The May Report: 11/17/2010: Two major events Tuesday night, including the launch of Robert Jordan’s book, ‘How They Did It: Billion Dollar Insights from the Heart of America’ which drew about 320 people and i.c. stars’ annual fundraiser; No Flips here: Mark Tebbe says “Know your number” so you won’t get sidetracked by being a billionaire for two weeks; and Michael Polsky says he’s “not interested in money”; Adcock Laid Off from OutStart: Inside Sales Girl now working outside, on the street, in the cold (boo hoo)

Editor and publisher: ron@themayreport.com, ronaldmay@aol.com, www.themayreport.com , 773-525-3944.

Assistant editor: Melanie Adcock, iPHONE: 312-259-0610, melanie_adcock@msn.com

If you missed an article, go here: www.tmronline.com/A55951/tmrarticles.nsf/vwFullNewsletter
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The Coupon Code for The May Report readers is: MayReport

This coupon code will get your readers 20% off the admission, VIP,
Fish Bowl (Demo) or Presentation Company sign-up amounts.

Funding Feeding Frenzy

www.FundingFeedingFrenzy.com

The next step up the food chain for Chicago’s

Fast Growth Companies & Entrepreneurs

When: December 8, 2010 – 8:30am to 8pm

Where: SYNC Technology Center

322 S Green Street, Suite 300

Chicago, IL 60607

To register now before admission goes up: www.fundingfeedingfrenzy.com

The Funding Feeding Frenzy is an exceptional event launching this
December 8th 2010 in Chicago at the Sync Technology Center.

www.synctechcenter.com/

We’re assembling some of the most interesting and exciting
entrepreneurial companies around to showcase their businesses in an
attempt to take their companies to the highest levels of success.

On December 8th, each company will present to a panel of four to five
investors (including angel investors, private equity investors,
alternative funding sources and venture capitalists) whose investing
specialties align with the company’s general profile. This makes the
Funding Feeding Frenzy the ideal opportunity for entrepreneurs and
business owners to get input from real investors who back growing
companies.

See fundingfeedingfrenzy.com/agenda/ for agenda information and
planned activities.

The Funding Feeding Frenzy is designed to connect Entrepreneurs, CEOs
and Founders of fast growing companies, with panels that include
active investors with sizable portfolios of companies. These Include
Angel Investors, Private Equity Groups, Venture Capitalists and
alternative funding sources.

To register now go to www.fundingfeedingfrenzy.com

As an Investor attending this event, The Funding Feeding Frenzy
showcases Entrepreneurs and business owners who have exciting
companies and ideas, who are seriously seeking connections and
resources in order to sky-rocket their companies to success. This is
the place to see these companies in action.

How Can I Become A Sponsor or Exhibitor?

If your business involves providing resources to entrepreneurs and /
or investors, as a potential exhibitor or sponsor for the “Main
Event”, you can be assured that the Funding Feeding Frenzy, Chicago
2010 will be an exceptional springboard to position your company
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There’s something stirring in the water…do you dare to find out what it is?

This event is solely for informational purposes only and any inquiries
from potential investors will be directed to presenting companies. We
do not charge investor introduction or “investor finder” fees when
companies raise capital. We are simply providing a forum in which you
can present your company. Further, we make no representations or
warranties regarding the financial ability or “accreditation” of
potential investors. You are solely responsible for conducting any
legal, accounting or due diligence review of potential investors.
Neither Extraordinary Success, LLC nor its affiliated entities are
registered Securities Brokers or Dealers or any other entity regulated
under the securities laws, and we do not receive any form of
compensation based upon investments in the companies presenting.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS

The Scoop section:

– Yahoo! to Aggregate Groupon listings and Yahoo!’s Stock Value, by Melanie Adcock
– Melanie Adcock is laid off from OutStart, by Melanie Adcock
– Melanie answers Ron’s question: “What is Qt Hands-on Training?
– Briefly noted, by Ron May
– Darrell Dvorak: A warning for your audience
– Jeff Meredth: Hilarious Stewart take on McCain & DADT
– Dawn Geras: CHECK THIS OUT!
– Tuesday, November 30: MEF Wheaton: Rebecca Wear Robinson and Kevin Doyle
– Cards Ron collected at the MIT-EF meeting on October 12, 2010 (10/12/2010)
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Plight of the MEF Holiday Party

Thee are plenty of holiday parties being conducted for companies that are celebrating their success – but the true spirit of the holiday season will always be found through embracing the unfortunates of society. That’s why I. Ron May, want to personally encourage you to give to the cause that I’ve been donating to for 20 years now: Jerry Mitchell’s MEF. As demonstrated by the recent turnout at Jerry’s last meeting (two people) – and his inability to even get the date of his own event straight (see below) – it’s clear that the MEF has disintegrated into a state of abject pathos. Well, what are the holidays if not a time for addressing the poor, the sick, the unwell, unbound and the fallen?

Join me in throwing a few silver coins into Jerry’s tin cup at what I’d like to call the MEF’s Undeath of a Salesman Holiday Party. And maybe, collectively, we can provide the mouth-to-mouth resuscitation necessary to bring Jerry’s organization back to life. If not, we’ll at least give it the wake it deserves before laying it to rest in Potter’s field.

