“Los Angeles is an underachieving city,” wrote the Los Angeles Times in its 2013 mayoral endorsement. ”The candidate with the most potential to rise to the occasion and lead Los Angeles out of its current malaise and into a more sustainable and confident future is Eric Garcetti.”

An overwhelming number of startup founders seem to agree that Garcetti is the best candidate to bring out the best in Silicon Valley’s sister city to the south.

“Eric is by far the best candidate for Los Angeles, and has demonstrated a clear plan to grow jobs & our local economy. The proof is in his record, he spearheaded an innovative partnership with our company to provide LA business owners/operators the simplest way to get business licenses,” Jason Nazar, founder and CEO of Docstoc, told us in an email. “He has the overwhelming endorsement of our tech community, and he’s someone I know will work tirelessly to make this the best city for every small business.”

Given the strong desire by L.A.’s startup community to see Garcetti in office, and his impressively geeky record as a city councilman, I’m compelled to endorse his candidacy and urge Angelenos to elect him as its next mayor on May 21st.

Government’s have an undeniable impact on technology entrepreneurs: burdensome taxes and regulations can strangle innovation in the cradle, while funding for education and research are foundational to emerging stars.

Mayors can be powerful allies if they care enough about startups. If San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee hadn’t personally gone out to petition for local proposition E, it might never have passed and saved nascent startups thousands in payroll costs.

Most importantly, we likely won’t know the biggest challenges of the industry in the near future. A few years ago, the sharing economy barely existed, let alone faced the aggressive targeting of government regulators. In Garcetti’s (hopefully) eight years as L.A. mayor, the only thing we have to go on in whether he will prioritize startups on unknown issues against established interests is how he has treated startups in the past.

Nearly every startup we spoke to not only knew of Garcetti, but knew him personally. We cannot think of a policymaker in L.A. who has dedicated more of his time to our readers. But don’t take it from me, take it from the flood of endorsements we received on his behalf (below).

Our mission with TechCrunch’s policy channel, CrunchGov, is to keep our readers informed about laws and policymakers that affect your ability to build amazing things. As mayor, Garcetti will no doubt help you all do that.

Tara Tiger Brown, Represent.LA/ LA Makerspace
Eric Garcetti understands the importance of startups and technology to the future of the Los Angeles economy. He wants high school students to learn how to code, he understands that small tech firms are key to retaining engineering talent, and he’s dedicated to working closely with our research universities to ensure we benefit fully from our innovation leadership.

Sam Friedman & Alexander Israel, ParkMe co-founders
Eric Garcetti has the right policies to foster innovation and growth for our tech industry. His stewardship will drive collaboration among the private sector and local government to help create solutions and increase efficiencies to issues such as traffic and parking.

Jason Lehmbeck, Datapop
Garcetti would be the first real tech champion in the LA mayor’s office. His track record on the council in leveraging tech to make Angelenos lives better speaks for itself including launching the first 311 app in his district years ago. His specific plans as mayor point to LA taking its rightful place as a global center of innovation. These aren’t just campaign talking points, they are real initiatives that will have a big impact on city life including appointing a city CTO as well as setting up an office to work with LA’s great universities to encourage all those talented engineers and scientists to stay in LA. As a tech entrepreneur in LA, he has my vote.

Greg Cohn, Co-Founder & CEO, Ad Hoc Labs (makers of Burner)
Eric understands the impact the tech economy is having on LA today, and as an ideas person, the long-term transformative potential inherent in fostering a startup ecosystem. He also gets tech culture — both at the level of what needs to be done to support & enable it, and at the level of what the city could learn from it to be more efficient and effective.

Adam Lilling Managing Director – Plus Capital and Founding Director – LaunchpadLA
Too many politicians make decisions based on personal experience. It’s very limiting. Eric uses data to inform and drive his decisions and he uses it to help others see the way forward. From the first time I met him (he knew the lease terms on my Chevy volt by heart) to the last time I heard him speak (he used historical data and a trend line to make a point) he has the substance to support his charming ways

Marc Mitchell, CEO and co-Founder, Lootsie
Eric has consistently shown that he understands how technology can be used effectively, efficiently and at a low cost to address LA’s everyday problems. In his district, the Garcetti311 app has been used to fill potholes and to identify and remove graffiti in a quick, cost-effective manner that puts citizens directly in touch with their elected leaders. Solutions like these are replicable and scalable and will benefit all of LA when Eric is mayor.

