Entrepreneur & Social Entrepreneur Meetup in Chapel Hill Thursday Night 9:30pm

Tonight at the West End Wine Bar in Chapel Hill we will be having our 5th Entrepreneur & Social Entrepreneur meetup from 9:30pm to 12:30am. If you are in the area you are very much invited. We have 15 confirmed attendees and 22 maybes. You can RSVP at the event’s page on Facebook.

Here are short bios on the confirmed attendees:

Paige Berges

Who Wants to Live With Two Entrepreneurs/Social Entrepreneurs

James and I are moving this weekend from Durham to Chapel Hill. We have two open rooms in the new house. Shoot me an email at ryan[at]icontact.com if you might be interested in living with us. Here’s the description:

Num Rooms: 4
Num Baths: 3
Millingport Court (near Meadowmont Lane)
Square Footage: 3000

Two early to mid-20s entrepreneurs/social entrepreneurs are seeking two other roommates to live with in a unique 4BR, 3000 sq. foot newly built three-story home in Meadowmont in Chapel Hill. The two of us move in on August 10 and everything is gorgeous and brand-new. $900/person per month covers everything. We want to build a social environment around people working to make a difference in the world. Beautiful fixtures, excellent kitchen with corian, walk in pantry, laundry with storage cabinets, large dining room, large office, 1200 sq. foot basement/future game room, workout room, washer/dryer, large living area with fireplace, plush carpeting, outside hot tub, large outside screened-in deck, front porch with rocking chairs. Beautiful forest views backing up to 70 acre nature preserve. The absolute best place to live in Chapel Hill, especially if you enjoy discussions about anything along the lines of politics, business, education, investing, economics, travel, public policy, etc. Hardwood floors, gas stove, large stainless refrigerator, nice neighbors, and close to everything. A large Harris Teeter’s grocery store is right across the street, along with a coffee shop, dry cleaners, ABC store, high end shops and boutiques–four excellent restaurants, the renowned UNC Wellness Center, and all the amenities and walking trails of Meadowmont. It is 0.5 miles from a bus stop of the V line which takes you to UNC and downtown. Easy shuttle-access across the street at the Friday Center for UNC football and basketball games. All furniture except your bedroom furniture is provided, but feel free to bring other stuff to add to the house. The house is 2.0 miles (less than 5 minutes from UNC, UNC Law School, and UNC Business School), 8 miles from Durham/RTP, 9 miles from Duke, 15 miles from Cary and 21 miles from Raleigh. All utilities (cable, hi-speed wireless, water, electricity, heating) are included in the $900 per month price. We don’t have any pets but small dogs and cats can be considered as long as they are clean. Invest in your time in Chapel Hill. You can email me at ryan[at]icontact.com if you have any questions or to schedule a time to meet and check out the house. 102 Millingport Court, Chapel Hill, NC 27517. See www.meadowmont.com for more information on the community.
Listed at:

UNC
Raleigh / Durham, NC

Interview on Exposzure

Exposure.com posted an interview with me today. Here’s an excerpt:

Imagine starting your first company at the age of 16. Imagine gracing such prestigious magazine covers as Small Business Fortune and Success. Imagine running a million dollar company before you were even old enough to drink. This super whiz kid Ryan Allis sat down with Exposzure and filled us in on how he got started, what it takes to be successful, and his high expectations for the future. Do you still think you

Gordon Brown Evokes Kennedy’s Call

As my Dad pointed out in the emailed link to an article on the new British PM Gordon Brown, it’s nice to have a world leader who’s focused on helping people. Here’s an excerpt:

“To address the worst of poverty, we need to summon up the best of humanity, and I want to summon into existence a great coalition of conscience in pursuit of the greatest of causes.

“And I firmly believe that if we can discover a common purpose, there is no failing in today’s world, that cannot be addressed by mobilising our strengths, and there’s no individual struggle that drags people down that cannot benefit from a renewed public purpose that will lift people up.”

He said the goal of providing primary education for every child by 2015 would not be met until 2100, while the goal of cutting infant mortality by two thirds would not be reached until 2050 unless action was taken now.

He said the situation had to be declared to be a “development emergency”.

He said 12 world leaders and 20 business leaders had signed a new “commitment to action” to meet the “emergency”.

“I want us to come together as one world. I want us to call an emergency meeting next year at which we report on where we are and what we have to do.”

He said scientists, engineers and the medical profession were key to helping reach the goals.

Mr Brown compared the plan to former US President John F Kennedy’s 1960 call for an international peace corps.

That was “an international commitment to harness the idealism many felt in the face of threats to human progress and world peace,” Mr Brown said.

“Today we should evoke the same spirit to forge a coalition for justice.”

TED Releases Video from TED Global Africa Conference

TED has released the video talks from their TED Global Conference in Africa in June. Here are a couple samples:

“When he was just 14 years old, Malawian inventor William Kamkwamba built his family an electricity-generating windmill from spare parts, working from rough plans he found in a library book. In conversation with TED Curator Chris Anderson, Kamkwamba, now 19, tells a moving story of ingenuity and adaptation, and shares his dreams for the future. This talk inspired outpourings of support from the TED community and in the blogosphere.”

“After four days of intense discussion on aid versus trade at TEDGlobal 2007, it was up to Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the former Finance Minister of Nigeria, to sum it up. She asks, first, for the discussion to continue, and for it to grow more sophisticated, more nuanced. And she shares a gripping story that puts the aid-versus-trade debate into true human terms.”

