Photo by Patrick via Flickr

What is Prairie Moves?

Published Tuesdays and Thursdays (one day late this week), 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 editor@siliconprairienews.com. And if you have suggestions on how we could improve these posts or any of our coverage, please contact danny@siliconprairienews.com.

Fundings

• Leap2 (Kansas City, Kan.) raised a $280,000 seed round - SPN

New Tech

• Handmark (Kansas City) released Pocket Express for NOOK - barnesandnoble.com

New Creative

• Blend Interactive (Sioux Falls, S.D.) launched Imation.com and related mobile sites - Imation.com, Blend Interactive blog, Blend Interactive portfolio
• Phenomblue (Omaha) launched Movie Lotto, a pre-movie experience that aims to entertain audiences before movie trailers begin - Phenomblue blog
• SocialVolt (Kansas City) launched a new company website - socialvolt.com
• Lemonly (Sioux Falls, S.D.) had an infographic published on Mashable: "Insights from 5 Million Emails"

Product/Business Development

• Des Mob, a site by 8/7 Central 2.0 (Des Moines), was redesigned - desmob.com and Des Moines Egotist

Mentions

• Social Money Systems (Des Moines) - Gartner: "SmartyPig Name Change Another Sign of Social Media Adoption in Banking"
• Synbak (Marion, Iowa) - KSTF 26: "Internet television"
• SkyVu Entertainment - B2B: "SkyVu Entertainment Pushes ‘Battle Bears’ Brand to Sky’s-the-Limit Vision of Mobile Games, TV, Film, Toys, Etc."
• StartupIowa - Des Moines Business Record: "A closer look: Andy Stoll" (Video)
• Des Moines Business Record: "Who are the tech investors"

Gig Bits

• Time - Business: "Will Google’s Insanely-Fast Kansas City Network Shame U.S. ISPs?"
• Kansas City Business Journal: "Former North Kansas City network director now helps with Google work"

Blogged

• Bret Neese (Le Claire, Iowa): "Iowa, the Silicon Prairie, investors, communities, hustlers, and you."
• Locusic (Des Moines): "Meet Erika"
• StartupCity Des Moines: "Meet the Mentor: Shane Reiser"
• Goodsmiths (Des Moines): "Goodsmiths Shop Update" 
• Jack Perry of Syncbak (Marion, Iowa): "Thinking about doing a start-up?"
• Far Reach (Cedar Falls): "Why We Invested in BarCamp Cedar Valley"
• Bawte (Des Moines): "Evolution of the Idea"
• Hurrdat (Lincoln): "Hurrdat Cribs"

Awards & Recognition

• LockPath (Overland Park, Kan.) named a corporate integrity GRC Technology Innovation award winner - Press Release

Misc.

• Google Offers launched in Omaha - twitter.com/googleoffers
• "Lincoln announces plan to install downtown fiber grid" - SPN
• "Iowa in running for $1.2 billion data center; is it Facebook? Apple?" - Des Moines Register
• "Iowa draws more interest as site for huge data center" - Des Moines Register
• "Guest columnist: Entrepreneurial Iowa at stake if trust law changes" - Des Moines Register
• "foursquare names Des Moines winner of 'city badge,' credits Drake class" - foursquare blog, SPN, Des Moines Reigster
• "Pinterest serves as inspiration, communication tool for wedding planning" - Des Moines Register
• Photos from KC Cowork's Happy Hour - Thing Big Partners blog
• Ben Milne of Dwolla (Des Moines) was announced as a speaker for the London Web Summit - London Web Summit and TechCrunch Europe