Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:
Oregon film star Bruce Campbell diagnosed with incurable cancer – oregonlive.com
“I’m not trying to enlist sympathy — or advice — I just want to get ahead of this information,” he said in his announcement. “Fear not, I’m a tough old son-of-a-bitch and I have great support, so I expect to be around a while.”
Tech & AI online social night, Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 7:00 PM | Meetup
Online: come chat with fellow technologists.
An Entirely Other Day: Lose Myself
I was lucky enough to have a trench-digging enthusiasm when it was economically advantageous to do so. I managed to pretty much exactly hit the window when deep-nerd brain chemistry could produce a viable, even lucrative, career. I am fortunate to be able to lean into an early senescence and walk (or be pushed) away, as what I want to do and what the world wants me to do diverge.
ProductTank March 2026, Wed, Mar 4, 2026, 6:00 PM | Meetup
We’re excited to welcome two incredible speakers: Betsie Hoyt (Fractional Product Management VP) and Jed Gresham (Head of Product @ Moment). As always, we’ll also have plenty of time to meet other product folks over drinks and tasty snacks. Sponsored by Oregon Venture Fund.
Startup Policy Seminar: Restricting patent review and the cost to startup innovation
Join Engine on Wednesday, March 11th at 12pm ET for a virtual conversation with an expert panel explaining how restrictions on IPR threaten startup innovation and invite renewed patent troll abuse.
Lindy West Talks About Her New Memoir, Portland and Why She’s “Alt-Weekly ‘Til I Die”
In her new memoir, Adult Braces (Grand Central Publishing, 336 pages, $29), Lindy West mentions that she did not have fun working on the television adaptation of her first memoir, Shrill, which was filmed in Portland. But in a phone conversation with Willamette Week, she said, “It’s not Portland’s fault! I’m obsessed with Portland. I love Portland. If I was looking to move back to a city, I would possibly pick Portland over Seattle at this point. Don’t tell Seattle.” (Sorrynotsorry, Seattle.) “The food’s so good. Portland rules,” she said.
Oregon Working Families Party, state’s largest teachers union decline to endorse in governor’s race • Oregon Capital Chronicle
Declining to endorse Kotek was a surprising development from both groups, which had previously thrown enormous support — and in the case of the teachers’ union, money — behind her in her first bid for governor. The union in 2022 donated roughly $389,000 to Kotek’s first run for governor.
The Great Transition | Daniel Miessler
What I want to give you is something where if you think about all of these ideas and just let them stew, the news that comes out over the next weeks, months, even years will just make more sense. You can put it into this container, this mental model of thinking about things.
Building an Advanced Agentic RAG Pipeline that Mimics a Human Thought Process | by Fareed Khan | Level Up Coding
In this blog, we are going to build an advanced agentic RAG pipeline that mimics how a human would read and understand a problem …
Hunters vs. Farmers — Chris Neumann
I’ve written before about hunting vs. farming within the context of how investors generate returns. In venture capital, “hunting” refers to going out and winning new deals (investing in new companies) while “farming” refers to increasing the likelihood that a company will succeed through post-investment support and services. In theory, investors should do both. In reality, VCs operate across a spectrum, with most firms focusing their efforts on one or the other.
The Token Trap; Bubble or Bifurcation? – by Jeff Becker
TLDR: The AI economy is splitting in two. Hyperscalers and true AI-native companies will compound to the right. Everyone chasing value instead of harvesting it will compound to zero — and most won’t see it coming until the bill arrives.
Tech Things: SaaS is Dead, Long Live SaaS – by theahura
I think that there are absolutely companies that are going to have a tough time because of AI. Those companies are, like, Salesforce and Hubspot and yes, Atlassian.
Moats in the Age of AI – by Tanay Jaipuria
The question is: In an AI world, which sources of power weaken, and which survive? Let’s walk through all seven, particularly in the context of software and technology companies.
Your Cap Table Didn’t Kill Your Round — Charlie O’Donnell – Coach, Author, VC
So if an investor passed on you and cited cap table issues, here’s the hard part: they probably just weren’t that interested.
Zelody uses AI agents to ease banking software integration – The Business Journals
Zelody uses artificial intelligence agents to automate integrating different tools within a larger regulated system. Banking technology infrastructure has been built over decades with new tools built on top of old ones, and it can be difficult for the different pieces to talk to each other.
For You, For Everyone – Graze Newsletter
We believe personalization is a critical piece of that puzzle. The open social web has proven it can build great infrastructure, great clients, great communities. What it hasn’t yet proven is that it can deliver the kind of eerily-good, “this feed knows me” experience that keeps people opening an app every day. That’s what we’re trying to build — not by surveilling people or optimizing for time-on-site, but by making the taste graph work for them, transparently, with the knobs in their hands.
Tuesday Town Hall – Level Up Through Community, Tue, Mar 10, 2026, 10:30 AM | Meetup
For the last 17 months at NedSpace, this weekly ritual has been helping Portland entrepreneurs, freelancers, and builders connect authentically.
Why AI startups are selling the same equity at two different prices | TechCrunch
As competition among AI startups heats up, founders and VCs are turning to novel valuation mechanisms to manufacture a perception of market dominance.
Quaise looks to advance ‘superhot’ geothermal power… | Canary Media
The Houston-based company says it’s developing a 50-megawatt plant in central Oregon that will tap into significantly hotter geothermal resources than its competitors do, using the firm’s novel rock-melting technology. Quaise broke ground on that site, called Project Obsidian, last year and plans to drill a well this year that will allow it to validate the subsurface conditions, which are expected to reach over 300 degrees Celsius (572 degrees Fahrenheit).
Feminist capital – by Dr. Astrid J. Scholz
Earlier day someone reached out via email, wanting to explore “what capital designed for female entrepreneurs, building based on feminine values, could look like.” I don’t usually think of my work in feminist terms since the structural violence that late stage capitalism inflicts on who gets funded, and who doesn’t, is a truly intersectional shits show. 😵💫
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