[fr] Quelques infos sur Downtown Project Las Vegas, un projet très inspirant.
Yesterday, before diving back into #joiito, I was rummaging around a little to see what Zappos and Tony Hsieh had been upto since the Amazon acquisition, where Tony’s book Delivering Happiness ends.
A bit of googling later, I understand that Tony is in fact the driving force behind the Downtown Project in Las Vegas. I first head of Downtown Project through Cathy Brooks, who was moving from San Francisco to Las Vegas to start Downtown Dog House. I was happy for her (as I pretty much always am when I see friends embark on big life changes) but also curious as to what was bringing her to move. The answer was the Downtown Project. I visited the website a bit then, got the gist of it, but only truly got what it was about when I understood that this is the continuation of Tony’s community and values-based vision.
I invite you to check out these links for more info:
- VegasTechFund, the money part
- watch Cathy’s story about her decision to move to Las Vegas (includes some good stuff too about storytelling, one of the much overused, overhyped, and under-understood words of the moment)
- more about the story of Tony and Downtown Project (with a slightly critical view)
- a general article with stories of people moving to Las Vegas (interestingly, this is one of the article I read initially when Cathy pointed me to Downtown Project, but I was missing all the background about Tony to really understand what was going on)
- about Cathy’s dog park project
- more background about Downtown Project, with numbers
I personally find all this inspiring, and next time I go to the US (no trip planned at this stage) it definitely makes me want to visit.
Serendipitiously, one of the first people I ended up chatting with last night on #joiito, Thomas Knoll, is also involved in Downtown Project. I took that as a sign that #joiito has to live on.