If you can figure out exactly which day the party is, let the rest of us, and Jerry, know. And don’t be afraid to wear black.
Party details provided by the MEF (I mean Jerry’s gang)
From the latest Newsletter

From: MEF@mail-list.com
Sender: mef@mail-list.com
Subject: The Midwest Entrepreneurs Forum
Date: Thu, 4 Nov 2010 02:09:50 -0500
To: ron@themayreport.com

Save the Date Monday December 6th Networking Event Union League Club

Yet more party details from the MEF website:

From the Website: www.MidwestEntrepreneursForum.Org/CalendarEvents.aspx

Event Title: Holiday Party ( Event Details )
Start Date/Time: 12/7/2010 – 5:30 PM
End Date/Time: 12/7/2010 – 9:00 PM
Location: Union League Club – 2nd Floor Lounge 65 West Jackson Chicago, IL.
Contact Info: mef@jerryrmitchellandassoc.com
Tel: 630 305-0005

1) If you are registering for an MEF event for the first time, select the “New Registration” option below and enter your e-mail address and desired password. If you have previous registered for any MEF event, please enter your existing e-mail address and password.

2) To update or cancel your registration select the “Update/Cancel Registration” option below.

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______________________________
The Scoop section:
_______________________
Yahoo! to Aggregate Groupon listings and Yahoo!’s Stock Value, by Melanie Adcock

Subject: Yahoo! to Aggregate Groupon listings and Yahoo!’s stock value compared to Google
Date: 11/16/2010 2:51:16 P.M. Central Standard Time
From: melanie_adcock@msn.com
To: ronaldmay@aol.com, ron@themayreport.com

Yahoo! to Aggregate Groupon listings and Yahoo!’s Stock Value

By Melanie Adcock

With all the excitement Chicago has around the success of Groupon it is worth bringing attention to the announcement that Yahoo! plans to aggregate listings of more than ten coupon competitors including Groupon with the idea that it will make coupons easier to find. It looks like Yahoo! is trying to get into this game in a big way. Yahoo! offered to buy Groupon for 3-4 Billion. Andrew Mason declined to comment on the matter and is quoted on Nov. 9th in a story by Nicholas Carlson on businessinsider.com saying, ” “I totally was going to comment except the way you asked for my comment suggested that maybe I shouldn’t and I didn’t want to let you down so I decided not to comment.” Wow, and Ron May thinks I babble.

Sometimes you can find intriguing insights in the comment sections of blogs. I found this comment by Bernand Moon on an article focusing on Yahoo!’s offer to buy Groupon on vator.tv news: vator.tv/news/2010-11-09-yahoo-offering-to-buy-grouponagain
“It’s a bad idea. Groupon could easily go the way of Broadcast.com after an acquisition. I don’t think they have an eBay-like barrier to entry, so the hundreds of competitors can easily chip away at their revenue base. With OpenTable, Yelp, maybe Facebook, and countless others are getting into the coupon/lead gen business.The flipside is that by being on Yahoo!’s platform, Groupon can take it to another level, but I doubt this will happen.”

What does all of this mean? It means international expansion for Groupon and a repurposing of Yahoo!, a search engine significantly trailing Google. According to Morningstar.com the price of Yahoo!’s Stock dropped today by forty-five cents to $16.14 quote.morningstar.com/Stock/s.aspx?t=YHOO

Morningstar’s take on Yahoo! as a company to invest in looks bleak from their summary:

Yahoo remains one of the most heavily trafficked sites in the world. However, despite secular tail winds for online advertising, we think industry dynamics (search market share, audience fragmentation, and pricing power) will prevent Yahoo from achieving robust revenue growth. In addition, an investor must consider the company’s other assets, as we estimate that Yahoo’s core business represents just 40% of its total equity value.

You can read their full analyst report which can be found on the above link. I would suggest doing that if you have stock in Yahoo!

Google’s stock by comparison dropped over ten dollars today to $584.38 quote.morningstar.com/stock/s.aspx?t=GOOG but the long term outlook for investment doesn’t look quite as bleak as Yahoo!’s. By looking at the numbers Yahoo! is looking pretty pathetic. Will they go up from a miserable $16.14 with the acquisition of Groupon, an exciting new company with tons of buzz? We’ll have to watch and see what happens to Chicago’s most talked about business success story.

As the holiday season approaches I say let the deal showering begin. The more competitors the better. -Melanie Adcock

Melanie Adcock
iPHONE: 312-259-0610
DROID: 312-833-1825
E-Mail: melanie_adcock@msn.com
Facebook Fan Page: bit.ly/MelanieAdcockFacebookFanPage
Bio: bit.ly/MelanieAdcockARC
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/melanieadcock
Twitter: twitter.com/melanie_adcock
Facebook Profile: www.facebook.com/melanie.a.adcock

Yahoo! wants to be the coupon section of the Internet
Posted on Nov 16th, 2010 by Chad Catacchio

thenextweb.com/us/2010/11/16/yahoo-wants-to-be-the-coupon-section-of-the-internet/

Yahoo! today announced a new beta service called Local Offers that will be an aggregator of many of the coupon/daily deal/group buying services out there, including both Groupon and LivingSocial.
According to a press release,Yahoo!’s Local Offers program is open to all deal providers, including local “deal of the day” partners and traditional direct-marketing partners, offering them an effective way to target offers and reach engaged audiences. In the near future, Yahoo! will extend the reach of its Local Offers program, making it available to more consumers throughout the US.

