Azavea debuts free subscription plan for legislative district, elected official search API

Fresh off a name change, GIS software firm Azavea, formerly Avencia, has launched a free subscription plan for Cicero, its much-touted legislative district and elected official search API.

The plan offers users 1,000 monthly credits toward “any coordinate-based legislative district matching, elected official data lookups and/or map web service requests,” according to a release [PDF].

The company release leans heavily on suggesting the ‘Cicero Free‘ plan is for more limited organizations that want to add legislative data to their Web sites or online applications. The recently released Our Philadelphia platform, which was built by Common Cause Pennsylvania to track money in local politics, used a beta version of the free plan.

Play with it the free API here.

FCC plans to increase Internet speeds in national broadband plan

In partnership with Temple University’s Multimedia Urban Reporting Lab, the university’s capstone journalism class, students Chelsea Leposa and Jared Pass will cover neighborhood technology issues for Technically Philly and Philadelphia Neighborhoods through May.

The Federal Communications Commission will push on telecommunication companies to make the Internet 25 times faster through its National Broadband Plan.

One of the major goals of the unprecedented agenda is to provide broadband access to all Americans. The plan also intends to provide 100 million American homes with 100Mbps (megabits per second) broadband service in 10 years. The current average household Internet connection speed is 4Mbps.

“This is very possible,” said Justin Shi, an associate professor and associate chair at Temple University’s College of Science and Technology. This advancement in communication technology will eventually change social and economic systems, Shi says. The seemingly large feat of increasing Internet speeds by 25 times can be accomplished by improving the current packet-switching system used for the Internet.

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Technically Philly offering tech insight for Philadelphia magazine’s Philly Post

Please give a warm welcome to our new readers.

Yesterday, by way of a link, we forged an informal partnership with Philadelphia magazine‘s new Philly Post daily news blog. From here, we’ll be offering our insight on Philadelphia technology to a broader audience of tech-interested individuals, first hinted at last week. As is true of so much of our effort, this is yet another opportunity to voice the triumphs and concerns of the community to a broader audience in the city and beyond.

I’ll be writing as Philly Mag’s online tech columnist, offering a fresh and often more in-depth and behind-the-scenes look at the goings-on of Technically Philly’s daily news. For those of you who have been following along regularly, the weekly column at Philly Post will be a different taste of what you already likely read between the lines in our news entries. For those just joining us, we hope you’ll enjoy the breadth of technology content that we’re humbly able to offer here.

Be sure to check out the first column, on the City of Philadelphia’s pitch for Google ultra-high speed Internet, at Philly Post.

Movitas Mobile plans to raise $2.7 million

According to recent SEC filings Movitas,recent acquirer of PhindMeMobile, is in the midst of raising $2.7 million in funding. According to documents, filed yesterday, the company has raised $700,000 thus far.

The Collegeville-based company specializes in mobile marketing for the hospitality industry and other location-based businesses and events.

No venture capital firm appears to be associated with the funding round.

In an email to Technically Philly, Movitas spokesperson Suzanne Harris declined to comment.

VC Roundup: Quaker gets aroused, Safeguard swaps debt

Welcome to the VC 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

As we tweeted yesterday, Fast Company interviewed Josh Kopelman about why people should start a company in Philly. In the interview Kopelman points to local universities and the low cost of living as prime reasons people should set up shop here. The article came after the local community lobbied the magazine to be included in its series.

According to a press release, Quaker BioVentures has teamed up with a student-run VC firm to invest in Semprae Laboratories. The company makes “arousal” oils. Yes, we’re serious.

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Philly invades South by Southwest

Indy Hall founders Alex Hillman and Geoff DiMasi lead "How Geeks Grabbed Philadelphia by the Balls."

AUSTIN – In the Courtyard Rio Grande Hotel, just across the street from the Austin Convention Center, BarCamp Philly organizers Roz Duffy and Kelani Nichole walked up the escalator with a burlap sack and hustled down the hall.

“It’s our bag of balls,” said Duffy with a smile.

Culminating Philly’s strong presence here (TP has seen our share of Phillies caps and jerseys) was the Saturday session “How Geeks Grabbed Philadelphia by the Balls,” a panel led by Indy Hall co-founders Alex Hillman and Geoff DiMasi that aimed to help residents from other cities foster a tech community.

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Comcast SportsNet purchases sports blog The700level

Comcast SportsNet has purchased The700level.com for an undisclosed sum, the popular sports blog announced on its site today.

Launching in January 2004, the blog will become a CSN property, though founder Enrico Campitelli Jr., 29, will be brought on as a full-time employee to edit and oversee the product. The site’s other contributors will be used as freelancers.

“We’ve been doing it a long time and I like to think we do it pretty well. But there were maybe two or three other Philly sports blogs in existence when I started. Now there are hundreds,” Campitelli says in his announcement. “This move allows us to not only differentiate, but to also put my undivided attention and effort into making this site a must visit destination for Philly sports fans.

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Event Highlights for March 15-21, 2010

The big event this week isn’t in Philly at all. But Philadelphia has quite a presence in Austin, Texas, this week for South by Southwest, for sure. Our reporter Sean Blanda is hot on the trial, chasing down Philly’s representatives. He’ll follow-up with a report later this week.

That said, there’s some great opportunities here in Philadelphia, too. Join Microsoft’s Malvern branch for its CloudCamp unconference to discuss the growing cloud computing industry and Philly Startup Leaders hosts a fishbowl of City of Philadelphia’s Digital Philadelphia vision with city officials.

All events listed on the event calendar are free to attend. Be sure to check our complete calendar for more.

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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:

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 the popular conference, which takes place April 8-9.

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.

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

Mason and Megan Wendell: from indie record execs to husband-wife branding and design Drupal team

Seems like ditching the record label for the branding and design firm was the right way to go.

Mason and Megan Wendell, the husband-wife team behind Mount Airy-based Canary Promotion + Design, met at the Berklee College of Music in Boston.

“We started our own record label (Solarmanite Records) to release our own music and some other artists, and more and more bands started coming to us for advice on everything from how to publicize a release to how to get a barcode,” says Megan, 35, who handles the marketing side of the firm.

So they started a business doing just that outside of New York City, where she was working for a dotcom and Mason was handling Web work on Wall Street. By early 2002, the duo moved to Philadelphia and found a niche in the region’s arts and culture community.

Now they have a heavy hand in the look and feel of the Philly arts scene and open source content management system Drupal is their tool of choice.

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