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Polldaddy have launched their API – 68% of Polldaddy activity is via API – pretty impressive.

Mashable has more details on

Adding Polls to Your Applications with PollDaddy's API.

We’ve organized with Anton and Digital Media Forum some post API Wars and Facebook Garage drinks – as well as pre FOWA Dublin get together.

Where: Dakota, South William Street, Dublin 2

When: 8:30pm, Thursday 5th March.

What: Come as you are for some drinks and networking with the folks from the Irish community.

Signup: via eventbrite

See

for more details/a>.

A quick bit of background…

A few months ago, Niall Smart contacted us in relation to his new startup – and we did a post where he was looking for a co-founder for his stealth startup – Cloudsync

Niall hooked up with Vinny Glennon and Cormac Driver – and these guys were accepted to the world famous Y Combinator in San Francisco.

Cloudsync is now known as Echodio – and Niall pinged us over the weekend to let us know that they’ve been shortlisted by the SXSW music+film+interactive festival to present at SXSW Accelerator, their showcase for technology startups.

One of four finalists in the music category – picked from over 200 applications.

Best of luck to the lads – keep the Irish flag flying….

Now this is something I could seriously do with.

The guys at Dial2Do have announced the Voice Assistant Service with Bluetooth headset manufacturer SouthWing, at MWC in Barcelona.

Drivers just push a button on their headset or carkit and speak to send text messages, send and listen to emails, record reminders and more. Powered by Dial2Do's Voice Platform, the service is a boost for anyone who wants to make best use of their time in the car, but stay safe and legal behind the wheel.

Dial2Do will be demonstrating the service at the Mobile Monday Peer Awards Barcelona, where they have been shortlisted in the Early Stage Startup category.

Last Wednesday saw the team from Guidewire host a leg of Innovate!Europe in The Digital Exchange in Dublin. And what a day! Chris Shipley, Mike Sigal and Carla Thompson ran the most impressive start-up workshop I have ever encountered. If you missed it, you really missed out.

The format was very simple. There were approx 12 Irish startups there including PutPlace, IGOpeople, LouderVoice, Locle, Toddle. The day kicked off with each of us giving a 90 second elevator pitch. Then we gave our 10 minute company pitch and got feedback from the Guidewire team.

That feedback was accurate, fair, pointed and deeply useful. I gave the first company pitch of the day and everything I heard back from them was spot-on. During the rest of the day I was able to refine the deck quite a bit.

However, it was’t just the feedback on our own presentation that was valuable, it was hearing about the problems (and successes) in everyone else’s that made the day so special. As the afternoon progressed, we had more and more discussions involving everyone. This included some excellent insights from Ray Walsh in Enterprise Ireland.

One thing I did notice was the difference between the expectations of  Valley VCs  and Irish ones. I was told I could easily ditch my detailed financials slide in a Valley pitch. I was told the complete opposite as part of the Genesis programme.

The Innovate!Europe roadshow then moved to London on Friday. The remaining venues are:

• 31 MARCH in Bern, Switzerland
• 3 APRIL in Berlin, Germany
• 6 APRIL in Paris, France

If you are a start-up based on the continent, you owe it to your business to attend one of these sessions. The best companies from the roadshow will then attend a Masterclass in Zaragosa Spain in May. The best of those will take part in a Trade Mission to the Valley in June.

Thanks again to Chris and the team for an invaluable day.

Innovate!Europe is a unique, three-part “Talent Search” designed to identify Europe's most promising startups and accelerate their drive into the global technology market.

Innovate!Europe is hosting a networking meetup in Dublin for local entrepreneurs, investors, executives, government officials and members of the press. The meetup is co-hosted by Enterprise Ireland, Guidewire Group, Orrick, and Innovate!Europe’s partners and sponsors.

I’ll be at this networking event, and feel free to invite along others…

Confirm your attendance by registering here (FREE).

DUBLIN MEETUP DETAILS:
———————-
February 4, 2009
6:30pm 8:30pm
4 Dame Lane
Dame Lane
Dublin 2

-Robin.

Just picked up from Pat Phelan, founder and CEO of Maxroam’s blog on the news that MAXroam has partnered with Dopplr

Congratulations to Pat and team – and no doubt this is the first of many white label partnerships we will see from them in 2009

Press Release below…

Cubic Telecom partners with Dopplr to help travelers save thousands on roaming mobile user

MAXroam, the mobile roaming product from Cork-based Cubic Telecom, will be available in Dopplr’s online travel shop. Dopplr is an online service for smarter travel that helps the world’s most frequent travelers meet up with their trusted friends and colleagues around the globe.

Today Dopplr announced an online store with MAXroam as one of the key products. The store, which is available to all Dopplr travelers, contains a number of special offers on products and services to make travel better.

Speaking about the partnership, Cubic Telecom’s CEO Pat Phelan stated “We’re delighted to be working with Dopplr. MaxRoam’s SIM card will enable Dopplr travelers to save a minimum of 70% on their mobile travel bills.”

Within nine months of its launch in September 2007, MaxRoam had saved travelers more than $1 million on their roaming mobile bill and almost $1.7 million to date. These savings will now be extended to Dopplr members with a Dopplr SIM and website to manage their mobile usage while traveling.

About Dopplr – www.dopplr.com

Dopplr is an online service for smarter travel. Dopplr helps you make more of your travels by sharing your future trips privately with friends and colleagues. The service then highlights coincidences, for example, telling you that three people you know will be in Tokyo when you will be there too. You can use Dopplr on your personal computer or mobile phone. It links with many popular online calendars and social networks.

About Cubic Telecom

Cubic Telecom is one of the world’s first and largest suppliers of travel SIMs, which abolish high roaming fees that are usually charged by incumbent Mobile Network Operators (MNOs).

The company offers a 100% white label platform where MVNOs can customize everything as their own, including having their own branding of SIMs and web portal, plus customized audio prompts and short-codes.

MVNOs can set up multiple sub-distributors, each with their own discrete pricing, and customization, through Cubic’s innovative new offering.

Niall and the crew at iFoods.tv have been working flat out for months to get the new site launched. Yesterday he announced that they are rebranding to Look and Taste and that they are going into private Beta next week.

As a total foodie, I love what they are doing and I’m looking forward to checking out the beta.

It looks like we’ll have the first two BizCamps in Ireland in very quick succession in March. These are unconferences in the style of BarCamp but focussed on business rather than tech.

Kicking off the day after FOWA, the first BizCamp is in the Digital Hub in Dublin on March 7th. All details over on the site. Now if only I could decipher their tagline!

The second one is in the University of Limerick on March 21st. It is being held in the new Kemmy Business school, from 9.30am to 4pm.

In both cases, as with all *Camps, they only work if YOU make them work. So get on over and offer to help out.