Creative Economy : Buzz

Investors.com recently reported on what some people describe as a “tech startup boom” in Minneapolis. 

In three years, Coco Coworking, which now has three Twin Cities coworking spaces where entrepreneurs can share resources and ideas, has grown to include 700 members, most of which are tech startups, the story states.  

CoCo has hosted over 4,000 people through its regular meet-ups just this year, according to the story. 

The nonprofit Minnestar, which is also dedicated to cultivating the local tech scene, has seen an increase of over 40 percent in attendance at its MinneDemo events since 2010. 

The story goes on to cite other examples of tech activity in the state. Jeff Pesek, co-founder of the Minneapolis-based website, tech.mn, which tracks the local tech scene, is quoted, saying, “There is a lot of activity here, a lot of signs that the market is evolving and blossoming.” 


Source: Investors.com 

“Michael Gaughan’s Visual Punchlines Bring Comedy To Art,” is the headline of a recent piece from the national art magazine, Beautiful Decay. 

Gaughan, a local artist, “represents a new breed of hyper-creative talents whose work spans an absurd amount of media,” the story states. 

His work is characterized by intense detail, which is tough to come execute, especially in watercolor, his medium of choice. His paintings are “painstakingly rendered for the sake of humor," the story reads. 

Whatever his subject matter, “Gaughan creates with an almost child-like glee. Despite the playfulness in the work, however, there is a sophistication and consistency that separates it from most. This is particularly evident in his highly-technical watercolor paintings,” the story adds.  

A poster series from local creative agency Replace highlights the ingenuity of Minnesota scientists and inventors through history, City Pages reports. 

Many people probably don’t realize that local creative types developed the first pop-up toaster, the first retractable seat belt, and the first commercial computer to use RAM, the story reads. 

That was the inspiration behind “MN Invents,” the brightly colored, informative poster series that can be viewed online here. 

Among the other inventions that originated with Minnesota thinkers, according to the story: handles on paper bags, a deep-sea submarine, and a remote-controlled helicopter. 

In Minneapolis, biking or walking to work is becoming increasingly commonplace, according to recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.

The survey shows that 6.9 percent of Minneapolis residents walked to work in 2012, which was an uptick from 5.8 percent in 2011, according to city materials. Another 4.5 percent of residents biked to work, over 3.4 percent the year before.  

“While these estimates are within the margin of error, they show that pedestrian and bicycle commuting in Minneapolis is holding steady and likely growing,” a city web post reads. 

The city “has the second highest per capita bicycle commuting and ninth highest pedestrian commuting” of major US cities, it states. 

Metro Transit recently added a service for commuters on its Northstar Line, which takes people between downtown Minneapolis and Big Lake during rush hours: It debuted wi-fi access on Monday, the Star Tribune reports. 

The complimentary wi-fi will work on at least one train car for each trip, which will be labeled, according to the Star Tribune blog post. That will usually be the “cab car,” at the end of the train.

Metro Transit spokesperson Brian Lamb is quoted in the piece, saying, "Due to the longer distances traveled on commuter rail, Northstar service is a great match for wi-i.”

Besides wi-fi access, passengers can listen to Minnesota Public Radio’s “Sound Point,” which provides historical background about the areas the train traverses. 
  

RT Book Reviews, which shares information about forthcoming titles in a column called "Forewords," recently gave a shout-out to a local author in its nonfiction category. 

Margret Aldrich, who used to work for the Utne Reader magazine, “is ready to celebrate the new miniature library craze with The Little Free Library Book, a collection of stories, images, and tips,” the column reads. 

Her book is expected to come out next spring, it states.  

Forewords draws from the “web team’s most-anticipated upcoming releases across the genres,” just as projects are announced. 

Amy Thielen, a Minnesotan, is leading a new TV show on the Food Network, the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal reports.

The show, titled “Heartland Table,” will first air this Saturday. 

“Heartland Table” features Thielen cooking at her home in Two Inlets, a rural area north of Park Rapids. 

“The show gives viewers a look at the former Manhattan chef's recipes for Midwestern dishes like fried bologna, rhubarb spears and blueberry lemon pie,” the story reads. 

Thielen stopped cooking professionally when she and her husband relocated to their Minnesota cabin. She turned to food writing and she even snagged a James Beard Foundation Journalism award for coverage, the story states. 

The October print issue of Bicycling magazine pays tribute to Minneapolis’ Midtown Greenway, a 5.5-mile bike and pedestrian path, in photos and words. Alongside a photo of a solo rider journeying down the Greenway in the wee morning hours, the piece reads, “Well-loved and heavily trafficked, the Greenway is an expressway of sorts for pedestrians and cyclists.”  

