Start-ups do best when there is an established market and people already have expressed a need.

What seemed to be the overarching theme at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in New York this month? Some ideas are ready to go to market and some are still inspirations on the back of...

Energy reporters need to understand science

You don't expect a donnybrook when a university like Northwestern releases a White Paper. Yet oh what fun it was to watch a liberal-minded geochemist mix it up with an American Petroleum Institute (API) spokeswoman last week at the Press Club in Washington.

Ken Burns and Sarah Burns Collaborate to Make "Wilding" Documentary

Ken Burns is a story-teller. His new documentary PBS film which debuted this week, The Central Park Five, is really a retrospective on the case of Trisha Meili, brutally raped near the Reservoir in the 875-acre...

Whether or not the Obama administration is putting pressure on Congress for a sweeping budget deal by closing White House tours and curtailing the popular Cherry Blossom Festival here this week (cuts of $1.6 million) in Washington, the Grand Bargain negotiations ain't such a great deal for the National Parks'...

President's Executive Order Protects Bay Budget, EPA Progress Report Issued for Comment

The rockfish are running again in the Chesapeake Bay, the 64,000-mile estuary that encompasses six states and Washington, DC. The indigenous blue crab, a staple of our diet here in the Mid-Atlantic, are plentiful enough that crabbers can...

Dancers Find their Voice at DRA Broadway Cares Event

The "Dance from the Heart" event in New York this week, a program of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, was a triumph of individual and troupe artistry. It was also a call to arms among the dramatic arts community to continue to...

At first, I was not sure Jennifer Anne Moses had the right to write this book! She comes, as far as we know, from neither the drug addict side of "living the life," nor the disease side of AIDS. So as I tried to suspend my disbelief, I was compelled...

Dapper and distinguished with more gray at the temples than when he was on the national stage as chairman of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele warned of internecine battles and the GOP still missing the point on inclusion. He's resolved his hurt over being summarily dismissed by his own...

Twitter Founder Biz Stone says 'All Social Media is Political.'

One of the best marketers I know who runs major U.S. Technology conferences from her offices in London and San Francisco said: "Tell Biz Stone to get back to the humble, inventive guy he used to be. He cannot take...

NCI Director Varmus Tearing Down the Walls

My sister Laura Ann died of pancreatic cancer six months ago at age 50. She had been a longtime editor at McGraw Hill, an old-movie buff (Judy Garland) and Washingtonian. Her diagnosis was 15 years ago and her life greatly extended by Whipple...

Syndicated Columnist Clarence Page at the DNC Convention

Clarence Page was a bit wistful as we shared a Starbucks in Charlotte. We talked about the Weather Underground and the Bill Ayers drama of the 2008 campaign; Page telling me that he and Ayers were in Grant Park in proximity during...

How to Treat Violence as a Disease

CeaseFire of Chicago has plenty of violence to deal with right in its own backyard and just announced plans in Washington to go global -- particularly in the Middle East and Africa.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel lambasted Chicago gangs over the death of...

Dietrich and Livingston Capture Collaboration in New Book

Prescient and thought-provoking, Marketing in the Round by marketing expert Gini Dietrich and Social Media Guru Geoff Livingston starts as an easy read. A simple concept captured in the subtitle: How to Develop an Integrated Marketing Campaign in the Digital Era. Then...

I went to four conferences at Internet Week in New York. But the two keynotes I found most compelling were by: the intractable Barry Diller, who is probably lamenting his investment in The Daily Beast, and the irrepressible David Carr, who continues to celebrate the New York Times asking online...

Knowledge Is Power in Gleaning First Party Data

In 12-step recovery programs, the first step is to "admit we are powerless" over our digital publishing foibles. It seems publishers have "reached a bottom" and are now fully in recovery. Or in rehab at least as the digital showcase called...

Hardball's Matthews Writes Campaign Handbook

Chris Matthews cut his teeth in politics for six years working for House Speaker Tip O'Neill who was famously quoted as saying, "All Politics is Local."

Thus his book Jack Kennedy: Elusive Hero is a political playbook. Matthews describes the first real canvassing program, Kennedy's...

Congress Won't Pass Comprehensive Energy LegislationThe premise of this column is that individuals must take personal responsibility for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction, mitigating carbon footprint, and returning un-used power to the grid.

Like so many things in this Congress, a comprehensive energy bill or national renewable energy standards...

Southeast habitat for turtles, birds, to be reforested
The National Fish & Wildlife Foundation (NFWF), a non-profit located in Washington, has been awarded a public/private grant to help restore native long-leaf pine trees through re-planting and conservation. The timber industry, foresters harvesting for years, and the lack of fire...

"You are not doing favors for people -- you are giving them gifts." Thus said Super Marketing Man Seth Godin, one of my heroes, at the EDUCAUSE education technology conference in Philadelphia this week. Godin seemed to turn the notion of quid pro quo completely on its head.

EDUCAUSE is...

I am incredulous that Centreville, Westfield and Chantilly High Schools are all in the Top 5. It is inscrutable and amazing to me that the high schools in the far western suburbs of the one-million-population Fairfax County are in the Washington Post's Top Five in Metro football...