Silicon Prairie News

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Published every Tuesday, Prairie Moves keeps our readers informed about career moves, media coverage, product development, and more from the companies and individuals we cover on Silicon Prairie News.

If you or your company would like to submit one of the items below for our next Prairie Moves post, please email info@siliconprairienews.com. And if you have suggestions on how we could improve these posts or any of our coverage, please contact me at danny@siliconprairienews.com.

Career Moves

• Dan Young, formerly of Wells Fargo, joined Dwolla (Des Moines) as Operations Manager

Media Mentions

• Secret Penguin’s (Omaha) office space highlighted by B2B Omaha Magazine: "Ramping Up Productivity"
• SmartyPig (Des Moines) mentioned by Quicken Loans news: "Attainable Personal Finance Goals for 2011 – the Antidote to Failed Resolutions" and Budget a Wedding: "Top 10 Posts from 2010"
• Uppward (Des Moines) covered by Des Moines Business Record: "Looking Uppward", Des Moines Register: "iPhone app makes connections at 30,000 feet", and Nathan T. Wright of Uppward interviewed by Des Moines International Airport: "Uppward Interview"
• Nebraska Global (Lincoln) covered by Lincoln Journal Star: "New company aims to develop home-grown software entrepreneurs"
• Steve Gordon of RDQLUS Creative (Omaha) interviewed by SneakerTube.tv: A RDQLUS Sneak(er) Peek!
• Dwolla (Des Moines) mentioned in Chicago Tribune Article: "Make way for a cashless lifestyle" and covered by Auction Bytes: "Will Dwolla's 25-Cent Payment Processing Fees Attract Online Merchants?"
• Hillary Brown of On Pitch (Des Moines) interviewed for the South by Southwest blog: "Music Panelist Spotlight: Hillary Brown"
• Hollrback (Omaha) covered by QR Code Press: "New iPhone QR code reader application unveiled"
• Chad Stansbury of Scriptito interviewed by Beyond the Pedway: "Why Chad Stansbury Started A Company Instead Of Buying A Sports Car"
• Corn Finger was involved in a spoof on “College Experiment” on FoxSports.com (1:15 mark): "College Experiment: Week 19 Pt. 2"
• Big Omaha (a Silicon Prairie News-produced conference) profiled by Nebraska Entrepreneur: "Big Omaha – Past, Present and Future"

New Work

• Secret Penguin (Omaha) re-designed their website, secretpenguin.com
• DownsDesign (Omaha) launched a website and brand for children's author Melissa Saunders, melissasaunders.com
• Thought District (Lincoln) designed the logo, business cards and website for Nebraska Global (Lincoln) – via necreative.typepad.com

Misc.

• Zach Leatherman (Omaha) posted a sneak peak of his current side project "BigText": "Sprawl II - Arcade Fire, an HTML5/CSS3 Web Browser Experiment"
• Jeff Slobotski (Omaha) of Silicon Prairie News participated in Omahype's New Year's Resolutions series: "New Year's Resolutions: Part VI"
• Daniel Shipton of BitMethod shared his outlook on the new year: "Five Emerging Technology Trends that Will Shape 2011"
• Ben Milne of Dwolla (Des Moines) shared his thoughts on the point of sale system: "Rethinking the point of sale system" and he was spotted in a stock photo in this Huffington Post article: "The Best Jobs In America 2011 (PHOTOS)"
• Des Moines Business Record looking for "Forty Under 40" nominations: businessrecord.com
• Omaha earned spot on Grasshopper Group's list: "10 Up-And-Coming Startup Hubs From Around The World"
• Omaha earned top spot on Forbes list: "America's Most Affordable Cities"

On Quora

• What Quora users are in the Silicon Prairie?
• What guests should we have on Prairiecast?
• How many users does Uppward have vs Planely?
• What is Uppward business model?
• What startups are in Des Moines, IA?
• What is the Silicon Prairie?
• Who should be a speaker at Big Omaha 2011?
• What technology companies have been started in the American Midwest?
• Silicon Prairie has great schools, and the Kauffman foundation, so why is the midwest only thought to consist of startups in Chicago or cities with notable seedcamps?