We Blog The World

Our visit, sponsored by the Israeli Foreign Ministry, was a pilot experiment to see what would happen if we could turn bloggers and podcasters loose to write about Innovation in Israel. This is a pioneering effort to utilize the connectivity and immediacy of the Web in service of extending “knowing” rather than just knowledge about [...]

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The impetus for this journey began when I met Ishmael Khaldi, Vice Counsel for the Israel Consulate in San Francisco (covering the Northwest US) at Gina and Dan Waldman’s house in Tiburon. We spoke about blogging and began to develop the idea of bringing well-known bloggers to Israel to report on Israel Innovation.
Over the course [...]

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The Traveling Geeks became a community during our five day visit. We partied in the evening with Israeli hosts and were schlepped in vans from site to site during the day to meet with Israeli VC’s, entrepreneurs, and innovators. We schmoozed, ate, laughed, and kvetched together—so I have come to know these people.
As a group [...]

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Gil Schwed had an intriguing answer: Israel began as an experiment in Jewish history. Innovation was built into the Israeli experience from the beginning.
Also technology development has always been a strategic component of the Israeli military advantage. That knowledge gets transfered to commercial applications better in Israel than anywhere else outside of the US.
Combine [...]

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With great enthusiasm the Traveling Geeks visited Ishmail Khaldi’s family in his home Bedouin village. Ish’s mother and father hosted us with Bedouin coffee (unbelievably strong), cakes, and candies. Ish gave a moving presentation on pluralism in Israel (video link of speech is posted check out Cathy Brooks’ site).
Bedouins are a part of the Israel [...]

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Can geographically dispersed teens in Israel and the Mediterranean countries create a web based community to increase their own improvement in school, their self-image (believing in themselves and wanting to change), English proficiency, and more their openness to others? Cisco Israel (a branch of the Global Internet company based in the SF Bay Area) is [...]

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While unknown by most American Jews, Gil Shwed is a role model entrepreneur for Israel. He is most admired because he founded and grew Check Point, the global leader in Internet security (think firewall and anti-hacker programs).
Gil spoke with our group in his office. Contrary to convention, it is no longer true that the best [...]

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I have been coming to Israel since 1970 and most of us who are Vatik (veteran) Israel visitors are well aware of the Tel Aviv/Jerusalem divide within Israel. In a sense each represents a different vision of the values of the State of Israel—kind of like how we environmentally aware/self-actualizing selves in Northern California view [...]

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We met with JVP who work with Israel’s Chief Scientist and receives substantial government backing for promising entrepreneurs. We heard presentations by several “under the radar screen” start-ups that are about to release their products. We can not give details, but several involve animation and use of Avatars that are very intriguing (Second Life—Watch out!)
One [...]

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Israeli tech people have been extraordinarily hospitable with our group.
Sunday evening we went to a party in the industrial area of Holon. Filled with an amazing collection— bloggers, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists schmoozing with rock music blasting while consuming potluck—pizza, falafel, beer, wine, and bbq skewers. Lots of good connection.
Monday we had an elegant dinner [...]

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