Jason Rapp, Managing Director, Science-Inc.
“Eric Garcetti has actively supported the tech community in LA for years. He understands that the tech industry is a powerful job engine and community builder. He listens carefully and he takes action swiftly — two important ingredients whether you’re running a startup or a city.”

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Some of Silicon Valley’s most influential investors have teamed up to tackle gun control through a new project that invests in startups that reduce or eliminate firearm violence. Noted Facebook investor and SV Angel Partner, Ron Conway, is heading the group, which will promote novel ideas on issues, such as mental health, and fast-track investments in technology-oriented solutions. The first-of-its-kind civil innovation campaign paves the way for startup industry to tackle timely political issues.

Specifically, the Sandy Hook Promise campaign aims to reduce gun violence in two ways. First, an advisory technical and investor advisory subcommittee is soliciting a call for innovative solutions, will pair participants with development teams, and award a prize to the best ideas. Second, a group of investors will fast-track ventral capital to startups. “If the idea is innovative with a great founder it will get funded just like” any other profitable enterprise, writes conway.

The investment portion serves as a kind of private sector expansion of Obama’s executive order to fund innovations in smart gun technology.

“There is money to be made,” writes investor and Sandy Hook Promise advisor, Ian Sobieski, “Anti-gun violence companies are for sure a double bottom line investment, but looking just at the financial bottom line is justification enough for investment. Gun violence is expensive to society and there is a big potential market for solutions.”

For example, he writes, Shotspotter, an automatic gun-fire alert system for law enforcement is already in employed in cities around the country. Sobieski is also eyeing crime prediction startup, Predpol that overlays probably danger zones on Google Maps.

Conway launched the initiative at a press conference today with San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, following up on a well-received gun violence reform campaign began immediately following the Sandy Hook school massacre last December.

It’s not uncommon for industry elites to take up a common cause, but support wanes as public attention moves on to other problems. Conway’s Sandy Hook Promise is notable for leveraging the resources of his industry to find for-profit solutions to a hot-button political issue.

The strategy has the potential to accelerate an entire cottage industry of gun violence-reducing firms, which will persist far longer than the public’s attention. Perhaps more importantly, it could become a model for how the technology industry engages with political issues. Natural disaster preparedness, water pollution, and drunk driving are all short-lived priority issues that lend themselves to technological solutions.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Ride-sharing is becoming increasingly popular and more widely available, as San Francisco-based startups Lyft and SideCar have both begun expansion into new cities. But what if I told you there’s a ride-sharing company that already operates in all the cities that those companies are just now starting to enter? The company is called Tickengo, and it claims thousands of drivers signed up in more than 900 cities.

Tickengo was incorporated in 2011 to reduce the friction between drivers and passengers who are going to the same place. But the company differentiates itself from other ride-sharing providers that have sprung up over the last year by providing a more open marketplace between drivers and passengers. Unlike Lyft and SideCar, Tickengo hasn’t been recruiting and training drivers to work shifts driving around town. Instead, it allows users to sign up and accept rides at their convenience, without the friction of a middle man managing their routes.

In that way, the company sees itself as more of a pure peer-to-peer marketplace like Airbnb. In contrast, CEO Geoff Mathieux says the other so-called ride-sharing companies that are amassing fleets of drivers in various cities, providing background checks, and training them are just operating cheap taxi services.

With Tickengo, there’s little barrier to entry if you want to be a driver — you simply need to create an account and list a car in good working condition. For a better chance of getting ride requests, drivers can verify various other pieces of information, like phone number, driver license and insurance info.

Tickengo isn’t doing background checks on its drivers like some other services, and that’s by design. The idea is that the more it steps in to manage the driving force, the less it operates like a pure “ride share” service, and the more susceptible it is to regulatory scrutiny.

“From the moment we start managing the drivers, we’ve gone past the threshold of allowing people to connect with each other,” Mathieux said. “We don’t discriminate against drivers. People voluntarily choose to sign up, and the best we can do is verify their info.”

Because Tickengo lets anyone sign up, Mathieux says there’s little difference between it and 511.org’s RideMatch service, which allows users to request a list of carpool or rideshare partners. And because it’s an open marketplace, he says Tickengo is a lot more like Airbnb than competing ride-share services that are managing fleets of drivers.

“We’re closer to Airbnb than Lyft and SideCar. What they’re doing is not a peer-to-peer experience, it’s just hiring a cheap cab,” Mathieux said.