The other announced partners are; Gilt City, BloomSpot, BuyWithMe, DealOn, Zozi, CrowdSavings, Lifebooker, FreshGuide, Scoop St, Goldstar, HomeRun, Tippr, Coupons.com, and Valpak. Most notably missing to us is Yelp, though Yahoo! promises that more partners are forthcoming.So basically, Yahoo! has made the decision to not deal directly with local merchants (at least right now) and instead just leverage its traffic to drive more people towards already existing deals (we’re assuming that Yahoo! gets a cut, but there isn’t any mention of that in the press release). Karsten Weide, a VP at research firm IDC, was quoted in the release as saying:

Consumers are inundated with offers, both online and off. I think a service that aggregates several different special deals sources will give consumers great deals and make the marketplace much more transparent. For partners in such a service, the audience reach of a large partner will give them a lot of much needed distribution. We more or less agree, though Groupon itself would probably constitute “a large partner”, though more distribution is rarely ever a bad thing, so it’s hard to see this as a negative for Groupon or any of the the other partners in this announcement. From Yahoo!’s perspective, this would seem to be the quickest way into becoming a player in this market, though how people find/get these coupons from Yahoo! is unclear, though we would image that it will be a combination of a dedicated space on the homepage, integration in Yahoo!’s mobile apps and pushed through email.

Search, however, could be a problem for Yahoo! here, as we suspect that Google could easily swoop in with a “deals” search option (perhaps integrated into Google Places?) that crawls all of these sites/deals in near real-time and then that could almost instantly be a faster way to find the deal users are looking for. Of course, if Microsoft’s Bing beats Google to that, then – as Bing is now used in Yahoo! search, then perhaps Yahoo!/Bing could work something out where searches go to Yahoo!’s hub (or whatever it builds).
So overall, a good idea, but one that Yahoo! is really going to have a hard time holding onto unless it figures out the search aspect of it quickly.
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Melanie Adcock is laid off from OutStart, by Melanie Adcock

Subject: Melanie Adcock is laid off from OutStart
Date: 11/17/2010 11:42:59 A.M. Central Standard Time
From: melanie_adcock@msn.com
To: ron@themayreport.com, ronaldmay@aol.com

Melanie Adcock is laid off from OutStart
By Melanie Adcock

When I shared the news with Ron that I was recently laid off from my full time job at OutStart he immediately wanted to make it a headline in the report (typical Ron) so I decided to take action and beat him to the punch. If it’s about me I may as well be the one to tell you all about it. Otherwise, (insert theme music from the movie Jaws here) Ron will write about it. Ron writes about what he hears and publishes it without answering to anything other than his own set of criteria. He is a human tape recorder serving up stories others put before him. When Ron May says there is no immunity in The May Report he is not referring to a seasonal flu vaccination.

For the last several years my full time job has been cold calling on behalf of tech companies to schedule appointments, create sales opportunities and load sales pipelines. My vantage point as an employee has been similar to that of a greasy mechanic on the underside of a car. I’ve been over managed, under managed, treated like I was on a football team, made to work like a dog, sworn at to serve as motivation, rewarded to serve as motivation, treated like gold, treated like dirt– I’ve pretty much seen it all. OutStart offered me what I felt was the rolls royce of sales jobs. I got to work from home and had the most outstanding sales manager I’ve ever had. I had fabulous co-workers and greatly appreciated the chance to work in a mature work culture with seasoned professionals. I couldn’t put my finger on it but something was up. When my department dissolved I was given an amiable, “it’s not you it’s us,” dialogue. The good news is the people at OutStart are smart so any changes they make to their company I’m sure will be good ones even if they have to make tough decisions. The bad news is some people lost their jobs including me.

OutStart’s Chicago office consists of what used to be the company, Participate Systems, Inc., which OutStart acquired in 2004. Participate Systems, Inc. was originally founded in 1997 by Alan Warms who is now CEO of Appolicious. The Participate software is still sold by OutStart. Participate is now a Social Business Software SaaS solution designed as a social community platform for both internal and external configurations like a customer service self-service portal on the external side or a sales enablement and knowledge management tool for internal company use. It’s a great product with a lot of flexibility to manage communication needs in communities. When asked to comment on the future of OutStart’s Chicago office location no comment was made and I’m sure they’ll keep that information private. Nothing unusual there, a lot of companies do that. There are no new positions available on their website as of right now but if anyone asked me about this company I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it highly.

