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Earth Aid is a service that measures consumer energy consumption trends, and then pays rewards based on how much energy is saved. Earth Aid gives consumers a big picture of their electric, natural gas and water usage on one platform.

The system identifies opportunities for rebates, tax incentives and discounts for saving energy. On August 26, BOALT had the opportunity to sit down with Ben Bixby, Chief Executive Officer of Earth Aid.

(Note: Sorry for the hard cutaways, it was my first time editing video but the content of the video is important for everyone to see.)

BOALT sponsored and attended the Social Matchbox Summer Social 2009 last Thursday at the E Street Cinema. The event hosted ten early stage start-ups that were picked from a pool of 50 applicants. The audience consisted of 200 handpicked industry leaders, investors, designers and press.

According to Social Matchbox, the audience also included representatives from Ashoka, Cooley Godward Kronish LLP, The DC Office of Economic Development, Department of Defense, Grotech Ventures, Novak Biddle Venture Partners, The Obama Administration, Sunlight Foundation, Valhalla Partners, the Washington Post, ThrillList, and TechCrunch.

Each emerging company presented their plan in a four minute secession followed by four minutes of Q&A. The event also set aside time for 60-90 second presentations in an open-mic session– “Opportunities and Ideas for Startups”.

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So you’re on a crowded street and you’re looking for a place to eat. If you have a smart phone, you’ll whip it out, open Google Maps, and do a search. Effective, but not sexy.

Today, at least for our friends across the pond, this has changed. BBC News has a story of a British company, Acrossair, that has created an iPhone application that overlays digital information on top of realtime video captured by the camera. Using this program, all you would have to do is look ‘through’ your iPhone camera to see points of interest on your path.

Smart and Sexy

Companies have already developed similar heads-up displays, but they’re nothing you’d wear in public; imagine donning this contraption on a first date. Using an iPhone to do the same is ingenious, socially acceptable and is sure to spawn even more innovation.

I wanted to do a quick product review for a product I started using today.  It’s called Litmus.  You got to see it to believe it!  It rocks!

Understanding the core principles of a Venture Capital deal can be quite the challenge.   For starters, you need to know that VC money can be smart money but its real expensive money too.

There are different stages of funding but today I’m going to be discussing an early stage term sheet.  Also, you need to know that east and west coast deals work differently.  West coast deals seem to have better terms than East coast – this is primarily due to the investment banking type of mentality you find in places like New York and Boston.   First question that probably comes to mind is why shouldn’t I just get west coast funding?  Well, it’s not that easy, West coast VC’s tends to want to have you in their backyard.  So unless your geographical located in Silicon Valley, this will be a challenge.

The most common mistake entrepreneurs commit is that they get completely blinded by a valuation and forget about the terms.  Whatever you do, make sure you get a good lawyer that knows about these things.  If you have a friend who’s already been down this road, don’t be afraid to ask them for a referral to their lawyer.

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This morning TechCrunch posted an article of some talks of Facebook acquiring Twitter.  The rumor on the street is that that Facebook was offering $500 mil of their already overvalued stock.

TechCrunch reports: “Facebook has raised $516 million in funding to date, while Twitter is backed by $20 million in investment. Twitter boasts 6 million active users, while Facebook reports more than 120 million.”

I’m on the fence as to whether this would be good for the tech community.   I like the idea of the expanding Twitter’s existing reach and making it a lot more powerful than it is.  I also like the idea of it becoming a more stable platform with the right team behind it.  My main concern is that Zuckerberg will try to integrate it in with Facebook too much and cause it’s unforeseen death.

Either way, Twitter, of which I’m a big fan, does need to start thinking about its future and quick burn rate.

What are your thoughts on Facebook acquiring Twitter?