Oniracom’s new identity revision is not a radical change from its previous incarnation, but it’s more revised and organized than at any point in our 15-year history. After such long a stretch of time, something has to change or complacency creeps in, threatening future creativity. As we pivot to specific offerings for a select clientele, our identity will reflect that.

For fifteen years Oniracom has grown into a leading creative marketing agency in the Santa Barbara area, but the company success was not achieved overnight. The Oniracom brand originated at 1453 Jameson street in the city of Montecito, with a small team in a duplex. Gradually, the team started to feel congested as they expanded up to fourteen people and realized the need to relocate. Jacob Tell, Sean Campos, and Mike Wald saw this as an opportunity to immerse Oniracom into a larger community. The chosen current location of 720 East Haley in downtown Santa Barbara is a vital part of the Oniracom success. The new town allowed them to expand their client target to the many small businesses in the area by actively outreaching and physically connecting. Oniracom has grown its reputation within the community and its broad range of clients by taking that opportunity to relocate.

In a rapidly growing economy full of cultivating ideas and start-ups, Santa Barbara has become a main vessel for small businesses. Locally known tourist areas such as the Funk Zone and Downtown, have become popular vacation spots. With the East side of Santa Barbara seemingly forgotten, it has become a perfect opportunity for local small businesses to nestle up and command their space. The native community is small and interconnected. Businesses are known for supporting each other and word travels extremely fast.Pure Order Brewing company, PlayBack Recording Studio, and Oniracom are three entrepreneurial companies located in the upper side of the Funk Zone who are sparking a cultural rebirth. Oniracom has teamed up to revivify the lower East side town as, The Lagoon District .

Oniracom and AIGA Santa Barbara have collaborated on several events over the past few years, but this latest one might just be the best. We are proud to sponsor AIGA SB’s joint event with StartupSB, “Convert Like Crazy: 10 Design and Copy Hacks You Can’t Afford to Miss,” taking place April 15 from 6:30-8:00pm at Workzones.

Oniracom and Playback Recording Studio host the second Solutions for Dreamers Fridays event of 2015, a networking mixer for creatives, artists, entrepreneurs and community builders.

We will be unveiling some amazing art by Matthew McAvene for the Tiger Heroes initiative, so be sure to wear whiskers and ears to get in the spirit!

The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County works tirelessly during the summer season to provide local kids with an abundance of food, cooking lessons, and nutrition education. The Picnic in the Park program, which runs through the summer, supplies lunches and games around the community for the thousands of children who struggle with food insecurity. Santa Barbara County has expanded the Picnic in the Park program this year with more food, donations, and volunteers- and they are always looking for more assistance!

If you like being entertained, rejoice! Today marks the beginning of four days of comics and more galore at Comic-Con International: San Diego. Over 130,000 super-fans will be heading down to the San Diego Convention center to catch glimpses of, and even experience firsthand, the biggest upcoming movies (and TV shows and games and science fictions). Every form of art and popular media entertainment ranging from 12 foot statues of World of Warcraft characters to sneak peeks of highly anticipated films such as Batman v Superman: The Dawn of Justice and the next Star Wars will be there. To name drop a few more, the cast and crew of the Walking Dead and Game of Thrones will also be swarmed by eager fans.

Oniracom’s latest collaboration with AIGA Santa Barbara happened this past weekend, when CEO Jacob Tell and Art Director Tad Wagner reprised their roles as reviewers at AIGA SB’s annual Portfolio Day. For those of you who might not know, AIGA is the professional association for design, and AIGA Santa Barbara is one of 70 chapters across the nation. For me, one of many cool benefits of being AIGA SB President is being able to include Oniracom in our design-related, educational, and networking events for the local creative community.

This past Sunday marked the end of the 2015 Santa Barbara Earth Day Festival, and it was a remarkable success! Thousands of people came out to Alameda Park in Santa Barbara to learn about how to make a difference in the environment while enjoying tasty foods, shopping at the eco-marketplace, and attending a multitude of concerts and events.

