SOMEWHAT FRANK

Wanna Free Ticket to PayPal's 1st Dev Conference?

PayPal is hosting it's first ever developer conference PayPal Innovate 2009 on November 3rd and 4th in San Francisco and I am excited to be heading out to take part in it.

The two day event includes a keynote by Tim O'Reilly keynote on Day 1 and GigaOm's Om Malik is doing a VC panel on Day 2. The event is sure to be well attended by developers, startups and entrepreneurs and more.

Today I joined Sudha Jamthe from the PayPalX team on BlogTalkRadio as she talked to Khurram Khan, Product Owner of Adaptive Payments from PayPalX TwitPay founder Michael Ivey to discuss the upcoming PayPalX Innovate 2009 conference. You can listen to the discussion here.

Vote me the next Panasonic Living in HD Insider

I am excited to be a finalist in the Panasonic Living in HD Insider program. What this means is that I am only one step away from being the next Panasonic Living in HD Insider! But I am going to need the help of my readers and community to help make this possible. Check out my video entry I submitted for the contest (below).

Here are a few ways you can help:

1. Vote for me here!
2. Help spread the word by copying the message below and set it on your status on Twitter and Facebook: I just voted for @FrankGruber for #LiHDInsider and you should too here: http://bit.ly/3TnfUB
3. Grab this code (below) and put it one you blog or other sites to help spread the word:

Oh and if I do become a Panasonic Living in HD Insider I get to give away one Lumix G1 SLR camera. So help me make it any you can get a chance to win too. Thanks so much for your help!

Intel Core i7 Processor Launch Event

Monday night I attended the Intel Core i7 Processor launch event at DogPatch Studios in San Francisco which was decked out with LCD monitors powered by some of the new Dell and Gateway machines leveraging the new Core i7 Processor. Experts gamers, developers and video and photo editors were all on hand to show off the power of this new micro-chip architecture. Intel Senor VP, Pat Gelsinger made some announcements at the event which I captured on video and there was a developer code-off putting the new processor to the test at the event.

Strands Offers $100K To Best Recommendations Startup

The Strands, a recommendations company with offices in Virginia, has put a little $100,000 prize to the best recommendation startup. What does that mean? The Strands seek to identify the best early stage project in the area of recommendation technologies, considering the technology, business opportunity and team behind the project. The Winner will be offered an investment of $100,000 from Strands. Winners will be awarded at the upcoming ACM Recommender Systems Conference in Switzerland. If you are interested or maybe you can recommend someone - check out the full contest details.

crowdSPRING Launches To Crowdsource Design

If you are looking to have a new logo, business card, graphic or web site designed you know it is sometimes tough to decide where to get started. crowdSPRING, a Chicago-based crowd sourcing startup, might be a good option as it offers a marketplace for your design projects. Simply create a project and the design community will offer up suggested proposals. You can select the one you like the best and pay the designer a one time fee for the design you decide to choose.

Mashup Open AIM For Cash Prizes

For all you developers out there that like to create mashups, there is currently a developer contest being held with cash prizes called the Open AIM Developers Challenge. All you have to do is create a mashup that leverages the Open AIM APIs and submit it to dev.aol.com. There will be 29 winners with prize allocations from $10K to $500. Scoring is based on a number of criteria but 20 percent is based on usage so the sooner you get a mashup submitted the better your chances are to win.

Strutta Turns Your Home Videos Into A Game

Do you have a particular home video showing off a skill that you think you might be better than anyone at? Strutta, a Vancouver-based startup, has launched into beta to allow you to prove you are the best. Whether your skill is break dancing, playing the harmonica or doing fast food rapping - Strutta creates an avenue for competing on the Web via online video contests.

Playyoo Mobile Gaming Network Launches

Playyoo, a social networking platform for creating and sharing mobile casual games, officially opens its beta doors to the public today. Described by TechCrunch as the "YouTube For Mobile Games," Playyoo (www.playyoo.com or m.playyoo.com on mobile phones) allows anyone to create and submit mobile games to its network. Users can create, share and discover new mobile experiences all via Playyoo.

Playyoo, a privately held company based in London, England, offers game developers a place to create and distribute Adobe Flash Lite mobile games. But you don't have to be a seasoned game developer to create a Playyoo game as it offers integrated game creator tools to enable anyone to develop and publish a mobile game creation.

You Be The VC: Could Get You Funding

Do you have a startup idea but are looking for funding? A couple of weeks ago YouBeTheVC.com launched to offer up a creative "reality funding" approach similar to that of American Idol. YouBeTheVC.com, created by New York-based VC firm Bang Ventures offers aspiring entrepreneurs to compete for a chance at some funding. The top 3 selected companies/product ideas will be given $15,000 living stipend and office space in the Boston area and additional guidance and services.

Company Could Win $50K At TechCrunch20

TechCrunch20, the TechCrunch conference coming up in September, is offering a platform for newly launching companies to present for free in front of an audience of hundreds of press, bloggers venture capitalists and entrepreneurs and potentially win a $50,000 prize. TechCrunch has been assembling an impressive and assorted list of judges which are listed here. Should be a good conference as the winning company/product will walk away a big winner! In addition, there will be other prize announcements and giveaways from conference sponsors. 

Stay tuned to additional updates on the TechCrunch20 blog.

Watch Coders Like A Sporting Event

If action packed coding is your thing, you might want to check out the Top Coder Challenge today. I did a call-out previously for this event. You can actually watch coding just like a sporting event via Webcast live from the Mirage Resort in Las Vegas, coverage will begin Friday, June 29 at 4:00 PM EDT on the AOL Developer Network, dev.aol.com.

So grab some brews, fire up the grill and make a Friday afternoon out of TopCoder Open as they compete for $25,000.

If you are solid front-end web JavaScript developers looking to work on a very cool and high visibility web 2.0 product please shoot me an email with your resume at: frank [at] frankgruber5 dot com.

Calling All Collegiate Coding Rockstars!

Are you a college student, computer programming superstar with dreams of being crowned supreme collegiate programmer of all the land? If so, you might want to sign up for the TopCoder Collegiate Challenge which is set to take place in San Diego on November 17, 2006. The event is being sponsored by AOL as part of the AOL Developer Network. I had a chance to talk to Duke Tunstall who has organized AOL's involvement in the event and he had this to say about the upcoming competition:

"I am really thrilled to be a part of this event.  I was originally a little skeptical about mashing developers with a sporting event, but when it all started to come together, WOW!  The excitement and level of competitiveness that these guys bring is incredible and I have only witnessed it online so far.  I can't wait to be side by side with the finalists in November."

Of course if you cannot make it out to sunny Southern California then be sure to tune into the Webcast which is being produced by AOL. Om Malik also has published his perspective on the competition. Finally, if you are looking for sweet full-time coding gig - AOL is hiring!