When talking about GlitchCon, The Gang kicks it old school (or is it, ‘skool’?) and reminisces about MECC’s classic ‘Oregon Trail’ game. More trips down memory lane are in the show, such as a mention of our beloved Treo 650/750 smartphones, but we also review the Minnesota tech news of the week and further debrief last weeks’ Minnebar.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson.

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

* MakerBot will no longer make its own 3D printers

* Tech company FPX plans to double staff after sale

* Capella buys Hackbright Academy coding school for $18M

* Twin Cities tech entrepreneur launches new video series about tech execs

Other Top Tech Stories

* Decline in iPhone sales leads to first revenue decline in 13 years for Apple

* Billionaire investor Carl Icahn sells entire stake in Apple

* Amazon has most profitable quarter ever, but operating costs also rose

* Google Play Music gets podcast support on Android and the Web

* Minnov8 Gang podcast on Google Music

* Has Desktop Internet Use Peaked?

Cool Thing of the Week

* Phil: Ring Pro

* Tim: Bubble

* Steve: Logitech Keys-to-Go keyboard

Upcoming Events

* The Complete List of 250+ Tech, IT, and DevOps Conferences in 2016

* The list as a Google spreadsheet

* 32 conferences for Mac and iOS professionals in 2016

* 2016 Minneapolis/St. Paul Mini Maker Faire, May 14, MN State Fairgrounds

* WordCamp Minneapolis, May 21-22 2016, Humphrey Institute, Minneapolis

* NEW: Big Data Tech 2016, Minneanalytics, June 7th, Normandale College

* NEW: Minnesota Digital Government Summit, August 2nd, St. Paul RiverCentre

This week’s show is from Minnebar, the “Superbowl for Geeks” held once per year at Best Buy’s headquarters in Richfield, MN. We take a moment to remember Prince who passed away this week, and the music selection is a ‘cover’ of a Prince tune as homage to this great musician.

Our special guest is one of the board members from Minne* (the organization that puts on Minnebar). He’s also Kipsu VP of Operations, Minnov8 podcast listener and friend of the show, and an all around great guy: Justin Porter. We talk Minnebar, what he’s been up to, and a bit about Kipsu on this podcast.

Hosts: Steve Borsch and Phil Wilson (Tim Elliott is off this week).

Music: Purple Rain (cover) by Per Christian Lilleby under a CC 3.0 License

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

Mobilize MN recap – Betty Crocker mobile app

IoTFuse recap

3M Introduces Smart Inhaler

Other Top Tech Stories

* China Shuts Down Apple’s Music and Book Stores. What’s Next?

Cool Thing of the Week

* Phil: Facebook Live Streaming (using provider: Livestream)

* Steve: YouTube Live Streaming (free)

* Google is building YouTube Connect, a livestreaming app to take on Periscope

Upcoming Events

* The Complete List of 250+ Tech, IT, and DevOps Conferences in 2016

* The list as a Google spreadsheet

* 32 conferences for Mac and iOS professionals in 2016

* MinneWebCon U of MN McNamara Alumni Ctr April 25-26

* GlitchCon, April 29-30, McNamara Alumni Center

* 2016 Minneapolis/St. Paul Mini Maker Faire, May 14, MN State Fairgrounds

* WordCamp Minneapolis, May 21-22 2016, Humphrey Institute, Minneapolis

The StarTribune had an article about how as Code 42 heads downtown, 100 Washington Square becomes tech center. The good news? Growing tech companies have a large square-footage building that is catering to their needs. The bad news? Phil is NOT happy about it as he thinks the building is basically butt-ugly.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson.

Music: Giorgio By Moroder by Elektro-Tek under a CC 3.0 License

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

* AlterConf Minneapolis event update

* Lewk is an algorithmically curated monthly menswear box

* Exclusive: Target Testing Connected Health Sections

* AliveCor Kardia

* Minnesota Middle School App Developers Demo At White House Science Fair

* You’ll be able to use your phone to ride Metro Transit soon

* For new Vikings stadium, an app that does everything but yell ‘Skol!’ 

Other Top Tech Stories

* Facebook

* How Will Zuckerberg Rule the World? By Giving Facebook’s Tech Away

* This is Facebook’s gorgeous, open-source 360-degree video camera

* Google looks to secure Bluetooth beacon communications

Cool Thing of the Week

* Phil: GolfShot and Hole19

* Tim: AirJamz: The Wearable Air Guitar From the Makers of jamstik+

* Steve: TarDisk

Upcoming Events

* The Complete List of 250+ Tech, IT, and DevOps Conferences in 2016

* The list as a Google spreadsheet

* 32 conferences for Mac and iOS professionals in 2016

* AlterConf April 9th, LeadPages

* Twin Cities Code Camp 20, April 16th, 2016, University of Minnesota

* IoT Fuse, April 22nd, Univ of St. Thomas-Minneapolis

* Minnebar, April 23rd, Best Buy HQ

We’re all serious at the outset of the show talking about Spy planes overhead still watching Minneapolis and the article it’s based on (Spies in the Skies) when Phil pipes up. He exclaims, “De plane! De plane!” referring to a reference that became a meme in the late 1970s from a show called Fantasy Island.

