Josh Kopelman is the new Old Spice guy

Josh Kopelman as the Old Spice guy in the First Round Capital's new Holiday video

Our favorite Christmas tradition here at Technically Philly (after reruns of How the Grinch Stole Christmas) is the First Round Capital Holiday Card.

In 2008, the venture capital firm produced its first “holiday card” video that was a riff on “Where the Hell is Matt?” In 2009, they went all Susan Boyle on us. And in 2010, First Round and its portfolio companies get shirtless. Sorta.

Keep an eye out for Philly (and Philly-born) companies Monetate, Solve Media, Adaptly, MyYearbook and ClickEquations.

Philly ranks 9th in high tech jobs

According to a report by TechAmerica, an IT trade association, Philadelphia ranks as a top 10 technology hub, employing 134,235 high-tech workers in 2009, a drop of 2,800 jobs from 2008.

However, the region’s tech industry wasn’t as affected as Detroit and San Francisco, where job losses topped 16,000. The country as a whole lost 1 percent of all technology jobs.

Given the amount of colleges and universities here, it’s easy to chalk this one up to a classic case of Philly brain drain mixed with the down economy. However, just last week Campus Philly announced that Philly has retained 49 percent of college grads in this year, up from 29 percent in 2004. Given that Philly’s losses weren’t as heavy as other cities, does this mean that the city will bounce back quicker than its peers?

Some other facts from the Cybercities press release. Keep in mind that “high tech jobs” does not refer to all technology employment in the region:

• 134,200 high-tech workers in 2009 (9th ranked)
• 2,800 jobs lost between 2008 and 2009 (43rd ranked)
• High-tech firms employed 60 of every 1,000 private sector workers in 2009 (33rd ranked)
• High-tech workers earned an average wage of $93,400 (10th ranked), or 83 percent more than Philadelphia’s average private sector wage
• A high-tech payroll of $12.5 billion in 2009 (9th ranked)
• 7,400 high-tech establishments in 2009 (8th ranked)

Comcast Roundup: Senate chairman worried, House leader encouraged by NBC deal

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

• Internet issues bog down Comcast-NBC merger [LA Times]
• Comcast Tests Combo Internet-Cable Device [Wall Street Journal] — “Comcast Corp. is testing a new service that knits together television and the Internet, as the U.S. cable giant goes after rivals that threaten to undermine its business.
• Rockefeller Pans Comcast-NBCU Deal [Tech Daily Does: National Journal] — “Senate Commerce Chairman Jay Rockefeller – the most powerful voice in Congress on telecom policy — told the FCC he’s worried that the $30 billion transaction could have a detrimental impact on consumers and competition.”
• Comcast getting good deal on NBC Universal, research firm Bernstein says [Philadelphia Business Journal]

Below, why Comcast should chase the Olympics, is the end of NBC regulatory approval nearing and more.

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Startup Roundup: Monetate still growing, UgMO helps irrigate Paradise Valley

Technically Philly’s Startup Roundup parses 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. Follow along with the Startup Roundup’s dedicated newsletter or RSS feed. If you’ve got news to share, get in touch.

MUST READS

While it’s on the hunt for 20 new employees, Monetate has announced a new client. Pet speciality shop PETCO will power its e-commerce site with Monetate’s technology. In related news, the company notes that 6 of Monetate’s clients made the Internet Retailer Hot 100.

King of Prussia-based UgMO, a water monitoring technology, has partnered with Waste Management of Arizona to provide measure irrigation in the dry town of Paradise Valley, according to a press release.

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Edison Ventures <3′s New England + 5 other stories

Welcome to the VC Roundup, 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

Edison Ventures continues its push in New England with a $5.5 million investment in NetProspex a company based in Waltham, Mass. that helps businesses track sales and marketing clients. Mass High Tech has more about the firm’s sudden infatuation with New England.

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Foobooz bought by Phillymag: founder reunites with former contributor

Philadelphia magazine has purchased Foobooz, the best trafficked food blog in Philadelphia, as the Inquirer’s Michael Klein first reported.

