We asked TORC Technologies to share with Handshake 2.0's audience more about the story we learned first from Montgomery County, VA Economic Development and TORC's Media Center. David Cutter kindly replied:

In early 2010 Dr. Dennis Hong, Director of Robotics and Mechanisms Lab (RoMeLa) at Virginia Tech, was tasked with upgrading his “phase 1” prototype dune-buggy and nonvisual interfaces for the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) Blind Driver Challenge, and putting blind drivers in a real, road-ready vehicle. Because of the way the nonvisual interfaces (DriveGrip and SpeedStrip) work, the equivalent of an autonomous vehicle was required.
 
To accomplish this in such an aggressive timeframe, and remain focused on improving the novel devices used to communicate with the blind driver, Dr. Hong made the decision to leverage TORC’s off-the-shelf mobile robotics platform – the ByWire XGV. This “modified Ford Escape” was then topped off with TORC’s PowerHub modules which are used to distribute power to all of the added sensors, computers, and the nonvisual devices added to the system. A custom version of TORC’s AutonoNav (autonomous navigation system) was used to process the environment and make driving decisions.
 
In a typical autonomous vehicle, these decisions would be fed back into the vehicle’s control systems to carry out the actual driving behaviors. Here is what makes this project so unique: Instead of driving the blind person around autonomously, the whole point of the Challenge was to let the blind person make active decisions and have full control over driving the vehicle. This is why communicating through the nonvisual interfaces was so critical for the project’s success.
 
This is a perfect example of why using TORC products makes sense – it allows the researchers to proceed full steam ahead on their technological innovations and not “reinvent the wheel” by building custom, one-off robotic systems which can eat up a majority of a project’s time and engineering resources. TORC is extremely proud to have its products and engineering support used in such a visionary project led by the Dr. Hong, NFB and Virginia Tech.

TORC Technologies was featured on the Today Show.

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R), is a full service real estate agency specializing in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, and Salem, Virginia real estate and homes.  You're invited to download the Coldwell Banker Townside App, check out the CBT blog, Keepin' It Real Estate, visit Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) on Facebook, and see more of Coldwell Banker Townside on Handshake 2.0. 

Coldwell Banker Townside REALTORS is a client of Handshake Media, Incorporated, parent company of Handshake 2.0.

Handshake 2.0 asked Henry Bass, founder of Automation Creations:

What is MatWeb? 

We see this description from the MatWeb site: "MatWeb's searchable database of material properties includes data sheets of thermoplastic and thermoset polymers such as ABS, nylon, polycarbonate, polyester, polyethylene and polypropylene; metals such as aluminum, cobalt, copper, lead, magnesium, nickel, steel, superalloys, titanium and zinc alloys; ceramics; plus semiconductors, fibers, and other engineering materials."

Glad to hear that data sheets exist.  What are they for?  Why would someone need them?  Who uses them?  Is anyone local a user of MatWeb?
 
"Data sheets for over 79,000 metals, plastics, ceramics, and composites."
 
79,000 is an impressive number in any business realm, especially with a founding in 1997.  What can invite someone in Blacksburg, Virginia, home of Handshake 2.0, to care that MatWeb is here and was created by ACI?  What's its cool factor?

Henry Bass replied:

Funny you should ask! We're actually proud that non-engineers ask us about this, because we can highlight this to our engineering-related advertisers: we've got an exclusive audience of engineers. Non-engineers write us and say they don't get it...so that's one way we can assure that products and services will be seen by the right audience.
 
Our datasheets provide a reference of the material properties for 79,000+ metals, plastics, ceramics and composites.  This means that when an engineer wants to use 6061-T6 Aluminum in his or her next product design, MatWeb.com serves as a handy reference for that metal's density, strength, elasticity and other properties.
 
Furthermore, if the engineer asks the question, "What other materials could I use that have the strength of this, but would be lighter?", he or she can use MatWeb to quantitatively search and find that Nylon 66 with glass fiber reinforcement can provide about the same strength but is 40% lighter.  If the application doesn't require the product to be exposed to high temperatures, this might be a lighter, cheaper alternative.

We went live with MatWeb in 1997, boasting properties of almost 500 materials.  Every year, we add to or update about 12,000 data sheets through the diligent efforts of Virginia Tech engineering students and our expert staff.  The result is that MatWeb.com is cited as the reference source for material properties more often than any other reference, printed or online. 
 
