Whether they are meant to be there or not, real business lessons are buried within the made-for-TV, startup-pitch-event-turned-reality-show Shark Tank, and despite the raised eyebrows, I love the program.

A rotating crew of five potential investors, billed as self-made millionaires, hear quick pitches from would-be entrepreneurs of varying skills, interests and levels of experience. Sometimes deals are made; sometimes those entrepreneurs walk away with nothing, aside from a little exposure.

This is not the first time I’ve talked about the show: last fall, I wrote about what the Knight News Challenge could learn from Shark Tank.

I watched most of last season and all of what has come out so far this year. I’ve got to thinking there are a few lessons to be learned from watching.

First, it’s the best reality show on TV because — though the drama is naturally turned up and the personality surely encouraged — it has the same quick-cut, digestible entertaining qualities of other programs, but it also has a taste of next-big-thing trends and dives into the American ethos of entrepreneurship with all the teachings of what works and what doesn’t.

Watch a clip from last season below.

So, yes, I’ve had some takeaways, some for pursuing investment and some, of course, for being the very unique experience of having five potential, competing investors sitting in front of you on national TV.

INVESTMENT PITCH LESSONS

1. Have a strong elevator pitch – Well, obviously, first and foremost, you should have down exactly what you aim to say: simply what your business is, why it’s unique, what needs it fills, how much money it has made, how it will scale to make more and why you’re the person to do it. Gabe Weinberg recently wrote on this and many other angles for your investment pitch.
2. Always offer your sales figures for the last calendar year — Or, if more relevant, in the last year or fiscal year, but the point is to have, ready immediately, how much in actual sales you made in a 12-month period. Projections are fine, recent numbers are cool, orders or forthcoming sales are great, but the first thing to say is what you’ve already done and that figure needs to be during a 365-day period.
3. Have existing sales — Don’t seek outside investment without sales unless you have a very clear, special circumstance, like intellectual property concerns for high technology, pharmaceutical, heavy machinery of the like. ….Even then…
4. Have a clear sense of why the investor needs you — Many of the entrepreneurs took for granted the idea that they were of value to the business being pitched, however in multiple pitches I watched the investors questioning that very idea. Have a rational, reasoned and succinct answer to why you are the best person on the planet to run or be involved in your business — other than just that you began it.
5. Don’t make an investment pitch as your last report — As noted above, you need to know what you want and what’s the least you’ll take and be able to walk away if neither is met. If you’ll take anything and show it and are unable to walk away, you can get yourself in a world of trouble.
6. What specifically will you do with an infusion of capital — You absolutely must be able to very specifically cite precisely what you’re going to spend outside investment on and it better be a very clear way to quickly grow revenue.
7. Investment money is for scale — When speaking to investors (not friends and family) you’re essentially trading a chance to grow your business big for an efficient return of investment. That means, outside investment is for a clear next step to growing quickly your business, as noted above.
8. Know your options for product direction — Startups are pushed lots of different ways, from direct to consumer sales for bigger yields, to private licensing for existing company for quicker payout, to distribution agreement with stores and more. Be well researched in which directions are possible, have a clear sense of which way you think you should go, but be aware of the other options.
9. Getting on store shelves is much easier than staying there — Products can be put on trial by a store, but price point, shelf placement and customer reaction dictate if it will stay there. As I learned, it all comes down to “gross margin per linear inch,” a phrase I now love.
10. Come with a clear direction in mind but be ready for others — Know how, where and why you want to grow your startup, but be willing (and eager) to get criticism and advice from investors who might offer varying directions.
11. Products scale, not services — Don’t go seeking investment for your service. Go seeking investment for a product-driven business or a service made unique by a product that supports it. Perception is that that’s a far safer chance to make a return on investment.
12. Know the size of your industry — Be researched enough to recite what annual sales are across your industry or a related one, be aware of units or other size scales. You need to be able to quickly prove that there is money to be made in an industry that those potential investors might not know well.
13. Know your cost to produce and the retail price — Those are two very important figures to know well in advance of asking for outside investment. Compare to other similar products, pay for user testing, have existing sales and do whatever else will get you to those numbers.
14. Have other investment to speak of and lessons learned – Before seeking outside investment, you should have used your own capital and that of friends and family. That’s where you start, and then have a reason why that money was successful and why you need more of it. If these tests of capital failed, getting more money from outsiders won’t look so wise.
15. Know the difference between a product and a company – Having a single idea or product or service is a fine start, but without anything more, when you seek an investment, that single sale needs to scale in a bigger way than if your idea is to build a robust and diversified business.
16. Licensing a product to an existing company can get costly — Let’s say you have a unique, cost effective way to better maintain the shine of motorcycle chrome, and you want to license the product to Harley Davidson. Assuming your product is good enough and connections strong enough that you meet with the company and get the deal agreed to, you just might be paying a hefty downpayment and pledging guarantee payments that will come from either sales or from limping away from the deal.
17. Gaining investment is not a success, it’s a tool — This is a concept that also came up in a recent interview I had with a scaling tech company in Philadelphia and is an important one. No one’s goal should be to get investment. Investment should be a way to get to that goal.
18. Know your competition — Be well versed in who is doing work similar to yours, directly or otherwise. Being unaware of relevant competition or simply ignoring someone who is can be a big mistake.
19. Having a mission is a wonderful plus, but it doesn’t replace needing to be able to talk business — Offering a reason that you’re motivated to make your business succeed, through social entrepreneurship or personal experience, can inspire an investor, or at least sell her on the idea that you’re determined to succeed. None of that, though, will replace the need to be sure about the business sense of your project. Inspiration doesn’t keep missions alive, the funding does.
20. Patents, trademarking and copyright matters more than almost anything you have – Unless you have sales to suggest otherwise, nothing you have is as valuable as the protection of an idea, product, brand or service to keep your sales your own.
21. Know the lingo but never be dependent on it – Every industry have its phrases and specifics. Know it. Talk it. Talk shop with others in your industry enough that when you encounter an investor who knows that industry, you convey the idea that you know it. But always be able to speak in comfortable, recognizable language.
22. Don’t take it personally — Women have cried, men have wined on the show. Be sure to keep your personal values and pride separate from a group of investors who could likely tear your plans apart.
23. Royalty guarantees are commonly at seven percent of profit per unit sold — When investing relatively large sums for a promising product with little in existing sales, the investors often asked for a product royalty on top of equity. The argument was that the invested money would have to go largely to awareness and less to scaling, so to better get a quick rate of return, royalty on unit profit was desired. The royalty rate varied but most often landed at seven percent, described as a common rate.
24. Evaluate your company appropriately — A surprising number of entrepreneurs came to the table without fully understanding that putting a price on equity in a company sets its evaluation; that is, if you’re offering 10 percent equity in your company for $10, you’re suggesting that your company is worth $100. That said, there’s some variation to evaluating companies, particularly startups and across various industries. Different methods include [A] multiplying your last 12-months of EBITDA by 2.5 or another multiple, [B] putting a dollar figure on all monthly users, [C] totaling full assets with a dollar figure and adding a calendar year projection. There are also startups like YouNoodle trying to get an algorithm to do the work or use resources from Inc. magazine or from CNN or perspective like here.

COMPETITIVE GROUP PITCH INVESTING LESSONS

• Ask for all potential offers on the table before negotiating — By simply asking if anyone else in the room would like to make an offer, you can improve the terms being offered from which to negotiate.
• Be confident, or at least look confident — The pack of investors swarm and cut down those who look nervous or uncertain.

