Social media the new marketing frontier

Startups & Venture Capital

Awareness Inc. puts focus on social marketing

Getting the message out 

 

Boston Business Journal by Taryn Plumb, Special to the Journal

Friday, November 23, 2012

Courtesy

Brian Zanghi, CEO of Burlington-based Awareness Inc., says there is a huge “appetite in learning about social marketing.”

Social media is a marketer’s dream.
Instead of merely presenting an ad with the hopes that someone will see it and act on it — a TV commercial, a promotion in print, a link scrolling along a Web page — social media enables businesses to target, interact with, and essentially court, current and prospective customers.
Facebook, Twitter and other growing platforms present an enormous and budding opportunity for marketing, but also unique challenges, according to Brian Zanghi, CEO of Burlington-based Awareness Inc., which provides a platform for companies to manage their social media presence.
Founded as iUpload, the seven-year-old company recognized the shifting marketing landscape in 2009, and re-launched itself to focus on social marketing software. Since that time, it’s grown from a customer base of 25 brands to more than 500 — including such giants as Major League Baseball and Sony Pictures — and has been backed by nearly $22 million in several funding rounds from Greylock Partners and North Bridge Venture Partners.
“There’s such an interest and appetite in learning about social marketing,” said Zanghi.
An understandably so, as Facebook has recently swelled to 1 billion users and Twitter to more than 500 million. Through its “Social Marketing Hub,” Awareness helps businesses reach its customers in that vast audience by allowing them to publish, manage, and measure their social media activities on various sites while prospecting for, and directly interacting with, users. Its platform and “Social Analytics” module allows marketers to publish to several sites with one click, collect and store social data, analyze for trends, and identify, store and rank prospects based on parameters they define.
In addition to its portfolio of brands, the company also licenses its product to other companies.
“It really is about acquiring customers socially by collecting data, scoring that data, and then acting on it,” Zanghi explained.
For example, Major League Baseball uses its software to collect profiles and target offers to those most likely to take advantage of them; meanwhile, Fox Broadcasting Company tracks profiles of its viewers that actively discuss its shows, identifies its most “influential” viewers, and targets ads to both them and its competitors.
“This is really new stuff for advertisers and marketers,” said Rebecca Lieb, an analyst with The Altimeter Group.
Most notably, she pointed out the difference between traditional “interruptive” advertising and social media’s “participatory” advertising.
“There are all kinds of opportunities when you actually talk to your customers and listen to them, rather than just interrupt them with your messages,” she said.
Beyond marketing, those include the ability to provide a customer service channel, she said, as well as public relations and reputation management. For example, she said, a company like American Express will directly answer questions and complaints via Twitter, while automotive companies have even added features based on what people have discussed on social media.
“This isn’t just marketing,” she said, “it’s R&D.”

Original story link here.

Science meets religion with success

Millionaire helps science meet faith

By Taryn Plumb | Globe Correspondent

November 23, 2012

Rick Friedman/Sager Family Foundation

 The Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists, speaks with Bobby Sager while visiting Sager’s home in Boston last month. 

 

Jim Bourg/Reuters/File 2003

The Dalai Lama, assisted by Yama Chopel (left) and Eric Lander, prepares mouse DNA for sequencing while visiting an MIT research lab.

Rick Friedman/Sager Family Foundation

The Dalai Lama addresses a gathering at the home of Bobby Sager (standing, at right).

Spartan recluses who chant, pray, and meditate, closing themselves off from society in the mountains, hidden beneath billowing robes.
That is how much of the Western world views Tibetan Buddhist monks.
But, according to millionaire philanthropist Bobby Sager, it is a misleading stereotype, and it does not represent who they truly are: well-rounded, cerebral, and inquisitive, lifetime students and debaters with fertile minds who possess a true desire to spread peace and knowledge. This is particularly underscored by the Dalai Lama’s landmark “Science for Monks” program, a 13-year-old initiative — financially supported by Sager — that incorporates the study of modern science into traditional monastic teachings and Buddhist philosophy.
What Sager calls the untapped potential of this dedicated and waning group of individuals, as well as their ability to provide a larger contribution to the human race, is emphasized in his new book, “Beyond the Robe.” 
“It’s an opportunity to interact with [Tibetan] monks and nuns on a different kind of basis, to develop a broader and deeper sense of who these men and women really are,” the world-trekking Malden native, 58, said in an overseas call from his room at the InterContinental hotel in Hong Kong. 

