eCoast loses one of its own; R.I.P. Jeff Beauregard

Sad news to report today. Jeff Beauregard, a Portsmouth technology sales executive and well-known face around town, took his own life Tuesday night. The obituary ran in today's paper. He was most recently with GreenPages; here's Jeff's LinkedIn profile. Condolences are pouring in on his MySpace and Facebook pages, as well as his online guestbook. He was just 28 years old.

I knew Jeff through my girlfriend when she worked with him at DesktopStandard, a Portsmouth shop that was bought by Microsoft a couple years ago. I didn't know him very well, but we hung out a few times after work at the local watering holes. I'll never forget how he had my back in a near altercation at Poco's one night. He was just a real, solid, stand-up kind of guy... Very outgoing, gregarious, funny... Which makes this so hard to understand.

I won't be able to attend his event tomorrow at RedHook so this is my memorial to him. R.I.P. Jeff. I hope you found the peace you were missing in life.

Meanwhile, I was reminded that I had just seen this in the paper a few days ago:

Thursday, September 11, 2008
PORTSMOUTH — Support the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention by participating in the Portsmouth Out of the Darkness Community Walk on September 27th in Portsmouth's Peirce Island. Proceeds will benefit local and national suicide prevention and awareness programs. Registration will be held at Peirce Island near the Portsmouth Outdoor Pool at 9:00 am The walk will begin promptly at 10:00 am. To register, donate or to learn more, please log on to www.outofthedarkness.org.

Deal Flow? Deal Slow.

Flipping through the new issue of Mass High Tech, my eye is always grabbed by any reference to New Hampshire, because, let's face it, it's an infrequent occurrence. This week, MHT correspondent Christopher Calnan covers the dismal state of business investment overall, and focusses on some initiatives here in the Granite State hoping to ameliorate the situation.

In his piece, "N.H. Angels Respond as Deals Slow," you can learn about the growing number of angel investment groups in NH. I find it interesting to see that the SBDC is getting more involved in funding -- good idea, as they have first-hand knowledge of and access to the best small startup opportunities.

Note: eCoast Angels were not quoted in the story but are mentioned in the sidebar of the dead-tree version. And somehow, inexplicably, old pal Jeff Sohl was not quoted, although his Center for Venture Research was mentioned.

In a related editorial "NH, Maine Get Lost in Hub's Glare," the MHT editors opine: Perhaps the time has come for state funding agencies — and the angel investors working behind the scenes — to come together across state borders for the regional good. You mean, like this? At the very least, that network might be a good place to start the conversation.

Fast is as Fast Does

OK, maybe they're not quite as fast as an Olympic sprinter named Bolt, but congratulations to my friends and colleagues at Single Digits - they've been named to the Inc. 500 list of fastest growing private companies! The company is ranked 215th in the country, showing four-year revenue growth of 1,176.4% from 2003 through 2007. Way to go Steve, Bob, and the rest of the SD team!

Other NH companies of note that will appear in the September issue of Inc. include SilverTech, NitroSecurity, Ektron, and eCoast Sales Solutions. If you can't wait for the magazine, The Union Leader has the whole scoop here.

Buy Local, Cruise Local

Kudos to SeacoastLocal, Portsmouth's BuyLocal group, for organizing a business networking cruise onboard the MV Thomas Laighton. Personally, I'm excited about it, because it fills the gaping gap created by the demise of the eCruise, which had been the can't-miss local networking event so far this century... until the Chamber effectively abandoned it this year. (Although a quick check of the eCoast section of their web site shows they still plan to have eBrews starting next month. Hmm...) Anyway, this new free event is an opportunity for owners of locally owned, independent businesses to celebrate a successful first year of SeacoastLocal.

SeacoastLocal's mission is laudable, and the main sponsors are two of my favorite local businesses: River Run Bookstore and Piscataqua Savings Bank. Piscataqua, BTW, has a great new web site, as of like 2 days ago, designed by an under-the-radar local development firm called Lightfin Studios.