Local users of MatWeb would include the audience of just about all engineers at Virginia Tech (electrical, civil, mechanical, chemical, materials science, aerospace, etc), and engineering-related product development companies such as Moog, Federal Mogul, Safety Performance Solutions and TORC.

The cool factor is that over 180,000 engineers worldwide have registered with us because we're the largest free material property database on the web. Right here in li'l ol' Blacksburg.

Thanks,
Henry

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R), a full service real estate agency specializing in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, and Salem, Virginia real estate and homes.  You're invited to download the Coldwell Banker Townside App, check out the CBT blog, Keepin' It Real Estate, visit Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) on Facebook, and see more of Coldwell Banker Townside on Handshake 2.0. 

Automation Creations, Incorporated and Coldwell Banker Townside REALTORS are clients of Handshake Media, Incorporated, parent company of Handshake 2.0.

National Football League fantasy football players - an estimated 27 million of them - are counting down to September 9, 2010, the start of the NFL season.

Fantasy football is big business.  The Fantasy Sports Trade Association, cited in The Acorn, reports that fantasy sports have a $3 billion to $4 billion annual impact across the sports industry.

To its devoted players, fantasy football is about way more than fun or fancy.

According to Henry Bass, "Selecting a fantasy football team is a math, science and art all to itself."

That's why Bass and his colleagues developed fantasy football league draft software pcDrafter.

From the pcDrafter site:

pcDrafter is software that you install on your PC to take the guesswork out of your fantasy football draft. During a draft, it needs no Internet connection, but before the draft, with optional registration and Internet access, it can automatically download the latest player projections directly to its powerful optimization engine. pcDrafter does a zillion calculations and sees patterns not humanly possible to find in 2 seconds. Your savvy FF mind plus pcDrafter equals an unbeatable draft. pcDrafter features automatic player updates from 4for4.com.

The "zillion calculations" through pcDrafter's algorithm made possible by today's computing power lay the foundation for the software founders' claim:  "pcDrafter software gives you a highly effective platform to both prepare for your draft and to crush your competition during the drafting itself."

Greg Alan Pisch, writes about pcDrafter for 4for4.com, "I've poured over pcDrafter with the GOLD algorithm and am convinced it's the best PC drafting software available on the market today."

Added 9/27/10: pcDrafter was featured on the WDBJ7 news.

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R), a full service real estate agency specializing in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, and Salem, Virginia real estate and homes.  You're invited to check out the CBT blog, Keepin' It Real Estate, visit Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) on Facebook, and see more of Coldwell Banker Townside on Handshake 2.0. 

Automation Creations, Incorporated, developers of pcDrafter, and Coldwell Banker Townside REALTORS are clients of Handshake Media, Incorporated, parent company of Handshake 2.0.

Thanks to the overwhelming success of the Red Cross mobile and text giving campaign for Haiti earthquake relief, nonprofits across the world have been inspired to investigate text based fundraising. Unfortunately the service, as initially envisioned, works well for large organizations, but is not really viable for the majority of nonprofits.

Click and Pledge set out to change that.

Click and Pledge offers Software-as-a-Service, SaaS solutions for organizations such as non-profits, charitable groups, and political campaigns to access online fundraising tools. The SMS Mobile Giving Platform has been added to its services.

According to Jim Barney, Vice President of Marketing and Sales, “This is bold new territory with a magnitude of potential and promise, so Click & Pledge wanted to be one of the early entries into the arena with a viable solution for all nonprofits. To do so, we attacked the current barriers and cost structures in four major ways.”

Fees

Most mobile donations are processed through the phone company which means, unless special arrangements are made in advance, 10%-50% of donated funds don’t go to disaster relief, but to the phone company. By processing mobile donations through the credit card companies, Click and Pledge is able to keep fees below 5% for each transaction.

Lack of Donor Data

While the extra influx of cash in a crisis is helpful, without the ability to contact new donors to start building long-term relationships, the value of mobile donations is significantly diminished. Unlike most mobile pledge services, Click and Pledge captures complete donor information and provides it to the nonprofit in a usable format.

Delay of Funds

Mobile giving is most effective for soliciting donations for crisis situations. Yet nonprofits using traditional mobile giving platforms often do not receive the funds raised for up to 3 months after they are pledged. While large organizations, like the Red Cross, have the cash flow needed to work around the delay, smaller organizations don’t have that luxury. Click and Pledge’s system gets donations to the organization in under 48 hours.

