MettaProgramming

We don’t tend to take ourselves too seriously here in The Gorge. We’ve got some great stuff going on, and a lot of that is pretty awesome tech. Still, we know that we’re small time, and we’re alright with that. Most of us who’ve grown up here haven’t left for a reason, and the rest of us who moved here have done so for a reason.

We’re not “big city lights.” We don’t have all the options of flashy Hollywood-like Portland.

We’re tiny. We’re quaint.

But quaint has it’s advantages. One of those advantages is The Gorge Technology Alliance, our “quaint little, pretend version of the SAO.”¹

The Software Association of Oregon is an incredible organization for technology companies. It’s one those organizations that you feel honored to be a part of. But it’s an organization that’s, well, big. Sometimes you can get lost in “big.” For instance, if you wanted to see a speaker such as Bill Weihl– the famous Green Energy Czar of Google– speak at the SAO, you’d have to pay $100 and be invited to their member’s only dinner event, where you could hob-nob with actual big time CEO’s wearing black ties and suits.

No, actual dress suits, not wet suits.

I know! Really?

In quaint little Hood River, however, you wouldn’t get such an opportunity. We don’t have too many fancy, black tie dinners, and when we do, we usually wear fleece and have just come off the river from windsurfing (instead of coming from secret conference room meetings with senators, big oil executives and flashy hollywood types like all those rich, suit wearing Portlanders!)

That’s why quaint is an advantage, because in quaint li’l Hood River, you can see the famous Bill Weihl speak completely free.

That’s right, free. Like “free as in beer” free.

The GTA is sponsoring Bill Weihl a day before the SAO! (Not because they rock, but because he happened to be coming to Google’s data center anyway– lucky us).

Details (from The Gorge Technology Alliance webpage):

On Feb. 23, Google’s Green Energy Czar Bill Weihl will speak about the revolutionary work that Google is undertaking in renewable energy, including a discussion of Google PowerMeter. Join us at 7:30pm, Columbia Center for the Arts, 215 Cascade Ave in Hood River. This event is free, courtesy of a Google grant we received. Email Jessica to reserve your seat!

Yeah, we don’t have all the shiny lights and fancy streetcars, but sometimes it’s good to be the quaint.

1. Disclosure: My wife is the director of the GTA, so I’m biased. She’s also the force of nature that’s revived it into something awesomely wonderful completely without my influence. She is also frustrated with me on a regular basis because I write stuff like this without telling her and get her into trouble [↩]