Event Scoop: Tuesday, Aug. 19, 6-8:30PM. (Boat leaves @ 6:25PM sharp.) More event details here. RSVP before tomorrow, Aug. 12, to Mollie Mulligan at SeacoastLocal@gmail.com
with your name, the name of your company and number of years in business on the Seacoast. If you're local, you should check it out.

PortsTube

I thought this was a really neat piece of local reporting on the use of technology in our home town, well deserving of a link and some props: Spotlight cover story: Portsmouth on YouTube; City and Seacoast presented to the world in variety of videos by Amanda Hamilton. It's a beginner's intro to YouTube, but it also highlights some interesting and unique uses for the site, from selling homes to keeping in touch with your family after a divorce. The article then links to 5 cool videos that I wouldn't have seen otherwise. Ironically, I first read the article in print, which made click-throughs a little difficult. But for you, since you're online already, here's the links!

Free Hugs in Portsmouth

Scuba Diving at the Isles of Shoals

2007 Portsmouth Fireworks

Water Slides at Water Country

(Shark) Fishing in Portsmouth

Dancin' in the Streets

And here's a bonus for you, my loyal readers... Our own YouTube video sensation: Herbert the Wonder Turtle! My girlfriend found this tiny newborn snapping turtle in a parking lot last year and we nursed him back to health and adopted him. This is his Internet video debut... Yet another use for this wonderful $1.65 billion technology!

Nashua Wi-Fi on NECN

Good piece here on NECN by Lauren Collins on the Nashua Wi-Fi launch last week. I like how she uses my favorite term "dowsing for signal!" From a muni wi-fi admin perspective, I like the idea of making the users go pick up a password in the local shops, but as a user, I'd find it at least mildly annoying. (I was in the Portsmouth library last week and was frustrated to realize that after I had gotten myself comfortable upstairs with my book and my laptop, the network log-in screen told me to back downstairs to the front desk for the password.) Also, I really dig the street signs in Nashua. Note to self: We need those here in Portsmouth.

Finally, it's very refreshing to see the media cover a wi-fi installation with a positive or neutral bias on its own merits, instead of bringing up old nay-saying arguments or invoking the demise of Earthlink.

Nashua Wi-Fi Up

As noted below, the much-anticipated launch of Nashua's wi-fi has been well, much anticipated, due to various delays. My follow-up inquiry to the Telegraph Weds night about the project status was met a front-page story the next morning: Downtown Wi-Fi up and running, sort of. I love the article and the comments below it -- all the same old tired arguments! I'm sure one easily predict the reactions in every place that tries to put wi-fi in their downtowns, because they're always the same. What's more, they seem to break along political lines, with Republicans typically arguing ("infringing free markets," "wasting tax dollars," etc.), despite the evidence that wi-fi is an effective economic development tool for small businesses, and despite the fact that the US is far behind in broadband deployment. Anyway, good luck to the Nashua Chamber and its partners in this; we'll be watching and rooting for you from Portsmouth.

Portsmouth's Got Buzz

As I noted in my 15 Seconds of Fame post, our fair city has been getting more than its fair share of attention lately. You could say Portsmouth's got buzz.

Now, Outside Magazine has ranked us the #4 city in the country. NECN sent a reporter to check us out and somehow the poor thing didn't get to Annabelle's for ice cream. Let's go to the video:


Meanwhile, Newsday tagged us as well worth the 5-hour drive from Long Island. They even gave us props for our free wireless Internet. (Thanks for noticing!)

We might even qualify for the full 15 minutes if this keeps up!

3rd of July Fireworks Delayed...

...Til the 5th of July!

During the eBrew last night, I was online adding people to my eCoast Facebook group when I received this e-mail:

The City of Portsmouth Community Newsletter SPECIAL REPORT July 3, 2008

FIREWORKS POSTPONED
The City’s annual fireworks display scheduled tonight (Thursday, July 3) has been
postponed until Saturday (July 5) at 9:15 p.m.

