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Roofcamp #9 on July 28

Marie Casas — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 01:41:33 +0000

On July 28, 2010 (Wednesday), 6.30 onwards, ROOFCAMP meets again. Venue is at BAREFOOT Headquarters, 29th Floor Rufino Pacific Tower, Ayala Avenue corner Herrera Street, Legaspi Village, Makati, Philippines.

The Startup Experience – Matthew Pontoles, Barefoot Investments LLC

Matthew is the co-founder and a principal partner of Barefoot Investments LLC, an SME venture specialist focused on green and ethical businesses. He is a published author and experienced practitioner in offshore finance, having lived and worked in the Caribbean for 3 years. In London he spent four years building and managing large sales teams for a PLC publishing house before establishing Barefoot Investments. Matthew now resides full time in Asia and oversees the start-up phase of Barefoot’s new ventures. Two of these include an eco-luxe private island development in Palawan and the Little Green Hub – a serviced office facility and boutique business hub for dynamic businesses, ambitious start-ups and entrepreneurs.

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Startups at echelon 2010 in just a few days!

Marie Casas — Fri, 28 May 2010 08:03:13 +0000

Echelon 2010 is to be held in just a few days… do you have your tickets ready?

I’m looking forward to ALL the keynote speakers, case study and startup presentors, which includes:

Dave McClure, the Master of 500 hats and Founders Found
what we can adapt from Indonesia’s learnings of monetizing the mobile market from Andy Zain (VentureX Capital)
Andi Boediman of Plasa
Social gaming — which I hate to admit I’ve grown a chronic addiction to
It’s going to be truly star-studded and cross-cultural experience…tech and business heads at various startups, tech companies, and related firms including Venturebeat, Rackspace, Amazon AWS, Yahoo and more

Check out the echelon 2010 schedule and list of startups exhibiting.

Insync Philippine-based startup
Insync (think of it as Dropbox for companies) will be carrying the banner for the Philippine startups. Have you seen insync features? I so want to get one already!

ReserveUp Later Launch
My partners and I had wanted to showcase ReserveUp (reservation and inbound marketing engine for accommodation providers) during the exhibit but ultimately decided we still had to fine tune our app. Sorry guys. Aside from dealing with personal emergencies, we’re in the middle of some crazy changes internally in our bootstrapping/consulting company. Yup, you never know what could happen next in the startup world.

Follow echelon happenings
Twitter @e27sg and Hashtag: #echelon2010

Airfare and accommodations
Get your plane tickets at PAL, Jet Air, Tiger Airways, or Cebu Pacific. I’d also recommend a hotel that’s near an EastWest Line MRT so you can get to Buona Vista station near Biopolis.

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From: Pinoy Web Startup Team

Apply NOW for the Perfect Event for Startups for June 2010 Launch

Marie Casas — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 01:32:33 +0000

I’ve long wanted to have a joint launch event in the Philippines or in Asia, where lean and small startups can join resources and give their web products a BIG BANG launch event or press conference – similar to DEMO or TechCrunch 50.

The wonderful team behind e27 is now empowering 50 startups to exhibit and and another 10 stealth or closed-beta startups to launch at Echelon 2010 – Asia’s Web Technology Event on June 1 & 2, 2010.

It’s going to be held in Singapore – and the fees and airfare are quite manageable. Your upside would be the big launch event, reaching investors and end-users, exposure, feedback from experts, users, and peers — and, how else are you going to get all that?

Somewhat “established” startups should join the Exhibit while those in closed-beta or stealth mode but with a working prototype by May 2010 should definitely apply to LAUNCH their product!

Though the deadline to apply for the exhibit or to launch is in 5 days, 31 March 2010, the application is straightforward and quite easy to accomplish. It’s practically just like explaining your product it to your friends or colleagues.

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Virtual & Small Office Options for Startups and Telecommuters

Marie Casas — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 08:33:34 +0000

When we were starting, we were lucky to find a small office thru an ad in Buy & Sell! Office spaces are usually 100 square meters and up, which is just (whew!) way out there, when you’re bootstrapping.

Incubators

Ayala TBI and DOST both have incubators. Recently opened are Open TBI is along C.P. Garcia Ave. near UP and Ateneo and UP Visayas Cebu College TBI. Both have spaces about roughly 15-30 square meters, which is just enough for a small team of 3-5 developers. It’s enough to get you started working on a prototype and you’ll have access to mentors and neighboring startups.

Virtual Offices and Coworking spaces

Another option if you just want a place to telecommute from time to time and can’t face being at the coffee shop all day is to rent a desk at Proud Cloud’s Hackspace in Eastwood. That’s definitely a “hacker house”, if that’s what you’re looking for. No long-term lease, you can just use the desk for a day or a month, and pay as you go.

