top executives, designers and developers from all kinds of companies including Adobe, Disney, Reuters, DoubleClick, Akamai, CNET, IAC and on and on. We ate some incredible fingerfood, danced till out feet hurt & talked (yelled) until I lost my voice. We also had the chance to hang out with our crew at blip in their NY office and visit family. Check out the pictures from the trip!
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It is a good life. I surf most mornings. We work from home sometimes. I swim with my wife at noon and then meet Peter or some of the other people who work with us at one of the local digs. It’s about choices, and we choose to work hard and play hard. So, while eulogizing this lifestyle to Amanda, the new owner/manager of our local Scotts Valley newspaper the Press Banner, Peter & I found ourselves being recorded. Sitting in the cafe in casual clothes, surf gear on our cars, she was shocked when Peter & I explained that we work with some of the worlds largest international corporations and government organizations.. And I kept telling her, come, join us!