Prior to the Twin Tech Party (the Twin Tech II RSVP is here) I posted here on iStrategyLabs that I wanted people to start talking about creating a startup incubator in the heart of DC that will support entrepreneurs who are building the next iteration of the web.

Low and behold, people came out of the woodwork and got me up to speed on the plans our fair city is already undertaking to make that happen! As it turns out, the Washington DC Economic Partnership and The Emerging Technology Consortium are in the midst of a feasibility study to determine if a full blown startup incubator is something our regions needs and would put to good use. My answer is obviously YES!

The group conducting the feasibility study has asked me to help gather as much input as possible from the community on this topic, so I’m asking you to please do the following:

1) Take five minutes to complete the following survey whose results will determine a) if this incubator gets built, and b) what it would look like if it does. Click here for the DC Area Entrepreneur Survey.

2) If you have a webcam, please leave me a videomail with a blurb on why you think we need an incubator. Talk about what you would use it for, how it would help the startup community and whatever else you think we need to know. Click here or the image below to initiate a video call/video mail:

3) Please take another moment to blog about this, email this post/survey link to an interested party, and/or tell anyone and everyone that we’re in the process of bringing to life what could become a vital new entity in DC.

I’ve made it my personal mission to help the Capital Region become the tech mecca that it should be. If we do our job right, people will be flocking here in the next five years to join the most vibrant startup culture outside the valley (we’re already well on our way there). Please lend a hand by tackling #1, #2 and #3 right now!

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I just left one of my favorite DC events, Media Future Now, which believes “media-centric businesses must be agile, innovative and future-focused”. In January, they hosted a panel on “Old and New: What they’re publishing and what they’re buying” with speakers from The Washington Post, Honda North America and Goddard Clausen. I spoke on The Rise of Social Media (video).

Today I was asked to speak on “Mobile Media in Motion” with Chris Parandian of MobileDiner/Tin Can Communications and Michael Collins of Kinetic Worldwide.

My presentation is here:

Thank you to Media Future Now for continuing to provide valuable knowledge exchange around media and marketing, and thank you for inviting me back to speak again.

Tomorrow, 7/23 from 9pm to 10pm, I’ll be live on “Jonny’s Partay“. About the show:

“Come Par-tay with uber connector Peter Corbett as we talk about his vision of a high tech incubator in DC. We’ll also get the scoop on why he thinks it is important to to build bridges between the established Northern Virginia tech community and the new crop of social media upstarts in the nation’s capital. While were at it, we’ll also delve into Peter’s approach to producing marketing campaigns that marry the online and offline worlds at iStrategyLabs.”

I’m looking forward to the show. Tune in!!!

Lastly, I’ll be speaking at The Greater Washington Board of Trade’s “Small Business Academy” on interactive strategy and small business marketing. This is a closed door session, but I’ll post my presentation up afterwards.

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Last night (7/17/08), iStrategyLabs hosted the Twin Tech Party with the Northern Virginia Technology Council and with the gracious support of our sponsors (see below).

Everyone is very interested to learn what happened last night. Did you find a potential investor? Partner? Employee? Kindred spirit? Please comment on this post or if it’s something that you want to be anonymous about because the info is sensitive, please give us the scoop here.

Photos of the event can be found on the iStrategyLabs Facebook Page (are you a fan yet?) and here, here and here. Thank you to Nick Strocchia for photographing all the action! The Flickr photo set is here.

Coverage of the event:

Tech Bisnow has photos and a great recap.

The Washington Post has a great recap as well.

Sarah Lacy’s take on DC here, here, and here.

Blog reactions here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Full Twitter stream reactions here.

Jeff Crites’ Qik stream video is here.

DCPiazza has a ton of content aggregated here.

Many people have asked what’s up next, so here’s the download:

I have to catch my breath after that last sprint, and next week I’ll chat with the NVTC and others involved to see if there’s interest in a Twin Tech II in August. Outside of that, mark your calendars for Thursday, September 18th, 2008 as The Wired Ones will be the next large scale community oriented event unless Twin Tech II happens first:

It’s our pleasure to announce that Twin Tech II will be held on September 18th, 2008 from 6pm to 9pm.

The format remains the same: the brightest minds in the tech/venture space will be on hand to mix and mingle with one another during a happy hour style meet-up. An open bar will be made available through the generosity of our sponsors.

Please make sure to RSVP now as you’ll need to be on the list to get in and we will most likely run out of room.

Additionally, BarCampDC2 will be held sometime in September as well.

And finally, iStrategyLabs will be hosting the following:

The Wired Ones is an event that will be focused on mashing up the creative, tech, media and entrepreneurial communities. There is already some crossover between the two; something you can see in places like XinDC and RefreshDC, but combined there are about 1500-2000 people that need to meet each other and get down to collaborating the the next big things.

That’s all for now. Thank you everyone for coming out and making it such a fun/energetic event! Thank you especially to our sponsors:

Our WidgetDevCamp Sponsors:

Blattner Brunner, ClearSpring, Webs, AmnestyWidgets, LaunchBoxDigital, Design Reinvented, iStrategyLabs, StaffMagnet, SkeevisArts, Jess3 and Limina

Twin Tech Party Sponsors

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