As with the strict orders in other religions, Tibetan Buddhist monks leave behind families and abstain from sex and other earthly pursuits. But, as stressed in Sager’s book — a heavy, atlas-sized volume rich with essays, quotes, portraits, and photographs — they are not bound by dogma. Rather, they study, engage in critical debate, meditate, reflect, and believe that the mind is the primary instrument in scientific research.
But up until just over a decade ago, their analysis of science had been based on archaic principles largely drawn from ancient India. So in 1999, the 14th Dalai Lama launched the Science for Monks program at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives  in Dharamsala, India. A year later, 50 monk scholars were selected to participate in the first workshop.
In 2001, the effort got an infusion of support from the Sager Family Traveling Foundation & Roadshow, through which Sager and his wife Elaine, 58; daughter, Tess, 22; and son, Shane, 18, travel in the developing world to give guidance on making things work in areas of conflict and crisis. Since then, dozens of scientists have come from colleges throughout the United States to teach workshops in India.
More than 200 monks and nuns have learned principles of mathematics, biology, physics, quantum mechanics, cosmology, and neuroscience, as well as basic foundations of science such as the periodic table of elements and the structure of the atom and DNA molecules.
“This is the first time in the 1,500-year history of Tibetan Buddhism that western science is being taught in the monasteries,” said Sager, who, through his family’s foundation, has made more than three dozen trips around the world to assist various populations.
Sager recently helped to launch the Science, Monks, and Technology initiative at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which was celebrated in October with a private reception at Sager’s Boston home (the event also launched his book, the proceeds of which will go to the foundation). The Dalai Lama and Sting — both close acquaintances of Sager’s — were in attendance. The pop singer, sometimes a travel companion, describes Sager on the foundation’s website as “a big brash guy from Boston — flamboyant, eccentric, inexhaustible world traveler, and practical philanthropist.”
The MIT effort, Sager said, teaches monks practical technologies such as solar power and clean water that they can use in the Tibetan community.
“Monks have long served as leaders and community organizers in the Tibetan diaspora in India and Nepal,” Tenzin Priyadarshi, director of the Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values at MIT, said in a written comment. The program, he noted, will enable an “additional dimension to their societal contribution.”
Sager has dedicated himself to this crusade to better the world for the past 12 years. In 2000, after making millions with the Boston-based Gordon Brothers Group, he established the family foundation. It has assisted with micro-loan and entrepreneurship programs in Rwanda and in the Palestinian community, encouraged female doctors in Afghanistan, and trained teachers in Pakistan.
His entrepreneurship started early: Growing up in Malden, he worked as a newspaper boy and also assisted his jewelry salesman father. Later, he flirted with the idea of becoming an actor. Instead, he went on to study economics at Brandeis University and earn a master’s degree in management from Yale.
Since his success at Gordon Brothers Group, he has been an executive producer of the 2006 film “A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints,” an author, photographer, and inspiration for the 2009 NBC show “The Philanthropist.” He is now trying to revive Polaroid as the chairman of its board.
Ultimately, though, he describes what he and his family do as “selfish.” They simply want to be involved in “hands-on, eyeball-to-eyeball philanthropy.”
Their participation in the Science for Monks program has been both “very challenging and incredibly rewarding,” said Sager, who said he is not a practicing Buddhist, but that he meditates. He and his family have had the experience of living, eating, and overcoming obstacles with the clerics — what he called a privilege.
Although other tradition-based religions might get stuck on the topic of how science integrates with their beliefs, eminent Buddhists consider them interconnected.
“There is no contradiction between the two,” the Dalai Lama said in Sager’s book. “Each gives us valuable insights into the other. Both science and the teachings of Buddha tell us of the fundamental unity of all things.”
Throughout the 10-year cultivation of the program, there have been some obstacles. Most notably, Sager pointed to the translation issue: not just of language, but of scientific terms that had no comparable Tibetan words. Similarly, there was the lack of a baseline science background for many of the monks and nuns.
But even so, the initiative has flourished and is now a core part of the monastic curriculum, with a goal to make it sustaining by getting monks and nuns to teach one another and, hopefully, to eventually make their own contributions to science. Similarly, Sager said, the hope is to train as many monks and nuns as possible in a broad range of technologies, and to encourage them to take that knowledge into leadership roles that can help the Tibetan community.
“This is as much about monks as leaders as it is about monks as budding scientists,” he said. “It’s important for their voice to be part of the chorus of voices that are trying to figure out who we are, where we’re going, and how to make the world a better place.”

