Event Highlights: April 18th – 24th, 2011

In April, Philly is chock full o’ festival.

Between our very own Philly Tech Week, PIFA, Philadelphia Science Festival and Entrepreneurship Week, you have no excuse for being bored. Even without these festivals, our calendar is packed with our regular slate of awesome tech events.

By the end of April, you’re going to wish you could be in two places at once.

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Friday Q&A: Paul Amess and Laurence Banville of Alliance Equals

When businessman Paul Amess and litigator Laurence Banville describe how they arrived in Philadelphia, they often have to whip out a globe.

Amess, a 25 year-old Englishman, and Banville, a 25 year-old Irishman, have traveled extensively around the world including stops in Brussels, Dublin and Alabama before finally meeting in Philadelphia and founding Alliance Equals.

Launching this month, Alliance Equals is a hybrid of a coworking space – where members can pay a fee for a desk or even a large room to serve as a home office – and an incubator – where Amess and Banville will receive an equity in return for office space and business help. The duo says they look to provide an “outsourced CEO” role to young companies who need marketing and legal help, especially in regards to international affairs.

“In house we’ll do a lot of the preparation and search work and that will help reduce the cost of lawyers billing $500-1000 an hour, “ says Banville.

After the jump, the duo tells us how they use the space’s giant television projector and see how their company compares to Ben Franklin Technology Partners and Indy Hall.

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City Council President: “Why are we are still having a problem with the Internet?”and other Links

City of Philadelphia Coming Into High-Speed Internet Age At Last, Official Promises [KYW] — City Council President Anna Verna questioned interim CTO Tommy Jones about slow City Hall internet speed. As VisitPhilly & Mayor Nutter Want YOU to be Mayor [Geekadelphia] — GPTMC on FourSquare

Bluecadet Interactive is again up for Webby Awards; Vote to support them [Bluecadet blog]

Facebook faceoff: Artist embarks on ‘social networking stress test’ [Newsworks]

Hacking Education: A Contest for Developers and Data Crunchers [DonorsChoose.org] — “We’ve opened up that data, and invite you to make discoveries and build apps that improve education in America. Help to shape your school system’s budget by revealing what teachers really need. Build the first mobile app for hyper-local education philanthropy. We’ve got a list of suggestions to help get you thinking.”

5th graders suspended for Facebook pics in school [NBC 10] — H/T NewsWorks

View more videos at: http://nbcphiladelphia.com.

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:

OpenDesks – OpenDesks.com lets you monetize unused workspaces – a cubicle, a conference room, an office or a seat in the lunchroom – as long as there’s somewhere to sit and work, you can post it. Join OpenDesks.com‘s Founders Circle today for a low-cost lifetime membership.

Caffeine Fish – Caffeine Fish develops the Trainboard iPhone app and offers iPhone development consulting in the Philadelphia area.

Empowerkit MLM Software – Empowerkit roots are in Philadelphia where it started as a company. It creates websites for Franchisees through powerful software solutions.

Optimized Cable Company – OCC is a distributor of high end electronic cable products, at a much lower price than most physical storefronts. Pick up some HDMI cables for your upcoming football parties today!

GOPromos Promotional Pens – GOPromos has great promotional items, like custom envelopes, for you to use with your company or for personal use. Get great products to give away!

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.

Mark Group: exposing energy efficiencies in homes with thermal imaging [VIDEO]

Craig Rodgers, Mark Group Home Performance Advisor, uses a handheld thermal imaging device to check for temperature variation. Photo by Sarah Schu.

We often have a subtle struggle to be comfortable in our own homes. In the winter, we use layers and blankets, and in the summer, it all comes off to keep down those pesky utility bills.

This is where the Mark Group, which says home weatherization can still shape that struggle, comes in.

The Mark Group uses state-of-the-art technology to assess and improve a home’s energy efficiency, says spokeswoman Abby Feinstein. Currently the Mark Group uses a blower door, which is a high-speed fan that connects to the outside of the homeowner’s door and pulls air out of the house. By pulling air out of the house, the air pressure is lowered and higher pressured air from outside will begin to come in through any cracks and holes. This allows the homeowner to see exactly where sealing or insulation needs to be installed.

“One of the greatest barriers to scaling energy efficiency is awareness,” Feinstein says. “In the United States, people are not familiar with the levers they can pull to make their homes more energy efficient, which saves energy consumption and money.”

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City of Philadelphia Streets Department wins honors from Public Technology Institute

The City of Philadelphia earned three honors in the 2010-2011 Technology Solutions Awards competition from the  Public Technology Institute, a national membership organization for local government IT executives.

City initiatives won in the sustainability and the GIS categories and received a ‘Significant Achievement’ honor in the sustainability category as well.

