1.
Texas
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Texas is the second largest state in the United States by both area and population. Other major cities include Austin, the second most populous state capital in the U. S. Texas is nicknamed the Lone Star State to signify its former status as an independent republic, and as a reminder of the states struggle for independence from Mexico. The Lone Star can be found on the Texan state flag, the origin of Texass name is from the word Tejas, which means friends in the Caddo language. Due to its size and geologic features such as the Balcones Fault, although Texas is popularly associated with the U. S. southwestern deserts, less than 10 percent of Texas land area is desert. Most of the centers are located in areas of former prairies, grasslands, forests. Traveling from east to west, one can observe terrain that ranges from coastal swamps and piney woods, to rolling plains and rugged hills, the term six flags over Texas refers to several nations that have ruled over the territory. Spain was the first European country to claim the area of Texas, Mexico controlled the territory until 1836 when Texas won its independence, becoming an independent Republic. In 1845, Texas joined the United States as the 28th state, the states annexation set off a chain of events that caused the Mexican–American War in 1846. A slave state before the American Civil War, Texas declared its secession from the U. S. in early 1861, after the Civil War and the restoration of its representation in the federal government, Texas entered a long period of economic stagnation. One Texan industry that thrived after the Civil War was cattle, due to its long history as a center of the industry, Texas is associated with the image of the cowboy. The states economic fortunes changed in the early 20th century, when oil discoveries initiated a boom in the state. With strong investments in universities, Texas developed a diversified economy, as of 2010 it shares the top of the list of the most Fortune 500 companies with California at 57. With a growing base of industry, the leads in many industries, including agriculture, petrochemicals, energy, computers and electronics, aerospace. Texas has led the nation in export revenue since 2002 and has the second-highest gross state product. The name Texas, based on the Caddo word tejas meaning friends or allies, was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves, during Spanish colonial rule, the area was officially known as the Nuevo Reino de Filipinas, La Provincia de Texas. Texas is the second largest U. S. state, behind Alaska, though 10 percent larger than France and almost twice as large as Germany or Japan, it ranks only 27th worldwide amongst country subdivisions by size. If it were an independent country, Texas would be the 40th largest behind Chile, Texas is in the south central part of the United States of America. Three of its borders are defined by rivers, the Rio Grande forms a natural border with the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the south
2.
Wired (magazine)
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Wired is a monthly American magazine, published in print and online editions, that focuses on how emerging technologies affect culture, the economy, and politics. Owned by Condé Nast, it is headquartered in San Francisco, California, several spin-offs have been launched including, Wired UK, Wired Italia, Wired Japan and Wired Germany. In its earliest colophons, Wired credited Canadian media theorist Marshall McLuhan as its patron saint, from its beginning, the strongest influence on the magazines editorial outlook came from techno-utopian co-founder Stewart Brand and his associate Kevin Kelly. From 1998 to 2006, Wired magazine and Wired News had separate owners, however, Wired News remained responsible for republishing Wired magazines content online due to an agreement when Condé Nast purchased the magazine. In 2006, Condé Nast bought Wired News for $25 million, the founding designers were John Plunkett and Barbara Kuhr, beginning with a 1991 prototype and continuing through the first five years of publication, 1993–98. Wired, which touted itself as the Rolling Stone of technology, a great success at its launch, it was lauded for its vision, originality, innovation and cultural impact. In its first four years, the magazine won two National Magazine Awards for General Excellence and one for Design. The founding executive editor of Wired, Kevin Kelly, was an editor of the Whole Earth Catalog and the Whole Earth Review, six authors of the first Wired issue had written for Whole Earth Review, most notably Bruce Sterling and Stewart Brand. However, the first issue did contain a few references to the Internet, including online-dating and Internet sex, the last page, a column written by Nicholas Negroponte, was written in the style of an e-mail message, but contained obviously fake, non-standard email addresses. Wired was among the first magazines to list the email address of its authors and contributors, associate publisher Kathleen Lyman was brought on board to launch Wired with an advertising base of major technology and consumer advertisers. The magazine was followed by a companion website HotWired, a book publishing division, HardWired, a Japanese edition. Wired UK was relaunched in April 2009, in 1994, John Battelle, co-founding editor, commissioned Jules Marshall to write a piece on the Zippies. The cover story broke records for being one of the most publicized stories of the year and was used to promote Wireds HotWired news service, HotWired spawned websites Webmonkey, the search engine HotBot, and a weblog, Suck. com. In June 1998, the magazine launched an index, The Wired Index. The fortune of the magazine and allied enterprises corresponded closely to that of the dot-com bubble, in 1996, Rossetto and the other participants in Wired Ventures attempted to take the company public with an IPO. The initial attempt had to be withdrawn in the face of a downturn in the stock market, the second try was also unsuccessful. Rossetto and Metcalfe lost control of Wired Ventures to financial investors Providence Equity Partners in May 1998, Wired was purchased by Advance Publications, who assigned it to Advances subsidiary, New York-based publisher Condé Nast Publications. Wired survived the bubble and found new direction under editor-in-chief Chris Anderson in 2001
3.