Original story link here.

© 2012 The New York Times Company

Artscope: Avant-garde at UNE in Portland

Maine Women Pioneers III: Vanguard

Taryn Plumb

Art Gallery at the University of New England

716 Stevens Avenue

Portland, Maine

Through December 16

A clock with 12 hands (instead of the typical two) continuously rotates around a benign face- a stark reminder of the ceaseless march of time. Thick rope- coiled and black like a snake- is deliberately unraveled, representing the eternal search for understanding.

Stools paired with earphones, and encircling a beam of light, abate the white noise of the world and prompt an inner illumination.

These pieces — Alicia Eggert’s “All the Time,” Julie Poitras Santos’ “Twist” and Ling-Wen Tsai’s “Sitting Quietly” — encompass “Vanguard,” a conceptual, avant-garde exploration of the thoughts, feelings and experiences that define humanity — yet often lie just beyond the reach of tangibility.

Experimental, cerebral and embracing numerous forms and media, the show is part of the larger “Maine Women Pioneers III” exhibition at the University of New England’s Portland Campus. Featuring the work of nine female artists and on display through December 16, “Vanguard” kicks off a four-part, months-long series of diverse shows.

Read the entire article in our magazine pages...

Making green transport affordable and "ridiculously easy"

Startups & VC

Bike-sharing company Zagster plans national roll-out

 

Premium content from Boston Business Journal by Taryn Plumb, special to the Journal

Friday, November 16, 2012

Business Journal photo by W. Marc Bernsau

Zagster co-founder and CEO Tim Ericson says he believes the Cambridge startup's bike-sharing service has traction.

If you provide it, they will ride.
That’s the way Timothy Ericson sees it: Getting urbanites to choose bikes as a transportation option, he says, requires the simple formula of making them both inexpensive and “ridiculously easy to use” from an accessibility standpoint.
When those factors come together, said the CEO and co-founder of Cambridge-based bike-sharing company Zagster, “a lot of people who wouldn’t normally ride a bike, ride a bike.”
Zagster aims to get more people peddling by differentiating itself in the bike-sharing market. In contrast to the model of city-wide programs involving public partnerships, the company is honing in on private markets — forging relationships with hotels, property managers, schools, and businesses, to provide fleets of bikes for tenants, employees, travelers and students to use at low (or sometimes no) cost.
“We’re really focusing on places that people live, work, and visit,” said Ericson, who rides his bike to work everyday (as does his co-founder and COO, Jason Meinzer), and says he’s never owned a car.
Founded in Philadelphia in 2007 and originally known as CityRyde, the company took part in the TechStars Boston and MassChallenge startup accelerators this year.
In October, Zagster announced a $1 million funding round led by LaunchCapital of Cambridge. The funding also included participation from Detroit-based Fontinalis Partners and well-known local angel investors Jean Hammond and John Landry. The funding is being used for the company’s national rollout; Ericson said the main goals are to double its base of six employees and, by the end of 2013, to have 4,000 bikes under management around the country.
It’s an ambitious plan for growth, with the company now having around 100 bikes under management, according to Ericson. Customers include the Hyatt Regency in Cambridge, three nationwide apartment complex management firms, a tech campus in North Carolina and University Park at MIT in Cambridge.
Zagster has a unique ability to scale, according to Hammond, who was also an early investor in Zipcar. The company allows small-scale, low-cost systems to fit anywhere, particularly places that large citywide systems can’t reach, she said.
It’s also a simple and flexible system to use: After becoming members on Zagster’s website, riders use texts to unlock, reserve and return the unisex commuter bikes. Often, bikes are provided free of charge by Zagster’s customers, Ericson said; otherwise, riders can reserve them for a full day, or they can sign up for monthly or annual plans (which, for example, cost $29.95 and $49.95, respectively, at University Park).
With an aim to keep the service affordable for the user, the company designed its pricing structure so that property owners cover most of the cost. The company also enables its customers to track and promote their own corporate sustainability efforts; through GPS technology, Zagster tracks distances traveled with each bike trip to determine how much greenhouse gas would have been emitted had that same trip been made by car.
Ultimately, Ericson sees a future of “intermodal” transportation in urban centers, with biking, walking, driving and public transit options creating “one mix that works really well.”
Hammond agreed, noting that adding bike- and car-sharing to the mix could create a new sort of urban existence.
“They can make it so that the urban native of the future does not need to own a lot of expensive wheels, but instead can use them when they need them,” she said. “Taken together, this is a good first step in reducing the high expense, ‘own everything just for you,’ American lifestyle.”

