However, I’m interested in one particular aspect: open government data. The US government is releasing their data at data.gov. The UK government has their data available at data.gov.uk. The New Zealand government is publishing their data at open.org.nz. And it doesn’t stop there. The following cities are publishing their data: San Francisco (datasf.org), District of Columbia (data.octo.dc.gov/), New York (nyc.gov/html/datamine), Boston (http://hubmaps1.cityofboston.gov/datahub/), Toronto (toronto.ca/open/). The city of London recently held an open event asking developers how it can make best use of the available data.

My questions are simple. What’s up City of Austin? Why are we behind? Aren’t we also considered a tech city? Shouldn’t we already be part of this trend? Why aren’t we already publishing City of Austin data?

There are a number of good reasons the city should publish government data. It can help improve the accessibility, accountability and transparency of the City of Austin. The data can offer citizens a much more efficient way to find useful information. We can help our web development community to create innovative applications that will offer users the valuable information.

All of these open government data efforts have one thing in common: they offer a machine-readable data on the web. What is machine-readable data? It is data that a computer can process without any human intervention in formats such as XML, CSV, KML, RDF, etc. PDFs are not machine-readable because their objective is to show content to humans.

The OpenAustin project has given the floor for people to propose ideas for the requirements of the new City of Austin website. Some of the proposed ideas are to provide an open API to government data, have machine-readable data feeds, and even offer data as Linked Data. However, I am not aware what the situation is at this moment with any of these ideas.

Semantic Web Austin, for one, would be happy to help. We are a newly formed non-profit with several goals. We want to help apply and create leading edge semantic technologies in Austin. We want to position Austin as the leader in the semantic web technology space and be recognized as the go-to place for technology breakthroughs. We want Austin to be a bellwether for startups and business applications in the semantic space. We want to retain, attract and home-grow leading semantic web talent in the technical and business areas. We want to create a sustaining, self-managing community of semantic web technical, business and investment professionals.

Without going into any huge explanation, the Semantic Web is all about publishing linked data on the web. From the beginning, we have been publishing documents on the web. After years of research and hard work, we have created the standards and principles to start publishing data on the web. But you may ask, haven’t we already been publishing data on the web for a while in all these different machine-readable formats? Yes we have! But there is a difference. We have a standardized way of publishing documents on the web: HTML. We now have a standardized way of publishing data on the web: RDF. And if you have the data on the web in the same format which is linked to other data, the possibilities are endless. You can start imagining the whole web as a giant global database. For more information, check out Sir Tim Berners-Lee’s, inventor of the Web, TED talk on Linked Data.

The UK government understands what it means to publish all of their government data on the web as Linked Data and has already become a world showcase. Their recently launched data.gov.uk offers more than 2500 datasets as Linked Data, and apparently it puts the US’ data.gov to shame.

Austin has an opportunity to lead, rather than follow. Other cities in the US have been publishing their data, but none of them have been publishing their data following the Semantic Web standards, data in RDF and as Linked Data. Let’s become the first city in the US to offer true Semantic Web open data.

Who’s with me?

The purpose of the conference is to engage local community members and business leaders in talks regarding our region’s evolving economy. Including a broader local and regional economic overview, the program will also include breakout sessions to discuss community and business issues. A full schedule of the breakout sessions can be found here.

In order to have a voice at this event, AustinStartup is offering a pair of tickets chosen from those among those persons that retweet this post by 4:00pm today with the hashtag #COEO.

So, start retweeting in order to take part in the conversation and help map the future of the Austin economy!

You can also buy tickets for the event here.

The Labor Market and the Economic Recovery

Last week The Bureau of Labor Statistics released the August employment report. Many believe the findings were positive for the recovering economy while others perceive a more somber picture. Are the labor markets recovering, or not?

Regardless of how the numbers are interpreted, the labor market appears to be in for a long and gradual recovery. It will literally take many months and quarters to put the sheer volume of the unemployed back to work.

Good News and Bad News

The good news is that August job losses in the U.S. came in lower than the previous month. In fact, last month’s job loss numbers were the lowest we’ve seen since August 2008. In recent months we’re losing fewer jobs. This is indeed good news and an indicator the economy is slowly recovering.