• GIS WIN: Optimizing Traffic Signal LED Installation Using Mobile GIS Technology: In 2010, the City of Philadelphia Streets Department Traffic Division began replacing over 70,000 incandescent traffic signal bulbs with energy saving Light Emitting Diodes (LED) modules, with funding by the American Resource and Recovery Act. To help manage this enormous effort, a mobile GIS solution was developed and deployed to enable field personnel to accurately track the replacement of these inefficient and undependable incandescent bulbs using GIS-enabled mobile technology. This project, funded by the American Resource and Recovery Act, also enabled field crews to track and maintain the City’s street pole inventory using scanning technology and edit capabilities native to the GIS mobile environment. Based on ESRI’s ArcGIS Server Mobile platform, this set of customized desktop tools also ensures data integrity as well as provides many advantages, including data standardization, GPS navigation, minimized paper use, and x/y coordinate locations with real-time efficiency. [This initiative started in July 2010, with more technical details here]
• Sustainability WIN: Big Belly – Solar Powered Energy Improving Service: The Philadelphia Streets Department’s Sanitation Division employs the latest innovative technology to track maximum capacity and disposal of trash in bins better known as BigBelly Solar, solar-powered trash receptacles. This system features a wireless monitoring and management capability which creates staff efficiency through better deployment of crews and better management of personnel when planning collection routes and work zones. Software solution tracks all compaction and collection activity, allowing collection crews to maintain high service levels. [These trash cans were rolled out summer 2009]
• Sustainability Significant Achievement: Maximizing Swift Reach Results for Maximum Communication: The Philadelphia Streets Department employs the latest innovative technology to disseminate information about the department’s services and programs to Philadelphia citizens. The service most frequently utilized is Swiftreach Networks Emergency Notification Service also known as Reverse 911. The service is used as a means of quickly and efficiently broadcasting recorded voice messages to citizens over the telephone simultaneously. The department has utilized this service to distribute thousands of messages ranging from emergency road closures to trash collection delays/changes. This service can be activated by advanced technology users, but, most importantly, activation can be done by any technologically challenged person from any location with an Internet-connected computer using a web-based notification control panel and/or remotely by phone. A call/campaign can be scheduled with two simple components, a call list and message to citizens within mere minutes.

Stephen Spielberg, Shoah institute to honor Brian Roberts in Center City: Comcast Roundup

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 subscri ption for our Comcast news updates.

• Spielberg to attend Shoah institute fund-raiser in Philadelphia [Inquirer] — “Film great Steven Spielberg and some of his Hollywood friends will gather in Philadelphia to fete Comcast Corp. chief executive officer Brian L. Roberts – a sign of the city’s growing clout in the heart of the movie-making industry.”
• The Worst Company in America: The Final Four [Huffington Post] — The last four in the Consumerist’s annual reader poll on the least liked companies are detailed, including reigning champ Comcast

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Planning Commission accepting final round of comments for comprehensive plan

Anyone interested in offering a final round of feedback to the Planning Commission about broadband infrastructure’s inclusion in the Philadelphia 2035 comprehensive plan should join the Commission this Thursday afternoon.

On April 14, from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m., staffers will take input on the “Connect” section of the plan … All meetings will be in the Planning Commission meeting room at 1515 Arch St., on the 18th floor.

[via PlanPhilly: Neighborhood groups want more input in 2035 comprehensive plan]

And don’t forget, the Planning Commission will be discussing innovation at our Philly Tech Week headquarters at WHYY on Wednesday, April 27. More information and free reservation available here.

The Costs of FOIA – A Healthy Information Diet – InfoVegan.com

A case for opening up data as a cost saving mechanism:

FOIA is one of those transparency things that sounds like a good idea, but in the end turns out to be kind of stupid. In 1974 when the law was put together, the House Committee on Government Operations said that FOIA’s cost should not exceed 100,000/yr — that’s about $450,000 in today’s dollars. Talk about gross underestimation. According to the new FOIA.gov from the Justice Department — the costs of FOIA are strongly outpacing both the growth of government and inflation.

via The Costs of FOIA – A Healthy Information Diet – InfoVegan.com.

Predicting future crimes in Philadelphia

Jeremy Heffner, product manager for Azavea's crime forecasting software Hunchlab, explains the program's potential to aid in making law enforcement more effective. Photo by Nicholas Vadala.

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

The term “crime prediction” often evokes the pop culture memory of Steven Spielberg’s 2002 science fiction film Minority Report. In the popular movie, the government polices its citizens with the help of a trio of psychic beings that can predict who will commit a crime in the future.

Throughout the film, which was based on a 1956 short story by Philip K. Dick, future offenders are arrested before they actually commit the crimes they were predicted to perpetrate.

Ralph Taylor, a criminal justice professor and crime trend researcher at Temple University, was quick to dispel that connection in a recent interview with Technically Philly.

“With Minority Report, you have what is called, in techno-babble, an idiographic prediction,” he says. “And what that means is that you can say this person is going to do this [crime], at this time, in this place.”

In reality, “crime prediction” is more appropriately termed “crime forecasting” and is far less nefarious than its fictional, more clinical counterpart, researchers say.

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