As reported on our Utah Tech Spotlight Blog, Wednesday May, 21 was the sixth Annual Innovation Awards in Salt Lake City, Utah and Twelve Horses was there to see and record the innovations that made it the finals and congratulate the winners. We were also hoping, after seeing Iron Man last week, to see the Robotic Exoskeleton by Raytheon Sarcos, and perhaps even take it for a test drive, but alas, they did not bring it.

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We did see some cool stuff. Top on the list of things to look out for next ski season was the Klymit insulation system, a Noble-Gas based adjustable insulation system for sporting outerwear. The system developed by Brigham Young University students uses argon in small canisters to fill chambers to vary insulation.

Mick Hagen won for his college student recruitment tool called zinch.com. This is a social network similar to Facebook, Myspace or Ning where high school students and colleges can create profiles and actively recruit each other.

This is effective for both parties as the Colleges can find good qualified recruits without relying exclusively on contact lists purchased from the standardized testing agencies (SAT, ACT etc) and less effective email marketing campaigns. According to Hagen, colleges are finding this social networking approach more effective at reaching the best students than traditional marketing techniques, buying contact lists for email, mail and telephone. Students everywhere are ecstatic at being able to substitute a “superpoke” for a profile essay when applying to BYU.

We spoke with Dr. Chris Johnson, the Keynote Speaker at the awards presentation and Director of the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute at the University of Utah. The research, advances and inventions coming out of that office are amazing. He told us about a new real-time 3D imaging system that can pinpoint cancer in a beating heard to target radiation therapy.

Also awarded was our client Solera Networks for their Network Monitoring Appliance. This is a tool that lets network administrators monitor, store and review everything coming in and out of their network.

And another cool one comes from Kevin Shurtleff of Mountain West Energy LLC. Shurtleff has developed an oil vaporization technology to extract the remaining 2/3 of oil that is left over with traditional techniques. This could add 180 billion barrels to US oil production with no new oil fields.

It was a great event showcasing the best of what Utah innovators have to offer. Thanks to Stoel Rives LLP and The Utah Technology Council for making this event happen.

2008 Utah Innovation Award Winners

Allocure: Cell Therapy for Acute Renal Failure: Biotech/Pharmaceudicals
Cerametec, Inc.: NaSICON Membrane Technology: Chemicals/Materials science
Mountain West Energy LLC: Insitu Vapor Extraction: Clean Technology and Energy
Raytheon-Sarcos: Robotic Exoskeleton: Computer Hardware/Electrical Devices
Zinch Inc.: Student Profile and College Wizard: Consumer Software
Solera Networks: Solera Networks DS Series Packet Capture Appliance
Klymit: Noble-Gas-Based Adjustible Insulation
Anecare Laboratories, Inc: QED-100: Medical Devices

-Mike

“Making social bookmarking truly social”Faced with the daunting task of researching and annotating huge documents on the web, A few years ago Dr. Wade Ren and Maggie Tsai out-surfed the capabilities of browser bookmark features and online bookmarking services. If you have a long web document with only a few widely spaced relevant paragraphs what do you do?
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You print it out, or copy to a document and print then get out the old highlighter pen. Then you fax it, or scan it and send it along, and soon you have a problem. A problem that, for Ren and Tsai, turned into the opportunity to create a new social bookmarking service.

Yahoo, MySpace, Blip.tv, Sclipo and Viddler

As we discussed in a previous post, and as Dr. Ren reiterated, Diigo is like del.icio.us on steroids. It takes bookmarking functionality and extends it with forum, blog and messaging features. If you take the time to annotate a page, leave sticky notes, multiple and lengthy comments, and highlight key text on the page, you can then view and forward all the relevant information w/o having to go to the page, or see other public comments and highlights and interact with other Diigo users.

With support for and compatibility with del.icio.us, ma.gnolia and Simpy; plugins or bookmarklets for every major browser; openid support; compatibility with Wordpress, Blogger, LiveJournal, TypePad, Windows Live Spaces and Drupal; a Facebook App; groups, lists, email and widgets; Diigo is embracing the open everything web 2.0 spirit and making a super useful community oriented tool.

But it’s not just for fun! We use it for internal research with private bookmarks and private groups. We have a few clients participating in Diigo groups almost like a Basecamp style project management site. Combined with other free site/services like Flickr, Wordpress or other blogs, and file sharing sites like drop.io and Zoho.com this could give 37signals a run for their money.Thanks to Wade and Maggie for the visit. It’s great meeting leaders in web development who live right here in Reno!

