Wednesday, May 15th, 5:30 – 8pm
AS220, 115 Empire Street, Providence, RI
FREE (buy your own food and drink – it’s cheap)
RSVP at Facebook

For the May Geek Dinner, we may have the perfect Providence startup story!

When his 2-year-old son was diagnosed with diabetes, former jewelry industry executive Angelo Pitassi Jr. started learning about medical alert bracelets. He was unimpressed to say the least. In short order, Angelo partnered with technologist Christopher Melo, and HealthID was born.

Today the Jewelry District-based startup is poised at the intersection of the jewelry business and healthcare technology, and is accepting pre-orders for its first product — HealthID Profile (or “HIP”) Bands. HIP enables first responders to pull up critical, in-depth, current health information from NFC-based bands onto a web/mobile interface. The wearer can also manage all aspects of their personal health scenario while on the go.

On Wednesday, the Co-Founders CEO Angelo Pitassi Jr. and CTO Christopher Melo will tell the HealthID story, demonstrate their HIP product and give a sneak peek of where they’re headed next.

Please RSVP at Facebook – and while you’re there please like our Facebook page. And if you want to join our very-low-volume email announcement send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin@gmail.com with your name and affiliation.

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:

• The event itself is FREE! Beverages and food are for sale at AS220’s excellent bar and restaurant.
• Doors open at 5:30pm. Socializing, eating and drinking up until the 30 min presentation/q&a around 6:30pm. Afterwards, back to socializing, eating, drinking…
• It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and take off whenever! And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good – it’s actually great)
• Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.
• There is Wi-Fi so bring your connected device of choice.

At the April 2013 Providence Geeks, we were joined by Elie Schoppik (CEO) and Andrew Sohn (CTO) of Knowyo, fresh off their win for Best Presentation at the LAUNCH Conference in San Francisco. We caught up with them after their talk to get a summary of what they are building. [Video link]

Wednesday, April 17th, 5:30 – 8pm
AS220, 115 Empire Street, Providence, RI
FREE (buy your own food and drink – it’s cheap)
RSVP at Facebook

Spring is here! Come celebrate its arrival this Wednesday at the April Providence Geeks Dinner!

The evening will feature Providence-based startup Knowyo, fresh off their win (“Best Presentation”) at last month’s LAUNCH Conference in San Francisco.

Knowyo will help you to never forget a name again. Their web and mobile-based adaptive learning platform integrates with LinkedIn (and soon corporate social networks like Yammer) to enable you to quickly and enjoyably learn the names and faces of the people you need to know.

At this Wednesday’s Geek Dinner, Co-Founders CEO Elie Schoppik and CTO Andrew Sohn will tell their startup’s story, demo Knowyo, and give a sneak peek of what’s coming next.

DISCLOSURE: I’m a Partner in the Betaspring accelerator, where we’re proud to call Knowyo an alumnus.

Please RSVP at Facebook – and while you’re there please like our Facebook page. And if you want to join our very-low-volume email announcement send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin@gmail.com with your name and affiliation.

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:

• The event itself is FREE! Beverages and food are for sale at AS220’s excellent bar and restaurant.
• Doors open at 5:30pm. Socializing, eating and drinking up until the 30 min presentation/q&a around 6:30pm. Afterwards, back to socializing, eating, drinking…
• It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and take off whenever! And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good – it’s actually great)
• Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.
• There is Wi-Fi so bring your connected device of choice.

Wednesday, March 13th, 5:30 – 8pm
AS220, 115 Empire Street, Providence, RI
FREE (buy your own food and drink – it’s cheap)
RSVP at Facebook

The March Geek Dinner will feature a particularly exciting, inspiring story of a local teacher turned entrepreneur.

In 2004, elementary school computer teacher, Alan Tortolani, frustrated with the lack of good educational games for kids, started making his own.

Over the past decade Alan has grown Providence-based ABCya.com into an award-winning educational juggernaut with over 175 online games and several best-selling mobile apps. He has bootstrapped ABCya.com to significant profitability with over 1 million app downloads to date and nearly 100 million visits totalling over 1 billion pageviews annually.

At the March Geek Dinner on Wednesday, Alan will tell the ABCya.com story, demo some of its games, and give a sneak peek into where he’s taking this online educational empire next.

Please RSVP at Facebook – and while you’re there please like our Facebook page. And if you want to join our very-low-volume email announcement send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin@gmail.com with your name and affiliation.

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:

• The event itself is FREE! Beverages and food are for sale at AS220’s excellent bar and restaurant.
• Doors open at 5:30pm. Socializing, eating and drinking up until the 30 min presentation/q&a around 6:30pm. Afterwards, back to socializing, eating, drinking…
• It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and take off whenever! And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good – it’s actually great)
• Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.
• There is Wi-Fi so bring your connected device of choice.

At the February 2013 Geek Dinner, Crunchbutton Chief Eater told the Crunchbutton story, demoed their service, and talked about where this promising startup is headed next. [Video link]

Wednesday, February 20th, 2012, 5:30 – 8pm
AS220, 115 Empire Street, Providence, RI
FREE (buy your own food and drink – it’s cheap)
RSVP at Facebook

The February Geek Dinner will feature Crunchbutton, who may well have the greatest tagline/value proposition ever: Push a Button. Get food.

Started in a Yale dorm room, Crunchbutton was born of the founders’ desire to make ordering their favorite local sandwich – the Wenzel – as simple as possible.