Donation Caps

Mobile giving provides people the opportunity to be generous when they are inspired, but by capping donations at $10 - well below the average online donation of $92 - a reliance on traditional mobile giving may actually hurt a nonprofit's bottom line. With Click and Pledge, the $10 donation cap does not apply. The Click and Pledge system also allows for reoccurring payments, a feature not yet available on any of the other mobile platforms.

By knocking down these four barriers, Click and Pledge not only improved upon a good thing, but also made this service, previously only profitable for giant organizations, accessible to the local organizations making a real difference in local communities.

You're invited to read more about the new SMS Mobile Giving Platform from Click and Pledge.

***

Maureen Carruthers is passionate about helping nonprofits achieve their missions.  For ideas to help a favorite nonprofit be heard, including how volunteers can help, you're invited to visit her blog, Low Hanging Fruit.

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R), a full service real estate agency specializing in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, and Salem, Virginia real estate and homes.  A client of Handshake 2.0, Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) strives to be the best online source for real estate listings in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, Salem and all of the  Roanoke Valley and New River Valley.  Experienced agents are available to provide expert real estate advice and quality customer service. 

You're invited to view this week's featured properties, learn the latest on CBT's blog, Keepin' It Real Estate, visit Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) on Facebook, and see more Coldwell Banker Townside on Handshake 2.0.

Click & Pledge and Handshake Media, Incorporated, the parent company of Handshake 2.0, are both member companies of VT KnowledgeWorks. 

Click & Pledge, Coldwell Banker Townside REALTORS and VT KnowledgeWorks are clients of Handshake Media, Inc.

Can a personal computer go green? According Kirk Cameron, founder of MiserWare, Inc., it is possible to make a PC more energy efficient with the help of one of his company's Green IT solutions: MicroMiser.

Smaller than a single MP3 file, MicroMiser can be easily installed on a server, laptop, or PC. It reduces energy use through a power-matching system that automatically syncs the energy consumed by the computer to the load on the system without any loss in performance. The result? A reduction in the PC's carbon footprint, a savings in power consumption which prolongs the computer's battery life, and a reduction in the cost to run the computer without any loss in performance. In addition, MicroMiser tracks the amount of energy saved and the reduction in carbon emissions and is available for both Linux and Windows systems.

While reducing the carbon footprint of personal computers around the globe, Cameron has increased the social media footprint of his company. Using Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter has turned out to be the best way to get the word out about MicroMiser's free beta user program.

“We have always tried to put our software in the hands of as many users as possible. Since most people 'friend' or 'like' a dozen or more people on Facebook and our software has broad appeal with an aspect of social responsibility, Facebook becomes a way for people to encourage their friends to use MiserWare software to be more energy conscious much in the way you might encourage someone to recycle.”

Judging by the increasing size of MiserWare's footprint, social media marketing is working. Cameron reports that within two weeks of launching the Windows version of their product on Facebook and Twitter, their user base grew to over 1,000 new users. He acknowledges that a referral program rewarding people who got their friends to try the software helped. “As part of our incentive program, so far we've given away nearly two dozen iPods to users from Ohip, to France and the U.K.”

As a leading provider of intelligent software power management, ISPM (TM), solutions, MiserWare is taking the necessary steps to reduce energy consumption and increase its user base.

***

Z. Kelly Queijo is the founder of SmartCollegeVisit and a frequent contributor to Handshake 2.0. You're invited to follow SmartCollegeVisit on Twitter, @collegevisit.

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R), a full service real estate agency specializing in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, and Salem, Virginia real estate and homes.  A client of Handshake 2.0, Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) strives to be the best online source for real estate listings in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, Salem and all of the  Roanoke Valley and New River Valley.  Experienced agents are available to provide expert real estate advice and quality customer service. 

You're invited to view this week's featured properties, learn the latest on CBT's blog, Keepin' It Real Estate, visit Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) on Facebook, and see more Coldwell Banker Townside on Handshake 2.0.

According to Amazon.com's Hot New Releases in Nanotechnology, what's hot is Nanotechnology Environmental Health and Safety: Risks, Regulation and Management, co-edited by Matthew Hull and Diana Bowman.  Hull founded NanoSafe, headquartered in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia.

How hot is nanotechnology safety?  So hot, nanotechnology environmental health and safety (EHS) even has its own acronym - nanoEHS - and many federal agencies and international councils are intensely focused on its study.

