This is a guest post from Gary Sharma (aka “The Guy with the Red Tie”), founder and CEO of GarysGuide and proud owner of a whole bunch of black suits, white shirts and, at last count, over 40 red ties. You can reach him at gary [at] garysguide.com.

Winter is coming.

No, I'm not talking about the weather (though it has been getting chilly lately). Nor Game of Thrones (FYI, season 3 begins on March 31 for those keeping track!). I'm talking about the growing perception in Startupland that the good times might really be coming to an end (for now). Following last week's post by Fred Wilson was this one by PandoDaily's Sarah Lacy, talking about the Series A crunch and how as many as thousand companies who've received seed rounds won't be around in six months. Then there's this one by TechCrunch's Alexia Tsotsis, arguing that the Series A crunch actually extended to Series B, C and D. So what should entrepreneurs make of all this? Do what ya should be doing anyway--focus on building an insanely great product that customers really want and start thinking about monetization early. Personally, I think this is the best time to build a company.

My buddy Steve Rosenbaum (founder/CEO of Magnify) is NYCEDC’s Entrepreneur at Large, and he'll be doing virtual office hours (via Google Hangout) to answer all your startup and entrepreneurship questions. Register here.

I have a couple of free tickets to the upcoming Mobile Loco conference in San Francisco on December 11. Speakers include Andrew Mason (Groupon), Bill Gurley (Benchmark Capital), Don Dodge (Google) and others. If interested, just shoot me an email at gary@garysguide.com with your Name, Title and Company. We'll pick two randomly selected winners.

The annual Amazon AWS Startup Challenge deadline is at midnight this Wed (December 5). This year there'll be four grand prizes (gaming, big data, consumer apps & business apps). Each prize includes $50,000 in cash + $50,000 in AWS credits. Nice!

And the deadline for nominating a startup for the Crunchies (co-hosted by TechCrunch, GigaOm and VentureBeat) is this Thursday (December 6).

In case ya missed TechDrinkup last week, a casting team from Bravo's Start-ups did show, looking for NYC-edition characters. Here's Betabeat's writeup, with all the juicy details.

Going slightly off-topic ... I'm in fairly good shape but I've been feeling the urge lately to find a kickass fitness regimen and get in reaaalllly great shape. But with a ton of holiday parties coming up, I'm wondering if I should start now or wait until after the holidays? Hmmmm ... If anyone has any interesting fitness or diet routines to recommend, feel free to email me.

And now let's see whats going down in the Alley this week...

TEDxSiliconAlley 2012
The theme is Rise of the Machines and the keynote speaker is Ray Kurzweil (The Singularity Is Near). Also includes Bre Pettis (founder, Makerbot), Francessca Ferrando (philosopher of posthumanism & visiting scholar at Columbia), Jincey Lumpkin (attorney & Huffington Post sex columnist) and Ken Segall (creative director of Apple's "Think Different" campaign).
Monday (Dec. 3), 9:30 a.m. @ Terminal 5, 610 W. 56th Street

Lean Startup Conference Livestream
Keynotes by Marc Andreessen, Steve Blank, Beth Comstock and Eric Ries.
Monday (Dec. 3), 12 p.m. @ WeWorkLabs, 175 Varick Street, 4th Fl.

Windows Apps Labs Launch at WeWork Labs
Access to the newest Windows 8 devices (including Microsoft Surface). Also Bing Fund, the new angel fund and incubation program backed by Microsoft, will be dropping in to talk about the program.
Monday (Dec. 3), 6 p.m. @ WeWork Labs, 175 Varick Street

NY Mobile First: App Pitch Showdown
With Nihal Mehta (ENIAC Ventures), Sim Blaustein (Bertelsmann Venture Capital), Charlie O'Donnell (Brooklyn Bridge Ventures), Chieh Huang (Zynga NY) and Heather Hromoho (Millennial Media).
Monday (Dec. 3), 7 p.m. @ Alley NYC, 500 7th Avenue, 17th Fl.

