Like modern-day heroes the Schmucker family of Lancaster, Pennsylvania travel to the Rio Grande Valley or South Florida every February at their own expense, in their own 4X4 F150 utility truck, and with their own tools to voluntarily assist the impoverished families of both areas in realizing the American dream of home ownership by building from the ground up the entire frame and roof of a Proyecto Azteca or Habitat for Humanity home.

The Schmucker are not carpenters or builders by trade, but entrepreneurs in the hotel and restaurant business in their native Pennsylvania, who since 1991 have been taking time out from their business to volunteer their time to Habitat for Humanity in both the Valley and Immokalee, Florida, another migrant farm worker community. “The reward for us is just in being able to help other people,” said Pauley Schmucker.

“We believe that we are very fortunate and believe that we should do something for those that are less fortunate,” his son Lee added.

“We are also happy to be part of the Texas sun in the wintertime,” laughed his brother John. “We do have a slightly ulterior motive.”

Note the misspelling of “Schmucker.” A neat story though. If you watch the video, you’ll catch my Grandpa and Grandma.

But it’s not just about the big bad banks. Local banks loan out a lot more money, as the chart shows. This is from an article by Stacy Mitchell, senior researcher for the New Rules Project’s Community Banking Initiative:

Why is it that community banks do so much more small business lending than their big competitors? One reason is that big banks rely on computer models to determine whether to make a loan. Because the local market conditions and the circumstances surrounding each borrower and his or her enterprise are so incredibly varied, this standardized approach does not work very well when it comes to understanding the nuances of risk associated with a particular small business.

By drawing on qualitative information – getting to know the borrower, learning about the business, and understanding the local market – small banks can better assess risk and successfully make loans to a wider group of small businesses.

“We don’t use credit scoring, where certain parameters about the business are put in and the computer says yes or no. We still rely on a thorough understanding of the financial information that the borrower brings us. You get to know the borrower and understand what the numbers mean in the context of that business,” said John Kimball, vice president of Park Midway Bank, a $272 million-asset bank in St. Paul, Minnesota.

So do it! Move Your Money!

Isaac Newton’s sense of “normal” was to be at rest. To him, Universe was a sculpture. It was The Universe. Bucky noted sadly that adherents to the “Big Bang” theory are still caught in Newtonian thought: They regard Universe as “it.”

In contrast to Netwon, Einstein’s “normal” was the speed of light and other radiation. His Universe was made up of nonsimultaneous energy events. What we think of as real may not be there: Light from the North Star takes 640 years to get here. To Einstein (and to Bucky, who knew and admired him), Universe is a continuously changing scenario, unknowable except in principle, and in localized special cases. Because of this, Bucky liked to say, “Truth is always approximate,” or “Truth is a tendency.” Universe will always defy “thinkaboutability” to some extent. Process and direction are more important than goals.

I love this concept. We can’t see into the future so it’s more important to move in the right direction in the right way than it is to know exactly where we’re going and exactly what it’ll be like. Because once we get there, it won’t be like what we envisioned when we started out. Story of my life!

Of course, what’s scary about following this concept is that you have to have faith that you’ve chosen the right process and the right direction; you can’t trust in the goals anymore. But what’s freeing about it is that the ends can never justify the means, answering one age-old question, and where you end is 10x more exciting because you never saw it coming.

Some people form and cling to false beliefs about health-care reform (or Obama’s citizenship) despite overwhelming evidence thanks to a mental phenomenon called motivated reasoning, says sociologist Steven Hoffman, visiting assistant professor at the University at Buffalo. “Rather than search rationally for information that either confirms or disconfirms a particular belief,” he says, “people actually seek out information that confirms what they already believe.” And God knows, in the Internet age there is no dearth of sources to confirm even the most ludicrous claims (my favorite being that the moon landings were faked). “For the most part,” says Hoffman, “people completely ignore contrary information” and are able to “develop elaborate rationalizations based on faulty information.”

It’s an interesting thought to ponder, one that’s effecting many of the current issues today. That the availability of more, better information can actually be totally subverted by easy access to false, untrue information. One question I’d have is is this a generational thing? That perhaps the younger generation who’s grown up with the Internet has better built in BS filters. If that is true, then it’s a phenomenon that will be with us the next 20-30 years but will perhaps fade after that point, especially as more standardized, universal Internet-information-rating systems are invented and used everywhere.

UPDATE: I’m late to blogging about this…a quick Google search revealed tons more information/blog posts about “motivated reasoning,” defined by Jonah Lehrer as “we’re all partisan hacks.”

The days of infinite margins, 1,000% productivity gains, and growth of market throughout the universe are long over. Internet companies now should be treated, at best, like utility companies that get bought at about 10 times earnings and sold at 13 times earnings. Even then, I’m not sure I would give the Internet sector the same respect as the monopoly-protected utility sector.

