Pulse2 Technology and Social Media News » The White House

Barack Obama Signs JOBS Act Into Law

Amit Chowdhry — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 19:54:55 +0000

President Barack Obama has signed the JOBS Act into law, making crowdfunding legal for startups by non-accredited investors. Entrepreneurs can now raise money from anybody too. However startups will be limited to $1 million per year and will have to use portals that are approved by the SEC. The legislation has also cancelled the 500-shareholder rule.

The JOBS Act requires all crowdfunding websites to be members of a national securities association in order to protect investors. The principles of the group are to:

- Establish strong protections for investors in the form of an Investor’s Bill of Rights, including tests to assess investors understanding of risk, criminal background checks on issuers, and adequate disclosures by issuers;
- Ensure confidentiality of investors’ personal financial information;
- Ensure that investors do not exceed statutory investment limits, by implementing standardized reporting and communication among platforms;
- Establish standard communication processes for transparent flow of information between the issuer, the investor, the intermediary and the regulatory agency;
- Develop a code of conduct for crowdfunding platforms, with enforcement mechanisms to punish bad actors;
- Create a recognizable brand common to trustworthy intermediaries (akin to VeriSign or BBB).

There are over 400 crowdfunding platforms that exist as of January 2012 and most likely there will be additional crowdfunding websites that will launch after the JOBS Act.

WATCH: Google Street View Goes Into The White House

Amit Chowdhry — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 19:31:21 +0000

The White House and Google have announced a partnership that will allow people to see a 360-degree tour of The White House. Street View will allow people to see all of the rooms in The White House digitized in ultra high-definition.

“The White House isn’t simply a home to First Families or meeting space for world leaders, it’s also known as ‘The People’s House,’ a place that should be open to everyone,” stated First Lady Michelle Obama. Thousands of people have walked around The White House and have seen the artwork and now you can do that without leaving your home. This project is considered a part of Google Art, which launched in February 2011.

President Obama Names Todd Park As U.S. CTO

Amit Chowdhry — Sat, 10 Mar 2012 04:55:54 +0000

President Barack Obama has appointed Todd Park as the new U.S. Chief Technology Officer. For about three years, Todd has served as CTO of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Park oversaw the creation of HealthCare.gov, the first website to provide consumers with inventory of public and private health insurance plans available across the country by zip code in an easy-to-use tool.

President Obama created the CTO position on his first full day in office to help modernize a federal government that was relying too heavily on 20th century technology. As the CTO, Park will continue the work of Aneesh Chopra. who stepped down last month after thee years on the job.

White House Administration Assures SOPA Legislation That Reduces Freedom of Expression Will Not Be Supported

Amit Chowdhry — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 22:48:33 +0000

Earlier today the White House administration released an official statement about their position on the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). As of right now, the hearing about SOPA in the House of Representatives has been delayed until there is a consensus on the bill. Thousands of people signed a petition against the bill, which is why the White House responded. President Obama did not indicate that he would veto the bill, but the White House administration assured that they will “not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet.” [White House]

Obama Administration Announces $2 Billion In Resources For Startups

Amit Chowdhry — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 21:59:56 +0000

The White House has announced an investment today that will benefit entrepreneurs. The White House will be increasing capital and resources for entrepreneurs through the U.S. Small Business Administration by moving forward with a $1 billion Early Stage Innovation Fund, which was originally announced as part of Startup America.

Startup America will provide matching capital to Small Business Investment Companies (SBICs), which targets early-stage businesses seeking private institutional capital.

On December 8th, the White House hosted the first board meeting for the Startup America Partnership where board members had announced commitments from over 50 private-sector partners. These partners will provide free software, free consulting, and legal services to 100,000 startups over the next 3 years.

President Obama also renewed his call for Congress to work on a bipartisan basis for developing ideas from the American Jobs Act plan by increasing limits on miniofferings and allowing crowdfunding.

“Today, we’re announcing $2 billion in public and private resources to help entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses. Now it’s time for Congress to do its part. It was encouraging to see members of both parties in the House come together to pass legislation that will help small businesses get ahead, and I’m calling on the Senate to do the same. But America’s small businesses can’t wait for these important tools to grow and hire faster,” stated President Obama.

Startup America is a nonprofit alliance of entrepreneurs and major corporations. Startup America is led by Steve Case and Reid Hoffman.

Miniofferings are for small business owners seeking private capital of less than $5 million and they would be exempt from various regulations. Crowdfunding is the concept of nonprofits using online fundraising and social media.

[WhiteHouse.gov]

Obama 2012 Campaign Joins Tumblr

Amit Chowdhry — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 22:33:32 +0000

President Barack Obama is campaigning for the 2012 election to serve another four years. Obama’s campaign team has joined Tumblr to tell stories, share jokes, etc. “There will be trolls among you: this we know. We ask only that you remember that we’re people—fairly nice ones—and that your mother would want you to be polite,” wrote the campaign team. [Obama's Tumblr]

Foursquare Gets Tip Lists and Check-Ins from President Obama

Riley Kennysmith — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 16:56:38 +0000

Foursquare has two big announcements: the first is a site feature called Tip Lists. The second is that United States President Barack Obama has joined geosocial network Foursquare, checking in at presidential events as he tours the country. The White House blog says the President’s Foursquare profile will feature tips with “the places President Obama has visited, what he did there, plus historical information and more.” The account already has more than 12,000 followers. Mashable theorizes that this may be a watershed moment for Foursquare as people join the network to follow the President’s travels.

Foursquare just went live with Tip Lists, a way to curate Foursquare Tips into user-friendly lists. Some of Foursquare’s examples include the Hipster Coffee Shop Explosion list and the NYC Summer Bucket List. I can’t find a way to search for lists, but I’m sure that update will appear soon. For now, lists can be found on users’ profiles and featured on location pages.

New White House CIO Steven VanRoekel Is A Former Microsoft Exec

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 01:34:10 +0000

Steven VanRoekel is the current managing director of the FCC and was a former Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) executive. VanRoekel will become the Chief Information Officer (CIO) for the federal government on Thursday where he will be responsible for the $80 billion per year IT budget.

The CIO government position is pretty new as it was created by Obama’s administration. Responsibilities include managing the IT budget and improving security practices.

Before working at the FCC, VanRoekel was a Microsoft executive in the Windows Server and Tools division. Before VanRoekel, Vivek Kundra served as the CIO.

Kundra worked there until March 2009 and introduced products like the IT Dashboard, which is a public website that tracks the spending and progress of federal IT projects. Kundra also encouraged the government to depend on cloud computing rather than the desktop.

[NYT]

White House Twitter Rickroll Gets Animated [VIDEO]

Amit Chowdhry — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 19:17:32 +0000

Earlier this week Riley wrote about how The White House Twitter account had Rickrolled a Twitter user named David Wiggs. Taiwanese animation company NMA.tv made a video out of the news story. Check it out above.

White House Rickrolls A Complaining Twitter User

Riley Kennysmith — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 18:41:02 +0000

Yesterday the White House rickrolled Twitter user @wiggsd in response to his complaint that “This WH correspondence briefing isn’t nearly as entertaining as yesterday’s.” The official White House Twitter calmly replied, “Sorry to hear about that. Fiscal policy is important, but can be dry sometimes. Here’s something more fun,” with a link to Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up.

@wiggsd is the Twitter handle of David Wiggs.