But like Airbnb in the early days, there are plenty of people who have signed up but haven’t actually used the service. This can make its stats a little misleading. While it claims more than 350 drivers in San Francisco, for instance, a very small number are actually verified or have given rides. Only 22 have given rides and just 18 are verified. Just five drivers are listed under both categories. The same is true for other cities.

That means if you’re a Lyft or SideCar rider, you probably won’t get the same kind of instant pickup that you’d expect from those services. There are no roving fleets of drivers, just those who choose to take a ride in their spare time. In that respect, Tickengo is probably best suited for pre-planned travel — like booking a ride to the airport ahead of time — as opposed to trying to find a driver to take you to that meeting in 10 minutes.

But if you’re willing to wait, Tickengo rides can be priced at about half what they would be for a normal taxi ride. Passengers set their own prices for rides, but Tickengo provides a suggested fare. The first driver to accept basically gets the offered amount, and Tickengo takes a 15 percent service fee from their cut.

Tickengo has raised $270,000, including a seed round of funding in 2011 from Kima Ventures. The company has five employees, and has former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown Jr. as its lawyer and an advisor.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Democracy just got an iPad upgrade: Citizens of San Francisco are now being greeted by campaign volunteers with tablets who can perform same-day signups through California’s new online voter registration system. Facebook investor Ron Conway and San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee were out registering citizens yesterday to promote the city’s new push to have the most innovative government. Earlier Tuesday, Conway’s technology advocacy group, sf.citi, released a video of famous tech founders expounding all the ways in which homegrown technology could enhance government services (such as the notoriously difficult transit system).

Prior to California’s adoption of pure online voting, citizens who used the Internet to register to vote still had to follow through with paperwork at home. An experimental analysis of this digital-paper hybrid system found that it could actually slightly decrease registration, so canvassers were incentivized to continue using paper many years after the digital revolution.

Now, with an iPad, or any other wireless device, the world is one step closer to going paperless.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

This is it. TechCrunch Disrupt is back in San Francisco and even though the show is sold out, we’re still going to bring you all the action on our official Ustream feed and on the site. Disrupt is just too big for one site. Watch TechCrunch’s social feeds for even more action!

Today is huge day. We kick things off with Ron Conway, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, and, later in the day for the first time since his company’s IPO, Mark Zuckerberg.

The full agenda for tomorrow can be viewed here.

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Article courtesy of TechCrunch

New entrepreneurs dream about making an impact that spans decades. Bill Campbell has done it. Some readers may know him as a key early Apple executive featured in the Steve Jobs biography, and as an Apple board member today. Others will recognize him for his work as CEO turned now chairman of Intuit. But ask around in Silicon Valley executive circles and you’ll most likely just hear that he’s “Coach.”

He really was a football coach, at Columbia, before he joined Apple. And he really is one today, providing formal and informal advice to industry leaders across the industry. He’ll be bringing his wisdom and experience to bear this Monday at Disrupt SF, where he’ll be interviewing Andreessen Horowitz cofounder and entrepreneur Ben Horowitz.

Campbell will join our all-star list of speakers and guests which now include: Twitter and Sqaure’s Jack Dorsey, Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, super angel Ron Conway, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, Vinod Khosla, Google Ventures’ Kevin Rose, Path’s Dave Morin, Marc Benioff, Jeff Clavier, about.me’s Tony Conrad, Quora founder Adam D’Angelo, Freestyle Capital’s Josh Felser, Reid Hoffman, Khan Academy’s Sal Khan, Yammer’s David Sacks, The Honest Company’s Jessica Alba and Brian Lee, and many more. Also, just announced — Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg. This is one show you will not want to miss.

Get your tickets here while you still can (by the way, we just announced that Mark Zuckerberg will be appearing). As always, if you are interested in becoming a sponsor, opportunities can be found here. Students can also come and be a part of Disrupt SF. We only have 300 student tickets available, so be sure to go here to find out how to get yours quickly.

Bill Campbell
Chairman of the Board, Intuit
Board of Directors, Apple

Bill Campbell assumed his role as chairman of the board of directors in August 1998. He previously served as Intuit’s president and chief executive officer from 1994 to 1998 and as chief executive officer from September 1999 until January 2000.

During Campbell’s tenure, Intuit solidified its position as the clear leader in tax, personal finance and small business accounting software. During that time, the company also invented a new class of Web-based finance businesses delivered through Quicken.com, Intuit’s Web site.

For the three years before joining Intuit, Campbell was the president and chief executive officer of GO Corp., a pen-based computing software company. Previously, he founded and served as president and chief executive officer of Claris Corp., which was purchased by Apple Computer Inc. in 1990.