Don’t just ask me. Ask the best. Nobody can figure out a business model.

In 1993, Bill Gates said:

The Internet? We are not interested in it

Similar predictions? I think so. We’ve now gone through 2 major waves of innovation with the internet. But the revolution is barely even starting…the iPhone and place-based, internet-connected devices (i.e. digital signs) are going to change our lives even more than the first 2 waves. Stay tuned.

And last time I checked, Amazon, eBay, Google, Basecamp, Netflix, Yahoo!, Apple/iTunes, etc. all had thriving Internet-based business models. Facebook and Myspace are generating 100s of millions of dollars as well, which seems like a working model as well.

Ultimately, Mindy and I went our separate ways, and we sold our client list and moved on to other things. This photo is from our third Everblue office here in Goshen, in the editing room. I remember thinking, when the photographer told me to lean on top of the monitor, “this is dumb.” I still think that:

Just minutes ago, they announced their 2009 Fellows, all of them “ready to spark change around the world, in areas such as civil and human rights, education and youth leadership, health, and public service.” Check out the blog post and video introduction here.

Congrats to the changemakers!

Essentially, his message boiled down to the fact that just in the past year or so, scientists have determined that 350 parts per million of CO2 in the atmosphere is the upper safe limit. We’re currently at 387 and rising 2 a year. Changing light bulbs, buying electric/hydrid cars, all these things don’t matter — they can’t get us back to 350. The only thing that can is building the political will to take on 350 as a goal. Nothing else will get us there.

Overall, a fascinating look at climate change and how we’re potentially already screwed, unless we can change the whole paradigm. Here’s his speech:

Last night as my cousins and I were sitting around with my grandparents, we were learning a bit about our family history. Both my grandpa and grandma grew up Beachy Amish, which split from the Old Order Amish church in the early 1900s. A little Amish history (as best I know it, I’m not an expert here by any means): The Amish/Mennonite churches have split many times since their start in the 1600s over many issues, one of the most prominent being shunning, one of the causes of the initial split between the Mennonites and Amish.

My grandparents both grew up in the Beachy Amish church. Ok, this gets complicated. According to my grandma, Chris King (he was a preacher) broke off from the Old Order Amish church because they didn’t believe in shunning. They also started allowing electricity and indoor plumbing (but no radio) and allowing separate church buildings. John A Stoltzfus was also a preacher there and split off to form the Beachy church (grandma can’t remember what that split was over). My grandma’s father Dave grew up Old Order Amish. He then married Barbara, a Beachy Amish, which meant that Dave’s entire family had to shun him, being Old Order Amish. Instead of shunning Dave, the whole family decided to join the Beachy church (meaning they were shunned by all Old Order Amish friends, neighbors, etc.). They all attended Weavertown Amish Mennonite Church, pictured at left.

My grandpa’s parents (John and Anna) both grew up Old Order Amish. John left the Old Order church (grandpa doesn’t know why) but Anna stayed in the church, which meant she had to confess in front of the church every time they had a child, as it meant she wasn’t properly shunning her husband. Finally, when she had either Sara Ann or Levina, my great-grandmother Anna decided she had had enough and refused to confess in front of church, instead leaving the church and walking home. She then joined the Beachy Amish church with her husband.

In 1928 (the year my grandma was born), as some of the younger members of the Beachy church were buying cars, which was not allowed, and hiding them at neighbors or in barns, a bunch of the kids had to confess in front of church. The church members that day then voted (after the kids’ confession, of course) to allow ca

Now back to the title of this blog post. My great-great uncle Sam never left the Old Order church. He had to shun his brother because of this. Apparently, with shunning, you can still talk to each other, do business with each other (but you can’t hand money from hand to hand), but can’t sleep in the same bed as your wife or sit at the same table. In my grandpa’s words, “it’s a lot weird.”

My great-grandfather John (my grandpa’s dad) was good friends with his brother Sam and they joked around a lot and carried on. Sam once was getting behind on his farming and hired a man with a tractor to finish up the field work at night. The bishop found out and Sam had to confess in church, where, so the story goes, he said “Van ich failed hab, will ich bessa du” which is Pennsylvania Dutch for “If I have failed you Lord, I will do better.” The funny part being the “if” — but whether or not that’s what Sam actually said remains unknown (and irrelevant). According to the story, Sam said it was worth confessing as it got his fieldwork done.

It’s an honor to be here with my grandparents and get to hear these sorts of stories; it’s really fascinating to hear about these traditions and the Amish church that I grew out of. It seems so distant from the technology-filled world I live in today, but a lot of this happened just 100 years ago.

