NCET

Everywhere you look at the South by Southwest conference this week, you see QR codes. The square "quick response" codes turn URLs, vCards, or any kind of text into a jumble of pixels that you can scan onto your smartphone instantaneously, no typing required. At SXSW, QR codes appeared on flyers, postcards, business cards, t-shirts, stickers, and swag. Organizers of the Austin gathering for film, music, and Web geeks even included a QR code on every registrant’s badge to cut down on paper waste and manual data entry.

From there you can export all your SXSW contacts to your address book, email, or contacts application of choice.

QR codes could be just a passing SXSW fad–unless Facebook introduces them to a wider audience. Leaked screenshots indicate Facebook’s experimenting with profile or status QR code generation on fan pages, according to TechCrunch. Imagine a QR code that instantly makes the person scanning it a fan of a brand, company, or personality on Facebook without ever typing a URL. Read more:

Technorati Tags: Gina Trapani,FastCompany,QR codes,SXSW,Robert Scoble,George Ruiz,business,NCET,Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology

Mark your calendars and alert your clients, members, readers, viewers and colleagues – the Nevada Small Business Development Center’s  next government contracting workshop is scheduled for April 22 from 2:00 – 4:00. The workshop topic is presented by Lynda Nelson, County Planning Manager, Parks and Open Space, and is a follow-up to last August’s event. The county has now identified prime contractors for its fire restoration project and will soon be ready for subcontractor bids.

This is an excellent opportunity for small landscaping businesses to meet and talk with Lynda, and to find out specifics about project specifications and bid process. Business providing mapping, seeding, planting trees and shrubs, soil erosion, control, weed clearance, irrigation, thinning of trees and brush, disease and insect control, as well as products related to these activities such as seed and plant material are invited to attend.

When:  Thursday, April 22, 2:00 – 4:00 p.m.

Where: Washoe County Government Center

Building “C” Conference Room, 1001 E. 9^th St., Reno

Cost:  Free. Register at nsbdc.org/education/calendar or call 775-827-4923

Technorati Tags: Nevada Small Business Development Center,Lynda Nelson,business,NCET,Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology

WHAT: UNLV’s Howard R. Hughes College of Engineering will host more than 1,200 high school students on 48 teams from throughout the nation – including 10 Clark County School District high schools – during the sixth annual FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Robotics Competition.

WHEN: April 2-3, 2010

Friday, April 2, 2010
8:45 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Matches 9:50 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
Awards 4:30 p.m.
(break noon to 1 p.m.)

Saturday, April 3, 2010 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Matches 9:30 a.m. – 11:45 a.m.
Final Rounds 1 to 3 p.m.
Awards 3 p.m. (break noon to 1 p.m.)
WHERE: Thomas & Mack Center at UNLV

DETAILS: The event is free and open to the public. All the excitement of a championship football game, but with much more at stake-the FIRST Robotics competition combines elements of sport with science and technology in a high-energy, team-driven contest that has inspired thousands of high school students to pursue careers in science and engineering.
The theme of this year’s event is "Breakaway," during which two teams of three robots compete on a bumpy 54′ by 27′ field, earning points by scoring soccer balls in goals. Additional points are awarded for robots suspended in the air and not touching the game service at the end of the match. Each ball in goal is worth one point; an elevated robot is worth two points; an elevated robot lifted by a team member’s bot is worth three points.

For a complete list of teams and additional event information, please visit http://engineering.unlv.edu/first or contact Tony Allen at 895-0893.

Can’t make it? Follow the action live online at http://www.team987.com/webcasts/

Technorati Tags: UNLV’s Howard R. Hughes College of Engineering,Clark County School District,FIRST Robotics Competition,business,NCET,Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology

More business owners in northern Nevada are beginning to talk with their bankers about loans to finance expanded operations.

The increase in loan demand in recent weeks hasn’t been dramatic, and bankers say they still don’t know how many of the would-be borrowers ultimately will qualify for loans.

Even so, an increase in applications is a sign that business owners are beginning to stir.

Nevada State Bank, for instance, received 39 applications for $6.1 million in small business loans at its offices throughout northern Nevada in January and February.

That compares with 128 applications that sought $19 million in business loans for all of 2009, says Kevin Sullivan, an executive vice president with Nevada State Bank in Reno.

“Two months doesn’t make a trend, but we are seeing a higher volume of loan requests,” Sullivan says.

Some of the loans would be used to finance equipment purchases, he says, as business owners feel that the economy has stabilized enough that they can forecast demand for their products. Read more:

Technorati Tags: John Seelmeyer,Northern Nevada Business Weekly,Nevada State Bank,Kevin Sullivan,First Independent Bank of Nevada,Jim DeVolld,First Independent,Rob Humphreys,U.S. Bank,Ken Achurra,Nevada State Development Corp.,Small Business Administration,Adrien Burney,David Leonard,business,NCET,Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology