"iDrink is a gathering for people involved in the Internet industry in Israel: VCs, entrepreneurs, employees, bloggers, journalists are welcome. Regularly iDrink organizes a meetup and this network will enable you to do much more"
The takeup in the community has been tremendous, and we plan to have several events very soon (including, of course, the monthly iDrinks gathering)
If you're part of the Israeli web scene, you're welcome to sign up here
Rocketboom was in Israel last week (they were present at our last iDrink event), and have items all this week covering their visit.
Today they shared the helicopter flight they had in the Israeli skies... If you wait until the end you'll get a good view of Israel "VC land" and the high tech center in Hertzlia (Israel's Silicon Vadi)
Its great to see Israel take part in a global effort. I'll post a full report on this shortly (with a new Israeli field correspondent... so stay tuned)
In the meanwhile, here are some thoughts:
Green is definitely the color of the year - and public awareness is at an all time high
It was great to see over a dozen non profit organizations present. Including a student organization fighting industrial pollution, a group fighting to save our beaches, and Greenpeace Israel. All young, energetic, with great ambitions.
The event was too commercialized - sponsored by the Israeli Channel 10, along with two large Israeli petrol companies. Its a shame that no governmental organization was willing to step up to arrange this, and get some more objective messages across
The reporters tried to suggest ways each one of us can help the environment. Including - Driving less, turning appliances "off" instead of "standby", buying a hybrid... I agree all these can help - But I think any changes that reduce the quality of life are not sustainable / scalable. I think developing smart technologies will do a lot to help - and will enable reducing environmental damage - while Increasing the quality of life. For example - energy efficient lamps (and not reducing the amount of light), water reuse (and not using less water), etc. etc...
The entire Rabin Square was filled with grass - Which was green when laid down (2 nights ago) and yellow today. This is a REAL waste. Think of the water that went into growing the grass, the energy (petrol) consumed in bringing it to the square, and finally throwing it out... In a desert country that lacks water, you would expect a bit more from a green event... Synthetic, reusable grass perhaps?
And finally, its always impossible to separate an Israeli event from the political situation. I spoke with two groups lobbying for peace who attended the event. In our region, water scarcity is a big factor that will impact peace. Water has always been a source of conflict in the region, and without it we will not be able to achieve peace
Finally, Today I watched John Doerr's very relevant presentation on Greentech investing from TED. I highly recommend wathcing this - Insightful and very important for all of us...
I just got an email from Jeff Pulver (Who is really rocking the Israeli media scene lately) regarding an interesting event he's helping organize:
The 
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