Here is a video on YouTube of the opening of this (at the time) wildly popular show and, at about 37 seconds in, comes de plane reference seemingly everyone used at the time (and some living in the past still do!).  

Our guest host this week is our good friend Julio Ojeda-Zapata. Besides enjoying his guest-hosting on the podcast, we were particularly interested in an article he wrote on Flarean, a St. Paul-based startup (see St. Paul tech startup’s mission is to light the way – literally ).

This post title about “light up the night” is a bit of a misnomer since they’ve been out testing stuff at night since they’re in stealth startup mode. Flarean’s vision is, “…to have every street, every home in America and the world connected by beautiful products that save lives and inform people about public safety.” It’s a big vision with a strong purpose and some cool technology to back it up.

Joining us as our guest this week is the founder and CEO of Flarean, Jason Barnett. Find out what they do, how he started it, his team, and where they’re headed next (and it’s much more than lights at night!).

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Phil Wilson and Julio Ojeda-Zapata

Photo credit of downtown St. Paul: Tony Webster via VisualHunt.com / CC BY

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

* Health Tech Industry Flush With Job Openings But Not Enough Talent

* Mayo Clinic Technology Said To Alleviate Nausea From VR

* Once-threatened low-cost Internet gets new life in the Twin Cities

* Blandin Foundation March archive

* Sprint owns up to past problems, hopes to win back customers

* St. Paul tech startup’s mission is to light the way – literally

This Week’s Guest… Jason Barnett

Known as an Innovator, Leader, and Disruptor, Jason Barnett – Founder and CEO of Flarean takes pride in founding companies that will change the world and improve people’s lives.

His background in the arts, technology, media and social organizing along with his expertise in forging new paths and opportunities have previously lead to the founding of TheUpTake.org, a nonprofit online video news gathering and broadcasting organization.

His passion for finding and building new concepts lead him to establish Flarean.

Other Top Tech Stories

* Apple’s 9.7-inch iPad Pro review: What makes something “Pro” anyway?

Cool Thing of the Week

* Phil: Tesla unveils its $35,000 Model 3

* Tim: Domotics Kit: an IoT platform for every Smart Home

* Steve: BlogBooker – Make a PDF out of your blog

* Julio:

Our guest this week is Greg Swan, VP of PR and Emerging Media at Space 150. At this top agency Greg leads a team devoted to influencing consumer behavior online, creating authentic engagement and uncovering the “what’s next” in emerging media that will impact brands in the near future. He is a nationally recognized thought-leader whose teams have helped some of the world’s largest companies build brands, launch new products, and change audience mindsets. (More about Greg below).

We talk to Greg about his experience at the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival that just ended, as well as some of the deeper meanings behind what happened there and the trends in marketing and emerging media. He has much to say on these topics and we covered these, and more, on this show.

Hosts: Steve Borsch and Phil Wilson (Tim Elliott is off this week).

Music: L’inventore del Jazz by Alessandro Pellegrini under a Creative Commons License

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

* Minnesota Hires 5,500 Tech Workers In 2015, But Demand Outstrips Supply

* COCO launches effort to increase diversity in tech sector

* Minnesota TechHire Initiative

* 3M Opens $150M State-Of-The-Art Research And Development Lab

Other Top Tech Stories

* Why Are We Fighting the Crypto Wars Again?

* John Oliver gives clarity to the encryption discussion 

* Report: Apple building its own cloud infrastructure under ‘Project McQueen’ codename

* Cloud Makes For Strange Bedfellows: Apple Signs On With Google, Cuts Spending With AWS

* Phil’s short time with the Fossil Q Grant

This Week’s Guest: Greg Swan

Prior to Space150, Greg spent nearly a decade at global PR firm Weber Shandwick, where his teams helped clients like The Coca-Cola Company, U.S. Army, State Farm, Verizon, and Chevrolet drive award-winning programs tied to measurable results. Previously, he had stints with both advertising and marketing firms, working on brands like Dupont, John Deere, Gorilla Glue, and Naked Juice. Greg was named Social Media Professional of the Year by PR News, and he was listed on both PR Week and Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal’s 40 Under 40.

Greg’s Personal Website, LinkedIn & Twitter.

* Discussed during Greg’s segment: 

People often joke about how we should be teaching our kids about the zombie and other potential apocalyptic events depicted in books, graphic novels, movies and TV. Thankfully there is an answer: Teach them by playing an incredibly fun board game that geeks and their families will love!

Our guest this week is Seppy Yoon, Chief Designer & Ogre at Fight In A Box who has made just such a game. Hear more from him about it, the nearly ended (and successful!) Kickstarter campaign, along with our usual tech story discussions on this week’s show.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson.

