One of the most satisfying parts of what I do is getting to work with people over a long period of time, starting early in their careers.  It’s one of the things I love about TechStars , but it’s not limited to that as I have many other relationships with young and first time entrepreneurs.

Last night, at Ignite Boulder 5 , I had a permagrin on my face as I thought about the amazing job Andrew Hyde was doing.  I first met Andrew a few years ago when we started TechStars – he basically volunteered to hang out with a video camera for free all summer to film stuff and learn.  He was so hugely helpful that it was easy to bring him on board the TechStars team in year two as the community manager (things like TechStars.TV are Andrew’s creation.) 

I attended Ignite Boulder 2 and had a great time.  But last night – #5 – just blew me away.  700-ish people in the Boulder Theater, enormous energy, endless laughter and brain stimulation, and just a very good time.  Andrew organized a phenomenal show and really shined as the organizer / MC.

But TechStars and Ignite Boulder are not the only things Andrew does.  He also created Startup Weekend (I was at the first one in Boulder) and he was one of the founders of Boulder.me . And – with Matt Emmi of One Button -created the hilariously creative VC Wear t-shirt line (my favorite: “ I went down on Sand Hill Road ”.)

But wait, there’s more.  Andrew is everywhere in the Boulder startup community while managing to travel all over the world sharing his brand of entrepreneurial passion.  I don’t ever think I’ve seen Andrew without a smile on his face, and he’s even gracious when he kicks my butt in ping poing.

It’s been awesome to see Andrew come of age as a key driver of our local entrepreneurial community.  Good job man!

Yesterday I posted that Trada is looking for a Test Engineer .  Gnip is also looking for software developers – three in fact:

• Senior Software Developer
• Senior System Adminstrator
• Senior Web Developer

If you are Boulder-based and fit the qualifications, email Jenny-Lynne Elledge .

Trada, one of our portfolio companies in Boulder, is looking to hire. They’re looking for a tech-skilled individual who thinks they can do just about everything, because they might be asked to.  Primary role is testing their online advertising app but there’s a huge opportunity to contribute much more.  There’s dev work; cloud systems admin; operations tasks; end-user support; and customer facing account management tasks that can be added to the mix for the properly skilled (and properly motivated) individual.  While still in stealth these guys are already rocking. Interested – contact Michael Lawless at mlawless@trada.com .

If I told you that I had just filed a patent for “a system to sell equity in domain names”, I’d expect you to laugh at me.  I haven’t ranted and raved against software (and business method) patents for a while because I got bored of doing it.  The PTO has gotten so far behind on responding to patent applications that the whole notion of a four year cycle to get a software patent approved just underscores how ridiculous the whole thing is given the pace of innovation in software.

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