As you build your company and website, you probably want to present something unique, something that is memorable about your company image. Many companies choose to create a logo to identify their brand and company. But often, creating an original logo when you are first starting out is too expensive.

So here are 33 logo creation applications or services that range in price from free to affordable. This list of free and paid services should help you find the best tools. One word of warning: Several of the “free” sites are free only for the creation process. Always read the fine print.

This week the Urban Institute released a report entitled Capacity Building to Diversify STEM: Realizing Potential among HBCUs. The report evaluates the National Science Foundation’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP) grantees and has some powerful results.

Too often HBCUs are underresourced, and many cater to students who are from academically and/or economically-challenged backgrounds. In addition to smaller endowments, these two factors make it difficult for HBCUs to fully realize their potential for producing black scientists and engineers. The National Science Foundation initiated HBCU-UP to bolster the resources and strengths of HBCUs.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The nation's outmoded patent system, which has forced innovators and inventors to wait years and outlast challenges and lawsuits before getting recognition for their products, would be overhauled under a measure passed Tuesday by the Senate.

The legislation, which was approved 95-5, transforms a patent system now operating under a law passed in 1952, at a time when the high-tech revolution was still in the future and international competition was still negligible. It now moves to the House.

President Barack Obama said he looked forward to signing into law "the most significant patent reform in over half a century" to help grow the economy and create jobs.

SMITHFIELD — One of Rhode Island’s leaders in innovation, Allan Tear, took his audience at a Bryant University economic forum Tuesday back to his high school days for a few moments when he tried basketball because he wanted to play sports.

But he was too short and wasn’t good. Rather than sitting on the sidelines of a basketball court for four years, Tear said, he switched gears and began wrestling and became a state champion.

Here in Rhode Island, Tear said, people say too often that the game is basketball and, so, that’s the game to play. But in doing that, Rhode Island would be playing the wrong game, he said; Rhode Island should be playing the game for which it has the right assets.

Startup Bootcamp, a European startup accelerator network and Techstars affiliate, just added Dublin to its existing locations of Copenhagen and Madrid. London and Berlin will follow in 2012.

Ireland’s tech scene continues to expand in spite of the woeful state of the rest of the economy with a plethora of accelerator programs, seed funds and events like Founders and the IBM smartcamp global finals happening there in the last year or two.

I don’t think entrepreneurship can be taught.

In fact, the list of entrepreneurs who dropped out of school reads like a who’s who of company builders: Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Larry Ellison, Paul Allen (Microsoft), Sean Parker (Napster, Facebook), Walt Disney, Mary Kay Ash (Mary K), Coco Chanel (Chanel), Barry Diller, Simon Cowell, Michael Dell, Henry Ford and Steve Jobs are just a few of the Spicoli-esque educated.

I think not only is getting an MBA a waste of money and two years of your life; it may also, in fact, reduce your chances of building a successful business. Here are four reasons why:

1. MBA programs teach causal reasoning

One of the most compelling pieces of evidence that an MBA is a poor investment for aspiring company builders comes, ironically, from one of the institutions that would benefit most if aspiring entrepreneurs got a degree in business. Prof. Saras Sarasvathy, a researcher at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business recently completed a study in which she compared 45 super-entrepreneurs (all had at least 15 years’ experience, had started at least four companies and had taken one public) with a group of equally successful big-company CEOs. One of her key findings was the difference between how entrepreneurs and big-company execs approach planning for the future.

Recently I read an article about welcoming new employees so they get off to a great start. Tips included welcome baskets, long lunches with key members of the team, and plenty of small talk to make them feel comfortable.

This is not that type of article.

The first few days of employment are critical. New employees are a lot like aircraft carriers: Once the course is set, it takes a lot of time and energy to change direction.

Here are seven ways you can set the wrong course, and in the process ruin a new employee:

1. Welcome them to the family. Strong interpersonal relationships, positive working relationships, friendships… all those come later, if ever. You hire an employee to work, not build relationships. Be polite, courteous, and friendly, but stay focused on the fact the employee was hired to perform a job, and jobs involve work. Let new employees earn their way into the “family” through hard work and achievement.

