Flutterby™! : Irony? 2009-04-29 12:42:21.094265+02

Irony?

2009-04-29 12:42:21.094265+02 by meuon 3 comments

I've got to go play with the Chattanooga Chamber and regional mucky-mucks todays. UtiliFlex was nominated for a Kruesi award. Funny, we have to buy our own lunch, for a table (8x50). It is yet another Chamber revenue creation event. HTS/COL used to belong to the local Chamber. and then the "pro-local-business" chamber supported the then Mayor in an attempt to take over the local water company. I took my membership plaque back to the Chamber in person and raised quite a stink about it. Later, they supoprted the City ala EPB into competing against private business for phone, internet and cable TV... Once upon a time, I thought things like the "Chamber" were important, they probably are still are in some ways, but not the ways they used to be. Still, it's ironic and just a little funny. I'll try to behave today. I promise.

You probably should behave because evidently the keynote address, at least, is going to be on a live webcast

Chattanooga has always been kind of a "play town" for various Lookout Mountain families. Local politics is just a way for the local kids to cut their teeth before moving up to bigger games (like Corker).

I laughed hard the last time I was in Chattanooga and saw the "Willkommen VW" billboards. Chattanooga is making such a big deal about landing about 2000 blue- collar jobs. Boulder hardly batted an eye over landing the new Conoco-Phillips Renewable Energy Research Center (which is taking over the old Exabyte campus - a tech spinoff from the local Sun campus). The Conoco-Phillips center anticipates adding 6000 jobs - mostly white-collar and many research.

But unlike the South Bay area, Boulder isn't defined by it's tech jobs. Of course, local politics is harder to understand. A benefit of the beneficent rulers from Lookout is that Chattanooga politics is generally very straight forward and predictable.

#Comment Re: made: 2009-04-29 22:13:55.989254+02 by: meuon [edit history]

Well, we didn't win.. DJO did (formerly known as the Chattanooga Group) for a variant of one of their physical therapy tables. It has a good story behind it so I'm glad it/they won. We made exactly 1 decent contact at the event, but most of the people there were pushing themselves. I was hit up by a dentist, several marketing consultants, a personal trainer (management) and telecom sales people and other assorted sales weasels. Besides tickets and time, it cost me a 24" Viewsonic LCD panel that got shattered when the convention center closed quickly on it as I was carrying an armful of stuff from the display.