Free Silicon Florist Gig board postings and other tweaks

I always try to be completely open with you about what’s going on behind the scenes with this blog. Sharing my thinking. This is another one of those posts.

Silicon Florist Gig board

When I started the Silicon Florist Gig board, I had hoped to kill two birds with one stone:

1. I wanted to provide a valuable resource for Silicon Forest startups to find the talent they needed.
2. I was hoping to find a revenue stream to fund continued—and expanded—Silicon Florist activities

Unfortunately, rather than killing two birds, bird #2 simply killed bird #1.

And so it goes. (The one person who did pay to post, Josh Pyles of Pixelmatrix, will be getting a full refund.)

Given that little lesson, I wanted to announce that the proof-of-concept gig board is now completely free. (But I have to provide a little workaround, given the canned solution I’m using.) Post as many jobs as you like, as often as you like. Simply use the discount code “freebie” at checkout.

But, be forewarned: freedom comes with a price.

Please bear in mind that the Silicon Florist Gig board is designed to help local Web-based startups (product or service), social media departments within larger organizations, and bloggers.

If you don’t fit into one of these areas, please do not post here. I will delete it.

A good frame of reference would be “Would Silicon Florist cover my company, product, or clients?”

If your answer is “Yes,” “Totally,” or “You should,” then post away. If your answer is “No,” then you should probably find another job board. If your answer is “Um,” “Maybe,” or a slight raising of your shoulders toward your ears, drop me a note or ping me on Twitter. I’d be happy to let you know.

And who knows? I might even start covering you because you post. How’s that for turning everything on its proverbial ear?

As an added bonus of this new found freedom, you can now post for positions wanted, as well. Simply start the title of the job with “Wanted,” “Seeking,” “Available,” or whatever. For example, I might post “Wanted: Paid blogging position for covering the Silicon Forest tech scene.” Have at it.

Again, that’s “freebie” at checkout.

Oregon Reddit buttons

Speaking of coverage, you’ll likely notice one other minor tweak to the site. On individual posts, down at the bottom, you’ll see a little “Vote for this post on OregonLive” Oregon Reddit button.

What’s with that thing?

Now, the primary reason I spend my time pontificating and waxing philosophic about under-the-RADAR startups is quite simple: I want people to see what’s happening. I want old-school tech and people in Oregon and the traditional media to see what you guys are doing. Because, honestly, it’s really cool.

Well, we live in a town with very few news pubs, and even fewer business pubs. This means that OregonLive, the online version of The Oregonian, gets a substantial amount of local traffic.

Oregon Reddit allows two of the most popular stories to sit on the front page of OregonLive and other sections of the site.

So, if you see something covered in Silicon Florist that you think would be valuable for more Oregon folks to read—or if it’s your company and you’d like to see it on the front page of the OregonLive site to impress your friends and family—please feel free to use that button to submit or vote.

Likewise, if you think something I’ve written is total and utter crap that doesn’t deserve to see the light of day, please, by all means, vote it down.

Long story short, it’s your chance to get the types of stories in The Oregonian that you think should be in The Oregonian.

Thanks for listening. As always, I welcome your feedback on these decisions.