Last weekend, I attended the Kairos Global Summit, held at the United Nations and the New York Stock Exchange, and had the opportunity to meet 50 incredibly cool, young startup founders. The Kairos Society was founded by 21-year-old Akur Jain, a senior at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton undergraduate program, and the son of Intelius CEO Naveen Jain. His intention was to assemble the world’s most entrepreneurial college students and encourage them, by giving them access to mentors, to start businesses that solve major world problems. At the event this weekend, approximately 300 “Kairos fellows” met with mentors from private industry, the not for profit sector, and government to discuss big issues like world hunger, access to clean water, higher education, energy consumption, empowering women globally, and expanding access to health care. Jain’s goal was to jumpstart the startup process for a new generation of entrepreneurs, who he hopes will create global companies from the get-go. The students had plenty of inspiration, because they were able to meet “50 most innovative student ventures,” presented by The Campaign for Free Enterprise, on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange last Saturday. Here are just a few of the companies that knocked my socks off:

* Solben. Founded by chemical engineering student Daniel Gomez Iñiguez, Solben is a biodiesel fuel company in Monterrey, Mexico. Gomez invented a new way to produce bio-diesel and is focusing on commercializing his bio-diesel plants. Solben currently has 25 employees working on green technology ventures; Gomez was also first runner up at last year’s Global Student Entrepreneurship Awards.

University of Exeter-based Crowdcube, has launched the World’s first crowdfunding website which enables ordinary people to buy shares in start-up and growing businesses and offers equity in exchange for investment.

Crowdcube aims to make access to finance easier for entrepreneurs of newly formed and growing small businesses. Instead of competing for limited business angel or venture capital funding, start-ups can use Crowdcube as a platform to connect with a nation of ‘armchair dragons’ to find investment.

“The task of securing business investment is notoriously difficult. Banks adopt a no-risk approach to lending while business angels and VC funding are difficult to access,” said Darren Westlake, co-founder and managing director of Crowdcube.

Would you believe me if I told you that water is not needed to surf? Yes, traditional surfing still requires a surf board and waves. However, a new game allows you to surf some imaginary waves at home.

The game is called Waimea Wipeout. Through the roll of a 10-sided die, you will determine just how good of a move you have pulled off. The higher your score, the better. At the end of the game the top two scores are combined, and whoever has the highest score wins the game.

Jeff Cicatko was kind enough to answer a few questions about his unique game and the inspiration behind it.

Graduation may still be months away, but it is already a safe bet that few seniors will stay in Rhode Island to begin work. Dan Egan, president of the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Rhode Island, told The Herald last week that the state retains fewer graduates from Brown than from other Rhode Island colleges and universities, where retention rates are "between 10 and 15 percent." But Bridge, a new program spearheaded by the association and its member institutions, aims to increase these numbers.

Bridge is in its formative stages, and much of the work currently being done involves surveying students to gather data that will guide the program. But Bridge's focus is clear — eliminating the disconnect between Rhode Island's opportunities and attractive features and students, who may scarcely travel off College Hill.

Last October, I wrote a blog post titled 57 Things I’ve Learned Founding 3 Tech Companies. At the time I had founded two startups and was a year into the third, a gay social network launched as Fabulis that was later rechristened Fab. A few weeks ago I followed up that post with an essay on the difference between year 1 and year 2 of your startup. Now that we’re relaunching Fab under an entirely new business model, I figured it might be a good time to share what I’ve learned about the stay/go/pivot decision to help others facing the same critical choices.

I have run this particular gauntlet three different times:

* At employment website Jobster, which was founded in 2004, raised $48 million in VC funds, employed 150 at its peak, and sold a song in pieces in 2009 and 2010.
* At social news service socialmedian, a shoestring operation with just me, a few developers, and $800,000 in angel money that was acquired only 11 months after launch for $7.5 million.
* And currently at Fab.com, which spent 11 months as a mashup of Facebook, Yelp, TripAdvisor, Eventful and Foursquare services for the gay community as we iterated in search of some traction -– now being reinvented as a private sales community for design lovers.

Last year, Sprint gave students in a marketing class at Emerson College 10 smartphones with unlimited wireless access. In return, Sprint received free marketing work for their budding 4G network in Boston from students who blogged and tweeted, and more importantly were able to record firsthand how social media could be effectively used at the company.

Unbeknownst to many, companies have increasingly turned to universities for research on social media. This isn’t highly unusual, as traditionally manufacturers have given financial support to universities conducting research relevant to their companies. In the past though, support has been given to “hard” sciences, for example to the research of pharmaceutical drugs. Companies had never partnered with universities to better understand social media.

Many comments are appearing on the internet taking enthusiastic positions for either the new 2011 Chevy Volt or the Leaf.

It seems most readers are in one “camp” or the other.

In our household, after studying the technical strengths and features of both cars as they moved from concept to production, I ended up ordering…one of each!

