HellaFrank

Yesterday I rocked out with about half the state of New Jersey at Bon Jovi’s free concert in Central Park and it… was… AWESOME…

50,000 people were at the Great Lawn to watch and seeing all the old tour t-shirts, Bon Jovi tatoos and hearing stories about concerts people had been to reminded me how this guy was THE MAN back in the day. He is still a pretty big deal, especially among the Jersey crowd, but it seems like his music is now mostly played in bars, sung along to by drunk 20-somethings that were probably a little to young to have really been engaged during his hey-day… Myself included. But his music has transcended decades and as was apparent yesterday, he still has a massive fan base and can easily fill 35 acres of park with fans (see photo above!).

Made me think I should have taken all of my childhood guitar lessons a little more seriously and been a rockstar. Now I’ll just have to wonder what it’s like to see women with a heart with a sword through it tatooed on their back with your name above it… Umm, yeah, I saw about 5 of those.

From my phone’s camera (regular camera’s were not allowed!)…

Now that I live in New York, I am much more exposed to the fiasco that is the New York Yankees on a regular basis and it has become very clear that Hank Steinbrenner is not smart or tactful.

The Yankees stink right now, they’ve had some key injuries this year and now star pitcher Chien Ming Wang is out for ten weeks because he hurt himself running the bases, something AL pitchers rarely do, during interleague play. So what does Hank Steinbrenner do? He blames interleague play, the national league, and the fact that major league baseball still uses a rule “from the 1800s.” As told to the Associated Press:

“My only message is simple. The National League needs to join the 21st century,” Steinbrenner said in Tampa, Fla. “They need to grow up and join the 21st century.

“Am I (mad) about it? Yes,” Steinbrenner added. “I’ve got my pitchers running the bases, and one of them gets hurt. He’s going to be out. I don’t like that, and it’s about time they address it. That was a rule from the 1800s.”

Wang is an elite professional athlete, a baseball player, and if he’s capable of making contact with a 90 mile per hour fastball (and throwing a ball that fast), then I hope he knows how to run correctly — apparently not. I see teams of 40-year-old obese smokers in Central Park playing softball on a weekly basis that can run the bases better than that.

And what’s this stuff about the 1800s? As far as I know, the DH wasn’t instituted until 1973. Maybe the rule was created in the 1800s, but then again, so was that rule about three strikes and you’re out. Maybe we should get rid of that one too Hank, then you’re players may actually have a chance to get a hit every now and then?

Alright, I’m done… HellaFrank promises to be in a better mood next time!

Last week was the first ever Internet Week in New York (and maybe anywhere?). Everyday had a slew of events from EconAds to the Applied Cryptography and Network Security Conference. It was a celebration of the Internet for the New York tech community in a sort of open-source, create-your-own-events format.

This event made it clear that New York is serious about becoming the “global technology hub” that mayor Bloomberg suggests. In fact, in a press conference to kick off Internet Week, Bloomberg announced NYC Seed, a $2 million fund for early stage technology companies. Granted, that’s not a lot of money, especially with the cost of operating a business in New York, but it’s a start and companies also receive advice and guidance from the fund’s members as they build their company. Any buy-in from the city is a good thing, and if that $2 million goes to good use, NYC Seed would definitely see a re-up in the near future.

Taking a seed-funding approach is appropriate for the state of the New York tech industry since many of the companies based here seem to be in much earlier stages than their counterparts on the West Coast. Also, I’d imagine that quite a few talented developers and less-experienced entrepreneurs may not have the relationships with wealthy individuals and VCs to raise a first round of funding they need to get their businesses off the ground. NYC Seed should give them easier and less relationship-based access to that kind of money and knowledge.

Overall it was a great week of events, and even culminated in an Internet Week “old media vs. new media” feud that made it onto Page Six! I guess Amy Winehouse took the week off.

Also posted on LaunchSquad’s Exclamation Blog

Everyday we hear stories about the failing economy, whether we’re in a recession and the fallout of some bad decisions by big financial institutions. For many aspects of the economy, people have a pretty good idea what’s going to happen — mortgages will continue to be tough to come by for many people, some more bankers will probably lose their jobs, and Nintendo Wiis will continue to be impossible to get… Well, not sure that last one has anything to do with the economy.