WORDS OF WISDOM

• “Between an idea and a business is a hell of a long way.” – Kevin O’Leary, season two, episode five
• “Don’t cry about money, it never cries for you.” — Kevin O’Leary
• “Don’t ever be enamored by what something sells for. It’s more important what you get to keep in your pocket.” – Robert Herjavec

OTHER READING:

• How to evaluate your financial position — Some interesting, unique measurements of a business’s viability, like the very simple idea of dividing cash on hand by monthly expenses to get the number of months before you hit bankruptcy. That’ll keep you from focusing too much on sales, if overhead is skyrocketing.
• Real-Life Lessons From Shark Tank — Some good, broad takeaways
• Branding Lessons From The Star Of ‘Shark Tank’
• Business Lessons from ABC’s Shark Tank

The New York 9/11 terrorist attack site view on Sept. 12, 2001 from the Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus camera on NASA's Landsat 8. Click to see original. H/t Gizmodo

Nearly 3,000 people are said to have died 10 years ago in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, perhaps more if some first responder deaths are to be included.

That is brutal and sobering and tragic and heartbreaking.

I grew up in northwest New Jersey, a rural enclave in the New York City region. Like many others there, my parents were from the city and arrived an hour west chasing suburban sprawl. Much of my family still lives in and around that city. They worked in and around the Twin Towers. A couple times a year, my parents would take my sister and me to Manhattan for nice dinners with family; I always wanted to play sandlot baseball or get lost in the woods instead.

I was a sophomore in high school sitting in English class that September Tuesday, but I don’t want to rehash my story. Plenty are doing that and, quite frankly, they are doing a better job of it than I can. Moreover, many people with whom I was in class had parents or other close family working there or near to the buildings. I didn’t, after some confirmation, so my personal story isn’t compelling.

Instead, I want to suggest what might be considered a rather unsettling thought, but I think it’s an important one.

That the most costly, most visual portion of the Sept. 11 attacks in lower Manhattan have, looking back at the last 10 years, been good for New York City.

People died. Real people. At a different time, my uncles, or cousin or sister could have very likely been in that number. Philosophy isn’t developed enough for us to understand why not. Very little is ever worth death. But, I believe, these attacks have propelled New York City to first city status among the few generations of Americans alive for 9/11 in a way that nothing else ever could.

I am not a resident of New York City. Never have been. The city was around me — literally and by means of familial roots, but, no, I wasn’t there that morning and know little of that moment. My arguments here rely most heavily on outside perception, so having roots and family there, but being distant enough to evaluate that perception is a strength, I believe.

Now let me tell you why the idea that something so painful could be beneficial is not only plausible, it is clear.

CONTEXT AND COMPARISONS

First, let me say something that should not be controversial.

The modern, cultural concept of the nation state is built on the back of the dead. Horrible, violent attacks, battles, wars and killings, over time, create broad identity, encourage camaraderie and establish an enemy around whom to rally.

Following the Dec. 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, more than 2,300 people were killed. By most accounts, the attack by the Japanese dragged our young power into what would come to be known as World War II,  where some 418,000 Americans died and, I think most historians would agree, how the United States developed the industrial efficiencies, economic size and military might that made it one of the most dominant nations in the history of the world.

More recently and perhaps more relevant, the Arab Spring, bloodier and more successful in some places than others, is the foundation on which some of those nation states will modernize and identify. It took great pain. For contrast, the Republic of Iraq has, too, suffered, but after a long, hard American presence, the question of who is the enemy, who is the hero and what the rallying cry should be has become much more muddled, keeping Iraq from finding its own George Washington.

Pain strengthens best when it’s relatively short, acutely dramatic and horrifyingly dynamic enough as to be be worth fighting against returning to.

Surely, Sept. 11 created a clearer national identity and grounds for which all political factions could agree. Following those quick, visual and painful attacks, Americans found an enemy, a rallying cry and a slew of, for a time, heroes: President Bush, Rudy Giuliani and, of course, every first responder. But, 10 years later, that national identity is largely gone, save for a few memorials that took place this week.

The real winner with true staying power has been New York City.

‘WE ARE ALL NEW YORKERS’

Pasadena Star News photo of Pasadena, Calif. resident John McDannel, who has lobbied for a 9/11 tribue highway. Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz

I listen to country music.

It’s my favorite genre for lots of reasons, not the least of which is that I think it’s music that represents the values and spirit of a bigger chunk of Americans than most of us realize.

If you want to get a good sense of how country music — and I’d argue much of the country — felt about New York City before Sept. 11, look no further than the 1970 hit from country legend Buck Owens called ”I Wouldn’t Live in New York City (If They Gave Me the Whole Damn Town).” It’s worth listening to, watch it below on an appearance of Hee-Haw, or just check out the lyrics, full of NYC bashing, including “Talk about a bummer it’s the biggest one around/Sodom and Gommorah was tame to what I found.”

For other references to NYC, rare in country but almost always negative, look at the classic anthem from Hank Williams Jr. called ‘A Country Boy Can Survive,‘ in which the city is described as a distant place where his friend was murdered, or see his retrospective ‘Dixie on My Mind,’ where the Big Apple is called nothing but ‘a hassle’.

Perhaps, though, there is no better case study in the genre’s changing view of New York than the folksy Georgia legend Alan Jackson, long credited for maintaining his roots, at the expense of broader commercial success.

In his 1994 hit ‘Gone Country,’ which still get radio airplay, the verses profile three genre outsiders, including a New York folk singer, who, with with failing careers, flock to country. Jackson has said the song is a celebration of the genre expanding, but the popular read of a track sung (though not written) by an artist known for authenticity has always suggested that there’s some subtext, particularly when he sings of the greed: “He says ‘I don’t believe in money, but a man could make him a killin’/Cause some of that stuff don’t sound much different than Dylan.”

Seven years later, Jackson debuted at the November 2001 Country Music Awards a song he wrote called ‘Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning,’ which became perhaps the best known 9/11 dedication track. Despite a South Park jab, it was easily the most broadly successful song of his long career.

It set off a flurry of other country songs referencing New York City, first in the spirit of 9/11 and then simply highlighting a place that was now a part of Americana again. Those terrible attacks made Middle America reassess New York City, and they seemed to like what they found.

The classic example is the May 2002 smash hit ‘Country of the Red,White and Blue‘ from Toby Keith. But there are plenty more: the controversial October 2001 track ‘This Ain’t No Rag, It’s a Flag‘ from the Charlie Daniels Band, Aaron Tippin’s 2002 ‘Where the Stars and Stripes and the Eagle Fly,’ with references to NYC, Darryl Worley‘s 2003 9/11 remembrance hit ‘Have You Forgotten,’ Mary Chapin Carpenter’s 2004 ‘Grand Central’ song, ‘Hole in the World‘ from the Eagles and “My Blue Manhattan” from alt-country star Ryan Adams, among others.

In short, I have heard endlessly more New York references in songs during the past 10 years than I know of or could find in the previous 60 years. I think that’s representative of Americans the country over.

(I’ll admit here that the biggest hole in my argument is ‘Only in America,’ the Brooks and Dunn hit that came out the summer before the 9/11 attacks and describes a school bus driver hauling a load of kids with ‘the sun coming up over New York City.’ I call it an exception.)

It’s no secret that throughout the 20th century, New York City flourished culturally enough that other genres have long and widely devoted many a song to the place, so it’s almost an aside that a new wave of pride in the city followed those attacks in other genres too, from general anthems to very specific tributes to the attacks, like ‘Open Letter to NYC‘ from the Beastie Boys and ‘Believe‘ from Yellowcard, ‘My City of Ruins’ from Bruce Springsteen and others. Similarly, New York City has long been a favorite settings of American cinema, but 9/11 brought about an entire other plot for the city of writers — altogether our popular culture shifted.

I can’t find an older study to compare, unfortunately, but a 2002 survey summary read: “New Yorkers are still more positive about their neighbors and their city than they were in the early 1990s. Nationally, opinion about New York City is just as positive. 83% of Americans have a good image of New York City,” presumably a sizable uptick from before the attacks.

In the mid-1990s, the New York City Police Foundation had been doing a tidy business selling licensed merchandise with its brand, when, as the foundation says on its website, “following the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the market for NYPD merchandise surged as members of the public looked for ways to demonstrate their support for the NYPD.”

