On January 21st, Paul O’Connor spoke on a panel at an Economic Club of Chicago lunch along with Kevin Willer from Google (now president of the Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center) and Randy Blankenhorn. The topic was the GO TO 2040 Economic Development Plan for the 21st Century.

Paul is a self described “…insightfully funny suit, who is actually serious about collaborative future building…” His background is far too distinguished to list all his accomplishments here. Check out his LinkedIn profile if you want a deep dive. Paul founded World Business Chicago and was its Executive Director for 9 years. Today he leads the City Design Practice at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. We are also on the Board of Directors together at the Metropolitan Chicago Information Center.

I was inspired by his upbeat message about the future of Chicago and how Gen Y is going to lead us into a bright future. His refreshing message about us getting getting our head out of our hands was something I thought more people needed to hear. So I invited him to record the first interview on my blog.

I hope you enjoy the first of two parts, which focuses on Gen Y. Thank you, Paul, for your time.

I started volunteering at the national headquarters of Obama for America on April 11, 2007. (Here is a post from my first day – wish I had kept blogging about it!) Winning the primary, let alone the election, was beyond a long shot. However, the energy in the office was palpable.

Senator Obama wanted a phone number Americans could call and talk to a real person. I became one of the people who answered. Often three-days a week I would leave my office for a three-hour shift. The call center started out as 4 phones; by election night rooms were filled with people on the phone.

In a few short hours, as he takes the oath of office, the Obama honeymoon will be over. While we are all still enjoying it, I thought I’d share my very small part in this very large day.

I would love to hear how you are feeling today.

In this video:

Lots of web sites are coming out to help people aggregate all the sites they go to. Mint.com and PageOnce.com are discussed. Web 2.0

In this video:

Companies are working to become to plumbing of the Lead Generation Industry, while also helping purchasers understand the true value of the leads and publishers they buy them from. Will people ever buy options on leads?

In this video:

I’m going to post more about business, technology and my observations on the ever changing landscape.

The Cubs will win the world series.

Below is a home video I came across today of the 1929 World Series at Wrigley Field. It features the Philadelphia A’s playing our beloved Chicago Cubs.

Here is to hoping Wrigley might host October baseball in 2007.

I love that they take it so seriously…

I love that they get a standing ovation at the end of it…

I love that someone leaked it so all of us could enjoy!!

That is starting to change. Groups of independent producers are creating a wide variety of videos. Here is one that was emailed to me today that is really creative!

You can check out the rest of the series at HERE.