A Startup a Week

A couple weeks back I did a fun project for Microsoft. The goal was to show Microsoft products being used to complete a real-life project in a week. “A Startup A Week” is the brain child of Kevin Leneway, and he picked me for the pilot episode. The video of the first day is now live on VisitMix.com.

Bringing teams together for short technology projects (whether they go on to become companies or not) is popular here in Seattle. Recently there was a Startup Weekend, and another group meets once a week at Saturday House. It is a great time to be a developer because of the growing availability of Web APIs and excellent tools – you can get a lot done in a short period of time.

I didn’t know the details of this project until the first day (other than that we would use the Facebook platform and Microsoft tools). The project description was simply to raise money for the Room to Read charity on Facebook. From that starting point, we brainstormed the “Lab Builder” Facebook application. This application lets you help build a computer lab in Cambodia.

Check out Lab Builder – if you don’t have a Facebook account, let me know if you’d like me to donate on your behalf. I’m excited to make a difference for a worthy cause. Let me know what you think of the video, and how I can help your company design a Facebook or Open Social application!

2019 Update: Removed a broken link. Visual Studio Express is now Visual Studio Community edition, but I prefer Visual Studio Code and now use Javascript instead of C#.