The Park51, or so called ‘Ground Zero mosque,’ controversy became a national rallying cry: how could a Muslim facility be installed so close to the smoldering grounds of where so many Americans were killed at the hands of an extremist sect of that religion so often misunderstood in our country? The outcry came nationally, notably from conservative Fox News commentators, to protect the supposed sanctity of what had become an American place of mourning, among the most modernly patriotic corners of the entire country.

Of course, New York City was surely always an attraction and place of romance, but, still, for much of the country, it was a place against which we defined ourselves: as being anything but New York City, a place of distaste and home to the elite others who tried to tell us what to think, what we should believe and what we should know (not that all that hate is gone). It was where national media and celebrities played; distant from how the rest of us lived.

Sept. 11 changed all of that, suddenly, swiftly and rather universally. Now, suddenly and almost shockingly, every September, we are told that we are all New Yorkers.

THE PATRIOTIC VEIL

Now, our entire national relationship with New York, I believe, is one incapable of accepting any criticism at all. It’s a half step less heretical than bashing the American flag itself.

In a 2008 issue of Vanity Fair, music legend Modonna said New York was fading — though, yes, speaking of songs, she has a track called ‘I Love New York.’ She was roundly ridiculed, even though the question had been asked before and would be asked again and again, enough that the very question itself was cast aside as being old hat.

Celebrities don’t much criticize New York anymore.

Instead, the dominant theory is that New York is so culturally significant that, well, Lady Gaga calls it the husband she never married, when thinking of the emotion 9/11 stirred inside of her. More viscerally, the 1970s era statewide advertising campaign ‘I <3 NY‘ has been taken to its greatest heights: those shirts now seemingly holding the improbable duality of being both patriotic and stylish.

I’m willing to bet the European travelers who won’t go home from their American tour without one of those shirts became particularly interested following the 9/11 attacks.

More broadly, international tourism to NYC took a tumble after the towers fell, but those numbers surged again in 2004 and are still flourishing. American travel to NYC grew in 2002 and jumped in 2003, increasing steadily from there.

There was a sudden jolt of interest in coming back to the city. In perfect timing, following the painful 1970s — with crime and bankruptcy, filth and poverty — the city had been booming for a variety of reasons.

People came for the historical significance and stayed when they found a suddenly prosperous mega city, surely one of the world’s most culturally meaningful.

A NEW SENSE OF BEING A NEW YORKER

Cities tend to have a lot of pride by default.

They hold dense, less educated masses to promote the passions of geography. There are region-specific cultural norms and institutions to identify by and, in a country of relatively short history, they tend to offer our deepest roots.

This particular sentiment will fade particularly quickly as years pass, with an influx of new faces (and a new lower Manhattan), but, still, today, 9/11 is a prism through which the modern New Yorker can identify. It is a common ground, a common source, a common attack that can bond those who are separated by other issues of turmoil. If you think people of the 1960s rallied around “where were you when Kennedy was shot?” you must be able to imagine the cache that the 9/11 question has for a single city seemingly under attack.

When Madonna made that seeming swipe at New York — no matter how true I might think it is — the sense of outrage came from a half-decade old crystallized New York identity built upon an already healthy established sense of self (always helped by the national media that take on New York as their voice, for example, the Weekend Update crew on Saturday Night Live, poked fun at Madonna)

New Yorkers were always proud, made prouder still by being the national voice box and then suddenly empowered and connected through a horrific attack on their sense of freedom.

In such a city of strength, there was never any doubt it would come back. In that 2002 survey, “more than six in ten think the people of New York reacted better to the attacks than people in other big cities would have.”

That’s how you build a nation state.

WHY NEW YORK CITY BENEFITED SO MUCH

I wasn’t alive following the Pearl Harbor bombing, so I don’t have a great sense if those attacks coincided with a sudden rise in interest and pride in Hawaii. I doubt it.

New York City’s domestic reputation benefited so much by those terrible attacks because (a) it had been previously so reviled by much of the country, (b) it had really become a much safer, cleaner, more welcoming place in the 1980s and 1990s and 9/11 was a chance to show that off and (c) the national media are based there so the locality bias that comes with that made this tragedy endlessly more pressing.

Now, though Wall Street has hurt the case (though perhaps less than you think) and the national media are always easy targets for bias, NYC in the past decade has become the backdrop for all the most patriotic perspective, and the 10th anniversary of 9/11 has brought about iPad apps and commemoration events far from the carnage, with the city playing a leading role. As 9/11 deservedly makes its way into our nation’s history books, our children will be reminded of the brave Americans fighting for our way of life in lower Manhattan.

We just might start to forget that, as Woody Allen’s character in his 1977 classic ‘Annie Hall’ puts it, at one time, you might have said: “Don’t you see the rest of the country looks upon New York like we’re left-wing, communist, Jewish, homosexual pornographers? I think of us that way sometimes and I live here.”

Deaths are never to be celebrated or characterized as beneficial. But they can mark a deep change in course that we should recognize.

What I set out to do here was suggest that we should realize what a dramatic shift in perception has happened regarding our country’s largest city and argue that we ought to parse what is important and what is excessive in that occurrence.

It is surely my hope, like it is yours, that Americans, particularly civilians, never die, certainly not in such horrific, senseless, random violence on that grand scale. But perhaps it is worth noting that most strong identifiable communities of humans are strengthened by attack, as, I believe, New York City was following the 9/11 attacks.

Sales tactics to lead and those to avoid are seemingly peppered throughout the classic, star-studded, independent black comedy Glengarry Glen Ross from 1992 that I finally got to watch — after quoting clips for years.

“We’re adding a little something to this month’s sales contest. As you all know, first prize is a Cadillac El Dorado. Anyone wanna see second prize? Second prize is a set of steak knives. Third prize is you’re fired,” says the character Blake, setting the mood early on.

As you might expect, there are some takeaways to be had.

The film, adapted from a 1983 play that won a Pulitzer Prize, shows the desperate, two-day plight of four real estate salesmen specializing in investment properties in retirement developments like Arizona and Florida. They’re getting squeezed by corporate to increase sales, represented by Alec Baldwin’s memorable, single-scene performance (watch a clip below).

Shot in Brooklyn, apparently subtly set in Chicago but including a New York Telephone sticker early on, was a critically-acclaimed box office bust that earned a Best Actor nomination at the Oscar’s for Al Pacino, who was joined by Baldwin, Jack Lemmon, Kevin Spacey, Ed Harris, Alan Arkin and other familiar faces. (Watch below a clip of Pacino’s famed monologue-laced sales pitch)

The film, dubbed ‘Death of the Fuckin’ Salesman’ because of its similar themes to Arthur Miller’s classic play and its coarse language, is an actor’s film destined to be a cult classic: well shot, smartly lit, full of monologues, a simple plot with deeper themes, filled with younger versions of top-flight actors. Yes, you know, all the reasons for it to not succeed financially.

