Helping travelers discover unique experiences at Voyagin. Indian tech geek / entrepreneur from Japan, Columbia Engineering grad, Geek Rendezvous co-founder, previously w/ Producteev and Social Bicycles
Institute for Data Sciences and Engineering
Mayor Bloomberg and Columbia University President Bollinger today announced an agreement between the City of New York and Columbia University that will lead to the creation of a new Institute for Data Sciences and Engineering, to be located at Columbia’s Morningside Heights and Washington Heights campuses in New York City, and the hiring of dozens of new faculty within the university’s Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. The announcement is the next milestone in the City’s groundbreaking Applied Sciences NYC initiative, which seeks to dramatically increase New York City’s capacity for applied sciences and engineering while strengthening and transforming the City’s economy for generations. Read more.
Mayor Bloomberg said:
“This historic partnership is the newest element in the applied sciences initiative that is, by far, the largest and most far-reaching economic development effort City government has undertaken in modern memory. It will create tens of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in economic activity, and it will encourage the growth of the tech sector in New York City and solidify our leadership in the innovation economy for decades to come.”
Fail fast. Don’t be afraid to take risks, don’t be afraid to make mistakes.
Malcolm Ong, Co-Founder of Skillshare speaking at Lean Startup Machine NYC (via skillshare)
Totally agree with this! When you’re not afraid to fail fast, you’re much more likely to try exciting, wild new things and innovate.
I mowed lawns to get my first Nintendo system, so my measure of success was to create a product a kid would want to mow a shitload of lawns in order to get.
even after living here for 20 yrs, excited after unlocking the foursquare city badge for Tokyo! makes me feel giddy, and more Tokyo-ite! still lovin’ the service! =)
We’re excited to announce the first annual CVC30, a list of Columbians who have accomplished the most interesting things in the technology, entrepreneurship, and venture industries.
From not-yet-graduated wunderkinds to venerated experts, the 2011 CVC30 is made up of alumni, faculty, staff, and students who represent a host of diverse backgrounds and experiences, much like CVC itself.
It goes without saying that there are many, many more people who deserve to be applauded for their accomplishments this year. We hope this list will serve as a reminder that with every round of funding raised, site launched, and graduate who dares to take a non-traditional career path, Columbia and New York City are only growing in their relevance to the startup world .
Without further ado, the CVC30:
Mike Brown Partner, AOL Ventures
Bill Campbell Chairman, Intuit
Mark Davis CEO, Kohort | Venture Partner, HPVP
Chris Dixon Founder, Hunch
Michael Dwork Founder, Verterra
Roger Ehrenberg Founder, IA Ventures
Marc Glosserman Founder, Hill Country Barbecue
Seth Goldstein Founder, Turntable.fm
Ron Gonen Founder, Recyclebank
Jared Hecht Founder, Group.me
Daniel Hoffer President/CEO, CouchSurfing International
Ben Horowitz Founder, Andreesen Horowitz
Doug Imbruce Founder, Qwiki
Deborah Jackson CEO, JumpThru
Philip James Founder, Lot18 & Snooth
San Kim Founder, ShowMe
Graham Lawlor Founder, UltraLight Startups
Dave Lerner Venture Studio + Venture Lab @ Columbia
Cyrus Massoumi Founder, CEO, ZocDoc
Chris McGarry Major Gift Officer, SEAS
Jen Schnidman Medbery CEO/Founder, Drop the Chalk
Alan Patricoff Founder, Greycroft
Alessandro & Alexandra Piol Co-founders, Vedanta Capital
Adam Pritzker Founder, General Assembly
David Rose Chairman, NY Angels
Bartek Ringwelski CEO, SkillSlate
Zach Sims & Ryan Bubinski Co-founders, Codecademy
Jon Stein CEO, Betterment
Jon Steinberg President, BuzzFeed
David Whittemore Founder, ClothesHorse
Chris Wiggins Founder, HackNY
11.11.11 11:11:11! Happy Nerd New Year / last binary date of the century! Let’s turn it up to 11! I’m celebrating by hatching a new startup!
This outtake / overtime of Steve Jobs talking about rivals Microsoft / Google / Facebook is definitely the more fascinating part of last night’s 60 Minutes interview with Walter Issacson on his biography of Steve Jobs.
I’d say Microsoft and Google have a lot in common. Microsoft never had the humanities and the liberal arts in their DNA - it was pure technology company. And they just didn’t get it. Even when they saw the Mac, they couldn’t even copy it well. How dumb do you have to be to not see it once you see it, you know? But, Google’s the same way - they just don’t get it.
Jobs’ advice to Larry Page on becoming the CEO of Google again:
Focus. Don’t be like Microsoft doing products all over the map. Figure out what you do best and keep it focused. Secondly, don’t try to be too nice as a CEO. You want a team only of A-players, and it really means that at times, you’re going to have to blow people off.
On Facebook:
You know we talk about social networks in the plural but I don’t see anybody other than Facebook out there. It’s just Facebook - they’re dominating this. I admire Mark Zuckerberg. I only know him a little bit, but I admire him for not selling out. For wanting to make a company. I admire that a lot.