With a more traditional business feel are the proliferating virtual offices in the metro. In Makati alone, there are: Worldnet Biz Center (830-0205 – 07 loc 11) and My Office along Salcedo Street and Makati Corporate (893-8909) near Don Bosco, and of course prestigious Regus at Enterprise. You can rent a desk or two for at usually at least 3-6 months for less than P5,000. Get a plan that allows you a few hours of the meeting rooms and conference facilities of the shared office space, so you can have private time for product presentations or customer interviews or skype calls.

Are you ready to step it up? Did I miss any other virtual office or small office options for startups and telecommuters? Feel free to share which ones you’ve tried or would like to try.

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Techpreneurship Talk at Explore I.T. 2010

Marie Casas — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 02:45:56 +0000

Junior Philippine Computer Society (JPCS), the country’s IT student organization, presents Explore IT 2010. It’s a nationwide student conference to be held today at AIM Makati.
JP Dela Torre will be one of the presenters this afternoon to inspire the students to BE TECHPRENEURS! Giving away limited edition Pinoy Web Startup shirts too.
I’m pretty sure you can walk in to register, sorry I can’t find any other info about the event online.

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Calling Aspiring Entrepreneurs, Developers, & Designers

Marie Casas — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:19:14 +0000

Most of us will be glad to have 2009 behind us with all the economic blunders but 2010 is going to be a fabulous year for startups, developers, and web designers.

Web/Tech-savvy people are at a great place right now — with consumers and businesses growing more comfortable with placing their data on the cloud. So will we be in position at the right time? Some of the upcoming events could help you connect with your future co-founders and end-users.

Startups Take a Pitch

Jojo Flores, who runs California-based incubator Plug and Play Tech Center, is giving Filipino startup companies a chance to pitch for funding and/or globalization. You have to be in the fields of consumer web, internet mobile, wireless, social media, gaming, software, hardware, clean & biotech… well, if you’re reading this, you can probably count yourself in.

Submissions in by January 29, 2010, 5pm PST
Competition: February 9, 2010 9am-3.30pm at SMX Convention Center
How to participate

Via Globe Labs

PHP Developers Summit 2010

PHP developers are coming together at the PHP Dev Summit organized by the PHP User Group Philippines. There’s going to be talks on PHP best practices, versioning with Git, Starting a Startup (which will be presented by my colleague JP Dela Torre), UI design for web apps, and more.

Registration: P1,200 pre-registered. P1,500 walk-in (including buffet lunch, snacks, conference kit, shirt, etc)
January 30, 2010 8am-5pm
Grand Ballroom, Hotel Rembrandt, 26 Tomas Morato Ext., Quezon City
Registration and Conference Details

Form Function & Class Mini Web Design Conference

It’s BarCamp style, meaning anybody who wants to talk can talk. And it’s really casual. For web designers, by web designers.

February 11, 2010 (Thursday) 6-9pm
G2VC TechBar, Orient Square Bldg., Ortigas (View map)
Registration Fee: Free! Sign up here

It’s an un-conference — we can be informal, we can speak in English or Filipino, there’s no structure. Be heard. Ask questions. Make new friends. Share your experiences and opinions on web design principles and trends.

On the same night, there’s also Roofcamp #6, so go and choose your booze.

Roofcamp #6 featuring Yahoo! Developer Network

Roofcamp is a venue for future looking, maverick, and fearless individuals sharing and distilling ideas from concept to reality. Michael “Smitty” Smith, Jr. and Alan Magtoto will be discussing YDN SEA and Live 3D Avatar technology.

February 11, 2010 (Thursday) 6-930pm
Mag:Net Bonifacio High Street (View map)

Via Proudcloud

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Drupal Camp Manila 2009

Marie Casas — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 09:16:02 +0000

Continuating after Jam Packed Morning Sessions at Drupal Camp Manila, we got to hear about:

Do more with less (effort): Tools that make Drupal deployment extra-efficient by Marcky

openatrium for project management based on drupal
uniform server lightweight local server
extplorer php-based file manager to demo obtaining a copy of open atrium and extract the tar and install on web server (sort of GUI cPanel). As an alternative, to quickly install and extract tarballs or zip from one server to another, I’d recommend using PuTTY (PC) or Terminal (*nix) instead. Go wget!
apture plugin – content creation assistant tool
lullabot’s pick: top 40 drupal module, drupalmodules.com
for theming, start with genesis, fusion theme, adaptive theme

Still to come

1 Core Theme, Unlimited Subthemes, Adding configurations on layout, colors, fonts, etc.
Automating your workflow with Drupal’s Workflow and Actions Module
A Discussion on Drupal’s Form API
Efficient Theming of Nodes, Views and Blocks

Have a great weekend! Photos

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From: Pinoy Web Startup Team

Jam-packed morning sessions at at Drupal Camp Manila

Marie Casas — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 03:23:14 +0000

Blogging live at Drupal Camp Manila, glad to see familiar faces at G2iX Techbar in Orient Square, Ortigas Center.