The Greenway, a former railroad corridor, has a scenic trail that “bypasses streets and highways and leads to the Minneapolis Chain of Lakes to the west and the Mississippi River to the east,” it adds.   
 

A local project called Nerdy Candles: For Nerds reached its fundraising goal of $5,000 on Kickstarter last month. 

The project, led by Tom Lubanovic of Frostbeard Studio, centers on handmade candles inspired by video games, movies, and comics. It’s a “fun mash-up of traditional craftsmanship with geek culture,” the Kickstarter page reads.  

This is the group’s second foray onto Kickstarter. In the past, the group created book-themed candles for the literary set. “It's become apparent that people really like our candles, both for smelling nice and for being... different,” the Kickstarter page continues.  

The new line of candles will take inspiration from Zelda, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Doctor Who, among other pop culture icons.  

Pioneer Press photographer Ben Garvin recently produced a stop motion video that went viral, hitting over 1.2 million views on YouTube within only a couple of days. Garvin’s short film, titled “Magic Beard,” which was recorded with a smartphone app, has since been featured on numerous morning shows, evening news broadcasts, and websites all over the globe, including the Huffington Post. The film goes to lengths, literally, to reveal the wonders of Garvin's  "magic beard." Besides the amount of time Garvin spent growing the beard, the film, which runs just a couple of minutes, took 15 hours to put together.   

The Huffington Post shout-out about the film reads, “Ben Garvin's glorious stop-motion film documenting the antics of his clearly out-of-control beard validates all of our fears about facial hair.” 

Former “Glee” actor Stephen Tobolowsky is coming to St. Paul’s Fitzgerald Theater to tape his syndicated radio show and podcast,  "The Tobolowsky Files," live on Oct. 10, the Pioneer Press reports.   

In the hit TV series, Tobolowsky was the glee club teacher early on. He's also appeared in many other roles on-screen, but he might be most known for his part as “the memory-challenged character who provides a key to the mystery in "Memento,”” the Pioneer Press story states. 

As a part of "The Tobolowsky Files,” the actor recounts personal tales about Hollywood, life, and love, the story adds. 

As a testimony to local food trends, a database from the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal has grown to include 103 food trucks and trailers. 

The database, which can be sorted by various attributes, including “most popular menu item,” also has information about food trucks’ presence on the street and on social media, a story from the Journal states. 

Food truck reporter Urmila Ramakrishnan put it together. “Besides profiling dozens of food trucks, Urmila broke food truck news and found innovators, interesting people and companies that support the industry as the mobile eateries fight turf wars with established brick-and-mortar restaurants and struggle with their own popularity,” the story states.
 

Community-supported art, a takeoff on community-supported agriculture, provides locally made art to its members. 

Since its start with the St. Paul-based nonprofit organization Springboard for the Arts, in collaboration with the local artists behind mnartists.org, four years ago, the concept has caught on in a number of cities across the country, the New York Times reports.

It has also taken on new forms as it has sprung up in different places, the story reads.  

“The goal, borrowed from the world of small farms, is a deeper-than-commerce connection between people who make things and people who buy them,” the story reads. 

It helps that many people were already familiar with the CSA model, the story points out.  

“The Ultimate Long Weekend in Minneapolis” is the headline of a recent Wall Street Journal story that highlights the city’s attractions. 

The scenic city “may bring to mind parkas before parks, and Vikings before biking, but Minneapolis is as sweet in summer as it is frigid in winter,” with everything from outdoor activities to cultural offerings to take in, it reads. 

The story lays out a step-by-step itinerary for visitors who visit the city for a weekend. Local restaurants like Burch, Icehouse (also an entertainment venue) and Matt’s Bar get a shout-out. The American Swedish Institute, Forage Modern Workshop, and the Walker Art Center also get props, as do a number of theaters, shops, and parks.  

ActiveTimes.com recently ranked the Midtown Greenway in Minneapolis as the nation’s top bike path, CBS Minnesota reports. USA Today picked up the story.   

The over-five-mile-long trail sees up to 5,000 people daily. “It runs right through the center of Minneapolis with little interruption from street traffic or pedestrians,” the story reads. 

On the path, ActiveTimes says, riders get views of the Mississippi River, the Chain of Lakes, and the Martin Sabo suspension bridge. And the site takes note of the fact that many people take the bike path to work. 

To come up with its results, ActiveTimes evaluated “whether the path allows you to skip traffic while at the same time giving you a view of nature.”