• SC New Tech Meetup will meet Wed, January 8, 6:30pm at Cruzio. Plan to hear from PayStand, Motrr, Apptology, and the usual hoopla. This meetup generally meets each 1st Wednesday. 

• Intro to The Startup Challenge: Tue, January 14, 4-6pm, at NextSpace, and Tue, January 21, 4-6pm, at Cruzio.  

• Darren Odden invites you to the inaugural meeting of the Design Santa Cruz Meetup on Wed, January 15, 6pm, at NextSpace.  

• Santa Cruz Wordpress Meetup meets each 3rd Wednesday, 6pm, at Cruzio. 

• Santa Cruz Web Developers Meetup meets each 2nd Saturday, 10am, at NextSpace. 

News:  

• "Hippie beach enclave no more? A gaggle of politicians, entrepreneurs and deep-pocketed investors want to diversify from Santa Cruz County's $500-million-a-year reliance on summer tourism." Silicon Valley Business Journal names Santa Cruz in list of five cities to watch in 2014.    

• The Sentinel followed up on the SVBJ article above with more local details.  

• Congratulations to Cruzio President, Peggy Dolgenos, recently elected to chair the board of the Santa Cruz County Business Council. 

• Zach Friend on Building the Santa Cruz Brand: "This community has a brand to showcase that more than a sum of our problems - it is a sum of our collective innovations."

• In an effort to bring its agriculture industry into the modern age, Salinas city officials have hired a venture capital firm to try to fund a startup incubator and attract talent from Silicon Valley.   

• Stay calm. Keep making the world better. Chris Neklason on Haters and Trolls.

• From SVBJ: Know about Netflix's humble start at Scotts Valley Best Western?

• Still craving more House of Cards? Reed Hastings, resurrected: Netflix CEO named 2013 Executive of the Year. (He's local.) 

• Local app developer invents new way to learn how to play music with the Music Wormhole, and launches Kickstarter campaign.   
    

• Civinomics reviews their one year in action, and shows off their 2013 timeline infographic.

• Blazing the trail of science: Top scientific breakthroughs from UC Santa Cruz in 2013, an "excellent year for research."  

• Cruzio shares their Top 10 list for 2013. 

• Santa Cruz has radically transformed its market positioning and image. Santa Cruz becomes the place Silicon Valley wants to be: it's now a young, cool and techie Silicon Valley beach town, says Tellus Venture Assoc.  

• The Silicon Valley Business Journal reports on how local policymakers are making plans to expand internet access and capacity to attract and keep entrepreneurs, consultants, and satellite offices for Silicon Valley tech companies.

• Watch: video about Nextspace, winner of Santa Cruz Chamber's Entrepreneur of the year. 
    

• Watch: video about David Haussler, winner of Santa Cruz Chamber's Man of the year.