Silicon Florist: One month as the florist
Excuse me, if you will, as I step out of character. I wanted to take a second to chat with you.
Don’t look over your shoulder. You. Yes, you. Please, read on.
Right around a month ago, I decided to try a little experiment.
I felt the local coverage of small technology startups was somewhat lacking. I mean, I could thumb through international coverage on sites like TechCrunch and Mashable for once-in-a-blue-moon postings on Portland-area companies. And, I could read about larger startups in The Oregonian.
But none of those was really hitting the mark. So I decided to quit being part of the problem. And I tried to do my little part to help solve it.
That solution, from concept to first post, took an earth-shattering 35 minutes. And the Silicon Florist—a blog covering the small startups in and around Portland, Oregon—was born.
And so here we are, one month hence. And I’ve been pleasantly surprised.
No, that’s not true.
I’ve been shocked. Shocked with the reception. Shocked with the kind notes. Shocked with the participation.
I think I’ve struck a nerve. And I hope that I’m providing a valuable service for you readers out there.
I also thought it might be valuable to provide a little recap of what has happened in the past 30 days or so. I’m not setting any records, but I am seeing some interesting stuff.
Stats
- 70+ posts
- Flirting with 100 RSS subscribers at times. The current count is:
- Nearly 2,000 visitors
- 37% returning visitors
- 70% of traffic comes from referring sites (Thank you to all of you who showed Silicon Florist the link love!)
Top cities by visitors
- Portland
- Seattle
- Beaverton
- Troutdale
- New York
- San Francisco
- Los Angeles
- Washington, DC
- Hillsboro (C’mon Hillsboro! Yeesh.)
- Atlanta
Top posts
- KATU Portland-blogger invites blanket the area
- Goboz launches Digg for Portland
- Roundup: KATU Portland-blogger meetup
- Jive Software secures $15 million… and moves blog to Clearspace
- Grabb.it releases incredibly cool interface for iPhone
- To-do: Name that stealthy Portland startup
- Video: OpenID and Digital Identity
- Reminder: Digital Identity and OpenID, tonight
- Rumor: Goboz looking to take on CitySearch
- Ignite Portland?
Portland-area blogs, groups, and products mentioned
- AboutUs
- Alpha Geek
- Attensa
- BarCamp Portland
- BlogtownPDX
- CouldBe
- Goboz
- Grabb.it
- Ignite Portland
- JanRain
- Jive Software
- KATU
- Lunarr
- Metroblogging Portland
- NetworthIQ
- OEN
- Open Coffee Club
- Panic
- pdxphp
- PDX Pipeline
- Portland Internet Astronauts
- Portland Web Innovators
- Planet Argon
- Platial
- SplashCast
- StepChange
- Unthirsty
- Urban Drinks
- Urban Honking
- Version Tracker
- Vimeo
- YourList
Finally, thank you for reading. Thank you for subscribing to the feed. Thank you for sending your tips. Thank you for your participation.
I’m looking forward to continuing this little experiment as long as it remains interesting to everyone involved.
Things people have said about this post
From Mike Berkley on September 12th, 2007 at 9:11 am
Thanks for filling the PDX tech coverage void, Rick! You’re doing a great job!
Cheers,
Mike
From Jeff the Great on September 12th, 2007 at 9:59 am
Great blog, Rick. I have enjoyed it from day 1. Very rare for a new blog on the scene.
Keep up the good work and I’ll keep reading.
Jeff the Great
P.S. I am one of the 80!
P.S.S have you read my other blog, pdxcompanies.com lately? Return the favor bro! Just kidding…kinda.
From Josh Bancroft on September 12th, 2007 at 10:12 am
You’re filling a niche, and you’re doing it extremely well, with style. Keep it up - I’ve been subscribed from the beginning!
Oh, and @Jeff, I’m off to check out pdxcompanies.com right now…
From Marshall on September 12th, 2007 at 10:36 am
Congrats on a great first month, Rick. Keep up the awesome work.
From Betsy on September 12th, 2007 at 10:52 am
Thanks for all that you do - keep up the good work!
From User First Web » Congrats to Silicon Florist on September 12th, 2007 at 8:58 pm
[…] Turoczy marks one month of covering the Portland technology community on his blog Silicon Florist. I’ve come to rely on his blog and tend to look at his posts as soon as he notes them on his […]
From Amy Winkelman on September 13th, 2007 at 3:08 pm
As always, great stuff Rick — how you find time to blog so often and so well astounds me with everything else you have going on. Awesome stuff. Hey, where are those posters you owe me?
From Ryan Williams on September 13th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
Great work, I look forward to new posts like in the early days of techcrunch. Just don’t go mashable on us and post 20 times a day :-).
From Web Things Considered » Weekly round-up on September 14th, 2007 at 9:23 pm
[…] Silicon Florist marks its first month - The best new blog around, if you live in the Portland area and are interested in web/tech, this is a must read. I left a comment about how reading Silicon Florist reminds me of the early days of TechCrunch, Read/Write Web, and Mashable when I was always anticipating the next post to see what great new stuff was coming. I’ve become a bit jaded following the general web 2.0 blogs lately, with their growing need to be businesses and post constantly, and I rarely get excited about anything that is posted there anymore, nor can I ever hope to keep up. So having a locally focused blog makes me feel so much more connected again. […]