Bill Gates to Jobs on the great difference they had:
You know, you proved that your model (everything should be connected, end-to-end, integrated tightly) works. [Later on: What I didn’t tell Steve was that it only works when you have a Steve Jobs]
Steve Jobs in return:
Well, you know, your model (of licensing it out) - that worked as well; I guess we were both OK [Later on: Yeah, it works, but only if you don’t mind building crappy products]
I don’t agree with everything, but it’s definitely interesting and the love-hate relationship between Steve Jobs and Bill Gates is always fun
Ashton Kutcher has even more foursquare stickers on the back of his laptop now (on Two and a Half Men)! Awesome!
Steve Jobs passing this week brings back memories of this famous pic (22,000 hits in 2 hours!) from Alexa Andrzejewski of Foodspotting (an awesome visual guide to good food + places to eat) when the founder of Apple was denied a table at Flour + Water (they have infamous wait times, like 3 hours?!)
Here’s the back story in Alexa’s own words (republished from TechCrunch):
Kim (@taro) is an awesome Swedish programmer living in Japan. He took a month off from work here at Smart.fm to do a cross-country road trip, with the idea of hitting Apple land as the Mecca of the voyage. He’d just spent the previous day in Cupertino, just to see “The Apple Temple.”
Kim is the the biggest Steve Jobs/Apple fanboy in the universe, and his trip ended with him seeing Steve Jobs and getting his picture with him plastered all over the place.
Kim’s second love to Apple is food, so I’d been planning to take him to Flour + Water for months. I had no idea that Steve Jobs would be waiting in line right behind us! What are the chances that, as our other flabbergasted friend Simon put it, “the great god in his infinite kindness and wisdom would grace @kimtaro with his presence at Flour + Water.”
When Steve Jobs politely declined our request for a photo with Kim, we walked away sullenly, but moments later my husband turned around to snap this “photobomb.” It was the happiest day of Kim’s life! Here are a few more photos to dispel the Photoshop charges. Plus this guy did a thorough analysis here.
By the way — he was there with his family of course. And yes, we were just bystanders.
Alexa
Steve Jobs memorial (done in chalk) at General Assembly, NYC.
GA’s a perfect place for this.
This is awesome and perhaps one of the most fitting tributes to Steve Jobs
Google + Dogfish Head collaborated to create a beer w/ ingredient ideas from Google offices all around the world! Although much of this is a marketing video, the ingenuity that went into this idea and this video showing the process of bringing the beer to life is awesome! =)
Way to go for innovative companies + concepts!
geekiest convo ever describing pants in RGB color values by Mark Hamilton + Thomas Bonnin! come meet these peeps @ #geekrdv!
Hilarious, and awesome! McGill scientists, students, lab techs, and volunteers dance to highlight some of the work being done at the Goodman Cancer Research Centre! Oh, and it gets even better; for every view Medicom will donate towards supporting advances in cancer research! <- let’s make this video go viral!
Not too long ago someone asked me what gets me up every day and keeps me goin’. I’ve also been asked a million times why I want to work at a tech startup. This video and Michael’s blog post (“How to Engage with the Community”) is ‘nuff said! Thank you guys! =)
A video response to the letter, card and gear that I received from Producteev in the mail! And I’m not talking about e-mail either.
I wanted to add what the first part of the letter said:
You’re an inspiration everyday! — Wow. Just… wow! Thank you so much! Judi, Tushar K, Farhana… YOU rock ;)
After the video I looked up the word “artistry”. I was sad to see that I, in fact, did not make up that word. But! I was glad to see that I used it in it’s correct sense — which I should because I am the editor of the school newspaper after all.
Here’s Michael’s blog post: How to Engage with the Community
You can also follow him on Twitter: @silversteelwolfAlso, here is the link I referenced too about ProducteevEdu
after two weeks here, we caved into finally having some Japanese food - the #ramen here was decent!
Chiang Mai Noodles! It looks spicy, but it's actually pretty sweet to offset the (little) spice! Delish :)
wasn't sure of this place at first, but the food turned out delish & the restaurant/bar/cafe with its wooden tones gave of a hipster vibe that reminded me of Brooklyn :)
Spaghetti Carbonara... not the best, but a refreshing change
yummy taco rice! this cafe is great to come to once in a while and the taco rice rocked as a change from the usual オムライス
awesome cream of shrimp udon! the portions at this place are massive, but that's only the beginning. the variety in the types of udon they have and the flavor of the broth makes you want to come back here again and again. definitely a must-visit on any trip to Tokyo!
delicious tsukemen w/ a unique broth that's a combination of a fish and tonkotsu prok broth. the 麺 (noodles) might not be the best, but the broth is delish!
delish! we originally came here for Indian, but since they didn't have butter chicken curry, it's a good thing they had Thailand food :)
delicious! but, it tastes more like spaghetti than anything else. that might be because I ordered the bolognese; will try something new next time. regardless, this place is a must-visit for its uniqueness :)