Before starting Claris, Campbell was Apple’s executive vice president, group executive of the United States. He joined Apple in July 1983 as vice president of marketing and added the title of vice president of sales in January 1984. In September 1984, his duties were expanded to include distribution, service and support when he was promoted to executive vice president. In June 1985, Campbell was named group executive of the United States and has served on its board of directors since August 1997.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

We have one more free ticket left to give away to a lucky fan who wants to come to Disrupt SF with us! We just announced a big surprise — Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg.

Mark will be joining our all-star speaker list which now includes: TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, MG Siegler, Jason Kincaid, Marc Benioff, Jessica Alba, Brian Lee, Dave Morin, Brit Morin, Vinod Khosla, Ron Conway, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, Marissa Mayer, Roelof Botha, Dana Brunetti, Tony Conrad, Jack Dorsey, Reid Hoffman, Ben Horowitz, Chris Kelly, Aileen Lee, and so many more. Seriously, just like people have been saying, this is going to be the Coachella of tech. Check out the full list of speakers here and our full agenda here.

Not only will the winner of this giveaway win a free ticket to Disrupt SF, they will also win a free Kindle we recently received. We asked what we should do with it and you all said to give it away, so the Kindle and the ticket will go to one lucky person who enters below.

1) Become a fan of our TechCrunch Facebook Page:

2) Then do one of the following:

- Retweet this post (making sure to include the #TCDisrupt hashtag)
- Or leave us a comment below telling us why you should win

The contest will start now and end tomorrow, September 4th at 7:30pm PT. Yes that’s only one day, so be sure to enter quickly.

Please only tweet the message once or you will be disqualified. We will make sure you follow the steps above and choose our winner tomorrow night. Anyone in the world is eligible. Please note the ticket is for one ticket only and does not include airfare or hotel.

If you are interested in coming to Disrupt SF, you can purchase tickets here.

If you would like to join us as a sponsor, opportunities can be found here.

Good luck!

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Sequoia Capital partner Jim Goetz, who focuses on mobile, software and enterprise investments for the firm, has had a busy year. Jive and Palo Alto Networks, companies where Goetz serves on the board of directors, have both gone public successfully.

Sequoia was also in mobile app du jour Instagram right before it sold to Facebook. And the firm has raised nearly $1 billion for new funds for its U.S., China and Israeli investments.

Goetz will be onstage talking about his enterprise investments, the current IPO market and more. And he will be joining many other illustrious speaker at Disrupt including TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, Twitter and Square’s Jack Dorsey, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, Salesforce CEO and Chairman Marc Benioff, super angel Ron Conway, Vinod Khosla, LinkedIn and Greylock Partners’ Reid Hoffman, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, John Borthwick, Cloudera’s Kirk Dunn, Emmy award-winning director Greg Yaitanes, Ben Horowitz, Twitter’s Biz Stone and Evan Williams, Path’s Dave Morin, Kevin Rose, Box’s Aaron Levie, Khan Academy’s Sal Khan, The Honest Company’s Jessica Alba and Brian Lee, and many more. Whew!

You can view the whole list of speakers here.

Get your tickets here while you still can! As always, if you are interested in becoming a sponsor, opportunities can be found here. Students can also come and be a part of Disrupt SF, for $300 here.

Jim Goetz
Partner, Sequoia Capital

Jim Goetz is a Partner at Sequoia Capital and is inspired by founders who aim to disrupt the enterprise (Jive Software, Nimble Storage, Palo Alto Networks), or change the mobile landscape (AdMob, Sencha, WhatsApp). He was raised in the Midwest, studied as an engineer, gave up on a PhD to start his career as a rookie product manager at SynOptics (SNPX), and matured into a VP/GM before co-founding VitalSigns (ALU). Both as an entrepreneur and as an investor, Jim is most enthused when teaming with others to turn an authentic idea into a market leading technology company.

Jim joined Sequoia Capital in 2004, and has also led Sequoia’s Investments in Appirio, Barracuda Networks, Clearwell (SYMC), Drawbridge, eMeter (SI), Flite, Metaswitch, Pocket Gems, and Ruckus. Prior to joining Sequoia, Jim served as a General Partner at Accel Partners where he led the investments in BroadJump (MOTV), Entrisphere (ERIC), Peribit (JNPR), RGB, Rhapsody (BRCD), Timetra (ALA) and Topspin (CSCO). Prior to VitalSigns and Synoptics, Jim held various product and marketing positions at AT&T, AT&T Bell Labs, and Digital Equipment. Jim has a BS in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Cincinnati and an MS in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

People don’t give technology enough credit as an art form — the specifics of infrastructure and hard science behind it ultimately overshadow its more inchoate creativity.

