Congrats to my friends at Return Path for being ranked #167 in this year’s Inc. Magazine’s list of the 500 fastest growing private companies America. Matt Blumberg and his team should be proud of what they’ve accomplished. When we invested in 2000, Return Path had a business vision, an initial product, and no discernible revenue. Six years later, they have a substantial business, are growing at a rapid rate, have a superb customer base, should be profitable this year, and are great people to work with.

I’ve been bugging Fred for a while about trying to use a feed reader on a regular basis. He’s been a random reader – surfing around his blogroll – following links that are interesting to him. When he recently switched from a PC to a Mac, I encouraged him to give NetNewsWire a try. I also pointed him at my Product Focused Venture Capital post where I explained how to publish your blogroll from NewsGator Online (which NetNewsWire synchronizes with) on your blog.

BarCamp Denver starts tonight and goes all day tomorrow. The attendees list has grown nicely, including some of my friends such as Derek Scruggs (Enthusiast Group), Kevin Cawley (NewGator), Scott Converse (ClickCaster), Dave Taylor (Intuitive Systems), and David Cohen (ColoradoStartups.com). I was going to try to attend, but I’ve got to head down to Keystone for the day for some stuff. If you are a BarCamp fan and are in Denver this weekend, go check it out. Half of the pizza is on me.

I’ve started to round up sponsors for my North Pole Marathon run. The first one is Pixie Mate, a local Boulder company that makes an awesome specialty drink based on Mate – a South American tea that’s loaded with antioxidants as well as more fun loving caffeine than tea (but less than coffee). I met with the founders – T.J. McIntyre (a swimmer) and Duane Primozich (a runner) in their office above Rudi’s near Hwy 36 and Table Mesa. They’ve got a rocking business going – powered by a bunch of Mate drinks. I’m been enjoying various flavors of Mate’s for the past few days and am hooked.

John Battelle has an excellent post up on the Failure to Fail. I won’t repeat it here – he states the point really well – and is a must read for any entrepreneur. John speculates that instead of a “bubble”, we might have a “company destruction crisis.” If you read Crichton’s Fear, Complexity, & Environmental Management in the 21st Century (that I referred to in my Lack of Critical Thinking post), you’ll recognize this theme as analogous to the dynamic of “the preservation of Yellowstone.” Failure is a crucial part of the entrepreneurial ecosystem and new and exciting bad things happen when there’s not the right balance of it.

My friends at Cooley Godward announced yesterday that they are merging with NY-based Kronish Lieb Weiner & Hellman. The new firm will be called Cooley Godward Kronish. I’m been a long time fan of Cooley Godward, have worked closely with them in both Colorado and the Bay Area, and have had a long standing relationship (both personal and professional) with Mike Platt – one of the senior partners in the Boulder office. One of Mike’s partners (and another friend and colleague of mine) – Jim Linfield – indicated that the merger isn’t likely to have any impact on the Cooley Colorado office. Given how Cooley has operated in the past, I see this merger as a positive move for them. Congrats guys.

IBM announced today that it is acquiring Internet Security Systems for $1.3 billion. This is IBM’s third large deal in as many weeks. I wrote about IBM’s acquisitions of FileNet and MRO on August 10th for a total of $2.4 billion – I wouldn’t have guessed they would have made another $1+ billion acquisition so quickly. With the acquisition of ISS, IBM has entered the security market in a big way. I wonder if they have an affinity for companies with three initials (ISS, MRO) – I guess I should abbreviate a bunch of my companies names to see if I can attract some attention.

In addition to trying to reform the health care system, my dad is on a quest to become a Chocolate Ice Cream Making Superstar. Chocolate ice cream has always been a mainstay of our family’s diet – I can think of few things more satisfying than chocolate ice cream covered with chocolate syrup (very few.) My dad now has an ice cream maker and is looking for recipes – if you love chocolate ice cream, give him some suggestions (it will improve the quality of my life in the long run.)

The debate between Colorado’s gubernatorial candidates (Bill Ritter and Bob Beauprez) on technology that I’m moderating with Jack Tankersley is coming up on September 8th. Phil Weiser – a professor at CU – who is also one of the instigators behind the debate and an outspoken thinker on Colorado’s technology policy – is interviewed by Larry Nelson about how the state government should think about technology policy in Colorado.