…And another thing

On Thursday, April 2nd, Geeks Who Give, a civic minded community group in Philadelphia, will be hosting Philadelphia Futures Game Night and Mentor Drive at Tattooed Mom on South Street from from 6 to 9pm. Admission is a minimum of 1 jump drive or 1 package of school appropriate office supplies (pens, notebooks, highlighters, etc). This is a 21+ event.

Philadelphia Futures is looking for a few good geeks, in the form of new mentors! From board games to card games, and maybe a few made up games, (Werewolf anyone?) G2: Geeks Who Game will be all about old school fun for some new school altruism. Tmom’s is raising the stakes with some amazing specials for this event:

* $1.50 Pabst Blue Ribbon
* $3.00 Yards Philly Pale
* $3.00, Philadelphia Brewing Company Kenzinger
* $3.00 Hamburgers or Vegan Burgers.

We are reaching out to local voices in the community in an effort to team up, not only to promote Philly, but to raise as much awareness as possible for this very important cause through blog posts, news articles, word of mouth, etc. Would you like to contribute to making this event a success? If so please contact us at any time at info@geekswhogive.org or just simply get involved!

Relevant Links
Geeks Who Give: www.geekswhogive.org
GWG Twitter: www.twitter.com/geekswhogive
GWG: G2 FB Event Page: http://tr.im/geekswhogame
GWG FB Group: http://tr.im/geekswhogive_fb
Philadelphia Futures: http://philadelphiafutures.org
Philadelphia Futures Mentoring: http://philadelphiafutures.org/sas_high_school/mentors/
Tattooed Mom: http://tr.im/tmoms

About Philadelphia Futures

Philadelphia Futures is a local nonprofit that has been helping Philadelphia youth accomplish their dreams of higher education for more than 20 years. What Futures does is match one student with one mentor, beginning in their freshman year. The student/mentor relationship continues until that student graduates high school. Futures provides academic support in the form of tutoring, SAT prep, college visits, advanced course work, and more. Apply now. They have a constant need for new mentors and volunteers. Currently they are seeking at least 60 new mentors for their incoming class.

About GWG

Geeks all over the world are proving to be open and caring individuals, and the Philadelphia tech scene is no exception. This compassion reaches beyond such limitations as 140 characters on twitter into real life places like Indy Hall, P’unk Ave, IgnitePhilly, The Hactory, Geekadelphia and various local establishments and businesses. Geeks Who Give seeks to mobilize this community to reach beyond its self contained boundaries, to route that amazingly powerful and positive energy to people and causes that really need it.

Geeks Who Give
The Theory: Open Source Community Giving

Everyone has something to contribute. Long term goals include idea, goods & services, and resource banks from which we can draw as well as coordinating volunteer opportunities on an individual basis and organizing large scale volunteer efforts for continued organization-based support

The vision is for this to happen organically, for those things which resonate to surface, and those which don’t to naturally recede. Everyone in the community is invited to participate at whatever level they feel most comfortable — from planning & organizing outreach to attending events — to blogging, promoting and evangelizing the cause. We are more than the sum of our parts, and together, we are capable of anything

We all have something to give. What will you give today?

Check out the Press Archive for previous Press & Media Releases.

The first AntiSocial Media site was DenySpace. Popularized by a teen crowd who just wanted to, like, be left alone, it grew rapidly, but its clumsy design turned many off. It was supplanted by Erasebook, started by college students trying to learn something at school other than what their ex-romantic partners were up to. With both sites, you signed up and sent End Requests to everyone with whom you wanted absolutely no contact. You wouldn’t reveal your picture, what school you attended, your favorite movies, books or hobbies, nor would you tell those you had Ended what you were doing. Some users called Erasebook “addicting”, saying that they couldn’t resist checking many times daily how many people they’d removed. Getting End requests became a status symbol, and some bragged about how few people they were in touch with.

But with text messaging so popular, the mobile app Splitter was inevitable. Splitter allowed friends, family and co-workers to disconnect from each other through one simple question: “Who cares what you’re doing?” Users sent Avoid requests to people whose 140-character messages they didn’t want to see. It was possible to Avoid people who weren’t Avoiding you and vice versa, and again, some thought it important to Avoid as many people as possible whether they knew them or not.

These AntiSocial media were started by entrepreneurial techies, but unlike many startups, they quickly began to generate revenue when it became clear that users were happy to pay for the services.

In working toward happiness, one key process is to gain more control over the major factors affecting your life. Money’s a big one. It’s easy to measure how much you have. It’s harder to measure how much you should have, but let’s give it a shot. [By the way - I am no expert. These are my opinions. Use at your own risk.]

Before you do anything else: Put at least six months of living expenses into a secure, easily accessible account. (If someone else also depends on your income, make that 12 months.) By secure, I mean an FDIC insured bank account, or something else with a real guarantee. By accessible, I mean that you can get to it immediately, either with an ATM card, in person, or by check. This is your emergency money. Don’t worry about the interest rate – all you care about is that it will be there when you need it.