Jacob, Mike and Sean worked hard all week to make sure our Storywall platform was ready for the big weekend! Storywall connected festivalgoers with all the exciting things happening throughout the event such as live music set times, tips for being environmentally friendly, and more. Everyone enjoyed interacting with the platform by sending in photos to be displayed on-screen and by participating in contests with awesome prizes including local gifts from the farmers market and an electric bicycle!

Overall, Earth Day and Oniracom’s participation with Storywall couldn’t have gone better. Thank you to everyone who played a role in this year’s festival, we can’t wait until next year! Check out some of our photos from Earth Day below.

Sonos has been a wireless stereo powerhouse in Santa Barbara for over a decade, reinventing audio for the digital age. Here at Oniracom, we’ve been beefing up our music system with Sonos gear since January, and it’s definitely made an impact.

“After I listened to classic albums on our Sonos such as Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, The Doors’ Morrison Hotel, and The Beatles’ White Album I heard new things in the music I never had,” said our CEO Jacob Tell.

Spring is here, it’s light out a little bit longer once we all get off work… the times, they are mellow. Which is why our staff compiled an amazing Mellow March Playlist that’s perfect for spring, the light sun rays, days out on the beach, or even a short road trip drive.

Enjoy!

Thank you for making Solutions for Dreamers Fridays a huge success!

The crowd, food, chat, live music & of course, s’mores were all a hit! Thank you to Playback Recording Studio, StartupSB, and Up Global Regional Summit for helping us put on the event.

Here’s to more SFD Friday Nights! Check out some photos of the night, below!

Come out this Friday, February 20th, to Oniracom and celebrate Santa Barbara’s music, art, startup, and entrepreneurial communities with us! This event is a part of the Up Global Regional Summit, hosted by Santa Barbara Up Champions and Up Global, an organization that encourages innovation and entrepreneurship. 

This is a great networking opportunity to connect with creative community leaders and visiting startup builders in a relaxed setting. There will be food trucks, local beverages, s’mores, and live music! Did we mention s’mores?

Performances by:
Jonathan McEuen
DJ ZEEK BEATS
Erisy Watt
Matthew McAvenue
Playback House Band
Special Guests  

What: Solutions for Dreamers Fridays
Where: Oniracom, 720 East Haley St., Santa Barbara, CA
Date: Friday, February 20, 2015 Time: 5:00 p.m. – 9:30 p.m. 

This event is open to the public, but please RSVP here

Also make sure to check-in on Facebook!

There’s not a lot to look forward to at the end of January. Maybe you’ve come to the realization that your New Year’s Resolution isn’t realistic (no one can eat that much kale) or maybe you just don’t like the chilly weather. But since 1986, the Santa Barbara International Film Festival (SBIFF) has been brightening up the classic January blues. This year, the festival is back with 11 days worth of events for anyone and everyone.

The SBIFF doesn’t only show films, it is full of events from free seminars to celebrity award presentations. With so much going on and loads of awesome events to choose from, we’ve put together some information on the events and films that we can’t wait to check out. 

Opening Night:
Kicking off the film section of the festival on January 27th at 8:00 pm is “Desert Dancer,” an inspiring, true-story about a man’s journey to becoming a professional dancer in a country where dance is illegal. After the film, for those 21+, is the “Opening Night Gala,” a celebration of the start of the festival with food and drinks, dancing, and live entertainment in downtown Santa Barbara.

Films:
This year, there are over 20 full-length films by directors from all over the world, including the USA, the UK, Canada, Israel, and Belgium! Plus, there are special events for specifically for local filmmakers to display their talent and highlight the creativity of Santa Barbara locals. See the Santa Barbara Independent’s website for official dates!

