 Where did ThinkTech come from? Chapter 1, Origins. It all started as a building owners and managers association meeting in spring of 2000. But the Prince Hotel was not available that day. So we booked the brand new convention center instead, with a much more ambitious subject, a program to showcase technology in Hawaii. Lots of speakers, lots of attendees. Gloria Kau and David Lassner were on our program committee. We called the program ThinkTech Hawaii. It was the beginning of what is ThinkTech today. From covering the Pearl Harbor Court of Inquiry that investigated the sinking of the Ehime Maru in spring of 2001, and then a meeting at the Sori Bowl Korean Restaurant, we connected with Kayla Rosenfeld of Hawaii Public Radio to set up a talk show. After that meeting, writing down Kapiolani, Gordon Bruce said to Gloria Kau and Don Mangiorelli and me, you know this will change our lives. We agreed. He was right. The four of us began our talk shows on HPR in the fall of 2001. Kayla Rosenfeld was producer. Gordon brought glasses and wine, and the shows were great fun. Station manager Michael Titterton told us to cut out the wine. But even then, we had a ball doing these shows anyway. We built a website, and focused on tech. In one of our early shows, we were talking about a certain software program. A listener called to complain. He asked how could we possibly cover a software program without first explaining what electricity was. We were all unprepared for that question. I turned to the studio guest and said, hey, this one's for you. The poor guy then stammered for an answer. It was pretty funny, but also very memorable. One of many such things that went into our scrapbook in those days. The show on HPR continued every Wednesday for seven years. We had some great guests and great shows. My all time favorite was about fallen Russian nuclear scientists. We had former consular official Pamela Sprotlin in the studio. We had an NGO guest from Washington DC, who gave the Russian scientists money to keep them out of trouble. We had an official from the Russian Far East State Technical University in Vladivostok. And for color and culture, we had a Russian poet from the University of Washington, all on the phone at the same time. We were going way beyond tech, and there was friction with HPR about that. Finally, we left public radio. I started writing for the Honolulu advertiser and doing a talk show on Salem AM Radio. We also started doing video. First in my office, then in a utility space J. Shidler led to us on the ground floor of the Davies Pacific Center. We produced talk show videos once or twice a week, uploaded them to Vimeo, and played them on our website. David Day and Bill Sharp were our principal hosts, and Nicole Horry was our cameraman. They were great. We installed a green screen and a talk show table. We went to two cameras and a switcher. We learned a lot. We had gatherings and events. One big one was in an empty retail space J. Shidler led us use. Lots of people showed up, and it was an inflection point for us. We were able to enlist underwriters. The first ones were J. Shidler, Galen Ho, Harry Saunders and Connie Lau. We are very appreciative to them and all the underwriters that followed. They made it possible for us to develop and grow. Soon, however, we had to find another space. Luckily, we found a great studio space in Pioneer Plaza. We took on more volunteer hosts, a studio engineer and a floor manager. We did more shows. Carol Mon Lee, a retired attorney and businesswoman joined us as vice president. Retired TV professional Michael Cooper helped us. We started live streaming and did some shows that streamed and played on Salem radio at the same time. Then came a big break. HPU wanted our space at Pioneer, so Steve Metter of Pioneer moved us to Suite 888, a lucky number, and built it out to our specifications. Now we had a separate studio space, a separate control room and a separate reception area, which we called the salon. We outfitted the place with more cameras, mics and studio lights, and a wrap around green screen wall. We grew the number of hosts, guests and shows. We were almost ready for another even more creative phase in our developments. Then it happened. We were searching for a database program to manage and keep a record of our productions. With the advice and counsel of our old friend Malcolm Makaru, we found the FileMaker database program. Using FileMaker we programmed a custom application that helped us manage and schedule all the shows and communicate with all the hosts and guests. It was a critical breakthrough, and has been central in our operations and development ever since. That is the end of this chapter. Some of the dedications in this chapter are as follows. Gordon Bruce, Laurie Akao, Don Mangiorelli, Kayla Rosenfeld, Michael Titterton, Jay Scheidler, Galen Ho, Harry Saunders, Connie Lau, David Day, Bill Sharp, Nicole Horry, Michael Cooper, Steve Metter, Malcolm Makaru. And Carol Mon Lee who became our Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer and who has been instrumental from then till now. Thanks to them all and to so many others that helped us during this initial period of our development. More to come, of course, in the next segment. Stay tuned for our next exciting chapter, Outreach to the World. Thanks for watching. Aloha.