After Earl turned off the camera we gave them each a Red Bull and asked them what’s next. Here’s what they said: A LOT OF COOL STUFF… You didn’t think I was gonna tell you?!!?! Look for just about everything you want from Diigo to come to life in future versions.

-Mike

“It’s Triassic Dino Poop!”

In this episode of Horse Power Video we cater to the kids! In an age when kids (and everyone else for that matter) get more information and entertainment from the web, ipods, mobile phones and anywhere-but-television, on-demand media, podcasts and mobile downloads become more important and subscription-based media management becomes way more powerful. To that end, here’s an informative and entertaining visit with Mary Schweitzer, some of her favorite dinosaur art and a gaggle of dino loving kids, live in the Twelve Horses conference room…

Mary Higby Schweitzer is a paleontologist at North Carolina State University and the first researcher to identify and isolate soft tissues from a 65 million year old fossil bone. More recently, Schweitzer’s work has provided further evidence of the link between birds and dinosaurs. When she is not discussing the finer points of petrified dino poop with kids, Schweitzer is researching reproductive strategies in dinosaurs and their bird relatives.

-Mike

A few weeks back Leilani and I spoke with Kit Hinrichs of Pentagram Design, San Francisco. Below is a short excerpt of the conversation in which, Kit talks about the narrative power of design and the importance of design in a strong and effective brand. It was really cool to talk with Kit! We hope to see him again when his collection of American Flags are on exhibit at The Nevada Museum of Art next fall. -Mike

Download the video here, or subscribe to video here.

In this episode of Horse Power we talk with Kit Hinrichs, AIGA Medalist and Partner at Pentagram Design, about creativity, branding and the American flag in the Founders room at the Nevada Museum of Art in downtown Reno.

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How about that: the last two podcasts have both been done on location! Let’s hope that becomes a trend. We were going to record the podcast Thursday evening, but Kit’s flight from San Fransisco had been canceled and he had to drive over the hill with his son Chris through yet another Tahoe snow storm. They made it just in time for the biggest audience the Reno Tahoe Chapter of the AIGA has hosted to date with 105 people in the NMA’s Theater.

We caught up with Kit on Friday back at the museum after he was done meeting with David Walker, NMA’s new Director, about displaying his flag collection in the museum next fall.

“I’m very confident in what I do; I’ve never met a piece of blank paper that ever scared me.”

Though he can always come up with a solution, he says his only worry is coming up with the best solution for the problem. Since the fastest and cheapest solution is often the favored one, that seems like an unusual way of looking at things. Kit’s insights, in light of the challenges that we as a web development, messaging and marketing company face every day, should inspire us all to think about how we go about solving our client’s problems. Or at least the particular ones in which they involve us…

“There’s an economic aspect of their brand not functioning any more.”

Kit spoke a bit about his work re-branding the company Muzak to change the way it and it’s products were perceived by their potential customers. A non-functioning brand describes, in this case, a company that had changed, but had not changed visually yet. It is amazing how visuals can affect the perception of a company who’s product is sound.

“I think the way in which people understand information is by telling a story.“

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-Mike

It was a dark and stormy night in downtown Reno…

Wait, actually it was a serene and peaceful night on the Truckee River, snow was listlessly falling when we rolled down to the Sienna Hotel, Spa & Casino to hear Louis Navellier speak at Lexies on the River. He had a lot of cool things to say about stocks, Wallstreet and finance, and after the event he and our CEO, David LaPlante, got a few minutes to chat down in the Enoteca Wine Cellar and Tasting Bar.

After we turned off the recorder we went on until we’d finished our wine, talked about the skiing, the new snow and the likelihood of us all being just a tad late for work in the morning…

-Mike

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Though the table in the Twelve Horses conference room is more of a Flying-V shape, Jackie Shelton and Joe Hansen, publishers of Rlife Magazine came by and used it for a round-table discussion on the ways news media is changing. Our own CEO, David LaPlante, sat in and had a few comments on the new/social media side. Also in the room were Paul Mitchell, Didre Pike, Jim Scripps, and Tad Dunbar.

This is Podcast #40 for Horsepower. Josh Kenzer and Robert Payne did an awesome job finding 39 cool people from Northern Nevada to interview over the last two years. Leilani Schweitzer, Earl Spriggs and Mike Henderson are taking over starting with Horse Power #40. They have a bit to learn, but are excited to get underway.