Due to the rescheduled fireworks display, the Dog Park will be closed from 6 a.m.
Saturday until 10 a.m. Sunday. The tennis and basketball courts, playground and
baseball areas will close by noon Saturday. The High-Hanover Parking Garage will
charge a flat $3 fee from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday. For more information, see
www.CityofPortsmouth.com.

So, yep, anything to avoid the unacceptable ignominy of celebrating the 4th of July on, you know, the 4th!

Anyway, Happy 232nd Birthday America.

Concert for a Cure

Congrats to old pal Katie Paine on another successful iteration of Concert for a Cure, the annual cancer awareness concert at RedHook Brewery held this past Saturday. The event garnered big coverage in both local dailies: Herald and Fosters. Unfortunately, the old saw of "any publicity is good publicity, just as long as they spell my name right" doesn't apply to the Foster's piece.

Portsmouth's 15 Seconds of Fame

A friend told me a few weeks ago that Samantha Brown from the Travel Channel was in town recently filming for an upcoming segment that would include Portsmouth. Allergic to flying as I am, I'm not a big Travel Channel viewer, and I was afraid I'd miss it. But then there's this Internet thing; a Facebook buddy posted a link for it today.

Here's the video. Portsmouth gets mentioned at 2:09 in and goes to 2:40. (So it's 31 seconds, not 15. But in my title I wanted to play off the Andy Warhol thing, math be damned!)



Obviously this is picking up off the Distinctive Destinations designation Portsmouth received a while back. It also doesn't hurt that Samantha has roots here in NH.

Impeachment on the House Floor but not the Front Page

As a PR practitioner for nearly a decade, and as a voracious news hound my whole life (somewhere there's a picture of me reading the newspaper at age 7), I'm constantly fascinated by what makes the news and what doesn't. Today, I'm less fascinated and more saddened.

Last night, one congressman stood on the mostly-empty floor of the House of Representatives and read aloud 35 articles of impeachment of George W. Bush. He read for something on the order of 3 hours, pausing only to take an occasional sip of water as his words echoed and hung in the chamber. Taken in total, the articles are well-reasoned, detailed, annotated, and devastating.

And yet, the next morning, one must dig and dig hard to find any media coverage of the story online. The AP and Reuters broke the story as it happened, but then a funny thing happened, or didn't happen. The story failed to propagate.

These articles are a scathing indictment of a sitting president, highlighting the hubris and the incompetence that has pockmarked the past 7 years. From ignoring Richard Clarke's warnings of the impending 9/11 attacks, to grossly overstating Iraq's threat of WMDs, to awarding back-room billion-dollar no-bid contracts to Halliburton and Blackwater to operate above the law, to bungling the Hurricane Katrina response, to documented voter fraud and disenfranchisement, to firing US Attorneys for political reasons (and covering it up with "executive privilege"), to outing a covert CIA agent for political reasons (and covering it up with "executive privilege"), to the endorsement of torture and holding prisoners against the Geneva Convention and international law, to the systematic unconstitutional spying on Americans' phone calls and e-mails in ways that would make McCarthy blush, these articles of impeachment were ticked off eloquently and simply.

*Nota bene: None of the above is to say Mr. Bush is guilty of anything. He's innocent until proven guilty, of course. If guilty of any one of the 35 accusations, the president could be impeached. But to determine guilt, Congress must investigate, which is what the impeachment articles are asking to do. And to those who say Congress has "better things to do," I say what could be more important than maintaining the balance of powers our Founding Fathers held so dear and upholding the laws of the United States Constitution?

