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VC Rebuttal to Bindu Reddy’s post on TechCrunch: “I Don’t Want To Be A Diversity Candidate”

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By Freada Kapor Klein (Venture Partner, Kapor Capital) A few days ago, TechCrunch ran a piece by Bindu Reddy bemoaning the fact that when raising money as a CEO of a start-up, someone wanted to invest in her in part because she’s a woman.

Bindu stated: “However, they don’t realize that by calling out someone’s gender they make the system less meritocratic.” She quickly went from this point to critiquing quotas, a non-sequitur that often confuses these conversations. Bindu’s post and the accompanying comments illustrate that the topic of diversity these days ignites passion and therefore is often full of muddled thinking and overloaded with accusations.

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Partner event: Bloomberg Empowered Entrepreneur (October 18 in New York)

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On October 18, 2011 in New York, Bloomberg Empowered Entrepreneur looks at the next generation of innovative businesses, how they are driving growth, and considering their exit options. The program brings together innovative entrepreneurs, investment bankers, angel & venture capital investors for discussions about starting, financing and growing a business. Women 2.0 members save 50% on tickets with coupon code "Women2.0".

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Why Women Need to Be At Tech Conferences

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By Melissa Fudor (Program Manager, Women in Wireless) I have to admit I was a little shocked after initially reading this article titled “Why Women Shouldn’t Go to Tech Conferences” (can you blame me?) featured on Forbes Woman.

The article followed Susannah Breslin who was asked to speak on a women-panel about how to make a living blogging as a career. She was annoyed at the fact that the panelists discussed how they got brands to sponsor their blogs:

“They allude to getting paid what I assume everyone imagines are large sums to work with these companies

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The Women Behind Hot Silicon Valley Startups, Named by Business Insider

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By Angie Chang (Co-Founder & Editor-in-Chief, Women 2.0) Jessica Scorpio, one of the co-founders of Getaround is missing from the list of Getaround co-founders on Business Insider's "20 Hot Silicon Valley Startups You Need To Watch". Getaround lets you rent cars from each other. Follow her on Twitter at @jessicascorpio.

StyleSeat co-founder Melody McCloskey made the list as well. She says StyleSeat's market is a $40 billion beauty/booking niche where most small businesses depend on word-of-mouth referrals. StyleSeat gives beauty professionals tools to manage, build and grow their businesses.

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5 Ways to Get More Women in Venture Capital

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By Deborah A. Farrington (Founder & General Partner, StarVest Partners) The 2011 Forbes Midas List ranked the top 100 venture capitalists based on M&A and IPO exits. As one of the two women included on this year’s list, it was disappointing to see that only two had made the cut. This begs the question: Why so few women on the list, and why so few women in venture capital in general?

Why is it important for more women to enter venture capital?

The career possibilities are terrific and I believe that more women in venture capital will contribute to growing better, stronger, more sustainable companies.

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How to Build Award-Winning Apps at Hackathons

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By Bess Ho (Mobile Architect, Archimedes Ventures)  

My winning luck in hackathons has been generating interest and curiosity from my peers, so I've been asked to blog about making it at major competitions and hackathons.

I won the "Best Healthcare" award at my first iOS Dev Camp in 2009, then I won again at iPad Dev Camp in 2010. I won at Muther Hackathon a month ago before I entered iOS Dev Camp 2011. These are not the only awards I have earned in my career. I mention these competitions because these mobile events are recognized widely by a fast-growing industry with the best

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Mobile Game Compares Decisions with Famous Female Leaders’

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By Sharon Wood (Founder & CEO, Stone Creek Entertainment) I spent the first half of my career in agencies, focused on entertainment marketing and digital entertainment. Midway through my career, I fell in love with digital games -- not just for the fun games give the player, but for the immersive emotional connections and aspirations the player gets from the experiences, the decision making and the communities that games create.

Watching my teen daughter revel in games as much as the boys did, I hoped for games that she could play through her lifetime, not just while she was young.

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Damn The Metrics, Full Speed Ahead!

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By Ellen Beldner (Director of User Experience, Groupon) A/B testing is useful, important and a valuable part of the software production process. Note that I didn't say part of the "design" process.

You can use A/B testing to compare two radically different versions of an idea or to optimize within a single design. A/B testing can move the needle a bit, and it can serve as a cover-your-ass sanity check before launching something. But it alone won't get you to an entirely new zone of user adoption, happiness, or conversion rates. Unless you're a design thinker and understand why

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Defying Stereotypes: 10% Tipping Point for Women Angel Investors

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By Angie Chang (Co-Founder & Editor-in-Chief, Women 2.0) Researchers at the University of New Hampshire Center for Venture Research found that women angel investors gain strength in their numbers. They defy the stereotype of women as cautious investors -- stereotypes that are prevalent when women consist of less than 10% of an angel group.

“In the context of this research, this means that when there are few women in an angel group, the stereotype of cautious investing is accentuated. As the number of women increases, there is less of a stereotype

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Women Who Seek Capital for Their Businesses Can Save the American Economy

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By Victoria Pynchon (Co-Founder & Principal, She Negotiates) According to the Atlantic, the debt ceiling crisis isn’t even real. The authentic crisis is jobs.

According to McKinsey and Co., America needs to create 21 million jobs by 2020 and isn’t getting there fast. "According to the entrepreneurship-focused Kauffman Foundation which just released in Washington a set of proposals called "The Startup Act", all new net job creation in the US comes from young firms — which are en masse performing today far below par and could use a boost

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Mozilla Seeks Program Manager for Open Web Innovation Incubator WebFWD

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By Lukas Black (Build & Release Engineer, Mozilla) Ok, I'm a little biased -- full disclosure: I work for Mozilla. But even if I didn't, I suspect I'd be impressed with the amount of amazing innovation and hustle that Mozilla's community puts out towards making the open web more accessible to everyone.

Recent projects like Popcorn and Butter are changing the way we work with video on the web. Hackasaurus is reaching out to kids, getting them to move beyond consuming the web (read-only mode) to being able to build and design their own web experience (read/write). Addons SDK, Open Web Apps, Browser ID,

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11 Lessons Learned from Mobile TV Startup TheChanner

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By Nina Alastruey (Founder & CEO, TheChanner) It was on a trip to MipTV, a TV conference held in Cannes, while contemplating a wi-fi enabled PocketPC, when the first idea about theChanner came to me.

Mobile, Internet.. That meant to me the way for people to discover a new world of content and news wherever they come from. Mobile devices would be the centric personal device, allowing user interaction over the internet. I imagine viewers around the world meeting others, sharing their thoughts, participating, and deciding the new premium TV for the future.

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Startup Lessons Learned by Dana Kanze of Moonit

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By Dana Kanze (Co-Founder & CEO, Moonit) I've heard the (annoying) phrase time and time again, "If you knew just how hard it is to start a company, you'd never do it." True, but what's the fun in that?

A few years ago, my co-founder and I waded out of our respective mind-sucking finance jobs and into the fun and exciting world of online media when we founded our company Moonit. This is just the beginning for Moonit but light years ahead of where we were last summer, when we were taking a whack-a-mole approach to our ever-growing list of pesky "cannot be replicated" bugs.

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