Tech & Innovation

The fields of science and technology are undeniably dominated by men. However, the contributions of women in these areas has been overlooked and underestimated throughout history. At the recent 2009 Women in Technology (WiT) Awards presentation, WiT President and i.lab CEO Anne-Marie Birkill delivered a keynote address in which she lauded the little-known achievements of female scientists and technologists, and called for greater acknowledgement and support for women today. Here is an edited extract from Birkill’s speech.

Researchers in Germany are developing a mobile ride-sharing service that could turn every car into a make-shift taxi.

In part four of our series on the capital raising cultures in Australia and the US, San Francisco-based Steve Anderson explores how Australian and New Zealand entrepreneurs can best prepare for securing local investors.

This July 2009 lecture to the TED in Oxford, UK sees Daniel Pink explore how the 20th century thinking behind staff and employee motivation...

Jarvis points to one particularly interesting example of how media companies can encourage increased distribution and readership for their online content: The embeddable paper.

Do you remember the first time you used computers? If you're under 30 that's like saying, "Do you remember the first time you drew breath," so obviously I'm talking to my older demographic. If the experience was not traumatic, you are a rare specimen, indeed.

Today, the Australian Federal Minister for Small Business, Dr Craig Emerson, officially launched a free phone service that will provide advice and support for people running and working in small businesses.

In a little over 10 days, we will be sending a fleet of mobile-billboards down the busy streets of inner-city Australia to promote our 2009 Cool Company Awards. I'm talking about Scooter Advertising, courtesy of our friends at Subterfuge. In accordance with my blog post of yesterday on using social media to promote the 'cools', it occurred to me that this exercise presents an excellent opportunity to promote two-way reader engagement. So far, we've developed three potential poster and themes (below).

In this video from the wonderful Academic Earth, Robert Sutton, author of "Weird Ideas that Work", argues that authority has its place, but most businesses succeed when creativity is allowed to flourish.

Margaret Thatcher once remarked that anybody over the age of 30 who used a bus could consider themselves a failure. Now, Adelaide commuters might be clamouring over one another to get on the bus thanks to a new free mobile entertainment platform.

Most people have a vague understanding of the various types of intellectual property rights, but few know exactly which rights relate to them and even fewer know how much this will cost. This new series takes readers through the ins and outs of intellectual property rights protection specifically for knowledge-economy businesses.

To coincide with today's relaunch of the oodles.com website, Sherlock and his team are inviting Twitter users to suggest a tagline for their online car rental platform. The author of the winning tweet tagline (twagline?) as chosen by Oodles staff will receive $1,000 cash.

Love it or hate it, crowdsourcing - harnessing the wisdom of the crowd - is changing the face of design. Angelina Russo takes a look at the winners and losers in this democratic revolution.

At Anthill, we often find ourselves at the receiving end of marketing gifts, from keyrings to... shoes. This week, we decided to film our reactions and opinions about some of the best (and worst). We're calling it, 'Cool for comment'.

It says much about the schismatic nature of Australia's economic strategy that the Federal Government invited public submissions on how to build a clever country in the same week that it signed a $50B gas export contract with China. Jordan Green outlines his vision for Australia's knowledge economy.

It usually manifests as a long monologue that starts with: "Get a Mac - they are perfect" then trails off, without punctuation or breathing, into an extensive list of Mac failures and bugbears. When they catch themselves, they add, "But they are still brilliant. You should get one!"

Our bloggers have been critical of its longevity (Can social media sell anything but itself) and equally dazzled by its potential (How I used social media to put my CEO on the street). Of course, the following example (first published as a 'Discussion' on the Social Media Academy LinkedIn Group) had me from the get-go. Its author is Paul Rickett, Founder and Principal at VARKETING!.

Sad news this week that INNOVIC, the support organisation for innovative Victorian startups, will be restructured due to lack of government funding.

In further evidence that there is investment capital available for innovative Australian companies in this bear economy, Adelaide-based seed investor Playford Capital succeeded in generating more than $12 million in innovation investment during the 2008-09 financial year.

The use of viral advertising in marketing campaigns is nothing new, however the power of this advertising vehicle appears to continue growing at a phenominal rate.