But regardless of the merits of the impeachment articles or of Mr. Bush's guilt or innocence, I am more concerned about the media's lack of response to them. If standing on the floor of Congress and calling for the removal of a sitting president doesn't rate as front page news -- and to most of the mainstream media outlets, it doesn't rate as any kind of news -- it makes one wonder. If they were baseless claims made in a reckless manner, would that constitute news? If they alleged sordid sexual dalliances of elected officials, would that constitute news? If they were delivered by someone taller or better looking, would that constitute news?

If the articles of impeachment were a vinyl LP record, the 35 tunes would read like the back of "Bush's Greatest Hits." Taken individually, each of these songs received tons of airplay. So why isn't the compilation album racing up the charts with a bullet? Because it's "old news?" Not with last week's Senate Intelligence Committee Report being issued, or with former White House Spokesperson Scott McClellan's book being released. In fact, at the same time the impeachment articles were presented, it was reported that McClellan will appear before the House Judiciary Committee to answer questions about the Valerie Plame case. So current, relevant news hooks certainly do exist.

Obviously, the media is betting on this being a "non-story," i.e., insofar as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says impeachment is "off the table," the proceedings won't proceed. But polls like this one show that the public is in favor of impeachment proceedings.

As I wrote this, a blog was just posted on USAToday that links to the PDF of the impeachment document, so now you can read it for yourself. But USAToday -- the newspaper and the "official" web site -- continues to offer no coverage of this historic event. Turn on the TV, and it's not even an item in the news crawler on CNN.

So what can we do about it?

1. Blog it. Buzz it up on Yahoo. Digg it. Share it on Facebook. Rate it up on YouTube. If the mainstream media won't report the news, then use our social media networks to spread the word.

2. Support independent and alternative media outlets by advertising and subscribing. Here in Portsmouth we've got the Wire and the grand-daddy of them all, the NH Gazette. (You know this will be front page news for their next issue!)

3. And while most of us don't feel comfortable calling our congresspersons, why not try your local paper. Ask them directly to cover the stories you feel are important.

Hubba-hubba!

Only $199?!

3G and Wi-Fi?!

Pant, pant, pant!

Drool, drool, drool!

Nashua Wi-Fi Up July 4?

Very interesting, in-depth, and somewhat contentious article in the Nashua Telegraph here on Nashua's troubles getting its wi-fi project up and running. There's some good old-fashioned finger-pointing going on, since the launch has been delayed several times already, and they've given themselves another hard deadline of July 4th. "Our reputations are on the line," says Nashua Chamber of Commerce President Chris Williams. Talk about backing yourself into a corner! Then old friend Bob Goldstein from SingleDigits has some pointed things to say about how the project has been handled, or mishandled, so far.

To e-Brew or Not to e-Brew

There was no e-Brew last night.

Or was there?

Stay tuned.

;-)

Dover's Wi-Fi Moving Forward

Once again, flying in the face of such wicked media-driven wi-fi flame-outs as Philadelphia and San Francisco, we are seeing that smaller cities are fulfilling the promise of municipal wireless Internet. And they're showing it's not that hard.

Yesterday's Foster's reported that the Dover NH City Council OK'd the plan to install wi-fi access points throughout the main downtown corridor. All it took was this:

1. Last year, Dover Main Street and Dover Chamber of Commerce applied for, and received, a $10,000 from the state Dept of Economic Development.

2. In December, Dover negotiated another $25,000 from Comcast when they re-upped their Cable Franchise Renewal Agreement. This is smart for both sides. Comcast has essentially a monopoly, so why not give a little back to the city? Gains a lot of good will, and since they offer Internet services, it's mission-centric to boot. Meanwhile, the city is well within its rights to ask for a little something in return for the franchise. It's your prototypical win-win.

3. Dover ponies up $30,000 of its own. This, too, is key. Many cities go too far one way or the other -- either they expect someone to come in and give them the wi-fi for free, or they try to buy and own the whole thing. Dover's approach is very reasonable. Take a little from the state, a little from private enterprise, and give a little out of the tax rolls. So to review: Multiple revenue streams + multiple stakeholders = wi-fi success story.