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Someone from the Reno Gazette-Journal had been scheduled to be there, but could not. And that’s a shame, because the RGJ is doing some cool things with social media, though it seems that some of them are still in a beta-testing phase. Specifically, I recently found the rgj Twitter stream. This is a really good way to get content out to people who wouldn’t otherwise interface with the print edition or the website. This gets me a headline every half hour with an article link that I can read right from my phone. Looks like James Ball, Online Content Editor, is behind that. Pretty handy! –Mike Henderson

Twitter was great for following the Nevada Caucus. During the controlled chaos I was getting and sending real-time Tweets to and from people who were at other precincts. Kind of like the ticker that runs along the bottom of CNN. Except Twitter is a lot more fun, and unlike many other media, you know the source of the information, and that lets you make a judgment about the content. The following is some Reno Twitter content from Caucus Saturday. -Leilani Schweitzer

83 Hillary, 129 Obama, not done yet. Edwards not viable. 12:32 PM January 19, 2008 from txt

caucus is a madhouse so many people! 12:15 PM January 19, 2008 from txt

Kucinich and biden unviable in 1018. 12:21 PM January 19, 2008 from txt

191 people here for a projected 70. 12:01 PM January 19, 2008 from txt

Being tempted by cookies & doughnuts to change my vote. I love democracy! 11:43 AM January 19, 2008 from txt

So many people at caucus pulling out all the bleachers. 11:31 AM January 19, 2008 from txt

In this interview, I am joined by fellow colleague and solutions engineer for Twelve Horses, Dean McBeth to conduct a very informative and interesting interview with the Nevada State Historic Preservation Officer, Ron James.

James has served in his position as officer since 1983, and in that time he has grown the agency in both size and significance. In 1991, he organized the Commission for Cultural Affairs and since that time has distributed over $30 million in grants to support such endeavors as rehabilitation of historic buildings and cultural centers. He also served on the Comstock Historic District Commission for 17 years and currently serves the National Park Service as a member of the National Historic Landmarks Committee. James is the author or co-author of  five books including The Roar and Silence: A History of Virginia City and the Comstock Lode. His complete bio is located here.

During the podcast, James shares some fascinating history, folklore and information regarding the state of Nevada. Clearly, we could not cover it all in the time allotted, but you can certainly pick up one of his books, find some more information on the State Historic Preservation Office website, or visit ONE, the Online Nevada Encyclopedia. One excerpt from the podcast that I found especially interesting is the following quote from Ron James:

“The grant program established by the Commission for Cultural Affairs puts Nevada at the top of a very prestigious list offering more funding on a state level per capital for historic preservation than any other state in the nation.”

There are a lot of wonderful historical landmarks and cultural centers to preserve and to visit in Nevada, and it is people like Ron James who ensure they exist for future generations to enjoy.

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In this interview, I have a frank discussion with Sean Adams, partner at AdamsMorioka and the newly appointed president of the national chapter of the AIGA. We are joined by Jeff Pickett, vice president of Finance for the Dupuis Group and president of the Reno-Tahoe Chapter of the AIGA. The podcast was recorded at the Nevada Museum of Art.

In this podcast we talk about the history of AdamsMorioka, the subject of branding, and the intricacies of client relations. Both Sean and Jeff have a lot of experience and knowledge to share in regards to these subjects.

According to his website:

Sean has been globally recognized by every major competition and publication including; Communication Arts, AIGA, Graphis, The Type Directors Club, The British Art Director’s Club, and the New York Art Director’s Club. In 2000, The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art exhibited AdamsMorioka in a solo retrospective. Adams holds the honor of being named to the ID40, citing him as one of the forty most important people shaping design internationally. Sean is a Fellow of the International Design Conference at Aspen. In 2006, Sean was named as a Fellow of the American Institute of Graphic Arts.

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Note: This podcast turned out to be a very good interview, but we did experience some technical difficulties with the lavalier mics; therefore, the sound quality in some areas of the interview was compromised. Nevertheless, it is still very much worth listening to in its entirety.

In this interview, we talk with Dr. Milton Glick about his first year as president of the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR). He shares his goals and objectives for the university, and the challenges and opportunities the school must contend with to realize them.

Prior to becoming president of UNR, Glick served as provost for Arizona State University (ASU). He is a chemist and a self professed “technophile and technoskeptic.”

Interestingly enough, the scheduled interview turned out to be quite timely considering some unfortunate turn of events. Just two days before the Virginia Tech shooting occurred, and then UNR experienced a bomb threat the following day. Because of these incidences we did ask about securiy on campus.

It was a pleasure talking with Dr. Glick, for he is indeed an individual with a unique perspective and personality. We will all be watching with great interest to see how UNR evolves under his leadership.

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tags: doctor, dr, milt, milton, glick, president, unr, unversity, nevada, reno