After years of practicing inside sales I can get the right Vice President in a high priority prospect account to call me back after leaving a compelling voicemail or sending a relevant targeted e-mail. I can run a CRM tool like one else and can create the PowerPoints for a company’s sales demos. I can decipher an annual report for an enterprise company and rank prospects in a sales territory. As Malcolm Gladwell would say in his book, “Outliers,” I’ve put in my 5,000 hours on the phone. I’ve trained people, given public lectures to share my skills and I feel like I’ve gone as far as I can go on the underside of the car. Unfortunately, inside sales is on the lower rungs of the corporate ladder and I’ve had no power to solve problems or initiate change. I’m a creative, curious problem solving type who hasn’t been working in a vacuum all these years. I’ve collaborated with other departments, explored the software I’ve sold, and creatively inserted myself outside of my role to help whatever company i’m working for to make progress in marketing, design, innovative software use, and operations. It is time for me to do more and be more. I’ve never faced uncertainty about my future with a greater sense of excitement than what I have right now. I feel strongly good things are on the horizon.

Many have warned me about potential downfalls of working with Ron saying that it will impact my future. I ask what will these people do for me if I walk away now while I still can as they suggest? Will they challenge me, help me grow as a person, and give me an opportunity to try something new like Ron has? Probably not. I can’t keep doing the same thing and had to break out of the box somehow. Even though I am only volunteering to help Ron and get paid nothing, I’m seeing the world through a new lens. People are looking at me, too. You’ll watch me grow, stretch, screw up, and learn in a public setting fraught with local tech scene political drama. Enough about me. I am looking at all of you as well and I’ve got to get back to writing about it for The May Report.
_____________________________________

Melanie answers Ron’s question: “What is Qt Hands-on Training?

Subject: RE: Melanie, what is Qt Hands-on Training?
Date: 11/16/2010 12:30:02 P.M. Central Standard Time
From: melanie_adcock@msn.com
To: ronaldmay@aol.com

Ron wants to know: Melanie, what is Qt Hands-on Training?

Hey there, Ron. I’m glad you asked. Qt is a tool that is used to write mobile applications created by Nokia. The event announcement we ran for free Qt training events.forum.nokia.com/invitation/qtchicago (also reposted again below for reference) is a chance for people to learn how to use the Qt programming tool. A free training event like this is a cool thing to see in Chicago because a lot of the time these events will happen more in New York and Silicon Valley. The advantage of the Qt tool is you can develop applications that can be deployed to desktop, mobile, and embedded operating systems and use the same code for all of it. Here is a link where people can download it: qt.nokia.com/products/ Because there are now mobile platforms like Andriod, iPhone, and Blackberry’s API, and Nokia’s Symbian platform it is a real pain and financial drain for developers to re-code the same app several times to go into all of the platforms. As a result many of the discussions in the mobile community center around tools like Qt that enable cross platform development to make developers’ lives easier and save companies money on app development costs. Some other cross platform tools that are similar are:

-PhoneGap www.phonegap.com/
-JQ Touch www.jqtouch.com/
-RhoMobile rhomobile.com/
-Monotouch monotouch.net/
-Appcelerator www.appcelerator.com/

While we’re at it here is a short list of acronyms you’ll see in the mobile user interface development world and what they mean:

IDE = Integrated Development Environment
SDK = Software Development Kit
OOUI = Object Oriented User Interface
GUI = Graphical User Interface
UI = User Interface

Qt Hands-on Training – Chicago, IL – December 6-7, 2010

events.forum.nokia.com/invitation/qtchicago

FREE TRAINING AND SYMBIAN^3 DEVELOPER PACK (WHILE SUPPLIES LAST)!
Forum Nokia and Integrated Computer Solutions (ICS), a Qt certified training and consulting partner, are providing an intensive two day hands-on, classroom style coding workshop that will train developers how to use Qt to develop mobile applications for the new Nokia N8. Attendees will learn how to create mobile applications with Qt by using an actual Symbian device.

To maximize the benefit of this workshop, attendees are expected to have prior experience with developing applications for mobile devices and be proficient with C++; however, no prior experience with Qt is necessary.

If you are thinking of using Qt to develop your next mobile application and want hands-on, practical training to jump-start your project this is the workshop for you. If you haven’t made your decision yet to use Qt, this is also the place where you will learn more about the technical capabilities of Qt, talk over ideas and concepts with your peers and find out how Qt will provide increased flexibility while reducing long term support costs.
Chicago venue:
Wyndham Chicago
633 N. St Clair
Chicago, IL www.wyndham.com/hotels/ORDDT/main.wnt

——————————————————————————–
From: RONALDMAY@aol.com
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2010 01:27:12 -0500
Subject: Melanie, what is Qt Hands-on Training?
To: melanie_adcock@msn.com
_________________________________
Briefly noted, by Ron May

* There was some confusion Tuesday night because two events had the moniker Tech Bash. One was the annual i.c. stars fundraiser at Excalibur for $250 a seat and the other was also called the Great Lakes Entrepreneur Bash put on by Robert Jordan with a supporting cast of about ten organizations including Tech America, The ITA, TiE-Midwest, the MIT-EF, and a number of others. The sponsorship did have a regional flavor, and we should note that TiE Detroit, Purdue Technology Center, MOJO Minnesota, and there were some organizations that we don’t see very often such as the Wharton Club of Chicago.

