December 2010
32 posts
5 tags
2010 Food+Tech Highlights
What a year for food and tech! It has been truly wonderful getting to know all of you over the past couple of months. I can’t wait to connect with more of you at the events (hackathons, classes, and nerdy tech dinners) that are in the works for 2011.
Two weeks ago, my friend Charlie O’Donnell wrote a really nice post about how during this time of year, it’s important to...
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And How!: Open Sourcing Food+Tech's Business Plan ...
Last week I introduced Simon Sinek’s golden circle – which shows that successful innovators start from a clear conviction or purpose that inspires belief and loyalty. The purpose of Food+Tech Connect is to connect innovators that are empowering better decision-making throughout the Food System. Moving out on Sinek’s Golden Circle the next question is HOW?
The question of How is really one of...
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Snowmageddon 2010: Cleaning Up & Building...
Waiting for your street to be plowed? In need of a shovel or snow blower? Car stuck in the snow? Abandoned your car in the middle of the street? Subway platform snowed in?
[caption id=”attachment_1884” align=”alignright” width=”167” caption=”Metropolitan G Train Platform”][/caption]
You could wait (patiently) for the city to dig you out, or you...
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Studio Feast's Datalicious Last Supper
[caption id=”attachment_1855” align=”aligncenter” width=”553” caption=”designed by Soo Baik”][/caption]
“You’re about to die, what’s your last meal?”
Since 2007, Studiofeast supper club founder Mike Lee has asked his mailing list subscribers to answer this question to get a better sense of who he’s cooking for. Four...
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WatchIt was a sad evening at Johns Hopkins Hospital..my grandmother is dying. I stepped out of her room to compose myself, when all of a sudden these voices filled the halls. Security guards, nurses, visitors, joined in, as the procession walked down the hallway, bringing a little magic to all of us.
Happy holidays!
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Food+Tech Gift Guide 2010
Last minute shopping? Have no need to worry, this food+tech gift guide should give you some awesome and creative options.
Happy Holidays!
Window Farms: Give the gift of R&D-I-Y: mass collaboration to solve environmental problems. Windowfarms now offers hydroponic home kits and hydroponic education kits. Windowfarms make some pretty rad gifts for teachers, gardeners, foodies,...
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ThisBatch.com: NYC Tech Entrepreneur Chris...
Last week my friend George sent me a tweet asking if I had heard of www.thisbatch.com. I hadn’t. But, the next thing I know, they were popping up all throughout my twitter feed- foodies, techies, vcs- it was incredible. According to founder Chris Muscarella, they had thousands of visitors to their site, all based on a single tweet he sent out that morning.
This Batch is a Community...
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Two Apps To Help With Holiday Baking
If you bake, then you know that it is a science. Experimentation with a recipe may lead to disastrous results. Here are two useful apps, Ratio and Food Substitutes, that are recommended by Dessert Professional, a trade magazine for bakers and pastry chefs.
Ratio: Michael Ruhlman, chef, author and blogger, has an excellent iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch app that will help you calculate amounts of...
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The Future of Biotechnology
I am really honored to introduce my new guest blogger Jameson, a middle school student at Sts. Philip and James School in Long Island, NY. Jameson and I were introduced by his technology teacher and my Twitter pal George Haines. After learning of Jameson’s interest in food and technology, I invited him to guest post. He’s done an incredible job of articulating some of the potential...
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Gourmet Live: Iterating A Recipe For Digital...
Gourmet Magazine’s closure last year “presaged the death of magazines,” lamented Jeff Jarvis in a blog post about the end of the longest running food-magazine in the United States. As the social web increasingly democratizes publishing and empowers anyone to become both a producer and consumer of content, the media industry is scrambling to develop new business models. And so,...
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Food+Tech Bites 12/20/10 - 12/26/10
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Happy Holidays
May you all have a wonderful holiday filled with friends, family, delicious food, and a little winter magic :-)
If you are in...
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Slate Visualizes Diabetes
This interactive visualization by SlateLabs demonstrates the rise in diabetes diagnoses among adult Americans. Slate used data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to look at county estimates between 2004 and 2008. Mapping this data reveals that the highest concentrations of diabetes are in states like Alabama, Mississippi, and South Dakota. Click here for full interactive map.
...
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Mapping Sustainable Seafood- You Can Help!
I’ve been a pescatarian for 17 years. This past year I made the decision to try my best to eat only sustainably grown and sourced seafood. While there were a number of reasons behind this decision- mostly I don’t want to contribute to overfishing or habitat destruction, and I don’t want to consume potentially heavy metal rich food. Sadly- that meant I basically stopped eating...
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Food Farm Connect: Building An Urban Agriculture...
City dwellers around the country are finding creative ways to use their fire escapes, windows, backyards, and abandoned lots to grow food in the city. As the movement matures, decentralized networks and entrepreneurial ventures related to the production, processing, and distribution of food grown in the city have begun to sprout.
These entrepreneurial ventures are changing the business of food...
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Food Information & Why We Need A Storytelling...