My Takeaways:

1. “A man is his job,”says Shelley Levene, played by Jack Lemmon. Even if you don’t define yourself by your work, the very fact of choosing work that allows you to not be defined by it makes it a part of who you are. What we do, what we spend most of our time doing, surely says a great deal about who we are.
2. “It takes brass balls to sell…” says Blake, played by Alec Baldwin. The effort, confidence and savvy to sell damn near anything is an admirable, enviable and, often, loathsome toolkit.
3. ABC. Always be Closing — Those immortal words from Baldwin’s character are very nearly cartoonish in the movie, but the sentiment is real. Before entering any meeting, know what your ask is, what is considered a success. Because, my friends, as Toby Keith sings, “if you don’t know where you’re going/You might end up somewhere else.”
4. “You’ve never even been on a sit,” says Lemmon’s character, accusing Kevin Spacey’s bookish character of being unaware of the real challenges of sales.  Two things on this point: one, there is a clear sense that any entrepreneur, any red-blooded American, really, should have some sales experience; and two, well, gosh, Brian Kirk and I use this phrase ‘going on a sit’ from time to time just because it sounds so god damn cool.”
5. Appearances matter — This, of course, is nothing new, but the movie’s humor comes best when the real estate agent characters are deploying any mechanism of treachery to fool potential clients into believing any number of lies (the properties are moving fast, deadlines are rapidly approaching, their operation is very established, etc.). Picture Jack Lemmon in a phone booth on a rainy night asking his lead on the other end of the call to hold on a minute, as he shouts to a fictional secretary named ‘Grace’ to get his nonexistent plane ticket ready. Lies are, ultimately, bad for business, but the point is clear. In most cases, you are who you present yourself as. You probably do good work and know your industry well, but do you look like you do?
6. Tell a story, get familiar, speak with passion — Lying or not, succeeding or not, even these small-time real estate agents are always doing these three things. (1) They have a story arc for why what they’re selling is the right fit and what now is the right time. (2) They are getting and remembering names and details to develop a connection and making that ‘no’ even a touch harder. (3) They are speaking like what they’re talking about matters.
7. Have a deadline, always have a deadline — In the movie, every character is always leaving, so, yes, we need to make the deal now. It’s all hogwash, of course, and the lying isn’t necessary, but understanding that without a deadline of some kind, getting the movement you want is always going to be harder is paramount.
8. Make people explain themselves — This fits into a classic of journalism: shut up and let your interview speak. We too often bail each other out or simply misunderstand each other when we impatiently finish people’s sentences or thoughts, when, rather, it’s better to wait someone out. In sales, a sense of directionless from someone else, is an opportunity to create direction for you both. Details are like family, you love them, but they don’t always need to be around. Bring them up when they’re beneficial or focus on the overall meaning or broad vision otherwise.
9. Ownership of the upperhand goes round and round – Throughout the movie, the cast of characters is always attacking someone else, only to find that vitriol coming back hours later. It was a combative, competitive work environment of one-upsmanship. It didn’t seem like any of the characters were aware that he would surely be in a different situation soon. That’s a lesson everyone should remember. Give help, because you’re surely going to need it soon.
10. “You never open your mouth unless you know what the shot is,” says Ricky Roma, played by Al Pacino. Perhaps one of the better, less known quotes of the movie, Pacino’s character scolds Spacey’s for bluffing without knowing the context and screwing up a deal. The big takeaway for me is that — while, clearly, lying is bad business, despite its common usage in the film — going hard on a sell, bluffing or not, is only the right bet when you’ve done your research. Know who, why and how this is the person to sell on this subject. Otherwise, it’s easy to get burned.

Any other takeaways from other fans of the film?

The Golden Ratio, the 2003 historical analysis of the irrational number phi (~1.62) by Mario Livio, reads more like a top level review of a few thousand years of mathematical history. And so, while I enjoyed the pursuit of phi in art throughout time, I was much more taken by the top-level review of the development of math. The development, or, well, the discovery of math.

Indeed, of the various historical storylines, one theme from the book that stuck out for me more than others, I was most taken bythe ongoing debate about whether math was invented or discovered, the former of which is my persuasion to date:

Wolfman holds very similar views. I asked him specifically whether he thought mathematics was “invented” or “discovered.” He replied: “If there wasn’t much choice in selecting this particular set of rules then it would have made sense to say that it was discovered, but since there was much choice, and our mathematics is merely historically based, I have to say that it was invented.” The phrase ‘historically based’ in this context is crucial since it implies that the system of axioms on which our mathematics is based is the one that happened to emerge because of the mathematics and geometry of the ancient Babylonians. This raises two immediate questions: (1) Why did the Babylonians develop these particular disciplines and not other sets of rules? And a rephrasing of the question on the effectiveness of mathematics: (2) Why were these disciplines and their offspring found to be useful at all for physics” p. 250

An argument that I found compelling:

“For example, when one drop of water is adding to another drop or one molecular cloud in the galaxy coalesces with another, they make only one drop or one cloud, not two. Therefore, if a civilization that is somehow fluid based exists, for it, one plus one does not necessarily equal two”

The reverse argument I really loved was the idea the famed ‘God was a mathematician,’ meaning that while the relationships of maths were invented, the interrelationships of the world is driven by mathematics. That is, the coincidences and order of the world that we often subscribe to a higher being is indeed math.

A couple other essays on the concept here and here.

Watch a few kids running through the debate:

White House Urban Entrepreneurship forum Better Together panel, featuring (from left) moderator Kathleen Warner from Startup America; Doug Rand from the White House Office of Science and Technoogy; Sherryl Kulman from the Wharton Program for Social Impact; Prof. Youngjin Yoo from Temple University's Fox School of Business; Jane Vincent from the U.S. Housing and Urban Development Dept and, behind the camera, me.

One of seven White House Urban Entrepreneurship forums across the country was hosted at Temple University in Philadelphia Monday, and, in addition to Technically Philly being a media sponsor, I served on one of a dozen panels.

Find the Livestream and Technically Philly coverage of Philadelphia Mayor Nutter’s address here.

I was on a panel called “Better Together: Public-Private Partnerships to Accelerate Urban Entrepreneurship and Startups.”

Unfortunately, our time was truncated due to a late start, so I spoke briefly once and answered one question.

I spoke about Technically Philly involving itself in connecting startups and entrepreneurs with the city, by way of Philly Tech Week, the Open Data Philly initiative and further fostering collaboration in various corners of the region’s technology community.

White House officials are holding these forums, from Newark to New Orleans, to connect and discuss ideas with local business leaders and entrepreneurs. Philadelphia’s forum coincided with a meaningful minority business event. The forum was co-hosted by the White House, The Office of Mayor Nutter, U.S. Departments of Commerce, Energy, Labor, Treasury, Education, and several federal, state, and local agencies.

Remember: I am an individual who is a technology reporter. These are my opinions and should not reflect those of my company Technically Media, nor its technology news site Technically Philly.

Online auction giant eBay bought for $2.4 billion King of Prussia-based e-commerce powerhouse GSI Commerce in March, and I spoke briefly about the deal on WHYY.

As NewsWorks reported, there was immediate concern about the loss of local jobs through contraction and restructuring. In my conversation, I pushed on the notion that there is important value for the region’s perception as a technology hub to have significant exits to point to.

This acquisition, I suggested, can be seen as a good thing.

In doing so, I raised the ire of Old City coworking space Independents Hall co-founder Alex Hillman, who told me he felt strongly that growing companies in Philadelphia was a lot more important than selling out to bigger players elsewhere.

This post is going to argue that we’re both right.

WHAT ARE WE TALKING ABOUT?

Philadelphia hasn’t been much known as a business powerhouse for, oh, I don’t know, maybe a century.

In the second half of the 20th century particularly, with consolidation across a variety of professional and service industries, Center City Philadelphia has become known as mostly the place of middle managers and regional vice presidents, with some prominent exceptions like Comcast, Sunoco, Aramark, Urban Outfitters, (Cigna, for now) among others. Regionally, Wawa is gearing up for something big, and SAP and Bentley Systems are players of important note, but we have a lot more stories about regional executives, like those we’ve seen in the competitive wireless market here.

That means a smaller pyramid of high-paying, white collar jobs, which often comes with other jobs and, yes, the draw of still others who want or need to be in the orbit of major decision makers.

While business woes are nothing new for Philadelphia — a cultural Goliath turned whimpering regional outpost — this city’s high yield, professional IT community has postured itself as a real way to grow jobs, improve perception and bring cache back to the Cradle of Liberty. Something other cities have seen, too.

But, as some like Hillman might rightly suggest, it’s tough to do that when anyone big enough to really impact the region keeps signing the biggest offer sheet, keeping the only Philadelphia beds with CEOs in them inside the Four Seasons.

First, a few examples of companies whose top decision makers aren’t here anymore due to recent sale.

