Miami in spotlight at AVCC, other entrepreneurship events

Entrepreneurs from around the world took the stage during this packed week of entrepreneurship events in Miami: Florida International University’s Americas Venture Capital Conference (known as AVCC), HackDay, Wayra’s Global DemoDay and Endeavor’s International Selection Panel.

The events, all part of the first Innovate MIA week, also put the spotlight on Miami as it continues to try to develop into a technology hub for the Americas.

“While I like art, I absolutely love what is happening today... The time has come to become a tech hub in Miami,” said Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos A. Gimenez, who kicked off the venture capital conference on Thursday. He told the audience of 450 investors and entrepreneurs about the county’s $1 million investment in the Launch Pad Tech Accelerator in downtown Miami.

“I have no doubt that this gathering today will produce new ideas and new business ventures that will put our community on a fast track to becoming a center for innovative, tech-driven entrepreneurship,” Gimenez said.

Brad Feld, an early-stage investor and a founder of TechStars, cautioned that won’t happen overnight. Building a startup community can take five, 10, even 15 years, and those leading the effort, who should be entrepreneurs themselves, need to take the long-term view, he told the audience via video. “You can create very powerful entrepreneurial ecosystems in any city... I’ve spent some time in Miami, I think you are off to a great start.”

Throughout the two-day AVCC at the JW Brickell Marriott, as well as the Endeavor and Wayra events, entrepreneurs from around the world pitched their companies, hoping to persuade investors to part with some of their green.

And in some cases, the entrepreneurs could win money, too. During the venture capital conference, 29 companies —including eight from South Florida such as itMD, which connects doctors, patients and imaging facilities to facilitate easy access of records — competed for more than $50,000 in cash and prizes through short “elevator’’ pitches. Each took questions from the judges, then demoed their products or services in the conference “Hot Zone,” a room adjoining the ballroom. Some companies like oLyfe, a platform to organize what people share online, are hoping to raise funds for expansion into Latin America. Others like Ideame, a trilingual crowdfunding platform, were laser focused on pan-Latin American opportunities.

Winning the grand prize of $15,000 in cash and art was Trapezoid Digital Security of Miami, which provides hardware-based security solutions for enterprise and cloud environments. Fotopigeon of Tampa, a photo-sharing and printing service targeting the military and prison niches, scored two prizes.

The conference offered opportunities to hear formal presentations on current trends — among them the surge of start-ups in Brazil; the importance of mobile apps and overheated company valuations — and informal opportunities to connect with fellow entrepreneurs.

Speakers included Gaston Legorburu of SapientNitro, Albert Santalo of CareCloud and Juan Diego Calle of .Co Internet, all South Florida entrepreneurs. Jerry Haar, executive director of FIU’s Pino Global Entrepreneurship Center, which produced the conference with a host of sponsors, said the organizers worked hard to make the conference relevant to both the local and Latin American audience, with panels on funding and recruiting for startups, for instance.

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Sperm whale dies off Pompano Beach coast

The carcass of a 40-foot sperm whale that apparently died as it neared the shore off of Pompano Beach on Sunday afternoon later drifted back out to sea, ending a drama that had drawn the attention of beachgoers and scientists alike.

The whale was spotted about noon offshore near the 600 block of North Ocean Boulevard, according to the Broward Sheriff’s Office.

Read the full story at Sun-Sentinel.com.

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SNL Pays Somber Tribute to Sandy Hook Victims

Saturday Night Live forwent their usual comedic cold open last night to pay their respects to the innocent lives lost at Sandy Hook Elementary School on Friday.

Related: President Fights Tears as He Addresses Nation

The New York Children's Chorus sang Silent Night in memory of the 20 children and six teachers and administrators shot and killed by a gunman who opened fire, and later shot himself dead, at the school in Newtown, Connecticut.

The night's musical guest, Sir Paul McCartney, later joined the young choir onstage to perform Wonderful Christmas Time.

Video: Riveting Details Emerge from CT School Rampage

Watch the emotional video in the player above.

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Losing by Winning?

Amir Taheri

With the first leg of Egypt’s constitutional referendum completed, it looks as if President Muhammad Morsi has secured the victory he had hoped for. Yet it may prove to be a hollow victory, if not the first step toward the derailment of Morsi’s troubled presidency.