Original story link here.

The enduring battle over development continues

Newburyport

Redevelopment officials, citizens, at odds over waterfront

By Taryn Plumb / Globe Correspondent

November 14, 2012 

The debate over whether to develop or conserve land has erupted anew in Newburyport.

As the Newburyport Redevelopment Authority  moves ahead with its proposed plan to incorporate commercial and residential development into two remaining open parcels on the downtown riverfront, a grass-roots group is preparing a flier campaign, gathering signatures for a petition, and exploring potential legal issues related to the properties.

“So many cities have lost their access to the waterfront, and lost their waterfront,” said Lon Hachmeister, vice chair of Citizens for an Open Waterfront. “At this point, putting in more buildings doesn’t make sense. Building isn’t progress.”

Quite the contrary, according to the redevelopment authority. “There’s still a real need for some level of commercial activity on the waterfront for it to be an active and viable space year-round,” said James Shanley, chairman of the authority.

Clashes over the waterfront have spawned several legal battles in past decades, with residents launching campaigns to preserve a handful of ways to the Merrimack River and to block a proposed hotel.

Now, the redevelopment authority, which has partnered with MassDevelopment, is proposing a 69,850-square-foot, mixed-use project on the two downtown waterfront parcels that together make up 4.2 acres. The lots are now used for parking and straddle a small public park.

As envisioned, the site would encompass two three-story buildings on either side of the park, with retail, restaurants, upper-level condominiums, and 66 underground parking spots. The development also would include two landscaped, paved parking lots with 191 spaces, as well as an expansion of the public park and rail trail.

The estimated cost is $25 million to $30 million, according to Shanley. There would be an option to either sell the two parcels, he said, or to enter into a long-term lease with the developer or property manager.

The authority is putting together a request for proposals for the development, which would include feasibility studies. Shanley said it expects to have the forms available within the next 60 days.

“We would like to keep things moving,” he said. “For the community’s sake, sooner is better than later.”

The citizens group, however, would prefer that the process be slowed down to allow for more analysis and exploration of other options.

Chaired by Newburyport resident Elizabeth Heath, the group has gathered more than 2,000 signatures in support of an open waterfront, and it also plans to distribute 6,000 informational brochures.

Their concerns include: The buildings would be overwhelmingly large; parking would be diminished; river views would be blocked or eliminated; and historic open space — as well as a long-cherished community site for activities, festivals, concerts, or simple walking, lounging, and sunbathing — would be lost forever.

Rather than having a sanctuary away from the city, it would be like “bringing the city into the park,” said Hachmeister, who lives in Newbury but visits the park regularly, and what’s left of the open space would essentially become a front yard for condos.

Joanie Purinton, the group’s community liaison and also a Newbury resident, agreed that the proposal is “overpowering a small park, turning it into a retail mall.”

Countering that, Shanley said there is going to be “a lot of preservation of viewscapes” in the development, as well as a much better and more organized level of public access, and sufficient parking. In fact, he contended — with the exception of a handful of “peak days” — there is an excess capacity of parking in Newburyport.

Meanwhile, the benefits of such a development are numerous, he said. Having residents downtown in a walkable environment is “the most sustainable green thing you can do,” and the development would add to the tax base without encumbering the city with much cost.

He stressed that the plan is just a concept at this point, and that the numbers are not “hard and fast.”

Ultimately, he called the proposal a compromise: “We tried to do our best to listen to everybody.”

“It’s not 100 percent open,” he said. “We don’t believe that’s feasible, or in the best interest of the downtown.”

But members of the citizens group feel quite the opposite. They’d like to see a mixture of a park, landscaped parking (of a permeable surface; not asphalt, to allow for drainage), and space that can be used for a variety of purposes. According to Heath, the group is working on a list of alternative funding sources for park upkeep.

“This is a historic harbor,” said Purinton. “There are so few historic harbors left where you can go down to the sea and experience what’s past.”