Foobooz founder Art Etchells noted a primary reason for taking the opportunity was the reason to work again with Phillymag’s food editor Kristen Henri, who was a major contributor to Fooboz before joining the regional magazine in April.

“Now we get to [work together again] for fun and profit,” Etchells, 41, who founded the site in May 2006, tells Technically Philly. “Philly Mag is dedicated to growing its food coverage online and I think it makes a lot of sense to grow it together.”

The Graduate Hospital resident received “some up front money, [a] full-time position and some possible bonuses.”

Metrocorp, the Phillymag parent company, intends to grow Foobooz to Boston ‘by 2011′ and nationwide afterward, Klein reports.

Etchells will become ‘digital product manager,’ as he posted on the site, contributing to Foobooz, and Henri will oversee the site in her role.

Philly Startup Weekend coming in January

If you’re the kind of person that hates panels and speeches, this one’s for you.

Next month Philadelphia will hold its first Startup Weekend, a nationwide program that packs a group of programmers, designers and business people in a room and challenges them to create a functioning company in just a weekend. Philly’s edition will be at Indy Hall on January 28th – 30th.

“There have been some startups that have come out of Startup Weekend, but the main goal is just to actually do something,” says Brad Oyler who, along with Cherif Habib is one the event’s organizers.

Past Startup Weekends have created over 700 startups, including some that have reached an exit.

According to Oyler, 40 of the 65 slots for the weekend are taken. If you’d like to participate, register here. Student tickets are $40, while general admission $75.

David Bohnett Cyber Center helps William Way connect LGBT community

The following is a post done in partnership with Temple University’s Philadelphia Neighborhoods Program, the capstone class for the Temple Journalism Department.

Chris Bartlett considers himself an active part of the technical community–or the geek community– as he affectionately calls it. But Bartlett is also an active member of the LGBTQ community, serving as the executive director of the William Way Community Center, a hub for sexual and gender minorities in Philadelphia.

Bartlett (also the host of TedxPhilly) has immersed himself in LGBTQ community and grant organizing in the Philadelphia region, developed the Gay History Wiki for gay Philadelphia men who died of AIDS and is now applying his vigor for activism and knack for bringing people together through technology at the the center.

“I think the true measure of social media and the true measure of [technology] is when people do engage face to face in their communities, taking a stand for the communities, whether that’s through activism or plugging in for a project or assisting somebody who’s in need,” Bartlett said. “I see us using those technologies to make that happen.

Bartlett’s only held his current director position at the center for four months, but he’s been involved with William Way for far longer than that.

“This is a place I’ve always come,” he said. “Because this is a place you can always count on people.”

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Event Highlights: December 13th – 19th, 2010

‘Tis the season for holiday partys and beer on our events calendar. And good thing, because next week there isn’t much going on except for, you know, Christmas.

But before you pack it in for Santa, focus on this week where Build Guild drinks beer, Zivtech gets down and the Game Dev Meetup has a weekend chat.

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Monetate CEO David Brussin wants to buy you an iPad

By all accounts, 2010 has been good to Monetate CEO David Brussin.

Brussin, an alum of TurnTide, was an advisor to Invite Media which sold to Google earlier this year. And now, Bussin’s own company just received a $5.1 million Series A investment from First Round Capital and others to help the ecommerce personalization company step up its growth by increasing its staff size (See our Shop Talk featuring Monetate here).

“If we had all the right people walk into the office today, we’d hire them all,” says Brussin noting that company is hoping to hire locally.

Up until now, Monetate has been purposefully keeping its client base small as it has built out its technology. But now the Conshohoken-based company is ready to take on more clients, recently announcing that it is now serving PETCO in addition to its current client base of QVC, Sports Authority and Urban Outfitters.

We chatted with Brussin about how Monetate’s hiring approach, a possible IPO and the company’s possible to expansion to industries outside of ecommerce.

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