Events:
The SBIFF recognizes the brilliant work of many celebrities and creative geniuses, which is why there are 9 categories of different awards to be presented to innovators in the film industry. Past recipients (and attendees of the SBIFF) have been people such as George Clooney, Quentin Tarantino, Oprah Winfrey, Jennifer Lawrence, and Leonardo DiCaprio. Attending this year’s award events gives you the opportunity to hear an hour and a half of personal details about the honoree’s career. 

Are you on a budget? No worries!! The SBIFF has many free events! Check out the SBIFF official website for more details on this years festival!

Some say that it’s a small world, and thanks to our advancements in technology, the world may have just gotten a little smaller. On January 14th Google released its’ update for the Google Translate app which now includes a radical new feature… translating spoken word! Now, you can speak into your phone and the app will translate and speak back your words in another language of your choice. This has the potential to make traveling and communicating abroad much easier, because no one has the time to play charades with strangers!

Another cool feature of this update includes Word Lens,which allows you hold up your camera to text and have it automatically translated. However, according to Mashable, this only works for English,French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish, other languages will still require you to actually snap the picture. Luckily, an internet connection isn’t needed to use Word Lens, so translating text can be done anywhere. These updates are available to both IOS and Android users, so go forth and translate.

Are you excited to start using this new update?

With our fast pace of business, 2014 already feels like history.  Here’s an impressive look back at our year.

Behold, our wonderful client map of Santa Barbara! Recently, a new local company called 805Connect featured Oniracom as a partner which summarizes our connection with the Santa Barbara community perfectly. You can read the full article here. Thanks for the support, Santa Barbara. Proud to call you our home.

Our annual holiday party was a bit bigger this year! We were thrilled to have all of our jolly employees there and also some friendly clients! Since it was a bigger group, our White Elephant gift exchange was flooding with gifts! 29 to be exact. Also, Jacob surprised us all with some rad new Oniracom T-shirts (see below).

Some highlights from the gift exchange:

Tad’s annual drawing
This gift has been won by yours truly now THREE times in a row. Well actually my boyfriend & I. Our luck is going to run out soon…

Tiki Toss
I almost had this one in the bag! But then I had it stolen by Justin, and then it was stolen by Jason again to lock it in his hands.

Kinetic Sand
Still not completely sure why this one was popular as I’ve never seen it in action, but it was stolen 2 times as well!

Marnie the Dog Calendar
Appropriately won by Miss Tracy, we now have Marnie the Dog staring at us daily in the office. Cheers, Justin!

We enjoyed everyone’s company and we hope you all have a lovely holiday season.

Thanks to Tad for taking the most awesome pictures to date!

CLICK TO READ MORE >>>

Oniracom is proud to be a partner of 805Connect—a comprehensive database created to provide an official directory and networking platform to connect all businesses in the 805 area code. We are excited to have this awesome service available to us! It’s more than a simple business directory, 805connect is also a “place for public entities, private organizations, businesses, entrepreneurs and non-profits, as well as educational institutions to have visibility and connect within the regional business community. It is designed to give you insight into the people behind the businesses in the region.”

Jacob was recently interviewed to be featured on the 805Connect’s Partner page here. He says, “Oniracom is excited to support 805connect because this region is our home. We love the people, businesses and events of the 805, and strive to connect with local organizations on a daily basis. Our love for local has grown stronger the more we invest in this area, and we believe the 805connect network will create a healthy platform for community support and collaboration.”

To signup and learn more, head to their website here.

Ello is a revolutionary social networking site unlike all the rest. Ello, is different from Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking giants in that it is completely add free. Ello’s manifesto reads, “We believe a social network can be a tool for empowerment. Not a tool to deceive, coerce, and manipulate — but a place to connect, create, and celebrate life. You are not a product. Ello. This is what makes Ello unique from its forefathers.  To generate revenue, Ello allows for users to customize their pages with special feature tools which may be purchased for a small price according to Ello these features are not necessary, but do provide some financial support to the company, as well as allowing for users to continue to create and uniquely customize their social networking experience.