Think Commerce Summit
Rockstar speaker list including Jon Miller (former CEO, Digital Media Group, News Corp), Bob Pittman (chairman & CEO, Clear Channel), Ben Lerer (CEO, Thrillist), Eric Hippeau (partner, Lerer Ventures), Shana Fisher (Highline Venture Partners), Ezra Kucharz (president, Local Digital Media, CBS), Nick Lehman (president of digital, NBC Universal) and others.
Tuesday (Dec. 4), 12 a.m. @ Chelsea Piers - Pier 60, 23rd Street and 11th Avenue

Xconomy Forum: Mobile Madness New York
With Rich Miner (Google Ventures), Roger Ehrenberg (IA Ventures), Peter Flint (Polaris Venture Partners), Joe Essenfeld (Jibe), Eric Koester (Zaarly), Robby Stein (Yahoo), Jalak Jobanputra (FuturePerfect Ventures), Rahul Sood (Bing Fund) and others.
Tuesday (Dec. 4), 2 p.m. @ NYC Microsoft Office, 1290 6th Avenue

December 2012 NY Tech Meetup
You know the drill. Five-minute, rapid-fire demos. A bunch of amazing new startups. Now hopefully you've managed to snag one of those elusive tickets.
Tuesday (Dec. 4), 7 p.m. @ NYU Skirball Center For The Performing Arts, 566 Laguardia Place

TechHub NY - A Very Merry TechHub
Networking, hosted drinks and bites, DJs, photo-booth action, and more.
Wednesday (Dec. 5), 6:30 p.m. @ Ace Hotel, 20 W. 29th Street

Pitchcrawl 2.0 - Angel Investor / Entrepreneur Mixer
Investors include Marissa Campise (Venrock), Lucas Nelson (DFJ Gotham), Rahul Gandhi (High Peaks Venture Partners), Mark Wachen (DreamIt Ventures), Peter Flint (Polaris Venture Partners), Charlie Kemper (Revel Partners & ERA), William Peng (Raptor) and others.
Wednesday (Dec. 5), 7 p.m. @ To be decided

Columbia Engineering Entrepreneurship Night
Arguably among the most influential technology entrepreneurs over the last decade, Bill Campbell and Ben Horowitz will discuss the new NYC tech boom, how it is driving the East Coast startup ecosystem, and how NYC entrepreneurship is giving Silicon Valley a run for its money.
Thursday (Dec. 6), 6 p.m. @ Metropolitan Pavilion, 125 W. 18th Street

Water Collective Holiday Party
An evening of open bar, hors d'oeuvres, silent auction, and raffle to celebrate a new year of clean water and economic empowerment.
Thursday (Dec. 6), 7 p.m. @ Top Of The Garden, 251 W. 30th Street, 16th Fl.

Celebrate the Arts with AlleyNYC (Holiday Party!)
Just pure partying and having fun with awesome people.
Thursday (Dec. 6), 8 p.m. @ AlleyNYC, 500 7th Avenue, 17th Fl.

Investor series with Erik Norlander of Google Ventures
Google is one of the largest companies and a frequent dream strategic partner, investor, acquirer. Hear from the inside how it works as well as the acquisition process.
Friday (Dec. 7), 4 p.m. @ The Lab, 122 W. 26th Street, 5th Fl.

Hack // Meat
Bringing together technologists, entrepreneurs, creatives, policy experts, non-profit leaders and industry executives to develop technologies and tools that help democratize meat.
Friday (Dec. 7), 6 p.m. @ Grind, 419 Park Avenue South, 2nd Fl.

TimesOpen Hack Day
A day filled with learning, coding, tinkering, having fun and hanging out with some of the best developers in NYC.
Saturday (Dec. 8), 10 a.m. @ The New York Times, 620 Eighth Avenue, 15th Fl.

