My friend Mark Long recently asked me about networking in Los Angeles. Rather than write something just for Mark, I thought I would let everybody else know what the good, tech-oriented networking events are in Los Angeles. It took me a little while to figure out the difference between entertainment meetups, advertising events, marketing conferences, and even fashion shows (did I mention that I am a Technologist?). Mark is a CTO, see, and his company, PortBlue , was recently acquired (congrats, Mark!). After transitioning to the new team, Mark was left to wonder,

He was struggling to find high quality developers in Los Angeles. Just the kind of person I like to meet. :) But I was a bit surprised when he emphasized how hard it had been for them to find a web developer in Los Angeles. My flippant comment was, “If you do a Google search for Los Angeles web developer, you’ll find a LOT of people and firms.” His response was that he had done exactly that, but that the long list is not all that useful. Yesterday, I met with someone at the early stage of a startup. He has a great concept with some complexity

Attendees: If you have review comments I'd be happy to consider them. Name: XING Community Los Angeles Sites: https://www.xing.com/net/la/ , www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=33803 gid=33803 (main), https://www.xing.com/ Self-description: "This forum is dedicated to all Los Angeles inhabitants, visitors of the area and business minded people from all around the world, who would like to explore business opportunities with L.A. This is will be a continually updating post. I'll be creating additional lists for educational, chamber of commerce, etc. Organizational representatives: please contact me directly for updates, etc.

Los Angeles By: Laura Rich February 26, 2010 It used to be, if you were serious about starting a tech company, you went to Silicon Valley. But lets face it, when you think of Los Angeles, Internet startups are not the first things that spring to mind. Mark Suster, a partner at GRP Partners in Los Angeles, spoke with Fastcompany.com about RSS ); Why You Should Start a Company in...

In 1986 I started an advertising and public relations firm to serve software and hardware companies, which became a marketing consulting business ( www.Allen.com ) when I moved to L.A. world? What networking events in Los Angeles or Southern California do you go to? For meetings aimed at helping salespeople network, I like B2B Power Exchange ( www.b2bpowerexchange.com ). If Cliff Allen is someone I've known for quite a few years and he's a go to person for me when I'm thinking about issues around marketing, sales, technology, startups and networking. Of course, when I started thinking about Visible Networking , I immediately went to Cliff to check in to see how he's doing and to get his feedback, thoughts and ideas on the concept. Cliff, remind me about your background? My first career was spent building radio and television stations, then running the programming side of those businesses.

Fast Company has a great article on why you should start a company in Los Angeles . Since 1994, I have spent about half of my time in the Bay Area and the other half in Los Angeles. LA beats the Bay for a lot of reasons, but the biggest reason is that Los Angeles focuses on building viable businesses, whereas the Bay Area largely focuses solely on technology…for the sake of technology. Los Angeles has a lot more opportunities in a number of very large-scale verticals, which means a wider variety of work and types of work for tech workers than the Bay Area.

Companies also use social networking sites in the hiring process, and increasingly, to do innovative advertising (such as the recent Jack in the Box campaign). Does advertising work in the social networking world? Top officers of some of the leading social media websites and tools (including Facebook, MySpace and Yammer) will be on the Panel, and there will be panelists from the worlds of media sharing platforms Just a quick note that I'll be moderating a Technology Council Event : Social Networking as a Business Strategy May 19, 2009 - Culver City Social networking media are used on a daily basis to grow businesses and expand career opportunities.

Los Angeles-based the Rubicon Project , a provider of Internet advertising optimization software and services, announced today that it has rolled out a new product which will automate the buying of online ad inventory. According to Rubicon, the new Rubicon OnDemand product will help advertising buyers precisely target audiences across its inventory. The new product allows advertisers to specifically target user demographics, including age, income, and gender; geographic locations; and also based on context and behavioral segments. Rubicon operates a service

Amazon.com said today that it has awarded a Los Angeles resident, Angela Kohler, as winner of its customer-created television commercial contest, Your Amazon Ad Contest. Tags: amazon advertising television commercial contes The online retailer said that Kohler was voted the winner by both its own jury as wel as by Amazon.com customers, and wins $20,000 in Amazon gift cards and a trip to a film festival in new York City. Kohler's 'Kindlicious' used stop motion animation to promote Amazon's Kindle reader.

Woodland Hills-based Gumiyo, which develops mobile marketing technology, said today that it has launched an effort with the Los Angeles Times to market classifieds, online automotive, and real estate advertising via mobile phones. Gumiyo said that it has rolled out a new service for the Los Angeles Times, to allow car shoppers and home buyers to use simple text messages to get information about listings, photos, and video on any handset. The new text messaging service also includes access to CARFAX Vehicle History Reports. Financial impact of the deal with the