The bad news is that we still lost 216,000 jobs last month. Though we’re not losing jobs as fast as we once were, but we’re still hemorrhaging jobs at a substantial rate. The national unemployment rate continues to climb and is now at 9.7%, the highest it’s been in over 25 years. Many economists believe we’ll surpass 10%.

The Numbers

The data clarifies the fact that unemployment numbers are significant and will take a reasonable amount of time to overcome.

• Just under 15 million people are without work and are seeking a job
• 7.4 million people have lost their jobs since this recession started
• 25.5 percent of teenagers are unemployed – this is the highest level on record
• 10.1 percent of men over age 20 are unemployed
• 7.6 percent of women over age 20 are unemployed
• 24.9 weeks is the average duration that unemployed workers are with out a job

The Recovery

These numbers are vast and deep, more so than many of us have ever seen. Again, it will take quite some time to put this volume of unemployed folks back to work. It begs the question of how the economic recovery will look. Many companies are obviously not hiring and are trying to get “more out of less” these days. CEO’s remain hesitant to increase their headcount and are looking to maintain a smaller yet more productive workforce.

The recent Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers also indicate that worker productivity is at an all-time high. This leads some economists to speak of a “jobless recovery”. Can companies grow and the economy recover if companies don’t refill the jobs eliminated by the recession and put the unemployed back to work?

Ellen Wood

Today’s guest blogger is Ellen Wood, the co-founder and CEO of Austin based vcfo, inc. The firm specializes in operational finance and accounting, HR Solutions and recruiting services for companies of all sizes. She can be reached at 512-345-9441. www.vcfo.com.

Yes – that’s right. The Austin Chamber of Commerce is making a big difference for everyone in Austin. Do we really think Austin is the number one place to do business in the United States just because we’re a cool place to live? That designation didn’t happen by accident. Chances are you or several folks you know are working for companies that are located here as a result of Austin Chamber efforts at some point.

Most Austinites don’t know what the Austin Chamber does or the value they and their families receive from those activities. For some reason many folks think “old school established business” when you mention “Chamber of Commerce.” Nothing could be further from the truth. The membership is very diverse across industry and size. The Chamber team of professionals is extremely busy on so many fronts with significant initiatives underway to support the technology community including being one of the statewide RCIC hubs. They are in partnership with the Austin Technology Council with the ATC Director a member of the Chamber board. They host the Central Texas Angel Network (CTAN) and Jamie Rhodes, Chairman of CTAN, is a long time board member.

Recognizing that underlying infrastructure is critical to the long term attraction of employers, the Austin Chamber was the driving force behind the formation of the Opportunity Austin campaigns. Now in the second campaign, millions of dollars have been raised and are funding initiatives to recruit new employers to Austin, to drive a focus on quality and college readiness in K-12, and to encourage programs that result in a local educated work force to continue to attract employers to our area. Multiple companies are recruited to visit the city every month and the Austin Chamber coordinates those visits with regional partners and ensures our guests are informed and made welcome.

Other initiatives the Austin Chamber advances include the promotion of planned development in the Central Texas corridor to ensure traffic does not overwhelm the region and that infrastructure is addressed in advance. They hold numerous meetings during the year for the smaller members and younger businesses focused on business networking and other educational topics that help business owners with challenges they face. They lobby for Austin in Washington DC as well as in Austin and raise awareness in the community for local political races as it is in all our best interest to participate in the process and exercise our right to vote.

Every Austinite benefits from their efforts every day. If you are a business owner, please remember that when you get a call asking you to consider membership. Dues are very modest, especially for small early stage companies. I’ve served on the finance committee for several years and can tell you that rarely will you see so much accomplished so economically. I encourage you to support their efforts with your dues but also with your participation at events of interest to you and/or on committees working on initiatives that further benefit the city. Participation by members is welcomed and encouraged and is a great way to learn more about what goes on behind the scenes to keep Austin number one.

Campaign & Elections’ Politics magazine today announced Tom Serres, Founder/CEO of Austin-based Piryx Inc, as one of the 2009 Rising Stars. One of the most prestigious honors in politics, the award goes to people 35 or under who have already made a significant mark in political consulting or advocacy. The magazine chose 10 Democrats, 10 Republicans and seven nonpartisan leaders this year out of a pool of several hundred nominees. The Rising Stars will be honored on June 12 in Washington D.C.

