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Discogs rocks the Portland Start-up Index, now at 40 sites

Rick Turoczy on January 15, 2008

A few weeks ago, I reported on the Portland Start-up Index, a ranking of Portland-area startups compiled by Techvibes, based on the average of Alexa and Compete rankings for each Web site. At that time, there were fewer than 30 sites listed on the index. And I noted it was a bit “apples and oranges,” but interesting nonetheless.

Well, apparently, things change quickly around here.

Techvibes has released their first update to the index. And some interesting things have happened.

Not only has the index grown to 40 sites, but now, the top position—formerly held by Portland-based media-widget-wonders SplashCast (#2)—has been soundly claimed by Discogs (#1), a community-built discography engine that is working to categorize artists, labels, and their recordings. Perhaps most interesting about this change is that Discogs’ combined average (4,648) is nearly 50,000 points higher than SplashCast’s (53,642).

Other new entries I noticed (when the index updated, the original list became inaccessible) include Grabb.it (#10), fmyi (#18), Goboz (#20), and Free Range (#27).

And because it has become clear that—without a snapshot of the list today—we’ll be unable to compare the next rev to the previous one, the entire list is included, below. (For actual Alexa and Compete numbers associated with the rankings, please visit Techvibes. They did the research and rightly deserve the traffic. I’m simply republishing to save the information.)

  1. Discogs
  2. Splashcast
  3. Sandy
  4. MyOpenID
  5. Earth Class Mail
  6. Cliq
  7. Gone Raw
  8. Stikkit
  9. NetworthIQ
  10. Grabbit
  11. Attensa
  12. KnitMap
  13. Walker Tracker
  14. Pibb
  15. UrbanDrinks
  16. Iovation
  17. GadgetTrak
  18. fmyi
  19. Imindi
  20. Goboz
  21. Picktastic
  22. Art Face Off
  23. Box Populi
  24. Pheedo
  25. ChoiceA
  26. Lunarr
  27. FreeRange
  28. Kumquat
  29. Kryptiq
  30. GoSeeTell
  31. Avnera
  32. Techchex
  33. Lumeno.us
  34. Workplace2go
  35. Jama Software
  36. MomHub
  37. Lightfleet
  38. YourList
  39. Cendix
  40. IDP Solutions

Being the astute reader you are, you’ll likely notice a few missing.

For the second time around, Portland’s wiki-based Web-site-information site, AboutUs, remains conspicuously absent from the list. As does the highly recognized, funded, and awarded Jive Software.

It will be interesting to see the shuffling that occurs once those sites are added.

And, again, the arguments will likely surface about this being a rather superficial means of assessing impact in the market. And how it is an unfair comparison among widget-based tools and Web-site-based tools.

That’s true. But it is an available—and somewhat objective—metric. And it does provide a reasonable indicator of Web traffic from the user population that has download either of the tracking toolbars.

Uh oh. You see it coming don’t you? Oh, all right. I can’t keep anything from you.

If you think that the Alexa and Compete rankings are misleading metrics, what metrics would you propose we use to rank the Portland-area startups? (And perhaps, more importantly: Do rankings even matter?)

If we can answer those questions, then maybe, just maybe, the Silicon Florist could publish an index that provides a clearer picture. Maybe. If you want.

Meet: Portland Web Innovators discuss mobile Web, February 13

Rick Turoczy on January 15, 2008

Portland Web Innovators has announced the topic of their February meeting: Mobile Web. And who better to speak on the subject than local mobile expert Jason Grigsby of Cloud Four?

Grigsby is one of those folks who is mildly excited by the prospects of the mobile Web. In his own words, “It isn’t possible to ignore the mobile Web any longer. So much opportunity for new discovery, new applications, and ways to make people’s lives better.” And his enthusiasm about the subject is infectious.

To read more of Grigsby’s thoughts on the mobile Web, see recent posts on his personal blog, User First Web, and the Cloud Four blog.

Plan on joining the Portland Web Innovators at Nemo Design on SE Belmont. To RSVP, visit Upcoming. For more information, visit Portland Web Innovators.

Silicon Florist’s links arrangement

Rick Turoczy on January 14, 2008

 

Sometimes, a link says more than I could ever say. Here are some fragrant little buds I’ve found recently, courtesy of ma.gnolia.

Happy Hour with the Metrobloggers

It’s once again your chance to meet up with the Portland Metrobloggers. On January 23 beginning at 5:30pm, you’ll find them at The Chesterfield. This is a great opportunity to meet some of the most well read bloggers in town.

Ignite Portland: Presentation Proposals due January 15 (that’s tomorrow)

Just one last reminder that, if you want to present at Ignite Portland, you need to submit you talk precis (not the entire presentation, just the concept) by January 15.

Vote for Portland Startup Weekend

Unlike typical codefest weekends, Startup Weekend is designed to build an ENTIRE company in less than 54 hours. If you’d like to see something like this happen in Portland, or even if you just think it sounds like an interesting idea, why not cast a vote?