Ello is set up as like a mash between Facebook, Pintrest and Twitter, in which users may generate statuses, post pictures and gifs, find friends and comment on posts. Started by a small group of programmers and artists, Ello has sprung up quickly with rapid popularity. There are as many as 35,000 requests to join the social networking site per hour according to The Guardian , and Ello’s head team is working rapidly to keep up with their growing popularity. The site however is not new; Ello was launched in March and was intended to be a small, invite- only community between friends. Interest was recently sparked by the LGBT communities’ migration to other social networking sites after Facebook launched their real name policy, prohibiting users from using names other than their legal names. As interest increased, Ello became more public, but one must still obtain an invite to join the site. Some have even begun selling Ello invites on eBay ranging from 5-150 dollars according to Mashable ,but it is still unclear whether or not Ello will be a fad, or is here to stay. 

Dear Dreamers,

Over the past several years, we have had the joy of working with our video partner Luke Archer.  Luke is the Creative Director and founder of the Cool Hand Look Agency. There are some big changes going on at Cool Hand Look, so I decided to interview him about the reinvention of the Agency. 

Here are some excerpts from that interview. Enjoy!

- Jacob

Q. So explain to me, what is the Cool Hand Look Agency?

CHL: We are a bad ass biker gang…except Dana has a scooter,  and Gianny cruises his moped around town. Ok, so were not a biker gang, but what we are is a group of creative’s that have been collaborating on projects for years. Dana and Luke have been working together as the technical duo behind the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, and Gianny has been their go to cinematographer since they first crossed paths in 2006.

We three are draw together by a love for creative production, and a general outlook on life, that is; people are what matters, relationships are everything, and “you only live once so do your best while you are here” attitude. 

We all have pretty amazing stories.

Dana Morrow is a rare pioneer that has kept up with an ever-changing industry.  In the 1980’s he owned the top video agency in Seattle, dragging his knuckles on tape-to-tape editors. He then went on to own his first AVID, and the business blossomed. Like many a smart businessman, he sold the company at it’s heyday and promptly moved to Santa Barbara’s Riviera, and began to bless the local community with his production chops and his contagious smile. When he’s not combing over the details of our next production, Dana and his wife Sharon, enjoy spending time with clients, family, friends, and Santa Barbara. Wow. We live here!

Where to start with Gianny Trutmann? Gianny is a first rate director of photography trained at the Brooks Institute.  When we say first rate we mean it -  he will literally take a bullet to get the perfect shot.  In fact, he has…just ask him to show you the wound. He grew up in Guatemala, where his family still resides. But like any smart cinematographer, Gianny moved to California and started making great television content, while launching the first RED Boot Camps in Los Angeles, Argentina, and Venezuela. For the past 14 years, has called Santa Barbara his home. When he’s not on a production, you might find him hanging out of a helicopter, experimenting with new cinematic technologies, or sniping new locations on his motorcycle.

And that brings us to me, Luke Archer. I was a bit of an academic rebel in school. I caused a ruckus, but somehow always ended up at the top of the Dean’s list.  After graduated business school in Monterey, I dived head first into entrepreneurship; co-founding a product development company, a learning company, a television production company, and more recently, launched the Cool Hand Look Agency. 

So what am I passionate about? God, my family, and content. Breathing content. Eating content. Dreaming content. Sleeping Content. Creating content. I can’t stop. 

Q. What do we do?

CHL: We work with brands. Our clients come to us to help them create, communicate, and deliver their brand message to the Public. That is what we do. We develop creative campaigns, content, commercials, and designs to tell your brand story and cultivate sales. 

Q. What is with the wacky Monster Suit?

CHL: That’s me, Luke, in the Sherbet the Monster Suit. Man is it hot in there! We had so much fun with this shoot!  Sometimes you just got to let the inner beast out.