Handshake 2.0 asked Matthew Hull why nanotechnology is hot and why we need to read this book.  He kindly replied:

Nanotechnology Environmental Health and Safety: Risks, Regulation and Management was assembled to target a broad audience including organizational safety managers, corporate executives, insurers and risk managers, nanotech investors, and students, all of whom are interested in a holistic perspective on nanotech environmental health and safety (EHS) risks, the current regulatory landscape, and emerging risk management strategies.  These are all areas where stakeholders have expressed concerns about the limited information available. 

Ultimately, the growth trajectory of commercial nanotechnology hinges on how well we identify and manage known as well as unknown risks, so a resource like this book is especially timely.  Newcomers to the nanotech EHS debate will find that they can pick up this book and, in a pretty short time, have a strong understanding of not only the risks of nanotechnology, but ways that society can manage those risks and effectively capitalize on the benefits of nanoscale materials.  More seasoned readers will appreciate the opportunity to delve into unique perspectives and detailed accounts of key nanotech EHS milestones offered by some familiar names that have helped shape the nanotech risk management landscape.

We believe that a real strength of Nanotechnology Environmental Health and Safety is that it offers unique perspectives on the nano EHS issue that have not been incorporated in other texts.  For example, one chapter written by a labor union representative, who represents workers impacted by the asbestos industry, provides a passionate charge to the nanotechnology community to apply lessons learned from asbestos to ensure the safety of emerging nanomaterials.  Another chapter provides an objective and detailed scientific review of nanoparticle toxicology and characterization.   Other chapters offer reviews of the global regulatory landscape, emerging legal frameworks, the insurance industry perspective on managing unknown risks, and case studies on how to effectively manage nano EHS risks in a range of organizational settings, from academia to large corporations. 

If, as a society, we are to enjoy the benefits that nanotechnology offers, we have a responsibility to make sure of its safety. Our book contributes to that effort.

***

NanoSafe, Inc. helps nanotechnology organizations navigate emerging environmental health and safety (EHS) issues.  NanoSafe, Inc. offers consulting, testing, and research and development services designed to accommodate a broad range of client needs.  Founded in 2007 by Matthew Hull, NanoSafe is headquartered in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center and is a member company of VT KnowledgeWorks business acceleration center in Blacksburg, Virginia.  Here's more about NanoSafe on Inside VT KnowledgeWorks.

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Venture Counsel, a law firm for entrepreneurs located at the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Centerin Blacksburg, Virginia. Ken Maready, head of Venture Counsel, reviewed Handshake 2.0's Social Media Authenticity Policy - Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials, helping to create a document about which Mark Schaefer - author of the blog {grow} and the post The World's First "Authenticity Policy"? - stated, "As far as I know, this is the first published, legally-validated 'authenticity policy.'"

Ken Maready's "Legal Concerns for the Web 2.0 Business" is forthcoming in volume one of the new series, Enterprise 2.0: How Technology, E-Commerce, and Web 2.0 Are Transforming Business Virtually, edited by Tracy Tuten, Ph.D.  The Enterprise 2.0 series is scheduled for publication by Praeger Publishers, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Company.

"GIS? We don’t need no stinking GIS."
- Companies without GIS

When I was a child, my father, Robert Giles, spoke of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) with reverence.  In the 1960s, he was one of the pioneers of GIS, using a light board with his team of graduate students to painstakingly digitize a map by hand with an attribute, then another map of the same place by hand with another attribute, so that layers of data resulted about one particular area.  He and his students then wrote lines of code and used punch cards and the mainframe computer to analyze all those layers of attributes and prescribe optimum locations for power lines in Virginia.

Today, personal mobile devices with Global Positioning Systems (GPS) are ubiquitous, using GIS to analyze only a few attributes - a location map, satellite date, and time - to tell a person where he or she is.

When my father was using GIS, computers were still tools, essentially large calculators, so their limited power limited the number of layers of attributes that could be analyzed to a couple dozen.  Computers are now so powerful they can take into account and analyze hundreds of layers of attributes almost instantaneously and in relation to each other. 

What if my mobile device had its own personal GIS, not just GPS?  What if my mobile device would answer not just, “Where am I?” but “What is best for me to I do?”

I don't think it's an original question or idea but it came to me from discussing GIS with David Bradshaw and Jeremy Rasor of InteractiveGIS, serving as project manager for my father’s new venture, a rural land management system, Rural System - a component of which uses GIS - and the site designed for Rural System by Automation Creations.