 

View all my bookmarks on Ma.gnolia

Digital Watermarks: Has Digimarc’s time finally come?

Rick Turoczy on January 12, 2008

Beaverton-based Digimarc, while far from being a startup, is—like many startups in the Silicon Forest—very much in the position of being way ahead of its time in terms of digital watermarking. (Full disclosure: I used to work there.)

But the impending demise of music DRM may be just the opening Digimarc needs to shine. At least, Wired’s David Kravets thinks so.

In an article entitled “DRM is Dead, But Watermarks Rise From Its Ashes,” he asserts:

Watermarking offers copyright protection by letting a company track music that finds its way to illegal peer-to-peer networks. At its most precise, a watermark could encode a unique serial number that a music company could match to the original purchaser. So far, though, labels say they won’t do that: Warner and EMI have not embraced watermarking at all, while Sony’s and Universal’s DRM-free lineups contain “anonymous” watermarks that won’t trace to an individual.

The article also goes on to mention:

Microsoft is betting on watermarking’s future, winning a patent for a “stealthy audio watermarking” scheme called El Dorado in September.

I’m betting that Digimarc’s digital-watermarking-patent portfolio would likely be an area of interest, as well.

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this flag raised. It will be interesting to see if it elicits a rallying cry, this time around.

For more information, visit Digimarc. For more on the benefits of digital watermarking, visit the Digital Watermarking Alliance.

Pulse of Portland begins beating

Rick Turoczy on January 11, 2008

The Portland-area Twitter hits just keep on coming.

In the “links arrangement” below, I highlighted a post that Scott Kveton published yesterday, where he mentioned an idea for following what Portland was talking about on Twitter. Today, Josh Bancroft made it a reality.

Pulse of PDX has launched.

How does it work? Anyone from Portland who is followed by @pulseofpdx on Twitter (and following @pulseofpdx is the easiest way to be added) will be added to a stream of comments that are published to the Pulse of PDX site.

So, if you’re not using Twitter (For shame! Here’s how you get started), you’re still dipping your toe in the Twitter water, or you’re not really interested in following all of Portland and Vancouver, try checking out Pulse of PDX and listen in on the talk of the town, today.

Portland Startup Weekend: Could it be what the Rose City needs?

Rick Turoczy on January 11, 2008

One of the best things about writing this blog is getting the opportunity to chat with a wide variety of folks. I mean, sure, a lot of us are geeky. And that’s pretty much where I focus the coverage. But I think you would be pleasantly surprised at the wide range of folks who are interested in Silicon Forest startups.

And in the conversations I’ve been having, there’s one consistent theme that comes through time and time again: For all the activity in Portland—all the cool startup energy and amazing tools being built—people feel pretty darn isolated in our relatively small town.

I think that’s part of the reason why Portland’s Twitter community is so active and responsive. It’s why there’s a ever-growing number of us who are really getting excited for Ignite Portland 2. It’s why things like the PDX Tech Calendar project are taking off.

But there’s still more to do. There’s still more crossover needed.

I mean, let’s be honest: This needs to be more than just techie-types leading the charge. It needs to be a group effort. And a diverse effort.

And that’s what appeals to me about Startup Weekend.

“What’s Startup Weekend?” you say? I’m glad you asked.

Startup Weekend is very much like the Ignite concept. Only it’s for a company.

I know. I hear you. “I’ve been to weekend codefests before.”

But, see, here’s where this one is a little different: It’s not a product. It’s a company.

One weekend to create one company.

That means design, development, marketing, public relations, business development, user experience, legal, and project management. All of those disciplines. In one room. Working to create a company under the gun.

What’s more, this isn’t some “Oh wasn’t that fun. Now let’s throw away all that work and go back to our lives.” This becomes a real company.

Startup Weekend recruits a highly motivated group of small business entrepreneurs to build a community and company in a weekend. The founders decide what to make as a team, and earn an equal share of stock in the developed business. Attendees are responsible for bringing the desire and passion to the project and walk out of the room with a brand new business, in a short 54 hours. Sound intense? It is.

So why all the hoopla from me? Well, there’s a little voting platform for deciding who gets to host Startup Weekends. And Portland is already on the list. So, we’re already part of the way there. All we need is to provide a little more oompf and we could have our very own Portland Startup Weekend.

Sounds interesting, doesn’t it? And I’m confident that with the brilliant folks in this town—and the great organizations that are working to bring us together *cough* Legion of Tech *cough*—we could turn it into quite an interesting event. A spectacle, if you will. In a good way. And an example of how we, as Portlanders and Silicon Forest… um “creatures” can come together to build something great.

And to start to eliminate some of those feelings of isolation.

If you’re even partially convinced that this might, just might, be a good idea. And that it might be good for our community. I highly encourage you to take two seconds to vote for Portland Startup weekend.

For more, visit Startup Weekend.

Silicon Florist’s links arrangement

Rick Turoczy on January 11, 2008

Sometimes, a link says more than I could ever say. Here are some fragrant little buds I’ve found recently, courtesy of ma.gnolia.