I’ll be blogging less this week as I enjoy manual labor and 80 degree weather. We’re headed to Mexico for lunch today :-)

• Circumstances haven’t changed much since I wrote that post just over 2 years ago, other than that Elkhart County is making national headlines with the worst jobless rate in the nation, going from 4.7% a year ago to 15.3%. Most of this unemployment has come as a result of the tanking RV and mobile home industry, two of the drivers of our region’s economy. For obvious reasons, however, people aren’t buying a lot of RVs or mobile homes right now.
• Also making national headlines, President Obama is coming to Elkhart County in two days for a town hall meeting about 5 miles away from RedPost’s world headquarters to tout the stimulus plan that’s currently in congress.
• Elkhart County has gone through several major industrial upheavals, from the invention of Alka-Seltzer and rise of Miles Laboratories and simultaneous rise of Charles Conn and the band instrument industry in the 1800s, to the 14 car manufacturers in the early 1900s, to the creation of the RV industry after the Great Depression, to the present-day diversified manufacturing base.
• Coincidentally, RedPost just completed an updated study of intellectual property (patents) in the state of Indiana, focused on the 5 county region that makes up North Central Indiana. This is the third revision to this study, which builds on my previous consulting work pre-RedPost. What this study shows is that Elkhart County has the fourth highest per capita number of patents in the state (if you throw out 3 tiny counties), just below Koscuisko County to our south, which is home to the prosthetics capital of the world. Elkhart’s higher (per capita) than Marion County, where Indianapolis is and the pharma giant Lilly; perhaps most surprisingly, higher than Tippecanoe County, home to the research powerhouse that is Purdue University. Here’s the top 10 per-capita patent producing counties in Indiana (throwing out the counties with less than 50,000 people):
  1. Kosciusko (prosthetics capital)
  2. Bartholomew (Columbus, IN)
  3. Howard (Kokomo)
  4. Elkhart
  5. Hamilton (Indianapolis)
  6. Marion (Indianapolis)
  7. Tippecanoe (Purdue)
  8. Allen (Ft. Wayne)
  9. Vanderburgh (Evansville)
  10. St. Joseph (South Bend)

So how does this all fit together? Yes, the economy is tanking. “Old ways” of doing things, including producing gas-guzzling, heavy RVs, don’t work anymore. But innovation is a process, not a product. People in this here region in Northern Indiana know how to innovate. It’s in our blood, part of our culture. Yes, times are bad right now. But we’re planting the seeds in a thousand garages and pole barns right now.

Oh, and I should note that the RV companies themselves are at the top of a huge supply chain (much like the auto industry). And being at the top, they don’t innovate that much themselves (with a few exceptions). They’re essentially marketing firms. It’s all the suppliers in that chain, who have to compete with China and the rest of the world, where the real innovation is. And those suppliers are all about diversification.

Case in point: RedPost and Lucid Energy (the company we share an office with).

Lucid, a green alternative energy company, grew out of a company supplying RV doors and windows. RedPost sources parts from local manufacturers and takes advantage of the ability to rapidly and cheaply prototype hardware locally. Both companies have been around about 2 years and have great potential. Both are located here, in Elkhart County. Both have innovation at the core of their being.

So don’t worry about Elkhart County. We know how to take risks, make new things and make other things better.

I’ll get off my soap box now, and end by saying, as much as I’d like to hear the president speak Monday, I’ll be doing my part to stimulate the economy by going to work.

Row one (left to right): Burl Troyer, Jeremy Stutsman, David Schrock Shenk, Gina Leichty, Gretchen Morningstar, Grace Hunsberger, Earlene Nafziger, Eric Kanagy. Row two (left to right): David Daugherty, W. Earl Taylor, Jim Kroemer, Scott Woldruff, Virgil Snyder, Janette Yoder, Allan Kauffman, Tom Stark, David Swihart, Tim Near, J.C. Schrock, Brad Weirich, Jim McKee, Julia Gautsche. (Not pictured): Mike Huber, Myron Bontrager, Nick Keiffer, Tim Saylor

Pictured above is the 2009 Downtown Goshen, Inc. board (that’s me on the far right). I more or less started this non-profit two years ago, merging two other existing organizations to form it. I didn’t, of course, do it by myself, but I set the vision, pulled together the pieces, and led as president for the past 2 years.

As you can see above, we have a lot of people from many different backgrounds involved from business owners to residents to the mayor and chamber president to building owners/developers to people passionate about our little downtown. Lots of differing opinions, good ideas, bad ideas, contention, frustration, problem-solving, etc. — and we’re all at the same table.  It’s an energizing group of people and it’s been highly rewarding helping to grow and strengthen the organization.