• GSI Commerce, while suburban based, boring and relatively unknown outside of investor circles, it was sold for just shy of two and a half billion-with-a-capital-B and will continue to help shape how consumers shop online.
• Boomi, the Berwyn business-software developer, merged last fall with online computer retailer Dell to form Dell Boomi, keeping offices here and official headquarters in Texas. Jobs may grow here for now, and while that’s valuable, regional offices have little cache and, arguably, less firm a hold on employment roots here.
• myYearbook, the New Hope-housed social network sold for $100 million last month to Quepasa Corp., a Florida-based social site targeted at Mexico and South America and took with it this region’s only truly successful social site with traction and profit.
• Avid Radiopharmaceuticals, the University City Science Center-based early-stage pharmaceutical manufacturer that is working on fighting Alzheimer’s, sold last fall to Indianapolis-based drug shop Eli Lilly for nearly $800 million. For a couple years there, Avid was the go-to defense for Philadelphia having a rich startup life sciences community that could go toe-to-toe to eds and meds foe Boston, a city that, in its own way is questioning how influential it can/could have be/en. Now the staff answers to someone in Indiana.
• Rohm and Haas, the legendary, original chemical technology company was bought by Delaware rival Dow for more than $15 billion in 2008, while a somewhat older example, it’s hard to point to a clearer case of an innovation company making investors (and shareholders) happy at the expense of, well, winning, which would benefit Philadelphia quite a bit more, I’d argue.
• University City-based PhindMe being bought by suburban Motivas and Old City VoIP startup Alteva selling for a meager $17 million to a regional telephone company are somewhat smaller examples of this.
• There is no shortage of examples that are not necessarily in IT but are such cultural touchstones in Philadelphia that they also suggest this sale and bail cycle that has kept any giant from growing here. See Larry Magid going corporate with the Electric Factory in 1998 (though he’s back battling) or, of course, remember that after building a big bold corporate office in the Navy Yard, Tastykake was bought by Georgia’s Flower Foods.

OK, by now, you probably get the point. But here’s a different one.

WHY ACQUISITIONS CAN BE GOOD FOR THE REGION

When that WHYY reporter asked me to assess whether GSI Commerce being bought by eBay would be bad for the region, I answered the only way I could.

I am a technology reporter, focusing mostly on city policy and early stage, consumer-facing startups.  My answer didn’t come from deep knowledge of GSI or eBay’s intentions regarding staff here. My answer was driven by the need for the business community, particularly technology-driven leaders the world over, to have on their lips the news that a Philadelphia area company exited for a few billion dollars.

It was an exciting, cloud-based deal in Philadelphia, a place that, as Inquirer business columnist Mike Armstrong put it in one of the most important columns in Philadelphia news over the past few years, “is home to many big, old companies, but few big, bold companies.”

That is why, yes, entrepreneurs growing their businesses and selling for great profit and whatever other reasons we might offer can be a good thing. Every city — every country — needs a varied ecosystem in any business community, and that certainly includes technology companies selling prominently to other technology companies, even rivals from other cities.

TAKE THE HILL: WHY ACQUISITIONS LIMIT PHILADELPHIA

But here’s why Hillman is also right.

Because for every point the region might get for a high profile acquisition, Philadelphia must get something like a million of them for snubbing convention and pushing to greater heights. As that Armstrong column referenced earlier suggests, though, Comcast is just about the only example of that happening here — as its acquisition of NBC Universal is making it one of the largest media companies in the world.

While I want 10,000 business sharks to bloom here — who chase money to create jobs in Philadelphia — Hillman also sees the need for the community-driven entrepreneur. Companies that identify their sense of place as a contributing factor to their success. These stories in tech are as essential to a region’s attraction and retention of talent as acquisitions and, yes, even likely more so.

We’ve seen this model of hip, young startups who are distinctly not from the Bay Area and are doing so proudly and successfully. Paired with a tech scene and a big, talent-hungry Fortune 500 company spewing out talent, perception can fuel wonder. Some startups in this case that quickly come to mind for me:

• Groupon in Chicago — the father of a million daily deal startups is the giant of the Second City’s startup community
• Gowalla in Austin — the location-based social network ended up losing out to FourSquare but in the height of the battle between the two, the tiny Texas town with the interactive design conference to top them all was rocking with one of the hottest companies in the country.
• SCVNGR in Boston — Sure, the mobile-based scavenger hunt platform was incubated in Philadelphia, but it’s home is in New England.
• Cheezburger in Seattle – the well-trafficked online comedy site has in audience what it lacks in seriousness and is that national voice (whatever that voice is) from a city with considerably less publishing notoriety than Philadelphia, once a leader in such things.
• GoDaddy in Scottsdale — the domain registrar and hosting company is almost 15 years old but remains Arizona’s IT face and fit with the Sun Belt scene, makes a case for being something.

In most of these cases, the tech scene has the freelancers, entrepreneurs and startups, along with the buzzy growth machine and a stable giant or two (think Dell near Austin and Microsoft in Seattle). That’s a nice package, but it seems Philadelphia is missing a piece of the puzzle, and that’s what Hillman seems to want most and feel acquisitions hurt that.

CONCLUSION

Will some of those examples be bought out? Almost certainly. But perhaps this is my final unfinished thought.

If Philadelphia proper and its environs succeed at anything in a big way in technology, it’s in the boring and stable world of life sciences. (I want to add education to fit the ‘eds and meds’ tripe, but after watching Wharton-bred Coursekit flee northward at the first opportunity, it’s clear that no one is listening)

And in the boring world of life sciences, buzz rarely extends beyond those narrow industries.

That’s fine, as an economic driver and jobs creator. But I’m also interested in Philadelphia raising its profile nationally and beyond to help attract and retain more entrepreneurs who might duplicate that work and, dare I suggest, build consumer facing products that could push the cycle forward of changing how Philadelphia as a place of business is seen.

Strictly building businesses won’t do that because Philadelphia IT is best at what most people care least about: slowly, carefully constructing a company.

So, yes, build powerful businesses, grow and make corporate headquarters inside the 135-square miles of Philadelphia. Care about community and place, do cool, innovative and even important things with technology and innovation. That is what we’re most lacking in Philadelphia’s technology community to date: those better known, consumer-facing products of buzz and growth and scale.

But understand that those take very different types of entrepreneurs and they are rarer than the ones who are going to execute the best deal possible for investors and themselves. And don’t ignore that we also need a bit of the marketing that acquisitions help provide.

I do wish GSI Commerce would have done the acquiring, rather than being acquired, but I won’t consider it a failure. Because this region needs as much activity in as many different ways as we can get.

Urban neighborhoods change.

We’ve known that for, what, like 150 years or something? In the past quarter-century or so, as educated (mostly, but not entirely white) professionals moved back to neighborhoods that had populations that didn’t always resemble them — in race or class or culture or all and more — there were natural clashes.

Mostly, I feel like those clashes have mostly been put in three categories, one initiated by new residents, one from more native residents and one that both share:

[Of course, we're painting with broad strokes here, as people move around for any number reasons and attitude and experiences and motives vary by neighborhood and city and region and more. This is nothing more than perspective from what I've experienced and read and heard, from both new residents and old in neighborhoods that are changing]

• Exclusion — Sometimes new residents try to recreate a neighborhood in their own image, without an understanding or an appreciation of the past. (I live in Fishtown, a neighborhood in Philadelphia that didn’t really suffer the kind of white flight, crime and urban decay of many other neighborhoods in the city, so you can be damn sure there is frustration from longtime residents who feel they’re being told their relatively successful community needs to be re-made. There’s a fine line between, say, including the community in creating the Sustainable 19125 initiative and, perhaps, plopping a restaurant down too boldly).
• Xenophobia – Often from more native residents, it’s that inclination opposed to the outside and any change that relates to it. If you have a recognizable clutch of neighbors and places and rules, as they change, we can all feel threatened.
• Ignorance — I think this tends to be the default category and both new and old residents fall into this trap. This is  where many of us categorize a lot of the senseless violence, petty mistreatment and other behavior. This is a motivation of senselessness, of not understanding the broader ramifications of what we do, of not communicating or understanding each other. That during a snowstorm, you only park your car in the spot you dug out and that’s important to one neighbor or that, yes, recycling is really important to the other.