More events on the horizon...
Women in Wireless Holiday Party on Dec. 10 @ SoHo House
Charity Ball 2012 on Dec. 10 @ 69th Regiment Armory
FashInvest 2012 Capital Conference on Dec. 11 @ Fashion Institute of Technology
10 Startup Mistakes to Avoid on Dec. 11 @ Orrick at The CBS Building
Damsels in Design 2012 Holiday Soiree on Dec. 11 @ Museum of the City of New York
Perfecting Your Business Development Strategies on Dec. 12 @ Anchin
Ultra Light Startups: Investor Feedback Forum on Dec. 13 @ Microsoft
StartupBus: Accelerate NYC 2012 on Dec. 15 @ The Alley
December NY Enterprise Technology Meetup on Dec. 18 @ Cooley
Windows 8 Launch Celebration! on Dec. 18 @ Microsoft

Until next week. Stay thirsty social, my friends! ;)

This is a guest post from Gary Sharma (aka “The Guy with the Red Tie”), founder and CEO of GarysGuide and proud owner of a whole bunch of black suits, white shirts and, at last count, over 40 red ties. You can reach him at gary [at] garysguide.com.

I'm a big fan of organizations and groups that encourage more women to get involved in the traditionally male-dominated worlds of tech and entrepreneurship, by creating community and providing guidance and support. And this week, we have a ton of these women-focused events.

There is the Ladies Who Code hacknight, where they encourage you to bring your brilliant self, your laptop,  and your beloved text-editor of choice! There is Celebrating Extraordinary Female Founders at Levo League (a site for Gen Y female professionals), as well as the launch party for PlumAlley (a new site supporting female-founded companies). There is the Go Connect - Ignite Your Ambition event organized by NY Tech Women and The White House Project. There is JumpStart Your Dreams, organized by She Creates Change (a community supporting women as they make their professional dreams a reality). And finally there's Women 2.0 Founder Friday, with guest hosts Alexis Tryon (cofounder, Artsicle) and Anagha Nadkarni (cofounder, AppGuppy).

Speaking of women in tech, there are two upcoming events that should be on your radar. My friend Dani, the founder of DaniWeb (a million-member-strong IT discussion community), is throwing a big party next month on October 2nd. So go check it out! :) Second is Focus100, a conference and boot camp on October 5th, organized by Kathryn Finney (founder, DigitalUndivided) and supported by BlogHer and Andreessen Horowitz. The event aims to get 100 companies founded or cofounded by black women to raise funding or get acquired by 2015.

Also: The deadline for voting on panels submitted for SXSW 2013 has been extended until midnight tonight, and so you still have a chance to help out your fellow Silicon Alley friends. Here's the list of panels we've compiled. Show some love with your votes!

And now let's see what's going down in the Alley this week...

Curators Conference
With Gia Coppola (fashion filmmaker), Susie Bubble (founder, Style Bubble), Josh Rubin (cofounder, Cool Hunting), Rodrigo Calvo (managing director, Mr. & Mrs. Smith), Chris Corrado (fashion curator, Capsule), Warren Fu (music video director), Philippe von Borries (cofounder, Refinery29), Soraya Darabi (founder, Foodspotting) and more.
Wednesday (Sept. 05), 8 a.m. @ Walter Reade Theatre, 70 Lincoln Center Plaza, 165 West 65th Street

NY Games Conference
With Dan Porter (OMGPOP/Zynga), Brian Cho (Andreessen Horowitz), Perry Tam (Storm 8), Adam Boyes (Sony) and more.
Wednesday (Sept. 05), 8 a.m. @ Museum of Jewish Heritage, 36 Battery Place

Practical Approaches to Transhumanism
Featuring a guest from Grindhouse Wetware, whose focus is "augmenting humanity using safe, affordable, open source technology." Yes, that does sound intriguing!
Wednesday (Sept. 05), 6:30 p.m. @ Pearl Street Studios, 519 8th Avenue

Celebrating Extraordinary Female Founders
Celebrating extraordinary female founders on Fashion's Night Out and kicking off the launch of Plum Alley.
Thursday (Sept. 06), 6 p.m. @ Levo Labs, 833 Broadway, 5 Fl.