But one aspect of the economy that’s near and dear to me is venture backed technology companies and how they will be affected. Many people have strong opinions and there is really no consensus on what will happen. On several occasions recently I have been asked by people outside the tech industry how the economy has affected, or will affect, the companies I work with and the VCs that fund them. My answer to them is that I really don’t know, and in my never-ending search for the answer to that question, no one else really seems to either.

Back in August, a prominent venture capitalist in San Francisco, Keith Benjamin received some attention from a blogpost he wrote about why the credit crisis would help venture capital. The New York Times and Silicon Valley blog VentureBeat also reported on his theory that venture capital is not based on credit and debt, therefore, investors will be more willing to invest in tech IPOs. There’s one theory.

But, the numbers show that those IPOs have not been plentiful the past few months. Hmmm?

More recently (and by recently, I mean, this week) another article in The New York times paints a dramatic picture of the slowdown in Silicon Valley. Silicon Alley Insider, a New York technology blog, agrees (but then again, they’ll never pass up an opportunity to prove superiority over our West coast counterparts).

On the flip side, here in New York, Union Square Ventures recently announced the closing of their most recent investment fund, apparently without much difficulty. Yesterday Reuters reported that New York is “fertile ground” for technology startups, and VC and tech/finance blogger Paul Kedrosky agrees, at least for financial tech startups. So now you’re telling me things are different based on location? It’s starting to get murky…

Probably the most convincing and level-headed post I’ve read on the topic comes from Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures. Yes, he is a VC and it’s in his interest for people to remain bullish on tech startups and the economic viability of the web, but he makes some good points and concludes that now’s the time for companies to build their business models for the long haul. There’s venture capital money out there waiting to be invested (see above, USV just got $156 million), but the returns may not come right away. So, companies need to build real, sustainable business models since Google won’t snatch them up anytime soon and they’re damn sure not going public… A real, profitable company, what a concept!

In the end, there really doesn’t seem to be an answer everyone can agree on. Overall, it seems that whether the effects of the downturn are negative or positive depends on your role in the tech community. For an entrepreneur, it may be harder to get money and convince VCs that his company can make it in this economy. Bad for them. For VCs, they’ll have to strategize on which types of companies can make it right now and advise accordingly once they’ve funded those companies. Not bad or good, just different. End-users of these technologies? It seems like we/they are put in a position of power. Products need to be made for end-users now, not for Google or Yahoo!, and consumers may ultimately decide whether a company is successful or not. With so many early acquisitions the past few years, widespread consumer adoption and revenue haven’t necessarily been the benchmarks of success for startups.

So, I guess we just need to sit back and watch it all unfold, and the next time someone asks you how the economic downturn is affecting tech, tell them to get comfortable cause the answer may take a while.

Update: Interesting post on Silicon Alley Insider today about computer science graduates not having any problem finding jobs. Seems like engineers are always in high demand though — a company is nothing without its product, and developers bring those to life.

I missed you guys. Seriously, I did.

Today was the first real day of regular season major league baseball and whether the Cubs won or lost, opening day has always been a pretty exciting and hopeful day for me. Why? Well, this time of year the Cubs generally aren’t out of the playoffs yet, this year it’s a sign that warm weather is almost upon us (in my younger years, it meant school was coming to an end… Definitely no warm weather in San Francisco though), and somewhere in the April/May timeframe you can start a golf round at 4:00pm and still get 18 holes in.

So I figured that today would be most appropriate to officially announce that HellaFrank is back and excited to bring you some new and improved regular programming.

The initial idea behind HellaFrank was to document my move out to New York. It was fun and from what readers told me, entertaining to at least three of you (not including my parents, of course!).

Now, I’m shifting the focus to things I like writing about and feel are topics with which I have some level of expertise and passion. I love sports, but so do 100,000 other bloggers. I like technology, but so do a million other bloggers. I also love New York and plenty of people write about this amazing city on a regular basis.

What I’m getting at is HellaFrank will sit at the center of all three of these passions of mine. HellaFrank is the intersection of sports, technology and New York life… I will write about each of these topics and the convergence of them when possible. I’m excited to get rolling again and I hope that all of you will continue to read and comment and tell your friends!

So, what do you need to do to stay up to date on HellaFrank? Tattoo it on your arm, bookmark this page or subscribe to the RSS feed (the big red button on the right), but whatever you do, visit early and visit often — you won’t want to miss a post………