Report: Atlantic City government IT outsourcing “inefficient, ineffective”

Atlantic City doesn’t have a single city employee overseeing its IT infrastructure, resulting in “inefficient, ineffective and unsecure processes,” according to a report by the New Jersey state comptroller [PDF].

Since 2006, the city has outsourced its IT functions to Newark’s New Jersey Institute of Technology, paying $2.47 million over 4 years for services covering the city’s networked PCs, servers and desktop support, GovTech reports. The comptroller recommends that hiring two IT staff members could allow “substantial savings and a full-time dedicated staff available on a daily basis to serve all City departments.”

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Thanks to our weekly sponsors

Technically Philly is made possible by advertisers and sponsors that are important to Philadelphia’s technology community. This week we’d like to thank:

Springboard Media – Springboard Media is a certified Apple Specialist and retailer based in Center City and now, in Exton. They’ve got a ton of accessories and a great trade-in program that can score you up to $1,500 when you’re ready to upgrade.

Alex Hillman – IndyHall‘s Alex Hillman has signed on as Technically Philly’s first “Philanthropist” sponsor. Be sure to check out his blog.

Nonprofit Technology Resources – Fairmount-based NTR refurbishes used computers and peripherals for families and individuals in Philadelphia who may not otherwise be able to afford to buy a computer. We urge you to donate to this great local cause.

Chariot Solutions – Long-time Technically Philly advertiser Chariot Solutions is host of the annual Emerging Technology for the Enterprise conference. This month, the developer and training partner is promoting its SpringSource Core Spring 2.5 training course, January 27-29.

Interested in joining these organizations and individuals in supporting Technically Philly? Check out our ad packages and contact Ad Sales Manager Tara Levin. Can’t find something that fits? We’ll customize a package for you.

Friday Q&A: Justin Premick of AWeber can beat you in Call of Duty

Justin Premick of AWeber.

Technically Philly first met Justin Premick of AWeber in December at our first meetup at Nodding Head over a pint of Monkey Knife Fight.

Since then, we’ve had out eye on the growing email marketing company.

The privately held company was founded in August 1998 by Tom Kulzer. Kulzer, a salesman with a programming background, wanted to automate following up with clients by email and began coding software. After a few years, he left his job and bootstrapped AWeber.

The company has since been based at two other local locations before settling on its new digs in Huntington Valley with plans to continue growing.

AWeber’s new office is five times larger than their last (by the way, they’re hiring) and the company is looking to expand on its existing 75,000+ customer base

We talked with Premick about what exactly the company does, why they decided to lay down roots in Huntington Valley and AWeber’s sweet setup for pwning n00bz.

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Twitter tracking Local Trends in Philadelphia, 14 other cities

What was trending in Philadelphia Thursday night on Twitter. Click to enlarge.

Tracking the dominant conversations in Philadelphia’s Twitter communities has gotten quite a bit easier.

As the microblogging rock star announced on its company blog this week, in addition to tracking what phrases, words and hashtags are being most frequently used worldwide at a given time on Twitter, the trends can now be localized to 15 cities, including Philadelphia, or one of six countries.

This gives you the option to see while, yes, last night the top trending item in Philadelphia was stimulating conversation over the meme ‘I’m not the type to…,” the worldwide conversation trended more to “Best Sex songs.”

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AT&T improves Montco 3G coverage with new cell site

AT&T's Montgomery County cellular coverage before the upgrades announced Thursday

AT&T Wireless customers in Montgomery County, rejoice.

The network has announced that it has installed a new 3G cell site that should improve high-speed coverage in Ambler, Fort Washington and Upper Dublin Township, according to a press release. Commuters trekking down Routes 309 and 152 should notice the upgrades as well.

The installation is the latest of six tower upgrades in the county. AT&T says it invested $775 million into infrastructure improvements in Pennsylvania from 2006 to 2008. Though the company makes mention of high-speed HSPA 7.2 technology, available in newer devices like the iPhone 3G, the upgrade still isn’t available in the region. Expect it later this year or in 2011, the company says.

Links: Mobile tech developer Demo Night, Logan gets new IT center and More

DEFINITE READS

• Innovation Philadelphia had help to beat the drum — as we did too — to get Philadelphia profiled by Fast Company magazine in a five-part series on great cities for startups.
• The Inquirer’s Mike Armstrong reports on ten local mobile tech developers who presented at Mobile Monday‘s Demo Night.

Below, car show tech highlights, our best story of the week and more.

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Photos from our January Technology Networking Happy Hour

Our second monthly meetup was a success, and now photos of the event have surfaced. Event Organizer Brett Silver of Center City Philadelphia was on-hand to shoot photos of the evening, and we can’t say they could have turned out any better. Look at all the pretty people!

More of the shots are available at the Center City Philadelphia event page.

Spot any buddies? Let ‘em know, or drop their names in the comments. And stay tuned for more information about our February meetup.

Comcast Roundup: Comcast knew about Leno’s ratings, NBC deal a “probably” and More

Every Thursday morning at 8:30 a.m. EST, find all the stories you need to know about your friendly telecommunications giant in the Comcast Roundup. Get an e-mail subscription for our Comcast news updates.

DEFINITE READS

• The Philadelphia Business Journal reports that Comcast-Spectacor will buy ticketing company Paciolan, which Ticketmaster has to spin off to win approval from the U.S. Justice Department for its merger with Live Nation.
• Reuters reports that Sen. John Kerry, chairman of the U.S. Senate’s communications and technology subcommittee, said oversight of the Comcast-NBC deal can “probably” be resolved.
• Bloomberg reports that NBC had warned Comcast in November that Jay Leno’s ratings were hurting local stations, a major factor in the controversy surrounding moving Leno and releasing Conan O’Brien. H/T Philly Tech News

After the jump, what Comcast would trade for SportsNet, notes from the State of the Net speech and More.

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Startup Roundup: Venmo public and proud at Mobile Monday, LTL gets Garbage Pail Kids, RedLasso will beat us up

Introducing Technically Philly’s Startup Roundup. Here, we’ll parse out the small pieces that make our greater Startup ecosystem thrive. We want to keep you in touch with the innovations that we can’t quite get to covering, but that deserve highlight. If you’ve got news to share, get in touch. Several of the tips in this week’s roundups resulted from a quick email to TP. Without further ado….

DEFINITE READS

Venmo, a young mobile payment startup based in University City received top honors at Mobile Monday Demo Night, after attendees used the service during a five-minute presentation to donate to a Haiti relief organization. Six-hundred dollars were donated in three minutes, adding to the $15,000 that Venmo says it has already raised for the disaster. It will be interesting to watch how Venmo continues to grow, considering XIPWIRE‘s competitive platform and business model, also based in the region.

PlaySay, a mobile language-learning flash-card platform was awarded third place at Demo Night. In an email to Technically Philly, founder Ryan Meinzer says the organization has grown to more than 4,000 users. We’re not sure at the moment how that compares to our report that the company had sold 3,000 products by July of last year.

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Shop Talk: Proton Media thinks your workflow is better in 3D

A screengrab of Protosphere, the company's flagship product.

If you work at a large corporation and think your job sucks, Proton Media CEO Ron Burns sympathizes with you.

“Most people spend their lives in front of their inbox,” he says. “The lives of the workers of these large organization can be rather inhumane.”

Proton Media, based in Landsdale, has been fighting inbox-based workflows through its Second Life-style software that acts as a meeting room for large companies. The software helps companies facilitate collaboration and cut down on unnecessary travel expenses. Specifically, life sciences and gas companies.

“Their entire workflow has revolved around files and folders. Not humans,” he says.

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