But Shanley said the goal is to reconnect Newburyport with that historical past.

“The NRA firmly believes that it’s a good project. We’re moving forward,” he said. “It will help connect the downtown to the waterfront.”

Original story link here.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And a previous story I did about this in April...

NEWBURYPORT

Open land debate renewed

Group opposes city on any development of waterfront lots

By Taryn Plumb Globe Correspondent

April 12, 2012 

The enduring and contentious debate over what to do with the city’s remaining undeveloped waterfront parcels - build on them or leave them open - has flared up again.

The Newburyport Redevelopment Authority, supported by Mayor Donna Holaday, is in the preliminary stages of analyzing options for retail, dining, and residential development on 4.2 acres of downtown riverfront that now serves as dirt-and-gravel public parking lots.

In response, some residents and other locals involved with regional preservation efforts have reestablished the Committee for an Open Waterfront, which has fought development on that site in the past, most recently a hotel in the late 1980s. The group prefers to have the area kept open to preserve the view, public access, parking, and, potentially, an expanded public park.

“Any additional building on the waterfront is damaging and inadmissible,’’ said Jim Critchlow, a member of the committee who has lived in the city for more than 25 years. “The open space of the waterfront is the jewel in the crown of Newburyport.’’

But not all share that view, and the town Redevelopment Authority, which manages the property, has long eyed it for development. Most recently, the authority signed an agreement with the state agency MassDevelopment to formulate requests for proposals for development possibilities on the site. It is also working with consulting firms, including Providence-based Union Studio, and is sharing $25,000 in consulting costs with the city.

The goal is to have a proposal request ready by midsummer, and host a public input meeting sometime this spring that would include a site walk. The Redevelopment Authority’s next public meeting is April 18.

“It’s important to state that we’re at the preliminary stages of putting this together,’’ said authority chairman James Shanley, a former city councilor. “There is no proposal at the table.’’

Ultimately, “we are years out,’’ he said.

The Redevelopment Authority, which was established by state law in 1960, is currently determining the possibilities for the property, which was active commercial space for hundreds of years until the 1960s, according to Shanley.

Through that process, they will assess local zoning and the state’s Public Waterfront Act, as well as parking requirements and five preserved “ways to the river’’ that cross the parcel.

Shanley confirmed that the group is looking at mixed-use options, including retail, restaurants, and residences, as well as multistoried buildings. It is not exploring options for a hotel, he said.

“We’re trying to improve the waterfront and make it a more vital place, year-round,’’ he said. However, he stressed that “nothing we’re proposing, or even thinking about, is going to preclude anybody from enjoying the waterfront.’’

Holaday agreed, calling herself a “strong proponent’’ of an open waterfront.

Although the city and the redevelopment authority have long “been at odds’’ about the disposition of the site, she said, she sees the current partnership as a means to identify property that can be used for “very controlled and very limited development’’ to ultimately finance the creation of a maritime park, and to also reduce parking.

Those are goals that would be in line with the goals of the citizen committee.

Ideally, the group would like to see the parking lots converted to grassy, tree-lined open space with paved walkways.

“Downtown Newburyport doesn’t need more condos and stores,’’ said member Lon Hachmeister, a Newbury resident and frequent Newburyport visitor.

Much like the proposal, the group is still in its preliminary stages: It plans to circulate a petition, and has been meeting every other Sunday at 6 p.m. at the Grog Restaurant.

Members have so far expressed concerns about the effect on established businesses should more competition be introduced in the way of new stores, a further strain on parking should spots be eliminated, as well as the impact on tourism if the view is blocked by development.

“Whenever you go to a city, one of the things you remember most is the open space,’’ said Critchlow, a retired foreign policy worker for the federal government who traveled all over the world for his job. “I would hate to see us give that up here in Newburyport.’’

But Shanley says that many of the group’s concerns are unfounded.

“What they’re saying is fundamentally a zero-sum game argument: That if something new shows up, then something old must go. That’s really not how economies work,’’ he said.

He pointed to nearby Portsmouth, where new restaurants and stores are introduced “all the time. . . . It adds, it gives people options and choices, which creates more of a destination.’’

And, while Hachmeister said that “everyone we talk to agrees’’ with the group’s stance, Shanley said that hasn’t been his experience.

