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Tag: ccsync

SweetSpot hits the… Oh. Um. Well, it secures seed funding for diabetes data services

When it comes to technology, health care, ironically, tends to fall closer to the rusting edge than the bleeding edge. But that shortcoming is a boon for startups that can figure out how to use today’s technology to solve health care’s problems—both for providers and patients.

One such company is Portland-based SweetSpot, a startup that seeks to help diabetics and their care givers better manage health information by providing a central resource for blood glucose tracking and reporting. And today, Sweetspot is one step closer that helping fix its own corner of health care, thanks to a round of seed funding. Read More

memePDX 013: Ignite Portland 7, Back Fence PDX, Supercomputing 2009, ccSync, Tim O’Reilly, Wikipedia, and Obama has never tweeted

This week, Cami Kaos and I talk about Ignite Portland 7 and Backfence PDX on the same night, Supercomputing 2009, ccSync, Tim O’Reilly on the war for the Web, Wikipedia’s annual fund drive, and Obama has never tweeted. And of course, get well soon to MetaFilter’s Matt Haughey.

Well, well, well. It’s another Thursday. Kinda. And that means it’s time for another episode of memePDX. Lucky number 13, in fact.

So what did we cover? Well, a whole bunch of stuff. But we’ve got one favor to ask. Just pretend it’s Thursday, pre-Ignite Portland and pre-Back Fence PDX. Okay? Okay.

This week, Cami Kaos and I talk about Ignite Portland 7 and Backfence PDX on the same night, Supercomputing 2009, ccSync, Tim O’Reilly on the war for the Web, Wikipedia’s annual fund drive, and Obama has never tweeted. And of course, get well soon to MetaFilter’s Matt Haughey. Read More

ccSync: Bringing the chatroom and IRC dynamic to SMS with group texting

With Portland-based ccSync, suddenly your text messages begin to resemble a chatroom or IRC. Every message goes to every person in the group. Voila. Group SMS.

[Full disclosure: I have consulted with ccSync in the past before they reconfigured their product offering. I was pre-briefed on the launch of this product, but I have not been involved in the launch planning.]

For all the cool Web apps, iPhone apps, and mobile technologies, few things beat SMS for market penetration. That’s what makes it so great. Next to actually calling someone on the phone—but I mean, who does that?—texting is the easiest way to communicate with folks. Because practically anyone carrying a phone in their pocket can send and receive SMS messages—so long as their data plan I allows it.

So as far as having SMS? Great. But using SMS only works for very particular applications. Like one-to-one conversations. If you want to use that technology to communicate with three different people, you’re going to wind up sending that message three different times.

If only there were some way to talk to a group of people—in a controlled confidential way, not a public Twitter way—using this nearly ubiquitous technology. Well, now there is. Introducing ccSync. Read More