On Saturday, half of Egypt’s provinces, including Cairo and Alexandria, went to the polls. The second leg takes place next Saturday, with people in the more rural provinces casting their votes.

Voting was organized in two stages because the government couldn’t persuade enough judicial personnel to supervise the referendum, as demanded by law.

Reuters

Uneasy lies the head: Riot police pass by tanks helping guard Egypt’s Presidential Palace, as President Morsi faces growing public rage over his power grabs.

An estimated 55 million Egyptians are qualified to vote, and almost 51 million registered to do so, the government reports. Half of those who could turned up on Saturday; if a similar percentage goes to the polls next weekend, the total turnout would be larger than in any parliamentary and presidential election since President Hosni Mubarak’s fall.

The government hasn’t announced official results of the first leg; it says it doesn’t want to influence voters in the second leg. But even opposition parties campaigning for a “no” admit that Morsi’s draft constitution is near-certain to pass. Estimates show that in the first leg around 54 percent voted for the draft — higher than the percentage of votes that swept Morsi to the presidency.

Yet what at first glance seems a major victory for Morsi may prove much less — and possibly his undoing.

First, the way the referendum was railroaded has reduced its credibility compared to the Post-Mubarak parliamentary and presidential elections, which took place under army supervision.

Only a quarter of those supervising the election had the legal qualifications required. More than a third hadn’t signed key documents required by electoral law.

Worse, the Interior Minisitry issued tens of thousands of badges to dubious nongovernmental groups for their members to serve as “election observers.” At some polling stations, the presence of these observers had an intimidating effect on voters. There is anecdotal evidence that some “observers” led illiterate voters into voting “yes.”

Another questionable tactic was the slowing down of voting in areas believed to favor the “no” campaign. This was especially true in Coptic Christian neighborhoods, where voters had to wait in line for hours, the official excuse being delays in the arrival of additional ballot papers.

More important, not enough time was given for the proposed draft to be debated in public and understood by the voters. This is a long document with over 200 articles, some in complicated legalese.

The opposition made the mistake of first calling for a straight boycott and thus did not spend enough time explaining why the draft may harm Egypt’s hopes for democracy. Then, less than a week before the first leg of polling, the opposition opted to take part and started campaigning for a “no” vote.

This reversal of gears confused many voters, while leaving little time to justify a “no” vote.

A simple majority is enough to pass most laws, but a constitution requires a larger consensus. It is a document designed to unite a nation around a set of fundamental rules to regulate the public space and protect the rights of citizens.

However, rather than unite Egyptians, Morsi’s draft has divided them into two camps of roughly the same size. And even the narrow majority that Morsi seems set to secure comes at the cost of a loss in the goodwill he won in the first months of his presidency.

The constitutional duel may transform Morsi into a factional leader rather than a unifying figure, while increasing his dependence on his Muslim Brotherhood base. And that would be bad news for Morsi and for Egypt.

Have a comment on this PostOpinion column? Send it in to LETTERS@NYPOST.COM!

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Five years after the recession, a slow recovery plods on

Five years ago this month, the Great Recession began. Which leads to this question: How much longer until South Florida can erase the damage?

Officially, the recession ended in June 2009. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the national economy began contracting in December 2007 and did not grow again for 19 months. Using taxable sales figures, it’s probably safe to say South Florida experienced a longer downturn. Overall spending contracted for the first time in South Florida in March 2007 and didn’t post a year-over-year gain until February 2010.

“Miami was at the forefront of the housing boom and bust,’’ said Karl Kuykendall, an economist who follows South Florida for IHS Global Insight. “It’s no surprise Miami was early into the recession and somewhat late coming out.”

But whatever the actual duration of the downturn, it doesn’t take much math to realize the economy still feels shaky. South Florida lost its first net job in more than two years in October, when a tiny decline of 300 payroll slots interrupted 26 months of consistent expansion. The upcoming November report out Friday will show whether the losing streak continues.

And while unemployment is off near-record highs set in April 2010, more than 180,000 South Floridians were listed as officially out of work in the last count. That’s almost 90 percent more than the 98,000 people listed as out of work in the first month of the recession.