But the clichéd trope of a socially awkward engineer coding in a hole somewhere is on its way out. Instagram is a mass product used to cover news events, Twitter is a celebrity playground and you can use Square to pay at Starbucks: The people who build technology companies now have as much influence as Oprah. In fact, Oprah is hanging out on their platform.

There is no entrepreneur alive who exemplifies tech’s creative ethos more than Jack Dorsey, and it’s no surprise he’s got a hand, either as an investor or founder, in all of those aforementioned companies.

Dorsey’s storied life could be a cross between an Ayn Rand novel and a Wes Anderson film. His early obsession with mass-transit and dispatch introduced him to programming, but he’s had many a career turn before doing double duty at Twitter and Square. He’s spent time as a certified massage therapist, botanical illustrator and has even dabbled in fashion design. His dream job is Mayor of New York City, and he has an Integral tattoo on his forearm.

“People who know what an integral is would generally not have tattoos. It sums up what makes Jack an interesting entrepreneur—his ability to blend ideas,” Sequoia‘s Roelof Botha told Vanity Fair earlier this year.

Dorsey will be joining many other interesting entrepreneurs and Valley superstars at Disrupt including TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, salesforce CEO and Chairman Marc Benioff, super angel Ron Conway, Vinod Khosla, LinkedIn and Greylock Partners’ Reid Hoffman, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, John Borthwick, Cloudera’s Kirk Dunn, Emmy award-winning director Greg Yaitanes, Ben Horowitz, Twitter’s Biz Stone and Evan Williams, Path’s Dave Morin, Kevin Rose, Box’s Aaron Levie, Khan Academy’s Sal Khan, The Honest Company’s Jessica Alba and Brian Lee, and many more. You can view the whole list of speakers here.

We are two weeks away from one of the biggest technology conferences of the year and I for one can’t wait to see Jack and all of the above onstage (Get your tickets here!)

As always, if you are interested in becoming a sponsor, opportunities can be found here. Students can also come and be a part of Disrupt SF. Students, be sure to check out your options here.

Jack Dorsey
Co-founder & CEO, Square
Co-founder & Chairman, Twitter

Jack Dorsey is the creator, co-founder, and Chairman of Twitter, Inc. Originally from St. Louis, Jack’s early fascination for mass-transit and how cities function led him to Manhattan and programming real-time messaging systems for couriers, taxis, and emergency vehicles. Throughout this work, Jack witnessed thousands of workers in the field constantly updating where they were and what they were doing; Twitter is a constrained simplification designed for general usage and extended by the millions of people who make it their own every day.

Jack was recognized as one of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people and was named an “outstanding innovator under the age of 35″ by MIT’s Technology Review.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

TechCrunch Disrupt SF is still in the planning stages, but so far it is shaping out to be one of our biggest shows yet. We have announced incredible speakers that so far include: Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, Jessica Alba, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, super angel Ron Conway, Path CEO Dave Morin, Marc Benioff, Vinod Khosla and many others. Exciting, we know. We are still a month off, so be sure to be on the lookout for even more speaker announcements to come each week. Tickets are on sale here.

We are ecstatic about something new we’re doing this year. There will be a strong global presence at Disrupt. Many of you may be familiar with our Israeli Pavilion we have done for three years now, but this year we are bringing even more countries into the mix. So far, we have a total of 66 startups from these countries, with 52 being from Latin America, from countries such as Brazil, Argentina, Chile, and Mexico.

We don’t want to reveal too much, but you’ll also be seeing companies from Africa, Europe and Asia both on the Battlefield stage and in Startup Alley.

One of the key trends we are seeing at Disrupt this year is the greater internationalisation of the entire technology economy, as tech companies open up to new markets, and many head towards the Valley while still retaining significant operations in their home countries. We’re all getting just that little bit more globalised, especially as VCs look for value outside of their home markets.

Guys, if you didn’t apply this time round then you really should consider it for the next Disrupt event, bookmark this URL for the future.

We can’t wait until Disrupt. And you shouldn’t want to either. It is going to be an amazing show. Come and be a part of it with us! Tickets are on sale here.

And if you are interested in becoming a sponsor, opportunities can be found here as always.

Expect many more pavilions like the one below this year!

Article courtesy of TechCrunch