Philadelphia Parking Authority launches social media campaign to bolster responsiveness, transparency and customer relations

Following quiet structural changes at the Philadelphia Parking Authority, the oft-criticized state-run agency announced today a transparency-driven social media campaign.

After news this month of staff sensitivity training and staff restructuring around customer service, the PPA will launch outreach efforts through Facebook, Twitter, QR codes and other tools.

Find the PPA on Twitter @PhilaParking and on Facebook here.

Tossing out an estimated 1.7 million tickets a year and forking over $99.6 million to the city and school district, according to a press release, hasn’t always earned the love of residents and visitors alike. The agency is famously the subject of the A&E reality show ‘Parking Wars,’ suggesting a divide between parkers and enforcers.

“While solving problems and addressing customer issues will be a major thrust, we will also use Facebook and Twitter to keep the public informed about parking emergencies during inclement weather – special holiday parking
discounts – parking at the airport during holiday rushes, as well as residential parking issues in our neighborhoods,” PPA Executive Director Vince Fenerty said in a press release. “Facebook and Twitter will help us better educate the public about parking regulations in the city, as well as our signage.”

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Links: Pittsburgh seeks middle tech, 8bit sequencing magic on video and more

DEFINITE READS

• The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports on that city vying for ‘middle-market’ technology firms, while some chase investment on the west coast and others fail. H/T Philly Tech News
• The Inquirer reports on the oenophile vending machine movement, in which wine kiosks are making their way from Harrisburg to Philadelphia. Philly Tech News reports that Oracle has given the Pennsylvania Liquor Control board a retail excellence award.
• The University City Review reports that the first 55,000 energy efficient LED traffic light bulbs are being installed as part of a $14.1 million stimulus grant. H/T Plan Philly

Below, finding a kidney on Facebook, Curt Schilling will take his video games and move to Rhode Island and more.

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How DormNoise founder Jay Rodrigues raised $500,000 from his dorm room

Two years ago, DormNoise Founder and CEO Jay Rodrigues was fed up with Facebook before it was the cool thing to do.

As the Rhode Island-native was graduating high school and transitioning to life as a student at Wharton, he saw all of his high school teachers had begun to friend him on Facebook.

“I thought it was kind of awkward, I wasn’t sure how much of my college life I wanted to share with them,” he says.

He then sought out to build a more closed social network for college students, eventually fine-tuning the idea as a closed online calendar for students. By his first semester of Penn, Rodrigues raised $200,000 from friends and family before raising a second round of $500,000 this month.

So how does a college freshman have an extensive enough rolodoex to raise two rounds of funding before he can buy a beer and before signing more than five major customers?

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Friday Q&A: Judah Levine of the Philadelphia Union

Union fans cheer at the MLS SupeDraft, which was held at the Pennsylvania Convention Center.

Those trying to bring Google Fiber to Philadelphia ought to learn a lesson from the Sons of Ben, the supporters club of the Philadelphia Union.

Before the soccer team was even announced, the “Sons of Ben” invented chants and songs and happily sung them at Washington’s and New York’s MLS games. Their passion helped to convince Major League Soccer to award the city a new franchise, beating St. Louis, among other cities.

After a rough start in week one, the team is preparing to play its first ever home game tomorrow at Lincoln Financial Field before eventually moving in to its new stadium, PPL Park, in Chester.

Since the team’s name and logos were announced in May 2009, the organization has made a priority to nurture its already vibrant fan base, taking an active role in using social media tools like Twitter and Facebook. Between the two platforms, the team has over 30,000 followers, more than enough to fill its new stadium in Chester.

We exchanged emails with Judah Levine, the man behind the team’s social media outreach to ask what tools he uses, who he admires in the social media space and why we should go to tomorrow’s home game.

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VC Roundup: GoodCompany goes to NYC, ETF changes name

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

GoodCompany Ventures is kicking off a handful of events up and down the east coast to discuss the social good of entrepreneurship and to raise awareness about the fund’s 2010 incubator. First up: The 67th Ward. The panel will be moderated by Fred Wilson, founder of Union Square Ventures and well-read VC blogger. The fund promises Technically Philly that a Philly event is in the works, but for now we’ll be at the NYC edition. So if you managed to snag tickets, be sure to say hello.

Tengion, a Quaker BioVentures backed company is raising money for an IPO.

ETF Ventures has changed its name to SeventySix Capital. Presumably because of the company’s West Conshohocken location right off of the Schuylkill Expressway. Or, as another theory suggests, they’re big basketball fans.

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Is local TV news exaggerating social media addiction?

It’s been a pretty standard affair for local news, recently.

Find someone “addicted” to social media�someone who is on sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter at work, perhaps utilizing it too much, too, by way of mobile phone. Then, seek an expert. Maybe a psychiatrist who’s work lately has perhaps included folks who are addicted to social media, though none claim to have evidence of an increase in these kinds of people and none specifically recognize of any of these types of patients in their clientele.

So far, NBC10 and 6ABC have covered the topic, overindulging in the mostly evidence-less theory to pandaemonium-like proportion.

And somewhere in the middle of it all�and very prominently placed in both news reports�is Nnamdi Osuagwu, local writer and owner of publishing platform Ice Cream Melts who recently penned a fictional book called Facebook Addiction.

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Two City Council members want to sue Twitter, Facebook over flash mob

Councilman Frank DiCicco

Councilmembers Frank DiCicco and James F. Kenney are seeking the possibility of suing social media sites like Twitter or Facebook if they indeed played a role in Tuesday’s Market East flash mob, as CNET reported this week.

The councilmen requested permission from Mayor Michael Nutter to take legal action to force a mechanism to stop events like the flash mob of this week.

On Tuesday, roughly 150 teens may have used text messaging and social media sites to coordinate a chaotic rampage from the Gallery mall throughout Market Street, pushing, kicking and vandalizing their way toward the Macy’s near City Hall and an inevitable snowball fight.

No serious injuries were reported, though 16 arrests were made, according to the Inquirer.

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9 local Facebook names we could have registered

So after my wild and crazy Friday night was drawing to a close, a little alarm on my phone reminded me that it was high time for the Facebook username land rush. In case you were unaware, Facebook had previously given all users URLs that were an indecipherable set of numbers.

So, Saturday at 12:01 a.m., the social network finally made “vanity URLs” publicly available so instead of http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=823408803, you could be facebook.com/awesomeTPreader. Below are some local names that could have been yours at around 12:06 a.m.:

1. /thephiladelphiainquirer

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Friday Tech Roundup: The Bulletin trashes Silicon Valley, Wawa on Facebook and More

In which we link out to the tech news from Philly and elsewhere (when it matters) that slips through the cracks and make it way fun.

Because that’s what we do best.

• The Bulletin, no seriously, the Bulletin reports on why it would make a lot more sense if the hub of the country’s technology community was Philadelphia, not the Silicon Valley.

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How social media took Asher Roth from Philly suburbs to hip hop stardom

It’s going to be that anthem you hear over and over again this summer, and the artist behind it happens to have grown up in Bucks County, a half hour Regional Rail ride into Center City.

Like a growing collection of young artists, Asher Roth, the artist behind “I Love College,” found his path to a major label album by way of MySpace. But it seems likely he’ll see more than Internet fame.

I helped profile Asher Roth on the cover of today’s Philadelphia Weekly, but during our interview last month, we also spoke about the role social media have had on launching his career.

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