Tourism posted an early recovery, particularly in Miami-Dade, where foreign visitors helped hotels shake-off a sharp drop in U.S. vacationers and business travelers. But the recession lingers in Broward’s tourism industry, which is just now retiring past records.

Housing suffered the most dramatic crash throughout the recession and was also the last of the major indicators to begin its recovery. The Case-Shiller real estate index pegs May 2006 as the peak of the bubble in South Florida. Although each neighborhood is different, the average South Florida house worth $200,000 that month would have fallen down to $97,600 by the time the market hit bottom just over a year ago, in November 2011.

Values have recovered 9 percent since then, meaning the same house should be worth just over $105,0000. That’s a loss of 47 percent over six years.

Recovering from that kind of crash takes time, and five years clearly isn’t enough. To give a hint of the progress underway, Business Monday checked into businesses and residents on the frontlines of the recovery. The reports follow:

Housing

After fending off a foreclosure and battling to get out from under an onerous option ARM mortgage, Marie and Wilson Destin recently worked out a loan modification on their 4-bedroom, 2-bathroom house near Miami Lakes.

With the help of Neighborhood Housing Services of South Florida, a nonprofit agency that helps people navigate the Byzantine home financing landscape, the Destins cut their monthly mortgage payment to $1,500 from $1,900 under a new fixed-rate loan.

In 2006, when the housing market was booming, the Haitian-American couple had taken out an option ARM loan on the property, which they had owned for several years.

“Somebody came to the house and approached me with an option ARM loan,’’ said Wilson Destin. “They said I would pay less.’’

The option ARM — which has triggered financial woes for thousands of homeowners during the downturn — allowed for flexible payments and negative amortization, practically encouraging people to defer payments.

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Brownsville resident wins historic preservation award

A warm Friends and Neighbors salute to our very own Enid Pinkney, who in November was awarded the Peter H. Brink Award for Individual Achievement in Historic Preservation at the National Preservation Conference in Spokane, Wash.

Pinkney, who was selected from among nominees from throughout the United States, said, "I proudly received the award, but I realize that I could not have achieved anything without the help of the community. I owe a debt of gratitude for the various historic preservation projects that the community helped me to promote. I accept the lovely award, which I cherish, on your [the community’s] behalf.”

Pinkney was nominated by Jorge Hernandez, the national vice president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, and was presented with the award at the event. Hernandez lives in Coral Gables. Pinkney and her husband Frank, live in the Brownsville area.

And speaking of awards...

Tracy Wilson Mourning, founder of Honey Shine Inc., will be the keynote speaker at the annual Thelma Gibson Awards and Installation Luncheon to be at 11:30 a.m. on Jan. 25, at the Biltmore Hotel, 1200 Anastasia Ave. in Coral Gables.

Sponsored by the Women’s Chamber of Commerce, the program will also feature special remarks from Justice Peggy A. Quince of the Supreme Court of Florida. Quince will install the chamber’s new president, Nordis D. Alvarez, and the new board of directors of the organization. Awards will be presented to individuals who have made significant contributions to the advancement of women in the Miami-Dade community.

Mourning will speak from the event’s theme, "Lift as You Climb," and will encourage attendees to reach behind and lend a hand to the women coming up behind on the ladder of success.

Tickets to the event are $65 for members and $75 for guests. For tickets and more information on how to become a sponsor, call Alvarez at 305-982-3328 or email her at: NAlvarez@totalbank.com. You may also go to www.WomensChamberofCommerce.org for more information.

Gold-medal winner

Congratulations are also in order for Asiya Korepanova, a University of Miami Frost School of Music student, who last week was named First Prize Gold Medal Winner in the 2012 Wideman International Piano Competition in Shreveport, La. Korepanova performed Prokofiev’s Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 16.

Korepanova has played the piano since she was 4, and currently studies with Santiago Rodriguez at the Frost School of Music, where she is a keyboard performance major.

For her excellent effort, Korepanova earned a $5,000 in prize money as well as the William Peyton Shehee and Virginia Kilpatrick Shehee Award. As the gold medal winner, Korepanova will have the opportunity to perform at numerous venues around the United States next year, including performances with the Shreveport Symphony Orchestra, the Northwest Florida Symphony and the South Arkansas Symphony Orchestra.

