Comments on: The Value of Community

By: jon chui

jon chui — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 05:35:53 +0000

David - I couldn't have said it better myself.

And I'd know because I actually tried . ;)

I wrote a recent post on my blog, jonchui.com, entitled "What Vancouver’s Startup Scene Needs (part 1): Real Community. Better PR."

As a recently minted UBC Engineering Physics + Computer Science alumni, I was idealistic & naive with no idea what the startup culture was like in Vancouver. Similar to @kensville, I was lucky enough to met many great people like Nicole Sheldrake of InnovationCamp.org, Mack Flavelle of CompassEngine.com & Ryan Holmes of Hootsuite.com who really demonstrated the genuine openness to help with little to nothing in return for themselves. However, I've also met many people who weren't.

I just wanted to thank you for your posts & the encouragement that there do exist genuine, open people like you building real startup community in Canada.

By: jon chui

jon chui — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 05:35:53 +0000

David - I couldn't have said it better myself.

And I'd know because I actually tried . ;)

I wrote a recent post on my blog, jonchui.com, entitled "What Vancouverâ€™s Startup Scene Needs (part 1): Real Community. Better PR."

As a recently minted UBC Engineering Physics + Computer Science alumni, I was idealistic & naive with no idea what the startup culture was like in Vancouver. Similar to @kensville, I was lucky enough to met many great people like Nicole Sheldrake of InnovationCamp.org, Mack Flavelle of CompassEngine.com & Ryan Holmes of Hootsuite.com who really demonstrated the genuine openness to help with little to nothing in return for themselves. However, I've also met many people who weren't.

I just wanted to thank you for your posts & the encouragement that there do exist genuine, open people like you building real startup community in Canada.

By: kenseville

kenseville — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 11:12:20 +0000

Community is everything! I moved from Hamilton to Ottawa in Sept. to increase my access to decision makers in my space, think military.com for Canada. What I didn't know was that I was going to join a community of amazing tech. people who really help one another. About a month after I arrived in Ottawa I was very lucky to discover and be selected for Lead to Win, a business development/accelerator program led by Dr. Tony Bailetti and administered by Carleton University. In the process of joining the Ottawa tech. community I connected to great founders like Scott Lake, formerly of Shoppify.com, more recently from Swix: swixapp.com, who took time from his already busy schedule to make a connection for me to a key individual that I needed to meet. I have also met many really interesting visionaries like Nick Desberats of choicebots.com who has thought so deeply on how people make purchasing decisions, and Craig Schoen of ucoursepack.com, who is redrawing how students interact with their learning materials. If I had stayed in Hamilton I would have met none of these people and not been energized as I have been by joining the groundswell of exciting tech. that I have in Ottawa. I cannot emphasize enough how empowering it is to be part of a tight tech. community that goes the extra mile for one another. If you don't have that yet, move to where there is one, you will not regret it.

By: kenseville

kenseville — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 11:12:20 +0000