I went to the Robert Jordan event which featured seven local entrepreneurs who are the subject of Bob Jordan’s book entitled How they Did it. The book covers a lot of local and regional entrepreneurs: www.entrepreneurbash.com/founders/

Here is a list of the people profiled and interviewed in the book:

Jeff Aronin, Ovation Pharmaceuticals, Illinois
Bonnie Baskin, AppTec Laboratory Services, Minnesota
David Becker, First Internet Bank
Allen Berning, Pemstar Inc., Minnesota
Viresh Bhatia, InstallShield, Illinois
Michael Blair, Cyborg, Illinois
Dick Costolo, FeedBurner, Illinois
John Croghan, Extended Care Information Network, Illinois
Bill Deville, Health Personnel Options, Ohio
Jim Dolan, The Dolan Company, Minnesota
Mike Domek, TicketsNow, Illinois
Tony Faras, MGI Pharma, Minnesota
Gian Fulgoni, comScore, Illinois
Ron Galowich, HealthCare Compare, Illinois
Bill Gantz, Pathogenesis, Illinois
Jim Gray, optionsXpress, Illinois
Roland Green, Nimblegen Systems, Wisconsin
Don Harrison, AtriCure, Ohio
Rich Heise, Innerworkings, Illinois
Scott Jones, GraceNote, Indiana
Tim Krauskopf, Spyglass, Illinois
Eric Lefkofsky, Innerworkings, Illinois
Thomas Rockwell Mackie, TomoTherapy, Wisconsin
Joe Mansueto, Morningstar, Illinois
Don Maurer, Empi, Minnesota
Bill Merchantz, Lakeview Technology, Illinois
Dane Miller, Biomet, Indiana
Chris Moffitt, Rubicon Technology, Illinois
Michael Pape, Esperion Therapeutics, Michigan
Thomas Parkinson, Peapod, Illinois
Vincent Pettinelli, PeopleServe, Ohio
Joe Piscopo, Pansophic, Illinois
Michael Polsky, SkyGen, Illinois
Joel Ronning, Digital River, Minnesota
Stephen Shank, Capella Education, Minnesota
Phil Sheridan, Extended Care Information Network, Illinois
Scott Sheridan, thinkorswim, Illinois
Rajesh Soin, MTC Technologies, Ohio
Phil Soran, Compellent Technologies, Minnesota
Brian Sullivan, Recovery Engineering, Minnesota
Jeff Surges, Extended Care Information Network, Illinois
Mark Tebbe, Lante Corporation, Illinois
Glen Tullman, Allscripts, Illinois
Howard Tullman, Certified Collateral Corporation, Illinois
Mahendra Vora, Intelliseek, Ohio

The panelists last night were: Bill DeVille, Jim Dolan, Tim Krauskopf, Chris Moffitt, Vince Pettinelli, Michael Polsky, Mark Tebbe, and the moderator was Bob Jordan.

Just off the top of my head, here are some of the people who were there (Melzinie and I counted 270 chairs — all filled — and there were at least 30 or more floating around in the back):

Larry Hayward, Scott Glickson, Mark Glennon, Ellen Carnahan, Dave Culver, Bob Ingersoll, Troy Henikoff, Jeff Coney, Tim Curley, Neil Kane who told Melanie he only reads TMR to see if his name is in it and if you believe that, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you; Stefania Aulincino who is “threatening” to do away with the salmon at her annual Christmas party, supplanting it with “pot luck” and that gives me a month to lobby for keeping the salmon ; Darcy Evon and her friend Jane Fischer whom I don’t know; Sarah Habansky who worked the registration desk; Mary Pat McGlynn who also worked the registration desk; Ed Longanecker, Tom Figel who has been kissing up to Bob Jordan quite a bit lately for PR business, I hear; Figel’s side kick Kevin Deany; Nancy Munro who also played a role in getting me in (I’ll give the play-by-play another day, but suffice it to say that this is one time that ended well despite the presence of security guards threatening to remove me, but credit must go to Darcy Evon, Ellen Carnahan, Melanie Adcock and Nancy Munro for talking to Bob Jordan who wanted me to agree to sit in the back, not make noise, not ask questions except through Melanie, and to be on good behavior — all of which could have easily been accomplished without the intermediaries to negotiate terms and the security guards — I regret that Melanie gets dragged into this crap when she has done no harm to anyone) and who spoke at the podium briefly; Terry Flanagan; Bill McDonald, Jason Jacobsohn, Terry Howerton, Fred Hoch, Jeffrey Lyons, Dan DiCaro, Jon Pasky, Maura O’Hara, Ira Weiss and I heard that one other person from Hyde Park Angels was there as well, Philippe Lavie, Lanny Feder, Glenn Gottfried, Ray Markman, Sheldon Rosenfield, Scott Harris, Joel Berez, Steve Ghareeb, Tom Lemanski, Roy Klein, Keith Bates, Michael Krauss whom I have not seen in a long time; Bill Furlong whom I have also not seen in ages; Dick Mulvihill, Walt Sloan, Richard Cross who for once was not being a flibbertigibbet last night, Irv Michaels, Dave Ormesher (who probably left early to go to the i.c. stars event), Brad DeSent, Adam Boris, Tom Hazlett, Craig Miller, Dan Lyne (I thought I saw him standing by the door in the back); Scott Miller of Integrated PDG who tells me he has a new card coming next week along with a new company name; and that is all I can think of off the top of my head.

