In an economy like Phoenix‘s, the prospect of a burgeoning and vibrant start-up community might seem unlikely. But the valley’s underground tech community has some advantages. Entrepreneur and author Pamela Slim says, “There is a real spirit of cooperation and collaboration here.”
The author behind Escape from Cubicle Nation, Pam spoke at the 2009 Arizona Entrepreneurship Conference this past Thursday. The event was part of Arizona’s GeekWeekAZ. GeekWeek consisted of a series of conferences focusing on the tech, start-ups and personal publishing communities.
The Project Fidelity team attended almost all of the week’s major offerings covering them for both our blog and cross-posting for The Knight Center for Digital Media Entrepreneurship’s site StartUpMedia.org, housed at ASU’s Cronkite School.
- Ignite Phoenix 5 – Open mic night for Phoenix’s creative community, Ignite serves as a platform to share new ideas. Each of 18 presenters gets five minutes to share inspirational insight.
- Tedx Phoenix – An offshoot of the TED program, Tedx Phoenix brought intellectual and motivational speakers from Arizona together.
- Arizona Entrepreneurship Conference – AZEC09 sought to help foster the spirit Pam Slim mentioned earlier. In it’s forth year running, the conference choose, “Bright Spots in the Recession,” as this year’s theme.
- WordCamp Phoenix – WordPress allows both easy publishing and rapid development. WordCampAZ aimed to put these communities in the same room to foster collaboration on what has become the world’s largest blogging tool.
- PodCamp AZ – With the myriad of options available, self publication hasn’t just become easier, it has become unavoidable. Podcasting is a great way to share ideas and foster relationships with people who care.
All these events underscore and emphasis the point Pam Slim made, there is still life in Phoenix. More coverage from the Project Fidelity coming soon.