This post features a screenshot of the cool animation made by Automation Creations that can be clicked on to show how the attribute layers accumulate. 

What if the layers weren’t about roads, ponds, and trees, but all about me?! 

What if I were standing on a street corner with my own personal GIS on my mobile device and it “knew me" enough to analyze what I value in attribute layers - houses with cats asleep on the porch, tea shops serving scones if it’s 3:00 PM, restaurants serving grits if it’s 8:00 AM, jewelry stores with sales?  And what if, based on what it had "learned" about me from data I had entered and from queries it had tracked and weights I had assigned, or it had assigned, it recommended the next step, perhaps not just to physically put my right foot in, but philosophically?

As a person and a consumer, GIS might show me my own personal power line.

As a company owner, what we offer and what our potential clients value might show up in their personal power lines.

Where do we sign up?!  I gotta have GIS.

***

InteractiveGIS was featured in another edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0.  Interactive GIS, Rural System, and Automation Creations are clients of Handshake Media, Incorporated, of which Handshake 2.0 is an enterprise.

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Venture Counsel, a law firm for entrepreneurs located at the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia. Ken Maready, head of Venture Counsel, reviewed Handshake 2.0's Social Media Authenticity Policy - Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials, helping to create a document about which Mark Schaefer - author of the blog {grow} and the post The World's First "Authenticity Policy"? - stated, "As far as I know, this is the first published, legally-validated 'authenticity policy.'"

Ken Maready's "Legal Concerns for the Web 2.0 Business" was accepted for inclusion in volume one of the new series, Enterprise 2.0: How Technology, E-Commerce, and Web 2.0 Are Transforming Business Virtually, by Tracy Tuten, Ph.D.  The Enterprise 2.0 series is scheduled for publication by Praeger Publishers, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Company.

How do technology company founders, a frequent subject of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0, get found? With 63.5 of the market share of all search queries, it's likely to be through Google.

According to TechCrunch, "Of the 137 billion estimated total searches performed in the U.S. last year [2008], 85 billion were done on Google. What’s even more impressive is that nearly 90 percent of all the growth in search volume was also captured by Google. Most of that growth came from increasing the number of searches per person, rather than bringing more people to Google."

Almost a year ago, for the VT KnowledgeWorks blog, Inside VT KnowledgeWorks, I wrote Google Yourself, a post inspired by advice from Seth Godin. Ten months later, I wrote about what I found when Google opened a window on its archives and allowed searches from Google 2001.  While the Google 2001 search is over, I took a screenshot from a former life (.pdf).

My observations:

1) The top listing for each term is linked to sites, or to accounts on other sites, that we created.

2) Nine of the ten listings on the first page of results for my name are linked to sites, or to accounts on other sites, that we created.

3) Six of the ten listings on the first page of results for this site are linked to sites, or to accounts on other sites, that we created. 

I then Googled our client, Barry Welch, founder of FurnishWEB, the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) order and inventory portal for the home furnishings industry.

My observations:

1) Although many share the name "Barry Welch," 4 of the top 10 search results linked to sites, or to accounts on other sites, that we created. All four linked to social media channels, including posts on two blogs, Handshake 2.0 and Inside VT KnowledgeWorks, Twitter, and YouTube.

2) Six of the ten listings on the first page of results for "FurnishWEB" linked to sites, or to accounts on other sites, that we created or assisted in creating.  Four of the six were social media channels, including posts on two blogs, Handshake 2.0 and Inside VT KnowledgeWorks, Twitter, and YouTube. Three of the remaining four results linked to our client's FurnishWEB site itself.

My conclusions:

In personal relationships, I know - and respect - the futility of attempting to control what others think and feel about me.

That said, do I wear professional attire to meetings with potential clients? Yes, I do. I mean business. 

Through conscious use of social media, we have established ourselves and our clients online as corporations and enterprises - with distinct brands - led by active, engaged people.

So, to answer my own question, yes, I've Googled myself lately. When someone else in that almost 64% market share finds me through Google, I've got on a very nice suit. And so do our clients.

***

Z. Kelly Queijo contributed to this post.

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Venture Counsel, a law firm for entrepreneurs located at the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia. Ken Maready, head of Venture Counsel, reviewed Handshake 2.0's Social Media Authenticity Policy - Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials, helping to create a document about which Mark Schaefer - author of the blog {grow} and the post The World's First "Authenticity Policy"? - stated, "As far as I know, this is the first published, legally-validated 'authenticity policy.'"