“It’s not accurate to say that they speak for everybody in Newburyport,’’ he said.

Again, original story link here.

© Copyright 2012 Globe Newspaper Company.

(Now) there's an app for enterprise

Startups & Venture Capital

Putting its sights on customized software

Verivo Software: Putting its sights on customized software

 

Premium content from Boston Business Journal by Taryn Plumb, Special to the Journal

Friday, November 9, 2012

W. Marc Bernsau

Verivo Software has seen a surge in new customers for its software, which lets enterprises create customized mobile apps, CEO Steven Levy says. 

It’s been four years since Apple first came out with its slogan-turned-cliche, “There’s an app for that.” And while it might seem like there really is an app for everything these days, some see a largely uncharted territory in the mobile space: customized apps for mid-sized and large businesses.
Waltham-based Verivo Software believes so strongly in that demand — both now and into the future — that it relaunched itself to focus on the area earlier this year. The firm shifted its business model, expanded its sights and physical space and changed its name from Pyxis Mobile Inc.
The company has moved from selling packaged apps (largely to financial service companies), to providing a platform that allows businesses across various industries to build, deploy, manage and update their own cross-device mobile apps for employees and customers.
“We want to help customers take ideas that they believe will help their business, and make those ideas a reality through a mobile initiative,” CEO Steven Levy said.
They’re just delivering what the market wants, Levy said. When the company was selling packaged apps, customers frequently asked for changes, and apps were tweaked on a per-customer basis.
Once it made the shift to a customized software platform, the company experienced instant gratification.
In 2011, Verivo saw a surge in new customers, Levy said, with large names such as CSX Corp. and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. coming on board. Over the last two years, its customer base has widened into manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, gas and oil, and many other industries, Levy said, with “rapid adopters” being in the financial services, business services and health care fields.
“Every quarter we’re announcing record run rate,” said Levy, although he declined to provide specific revenue figures. Similarly, the company is continuing to add to its base of more than 100 employees (including, in June, CTO Arnold Epstein); its developing teams in London (where it now has an office) and the Netherlands; and it’s beginning a gradual expansion into Asia.
Fueling this expansion is $17 million in venture capital the company received in January from Commonwealth Capital Ventures, Ascent Venture Partners and Egan-Managed Capital. Pyxis was previously backed by $7.1 million in Series A and Series B rounds.
According to Chris Silva, a mobile analyst with San Mateo, Calif.-based Altimeter Group, Verivo has helped to change the dialogue around mobile enterprise apps.
Previously, it was technology first, business need second — for example, a company would adopt a system, then task developers with creating an app — whereas now it’s the other way around, he said.
Levy likewise touts Verivo’s CPU-based pricing (as opposed to per-app or per-user), along with the platform’s security and updating features and HTML5 capabilities. The company released its newest version (7.4) in October, which will provide support for its global expansion with the inclusion of double-byte character sets.
Overall, the mobile apps market is still “pretty early,” Silva said. Levy agreed, calling the development process never-ending.
“This space is moving so fast, that the transition keeps going,” he said. “The innovation is at a breakneck pace.”

Original story link here.

Drumming up sweat

Drums Alive has fitness buffs channeling inner rock stars

By Taryn Plumb |  Globe Correspondent  

November 07, 2012

LISA POOLE FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE

Ellen Fulchini (left) takes part in a Drums Alive class in Peabody.

WENDY MAEDA/GLOBE STAFF

Raisa Ryabina (right) drums during a class in Marblehead.