[I'll also note that 'new' residents and 'native' residents are self-created distinctions. Some who have lived in changing neighborhoods for decades will be seen as part of the new class, and some who were born there but moved away will still be considered natives.]

I hear from a lot of friends who are new residents to neighborhoods in Philadelphia and other cities talk about how they are in communities where their more native counterparts hate them. That gets chocked up into the ‘ignorance’ category, or maybe sometimes the xenophobia, or perhaps both.

I think for a lot of people, there’s greater nuance there.

It may be an obvious point here, but I was sent an email from a friend after rooting around the archives of Temple University’s capstone journalism course, and she said something I thought was provocative.

She sent me the below quote from this story about a gentrifying block in the long blighted Kensington neighborhood, not far from my own:

“A lot of people don’t like these yuppies coming in,” she says. “This is because they come in and are getting houses, grants for lots, building cafes.  It seems to a lot us that they have a way around to getting stuff and no one knows why or how they are getting these things we aren’t.”

I found my friend’s reaction to that quote insightful:

I think I’ve pinpointed something that may seem obvious, but I’ve been overlooking. For the natives in the neighborhood, they’re not necessarily against gentrification and change. It just goes back to the same old perception of things being easier for certain people — in this, and most, cases — educated white people.

Neighbors don’t hate what gentrifiers are doing, they hate that the gentrifiers can do it, and don’t understand why they can’t do these things themselves. Mostly because, as illustrated in the quote about needing more national chains in Kensington, native residents don’t understand the problem so they can’t make the correct steps to fix it. They assume that the new businesses and residents coming in are somehow working their way around a system because gentrifiers are perceived as having certain privileges.

In most cases, few people actually hate that you fixed up your rowhome or opened that store on the avenue. Those who take issue may just be frustrated that you were able to do it when they couldn’t.

That’s something we can all understand. I believe I work really hard, and I enjoy using some of the compensation of that work to make improvements on my home, something that ultimately benefits all of those who live near me.

But, while most of my neighbors appreciate it wildly, not all do. Even if I work hard, I inevitable, of course, have been gifted amazing privilege and remarkable good fortune.

So — certainly unfairly but perhaps a bit more understandable than unchecked hate or the ignorance and xenophobia that time should help quell — a neighbor who doesn’t seem to appreciate what I quietly do to my home (say, replace a ragged front door that has street value to everyone on the block) may well be motivated by a sense of confusion.

Why do I, a young, privileged resident new to the neighborhood get to improve my home in a way that a particular neighbor can’t (either because of money or energy or other obstacles)?

The answer, I think, lies somewhere in the fact that, say, all neighborhoods change, and, though the speed with which it happens vary, they do so in three different ways (again, very broadly speaking):

• More newer, mostly wealthier (than current) residents are moving in (Graduate Hospital, East Passyunk)
• More newer, mostly poorer (than current) residents are moving in (pockets of lower Northeast Philly)
• A net loss of population (Whatever the class, resident loss is not being replaced, which, I’d say, is worse than either fortune above)

So which way is your neighborhood trending? Maybe that’d help shape your opinion.

Ultimately, cities work and are beautiful because of their density (and, often, authenticity through their generational roots).

They force us to interact. To have human experiences with each other, to trust and grow and learn and develop communities — a concept that is thousands of years in the making.

Ultimately, a little understanding and a lot of communication goes a long way.

Creating a bold and serious collaborative niche membership network with existing and emerging independent media should be a primary objective of WHYY, the Delaware Valley public media organization.

Highlighted by its six-month-old NewsWorks online news site and hyperlocal news experiment, WHYY has attempted to recast itself as something more than a stodgy PBS TV channel and NPR radio affiliate. While progress has surely been made, WHYY is short of being as fully integrated and networked as the ‘public media’ nomenclature might suggest.

Whereas Philly.com is driven primarily by eyeballs and so its strategy should reflect that by becoming a truly comprehensive portal for the region, WHYY is ‘member-supported public media,’ so its driving focus (and its relationship with Philly.com) should reflect that. I’m not entirely sure that’s the case just yet.

First, I’m a true fan of WHYY’s NewsWorks initiative, if only because it is a new experiment in engaged, local online news taking into account many of the web-first strategies of native users, like linking out, audience participation and agility. Second, I don’t drive terribly often, but when I do and my favorite country music radio station is on commercial, I tune to WHYY. Thirdly, I am neither two years old nor am I 70 years old, so I’m not sure I have ever watched WHYY Channel 12 on TV ever.

[Full disclosure, as usual when it comes to Philadelphia media, I am quite close with many involved with this initiative, so I have neither objectivity nor distance.]

OBJECTIVES

So, if I were to devise a strategic plan for WHYY, here would be my three primary objectives:

1. Highlight strategic partners for collaborative membership growth – By offering technology, experience and perhaps sales support, WHYY could grow its own members, while developing some of the resources that should otherwise fall to the proposed PPIIN.
2. Better integrate TV, radio and the web to reflect the singular WHYY brand — To share the resources, branding and audience of the various platforms
3. Create and support bold, creative local content — Using its varied platforms, big reach

ACTION

To make good on those objectives, I’d investigate the following deliverables for each.

HIGHLIGHT STRATEGIC PARTNERS

• Find interested, relevant niche communities with a clear news source whose readers fit the WHYY profile of educated, civic-minded Philadelphians — There are ample places to start: Technically Philly, PlanPhilly, Public School Notebook, Grid magazine, NEast Philly, Geekadelphia, NJ Spotlight, Young Involved Philadelphia, Broad Street Review, Philly Beer Scene, Philly Sports Daily, the art blog, the Key at partner station XPN, National Constitution Center, Campus Philly, Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia, Committee of Seventy, Metropolis
• Work with these select partners on membership sales, price points and objectives — They might teach you something too, you probably could get a big fat grant for helping develop independent media and, in the end, it should help you bolster your own members.
• Develop and/or host and share widgetized membership sales, tracking and outreach CRM –  So all of these participating strategic partners could host on their own websites membership sales mechanism. Say, an individual annual membership for Technically Philly would be $100 and for a reduced price of — I don’t know — $50, that individual could also be an WHYY member, with additional benefits. If TP has 500 members and just 10 percent opt in for WHYY, the revenue might not be large in the individual case, but the lead generation is valuable and the scale across partners should begin to be beneficial.
• Membership and cross-platform directory build out — Offer the technology and shared sales and follow up resources for niche sites to have a membership platform, that could fit into customizable directory pages, which would be populated by all tagged content, like this Knight application of ours. [Unless WHYY could get to this]
• Advertising network — I wrote that I don’t think the traffic would be meaningful enough for Philly.com to make this happen, but I think there’s a real build here WHYY, if PPIIN doesn’t get there first, to additionally benefit its own NewsWorks initiative.
• Event Partnering — As WHYY did with TP for Philly Tech Week, there would seem to be a very wise move to make around co-branded events with these strategic partners and their niche communities, in order to grow leads for paid events, bring in sponsorship revenue or the like.
• Content partnerships — With developed support around membership, it’d likely be easier to develop more content partnerships, like the It’s Our Money project with the Daily News, co-branded long-form reporting, partnerships around sharing or pushing content and the like, much of which could bolster NewsWorks.