Past Rising Stars include Karen Hughes, George Stephanopoulos, David Axelrod, Paul Begala, Donna Brazile, James Carville, Rahm Emanuel, and Laura Ingraham.

“Capping off an historic election year, we received a record number of nominations for this year’s Rising Stars,” said James Klatell, managing editor of Politics. “With so many exceptional young people working in politics today, this was an exceedingly difficult process.”

Tom Serres, 27, is one of the seven nonpartisan leaders recognized this year. Serres is the entrepreneur behind Piryx, a social commerce platform aimed at empowering the little guys of the political world with online tools.

Piryx empowers users with technology to effectuate political and social change. Their web platform offers political aspirants the online tools needed for faster and easier compliance and fundraising, a social networking infrastructure with voters, and other political applications and resources needed for any campaign. Whether Barak Obama or Joe Blow, Piryx presents an affordable web platform to make a difference.

“Our mission is to ignite much needed involvement among the voter community, while allowing candidates at all levels to have the tools and information they need for an equal chance on Election Day,” says Piryx CEO Tom Serres.

You may remember some of the discussion surrounding the City of Austin giving a contract worth between $700K – $1.5M to a web developer on California for the creation of the city’s new website. Given that Austin is full of people who are talented in the ways of the interweb, why would this need to go to California?

OpenAustin.org would use crowdsourcing, open source, local talent, agile development methods, and displaced web workers to build the city’s website. It wouldn’t be the stagnant Web 1.0 style of most government websites, but a growing, living, community-based web portal. Brewster McCracken was also at happy hour, and I see that he is a member of the Facebook group. Tacit endorsement? We’re not really sure.

Stacey Higginbotham, who is a writer for GigaOm was at Austin Tech Happy Hour. She probably had no idea she was about to get the scoop on a great idea, and at 7:45am the next day created a blog posting about OpenAustin. Lyn over at GeekAustin also had a blog posting on Sunday.

Join the Facebook Group, or follow on Twitter (@openaustin).

Congress is full of attorneys, and Jack actually started his career as an attorney, but he’s been growing businesses and employing people for probably longer than he practiced law. More importantly he’s been growing his business and raising his family right here in Travis County for over 10 years.  Call me crazy, but I think we need more entrepreneurs in DC.

The Obama campaign proved that you can be successful raising funds from the average person like you and me, in smaller and reasonable denominations. Multiplied by thousands of voices, those funds become powerful enough to initiate change.

I urge you to go to www.jackforcongress.com to see what he is all about, and to consider making a donation. Remember that no contribution is too small, and if you happen to see Jack around town at any of the Austin organizations that he is involved with, I’m sure he would extend to you his heartfelt thanks.

How did you first get the idea for Piryx?
Piryx began as an idea three years ago when I realized I wanted to make a difference. I guess you could say I was tired of being a bystander watching the political process pass me by—I wanted a stake in the game. As an undergrad attending the University of Texas McCombs School of business, I decided to get involved—to make a change.

It began with a Judge, passionate about making a difference. Her name was Angelita Mendoza Waterhouse, a sweet woman asking if I would voluntarily help her run her campaign. I was so excited; I mean, what better way to get involved? I went in full throttle, I believed in her—and people like her. People who had a genuine passion to help others.



The rest is history. The frustration, and the miles of red tape inspired me to find ways to help others like Judge Angelita. I was tired of seeing great candidates fail purely on the premise of social inequality. She wasn’t a “good ‘ol boy.” She was a woman of conviction, passion, and unconditional love. And her passion convinced me to make a change in this country.



From there Piryx was formed. My band of brothers, Greg, Brian, Naveed and I, teamed up to offer solutions for average people interested in public service. We chose the Internet because we knew it was the new frontier of political technology.

Today, Piryx is focused on delivering efficient and economical web solutions to political entrepreneurs. We want to empower all who have a passion to serve with the tools to realize their potential. Some of the computer stuff we use everyday can revolutionize politics. We’re sharing that, and some of our own tricks, with the average political entrepreneur.