PEABODY — There were a couple of rock star-inspired, over-the-head stick clicks – and then the group plunged into rhythm. They thundered in time, tapping and thrumming: Fast beats followed by slow ones. Rolls punctuated by pauses.
But the nine women weren’t percussionists — and it wasn’t drums they were banging on.
This was — ahem, drumroll please — Drums Alive, a fusion of pulsating rhythms and energetic group fitness that encourages participants to channel their inner John Bonham.
“It’s totally different than anything that’s ever been done in aerobics,” said Jill Martin, who teaches a class weekly at Everyday Fitness for Everyday Women in Peabody. 
The gym rat’s version of “Stomp,” Drums Alive involves tapping beats with drumsticks onto those enormous, cushy exercise balls — all while performing choreographed cardio moves, Tabata high-intensity drills, and core exercises.
The program is based on the principle that we all have a primal need for music and rhythm, and it migrated to the states after being developed in Germany by Carrie Ekins. Its website, www.drums-alive.com, lists more than 150 classes across the US and in Canada (although it notes that it’s still collecting data), as well as another several hundred in Germany, the Netherlands, Israel, and New Zealand.
A smattering of local classes are held at Everyday Fitness for Everyday Women, the Jewish Community Center of the North Shore in Marblehead, the Franklin Senior Center, ZYP Fitness Plus in Hanover, and Z Club in Nashua.
Participants describe it as both rhythmic and calming, spirited and cathartic.
“At the end of the day, it gets all your stress out,” said 43-year-old Christine Cassidy of Peabody, an exercise devotee who has tried everything from step classes to TRX training to hula hooping, since she was a teenager. “You can beat that ball to death.”
Martin agreed with a laugh and a shrug. “You can picture someone’s face on the ball, if you want.”
Beyond purging your demons about your boss or your ex-boyfriend, the regimen has another big selling point: It’s remarkably easy.
“Anybody can pick up sticks and start drumming on a ball,” said Martin, a fitness instructor for 25 years.
Studio co-owner Diane Moore — who teaches a ’70s “time warp” version fittingly called “Disco Drums” — agreed that it has a “low learning curve.”
“Most people say they’re not coordinated,” she said, “but if you can move right to left, side to side, you can do this.”
Instructors also note that there’s a “comfort zone” in being behind a ball — as opposed to putting it all out there with the spirited likes of Zumba — and point to studies that indicate that drumming enhances memory and increases neurological connections between the brain’s hemispheres.
Plus, it’s a workout with variety, incorporating cardio, squats, core work, and interval training. “It’s the full spectrum,” said Martin.
That variety is what attracted 59-year-old Shirley Davis-Chase of Revere: She called it “therapeutic,” a “de-stresser,” “easy on your joints,” and an exercise that can be done fast or slow, depending on ability.
And, she added: “Fifteen minutes in, you are sweatin’.”
She wasn’t kidding. A short time later, the class at full speed, her neck and face were glistening, her hands working the drumsticks in black, fingerless gloves. Energized as the group took a short break, she pounded her ball with a whack, proclaiming, “Bring it on!”
Spread out across the Peabody studio, participants held their drumsticks, gray exercise balls positioned on pedestals in front of them. (Their purpose is to hold the “drum” still — but, when sticks don’t land where they’re supposed to, or drummers get too intense, they tend to bounce off and roll away.)
Techno music pounded from a stereo in the corner, rubbery thwacks kept time with the music. Following cues from Martin, the group moved through a 45-minute routine: They squatted, hit the ball with both sticks, bopped from leg to leg, clacked sticks overhead, sprinted in place, and hit the ball as quickly as possible, emitting a primal yell that swelled into a collective roar.
Watching from the doorway, Moore, the co-owner, ultimately described it as a “deceiving” workout. “People are so fixated on making the sticks go in the right place,” she said, “that they don’t realize how much their body’s really working.”
Well, eventually they do.
Maria D’Aveni, a 56-year-old from Peabody, said she has better posture and balance as a result of the classes. She feels “elongated,” and, overall, she’s stronger and has more energy.
“I plan my schedule around this,” she said.
As for Peabody retiree Deanne Dulong? She doesn’t miss a class, either. A petite blonde in a tight pink tank and black pants, she extended her left arm to show off a well-toned biceps.
“I’m 66,” she marveled, “and I’ve got definition.”

Associated video: "Drumming up Sweat." 

Original story link here.

© 2012 The New York Times Company

More on "Sandy" aftermath

Cats rescued in Methuen; Plum Island escapes major damage

Compiled by Globe correspondents Brenda J. Buote, Taryn Plumb, and David Rattigan.

 

High tide swelled to 8½ feet around noon Monday in Newburyport, covering the Black Cow restaurant’s lot.

Merrimack Valley

About 10,000 customers lost power and close to 2,000 were still waiting for the lights to come back on Thursday. National Grid was expecting everyone to have power restored by noon Friday.

Route 133 was closed about 7 p.m. Monday when light poles fell across it, Andover Police Lieutenant James Hashem, deputy emergency management director, said. There were no injuries reported.