NYTechWomen and The White House Project Present: Go Connect - Ignite Your Ambition
With Tara Sophia Mohr (founder, Wise Living), Amanda A. Ebokosia (founder, The Gem Project), Layla Revis (VP digital strategy, Ogilvy), Maggie Patton (founder, Hands On America) and Jessica Lawrence (managing director, New York Tech Meetup).
Thursday (Sept. 06), 6:30 p.m. @ AOL Patch NYC, 675 6th Avenue, 3rd Floor

Discussion with LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner & New York Times Columnist Adam Bryant
A discussion between Adam Bryant (Columnist, New York Times) and Jeff Weiner (CEO, LinkedIn) before a live, interactive audience.
Thursday (Sept. 06), 7 p.m. @ Directors Guild Of America Incorporated, 110 West 57th Street, #6

#techdrinkup - Rooftop Party @ Empire Hotel
A party for NYC's brightest and savviest tech people to gather and mingle over drinks and food at exclusive NYC venues.
Thursday (Sept. 06), 7 p.m. @ Empire Hotel Rooftop, 44 W. 63 Street

CashCatsBiz Art Exhibit + Partie!
Tumblr and Forced Meme Productions will present "Cashcats.biz: How the One Purrrcent Really Live." It's a one-night popup exhibition featuring dozens of previously unseen "member photos" from Cashcats.biz and new mixed media works inspired by C$C$ aristocats.
Thursday (Sept. 06), 8 p.m. @ Dumbo Loft, 155 Water Street, Brooklyn

Tech Does Fashion Week (#TDFW): A Kickoff Party
An evening of fun, music, and dance. Drinks & hors d'oeuvres provided.
Friday (Sept. 07), 8 p.m. @ AlleyNYC, 500 7th Avenue , 17th Floor

Comedy Hack Day
Twilio and Cultivated Wit are organizing Comedy Hack Day, an awesome 36-hour hackathon where developers and comedians come together to build the most hilarious apps imaginable.
Saturday (Sept. 08), 9 a.m. @ Pivotal Labs NYC, 841 Broadway, 8th Floor

Cool Cravings | Hot Startups
Insanely delicious desserts from innovative food startups around the city. Get an hour of unlimited access to the newest creations from brands like Brewla Bars, Krumville Bake Shop, SkyIce, Purely Elizabeth, NibMor, The Soft Serve Fruit Co. and Stogo.
Saturday (Sept. 08), 12 p.m. @ OpenHouse, 379 Broome Street

More events on the horizon...
Digital Money Unconference-- From NYPAY and Consult Hyperion on Sept. 11 @ Google
September 2012 NY Tech Meetup on Sept. 11 @ NYU Skirball Center For The Performing Arts
Dating Tactics for the Business World on Sept. 11 @ General Assembly West
Investor Feedback Forum on Sept. 13 @ Columbia University - Schapiro Center
From Wall Street to Silicon Alley on Sept. 19 @ General Assembly
Design for Manufacturing Summit on Sept. 20 @ Dumbo Spot
Startup Weekend NYC on Sept. 21 @ AlleyNYC
Daniweb Presents: Advertising, Marketing and Media Mayhem! on Oct. 02 @ Slate Lounge
FOCUS100 Symposium and Pitch Bootcamp on Oct. 05 @ Ogilvy & Mather

Until next week. Stay thirsty social, my friends! ;)

This is a guest post from Gary Sharma (aka “The Guy with the Red Tie”), founder and CEO of GarysGuide and proud owner of a whole bunch of black suits, white shirts and, at last count, over 40 red ties. You can reach him at gary [at] garysguide.com.