I did not see Bruce Montgomery, Ted Wallhaus, Linda Darragh, Dennis Serio, Ron Kirschner, Bob Geras, Matt McCall, Geoff Domaracki, Brad Keywell, Eric Lefkofsky, Andrew Mason, Len Bland, Raman Chadha, Chris Rollyson, Bob Brill, Daliah Saper, David Carman, Kapil Chadhaury, Mike Rhodes, Gian Fulgoni, Nik Rokop, David Baker, Tim Courtney, John Dallas, David Dalka, Jason Rexilius, Adam Koopersmith, JB Pritzker, Howard Tullman and others.

A few of those folks, including Ted Wallhaus, Linda Darragh, Raman Chadha, and Kapil Chadhaury were credited on the program guide as people who had helped put the event together.

In terms of “news” — on the theory that if I did not know it until now, it is NOW news — I heard from Jeff Coney that Pat Statwick left NU and moved to Iowa. I also heard a rumor that CompTIA might buy the ITA. That sounds crazy at first, but think about it. The ITA can’t operate forever with its high overhead and when the windfall profit they got from the ITDA money runs out, they will need a cash infusion. CompTIA is an international organization.

I have a few general observations quickly for today: 1. This event was a good thing and the publication of the book by Bob Jordan which got input from a slew of local entrepreneurs is something to be honored and celebrated — in fact, I met a number of Bob’s relatives who were there for the special occasion!; 2. In keeping with Bob Jordan’s own personality which is low key (albeit possibly a bit on the passive-aggressive side), the seven entrepreneurs on the panel were also models of equanimity and while they did tell some stories that exhibited the presence of big egos, for the most part, this was not a Flip and Bob Bernard (RIP) or Howard Tullman type crowd; and 3. It is also true that for most of these guys, their glory days are behind them.

Philippe Lavie strongly disagreed with me. We had a great discussion after the event at Joy Yee Noodles which debunked some of the myths I have grown to believe over the years. Philippe has been here since mid-2006, just about the time Tech Cocktail had its first event in July 2006.

He came from Portland and San Francisco and of course, he is originally from France.

He believes that the willingness to cooperate and help is much greater here than it is on the coasts. He said that in four and a half years here, he has only been denied his request for a meeting with someone four or five times. And on other occasions, he found that he and the people he sought to meet have been able to figure out if they can help each other out in a short time. The egos are much bigger in the Valley than they are here, he told us. Melanie had wheeled me down to the restaurant and Philippe was just finishing his meal and I motioned for him to join us.

Philippe had a big job with the Portland Trailblazers and he does know business, both start-up and larger scale.

Philippe also disagreed with me about the glory days of the entrepreneurs being in the past. He said that you can’t hit a home run every time and some entrepreneurs need only one in a lifetime to be happy.

Philippe and I agreed that the fiefdom mentality in this town has taken a hit and also that the gatekeeper culture here is on the wane. I saw Scott Glickson standing there in the back and he exemplifies that gatekeeper culture, but who can argue the proposition that his influence has declined?

This somewhat fits with what Mark Tebbe said. Tebbe is the one person on the panel who has had an outsized ego (I say that because I may know far too much about the guy thanks to Hope Bertram whom i hear Tebbe tried to get a restraining order on — and many others who used to work for Lante), but Mark did stress that you have to “know your number” and not get carried away by the two weeks when you were a multi-billionaire during which time everyone you know was kissing your butt. I forget what the price of his stock was at its peak, but he sounded like he was happy to settle for a dollar a share.

Tebbe is also a family man who enjoys spending time with his kids, even if that means micro-managing their college applications — and writing the essays himself at 3am.

Michael Polsky who is the founder, CEO and president of Invenergy said that believe it or not, he is “not interested in money.”

Can you imagine Flip ever saying THAT??!!

Jim Dolan argued for the importance of having “hot standbys” as options. One other panelist quipped that you don’t always have them to fall back on.

Thinking about the people on the panel, Chris Moffitt could afford to be somewhat humble because he was associated with TSC and Diamond Management. There was enough ego to fill the room at both of those firms with the likes of Al Beedie and Mel Bergstrom. Maybe this is why Chris Moffitt said “surround yourself by smarter people.” It helps to really know the history of the people speaking.

Bill DeVille stressed a zigzag or niche approach built on flexibility and related a story about shifting gears hours before closing a deal.

The book can be ordered here:

www.howtheydiditbook.com/

BTW, Terry Howerton is hocking Bob Jordan’s book. Howerton is up to his old tricks. He appears to be writing an article but it turns out that he is just linking you to Amazon to buy the book.

www.illinoistech.org/story.aspx/302963?