Music: All Hoochie Coochied Up by DJ Ecklectic Mick under a Creative Commons License

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

Digital divide persists in Minneapolis 

Twin Cities included in Obama’s new tech training program 

Electric cars get a room of their own at Twin Cities Auto Show 

Other Top Tech Stories

Mac ransomware caught before large number of computers infected 

Facebook announces a WordPress plugin that lets publishers easily create Instant Articles 

This Week’s Guest

Seppy Yoon, Chief Designer & Ogre – Fight In A Box (LinkedIn). Currently wrapping up a Kickstarter campaign for his board game “End of the Line”. Check out this post and get involved now…before it’s too late!

Seppy’s escape from corporate america was more grueling than Snake Plissken and New York. He has been writing games longer than is polite to ask. Additionally, meetings with him are strictly prison rules: “Don’t make eye contact unless you’re challenging him.” We try and avoid him entirely keeping him chained to the game forge where he can hammer away at the imaginary people in his head instead of us.

Quotes:

* “I kill more monsters before 6 am than some people do all day.”

* “Monsters don’t kill themselves.”

* “I’m just happy to be here.”

Cool Thing of the Week

* Phil: Obama at SXSW

Tim: Neverware CloudReady

* Steve: Intel’s Upcoming Ultra-Fast Optane SSD May Come to MacBooks

Upcoming Events

* The Complete List of 250+ Tech, IT, and DevOps Conferences in 2016

* The list as a Google spreadsheet

* 32 confere...

Like always we cover the top Minnesota and other tech stories from the past week, but we are also pleased to introduce to you this week’s guest: Ashe Dryden. She has been a programmer for over 15 years and has become a diversity advocate and consultant, White House fellow, a prolific writer, and speaker. She is the founder of AlterConf and co-founder of Fund Club.  Ashe is also in the midst of writing two books: The Diverse Team and The Inclusive Event. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, Scientific American, Wired, NPR, and more.

We had Ashe on the podcast since AlterConf is coming to Minneapolis April 9th and the three of us felt this effort, and an overall conversation about diversity in tech, is long overdue and awareness needs to grow. Plus, who better than three older white guys to talk about diversity with someone on the forefront of inclusion in the tech industry?  

On the darker side, we discuss more about the unfolding FBI vs. Apple controversy and Borsch’s response to a StarTribune editorial in last Sunday’s paper. On the lighter side we talk a bit about the new response-to-a-post emojis at Facebook and we, like many others, either don’t care or want to know more about how Facebook will be using them (hint: Facebook confirmed to Mic in this posting that it will use data gathered when you use the new emojis to alter your News Feed and learn more about what you like).

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson.

Music: Mercy, Mercy, Mercy by VB and the Buzz under a Creative Commons License

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

* A quick look at Product Tank meetup

* Code42 Names Tim Connor as Its Chief Financial Officer

* Minneapolis-based start-up applies advanced technologies to power-demand peaks

* Phoji Channels Angel Investors To Spread Nationally

* StarTribune Editorial: National security is at stake in Apple’s faceoff with feds

* Steve’s editorial counterpoint: What’s really at stake in Apple encryption case

* Seriously Minneapolis StarTribune? “U.S. security at stake as Apple defies order”

Other Top Tech Stories

* Google, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, Box To Support Apple In Court

* Apple

* Apple Is Said to Be Trying to Make It Harder to Hack iPhones

* The Apple Case Will Grope Its Way Into Your Future

* Apple Hires Developer Behind Signal, Edward Snowden’s Favorite Secure Chat App

* Obama Administration Set to Expand Sharing of Data That N.S.A. Intercepts

* Hack Brief: Last Y...

THE big story of the week has to be the Apple/FBI dust-up over the court-order demanding Apple decrypt the iPhone 5c of the San Bernadino shooter. The three of us stand by Apple, who is pushing-back to NOT build a tool to decrypt that phone, all while the Dept. of Justice is now shoving to get Apple to comply. It’s complicated, but we talk about that—and a whole lot more—on this week’s show.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson.

Music: Bonaparte’s Retreat by Walker Winn under a Creative Commons License

The Podcast

Story Links

Past Week’s Top Minnesota Stories

* Minnedemo

* St. Paul software startup acquired by Contently

* 3-D printer Stratasys struts its stuff during New York’s Fashion Week

* Broadband alliance formed to serve southern Minnesota

* DOCSIS 3.1: 9 million served by 2017 says ABI Research 

* HomeSpotter has raised $925k

Other Top Tech Stories

* FCC Rules You Can Get Cable Through Apple, Google, Amazon, and Android

* Apple / FBI controversy

* Apple publishes letter responding to FBI iPhone unlock demand: ‘an unprecedented step which threatens the security of our customers’

* Apple Executives Detail Scope Of FBI Request And Company’s Motivations For Not Complying

* Apple: Terrorist’s Apple ID Password Changed In Government Custody, Blocking Access

* No, A Judge Did Not Just Order Apple To Break Encryption On San Bernardino Shooter’s iPhone, But To Create A New Backdoor

* Cringely: The FBI v. Apple isn’t at all the way you think it is

* Justice Department Calls Apple’s Refusal to Unlock iPhone a ‘Marketing Strategy’ 

Steve’s Security Tip of the Week

* Practical tips to keep yourself from getting hacked (inspired by this post):

*