2008 Was a Great Year for Santa Cruz Geeks

January 22, 2009 by Sean Tario · View Comments
Filed under: Future of Santa Cruz, Inspiration, Santa Cruz NEXT, Santa Cruz Tech, Tech Stuff 

At the dinner we had last week I sat down about 30 minutes before the event started and began writing down all the different and amazing things that took place in 2008 that either directly or indirectly spawned out of the Geek Dinners we had started only a little over a year prior. I also started listing some of the movers and shakers in the room specifically providing infrastructure to help the technology and entrepreneurial community in town. What I came up with is below, and I gotta say, I’m still freaking impressed and very much looking forward to an even more successful 2009.

MEMBERSHIP
-grew from Sol Lipman, Margaret Rosas, David Beach and Sean Tario to nearly 200 amazing members within a single year

EVENTS
-Numerous CoWorking Jellys at Quiddities’ former offices and at a stellar rental on the beach
-FreelanceCamp
-Public Media Camp
-Numerous Santa Cruz Design and Innovation Center Events
-Geeks on the Beach – Dinner and short lived bonfire
-Holiday and Halloween Parties
-Santa Cruz New Tech Alliance Meetup
-iPhone Application Meetup

COMPANIES MAKING HUGE STRIDES
-12seconds.tv (spawned from Beach and Sol connecting at a dinner)
-UserVoice.com (convinced founders to move from SF and Wisconsin to Santa Cruz because of the geek dinner!)
-RideSpring.com (look out for even bigger things from Paul and RideSpring in 2009!)
-RoomQuick.com (You’ll be hearing a lot about these folks in 2009, guaranteed!)
-ProductOps.com (Bob said, “why the heck not, done it before and I’ll do it again,” and thus, ProductOps was born in 2008)

INFRASTRUCTURE
-Marty Collins and The Digital Media Factory on the West Side (not new, but Marty did some serious growing last year!)
-Jeremy, Ryan and Veronica and NextSpace downtown
-Santa Cruz Geeks Google Group
-www.SantaCruzGeeks.com
-Local geek Peter Koht hired as the Economic Development Manager for the City, who was able to launch within the first month in the position www.CruzBusiness.com

OTHER STUFF
-Mike Brogan, Acting Director of Marketing for Cruzio Internet, elected as the Technology Director on the Board of Directors for Santa Cruz Next
-UCSC Baskin School of Engineering starting to spin off some interesting and viable companies such as www.pergamumsystems.com and putting plans in place for some engaging and entrepreneurial focused events coming up in 2009

So, that’s what I’ve got off the top of my head… what’s missing?

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  • Steve Terry
    A great year, indeed. The wind is shifting from east to west all over the country, not just in Washington where Science and Tech has fought the headwinds of a retro-thinking administration for eight long years. Silicon Valley still rules, but what began with you and some others here in Santa Cruz is seminal of something that only a collective swarm or visionary and talented minds can make happen. A storm of ideas at Level 5 strength began swirling above us in 2008. The collaborative power it holds is like nothing ever seen before here or even over the skies of the capitol of innovation that some of us must still commute to daily. SCD&IC, SCTA, and SCG represents nothing less than the leading edge of a surging front of entrepreurial energy and innovative power that will transform and salvage our economy with the model that works best for us: building new markets by reaching beyond what's happening now into what's happening ahead. Someone smarter than I said something like, "The best way to know the future is to build it." In years ahead, I would not be surprised if history records this town, our town, as the place where the winds of change blew hardest. Hang on! The wind is at our backs. Let's put up the sails and hold the helm. It's a great time to be alive. There's no place I'd rather be. There's no people I would rather be with in 2009 and beyond.
  • Sean, great work on putting this all together. Your work as an evangelist about SC and the tech community are invaluable. I'm glad we got to meet, and I'm looking forward to 2009.
  • Yes, and another great happening of 2008 was connecting with my fellow pirate Captain Groggy Swagger, aka Aaron. The Santa Cruz Armada will surely be storming the high seas of the Monterey Bay this summer!
  • More pirates!
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