Until recently, angel investors seemed a bit ethereal. Rarely seen, their influence in providing seed money for promising concepts and entrepreneurs was taken on faith. But in the past five years, angels have come down from the clouds to organize and to track their results. As with all investments, the devil is in the details. These down-to-earth tips will help you sort through the if, how and when of becoming an angel investor.

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If you’ve built a startup to the point where it could use a venture-capital investment, how do you pick between an East or West Coast VC firm?

You might think the whole premise is wrong – what difference does it make? Money is money, right? Based on my experience investing in startups, listening to hundreds of business plan presentations, interviewing more than 200 entrepreneurs and dozens of venture capitalists, the answer is that there are big differences between East and West Coast VCs.

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There will be a big boost for small companies when the €2.3 billion Programme for the Competitiveness of Enterprises and SMEs (COSME), voted through the European Parliament this week, gets off the ground in January 2014. The programme is intended to create more favourable conditions for start-ups and entrepreneurship, at the same time as providing access to bank loans, venture capital and other forms of finance for SMEs.

Francesca Gino and Adam Grant, of Harvard Business School and Wharton, respectively, discuss their research on gratitude and generosity.

In 2009, during the dark days following the financial crisis, Goldman Sachs (GS) pledged $500 million to the nation’s struggling small businesses. (It was also a time when the investment bank’s reputation was at a nadir.) The idea: Goldman would spend $300 million to fund lenders focusing on economic development in low-income neighborhoods and $200 million for entrepreneurship education.

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I just visited California, dubbed by Patrick Hanlon "The New State of Innovation." I went to participate in the 11/25/13 social entrepreneurship forum, "The Future of Education in a Globally Connected World" sponsored by Hack for Big Choices in Palo Alto, CA. I went because I was making a stand on behalf of female entrepreneurs everywhere. I was on a mission to prove that entrepreneurship today involves not only disruptive innovation but thought leadership and civic engagement for real world problems needing collaborative, creative and male- and female-generated solutions, such as how we educate our children. I went because I was the lone female panelist at this particular event. As Vivek Wadwa tweeted: "Good, there's a woman on the panel. This is Silicon Valley, and you don't see many!"

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From parades to pumpkins, the facts and figures behind this year's Thanksgiving holiday.

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It’s frequently used to raise money for producing movies and recording CDs, but a Toronto hospital is hoping the crowdfunding craze can help get potentially life-saving treatment out of the lab and into the arms of the people who need it most.

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What’s your top recommendation for an entrepreneur pitching investors, based on you own success or failure?

SHARE YOUR BIG VISION, NOT A PRODUCT TOUR

“It’s a rookie error for an entrepreneur to pitch an investor with the equivalent of a product tour. Investors are usually more interested in the big picture — your vision for your business, why they’ll be a good match, and how your company will return their money handsomely. If your slide deck or in-person presentation seems to linger too long on touring your site or demonstrating your product, it may convey that you don’t have a sense of the larger mission. Spend less time on the nitty-gritty upfront; rather, capture the investor’s interest with your passion for the bigger picture. Once the investor has a sense of that, s/he can always ask you for a deep-dive into the product tour. And if they do, it likely means you’ve piqued their interest.”

 - Doreen Bloch | CEO / Founder, Poshly Inc.

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The SEC released its proposed rules for Title III of the JOBS Act this past October that will eventually allow average investors to participate in equity crowdfunding for the first time much as they would on E*TRADE or other self directed investment platforms. These rules will come into effect sometime next spring. While this new legislation will open the doors for a wider base of investors and revolutionize access to capital, it will now also present unique challenges to equity crowdfunding platforms (ECPs).

This is the third post in my ongoing Series on Tech and Chess.

In the previous post I contrasted the old world of closed or hidden knowledge with the new landscape of open knowledge in which we are living. I also described a framework that I think is helpful for entrepreneurs, investors and technologists as they search for opportunities within sectors that have been or are in the midst of being disrupted by technology/software. In this post we will examine the world of venture capital- an industry that is well along in experiencing this phenomenon of “software eating the world”. It’s being unbundled before our eyes. Here’s my effort at describing this evolution, layer-by-layer:

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Oh, the heralded "man cave" — the space of manliness and testosterone where men can truly let loose and revel in their guiltiest pleasures. Whether they are die-hard sports fans, nerdy gamers or obsessed with Settlers of Catan, guys everywhere know that a well-equipped man cave is essential for relaxing after a grueling day in the office.

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Legendary science guy Bill Nye turns 58 on Wednesday, but '90s kids know that's not his most important number.

From 1993 to 1998, Mr. Nye stared in 100 episodes of Bill Nye the Science Guy, otherwise known as the greatest gift a substitute teacher could give.

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Some bumper sticker wisdom: “You shouldn’t really worry when the competition’s trying to copy you, you should worry when they’re not.” You’ve seen them, right? The so-called Facebooks or Amazons of Africa. Notoriously known as clones, emerging markets have their fair share of them, each with its own degree of success and unique challenges. If you think about it, isn’t it only natural for a working solution to be applied elsewhere? Are they then as bad as their reputation holds them to be?

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Automotive gadgets that were once unique to the most well-appointed of luxury barges often end up filtering down to common-or-garden runabouts that ordinary people buy, albeit over the course of many years.

In thinking about the first Thanksgiving in Plymouth Colony nearly 400 years ago, it’s impossible not to be impressed by the number of constraints and hardships this brave band of pilgrims faced and then ultimately overcame. Rather than focusing on what they didn’t have, the settlers gave thanks for what they did have and used their creativity and innovation to assemble a bounteous Thanksgiving feast that has since become an American tradition.

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In physics multiple choice papers, the correct answers should follow Benford’s law while the other options should not. So can an enterprising student use this to beat the test?

Back in the 1930s, the American physicist Frank Benford discovered that the first digit in certain lists of numbers was much more likely to be a 1 than a 9. He tested this idea on a variety of datasets such as the surface area of rivers, a list of physical constants and even the street addresses of the first 342 entries in American Men of Science.

What does it take to be successful starting your own small business? Here are the 8 skills every successful entrepreneur has in common:

Resiliency. The ability to weather the ups and downs of any business since it never goes exactly the way the business plan described it. This skill enables the entrepreneur to keep going when the outlook is bleak.

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Thinking about starting your own business? Beware! Below are 10 signs that you just may not be cut out to be an entrepreneur. 10. You can’t stand the heat. Before you jump into self-employment, make sure you’re very comfortable being uncomfortable. Every day, you’ll need to try something new for the first time. You have to be ready to put yourself out there and do things you’ve never done before –all with less financial security.

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I love the holiday season. I get to spend time with my family, cook (a passion of mine), and wake up early to update my website. While established businesses and employees enjoy shortened work weeks and paid vacation days, the truth about entrepreneurship is that you don’t get to step away for days at a time.

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