We had been driving a Toyota Prius and a 2007 Toyota Camry Hybrid, enjoying the technology and economy of those designs since mid-2006. Our Prius had around 64,000 miles and the Camry Hybrid had just 40,000, so we didn’t need to replace them. But I enjoy new “toys,” and cars are almost the ultimate consumer toy.

Perhaps, you have just been promoted to management for the first time. Perhaps, you have just promoted someone to their first management role. In either case, the next few months will be a challenge. The shift from valued contributor to successful manager is a difficult road with potholes, detours, and drop-offs up ahead.

As such, it is vital to detect the warning signs when a first-time manager is struggling. It is likely that the performance of the manager’s team will not immediately crater. But, these warning signs, these flashing “yellow lights” will give a heads-up that something is not going well and that future problems are just around the bend.

Reading and learning is crucial to building a successful company. While not everything you read may be ground breaking or directly related to your industry it is important to stay on top of trends and learn about what others are doing. There are a ton of blogs out there talking about small businesses, startups and entrepreneurship but a bunch really standout from the crowd. These bloggers are all also active on twitter which is a great way to engage them and see what else they are reading, thinking and talking about.

Below is a list of some of the top blogs and their twitter accounts to follow when it comes to entrepreneurship and small business. These sites are sure to make you think, teach you some things and overall help you build and grow your business.

IF YOU LIKE innovationDAILY.................MAYBE YOU COULD SUGGEST IT BE ADDED TO THEIR LIST?

To honor 25 years of backseat-driving robots and vision-scanning iPhones and touchscreen-keyboard-3-D-display hybrids, the MIT Media Lab tapped Brooklyn-based designers (and erstwhile Media Lab rats) E Roon Kang and Richard The to dream up a fresh visual identity. The result is pure, unadulterated Media Lab: an algorithmic logo that generates a sui generis image for each of the Lab’s sui generis brains. (Cue spazzo nerd gasp.)

It’s darn clever stuff. As The tells Co.Design, the Media Lab never really had its own logo. “There were identity components designed by Jaqueline Casey (in 1984) referencing the original (Media Lab) building by I.M. Pei,” he says. “It features a nice colorful mural by Kenneth Noland. But there never was an actual logo per se.” The algorithmic design represents the Media Lab’s first official stab at a coherent identity, and it’s high time. The Lab has transformed from a scruffy operation focused on quaintly enhancing the “digital revolution” into a full-blown brand synonymous with wild experimentation, collaboration, and big-time math geeks. Now, it’s got the graphic design to match.

Australia’s venture capital sector has faced a series of challenges, namely the global financial crisis and retraction from the superannuation sector. Still, emerging industries like the cleantech and biomedical sectors signal promising growth for venture capital firms. Chief executive of the Australian Private Equity & Venture Capital Association (AVCAL) shares her thoughts on the current state of Australian venture capital.

MM: What trends are you tracking in the Australian venture capital industry at the moment? Are they fleeting, or can we expect to see them for awhile?

KW: Since FY 2007, venture capital (VC) fundraising has seen consecutive y-o-y declines in FY2008, FY2009 and FY2010. VC funds in FY2010 raised $168m – a large portion of this amount was raised as part of the Innovation Investment Fund (IIF) and the Innovation Investment Follow-on Fund (IIFF) rounds. Fund raising in this sector is getting increasingly difficult. The global financial crisis is partly to blame as it is more difficult now to sell assets, and assess fund performance based on market value for the purposes of raising a subsequent fund. Additionally, the growing Australian superannuation sector (the biggest investor in VC) is retracting from the VC sector partly due to their increasing inability to write smaller cheques.

One of the most powerful collaboration tools available is not a piece of software for employees to use on their PCs. Nor is it an enterprise social network used to break down office silos. It is a technology that's simple, open, and often free: the application programming interface (API).

The API is a set of rules and specifications for sharing data between Internet sites. It lets Web developers access elements of an application or online "platform," such as Google Maps or Facebook profiles, and integrate the functions into their own sites or applications. Those providing APIs can scale their products or services in an automated fashion, and those implementing APIs can add features to their sites without having to build them from scratch.

For the past three months, we’ve run an experiment in teaching entrepreneurship.

In January, we introduced a new graduate course at Stanford called the Lean LaunchPad. It was designed to bring together many of the new approaches to building a successful startup – customer development, agile development, business model generation and pivots.

We thought it would be interesting to share the week-by-week progress of how the class actually turned out. This post is part one.