Ending summer. Kicking off Fall with a Bang (and a cigar!).

I'm not going to spend a lot of time on my post this morning. It's the last official weekend of summer and after I go to the dump, we're heading for our last outing to the beach for the season, and then driving to MD tomorrow preparing for three weeks of hard travel and the official kickoff of the fall surge. We always get busy in the fall. Founded on 8/29/2011, we just passed Red Sky Alliance's 5th birthday, and every year is pretty much the same. In fact, we built Wapack Labs to start pushing intelligence into the Red Sky portal after our first summer, hoping, making sure, that after summer, our members would come back. It got so slow doing the first year that I thought we'd been abandon... we needed to find a way to add value to make sure they came back --and they did.

We kicked off operations in Feb '12 with two guys, three members, and a monster American Express bill, waiting, waiting, waiting, for that first check so that we could pay the Amex... and when it finally came in, we both (Jim and I) sighed a huge sigh of relief.

Since then, the Red Sky group has grown to roughly 35 companies participating, and even today, we maintain about 40% of our members checking in at least monthly. We've lost four companies in five years, and although we've shifted our stance just a bit --some companies still prefer to share privately --and do, others just don't care. The portal remains fully attributional.

How do we build trust? One of the ways we do it is by hosting quarterly get togethers --cocktails first, followed by a day of meetings where we share ideas and threat information. Our next will be held in New Jersey... cocktails at JR's. If you're a geek and want to stop by for a few minutes, please, by all means.

Threat Day will be held the next morning at the conference center at the (ahem) Large Telecom in the area... with a tour of the Global Network Operations Center. For those of you who remember doing this a couple of years ago --this is our second visit, this is one of the coolest locations for a conference that I've ever been to... I'd even have to say this is cooler than the underground conference center at the Pentagon... that's cool, but this place? It's a Geek's dream!

So here's the logistics: If you'd like to attend, please RSVP to our event coordinator. Not a member? RSVP anyway. If we run out of space, we'll let you know!

Join Us For Cocktails, Conversation & Cigars The Evening Before Threat Day!

The Red Sky Alliance & The Wapack Labs team invite you for cocktails, appetizers, conversation and yes, a cigar [if you would like :)] the evening prior to Threat Day. Join us at the Montecristo Lounge September 19th at JR Cigar. We will be in the Churchill room! Listen for raucous laughter and tall tales. Check out the link below. Looking forward to seeing everyone!

JR Cigars - The Churchill Room

301 Route 10 East
Whippany, NJ 07981

*Dress Code -- Business Casual 
http://www.jrwhippany.com/index.php/gallery/new-cigar-lounge/#prettyPhoto[]/3/
BT
The summer's always slow but we try to use it to build something insanely cool for release after Labor Day, and this hear is no different. Look for one of the coolest new tools you've ever seen to hit the streets next week. We've been working hard, beta testing in the membership, and loading context all in preparation for one of the absolute coolest tools. I'm not going to say any more --you'll just have to wait for it... but trust me... it'll be worth the wait! 
I've got a dump run and a beach waiting... so until next time,
Have a great weekend!
Jeff