BTW, Bill McDonald and his toupee wrote in a comment about the Jerry Alderman talk at Steve Lundin’s BIGFrontier event last Thursday. After I told Lundin about Bill’s complaint, he said that “We’ve been feeding, hydrating, educating and entertaining Bill for ten years now on our dime. I’d like to see what he has to say about events he has to pay attend.”

I think Bill may be of the Jeff Willinger creed: If it’s free, I’ll take three.

* Bobby – how you doing?

www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/15/rahm-emanuels-tenant-rob-_1_n_783764.html

____________________________________
Darrell Dvorak: A warning for your audience

Subject: a warning for your audience
Date: 11/16/2010 2:43:18 P.M. Central Standard Time
From: d5547k@yahoo.com
To: ron@themayreport.com
CC: RONALDMAY@aol.com

Ron,
Since you seem to be a cheerleader for government subsidizing entrepreneurs, here’s a timely warning for you and those investors and entrepreneurs who expect to feed from the public trough. Although I have strong views, I leave it to you and your readers to explain where and when taxpayer subsidies are oh-so-virtuous compared to those not favored by national, state and local governments. Good luck.

online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703305404575610402116987146.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop#articleTabs%3Darticle

p.s. spare me and your readers the passionate incoherence of Meredith and his ilk.
___________________________________
Jeff Meredth: Hilarious Stewart take on McCain & DADT

Subject: Hilarious Stewart take on McCain & DADT
Date: 11/16/2010 1:19:46 P.M. Central Standard Time
From: jeffmere@gmail.com
To: ronaldmay@aol.com

www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_11/026661.php

“It’s the maverick way — spend a year studying whether soldiers deserve full civil rights, and a half an hour deciding who will be your presidential running mate.” – Jon Stewart
____________________________________
Dawn Geras: CHECK THIS OUT!

Subject: CHECK THIS OUT!
Date: 11/16/2010 1:54:24 P.M. Central Standard Time
From: bob@vcbob.com
To: RONALDMAY@aol.com, ron@themayreport.com
CC: thendrix@biaspower.com, craigqdavis@gmail.com, mcreighton@biaspower.com

Great piece about the Baby Safe Haven Law on “Charity Chat Radio”

www.thelocaltourist.com/blog/chicago/charity-chat-episode-11-save-abandoned-babies

Dawn Geras
President
www.SaveAbandonedBabies.org
www.facebook.com/SaveAbandonedBabies
Phone: 312-440-0229 Fax: 312-440-0805
55 E. Erie St., #2905
Chicago, IL 60611-2255
______________________________________
Tuesday, November 30: MEF Wheaton: Rebecca Wear Robinson and Kevin Doyle

From: MEF@mail-list.com
Sender: mef@mail-list.com
Subject: The Midwest Entrepreneurs Forum
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2010 12:09:21 -0600
To: ron@themayreport.com

MIDWEST ENTREPRENEURS’ FORUM, INC., Volume 15, Issue 11B , Tuesday
November 30, 2010

We have a strict anti-spam policy! We know how important your privacy is to
you so we guarantee that we will NEVER sell your e-mail address. Please also
note…you can remove yourself from our list at any time. We supply a link
at the bottom of each e-mail to manage your subscription to The Midwest
Entrepreneurs Forum Inc.

Cost: Free to members, $20.00 for non-members (reservations are not
required) IIT Students with valid student ID Free. Students from other
Universities with a valid student ID $5.00 Register on line
www.MidwestEntrepreneursForum.Org/CalendarEvents.aspx you will need to
select either Chicago or Wheaton

You can pay by credit card on line or you can pay at the door with cash,
check, or credit card.

Our meeting will be held at: Daniel L. & Ada F. Rice Campus of Illinois
Institute of Technology 201 East Loop Road, Wheaton IL (directions below)

Time: 7:00 to 9:00 p.m.
Date: Tuesday November 30,2010

Tonight we have two entrepreneurs speaking of their experiece in building
their dream.

Tonight I want you to take the time to listen to entrepreneurs just like you
who will share their experiences in starting and building their business.

They have very different businesses and this will make for an interesting
evening as the audience will hear from two very different entrepreneurs but
with experiences that could make your mistakes preventable.

The one thing that they both share is their dream of making a difference in
children’s lives. For you see each of them has a charity that they believe
is more important then their own personal gains.

Each of us can learn from both of these entrepreneurs the satisfaction that
comes with the knowledge that you have made a difference in peoples lives.
After all it’s the holiday season and each of us will be celebrating with
family and friends. Going to our religious places of worship to enjoy the
holiday we give thanks for all we have. However we often times forget the
less fortunate. These two entrepreneurs will teach us all to be more humble.

Tonights entrepreneurs are:

Rebecca Wear Robinson www.jabariofthewater.com
Blog: RebeccaSaveKids.wordpress.com

Rebecca Wear Robinson
RWR Consultants, Inc., Mentor Life Products LLC, Jabari LLC

Rebecca brings business savvy, tenacity and a wonk’s love of statistics to
the launch of “Jabari”, a new approach to water safety for children.