The competition is named in honor of the late Nena Plant Wideman, a former member of the Centenary college faculty and noted piano instructor, who spearheaded the first competition. the competition was named in her honor after her death in 1983.

Art Exhibit

The annual Kuumba Kwanzaa Art Exhibit is now on display in the Amadlozi Gallery at the African Heritage Cultural Arts Center, 2166 NW 62nd St. in Liberty City. It will run through Jan. 21. and is open to the community.

For more information email Gene Tinnie at dinizulu7@gmail.com

Honoring black leaders

The Rev. Eric H. Jones, mayor of West Park, invites the community to the 2013 Gala honoring Broward County’s black elected officials and the Community Service Honorees, to be at 4 p.m. Thursday in the commission chambers of West Park City Hall, 9965 S. State Rd. 7 (441 and Pembroke Road).

The gala will be hosted by West Park Vice Mayor Felicia M. Brunson.

It’s free and reservations are not required. For additional information send an email to: Caroline Rucker at carolineh@aol.com.

Christmas story told through music

The Advent and Christmas season will be ushered in with a little taste of Great Britain, when Our Lady of the Lakes Catholic Church and School at 6600 Miami Lakeway, presents the English classic, "Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols," at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the church sanctuary.

The program is a Christmas service that celebrates the birth of Jesus through nine short readings from the biblical books of Genesis, the prophets, and the gospels, and are combined with music and congregational singing of Christmas songs and carols. The readings tell the story of the "Fall of Humanity", the "Promise of the Messiah", and the "Birth of Jesus."

The church’s Children’s Choir, musicians, dancers, Glee Club and other students will perform with their teachers, church parishioners and the church’s Adult Choir directed by Sister Helene Kloss.

It’s free and open to the community. Call 305-362-5315 for more information or go to, www.oollnet.com.

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Riveting Details Emerge from CT School Rampage

As morning turned to afternoon on Friday, further details continued to emerge from Newtown, CT, a tight-knit community shaken by a massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School that took the lives of innocent students and teachers, in addition to the gunman, reportedly identified as Adam Lanza.

RELATED: President Fights Tears as He Addresses Nation

As President Barack Obama touched on in his tear-jerking press conference, this is not the first time the nation has witnessed a tragedy of this kind. The recent mass shooting at an Aurora, CO movie theater is just one instance of such violence. Columbine High School and Virginia Tech also resonate as prime examples.

Hollywood's biggest stars were quick to react to the news on Twitter and made an outcry for stricter gun control regulations.

Watch the video for ET's complete coverage of today's biggest headline.

RELATED: Celebs Tweet Reactions to CT School Shooting

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It’s been a pretty good year

Terry Keenan

2012. On Wall Street it has been a year marked less by excited cries of “buy!” and “sell!” than by sighs of “ho-hum!”

But behind the respectable, though not heart-stopping, 7 percent return for the Dow Jones industrials this year, there are reasons for cheer for investors as we head into 2013.

Here’s a list, worth checking twice, as we close out the year.

2012 brought some much needed housecleaning to the corner office: From Yahoo! to Avon to Citigroup, the boards of some of America’s worst-run companies finally woke up and shook up the status quo by installing new CEOs.

Bold-faced scandals didn’t have legs: Sure, big bad bets by the so-called London Whale at JPMorgan left the bank with egg on its face and billions in losses this summer. It also cost the talented Ina Drew her job.

But deft management of the crisis by JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon kept the whale from enveloping his reputation and that of the rest of the firm. As a result, JPMorgan stock has been a stellar performer on the year, up nearly 30 percent.

The presidential election didn’t roil the markets: Time will tell what the long-term impact of the November results will have on Americans’ bottom line. But for this year, at least, the most contentious and misread election season in decades didn’t derail investors.

Housing showed signs of life: Those investors who ignored all the statistical noise on housing and just looked around their neighborhoods were richly rewarded if they took a bullish bet on the home front in 2012. The prize for the best-performing exchange-traded fund of the year goes to the iShares Dow Jones US Home Construction Index, which is up nearly 70 percent. Not bad.