This year, as I’m no longer president, I’m focusing on fundraising, attempting to double our budget from roughly $80,000 to $160,000. If we can do it in this economy, we know that we have the support of our community. We do SO MUCH with SO LITTLE, every dollar is well spent. But that’s the small-midwestern-town way, I suppose.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of shortcuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted — for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things — some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

Mornings when I wake up and feel that the impossible is truly impossible, I’ll keep this passage in mind. Congrats to Obama, now the hard work begins!

Most striking lesson learned: we are in less control of our choices than we think we are. As in, hardly at all. Like, for example: if you drink a warm drink, you’ll like people more. If you drink a cold drink, you’ll like people less.

Scott Adams really IS onto something with his whole moist robot theory.

I just finished three interviews with people for the First Fridays Director position with Downtown Goshen, Inc. I drank a cold drink, to be sure to be unbiased in choosing who I liked the best.

Mainly, I want to say thanks to everyone who worked their butts off to get RedPost to this point (all of you — you know who you are). Even on days when I’m feeling stressed or discouraged (remember that this startup thing is like an extreme roller coaster that hasn’t been tested, ever, or even marginally reviewed for safety) my employees are what get me through. You guys are amazing and do amazing work.

Enjoy the new face of RedPost!

And ok, so no one showed up but me and Nick Hoffman, the museum director. I benefited, however, with a personal tour of the museum, their new archives annex and a great, wide-ranging conversation with Nick. It’s amazing the things he and his staff of 4 are doing there…they’ve over doubled attendance in one year (from 5,000 to 10,000) and [something that's not public yet] and [something that's not public yet]. Really really cool.

I blogged about a conversation I had with Nick in July of 2007, shortly after he arrived. Tons of progress since then…almost like a startup (oddly, I think of everything in terms of whether it’s “like a startup” or “not like a startup”), starting from the ground up, building a world class museum.

And man, there is some crazy stuff in that museum. Like a huge collection of original photos from Nazi Germany and the Nuremberg War Crime Trials.

Oh, and the answer to the question is: Both and neither — innovation is a process, not a product. There are high- and low-tech ways of doing most things.

Dr. Leonard Kleinrock created the basic principles of packet switching, the technology underpinning the Internet, while a graduate student at MIT. In this effort, he developed the mathematical theory of data networks. This was a decade before the birth of the Internet which occurred when his host computer at UCLA became the first node of the Internet in September 1969. He wrote the first paper and published the first book on the subject; he also directed the transmission of the first message to pass over the Internet. He was also responsible for setting up and running the Internet measurement facility that stressed the early Internet to establish its performance limits and to evaluate its performance and behavior. In these efforts, he laid the groundwork and established the discipline by which future generations of engineers would seek to model, measure and evaluate the computer and communication systems they were building.

Dr. Kleinrock received the National Medal of Science and Technology and Innovation from President Bush on September 29. From Bush’s speech (available here with video (alas, not embeddable) and audio):

We’re proud to honor a new generation of people who have strived for excellence; people whose discoveries have changed America and the world. I mean, that’s what we’re here to honor: discovery and hard work and creative minds.

The men and women we honor here hold more than 100 patents. They are the leaders in business and industry. They public — publish influential books. They chair academic departments in some of our country’s finest universities. Our honorees have made breakthroughs in the range of — in a range of fields, including polymer chemistry, neurobiology, condensed matter physics — all a little esoteric for a history major, I might add.

Here’s a funny story though, from Lionel who runs DSU:

My wife and I were just at a party this evening for one of her co-workers who just got married. So we’re making small talk with the bride’s father and he asked me what I did. So I started to tell him about myself and my portal, Digital Signage Universe. His eyes widened, and he said: Gee, I know a little about that, my son worked for a start-up digital signage company in Goshen, Indiana. Oh, you must mean RedPost?  I said. Yes! RedPost! how did you know? he said. Oh, I keep up on all of the companies in the industry, and it’s really funny, I just got an email today from the owner of RedPost, Eric Kanagy I said. That’s Right!  Eric Kanagy! he said…

…To make a long story short… The father of the bride was Jonathan Glick’s father…

Jon was employee #3 at RedPost (he’s now looking for work in Portland, OR, if anyone needs a really good Rails developer). His sister works for Lionel’s wife. Small, small world.

I watched Friedman’s interview on Meet the Press (which I watch now that NBC video podcasts MTP thru iTunes) and was impressed, especially by his answer to the question “What if global warming is a hoax?” which was along the lines of “Then it’s the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the U.S. in that it’ll renew our country and economic/technological/innovation leadership in the world.” Here’s his interview:

The book came out Tuesday. I txted Brad, owner of Better World Books’ retail store in Goshen, on Sunday and he had the book for me Wednesday, at a price lower than Amazon when accounting for shipping. Thanks for beating Amazon, Brad! Buy local AND buy less expensively. I like it.