A few months ago, Marc Andreessen wrote a now-famous essay in the Wall Street Journal about "Why Software Is Eating the World." If you haven't read it, I'd highly recommend you do so. Marc's thesis was that more and more industries are being run on software and delivered as online services--from movies to agriculture to national defense--and tech startups will increasingly invade, disrupt and overturn established structures in these industries.

Right up there in the list of important sectors vulnerable to disruption are government and politics (and about time, I say!). To learn more and dive deeper into the nitty-gritty of technology's impact on politics and government today and where it's headed, go check out the Personal Democracy Forum conference (organized by our very own New York Tech Meetup chairman Andrew Rasiej) today and tomorrow at the Skirball Center.

For all ye Ruby afficionados out there, the annual Gotham Ruby Conference (aka GoRuCo) is back on June 23. More details here.

And now let's see what crazy shenanigans the NY tech gang is up to this week...

Personal Democracy Forum (PDF) 2012
Speakers include Todd Park (US CTO), Ben Rattray (founder and CEO, Change.org), Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), Alexis Ohanian (cofounder, Reddit, Hipmunk and Breadpig), Jane Holl Lute (COO, Department of Homeland Security), Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), John Perry Barlow (cofounder, Electronic Frontier Foundation), Emily Bell (director, Columbia Journalism School), Yochai Benkler (co-director, Berkman Center for Internet & Society), David Binetti (cofounder and CEO, Votizen), Susan Crawford (professor, Harvard) and others.
Monday (Jun 11), 9 a.m. @ NYU Skirball Center, 566 Laguardia Place

NYC Gaming June Meetup: Demo Night
Demos by Noah Sasso (BaraBariBall), Sam Glassenberg (The Hunger Games Adventures), Patrick Cremin (Little Legends), Jesse Freeman (Jetroid), Ashley LeBlanc (Strange Clouds), Jess Haskins (Guns of Icarus) and Brian Chung (The Universe Within).
Monday (Jun 11), 7 p.m. @ Microsoft Offices, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, 6th Floor

Venture for America 2012 Summer Celebration
Featuring guest speaker Tony Hsieh (CEO of Zappos and founder of the Downtown Project in Las Vegas). Hors d'oeuvres, open bar, and entertainment.
Tuesday (Jun 12), 7 p.m. @ IAC HQ, 555 West 18th Street

Investor Feedback Forum and Pitch Showdown
Panelists include Somak Chattopadhyay (Tribeca Venture Partners), Weston Gaddy (Bain Capital Ventures), Marc Michel (Metamorphic Ventures) and Micah Rosenbloom (Founder Collective). Startup Pitches include Jess Brondo (The Edge in College Prep), Hissan Bajwa (SpotlessCity), Mahe Bayireddi (iMomentous), Amy Schrier (MISSION.tv), Charlie Rubin (Property Tax Database), Marc Guldimann (Enliken), Chris Kieran (Zokos), Brett Goldberg (TickPick) and Bjorn Holte (bMobilized).
Wednesday (Jun 13), 3 p.m. @ Javits Center, 655 West 34th St

Startup Weekend Partnership Series - The Most Creative Deals
Explore how to make strategic partnerships work with startups and established companies. Speakers include key decision makers from Amex, Billboard, ESPN, and Pepsi.
Wednesday (Jun 13), 6:30 p.m. @ Microsoft Offices, 1290 6th Ave

Northside Entrepreneurship Festival
Rockstar panel of speakers including GZA (Wu-Tang Clan), Dennis Crowley (cofounder & CEO, Foursquare), Anthony Casalena (founder, SquareSpace), Zach Sims (cofounder & CEO, Codecademy), Avner Ronen (founder & CEO, Boxee), Phin Barnes (First Round Capital), Jerry Colonna, Brian Schecter (cofounder, How About We), Bre Pettis (founder & CEO, MakerBot) and many more.
Thursday (Jun 14), 9 a.m. @ All Across Town, Brooklyn

