Black Family Technology Awareness Week luncheon at Northeast High School

A portion of the students, staff and professionals attending the 2010 Black Family Technology Week luncheon held at Northeast High School.

This story also appears on Northeast news site NEast Philly and is reprinted here with permission as part of a content partnership. See more photos here.

More than 200 students, staff, technology professionals and partners listened to the musical stylings of a high school choir last week. But everyone was there to promote technology literacy.

Held at Northeast High School, the sixth annual luncheon was again the signature event of the 11th annual Black Family Technology Awareness Week, which has some lingering events over the next few days.

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TNT: The state of hyperlocal online news in Philadelphia

Updated: 8/31/09 6:17 p.m., source title

Sarah Lockard should take more walks.

Earlier this summer, the Wayne native was on a long stroll when she decided she should contact Internet craft supply marketplace Etsy about working with AroundMainLine.com, the online magazine startup she launched last fall to cover the famed, ritzy swath of Philadelphia suburbs.

It was on another walk — one amid the crowds of last September spring’s blue-blooded Devon Horse Show — that the former B2B magazine sales executive decided the Main Line needed community coverage online.

Sarah Lockard

Both “epiphanies,” as Lockard called them, seem to have worked out just fine. AroundMainLine.com has partnered with Etsy to profile artisan goods from regional crafts-makers and, while she declined to disclose monthly revenue or funding, her online magazine features weekly content, has a Web designer on staff, photographers on call and a sidebar etched with advertising.

Lockard, 34, boasts that hers was the first for-profit online magazine in the Philadelphia region. But she won’t be the last.

The hyperlocal Web outfit — tied by geography, focused on a niche community and online-only — is meant to be a great wave of the future, seen by MSNBC’s recent purchase of crime and news aggregator EveryBlock, partnerships with online news startups and product launches like Outside.In and Patch.com.

Philadelphia has its first wave of adopters, but their sustainability is far less certain.

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Democratic candidates for city controller voice support for paperless government

Democratic candidates for city controller from left to right: Incumbant Alan Butkovitz, John Braxton, Brett Mandel. Far right: Moderator Chris Satullo of WHYY

The Democratic candidates for city controller each voiced support for paperless government initiatives Thursday night at the third and final major debate being held for the elected city office.

The rare moment of agreement between incumbent Alan Butkovitz and challengers John Braxton and Brett Mandel followed a confrontational discussion of the city’s $2.6 billion budget shortfall, real estate tax abatement and wage and sales tax increases.

In a modest side room of the John Perzel Community Center, the candidates responded to a question posed by Technically Philly in front of more than 30 residents in the Mayfair neighborhood of Northeast Philadelphia.

If elected city controller, would he support recommendations made by freshman councilmembers in October that would promote digital government initiatives that would cut back on paper consumption, bring forms online and potentially save the city millions of dollars?

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