BETTER INTEGRATE PLATFORMS

• Redesign WHYY.org and its brand message– Honestly, you don’t even need to redesign it, for costs concern, it just needs a clear strategy and to be cleaned up. Much like NewsWorks, the site is just silly with boxes and choices. Why does someone go to WHYY? How is that different than NewsWorks? What are the calls to action and can we please drop the rest?
• NewsWorks Tonight Live — WHYY launched this Monday a daily local half-hour of drive-time radio called NewsWorks Tonight, which I think is a great concept, particularly because it was immediately podcasted so they’re paying attention to the slow decline of terrestrial radio. But with killer event space, at least quarterly, there should be a bigger, cooler live show, with on-air personalities giving news live, interviews live, with a live studio audience, live music, all of which is podcasted. Maybe only members can get in, surely strategic partners from above should lead the charge. Film the thing and put it on your TV channel. Then podcast the audio and stream the video online.
• Move the stars across platforms — It’s good to see your noted political writer Dave Davies on radio and online, but I’m always interested in seeing more of your staff take to more, like why not video when that fits.
• NewsWorks Tonight features — I’m likely more interested by this big jump into local news programming than the NewsWorks overall, so I’d like to see it driven. Thanks for the podcast and, as noted above, it’s good to hear a development of talent, but I’ll say that in creating community online (and I’d bet radio isn’t so different) it helps, if only in the beginning, to stake out some regular features, to help fill content holes and to welcome in listeners (who had previously been hearing national news so are surely apprehensive). Fortunately, NewsWorks.org is silly with branding, so, please, don’t create any others. The Feed, which is the top portion of the site that points to the biggest stories around the region regardless of content provider and pushes engagement, could be a weekly roundup of the best (funniest, most interesting or insightful) comments on social media, emails or the like from readers, to encourage more interaction by shouting people out. MindMap, something of a reader questionnaire, could be done in an audio format to introduce us to Philadelphians (of every race, position and direction, from interviewing someone in a crane working on a new Center City condo to a state policeman).
• Where is all the multimedia? — For an organization that as a TV station, a radio station, a dozen audio reporters and all the tools, I sure don’t see the type of seamless integration of media that I would expect online or elsewhere.

Watch below an example of WHYY doing a great job of getting video content, in this case, incumbent City Councilman Jim Kenney talking about the Democratic primary election who came close to getting knocked off the November ballot

CREATE AND SUPPORT MORE BOLD, LOCAL CONTENT

• Do something crazy and create local TV content — Take a one-hour block of  your worst performing late night programming and create something interesting experimental. Maybe leverage your strategic partners from above for a rotating block of niche-orientated discoveries of what the region has to offer. Perhaps create a contest for what the programming should be: long-form interviews, local politics. Could you create a local brand? Again, it’s all podcasted online with streaming video and the like. Maybe do it live again with a studio audience.
• Lead the public access TV charge online — Look, truth be told, I don’t really know the difference between groups like MiND TV and Philly CAM. And I know Scribe video and this new Comcast Project Open Voices is interested in local video. So shouldn’t you be the leader among them all? Create ways to share content, or grow or promote the best. Is there no relationship to be had with the various film festivals here?
• Help grow local niche communities – If they prosper, they can become strategic partners like the ones above, so they should be as friends, not foes. If you can’t do it, then help those who can and see them as friends, like, say, CenterCityLocal.
• Partner with anyone creating cool content — With the web and other platforms, you have an opportunity to brand yourself as way cool. I host a storytelling event and there are far better, cooler ones, like the FirstPerson Story Slam, so why aren’t they partners of yours to record a live show and share on NewsWorks? Why aren’t you partnered with the Philly Youth Poetry Movement or anyone else in the region that is creating cool content? All these groups are recording this stuff already on their own, so start sharing the best of them. Help me find cool new podcasts or web series through you. Events in your great space and then record great audio and video and use it as content. Repeat.
• Be a friend to the community weeklies — Public media is always concerned about ignoring underserved communities. A great way to grow this might be to do something cool like, say, host the latest PDF covers, like the Newseum does for national newspapers. Offer select services, like web hosting, static templates (if they don’t have websites or want new ones) all for a nominal charge. You might do the same for high school (and college?) newspapers.
• Support your media literacy training — Your grant funded work to offer training to the community is great. How would that fit with the community weekly push from above? Connect these newly trained community members with neighborhood news orgs, empower new creators. This fits your mission, and, sure, maybe there could be select discounted memberships to shape a more diverse support base. You should be the umbrella of all media literacy groups in the region. They should all come to your sweet space and see you as the real leader.

Why isn’t WHYY partnering with the Youth Poetry Movement to record, raise funding for and share beautiful work like what you can watch below.

Broader thoughts:

• You’re the good guy — Never forget that the brand of public media is meant to be community-orientated and thoughtful and, yes, cool, if you make it so. You’re also set up with diverse revenue and varied platform integration. You have all the tools to be the leader.
• You are not competing with Philly.com — Every morning wake up and tell yourself that. Give really insightful, unique, deep analysis in a local way in the same way that NPR has rejuvenated its interested young listeners by being web-savvy, sexy and incredibly deep. That can grow eyeballs to the online site, particularly with the help of the dedicated radio programming. So, without that competition, no need for a beef
• Philadelphia can support innovation — Philadelphia does not have a lot of recent examples of innovation in media. So start something. Remind yourself that Philadelphia is a big market and so can have really bold examples. Do something thrilling and risky and set the tone.
• You’re not the leader — Don’t forget that public media across the country has consistently failed to lead the news and information conversation but rather lag behind, albeit often with deeper context. That said, let that light a fire under you and strive to be bigger and better.
• Let the people hear you — As noted above, I’m stunned I don’t see more multimedia — video, audio, photos — from such a multi-tiered news organization. Rather than recreate a proprietary video host, I’m cool with videos going to YouTube so they can at least get embedded (though regional site Viddler helps with branding) but your premiere local product is radio, yet you don’t post much of it and I can’t embed it elsewhere when you do.
Number of Views:294 ]]> http://christopherwink.com/2011/05/20/whyy-newsworks-and-other-thoughts-on-what-the-public-media-org-should-be/feed/ 3 http://christopherwink.com/2011/05/16/technologies-are-more-often-tools-than-solutions-and-no-thats-not-the-same/ http://christopherwink.com/2011/05/16/technologies-are-more-often-tools-than-solutions-and-no-thats-not-the-same/#comments Mon, 16 May 2011 13:30:39 +0000 Christopher Wink http://christopherwink.com/?p=6583

A team of Temple University Fox School of Business MBA students who won a March 2011 innovation contest for improving the North Broad Street corridor in Philadelphia.

When re-purposing technology tools as  solutions, the core problem and end user are often ignored and so little will be accomplished.

Back in March, I was on a panel of judges for Temple University’s Center for Design and Innovation NorthBroadband DesignWeek competition.

In short, nearly 100 Temple students from six different schools were broken into cross-disciplinary teams and given a week to conceive of plans to grow opportunity along the beleaguered North Broad Street corridor in Philadelphia. Community members, leaders and other thinkers on the subject were brought in, student teams were encouraged to take to the streets and employ what they already knew.

On Thursday, March 17, in a big, open, light-filled seventh floor room of the university’s Alter Hall — minutes after watching the Temple men’s basketball team beat Penn State in the NCAA tournament — I was joined by a dozen other volunteer judges from different industries to hear final presentations, which were being tied together just then, in the collaborative, messy, fun space around us all.



An undergraduate team pitching 'Teacher Dashboard,' a collaborative social network for teachers.

There were 15 teams, though I only heard from five of them first and then final pitches from the best ranked half dozen. Of the 20 or so presentations I saw, all but one was technology driven: a website, a mobile application, an industry-specific social network, a cable-driven access point and the like.

The favorite of the judges — and of myself — and the eventual winner was from a team of first-year MBA students who wanted to partner with a bank to create financial literacy and savings incentive programming at area barbershops and salons.

Most of the 20-somethings were fixated on something glitzy and modular. Many of the ideas were fine tools in concept but very few seemed to attack the actual problem or pay any attention to a clear constituency.

While a hornet’s nest of obstacles face the banking-salon co-location idea — namely enormous socio-economic reasons why cash checking storefronts and barbershops out numbers banks in much of North Philadelphia and incentivizing the creation of a prototype — the idea was the most innovative and end-user focused.

