Soapbox Engage Blog

I've been to more than a few conferences this year. Most conferences I attend are squarely focused on either the Joomla! or non-profit technology communities.  That tends to be my comfort zone.  So when I decided to join Melanie and Tim to do some crosstraining and Joomla! evangelism at Salesforce.com Dreamforce 2010 conference, I had no idea what to expect.

The result:  after four days at Dreamforce I was completely exhausted, my mind was swirling with possibilities, and I'd shaken more hands than a politician walking a rope line.  Thank goodness for the "cloud" beanbag areas in San Francisco's Moscone West.

[caption id="attachment_1214" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="PICnetters and SaaSy at Dreamforce 2010"][/caption]

There were more than a few times I asked myself, "is this a rock concert, or am I at a technology conference?"  DJs were spinning in the lobbies of all the conference halls (Dreamforce took over all three of the Moscone conference halls in San Francisco), SaaSy and Chatty (Saleforce's mascots) roamed the halls with big smiles, and the rain didn't keep anyone from staying to see Stevie Wonder, will.i.am and apl.de.ap, and President Bill Clinton make appearances.

But seriously, it wasn't a rock conference.

This year has been quite a ride for us at PICnet, especially with strong pickup in the community of our Non-Profit Soapbox services.  After hiring a new project manager (great to have you aboard, Alex!), we're continuing our recession-busting expansion.  We're looking to keep pace with the project inquiries coming in to us on a daily basis, and we could certainly use another set of hands and a sharp mind to keep pace with the proposal writing needed.

Needless to say, we need more hands on deck!  So, we're hiring for our new Business Development Associate position.

Ever wonder which government agencies oversee the items that end up on your dinner table? Well, as you may have guessed, the answer to that question isn't so simple. For example, a slice of pizza? Well that depends on whether the slice has meat on it or not. I'm no expert on the matter, so let me leave it to the folks at the Government Accountability Project's Food Integrity Campaign to explain:

Easy one! The FDA. Wait, the USDA! Wait! Actually, it depends on what's on your pizza. Does your pizza have meat on it? If so, the USDA is regulating it. Plain cheese? The FDA gets that slice of the pie! Under the system, each agency performs its own pizza inspections. The USDA inspects meat pizza plants daily. Meanwhile, the FDA will inspect the same plant's cheese pizza every one to five years. Does that make any sense?

Hmm, yeah, I'm still confused, but that's the point! That's why I'm so glad to roll out the red carpet for one of our newest Soapbox sites: http://food.whistleblower.org!

For those of you keeping track, you may remember whistleblower.org was mentioned here a little less than a year ago when we launched their main soapbox site. That's why we were so pleased when the Government Accountability Project approached us shortly thereafter about putting together a second site for their new Food Integrity Campaign. Anytime an existing client comes back looking for additional work, we couldn't be happier, but in this case I was double excited just because it seemed like such a fun project.