Europe didn’t implode: Despite tear gas in the streets and a tip into recession, the European Monetary Union held together in 2012. Indeed, in another example of how it pays to be a contrarian, the FTS index of Europe’s 300 biggest stocks had a banner year, up 13 percent or about twice the gains of the Dow here in the US.

And there you have it: some reasons 2012 wasn’t such a bad year after all on Wall Street. Let’s hope 2013 brings more of the same.

terrykkeenan@gmail.com

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Miami in spotlight at AVCC, other entrepreneurship events

Entrepreneurs from around the world took the stage during this packed week of entrepreneurship events in Miami: Florida International University’s Americas Venture Capital Conference (known as AVCC), HackDay, Wayra’s Global DemoDay and Endeavor’s International Selection Panel.

The events, all part of the first Innovate MIA week, also put the spotlight on Miami as it continues to try to develop into a technology hub for the Americas.

“While I like art, I absolutely love what is happening today... The time has come to become a tech hub in Miami,” said Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos A. Gimenez, who kicked off the venture capital conference on Thursday. He told the audience of 450 investors and entrepreneurs about the county’s $1 million investment in the Launch Pad Tech Accelerator in downtown Miami.

“I have no doubt that this gathering today will produce new ideas and new business ventures that will put our community on a fast track to becoming a center for innovative, tech-driven entrepreneurship,” Gimenez said.

Brad Feld, an early-stage investor and a founder of TechStars, cautioned that won’t happen overnight. Building a startup community can take five, 10, even 15 years, and those leading the effort, who should be entrepreneurs themselves, need to take the long-term view, he told the audience via video. “You can create very powerful entrepreneurial ecosystems in any city... I’ve spent some time in Miami, I think you are off to a great start.”

Throughout the two-day AVCC at the JW Brickell Marriott, as well as the Endeavor and Wayra events, entrepreneurs from around the world pitched their companies, hoping to persuade investors to part with some of their green.

And in some cases, the entrepreneurs could win money, too. During the venture capital conference, 29 companies —including eight from South Florida such as itMD, which connects doctors, patients and imaging facilities to facilitate easy access of records — competed for more than $50,000 in cash and prizes through short “elevator’’ pitches. Each took questions from the judges, then demoed their products or services in the conference “Hot Zone,” a room adjoining the ballroom. Some companies like oLyfe, a platform to organize what people share online, are hoping to raise funds for expansion into Latin America. Others like Ideame, a trilingual crowdfunding platform, were laser focused on pan-Latin American opportunities.

Winning the grand prize of $15,000 in cash and art was Trapezoid Digital Security of Miami, which provides hardware-based security solutions for enterprise and cloud environments. Fotopigeon of Tampa, a photo-sharing and printing service targeting the military and prison niches, scored two prizes.

The conference offered opportunities to hear formal presentations on current trends — among them the surge of start-ups in Brazil; the importance of mobile apps and overheated company valuations — and informal opportunities to connect with fellow entrepreneurs.

Speakers included Gaston Legorburu of SapientNitro, Albert Santalo of CareCloud and Juan Diego Calle of .Co Internet, all South Florida entrepreneurs. Jerry Haar, executive director of FIU’s Pino Global Entrepreneurship Center, which produced the conference with a host of sponsors, said the organizers worked hard to make the conference relevant to both the local and Latin American audience, with panels on funding and recruiting for startups, for instance.

Read More..

Miami photographer sentenced to 10 years in child-porn case

A Miami-area photographer who secretly videotaped children while they changed clothes in his home studio was sentenced in federal court Friday to 10 years in prison.

Diego Tobias Matrajt, 37, pleaded guilty in September to distribution and possession of child pornography.

Last February, Matrajt distributed 10 images of child pornography to an undercover agent by using a peer-to-peer file sharing program, according to court records.

In April, FBI agents did a search of his home and computers, uncovering 26 video images of boys and girls changing clothes alone in a guest bedroom with their genitalia exposed, records show.

Matrajt admitted surreptitiously video recording children under the age of 12 as they changed clothes in the guest bedroom during photo shoots.

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