Even during good times, it pays to think about what happens when times are hard. Injuries and illness, clients defaulting, layoffs, sudden damage to your home or car…these things do happen. What would you do if you really had zero income? Your emergency fund can make the difference between a tough time and a real disaster, so make it a priority. If you aren’t putting money aside for it, start now. Find it hard to save? Look closely at where your money is going. Low resources make it even more important to have an emergency fund. Building one may mean cutting out meals at restaurants or foregoing a vacation, but you will never regret having that margin of safety. What’s more, it will multiply your control over money. Right away, adding regularly to your fund means that you’re asserting control. Then, hitting your fund target gives you backup – and options – for when things get tough.

You can’t control what you don’t measure. It’s a great if somewhat sobering practice to figure what it really costs you to live. Count up, as closely as you can, what you must have every month – the rent, utilities, clothes and groceries level expenses. Add in mandatory payments, such as loans, health insurance, car insurance and credit card debt. Then, add up those other things that have somehow become almost necessities: meals at restaurants, entertainment, donations, gifts to friends, vacations, dry cleaning…and bar tabs. It all adds up to a surprisingly large sum. Here’s a key point: pay yourself first. Before you pay the first bill, save some portion, even if it’s a small part, of what you make. You won’t be sorry.

Many people are using credit cards to spend more than they make. We feel entitled to our little luxuries, especially when everyone we know seems to be doing the same thing. It is very difficult to turn down a night out with friends just because the checkbook is bare. But in my opinion, taking on debt to consume more is a terrible idea. For one thing, the interest rates are very high – you would be very happy to get the kind of return on your money that the bank gets. More insidiously, credit card debt takes away our control because it is so easy, and the reckoning is so detached from the things we’ve bought. The more meals, vacations, and haircuts we buy with credit cards, the more it becomes normal, and the larger the high-interest balance becomes.

Adding to your debt just to consume reduces your control over money – the opposite of what we’re looking for. It is almost certain to make you less happy, not more. Paying off your credit cards has a very high return – getting rid of debt with an 18% interest rate is like earning 18% on your money! If you have credit cards, check the interest rate – you will probably find that paying them off is well worth the effort. When buying fewer things means having less debt, you are really giving to yourself instead of to the bank.

Not all debt is bad, of course. There are three reasons to borrow, in my opinion. First, to pay for an education that you couldn’t otherwise get; second, to buy a house; third, to start or support a business. Each of these has a reasonable chance of helping you in a long-run way, unlike the long-forgotten meals and toys we just had to have.

We’re fascinated with money. Look at all the slang terms for it. Although it can’t buy happiness, we do need it. By building an emergency fund, paying yourself first, and paying off the credit cards, you can start making sure that this element of your happiness is under your control.

Indyhall celebrated its first anniversary with a full-blast birthday party at Triumph Brewing Company. More than 3 dozen sponsors – individuals and companies alike – donated more than $8,000 to underwrite the food and drink, and none of it went to waste, as the hundreds of partygoers could tell you!

Philadelphia’s first coworking space, founded by Alex Hillman and Geoff DiMasi, enjoyed a remarkable year of growth and success. Providing coworking space for a growing community of developers, designers, writers, graphic artists, marketers and other professionals, Independents Hall became a focal point for the expansion of Philadelphia’s creative economy. Enjoy some highlights of the party, and stop by Indyhall sometime!

Earlier, I said that health is on the list of things that make you happy. (If you have serious problems, get help from a professional. That’s not me.)

First, ask yourself, “What result do I want?” (I am always amazed at how often people don’t do this.)

You might say that you want to:

• Be able to lift X weight Y times
• Be able to walk or run X miles in Y time
• Have such and such a cholesterol level, blood sugar, or weight

…Or many other measures or qualities. You might be fine with your physical health but you don’t want to worry as much about [you name it], or perhaps you’d like to handle anger better. Possibly you think in terms of how far you have progressed with yoga.

The point is: you need goals. You need to define a state you want to achieve. Otherwise you won’t know where you are and you will feel bad about it. Setting goals is therapeutic in itself – you aren’t taking on the whole universe anymore.

Be reasonable. Telling yourself you have to run a 10 mile race in a couple of months when you haven’t walked more than a few blocks at a time for 5 years is setting yourself up to fail.

Be persistent. Those who succeed are those who keep trying. If one method is not working for you, try something else. Just because meditating helps your best friend relax doesn’t mean it’s for you. Don’t give up.

Compare yourself to you, not to other people. There is always someone who can run faster, lose more weight, be more one with the all. Measure your progress against your own goals.

You may like joining with others in working toward your goals. Sharing your progress can keep you on track and give you a reason not to skip a yoga class or eat half the key lime pie at a sitting. Don’t worry if others appear to make more progress – your movement toward your own goals is what counts. And if others compare themselves unfavorably to you, gently remind them of this.

Some can take inspiration from the example of others – and there are certainly many inspiring people. If someone’s success, perhaps against great odds, gets you going, that’s wonderful! Use that example to your advantage!

For various reasons, though, not everyone works that way. Some might look at a success story and find it overwhelming, thinking, “I could never do anything like that.” Whether or not you are encouraged by the success of other people, take this one thing from their experience: They started. They persisted. And you can do that much too.