I agree, it seems odd to complain about a geek shortage at a time when there are plenty of out-of-work geeks around. Hire some of them.
That said, the article mentions cuts in Darpa's funding for research at universities makes me wonder if they're hoping more for geeks with grad degrees. Hard to tell for sure.
It's true there are plenty of out-of-work geeks, but I believe she is referring to the future. It is my understanding that the number of American students entering 'geeky' degrees is declining rapidly, which is certainly concerning for DARPA in both medium- and long-term P.O.V.'s.
What kind of generic information would help you? We're pretty excited about graphs, social software, collaborative filtering, event coordination, behavior analysis, and collaborative editors, but would consider working on anything interesting with a realistic chance to succeed. We like iterating and letting the market guide us. These are roughly the things we agree on, and why we are considering to work together.
If you email us at founders@iter8.org we can give you more personal info.
I think this is a good idea, but I had the same reaction to the lack of information. What I want is specific information, not generic. For example:
1. How many of you are there?
2. Why are you withholding your identities?
3. Are there several organizers looking to find co-founders for several different startups, or are the organizers already committed to working together?
4. Is the point to co-found companies with the organizers or will it be setup so that any two (or three) attendees have a chance to group together?
5. Name one example of a "pretty impressive" thing that you've built. If you insist on being secretive could you give an example of a similar thing that somebody else built that was as impressive as the things on your resumes.
We are three right now, we're not sure if us (the initial attendees) will be matches - that's part of what we want to find out. we'd be happy if others find cofounders and we don't. All of us are already working on side projects, but are not far enough along for that to be a hindrance towards joining someone elses project. We don't want any special position over the other attendees - in fact you'll get root on iter8.org and if everyone decides to do a startup without one or all of us, we would not complain. We do this exactly to find out who to work with. We're secretive because we have jobs right now, and bragging anonymously doesn't work.
Yeah we prefer small groups and focus on actually getting work done. We want to figure out by actions not words if some subsets of us would make good teams.
