EirePreneur

Do Irish entrepreneurs dare to dream?

The Land of Ireland blog reports on the Small Firms Association (SFA) 'Dare to Dream' conference, held in the National Conference Centre at Dublin Castle yesterday. I wonder if it was as 'inspiring, challenging and informative' as the organisers proclaimed?

Chinese-like censorship in Irish schools!

I rarely delve into matter political on this blog but this truly alarming post by Bernie Goldbach must be amplified. I find it absolutely shocking that such strong arm tactics are now being used by Irish schools as to block students access to a website merely talking about RateMyTeachers.ie. What next? Where does that line of line of 'reasoning' end? It's too frightening to consider.

I fully echo Bernie's sentiments -

Rate My Teachers may not be the flavour of the moment for Irish teachers or their unions but blocking access to sites that discuss the site by using software purchased with my taxes is misappopriation of assets, in my opinion.

Absolutely and an incredible abuse of power. Maybe the next time teachers' unions are looking for a pay rise the ruling party should block their access to RateMyGovernment.ie?

"Hey, teachers, leave those keyboards alone!"

By the way, fair play to Bernie, himself a teacher, for bringing this to light.

Keeping an eye on Irish Politicians

The Guardian Unlimited has launched a great initiative called The Blair Watch Project for Election 2005 -

Limited access means we need your help to keep up with Mr Blair. So today we announce the Blair Watch Project, where we ask you to send us your photos of the PM on the campaign trail. All pictures will appear on our Flickr account - which anyone can look at - with the best appearing here on the blog.

I had a similar idea when I started The Bertie Bowl over a year ago but I stopped posting after a while for want of time, and interest. Come electecion time in Ireland I think I'll warm it up again and setup a Flickr group for moblogging.

The internet has provided us with the tools to help us keep our politicians honest - let's use them.

Calling on Irish entrepreneurs to come home

From ENN.ie - Agency calls Irish entrepreneurs home -

A new initiative from Shannon Development aims to encourage Irish entrepreneurs living abroad to start-up a business on home ground.

The programme, called AlumniStart, works by assessing the viability of a business plan which is targeted at the Irish market. The practicality of this programme for Irish people living overseas is that there is no need for them to make the move back to Ireland until much later on in the process when their plan has been proved realistic.

EU publishes an Entrepreneurship Action Plan

The European Commission has published an Entrpreneurship Action plan -

The Action Plan establishes a framework of five strategic priority areas setting out Europe’s agenda for entrepreneurship in the years to come. The Action Plan outlines a series of key actions related to five strategic areas. High on the agenda are fostering entrepreneurial mindsets among young people, reducing the stigma of failure, providing support for women and ethnic minorities, reducing the complexity of complying with tax laws and facilitating business transfers.

Good action points, let's see what comes of it.

We're winning the Olympics.... really!

There was I nearly crying for poor old Sonia O'Sullivan last night as I watched our final medal chance going up in sweat. So what a relief to discover that instead of currently lying #198th (or however many countries there were in the world at last count) we're actually lying in 1st place! Woohoooo! What a proud European Unionist I am :-)

RTE interview rocks the blogosphere

This blog isn't about to turn all political but as a daily visitor to Daypop's Top 40 Links I find it extraordinary to see the Irish Independent's story about Carole Coleman's Prime Time interview with the US President George Bush rising so high in the charts. I'm amazed to read numerous American bloggers heartily praising Ms. Coleman for having the gall to ask tough questions and demand answers to those questions. And I've read hundreds of comments to those blogs (mostly by Americans) encouraging other readers to email RTE in thanks.

What amazes me is not the political aspect to all of this, but the process of how I discovered that the interview had such an extraordinary effect on so many people, not from the Irish media or RTE itself, but through the incredible backchannel of the blogosphere (including IrishEyes).

Europe's technology climate inferior?

Declan McCullagh writes an interesting rant in today's ZDNet about how "one unsung benefit of the Internet is how beautifully it illustrates why the technology climate in the United States is superior to the one in Europe."

"The total tax burden for the average worker is 48.3 percent in France, 50.7 percent in Germany, and an astonishing 52.6 percent in Hungary. Compare this to a total tax rate in Ireland of just 25.8 percent and the U.K. of 29.7 percent--the two countries that are most like the U.S. in political temperament."

Its difficult to argue with him because, as I posted on Loic's blogs I think Europe needs a good kick up the entrepeneurial backside! We're probably among the best of a bad lot here in Ireland but let's not get too complacent about it. Bertie Ahern for President! ;-)

Big investment in the Shannon Estuary

Shannon Foynes Port Company "has approved a Strategic Development Plan to invest €53.5 million over the next five years to create new shipping, industrial and commercial facilities along the Shannon estuary. The five-year plan sets in place a series of ambitious partnerships and project developments which will, according to its promoters, represent the biggest ever boost to infrastructure in the western half of the country."

This is great news for my county of Limerick as well as for Kerrry and Clare. One of the developments I'm particularly looking foward to is a second ferry crossing, this one going from the Shannon Airport jetty to either Foynes or Aughinish island, apparently, on the Limerick side. That could make my trip to Shannon Airport as quick as my drive to Kerry Airport.

Entrepreneurial South East

ElectricNews.net:News: "A new centre dedicated to "entrepreneurial studies" is to be established at the Waterford Institute of Technology. "