As the founder of the internet venture, GourmetOrigins, one of the topics that often comes up when speaking with people in the food industry is technology and particularly, how to use technology to sell food or, and this is particularly important at a time when the consumer is facing almost limitless choices of food, how to take advantage of the web to better reach more customers and better...
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Start Here: Open Sourcing Food+Tech's Business...
Ready, Set,.. Where you do you start?
Every entrepreneur is bursting with at least one good idea. Usually more. When you are bursting with good ideas and feel connected to multiple opportunities its hard to prioritize.
What should you do first?
Danielle has very clear and ambitious goals that she wants to work on in our coaching sessions. The list includes defining the business model for...
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When Demand is Not Enough, Challenges are Steep...
Illustration by Melkorka Kjarval
Grass-fed beef has become a household name, but despite unprecedented awareness and demand, many American producers find themselves struggling to make a living, battling against infrastructural flaws brought about by decades of agricultural consolidation. Retail chains like Wegman’s (here in NY) and Trader Joe’s have recognized the demand for grass-fed beef, but...
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When I'm Mobile: Building Sustainable Mobile...
Trying to navigate a restaurant’s website from my cellphone is often an annoying and time-consuming experience.
Why? Many restaurant websites are decked out with all the old Flash glitz and cannot be opened by the smartphones of today.
Which is why startups such as When I’m Mobile & ChompStack have developed tools to easily develop mobile based websites. When I’m Mobile...
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Pando Projects: Incubating Your Ideas & Empowering...
“I see Pando as the first incubator for grassroots initiatives. We will support projects that can be carried out in less than 1 year for under $5,000, providing the project mentorship and online tools that people need to transform their ideas into action.”
How often do you meet someone who wants to make your community project ideas happen?
Two weeks ago, I met Pando Projects...
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Open Sourcing The Food+Tech Connect Business Plan
I am thrilled to introduce Christine Rico, my business and idea weaving advisor. Christine and I have been working together to take all of my ideas and the amazing people and opportunities coming my way, and build a cohesive business plan. I feel very fortunate to be working with her. So, I’ve decided to spread the wealth- we’ll be open sourcing the process!
-Danielle
As Danielle...
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Food+Tech Bites 12/7/10 - 12/12/10
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Inaugural Food+Tech Hackathon
Huge thanks to all of the amazing people that came out to Soho Haven this past Saturday for the 12-hour...
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Hacking For Social Good — Using Open Data to Make...
It was 8:00 a.m. on a Saturday morning in Soho, the streets lay quiet and Broadway was not yet filled with shopping tourists. Though one floor above, at co-working space Soho Haven, there was a bustle of energy as developers, designers, statisticians, urban farmers, public officials, and researchers from across the city gathered for the first-ever Food + Tech Hackathon.
[caption...
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2 Years Later... A Rooftop Environmental Science...
Around two years ago (December 15th to be exact), I became the first paid employee of BrightFarm Systems (the New York Sun Works crew joined 16 days later). Our only project at the time was a rooftop environmental science lab— the Science Barge was ‘moving’ to a rooftop.
Nancy Easton, NYC Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott, Sidsel Robards, & Manuela Zamora perform the lettuce...
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Scott Stringer Helps Launch NYC's First Rooftop...
Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer spoke at the launch of The Sun Works Center at the Manhattan School For Children on December 7, 2010. Stringer said:
“Let’s make this a model for what’s possible so that every neighborhood in New York can enjoy what’s possible, what our children are going to learn right here. Let’s transform New York and make this the...
11 tags
Scott Stringer Helps Launch NYC's First Rooftop...
Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer spoke at the launch of The Sun Works Center at the Manhattan School For Children on December 7, 2010. Stringer said:
“Let’s make this a model for what’s possible so that every neighborhood in New York can enjoy what’s possible, what our children are going to learn right here. Let’s transform New York and make this the...
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Open Data + Food Ontology+ Semantic Web Primer
Thank you so much to everyone who came out yesterday for the inaugural Food+Tech Hackathon! I will be covering all of the interesting people, projects, and outcomes from the event over the next week, but wanted to get you started with this awesome video.
We were extremely lucky to have Dominic DiFranzo join us for this event.
Dominic DiFranzo is a Computer Science PhD student at RPI, working in...
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Food Safety Modernization Act Infographics
It’s been quite a week for food safety! Tuesday, the senate approved the largest overhaul of food safety legislation in 70 years. If passed, the Food Safety Modernization Act, will grant the Food and Drug Administration the power to protect citizens by recalling tainted foods, increasing inspections of food companies, and overseeing farming.
Here are two of the infographics produced in...
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Windowfarms R&D-I-Y: Lessons for Crowdsourcing...
Crowdsourcing innovation is all the rage these days. Large corporations like IBM, Nokia, and GE have all created web-based platforms to gather the wisdom of the masses.
When I first became interested in open innovation, I was both encouraged and fascinated by the growing interest in collaboration. My initial reaction was- this is great! This will help to improve the design of products and...