Dallas
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Dallas is a major city in the U. S. state of Texas. It is the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the citys population ranks ninth in the U. S. and third in Texas after Houston and San Antonio. The citys prominence arose from its importance as a center for the oil and cotton industries. The bulk of the city is in Dallas County, of which it is the county seat, however, sections of the city are located in Collin, Denton, Kaufman, and Rockwall counties. According to the 2010 United States Census, the city had a population of 1,197,816, the United States Census Bureaus estimate for the citys population increased to 1,300,092 as of July 1,2015. In 2016 DFW ascended to the one spot in the nation in year-over-year population growth. In 2014, the metropolitan economy surpassed Washington, D. C. to become the fifth largest in the U. S. with a 2014 real GDP over $504 billion, as such, the metropolitan areas economy is the 10th largest in the world. As of January 2017, the job count has increased to 3,558,200 jobs. The citys economy is based on banking, commerce, telecommunications, technology, energy, healthcare and medical research. The city is home to the third-largest concentration of Fortune 500 companies in the nation. Located in North Texas, Dallas is the core of the largest metropolitan area in the South. Dallas and nearby Fort Worth were developed due to the construction of railroad lines through the area allowing access to cotton, cattle. Later, France also claimed the area but never established much settlement, the area remained under Spanish rule until 1821, when Mexico declared independence from Spain, and the area was considered part of the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas. In 1836, the Republic of Texas, with majority Anglo-American settlers, in 1839, Warren Angus Ferris surveyed the area around present-day Dallas. John Neely Bryan established a permanent settlement near the Trinity River named Dallas in 1841, the origin of the name is uncertain. The Republic of Texas was annexed by the United States in 1845, Dallas was formally incorporated as a city on February 2,1856. With construction of railroads, Dallas became a business and trading center and it became an industrial city, attracting workers from Texas, the South and the Midwest. The Praetorian Building of 15 stories, built in 1909, was the first skyscraper west of the Mississippi and it marked the prominence of Dallas as a city
4.
