There’s a competitive nature amongst large cities around the world, and the superlative “best” is often used to describe what each metropolis has to offer. Can your city brag about having a cultural strategy that champions ideas, innovation, and creativity? Ask London, and the answer is a resounding yes – thanks to the city’s mayor, Boris Johnson. This past Monday, Johnson published Cultural Metropolis, a visionary recommendation to strengthen the cultural life of Londoners across the capital. The case set forth acknowledges the contributions of the cultural and creative sectors in London and recognizes how continued support and investment leading up to the 2012 Olympics will provide a brilliant opportunity for London to shift its cultural activity and participation.

In my last post, I wrote about Dr. Jack Geller of the University of Minnesota and his research into Internet and broadband adoption in rural areas of his state.  Minnesota has made remarkable progress this decade at extending broadband access.  In 2001, only 6% of rural homes had a broadband connection.  By 2010, 68% had one.  But older citizens have not joined the party.  Overall, almost 70% of Internet non-adopters are 65 years of age or older.  

A great deal of attention is paid to digital inclusion of the elderly – for perfectly good reasons – but I believe that the digital exclusion of another group is far more important.  That group consists of the chronically poor: those with low income, poor education and little prospect of any improvement in their lives or those of their children.  Entrenched, multi-generational poverty is a stain on the life of communities everywhere, but most of all in the industrialized nations with their immense wealth and power to affect the lives of citizens.  The causes are multiple and complex.   Being a member of an ethnic or racial minority with a history of exclusion increases the odds but is hardly conclusive.  More powerful are culture, personal expectations and day-to-day habits.  Such poverty persists because the conditions for it are created anew when each child is born.  The cycle of poverty is refreshed each morning in the mind, through habits of thought and feeling that are stronger than chains.  The British have a wonderful phrase to describe their problem population: "not in work."  They might just as well say "not in the world," at least as the rest of us define our existence.

Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, wants the U.S. to catch up with other countries in making sure a high percentage of the population has access to broadband communications. He believes the way to do that is to set aside more of the radio spectrum for mobile broadband services than is currently allotted. Speaking at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco on Wednesday, Genachowski talked about how to maximize investment in broadband and how to get more people on the web.

"If you've never failed... you've never lived" is a popular video on YouTube describing the failures of people like Thomas Edison, once called "too stupid to learn" by his teacher and Walt Disney, who was fired from a newspaper for "lacking imagination." Not every idea succeeds, and indeed, some of America's most triumphant inventors, artists and entrepreneurs have most likely failed at some point in their lives. But without risk and the possibility of failure, there can be no Innovation and no success. That is precisely one of "Robert's Rules of Innovation" imperatives: No Risk, No Innovation.

The success rate when it comes to innovation is very slim. In fact, just 1 in 100 new product entries succeed in the grocery business, according to a study by allbusiness.com. For every innovative product that comes out of the NPD process, there are plenty of ideas that don't work out -- deemed as failures. What's important is that companies have a tolerance for failure and encourage risk taking. Fear of failure can kill innovation. Never punish for failed ideas. Instead, learn from them how to improve in the future. Establish a level of trust so your team won't be afraid to think outside the box. To build a successful culture of Innovation, encourage everyone on your New Product Development team to take risks!

MOST people think entrepreneurship means large enterprises and corporations. But that is hardly necessarily the case at all. All businesses start small before they get to grow. In the dictionary, entrepreneurship is linked with being adventurous, ambitious, dynamic, enthusiastic, innovative, and a go-getter spirit.

But beyond that, I believe that entrepreneurship is in many ways similar to growing plants. Young companies, like young seedlings, need the right opportunities and conditions to grow.

As a small business owner, using online video helps you to stand out. It allows you to attract new customers, gain additional rankings in the search engines, and to offer content in a more digestible format. You know this. But what are some ways you can get even move from video as a small business owner? Here are some online video techniques that are getting me excited right now.

1. Optimize Everything: The easiest way to get MORE from your online videos is to make sure you’re doing everything you can to make them findable by optimizing them for users and the search engines. When it comes to optimizing your video, you want to pay special attention to your Title, Description, Tags, and Captions/Annotations. The more keyword-rich and engaging you can make them, the better.

There’s a slide in my standard social media strategy presentation showing a young couple looking lovingly at one another. Okay, actually only the girl is looking lovingly. The boy’s face looks as if he’s brimming with ulterior motives!

The image is there to remind organizations considering social media that their strategies can’t resemble the teenage boy’s apparent dating strategy if they expect to build strong, lasting relationships.

The striking similarities between dating’s early stages and the first phases of implementing a successful social media strategy are a convenient way to gauge whether your organization’s social media strategy is likely be appropriate and successful.

Act® is a COTEC initiative that supports the creation of high and medium growth technology based ventures and the licensing of technologies.

Act® provides a set of specific services that enable the creation of social and economic value from knowledge developed by researchers and facilitates the access to funding throughout the different stages of the projects’ development.

By Tom Still

There have been a number of thoughtful "early warning sign" posts in the past few days including one from Fred Wilson (Storm Clouds), one from Mark Suster (What Angel Investing & Florida Condos Have in Common), and Roger Ehrenberg (Investing in a frenzied market).

The seed investing phenomenon of 2010 has been awesome to watch and participate in.  The velocity of activity from individual angels, angel groups, seed VCs (the correct phrase for most of the "super angels" which have now raised actual funds), and even traditional VCs has been on a steep climb throughout the year.  When the numbers are tallied up at the end of the year (I'm sure someone will do it - and it won't be me) I expect there will be all kinds of new records set.

I’m a high-volume person.  That doesn’t make me important.  It doesn’t mean I’m not accessible.  It means simply what I’m stating – high volume.

What that means is that in a typical week I might see 10-15 new company pitches.  Sometimes more.  I speak at conferences where I might meet 75-100 people and have conversations.  I do dinners too often as my waistline can attest.  I have long one-on-one conversations with people for hours.

I have Twitter chats, respond to blog comments, trade emails, respond to comments on This Week in VC.

Most people think that the Peter Principle (employee rises to his level of incompetence) only applies to large organizations. Let me assure you that it is also alive and well within startups. There I see founders and managers who are stalled transplants from large organizations, and technologists trying to run the business.

Forty years ago, in a satiric book named “The Peter Principle”, Dr. Laurence J. Peter first defined this phenomenon. The principle asserts that in a hierarchy, members are promoted so long as they work competently. Sooner or later they are promoted to a position at which they are no longer competent, and there they remain, unless they join a startup to get the next level.

In all environments, the move to incompetence often occurs when competent technical people try to step into management or executive positions, for which they have no aptitude, interest, or training. How many technologists have tried to run startups and failed?