I went to the Santa Cruz New Tech Alliance Meetup last night (May 7) with 60+ other geeks and even our Santa Cruz Mayor Ryan Coonerty. Sponsored by Ceboa who paid of the pizza and soda (mucho props!). Overall I rate the night a 4+ on a scale of 5, my only complaint was the lack of Wi-Fi (how hard is it to give access?!?).

I encourage all of my local friends to join the Santa Cruz New Tech Alliance Meet-up Group. The event is free, you get a face-feed and you learn about local tech happenings. True geek happiness! (And you might get a REAL job – That is my better half’s comment)

There were six presentations. I will only touch on my highlights.

• Santa Cruz Design and Innovation Center
  • If I got this right, this center is part of Santa Cruz’s long term plan to rebuild its business economy. One of the core elements is that the area is a hot bed of design. The Center’s vision is to transform Santa Cruz into a global design destination by creating a nexus of design, industry, education and entrepreneurship.
  • Next big event is June 10th – visions of the future of dame design and digital media – Two teams from UCSC are being taken through VC this summer – I will keep you posted.
• Evernote
  • This company’s offering is pretty sweet. Evernote allows you to easily capture information in any environment using whatever device or platform you find most convenient, and makes this information accessible and searchable at anytime, from anywhere.
  • I am signed up for the beta trial so I will keep you posted.
  • I also have 20 signs ups (free!), so if interested, drop me a line.
• PhotoCrank
  • Another sweet offering. Bloggers NEED to check this out!
  • Basically it allows users to add commentary to photos. Similar to a graffiti wall but on photos.

There were three other presentations that need to mentioned.

• Ceboa – Web-based business management resources tailored for the needs of independent professionals.
• ZNA Communications – market development and public relations services
• TWiki – Open source enterprise wiki software, enterprise collaboration platform and knowledge management system.