This morning, we had an install fest where Drupal n00bs got a walk-through of installing Drupal on your localhost XAMPP, creating a database in MySQL phpMyAdmin, creating content types. (Personally, I’ve become a fan of installing via command line)

Earlier, Rick Bahague of Computer Professionals Union showed their workflow when working with nonprofit websites for NGOs. They’re always looking for volunteers and will have an intensive Drupal workshop on December 15-16, 2009.

Just wrapped up, Loloy D showed how he’s integrated photos hosted on his Picasa Web account to his Drupal site. He’s distributing the code under GNU license.

Breaking for lunch! Right after, we’ll listen to Marky Caballero “Do more with less (effort): Tools that make Drupal deployment extra-efficient”.

G2iX Tech Bar Venue
G2iX Tech Bar is really a fab tech venue. They’re very accommodating, you can have a classroom setup (where you can set up laptops) which is very fitting for something like the Drupal Installfest and it’s also comfy for informal Barcamp.

Good job with today, Rachel Jaro! Looking forward to see what Drupalchix has in store

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From: Pinoy Web Startup Team

Friendster Revamp to Revive Asia’s social network

Marie Casas — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 02:36:13 +0000

Login to Friendster and you’ll get a major surprise. What used to be shades of white and grey (with ads thrown here and there) are now green and yellow. Improvements to the interface are long overdue for this social network that’s still giant in Asia — and now it’s a whole new brand. Though most of the west are already on Facebook, Friendster still has a strong user base in Southeast Asia especially the Philippines, thanks particularly to its early-mover advantage. All of my college friends are still my contacts on Friendster.

New Friendster: simple fun personal

If for some reason or other, you won’t login to Friendster, you can take a peek at

“First” Impressions

Green and yellow The new logo is quirky, tightly integrated with the whole new look, even the favicon, though I’m not fond of it yet. Green because they can’t do blue anymore?

More user-friendly navigation Friendster’s easier to use and nicer to look at now. Navigation is more obvious so I’m no longer afraid to click because I might get lost.

Efforts to get user feedback Sometimes you’d get an image ad asking for you to give feedback. Some incentive would be nice, perhaps some credit in the “Wallet” feature which I’m still not sure what it’s for.

Distracting image ads They get eyeballs but it’s hardly quality attention. I’m looking forward to more relevant and less obtrusive advertising. Good copy and stylesheets can do wonders.

An overhaul of a social network with a huge existing user base is a massive undertaking… which must be why my Friends list isn’t working yet.

What do you think of Friendster’s new look?

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From: Pinoy Web Startup Team

Gloo Social Network by Berkadoods Now Online (Globe Labs)

Marie Casas — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:45:39 +0000

Just when I’m trying to rid myself of Facebook (game) addiction by Pomodoro-ing myself , here comes along a new social network made by “2 dudes” called Berkadoods. Watch out Sandbox!

Gloo is a new way to communicate online. It’s an online collaboration space where you can post Facebook pictures, web images and videos into spaces where you and your friends and family can collaborate in real-time. People can chat, doodle, write free form text, place post-its and even send SMS and MMS messages to mobile phones. Each element that you post can be moved and resized by you or by other people, and changes that anyone makes will be seen by other people IN REAL TIME. That’s the power and uniqueness of Gloo. It’s not only a place where you can post media and text, you can manipulate these elements with other people at the same time.”

That’s quite a lengthy description to tell us what we can do inside Gloo.. ~~now if only I can manage to figure out how to register~~ Sign up button in the middle of the page.

Give it a try and tell me how it goes. Now I’m not sure what we’re supposed to do with mobile-crossover-web social networks. Was Gloo meant to replace or complement Facebook? When are the instances you’d log in here instead of FB/Flickr/IM/Wave?

Actually I’m a tad surprised because I always thought the Globe Labs Challenge was primarily mobile applications with some optional web component — but Gloo appears to be intrinsically a web app. If Gloo is meant to compete with Smart’s Sandbox, I have yet to see a mobile-friendly version of Gloo — if only I can try Gloo on my mobile for free. Till then, go ahead and explore Gloo.

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From: Pinoy Web Startup Team