Ken Maready's "Legal Concerns for the Web 2.0 Business" was accepted for inclusion in volume one of the new series, Enterprise 2.0: How Technology, E-Commerce, and Web 2.0 Are Transforming Business Virtually, by Tracy Tuten, Ph.D.  The Enterprise 2.0 series is scheduled for publication by Praeger Publishers, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Company.

From Jim Schweitzer, Operations Manager at Vision Point Systems:

At Vision Point Systems, we consider ourselves "language or platform agnostic."  We're software engineers who use the right tool for the job. We are not, for example, a Microsoft Partner Network company, but we hold a Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) Professional Subscription.  This allows us to set up a lab in our office to test out the various pieces of software we write in a wide sample of target environments.

The best example of our lab in practice was for a piece of software we wrote back in 2003. Our requirements were that the desktop application run on every version of Windows from 3.11 to XP and Mac from 8.6 to 10.3. Oh, and it had to be self-contained on a floppy disk. We got it done, but it wouldn't have been without our lab of various environments in which to test. One lesson learned: Not everything that runs on a clean Windows XP install will run on a clean Windows 98 install.

Times have changed since then. We've had the opportunity, because of MSDN, to get out in front on Windows 7 a bit, having beta and release candidate versions available to us on the day they were released without any hassle. We also employ virtualization in our lab these days. We can keep pristine virtual copies of all our lab machines to load up any time we need to have a clean environment.

Here's more about what we do at Vision Point Systems:

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Vision Point Systems is an engineering and technology consulting firm with offices in Fairfax, Virginia and the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia.  Vision Point Systems serves clients ranging from local high-tech and non-profits, to the DOD and multi-national pharmaceutical companies. Vision Point Systems helps transform clients' tough projects into reality through thoughtful and inventive software and systems engineering.

***

This edition of the Tech Showcase on Handshake 2.0 is sponsored by Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R), a full service real estate agency specializing in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, and Salem, Virginia real estate and homes.  A client of Handshake 2.0, Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) strives to be the best online source for real estate listings in Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Roanoke, Salem and all of the  Roanoke Valley and New River Valley.   Experienced agents are available to provide expert real estate advice and quality customer service. 

You're invited to view this week's featured properties, read the Keepin' It Real blog, and become a fan of Coldwell Banker Townside, REALTORS (R) on Facebook.

Founded in Blacksburg, Virginia in 2002 as a means of bringing the online fund-raising power of Software-as-a-Service, SaaS, to non-profits, Click & Pledge now serves more than 7,000 customers, ranging from health organiztions, to public service initiatives, to politial campaigns in 45 countries.  Aptly, the company's tag line is "a better way to do good."

The most recent innovation at Click & Pledge is Pledge TeeVee, a video fund-raising tool.  Client organizations create their own YouTube videos and the Pledge TeeVee widget allows the video to play within an applet so organizations don’t have to utilize their own bandwidths.  A donor may donate anytime during the video.

Robert Scoble of Rackspace took video footage of Kamran Razvan during his visit to VT KnowledgeWorks in Blacksburg, Virginia in June, 2009.  We share it with you here:

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Click & Pledge and Handshake Media, Incorporated, the parent company of Handshake 2.0, are both member companies of VT KnowledgeWorks.  Click & Pledge was a client of Handshake Media in 2008 and purchases through Handshake 2.0 are powered by Click & Pledge.

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The Rackspace Tech Showcase is sponsored by Rackspace (R) Hosting.  Rackspace Email and Apps is a division of Rackspace located in Blacksburg, Virginia. 

About Rackspace
As the leader and specialist in hosting services, Rackspace(R) Hosting is changing the way businesses worldwide buy IT. Rackspace delivers computing-as-a-service, integrating the industry's best technologies into a flexible service offering, making computing more reliable and affordable. A trusted partner to companies of all sizes, Rackspace enables IT departments to be more effective. Rackspace is distinguished by its award-winning Fanatical Support(R), furthering the company's mission to be one of the world's greatest service companies. Rackspace is recognized as one of FORTUNE Magazine's 100 Best companies to work for in the US, ranking number 43 on the list. Rackspace's portfolio of hosted IT services includes managed hosting (www.rackspace.com), email hosting (www.rackspace.com/apps) and cloud hosting (www.mosso.com). For more information on Rackspace Hosting, please visit www.rackspace.com.