Campus Entrepreneurship

DC-based accelerator Launchbox Digital is hosting another online chat this week. From their email,

LaunchBox Digital will be hosting another online chat tomorrow, Wednesday, April 2, 2008 at 7 pm EDT.  Please join moderator Tom Des Jardins, founder and ex-CTO of Lightningcast, as he leads a discussion on start-up company valuations and investor due diligence.

To join the chat at 7 pm EDT tomorrow please visit www.launchboxdigital.com and follow the link, or click here.

At the login page, please enter the username that you would like to use as an identifier for the chat.

Thats what the headline in the WaPost screamed. Of course I was going to read this article.Turns out the story is about the Mid-Atlantic Business Plan Competition, a business plan contest in my home region. From the WaPo story,

Joseph Zuccaro, 47, strutted around a Northern Virginia restaurant showing off his ultimate networking tool: a gold-plated championship wrestling belt.

It’s flashy. It’s bizarre. And it never fails to attract curious businessmen, itching to ask this middle-age marketing consultant how he’s involved with World Wrestling Entertainment.

Zuccaro heads the 2008 Mid-Atlantic Business Plan Competition, and the Startup Smack Down belt is the grand prize for the winning team. The contest isn’t until April 26. So to drum up sponsorships and judges, Zuccaro slings the belt over his shoulder twice a week and finds business partners at networking events around Washington.

Now that is some crazy marketing. The site for the contest really doesn’t mesh well with the belt, ’smack down’ message of Zuccaro, but the belt got him the story.