Kickstarter
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Kickstarter is an American public-benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The companys stated mission is to bring creative projects to life. People who back Kickstarter projects are offered tangible rewards and/or experiences in exchange for their pledges and this model traces its roots to subscription model of arts patronage, where artists would go directly to their audiences to fund their work. Kickstarter launched on April 28,2009, by Perry Chen, Yancey Strickler, the New York Times called Kickstarter the peoples NEA. Time named it one of the Best Inventions of 2010 and Best Websites of 2011, Kickstarter reportedly raised $10 million funding from backers including NYC-based venture firm Union Square Ventures and angel investors such as Jack Dorsey, Zach Klein and Caterina Fake. The company is based in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn, andy Baio served as the sites CTO until November 2010, when he joined Expert Labs. Lance Ivy has been Lead Developer since the website launched, on February 14,2013, Kickstarter released an iOS app called Kickstarter for the iPhone. The app is aimed at users who create and back projects and is the first time Kickstarter has had an official mobile presence, and in Spain on May 19,2015. Kickstarter is one of a number of crowdfunding platforms for gathering money from the public, project creators choose a deadline and a minimum funding goal. If the goal is not met by the deadline, no funds are collected, Kickstarter applies a 5% fee on the total amount of the funds raised. Their payments processor applies an additional 3–5% fee, unlike many forums for fundraising or investment, Kickstarter claims no ownership over the projects and the work they produce. The web pages of projects launched on the site are permanently archived, after funding is completed, projects and uploaded media cannot be edited or removed from the site. Kickstarter advises backers to use their own judgment on supporting a project and they also warn project leaders that they could be liable for legal damages from backers for failure to deliver on promises. Projects might also fail even after a fundraising campaign when creators underestimate the total costs required or technical difficulties to be overcome. Asked what made Kickstarter different from other crowdfunding platforms, co-founder Perry Chen said, or, if there’s even an agreed upon definition of what it is. We haven’t actively supported the use of the term because it can provoke more confusion, in our case, we focus on a middle ground between patronage and commerce. People are offering cool stuff and experiences in exchange for the support of their ideas, people are creating these mini-economies around their project ideas. So, you aren’t coming to the site to get something for nothing, on June 21,2012, Kickstarter began publishing statistics on its projects
5.
Cyan Worlds
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Cyan Inc. also known as Cyan Worlds Inc. is an American video game developer, founded as Cyan Productions by brothers Rand and Robyn Miller in 1987, and best known as the creators of the Myst series. After Myst and its sequel Riven sold several million each, Cyan went on to create the massively multiplayer online adventure, Uru. After the departure of brother Robyn Miller from Cyan, Inc. a second company, Cyan Worlds, both companies are located in Mead, Washington, just outside Spokane. Cyan was founded in 1987 by brothers Rand and Robyn Miller, operating out of their parents basement in their Spokane, Rand had been programming games since a junior high school student in the 1980s, while Robyn studied music and arts in high school. The two found a common ground through the Macintosh Hypercard development program which allowed them to mix their talents together, Cyan originally produced adventure games for children. The companys early titles, The Manhole, Cosmic Osmo and the Worlds Beyond the Mackerel, the games offered numerous graphical screens with puzzles, mini-games and activities. Some of these titles were early forays of Cyan into both construction of interactive worlds using HyperCard and the CD-ROM medium, both of which would later be used for Myst. In 1993, Cyan shot to fame with the release of Myst. Myst was one of the earliest CD-ROM games, in a time when CD-ROM drives were beginning to become mainstream, the title sold more than six million copies, and was the best-selling PC game ever until The Sims exceeded its sales in 2002. With the revenue from Myst, Cyan quickly moved to a new headquarters to accommodate a bigger staff, during this time, three novels set in the Myst universe were co-authored by the Millers and David Wingrove. The sequel to Myst, Riven, was released in 1997, after its release, Robyn opted to leave Cyan to pursue other interests, primarily working on independent film production. In a 1999 interview, Robyn stated that the reason for his departure was Two people cant pilot a ship – someone must be in charge. The parting gave us each a ship. The next eight years saw a huge amount of expansion in the Myst franchise, during this time, a second company, Cyan Worlds, Inc. was started. Partly as a test of their new real-time 3D engine, Cyan released realMyst in 2000, at the same time, the next Myst game, Myst III, Exile, was developed by Presto Studios and published by Ubisoft, and released in 2001. The single-player component, Uru, Ages Beyond Myst, was released later that year, the multiplayer component, Uru Live had a short beta test, but was cancelled before being officially released. In 2004, Cyan released two Uru expansion packs that included content originally intended for the online component, the same year, Ubisoft independently developed and released Myst IV, Revelation, the second game in the series not developed by Cyan. In the following year, Cyan developed the final chapter in the Myst series, Myst V, after Myst V, the company laid off most of its employees due to financial difficulties, but shortly after rehired almost everyone after negotiating a deal with Turner Broadcasting. After Uru Live closed, fans began developing their own server software, in response to this demand, Cyan Worlds released Untìl Uru in late 2004, a modified version of the client and server software of Live
