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Ben Roodman and Rana Basheer, two students at the University of Missouri-Rolla, have a serious case of the entrepreneurial bug.
It shouldn't be a surprise if their names sound familiar. They've created two unique social networking services (ImThere and GuruLib). TechnoFiles sat down with the two students to get the scoop behind their success. Dowload the mp3 or make it simple on yourself and subscribe to the podcast, already.
Blogworld has been buzzing about ImThere, an innovative mobile social networking service. Now the service has caught the attention of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, snagging a spotlight in a recent Random Play feature.
UMR student-entrepreneur Benjamin Roodman is CEO of this new networking service that connects subscribers to information about events -- such as concerts, CD launch parties or indie film festivals -- via text messages over their cell phones.
Here's how it works: Users log on to the website and create profiles based on their musical tastes and other interests. Users can post photos in real time taken with cell phones from concerts, write reviews of events and get a text message with a list of events happening in the area, based on their interests.
It's a handy little service to use when you're in the St. Louis area but I'm looking forward to early April, which is when Ben tells me Ramped Media will launch ImThere nationwide. When that happens, I'm so there.
While the so-called old media has been slow to pick up on our recent news item about student-entrepreneur Benjamin Roodman's cool mobile social networking service (ImThere), the blogosphere is all over it. Which should come as no surprise, since it involves techie gadgety and connects Internet and cell phone technology. That's the sort of thing bloggers jump on. The mainstream media? Not so much, apparently. Or not as quickly. We think they're missing out on a great story. ImThere could be the next YouTube.
Here's a roundup of blog coverage from the past couple of days:
Years ago, those groovy mod rockers the Who sang about "going mobile." These days, UMR student Ben Roodman is putting a new spin on the idea with the launch of ImThere, a social networking service that integrates the Internet with cellular telephone technology.
Roodman, a senior computer engineering major from Chesterfield, Mo., is the the CEO of ImThere, which could become the MySpace of the mobile world. It's a social networking
service that connects subscribers to information about events -- such as concerts, CD launch parties or indie film festivals -- via text messages over their cell phones.
ImThere is the first service launched by Ramped Media, a company Roodman co-founded in 2006. He describes ImThere as "a user-driven site that allows people to find things to do, by using either their cell phone or the website."
"We want to be on the forefront of mobile Internet technology,” Roodman says. “Text messaging is the medium that’s going to allow us to get to that point.”
Roodman and company -- which includes some fellow UMR students and one recent grad -- are piloting ImThere in St. Louis with plans to expand it to other markets later this year. Keep tabs on how things progress for this budding entrepreneur at the Ramped Media blog.