Omaha Catherine Rohr’s American dream is different than the average entrepreneur’s. Yes, she has a background in investments, but now she invests in people through Defy Ventures, a program that teaches former felons to be successful entrepreneurs. After visiting a Texas prison with a friend, Rohr’s world was turned upside down when she discovered many inmates are profitable businessmen and entrepreneurs, but are stuck in a cycle of incarceration ... read more

Omaha Alejandro Velez and Nikhil Arora, co-founders of Back to the Roots, developed their grow-at-home mushroom kits without knowing anything about mushrooms. Or even, really, food. After all, their careers after graduation from Berkeley were intended to be in investment banking and consulting. But they pressed on from their launch in 2009 to learn three key lessons, which they shared this afternoon at Big Omaha: read more

Omaha Big Omaha has gone 8bit. The annual event is nearly one day in, and even at this highly innovative tech conference, there's still room for old-school style—and Adam Nielsen is proving it. Nielsen is one of this year's Big Omaha artists, live-drawing (yep, that's right—live-drawing) caricatures of the 14 speakers while they're on stage. Images from his computer are projected onto a wall in the event … read more

Omaha Dr. Peter Hudson had "almost a cathartic journey" planned for Big Omaha 2013. "My thesis today is that if you experience life, and you live it to the fullest, and you do things that you're interested in," he said, "you will have experiences that lead you to big problems, problems that really matter." He took the audience back to when he was 10 years old, saw his father have a grand mal seizure and kept a cool head. Then he talked about inventing a fence-climbing ... read more

Omaha Megan Casey had a great thing going at Squidoo. She spent seven years building a successful site for users to generate content. But she wanted to throw herself "back in the deep end." At Big Omaha, she shared how she did just that, and stand for something in the process. "I wanted to scare the pants off myself," she said. Pack, a site that states it's "for dogs and the people who love them," stands for the need to "slow down in life," Casey said. "There's ... read more

Omaha For Tony Conrad, successful entrepreneurs aren’t starting companies—they’re starting movements. Conrad’s keynote kicked off Big Omaha, where he challenged the audience to think bigger. “Think and ask yourself, 'How does my product impact the world?'” he said. “How does this product capture imagination? And how can this product spark a movement?” Conrad started about.me with this in mind. He saw the site as an opportunity ... read more

Omaha We're excited to welcome the following seven organizations sponsoring Big Omaha on the "supporter level" this year ... read more

Omaha Weren't able to make it to KANEKO today for our fifth annual Big Omaha? Don't worry. We're providing a free live stream starting at 9:00 a.m., thanks to our sponsor Hayneedle. Here's today's schedule … read more