The premise: many people in the surrounding neighborhoods were lacking basic financial literacy and so struggled to save for a better, more stable future of upward mobility, adding to a cycle of poverty. In walking these neighborhoods, the team said they found just how many more friendly, welcoming salon/barbershop hubs of activity were awake, while banks were intimidating and limited. We need to think of the consumers we’re trying to attract, and not force a limited vision of what a bank looks like and its roles.

That’s about thinking of the end user first, and trying to think innovatively about solving a problem. Technology doesn’t have to have anything to do with the solution. Instead, in this case and many others, technology tools can be used to make the solution more viable.

Thanks for the opportunity Center Director and Professor Youngjin Yoo.

Number of Views:146 ]]> http://christopherwink.com/2011/05/16/technologies-are-more-often-tools-than-solutions-and-no-thats-not-the-same/feed/ 0 http://christopherwink.com/2011/05/13/what-the-philadelphia-public-interest-information-network-should-be/ http://christopherwink.com/2011/05/13/what-the-philadelphia-public-interest-information-network-should-be/#comments Fri, 13 May 2011 13:30:23 +0000 Christopher Wink http://christopherwink.com/?p=6861

If all the timing was right on track, some time this month or next, a CEO might be named for a new collaborative nonprofit news and information project being initially funded by the William Penn Foundation.

As first shared here, the deeply invested regional foundation put an initial $2.4 million onto the table to form with Temple University a Center for Public Interest Journalism, which is being charged with initially housing the currently named Philadelphia Public Interest Information Network and represents the largest gift the university’s communications school ever received. What that will be, well, that’s up to the as-yet-unnamed CEO.

(Full disclosure, yup, the William Penn Foundations funds the Technically Philly Transparencity open government coverage project and CPIJ was the title sponsor for this year’s BarCamp NewsInnovation, so let’s go ahead and assume that I have absolutely no objectivity about anything written here.)

Now, I’ve shared broadly what I’d do if I had $7 million burning a hole in my pocket and wanted to drop it the news pot, but, after a few dozen conversations on this topic, I wanted to get a bit more detailed with my thoughts on what PPIN should be.

I’ve struggled a bit, like many to whom I’ve spoken, to parse the difference between the Temple-housed CPIJ and the, at least initially CPIJ-housed, PPIN. So, I’ve decided to go ahead and make that distinction for myself from what I know:

• CPIJ should be a subscription-based cohort of Temple University services — Offering innovation-themed continuing education, networking and connective events for journalists and their kin, serving as a clearing house for journalism-related internships, a broker of photography, video and other multimedia talent, creator of professor speaker series (strong lectures recorded and shared, in addition to connecting the Philadelphia Neighborhoods capstone, application development and other university-based tools and resources that news organizations can pay limited fees to have access to.
• PPIN should be an independent investment, philanthropic and incubation network — Creating a near lobbying block of independent sites that pool back-end services

In short, (a) CPIJ is a services-orientated, business-minded collection of university services that relate to news and information and (b) PPIN should be responsible for increasing collaboration between existing and expansion and sustaining of new news and information sources.

That much is mostly, from what I understand, the plan that is already currently in place.

Here’s what I say the CEO of PPIN should do: [Formal job description here]

• Think product locally, impact nationally and message globally — This damn well better be oozing with Philadelphia luster in the projects and partners it creates, but the projects and processes should have a big footprint across the country, the success of which will echo internationally.
• Fundraise an initial $100 million for the Philadelphia Innovation Fund — Expanding on an idea from RoseAnn Rosenthal, go to every big company in the region, foundation of every kind and any group with a relevant mission in the world. Have five big piles of cash, (1) public affairs journalism, (2) community coverage, (3) technology, (4) entrepreneurship and (5) media literacy/education. Use this pile of money as a carrot stick to get done what you want: like JLab did with considerably smaller piles of money, foster collaboration around important issues, invest in companies and demand they stay in Philadelphia for a certain period of time or whatever else you want to do to create triple-bottom line businesses that impact our communities for the better. White paper everything and share your lessons with the world.
• Take ownership of, curate, house and grow OpenDataPhilly.org — This is the future of accountability journalism, and PPIN could have the broadest and most relevant mission to steward this ship. You’d probably curate a community  of coders, hackers and designers, host a quarterly event series and an annual competition partnering groups with developers and designers.
• Partner with the Our Philadelphia local campaign contributions database — This project came from CommonCausePa and Azavea but clearly needs a steward.
• Serve as a bridge and a conductor of public affairs research — That means in addition to playing traffic controller with existing news agencies and pushing them to do better, bigger and bolder work. Additionally, that means connecting and creating collaboration — not competition — among similarly themed groups, like Common Cause, Committee of Seventy and even the local ACLU, City controller, Solicitor General and other watchdog groups.
• Host and highlight journalism excellence in the region with the Pen & Pencil Club — To help create a culture and community among journalists and good government research.
• Create the world’s first information incubation program — Host five startups, meaningful, topical (not geographical) niche sites with real business plans from elsewhere in the country, relevant tech shops and the like, offer them space, capital, mentorship and a deadline. The Philadelphia Media Network keeps talking about something sorta-ish like this [sidebar], so maybe you go in with them together on it.
• Serve as fiscal agent for other media projects — If any for-profit or smaller news or information outlet gets outside funding, be the go-to resource to house and incubate those groups.
• Offer other boring back-end services — As we’ve often pitched about News Inkubator, some group could offer pooled accounting, payroll, libel protection, general insurance and other assortments of media-related services.
• Membership and cross-platform directory build out — Offer the technology and shared sales and follow up resources for niche sites to have a membership platform, that could fit into customizable directory pages, which would be populated by all tagged content, like this Knight application of ours. [Unless WHYY could get to this]
• Advertising network — I wrote that I don’t think the traffic would be meaningful enough for Philly.com to make this happen, but I think there’s a real build here for PPIN. [Unless WHYY could get to this]
• Parse the rest of this post for anything that make be relevant to the mission and bring in a little scratch — Don’t rely only on foundation, philanthropic and related support.

Here are the actual roles I think matter:

• CEO — You’re a cheerleader of, advocate behind and fundraiser for public affairs journalism, news, information and informing communities generally. Speak artfully and uniquely across the country — see the honorariums as mini-grants toward PPIN — and bring word of the great work that is happening in Philadelphia.
• Investment Vice President — Give out bags of money to get news organizations and other groups to hit your mission, and also be adept at asking for money. Bring it in and then send it out.
• Chief Innovation Officer –  Your job is to know everything that is happening in the news and information world, to push forward conversations, dream up collaborations and projects, work with partners, create and move forward cutting edge technologies, projects and the like.
• Event planner – Lead convenings, help grab in-kind sponsorships and other partnerships for all partners
• Important boring stuff person — HR, manage bookkeeping, accounting
• Sales Director — Advertising network, sponsorship sales,
• Multimedia Producer — Media literacy training for outsiders and, perhaps, partners.
• Investigative reporter chair — Maybe. What if there was an investigative reporter endowment chair, where a year-long stays for talented investigative reporters would bring them here to work with partner groups or sites to create impactful reporting and action>

What you don’t need:

• A website that costs you more than $10,000 to make — The idea of a landing page is on its way out anyway, but any need to recreate this is over, if Philly.com ever does right, they are the portal through which all meaningful content flows. Don’t waste your money chasing after them.
• To be creating meaningful journalism at the outset — There could be a future in that, but I’d say to start, I’d use the pot of money to give incentive to existing news organizations to act.
• A mobile app — Stop.
• A Board of Directors that is made up exclusively of old white men, or exclusively of journalists — Have an impressive, meaningful, varied board that will push and dictate the future of the country’s methods of informing communities. That said, you do sure as hell want an old journalist or two who know a thing about meaningful reporting and important coverage.
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