Methuen

A Good Samaritan dropped off a mother cat and her two kittens found trapped in a wind-lashed carrier on East Street Monday during the howling winds and driving rains of the storm. He sheltered the cats at his house before bringing them to the MSPCA. Since they have no IDs, they will go up for adoption as soon as they are vaccinated and neutered.

Plum Island

Thanks — residents say — to recent beach scraping projects that shored up sand in front of eight properties, the island escaped the storm largely unscathed.

According to Bob Connors, who lives on Annapolis Way and serves as an advocate for Plum Island homeowners, dunes along the barrier island did erode about a foot or two — as typically happens during big storms — but the majority of impact came from wind damage, such as shingles being torn off by violent gusts.

Connors reported seeing waves 12 to 16 feet high, and a tide 5 feet above normal.

But, as the result of the beach scraping, “homes were protected that might otherwise have been damaged,” he said. “It worked as planned.”

Beverly and Cape Ann

High winds were more of an issue than rain or tides. “Overall, we can thank our lucky stars,” said Beverly Mayor Bill Scanlon. “We had the tide rising and a lot of trees came down, but not many trees that we couldn’t lift. The city was fortunate to be where it is, physically.”

Gloucester was hardest hit, with approximately 3,000 residents losing power. There was damage to the corrugated metal siding at the former Birds Eye seafood factory, and a dock broke free from the Cape Ann Marina but was secured by the Coast Guard and harbormaster before it could damage any vessels.

“We were lucky that we didn’t have much rainfall to add to the the coastal flooding issues,” said Gloucester Police Chief Leonard Campanello.


Original story link here.

Managing documents in the cloud

Startups & Venture Capital

Control after hitting the send button

Startup offers new way to track and secure digital documents after they’re sent

 

Boston Business Journal by Taryn Plumb, Special to the Journal

Friday, November 2, 2012

Courtesy

It's often hard to truly know the fate of emails and documents you send and share. Sometimes you're simply left to wonder: Did they arrive where they were supposed to? Were they looked at? Or did they get intercepted or passed along to someone who was never intended to view them?
That's a level of control you shouldn't have to give up, according to Clement Cazalot, CEO of the startup docTrackr, which has entered the hot market of cloud document management.
The company launched in Paris in 2011, took part in the 2012 winter session of the TechStars Boston accelerator program, and is now based in Boston. In early October, docTrackr announced raising $2 million in seed funding from investors including Polaris Venture Partners, Atlas Venture, CommonAngels and the French government.
The startup doesn't aim to directly compete with powerhouses like Box -- in fact, it's forged partnerships with them. Instead, the company intends to add a layer of protection and insight through encryption and analytics that its founders say has been lacking in the industry.
"Being able to control and protect documents is a huge challenge, especially in the cloud," Cazalot said. "We give you the power to know what is happening to your documents after you share them."
To do so through the cloud-based platform, users upload files, choose recipients who can access them, and set privileges - such as whether the receiver can edit, share or print. Documents or files are encrypted and can be password-protected, and opened through traditional tools such as Adobe or Word.
The moment the email or document is opened, the sender starts to get a history through docTrackr's detailed intelligence analytics. The sender can see when the file was opened, how long it was open, who it was shared with, and if it was printed. The sender also continues to have the ability to update, edit, and change the file's accessibility.
"They're controlling their document, owning their data," said Cazalot, saying that docTrackr is "democratizing" online document security, and helping to curb unintended sharing of intellectual property or sensitive information.
With numerous companies now offering cloud document management, docTrackr is entering a robust, flourishing market.
"As the cloud grows in popularity, document exchange among business partners will also grow," said Michael Krigsman, president and CEO of Brookline-based IT consulting firm Asuret. "Unlike paper documents, material sent over the Internet can be easily replicated but not easily tracked."
Still, he noted, docTrackr faces a challenge in asking customers to entrust sensitive and confidential documents to a "new, untested service."
"That's the biggest hurdle this company faces in the short term," Krigsman said.
But Cazalot doesn't appear to be intimidated. Developed at the accelerator Le Camping in Paris, the nine-employee company has partnered with Box, and has an eye to also integrate with Dropbox, YouSendIt and Egnyte.
The startup is currently focused on small to midsized businesses, although it has worked with SNCF, France's national railway, and also has a beta version available for individuals. Cazalot declined to disclose numbers related to customers or growth.
As for settling in Boston? Cazalot explained it this way: "We believe Boston is where there is talent in the U.S."

Original story link here.