
Portland wants to transform its software culture into an industry - turoczy
http://blog.oregonlive.com/siliconforest/2010/12/portland_wants_to_transform_it.html
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mtrichardson
Portland venture capital is picking up (and we've been lucky to be a part of
that). An important note is that most of the money isn't coming from Portland
and it's not coming in small amounts. Serious investments are coming in from
out of state VC firms.

Dedicated entrepreneurs exist and are making a go at it here - and doing quite
well.

I'm wary of most of these organizations, but I do have high hopes for the
software startup scene here.

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baguasquirrel
Make non-compete agreements unenforceable there and I would consider moving
there.

Now if you really want a leg up on California, also consider make non-poaching
agreements unenforceable.

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bediger
Oregon should also do the "work done after hours is your own" thing that
allows Californians to do "startups in their garages". Literally.

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garrettgillas
Yeah, this article really doesn't mention too many hard and fast promises but
I am optimistic about the Portland seed fund. I got to talk to the two fund
managers in charge and they seem to have the right idea about how to bet their
chips. We'll see in another month or two if I'm right.

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garrettgillas
By the way, I didn't know that Josh Friedman wanted to be in charge of the
Portland Seed Fund. I thought I heard that the whole thing was originally his
idea but I could be wrong. Either way, the fund would best be managed by a
hands-on Paul Graham type and Josh is probably as good of a fit as we can get
out here.

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pdxlover
It was and you are right he should have been, but it was basically pulled
away.

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dailo10
Here's hoping they succeed. Portland would make a great tech center. It
certainly has that counter culture attitude. And it's highly livable.

Now they just need the jobs and talent - that's the hard part.

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olefoo
There's a reason that some of the best open-source conferences happen in
Portland, and it's not just because Linus Torvalds lives nearby. Portland is a
remarkably livable city with a fairly deep talent pool.

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randall
And, they have their own TechCrunch: I believe most writers for ReadWriteWeb
are Portland-ers.

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cullenking
The problem with Portland is talent seems to be hidden. I haven't explored too
much in the time I have been here, but the bits of exposure I have had didn't
seem too promising. Contrast that to a larger area like Seattle, or a very
talent-dense area like Silicon Valley, and you have the opposite problem of
sorting through talent.

Additionally, there are very few resources for people just starting out. There
is the Oregon Entrepreneurship Network, but with their fee structure it seems
to be more of a business than a resource for a small business. You have to pay
annual membership dues, and from there you have to pay entry into their
events. Want to go to their monthly pub talk? Yeah, that'll be $30 for non
members, and $15 for people already registered with the OEN.

Of course talk is cheap, why not put together something myself? From the few
events I have been to, the SNR was poor enough to be intimidating. 2/3 social
media consultants, 1/4 looking for a free lunch and the rest as lost as me.

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mtrichardson
There are local tech events happening pretty much every night of the week.
<http://calagator.org/> has a good listing. It's to the point where you can't
pick a night to do a user group/meetup without it conflicting.

You might want to start there when trying to find talent... though for what
it's worth we haven't had a hard time finding talent lately. Lot of competing
people away, but that's hardly new or different.

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cullenking
I know of the list and have been to a few meetings. When I mentioned I didn't
see much going on, I meant there didn't seem to be a cohesive group of
entrepreneurs. There are plenty of user groups and other nerdy meetings, but I
haven't had luck connecting with other people attempting to get a business off
the ground. Yes, PDX has nerds and programmers and people interested in tech,
but, it doesn't have many software entrepreneurs to connect with.

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sedachv
That's also the impression I got when I spent a couple of months in Portland
last year.

Somewhat unrelated, there's a lot of interesting programming language
companies around (Galois, Gemstone, and some others I can't remember now). I
don't have hard data, but have the impression that that's a lot more than
average for other US cities with high-tech sectors.

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intellectronica
What they call "dogfooding" has a different name when it comes to the
relationship between government and business - subsidy.

If shielding local industry from competition is the mayor's idea of creating a
new market, Portland's efforts should probably start with getting a better
mayor.

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tapp
The mayor was elected by the citizens of Portland and is paid with their tax
dollars. One of his primary mandates is to improve the local economy. Why
should Portland not use those tax dollars to cultivate its local economy if
that is the goal?

I am the CEO of a mid-sized, private company. I need our website updated.
Should I be required to put out an RFP to source the work to the lowest
bidder? By your logic, if I don't, aren't I "shielding" my internal staff from
competition?

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jacques_chester
> Why should Portland not use those tax dollars to cultivate its local economy
> if that is the goal?

The goal is a noble thing, but good intentions are not enough. "Sheltered
workshop" policies lead either to feeble industries or rent-seeking or both.

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tapp
According to the article, the purpose of the 'dogfooding' is not providing a
long term subsidy, but rather "to serve as a proving ground for the technology
and a reference customer."

YC provides its portfolio companies with a direct financial subsidy at a time
when they are not yet able to stand on their own, and gets other YC connected
companies to use their products and serve as reference customers. Is YC
"enfeebling" its startups?

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jacques_chester
YC (or any other commercial funding source) does not have a political
incentive to keep funding failed or failing companies.

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erik_landerholm
As someone that tried very hard to raise even a little money in Portland
before getting into Ycombinator and ultimately raising 6 million this idea is
DOOMED.

We did the Portland Angel Fund (or whatever it's called) American Idol off for
start-ups...total joke. The whole industry is dominated by 'service providers'
that look to charge start-ups for everything while writing no checks.

They actually asked us to come back and speak at one of their conventions and
wanted to charge us almost $400.

There is no follow on capital. There is no entrepreneur culture. I love
Portland and Oregon (grew up there, went to OSU), but this is a waste of time
and money.

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cullenking
Is that the event put on by the Oregon Entrepreneurship Network? I have been
very skeptical about all their events (really, to do anything I need to shell
out HOW much? To go to a pub and drink a beer even?). I wouldn't say the idea
is doomed. Even if it isn't successful, at least it's something in the right
direction.

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erik_landerholm
You are right to be skeptical.

The reason why i say it is doomed is (i'm not sure it's this plan so i could
be jumping the gun) because one of the plans that is being implemented we were
interviewed by one of 'LPs' and the info about how the 'funding' works was
very sketchy.

It pretty much boiled down to pick 4-6 companies and give them loans that can
be called back at roughly anytime and are personally guaranteed.

When we (my partner and I) looking for money in portland and working on our
start-up at the same time even giving BrainTree a few thousand bucks as
guarantee was out of the question. The idea that any young, early start-up
wants loans with personal guarantees makes no sense. If anything just get 5-6
credit cards and max them out to finance it. It's easier.

