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This month, we proudly announced the winner of our 2007 RapidGrant program. For those who don’t know, RapidGrant is a program we launched last month as a way to recognize non-profit MyQuire members who are innovative in their approaches to the problem they’re working to address. We were blown away by the applications we received. We heard from people across the country who are working around the world to improve people’s lives, protect animals, and save our environment. It was a pretty tough process but we had to choose a single grant recipient out of the pile of inspirational groups who applied. The organization we chose is called Redemption, a non-profit organization whose mission is to increase the educational advancement of underserved youth between the ages of 13 and 19 residing in Brooklyn, New York. They inspired us by taking such a hands-on approach to giving students the support they need to reach their potential.

Tiffany Tucker, Executive Director of Redemption, told us they were faced with the challenges of coordinating a growing non-profit and dealing with the headaches of having a distributed team working on projects. “We heard about MyQuire and quickly found it was the tool we needed to solve our logistical problems and coordinate our teams,” says Tiffany. “We wanted to get our volunteers on the same page, so we know who’s working on what, and where we can find the latest versions of our documents, schedules and tasks. MyQuire is such a relief – it changes the way we work together to make things so much easier.”

Please join us in congratulating Redemption or better yet, add Tiffany Tucker to your network and send her a message.

A few weeks ago MyQuire was named a finalist in the Collaboration category of the 2007 Silicon Valley Business Journal's Emerging Technology Awards. Very cool! The winners were announced last night at an award banquet held at the Computer History Museum right in MyQuire's hometown of Mountain View, and I went to represent the team. I was on the phone with our CTO and ran in about fifteen minutes after the program had started. I sat down just as they were announcing the collaboration category, and MyQuire won!

I honestly was shocked when he named MyQuire as the winner – and that shock started to feel more like panic as I approached the podium with no acceptance speech prepared. Oh well, it all turned out fine and the rest of the evening was fantastic. David joined me for the banquet following the ceremony and we got a chance to chat with some really interesting folks from the Silicon Valley business community (fellow finalists, journalists, venture capitalists, former winners, etc). It was incredibly validating to hear how excited people are about what we're building (people who aren't living and breathing it every day the way the MyQuire team is). So, now we have a tombstone to put on the shelves of our office to look as was we are hard at work earning our designation as an outstanding Emerging Technology. As they say in Hollywood "it was an honor just to have been nominated" (but between you and me - it was fun to win).

I'm excited to announce that Michael Plotkin has just come on board as MyQuire's Chief Technology Officer. Previously, he was leading the engineering team at iWIN, and has over 20 years of leadership at some of the world's leading technology companies.

Michael has a true passion for helping people do projects. He has been thinking about it ever since his days getting his PhD in computer science at the University of Moscow, but it was really while he was developing Sony Worldwide Studios' project management and collaboration platform that he began to really understand how many people need an easy-to-use tool to help with projects.

What struck me about Michael was that he has stayed close to the code even as he took on more senior roles. Michael's understanding for how technology needs to function invisibly and seamlessly in our lives fit perfectly in our our company culture.

We are thrilled to partner with Michael to build MyQuire!

I'm really excited (and proud!) to announce RAPIDGrant, a new MyQuire program we're kicking off to recognize the efforts of an innovative non-profit MyQuire member organization.

On November 23rd we'll award a single $5,000 grant to the MyQuire non-profit member who most successfully demonstrates the spirit of innovation in its work.

It's been an honor over the last months to work with non-profit MyQuire members. We're inspired by the amazing work you're doing and we're proud that MyQuire is helping you work more efficiently, save time and money, and achieve your mission. Now it's our turn to honor you.

Do you have a unique approach to solving one of the world's problems? Tell us all about it. There are no restrictions as to type of work you do or the community/country you serve (animals, people, the environment, etc.). Our judging panel will select the non-profit organization best able to show how its creative approach is making a difference in the world. Eligible organizations must have at least one registered MyQuire member. Preference in judging will be made to entrants actively using MyQuire to do projects in their organization and entrants who have the ability to use the effect of networks to create MyQuire projects of scale and significance.

We've tried to make the application process as simple as possible. Get complete program information and an application here. All entries must be received by November 12, 2007 (Winner will be announced on November 23rd)

Good Luck! I'm looking forward to reading about all the interesting, inspiring, impactful and innovative work you're doing.

David

We just got back from debuting the next version of MyQuire at DEMOfall 07. We had a great time showing our new product to a bunch of smart folks and were very excited to for the chance to tell the world we have arrived.

The path to DEMO

Getting to DEMO was a rollercoaster ride. We started off thinking we wouldn’t be ready in time to apply for DEMO as our new release wasn’t coming out until later this Fall. Yet as we learned more about the conference, we realized a demo would be enough (seems obvious in hindsight – DEMO/demo), so we applied about 3 weeks after the deadline, talked to Chris Shipley the next day, and were in.

We spent the next month and a half pushing hard toward DEMO, making sure that all the pieces of the product fit together, getting the nuts and bolts of our stage presentation worked out, and making sure we had enough back-ups to survive any situation. After a heroic final 24 hours of testing, we dropped 5 boxes off at FedEx last Friday, and then headed to San Diego on Sunday.

Setting up

Once we arrived Sunday morning, we knew we had arrived at a well-run event. Everything was planned to the minute. We had our on-stage practice, met some of the other folks, and got ready for a hectic three days.

Monday, the conference officially launched. We hadn’t received the fifth box, which had the computers we were using in our DEMO booth, and we were still putting final touches on our presentation, so we were a bit nervous. Finally, around 3pm, the box arrived, and we could join the crowds in the demo pavilion tearing into boxes like it was Christmas – a plasma here, an LCD there. We also had a few final practices to get the presentation straight, then went outside to meet the other folks who had come early and get ready for two very long days.

The DEMO

Our 6 minute stage presentation, which you can see below, was on Wednesday morning, so Tuesday was spent just running through it a few more times in between stints manning our booth. We had a range of conversations, and we also had a chance to talk to some of the other folks demonstrating. Wednesday, we got to the stage at 7:30am to check everything, grabbed breakfast, then waited impatiently for our chance to go onstage. David, our CEO and founder, and I headed out and got started.

In retrospect, it feels pretty easy. It’s only six minutes, right? The lights were a bit too bright, and the crowd is hard to tear away from their email. But in the end, it was great to get out there and tell the world that MyQuire is here and ready to change how we do projects.