Now headquartered in Providence, Crunchbutton today facilitates ordering from dozens of restaurants in Providence, New Haven, and Washington, DC (yes, there’s a college town theme here), and has big plans for further expansion.

On Wednesday, Co-Founders Judd Rosenblatt, David Klumpp and Devin Smith will tell the Crunchbutton story, demo their service, and talk about where this promising startup is headed next.

Disclosure: Crunchbutton is an alumnus of the Betaspring startup accelerator, where I am a Partner.

Please RSVP at Facebook – and while you’re there please like our Facebook page. And if you want to join our very-low-volume email announcement send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin@gmail.com with your name and affiliation.

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:

• The event itself is FREE! Beverages and food are for sale at AS220’s excellent bar and restaurant.
• Doors open at 5:30pm. Socializing, eating and drinking up until the 30 min presentation/q&a around 6:30pm. Afterwards, back to socializing, eating, drinking…
• It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and take off whenever! And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good – it’s actually great)
• Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.
• There is Wi-Fi so bring your connected device of choice.

Wednesday, January 16th, 2012, 5:30 – 8pm
AS220, 115 Empire Street, Providence, RI
FREE (buy your own food and drink – it’s cheap)
RSVP at Facebook

We’re kicking 2013 off with another awesome Geek Dinner!

We hear near daily about the frustrations (nightmares?) patients face in navigating our convoluted healthcare system. What we don’t hear about are the challenges that healthcare providers – the doctors, nurses, and other clinicians – face in providing better patient care. The pain is especially acute around how providers communicate and collaborate with one another.

That’s where Providence-based startup Care Thread comes in.

Care Thread has built an innovative set of real-time mobile tools to empower providers to better collaborate, resulting in better care for their patients.

At next week’s January Geek Dinner, fresh off their announcement of Slater’s $250K investment into Care Thread, CEO & MD Scott Guelich and CTO (and healthcare IT industry veteran) Andrew Shearer (@ashearer) will share the challenges healthcare providers face every day, and show how Care Thread’s mobile & web apps improve both provider and patient experiences.

Disclosure: Care Thread is an alumnus of the Betaspring startup accelerator, where I am a Partner.

Please RSVP at Facebook – and while you’re there please join our Facebook group. And if you want to join our very-low-volume email announcement send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin@gmail.com with your name and affiliation.

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:

• The event itself is FREE! Beverages and food are for sale at AS220’s excellent bar and restaurant.
• Doors open at 5:30pm. Socializing, eating and drinking up until the 30 min presentation/q&a around 6:30pm. Afterwards, back to socializing, eating, drinking…
• It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and take off whenever! And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good – it’s actually great)
• Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.
• There is Wi-Fi so bring your connected device of choice.

At the December 2012 Geek Dinner, VCharge Chief Science Officer (and MIT PhD) Jessica Millar and CFO (and Harvard B-School prof) George Baker told the VCharge story, demoed their SmartBricks control technology, and gave a sneak peek at where this exciting startup is headed next. [Video link]

Wednesday, December 12th, 2012, 5:30 – 8pm
AS220, 115 Empire Street, Providence, RI
FREE (buy your own food and drink – it’s cheap)
RSVP at Facebook

Providence Geeks returns this coming Wednesday, the auspicious date of 12/12/12! And we’ve got a great evening planned starring Providence-based startup VCharge.

VCharge is innovating at the intersection of the information technology and energy industries. They are solving the problem of integrating renewable energy sources like wind and solar into the electric grid using a market-based approach. Their software and hardware controls enable distributed generation, storage, and load like electric cars, thermal storage heaters, and commercial refrigeration to respond dynamically to grid conditions and improve overall system efficiency.

The commercial rollout of its SmartBricks product is underway, and VCharge is controlling residential heating systems using the homes’ existing broadband connection to lower monthly heating costs and balance the grid. The company has installations in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Maine, and they’re just getting started, eyeing projects in Ireland and Germany as well as right here in RI.

At Wednesday’s Geek Dinner VCharge CTO (and MIT PhD) Jessica Millar CEO (and Harvard B-School prof) George Baker will tell the VCharge story, demo the SmartBricks control technology, and give a sneak peek at where this exciting startup is headed next.

Please RSVP at Facebook – and while you’re there please join our Facebook group. And if you want to join our very-low-volume email announcement send an email to Jack Templin, jtemplin@gmail.com with your name and affiliation.

As always, for first-timers here are the details on the Geek Dinners:

• The event itself is FREE! Beverages and food are for sale at AS220’s excellent bar and restaurant.
• Doors open at 5:30pm. Socializing, eating and drinking up until the 30 min presentation/q&a around 6:30pm. Afterwards, back to socializing, eating, drinking…
• It’s totally casual. Wear whatever, bring whoever, arrive and take off whenever! And don’t worry about eating or not – come famished or full – eating is optional, and frankly, the least of the festivities (that’s not say the food isn’t good – it’s actually great)
• Topics of conversation will vary as they will at any gathering of geeks, but many of us will be talking about AJAX, mash-ups, start-ups, new devices, innovative business models, interaction design, social computing, digital art, web services, etc. etc. etc.
• There is Wi-Fi so bring your connected device of choice.

Now for the good news: Geek Dinner returns 12/12/12!  Ooh, that sounds auspicious. Please save the date, and stay tuned!

Finally, here are a couple of terrific local Geek events to tide you over this ths week:

• Wednesday — Introduction To 3D Printer Building
• Thursday — MAKE International 3D Printing Meetup