Green and the 2012 Election
With Christine Todd Whitman (Former NJ Governor), Scott Stringer (Manhattan Borough President) and Yetsuh Frank (Director, YR&G). Moderated by Ellis Henican (Newsday and Fox News Channel).
Thursday (Jun 14), 6 p.m. @ PricewaterhouseCoopers, 300 Madison Avenue (at 42nd), PwC auditorium

NY Tech Meetup Change the Ratio Womens Demo Night #1
Opening Remarks by Rachel Sterne (Chief Digital Officer, City of New York). Featuring Demos by Fathom, The Mission List, HonestlyNow, ElectNext, Incline, VenueBook, Paperlex, Findings, Hourly and ReadSocial.
Thursday (Jun 14), 6 p.m. @ Microsoft Offices, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, 6th Floor

The Hatchery Presents: Investor Series with Joanne Wilson
With Joanne Wilson, an angel investor in 17 startups and wife of VC Fred Wilson (Union Square Ventures).
Friday (Jun 15), 12 p.m. @ The Hatchery, 500 Seventh Avenue, 17th Fl

Hack 'n Jill
Why Montauk when you can Manhattan? #HackYourSummer is about building something cool around summertime fun in the world's greatest city, focusing on food (and drink!), fitness, music, and travel.
Friday (Jun 15), 7 p.m. @ AppNexus, 28 W 23rd St

NYC Fashion Hack Day 2012
Hosted by Gilt Groupe, Tumblr and Apigee. Prizes will be awarded and a party will follow!
Saturday (Jun 16), 8 p.m. @ Gilt Groupe HQ, 2 Park Ave

More on the horizon...
Fireside Chat with Ed Gilligan, Vice Chairman of American Express on Jun 18 @ General Assembly
Games for Change Festival on Jun 18 @ NYU Skirball Center
For Startups: When Hiring, Don't Give Away the Company Store! on Jun 19 @ Marks Paneth & Shron LLP
June NY Enterprise Technology Meetup on Jun 19 @ Cooley - The Grace Building
VentureForward 2012 Conference on Jun 20 @ The New York Academy of Sciences
Executive Council Presents: Healthcare Transformation & Innovation Summit on Jun 21 @ Hearst Tower
NJ Tech Meetup 25 on Jun 21 @ Babbio Center at Stevens Institute Of Technology
AngelHack Summer 2012: New York on Jun 23 @ Microsoft Offices
NYC Tech Picnic on Jun 24 @ Lawn at Chelsea Piers

Until next week. Stay thirsty social, my friends! ;)

Foursquare co-founder Naveen Selvadurai announced on Friday that the company will host its first official hack day where programmers will get together to work, marathon style, for a day or a weekend on an application that uses Foursquare data.

"I'm incredibly excited to announce something I've been dreaming about for so long: Foursquare is going to have its first ever developers meetup," Mr. Selvadurai wrote to the 1,841 members of Foursquare's developer listserve.

The event is happening in New York City on Feb. 5, details to be announced.

Chris Thompson of the Ohio-based blog About Foursquare floated a few ideas for Foursquare-based apps:

Here are a few things I'd love to see:

A way to browse nearby specials in real time using the API's new specials endpoint.

A nice-looking map I can share on Facebook, Twitter or my website that shows the places I unlocked each badge.

A tool that can look at my history and my friends' histories and suggest places to meet up for dinner or drinks that we all like.

Marshall Kirkpatrick from ReadWriteWeb suggests another:

I'm cheering for someone to build a Foursquare mashup with Google News and Wikipedia, so I can be told automatically when the places I go have been mentioned in the news or have history posted on Wikipedia.

The time and place is not set yet but Mr. Selvadurai wanted to announce the date as soon as possible so developers can make plans to travel to the city.

ajeffries [at] observer.com | @adrjeffries