OpenCoffee Club - Pittsburgh June 1, 2007

The OpenCoffee Club was started to encourage entrepreneurs, developers, and investors to organize real-world informal meetups to chat, network, and grow. We meet on the first Friday of every month at 9:00am at the Crazy Mocha Coffee Shop in Sewickley.

This is a place to meet people, find out what's going on nearby you, and then take part.

Imagine it as a big open lounge where people come and go, talk to others in their industry, and informally showcase demos of what they are working on.

Some ground rules:

Let’s not treat it like just another social networking event - if you don’t make it one week, it’s not the end of the world - there’s one every other week. You don’t have to speak to everyone - sometimes it’s good to meet a few people and have a few in-depth discussions - the other people will probably be there next week!

We will never, ever, have name badges or colour coded tags - it’s not that type of event and never should be. It’s not even an event - it’s a place where entrepreneurs and investors come and go for coffee and conversation.

This is a gathering of entrepreneurs and investors, not those seeking commercial gain - this rule can be a bit controversial. We are gathering a great blend of people from the entrepreneurial and investing communities in Pittsburgh; we are specifically excluding the industries that provide support services to startups - PR agencies, recruiters/headhunters, lawyers, and accountants. There are plenty of other forums/events for these service providers to network with entrepreneurs.

The main goal of OpenCoffee is to make investment more transparent to entrepreneurs, and to move away from the formalized "pitch" to an open conversation. Investors can give entrepreneurs really valuable feedback, and this environment is meant to foster that in a pressure-free way.

Official Website: http://www.opencoffeeclub.org