Give us the elevator pitch for Piryx?
Piryx is a community, an online medium focused on providing tools to empower the average political entrepreneur. Imagine if we could offer every political entrepreneur the technological infrastructure of the Obama campaign—in a universally user-oriented way. Take the tools of Google, the infrastructure of PayPal, and the social medium of Facebook—and you get Piryx.

How has the company been funded so far, and are you seeking any additional funding?


Piryx was bootstrapped by doing consulting for candidates to enable online outreach strategies. We developed our new system in between gigs, on the weekends, and in the evenings. After making some headway through the Houston Angel Network and UT’s social innovation competition, we were backed by an investor here in Austin. We’re currently preparing for our beta launch and actively seeking our first Series A.



What was your first “a ha” moment, when you knew you were on to something really good.


I guess you could say there were several “a ha” moments over the last few years. Most importantly it began with the judge, and experiencing the complications in helping her campaign for public office. At that point I realized, this woman couldn’t be the only one experiencing these problems. As we began working with more and more campaigns, we realized others were experiencing the same hurdles.

The next big moment came as we began developing and pitching our first business plan, not to mention what was going on in the political community. What Joe Trippi and Howard Dean began with their use of meetup.com and online fundraising, the field of politics was experiencing revolutionary moments in politics as Obama, Hillary, Romney, and McCain began utilizing advanced technologies and social media in their campaign…Suddenly our business idea soon became quite a bit more relevant. The revolution, as Joe Trippi called it, was now in full swing.

Our mission is to ignite much needed involvement among the voter community, while allowing candidates at all levels to have the tools and information they need for an equal chance on Election Day.

If we can help make politics accessible and exciting again, we’ve done our job.



What can we expect to see in the future from Piryx?
We will soon launch our Piryx.com vision site and Realpolitix.com, a non-partisan political blog about the technological revolution occurring in politics. Realpolitix.com is Piryx’s first step in empowering democracy as the company aims to emerge as the leader of content and solutions that change the way people experience the election process.

Realpolitix.com will provide emerging insight into real world political events, the evolution of technology in the political process, and a non-partisan approach to current political news. Also The Piryx.com vision site is a community that will allow members to stay current on Piryx news and events, provide blog content, and be a part of the technological movement in politics. Additionally, we’ll be launching several additional solutions throughout the presidential campaign season including an automated filing system for campaign ethics compliancy and reporting. Piryx.com will offer visitors an opportunity to request access to our beta environment. This will give a glimpse into tools that will assist them as they drive through the campaign process.

As for the future…only time will tell, but if history tells us anything…it looks really good. Piryx will be at the forefront of this, leading the renovation and restoration of politics. We’re moving into a world where online voting and virtual town halls are real possibilities. Who would have thought 4 years ago John Edwards would be advertising online in Second Life or Congressman John Culberson would be twittering from the house floor. What’s happening is truly amazing – revolutionary. As this cultural change shifts, Piryx will lead the way.

If you are in to clean energy in Central Texas, chances are you’ve met Jose Beceiro.  Jose is the Austin Chamber of Commerce’s economic development point man.  With the demeanor of a collie and the tenacity of a pit bull, Jose rides herd over the Chamber’s support and leadership of the clean energy sector for Austin.

One of his chief resources, of course, is the strength of the informal and formal business networks – especially chamber members – who are motivated to put their time, money, and passion into collectively growing the clean energy sector.  One of the Chamber’s formal networks is the Clean Energy Council, or CEC for short.  CEC members reflect the broader DNA of the Chamber:  real estate companies, policy-oriented groups (including public sector and non-profit interests), energy-related firms, service providers, investors, and other cleantech eco-system companies.

For 2008, the CEC’s work is divided into 6 main areas of focused interest, illustrated by the figure.  These interest areas (sub-committees, if you will) are all about ultimately getting results that fuel economic development for the community:  that’s the bottom-line. For example, in the most recent quarter, that CEC’s PR team – in partnership with Lois Paul Partners – got strong coverage and story-line interest from The Washington Post, CNET, The Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, and others.

Interested in getting involved?  This is the point where membership, as they say, has its privileges.  CEC members are primarily Chamber members/supporters (with a very few exceptions)…providing you another good reason to write that check for your Chamber renewal!

But, what’s driving the agenda for the CEC’s work?  What’s the broader context for clean energy in Austin – the play book or roadmap, if you will, looking ahead?  More about that next week.