She is a social entrepreneur who combines her business consulting background
with a lifelong devotion to helping children reach their full potential.
From ‘cuddling’ newborns as a volunteer, qualifying in CPR/First Aid, and
spending countless hours in the water with her own kids. She is deeply
committed to keeping children safe and has pledged 10% of sales to support
water safety programs for at-risk children.

Her fondest hope for Jabari? To make it “cool” for kids to be safe in the
water.

Born and raised in the United States, she has a Master’s in Management from
Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University as well as a
Master’s in Organizational and Social Psychology from the London School of
Economics.

She lived in the UK and France for 10 years, where her eyes were first
opened to the global issues surrounding children and drowning. Today, she
is back in her beloved hometown of Chicago.

KEVIN DOYLE – PRESIDENT www.3points.com
Foundation for his deceased mother www.sadfund.org
Kevin Doyle co-founded 3 Points LLC in 2002. He enjoys helping small
business owners grow their business through the use of technology. For the
last decade, he has worked hard to become an industry expert and trusted
advisors to over 200 Chicagoland small businesses.

In addition to his passion for technology, he has also just recently started
a not-for-profit organization to provide college scholarships to children
whose parent or legal guardian became the victim of murder. He lost his
mother to a murder in July of 1993. Through his experience, he believes he
can be a role model to others who have experienced similar tragedies.

About The Midwest Entrepreneurs Forum

www.MidwestEntrepreneursForum.Org

THIS MONTH’S PRESIDENT’S LETTER

www.MidwestEntrepreneursForum.Org

President
Jerry R.Mitchell

Directions

The campus is just North of Butterfield Road (Rt 56) and a half-mile East of
Naperville Road. From the East you can take the East-West toll Road (I-88)
West to the Naperville Road exit. Go North on Freedom Drive to Warrenville
Road at the stop light which is Warrenville Road turn Right (East). At the
first stop light which is Naperville Road turn Left (North) Turn Right
(East) on Butterfield Road (Rt 56) Turn left [North] at East Loop Road, the
first stoplight on Butterfield Road. The IIT building is a short distance
ahead on your right.
______________________________________
Cards Ron collected at the MIT-EF meeting on October 12, 2010 (10/12/2010)

David R. Brown
Ungaretti & Harris
www.uhlaw.com
drbrown@uhlaw.com

Raymond J. Markman
President and CEO
Financial Life Planning LLC
raymarkman@yahoo.com

Philip Berman
Principal
Applitite
www.applitite.com
phil@applitite.com

Norman May
Vice President of Operations
MyHealthyPuppy
www.myhealthypuppy.com
nmay@myhealthypuppy.com

Charles B. Brown
Principal
CorpLaw Associates
www.corplaw.com
charlie@corplaw.com

Thomas Meyer
Vice President
District Sales Manager
Wells Fargo
tjmeyer@wellsfargo.com

Dick Mulvihill
Managing Partner
Hexistor
www.hexistor.com
dick@hexistor.com

Daniel Darby
Choke Clothing
www.chokeclothing.com
chokeclothing@gmail.com
twitter@chokeclothing.com

Michael R. Liss
Attorney at Law
mliss@lisslamar.com

Richard T. Jander
Maranon Capital LP
rtj@maranoncapital.com

Lisa Ackerman
President
LuxeLife
www.shopluxelife.com
lisa@shopluxelife.com

Neil Khot
VP International Business
RelyServices
www.relyservices.com
nkhot@relyservices.com

Scott B. Harris
Creative Capital Corp.
scott@creativecapitalcorp.us

John L. Ambrogi
Partner
McCracken & Frank LLP
www.mccrackenfrank.com
jambrogi@mccrackenfrank.com

Joel M. Berez
joel@berez.com

Matthew R. Smith
Consultant
em_are_ess@yahoo.com

Daniel M. Gurfinkel
Attorney
Husch Blackwell Sanders LLP
Welsh & Katz
www.huschblackwell.com
daniel.gurfinkel@huschblackwell.com

Christopher J. Schafer
Ungaretti & Harris
www.uhlaw.com
cjschafer@uhlaw.com

Nate Marks
DesignMarks.biz

Dr. Yaser Maksoud
President
Nerve Access, Inc.
www.nerveaccess.com
ymaksoud@nerveaccess.com
ymaksoud@gmail.com

Joe Sprovieri
Founder & CEO
ReadyPing
joe@readyping.com

Roy W. Klein
Principal
Applied Engineering Technologies
rwk.aet@gmail.com

William A. Price
Attorney at Law
Growth Law
www.growthlaw.com
wprice@growthlaw.com

Scott A. Fiedler
Senior General Management/Operations Executive
scottafiedler@gmail.com

Justin Lampel
Registered Patent Attorney
Lampel & Associates, P.C.
www.lampellaw.com
jlampel@lampellaw.com

Ellie Carlson
Green Guestbook Inc.
www.greenguestbook.com
ellie@greenguestbook.com
_______________________________________
END OF REPORT