Meanwhile, stay tuned for big news on our eCoast Wi-Fi Project ongoing in Portsmouth!

Addendum: This just in! Today's Portsmouth Herald: City expands free wireless Internet access.

Sex and the City... of Portsmouth!

In today's Portsmouth Herald, Rachel Forrest features my old pal Dave Cummins, star of stage and screen! In one scene in the new Sex and the City feature film, we find Mr. Cummins sitting at the head table with stars Kim Cattrall, Chris Noth ("Big"), and Sarah Jessica Parker. (But Dave, where's Kristin Davis? She's my favorite! For obvious reasons...)

In a related story, local businesses are also trying to get into the act, but only David makes the scene for real!

"Sex and the City: The Movie" will be in theaters tomorrow. In fact, unless I'm reading this wrong, you can catch it at the Fox Run Regal Cinema at midnight tonight?!

Even better, Rotten Tomatoes has it at 65% fresh!

Bike to Work Day!

It's tomorrow! Now, I don't want to hear any excuses, cuz I'm doing it, too! My six-mile commute is no endurance run, and it's no cake walk, either. But it makes sense on so many levels: reducing my carbon footprint... saving the gas $... cleaning out my genetically-blocked arteries... sssallgood. ;-)

Skate over to the SABR site linked above and register for the free bagel at checkpoints around the Seacoast. Mmmm... Carboload!

I'll post a pic here of me on my bike as proof that I did it, and I challenge you all to do the same in the comments.

(Oh yah, but if it rains, screw my carbon footprint, I'm out!)

Big Apple Comes to Boston

We've had an Apple Store (or as I like to call it, "Mecca") in Tax-Free-Salem-New-Hamsphire (as the advertisers like to call it) for many years. Now the company is opening a store in Boston. It's big news for sure: Front page of the Sunday Boston Globe's Business section this past weekend and its sparked an active discussion thread on Boston.com.

Big kudos to the Apple marketing group who came up with this Red Sox themed signage. Creating an homage to Fenway Park's Green Monster to hide the construction is a stroke of genius. And for Apple, the branding king of the world, to play off the Sox demonstrates just how powerful the Red Sox brand has become.

Incidentally, Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) is also opening a store in Maine this year, although in their typical AppleSecret M.O., they won't say when or where. The Portland Press-Herald reports it could negatively impact those independent Apple Authorized Resellers who had been holding down the fort. It's certainly a concern, but I tend to see it as a "rising tide lifting all boats" situation.

For instance, I bought a new laptop battery -- for the MacBook on which I'm typing now -- from a local independent shop called MacEdge. They're in the Bowl-a-Rama plaza on Rt.1 South, just a couple miles from my house, whereas Mecca is a solid 40 miles to the West. With gas prices these days, the more Macs are sold (be it at Apple retail stores, BestBuy, online, or through resellers), the more demand there'll be for local service centers for repairs, peripherals, et cetera.

I note that Michael Oh, who operates Tech Superpowers on all-too-near Newbury Street, is using the Apple Store's arrival to refocus his operations toward professional and business accounts, smartly ceding retail consumers to Apple corporate. And yes, as a true Apple geek, he's ramped up about the new store, too, even if might be competition: Check out the "Birth of an Apple Store" blog featuring his way-cool webcam chronicling the construction.

Most importantly, I wonder if I could get to Boston on Thursday night in time to get one of those free opening day t-shirts?

Local Boy Still Making Good

Old pal Dave Cummins has scored again! Here's the latest posting from his Facebook page:

David J Cummins (New York, NY) wrote
at 1:47pm on May 10th, 2008

If you are reading this and it is Tuesday May 13th...tune in to As The World Turns on CBS at 2pm EDT...or go online to cbs.com and see it at 6pm EDT. Look for me in the background during the outdoor cafe scene shot at The Boathouse in Central Park...I think I may be right on camera...but alas...no speaking this time...but good things are coming...tune in soon for some big news.