Pennsylvania receives $2.2 million for broadband data collection

A $2.2 million federal grant for broadband data and mapping in Pennsylvania will help the state's broadband vision, outlined in a report here by the Rendell Administration (PDF).

A federal grant will fund research into the digital divide and ways to solve it in Pennsylvania.

The National Telecommunication and Information Administration announced Tuesday that Pennsylvania has been awarded a two-year, $1.7 million grant to collection data about broadband adoption, MuniWireless reports. An additional $500,000 will be used for planning a broadband strategy in the state, bringing the total award to $2.2 million.

A spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development, which will handle the funds, was not immediately available for comment.

The NTIA has awarded $97 million to 51 grantees so far and will likely wrap up the remaining grants this quarter. The grants -which will be awarded to each state, the District of Columbia and five territories – are a part of the Obama administration’s strategy to improve broadband adoption in the U.S.

More than $300 million was set aside in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to collect data to better assist the NTIA in distributing $7.2 billion to improve broadband infrastructure, create public computers centers and promote sustainable broadband adoption.

The City of Philadelphia requested $35 million in the NTIA’s first round of broadband investment, as we reported in September. The NTIA has not yet announced which projects will receive funding.

Comcast Roundup: How Comcast could be affecting ‘Late Night,’ Skype has beef 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 Silicon Alley Insider suggests established players like Comcast would never have created innovations like Google so the issue of net neutrality and Comcast’s resulting power needs to be taken seriously.� Comcast EVP David Cohen says the company’s battle with the FCC has more to do with the letter of the law.

The Philadelphia Business Journal’s Peter Key says that battle seems to be going Comcast’s way.

The Atlantic Wire reports that Comcast may have a hand in NBC’s surprise decision to switch Conan O’rien for Jay Leno in the coveted late night spot. H/T Philly Tech News

Below Skype has beef, FCC delays and more.

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Vonage co-founder Pulver introduces 140conf social media meetup, but is it needed?

140conf organizers make introductions at National Mechanics in Old City before founder Jeff Pulver takes the stage.

Updated: 2:19 p.m., Copy error.
Updated: 2:26 p.m., Added final attendance figures.

When Vonage co-founder Jeff Pulver decided to take a closer look at social media last year, it was not without skepticism.

“I wanted to see how much of it was bullshit. But it’s real,” Pulver, dressed in a purple checkered shirt, said to a crowd of more than 50 attendees of Philly’s first 140conf, a new social media meetup, its name a play on Twitter’s character limit.

The quiet, bespectacled Pulver, who organized the first 140conf, a larger, semiannual event held so far in New York, Los Angeles, London and Tel Aviv, told Technically Philly in a pre-event interview that so many folks were making the trip from Philadelphia to New York that he decided to cut their trip. With local help, he introduced a Philly-centric monthly installment of the semiannual conference Tuesday evening.

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Update on passing of Carole I. Smith mayor’s Commission on Technology director

Details on the memorial services for and a scholarship fund on behalf of Carole I. Smith, the executive director of the Mayor’s Commission on Technology who died last Monday, have been announced.

Smith, 67, passed from complications related to pancreatic cancer. She is survived by her daughter Narissa Wallace, who is married with two children.

Supporters can celebrate Smith’s life at a memorial service to be held at 10 a.m. Sat. Jan 23, inside the Community College of Philadelphia’s Bonnell Building auditorium on 17th Street between Callowhill and Spring Garden streets. The internment will be private.

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Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corp. launches brand new VisitPhilly.com

Update here

The Philadelphia region’s most powerful cheerleader will unveil a sleek new Web presence and re-branding effort today.

At a Center City hotel this morning, the primary online home of the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corp. will be recast as VisitPhilly.com, which is dominated by big photos and better integration of other content. This fifth redesign for GPTMC is also their first step away from their 13-year-old GoPhila.com. GoPhila.com now redirects to VisitPhilly.com.

The new design, led by Web design firm Happy Cog East with offices in Center City, features a cleaner navigation with more interactive drop-down bars, a trend in development moving away from the more cluttered, screen-wide top navigation bar the last iteration GPTMC had.

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Orpheus Media Research seeks funding for Clio, music analysis tool

A team of developers located in Old City’s Independents Hall is seeking an initial round of funding for their music composition search engine.

After launching an online pre-alpha beta and graduating from the Wharton Business Development Program late last year, Orpheus Media Research - which is developing Clio, a content-based music search engine – is inviting investors to review its business plan.

The investment would be used to hire developers, protect intellectual property and market and support Clio. The group made the announcement in an e-mail to Technically Philly last week, after it decided that funding was the best next step.

“For a couple weeks there, we had to press pause and figure out what was going to be the most flexible development path,” Founder and Chief Science Officer Dr. Greg Wilder said in a telephone interview.

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Economy League of Greater Philadelphia Turns 100

Click to enlarge.

In 1939, the City of Philadelphia was in a financial pinch. Some were clamoring for the city to privatize its gas works, because natural gas as an energy was in decline and the capital could finally right City Hall’s ship. Of course, there’s a good chance natural gas heats your home today, the city is once again in financial straits and people still talk about privatizing utilities.

That reality is something the Economy League of Greater Philadelphia, the nonpartisan policy nonprofit, seemed to know even then, as it offered a report calling ideas to sell the utility “unwarranted.”

It was one in a century-long history of involvement in public affairs by offering analysis of the region’s issues of the day.

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VC Roundup: BioStrategy primes the pump, SeatGeek gets funded

Welcome to our new weekly round-up, where we’ll parse through venture capital news related to Philadelphia-based private equity firms and the companies they fund. Subscribe to the roundup as an email newsletter. If you have any VC-related news to pass along to us, please: drop us a line.

DEFINITE READS

The fine folks at the Philadelphia Business Journal profile BioStrategy Partners, a biotech incubator. Based in Elkins Park, the nonprofit focuses on first-time business owners and is funded by local universities and medical schools. And, just so you know, someone in the story uses the phrase “prime the pump.”

Another week and another DreamIt Ventures grad gets additional funding. This week it’s SeatGeek’s turn. The company’s founders, if you remember, founded Scribnia, sold it and got working on SeatGeek just before DreamIt’s demo day. The company also demoed at TechCrunch 50.

After the jump, see what firm saw two portfolio companies get additional funding.

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TNT: coIN Loft brings coworking to Wilmington

According to Wes Garnett, Delaware is the only mid-atlantic state that does not have a coworking space.

“It’s not just because no one has started it,” he says, “but because no one has even heard of coworking.”

Much like many Philadelphians, Garnett sees a northern neighbor taking technology talent from his city when there are plenty of reasons to stay home. Though Delaware is well-known as a tax shelter for large corporations, the state hasn’t exactly been rolling out the red carpet for entrepreneurs, something Garnett and his partners hope to change through coIN Loft.

“In 2007, Delaware was ranked 50 out of 50 for attracting entrepreneurs. The next year we jumped to 35,” he says. “Either way we suck.”

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Event Highlights: January 11 – January 17, 2010

Excuse us Philadelphia as we talk ourselves down from the ledge after the thumping that the Cowboys put on the Eagles this weekend.

Lucky for us, we have a whole slew of tech events this week to get our mind off of football and onto our wonderful technology community. For the first time this calendar year, our calendar is packed with events.

Leading off, our city’s first 140 conference packs National Mechanics on Tuesday. Right afterwards, take the El out to Penn for philly.rb’s first meeting of the year. Then, on Wednesday, take advantage of the Free Library’s free small business workshop.

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