This grab-you-by-the-throat speech by Ghanaian economist George Ayittey unleashes an almost breathtaking torrent of controlled anger toward corrupt leaders and the complacency that allows them to thrive. These “Hippos” (lazy, slow, ornery) have ruined postcolonial Africa, he says. Why, then, does he remain optimistic? Because of the young, agile “Cheetah Generation,” a “new breed of Africans” taking their futures into their own hands.

Seeking: Product Manager, Graphic Design Rockstar, and PHP Developers

iContact is seeking a Product Manager a Graphic Design Rockstar, and two PHP Developers. If you know of anyone that may fit the descriptions I can be reached at ryan[at]icontact.com. Here are the job descriptions. Thank you very much.

iContact Product Manager

Opportunity
Seeking Product Manager to plan, analyze, and execute new releases of iContact email marketing and communication software. iContact has over 12,500 customers and 93,000 users of iContact. He or she will take vision and input from The Board of Directors, team members, and customers and synthesize them to build our product, project, and iteration plans. Excellent verbal and written communication skills and a bachelor’s degree and 3-5 years experience are required. Candidates with previous project management skills and experience with Scrum will be strongly preferred.

Responsibilities

1. Build great products with a team of talented and passionate people looking to make an impact on how people use the Internet to promote, build, and support their businesses
2. Own the end-to-end development of major product components
3. Develop a deep understanding of email marketing, blogging, online communities, newsletter archiving, and multi-channel marketing.
4. Be the diplomat who mediates and campaigns for what’s best for the business and our customers.
5. Own the creation, launch, and success of new products and enhancements to existing products
6. Establish short and long-term goals and strategies for iContact’s products
7. Work closely with engineering and design to determine technical and design solutions, prioritize work, and build schedule.
8. Take input of customer needs from focus groups, feedback, conversations, and metrics as input along with internal vision and needs to form informed recommendations on product opportunities.
9. Help our teams set a bar for getting rid of bugs and improving the usability of produced software for smooth releases.
10. Act in a manner similar to our agile development methods by iterating quickly on feedback and evolving release plans based on new knowledge, needs, and past progress.
11. Actively track the development schedule, make adjustments as necessary, lead by influence, and ensure a smooth release to customers

Requirements

1. Passionate about the people who use our products
2. Experience developing and launching consumer technology products
3. Intuitive sense for product usability and design—ability to think through every aspect of the user experience
4. General understanding of web technologies (e.g. AJAX, CSS, MySQL), how they’re implemented/served, and how they fit together
5. Excellent communication and interpersonal skills
6. Entrepreneurial spirit and pace—thrive in a dynamic, fast-moving environment
7. BA/BS degree, MBA a plus
8. Minimum of three to five (3-5) years experience in a related position
9. An understanding of the intricacies of managing people and projects and ensuring open communication structures
10. Experience with Scrum and agile development
11. Experience working with open-source technologies

For More Information
If you are interested and/or would like more information please send resume to HR Director Cindy Hays at jobs@icontact.com. If you are a qualified candidate we will contact you to schedule either an in-person interview or teleconference interview. Additional information on the company and software can be found at www.icontact.com.

Graphic Design Rockstar

iContact is a four-year old venture-backed 60 person company based in Durham, NC, that provides on-demand software that makes online communication easy. The iContact product is the leading email marketing and online communications platform used by over 12,000 companies worldwide ranging from small businesses to blue chip clients like International Paper, Ford, Bank of America, Super 8 Motel, Symantec, Re/Max, United Colors of Benetton, Nissan, and LG Electronics.

The company is seeking an experienced Graphic Designer who has expert skills with tools such as Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. The ideal candidate will have experience in creating mock-ups and storyboards, a history of designing user interfaces for web applications with multiple features and a constantly-evolving feature set, experience designing with grids, excellent verbal and written communication skills, and a bachelor’s degree or five years of related experience. In addition, they must possess a design portfolio demonstrating related and relevant work, including links to at least 2 designs that are live, with a description of what role you played in the development and design of the web application and/or web site.

Additional desired skills and experience: advanced HTML & CSS skills, with an extremely solid understanding of semantically valid markup; formal education in Graphic Design with a thorough understanding of color, layout, composition, typography, and iconography; experience with print design; a passion for web standards; proven skill at creating both vector-based and pixel-based user interface elements (controls, dialogs, icons, text, etc.); excellent prioritization and analytical skills; self-starter/highly motivated; passion for designing interfaces that are simple, usable, accessible, intuitive, consistent and beautiful; experience creating, maintaining and following GUI standards and design standards; technical writing skills; familiarity with Smarty; JavaScript and AJAX experience.

Responsibilities

Responsibilities include but not limited to:

1. Updating our product and corporate websites
2. Working with UI Engineer to ensure the user-interface has a consistent look-and-feel
3. Helping our front-end engineers create interfaces that are easy to use and communicate the purpose and functionality of new features
4. Playing a pivotal role in creating an enterprise-scale email software product

Salary/Benefits

Salary commensurate with experience. Excellent benefits are provided including health care coverage, a 401(k) plan, a Flexible Spending Account, free sodas, foosball, ping pong, company activities, an entrepreneurial and creative environment, and being part of a rockstar team that acts like a family.

For More Information

If you are interested and/or would like more information, please send resume with cover letter to jobs@icontact.com. If we determine you to be a qualified candidate we may send a questionnaire or contact you to schedule either an in-person interview or teleconference interview. Additional information on the company and software can be found at www.icontact.com.