Power of PDX Twitterverse

More Twitter love from Portland. Scott Kveton shows the dynamics of Twitter in action over the topic of (what else?) bacon.

Green Lite Motors wins Round 3 of OEN’s Seed Oregon.

Here’s the latest on the Seed Oregon competition. As an aside, I’m really looking forward to a time when ALL startups pick up the Web 2.0 practice of launching a site and a blog prior to releasing a product. It would be great to follow these companies from the beginning. Unfortunately, for now, that remains only a hope.

CandyBar 3 upgrade released

Portland-based Panic, makers of beautiful and useful Mac software, are on an upgrade tear. First Transmit, now CandyBar.

View all my bookmarks on Ma.gnolia

Lighting a fire under your derriere

Rick Turoczy on January 10, 2008

Have you submitted your Ignite Portland presentation concept, yet? What’s that? Don’t you know that there’s less than a week to get it submitted?

C’mon. You can do it.

I mean, sure. You may not have a title as cool as “Eggs & Chard: How eating local and seasonal can fill you up and save us all,” “What Would Dr. Seuss Say About Online Communities,” or “How to Be An Undercover Hooker.” But I bet you have a cool idea. And I bet you could talk about it for 5 minutes.

What’s that? Not your cup of tea?

No worries. Why not just show up? Watch a few presentations. Meet some people. Have some refreshments.

If it’s anything like the first Ignite Portland, it’s not an evening you’ll soon forget.

And, besides, I’d like the chance to meet you. You’re one of my favorite readers. (You’re really my very favorite, but don’t tell the others.)

Looking forward to seeing you.

Ignite Portland is an event for sharing burning ideas. And sharing them really, really quickly. Just about any topic will do, as long as it’s interesting. To RSVP, visit Ignite Portland on Upcoming. For more information on the event, visit Ignite Portland.

Wiki-based AboutUs edits its offerings

Rick Turoczy on January 10, 2008

AboutUsPortland-based AboutUs, the wiki that has rapidly become the de facto source for company Web site information, has announced three new service offerings that promise to improve the promotional nature and the utility of AboutUs services. Not to mention, help the AboutUs bottom line.

The new services include:

  1. Monitor any page on AboutUs for free. Now, anyone (you don’t even have to have an account) can monitor any wiki page on the AboutUs site for changes. Think of it like Google Alerts for your Web site profile.
  2. Hire an AboutUs expert to design your presence. Sure, the beauty of wikis (wiki? wikia?) is that they can be edited on the fly. But, let’s be honest, that doesn’t always make for the prettiest presentation. To help solve this problem, AboutUs is now offering a premium services package that includes in-house design and personalized wiki coaching for a one-time fee of $99.
  3. Sponsor a collection of pages. AboutUs is also introducing the option of sponsoring a collection of links on a given topic—they refer to these landing pages as “portals”—that aggregate business listings and functionality like calendaring and maps for cities around the world and industry verticals. Obviously, my favorite portal page is the Portland Tech Portal. Although I must admit, I’m quite fond of the Portland Tech Blogs page, as well.

But perhaps the most interesting part of the AboutUs announcement is the level of traffic (emphasis is mine) these guys are generating. And the types of revenues to which that traffic may lead.

Though AboutUs is a collaborative project built together by people from around the world, it needs none the less to be economically viable. Advertising revenue from 5 million monthly unique visitors to the site and Portal level sponsorships are already coming in. The new products launching today should lead to a further, substantial increase in site traffic and company revenue.

No doubt, the Silicon Florist page on AboutUs has a great deal to do with those numbers.

Allen Stern of CenterNetworks has also covered the AboutUs news, highlighting:

Clearly it’s working based on the traffic they are receiving. I like the options they are offering to monetize the site past AdSense and the monitoring could help clear up sticky edits quickly. Again, this relies on a business even knowing there is an AboutUs page about them.

AboutUs is a wiki whose goal is to create a free and valuable Internet resource containing information both about websites and other community created topics/information. The site was pre-populated with information about many different websites and thousands of updates are now being made by people each day. For more information on AboutUs, see its AboutUs page.

Silicon Florist’s links arrangement

Rick Turoczy on January 10, 2008

Sometimes, a link says more than I could ever say. Here are some fragrant little buds I’ve found recently, courtesy of ma.gnolia.

Times Square rocked during New Years Eve with partyStrands!

For New Year’s Eve 2007, MTV used Corvallis-based MyStrands partyStrands to allow Times Square folks to interact with the jumbotron. Here’s a recap (includes photos).

Transmit 3

Portland-based Panic, makers of beautiful and highly functional software for the Mac, have released the latest version of their elegant FTP software, Transmit 3.6.4.

Want to Learn about OpenID?

Portland-based OpenID proponents JanRain has gathered a useful collection of links to help get you up to speed on OpenID.

View all my bookmarks on Ma.gnolia

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