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Archive for the 'Geek Dinners' Category

Chris Nuzum of Traction Software at the September 2007 Providence Geek Dinner

Friday, September 21st, 2007

This past Geek Dinner was a heavily-attended double header (RI Nexus and Traction Software)! Chris Nuzum of Traction Software spoke about their award-winning enterprise wiki… it’s actually much more than a wiki. Check out the interview to learn more!

Saul Kaplan at the September 2007 Providence Geek Dinner

Friday, September 21st, 2007

Jack Templin and Saul Kaplan introduced RI Nexus at Wednesday’s Geek Dinner. It was a huge crowd, maybe our biggest ever—just what you’d want for a double header (RI Nexus and Traction Software)! Saul joined me after the RI Nexus presentation. Check out the video for the complete interview.

Last Geek Dinner of the Summer! Wed. July 25th Featuring Digication

Wednesday, July 18th, 2007

providence-geek-dinner-july-2k7.jpg

Wednesday, July 25, 2007, 5:30pm – 9pm
AS220
115 Empire Street, Providence, RI

This is your last chance to get your geek on before September. Yup, we take August off. Even geeks need to “shut down” sometimes… did I really just type that?

We’ve got another great presenter lined up – Providence-based startup, Digication. Digication provides an easy way for schools to create online communities and for teachers and students to showcase their work. Digication is founded by faculty at RISD’s Art + Design Education Department. Digication was made available to US schools in August 2006, within 10 months, it has attracted users from over 1000 schools in all 50 states in the US.

Digication has been featured in numerous publications and outlets including Forbes and The Christian Science Monitor. And last Fall, Digication Founder, Jeff Yan was interviewed Leo Laporte for a TWIT podcast.

On Wednesday, Jeff and Jeffrey Tagen, one of Digication’s software developers will share some of the lessons learned, including business strategies, technology scalability, choice of software library/ framework / platform.


Please RSVP in the comments section of this post so that we can give the good folks at AS220 an estimated headcount. And while you’re at it, subscribe to Providence Geeks’ RSS feed (see sidebar) and/or join our very-low-volume email announcement list (for the announcement list, send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin over at Gmail with your name and affiliation).

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:


  • It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and vamoose whenever… And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good—it’s actually great).

  • Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.

  • Food and beverages are for sale at the adjoining Taqueria Pacifica and bar.

  • There is WiFi so bring your connected device of choice.

Pam O’Hara of BatchBlue at Providence Geeks

Friday, May 25th, 2007


Pam O’Hara and Sean Ransom spoke about BatchBlue to an well-fed and enthusiastic crowd at the May 2007 geek dinner. Attendees got to hear about BatchBlue’s innovative take on contact management systems, and anyone who parted with a business card went home with the BatchBlue roast of coffee beans. I interviewed Pam after the talk, and the video is available on YouTube.

Big thanks to Pam, Sean, and all the Providence geeks who turned out for yet another great geek dinner!

May Geek Dinner Wed. the 23rd 5:30-9pm Featuring a First Look at BatchBlue’s BatchBook

Friday, May 18th, 2007

provgeek-may-2007.jpg
Photo Credit: Bret A. Ancowitz, M.D. of Garris Photography

Wednesday, May 23, 2007, 5:30pm – 9pm+
AS220
115 Empire Street, Providence, RI

At next week’s Geek Dinner, find out how a local entrepreneur assembled a team of 4 ex-Amazonians in the “Biggest Little” to launch a new Ruby on Rails customizable contact organizer for micro-businesses (you know, the tech startup, the freelance consultant, the local florist or bakery…).

Pamela O’Hara, President of Barrington-based BatchBlue Software, and Sean Ransom, VP of Technology and former Amazonian, will talk about how the team got together and used their well-honed usability intelligence to create a database for the masses called BatchBook.

Get a sneak peek of the app as they prepare to go to beta. They’ll
be taking questions and answers after the presentation.

Please RSVP in the comments section of this post so that we can give the good folks at AS220 an estimated headcount. And while you’re at it, subscribe to Providence Geeks’ RSS feed (see sidebar) and/or join our very-low-volume email announcement list (for the announcement list, send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin over at Gmail with your name and affiliation).

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:


  • It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and vamoose whenever… And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good—it’s actually great).

  • Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.

  • Food and beverages are for sale at the adjoining Taqueria Pacifica and bar.

  • There is WiFi so bring your connected device of choice.
  • Update Brian will give a brief report from his visit to last weekend’s Maker Faire.