Sherbert was designed and built by local artisan, Matthew McAvene. Matthew cut his teeth at the Jim Henson Company makers of the Muppets! He is a hella-of-a-guy and was kind enough to let us borrow Sherbert for the photo shoot. Matthew is also a great commercial artist.  You have probably seen his work scattered around Santa Barbara and wondered who created this fantastic art? Check out more from Matthew McAvene at mackyworld.com.

Q.  Who took those great photos and where?

Local photographer and Brooks Institute graduate, Lexus Gallegos. She took these bad ass photos at the Historic Arlington Theatre.  Check out her incredible photos at lexusgallegos.com. Special thanks to the Metropolitan Theatre Company for allowing us to shoot at the theatre and a very special thanks to Karen Killingsworth for making that happen!

Q. The shoot looks like a lot of fun!  Do you have any video?

CHL:  Of course we have the video that we asked you to ask us about!  We didn’t bring any video lights but we couldn’t resist shooting a couple of seconds of slow motion at 4K.

Thanks for your time Jacob.  Solutions for Dreamers and Oniracom, YOU ROCK!

Next week is the moment we’ve all been waiting for… Jack Johnson at the Santa Barbara Bowl. What could get better than that, right?

We’d argue a show that actually reduces plastic consumption and promotes a plastic-free lifestyle to aid the environment, of course! LoaTree, Jack Johnson, and Klean Kanteen are launching a wonderful campaign at the Santa Barbara Bowl on Sunday, 8/31 and Monday, 9/1 in conjunction with Jack’s two shows called #MyCupAndMe. Patrons will be encouraged to purchase reusable cups to help the Bowl meet its sustainability goals. By purchasing a reusable cup, you will receive $1 off any beverage every time you use the cup. You can help green the bowl by rocking the cup!

“We consider ourselves not only hosts of our musical guests, but stewards of the Bowl’s land,” says Rick Boller, Executive Director at the Santa Barbara Bowl. “We are part of this amazing community who supports the Bowl.” LoaTree also states, “The #MyCupAndMe campaign is the Bowl’s first effort to begin addressing the serious problems associated with single-use plastics which is part of their broader venue-wide waste reduction campaign.”

This campaign will begin at the two Jack Johnson shows, but will continue throughout the rest of the 2014 season at the Bowl. AND you can qualify for some prizes by participating in the campaign. Get the details below from LoaTree!

1) Starting August 18th, register online at http://www.MyCupAndMe.com to capture your commitment to reducing single-use plastic by telling us stories of the steps you’re taking to eliminate plastics from your personal lives. All entries will be registered to win. Winners will be selected and notified by email on Saturday, August 30th. Register TODAY!

Prizes include Jack Johnson CD’s and ukuleles, autographed by Jack, Jack Johnson branded Klean Kanteen stainless steel pints and more! Additional prizes will be given away throughout the Bowl’s season for ongoing #MyCupAndMe supporters.

Want to know what we have been listening to lately? Check out our August playlist below and take a look at what some of the staff members have to say about their picks. Such a great playlist, definitely one of my all-time favorites from the Oni crew.

Keir:
I’ve been on all-Spoon-all-the-time since a few days before their new album came out. Standouts from that one for me are “Inside Out,” “Do You,” “Outlier,” and “They Want My Soul.” However I’m just about to dive deep into the new FKA twigs, starting with “Two Weeks” and “Pendulum.”
1. Inside Out - Spoon
2. Do You - Spoon
3. Outlier - Spoon
4. They Want My Soul - Spoon
5. Two Weeks - FKA Twigs
6. Pendulum - FKA Twigs

Calia:
Ryn Weaver, Broods, MØ, Laura Welsh… basically really interested in those soulful ladies with that catchy pop tune in the background.
7. Octahate - Ryn Weaver
8. Mother & Father - Broods
9. Pilgrim - MØ (MS MR Remix)
10. Cold Front - Laura Welsh

Justin:
11. Late Bloomer - Jenny Lewis
12. Love Never Felt So Good - Michael Jackson
13. Keep The Car Running - Arcade Fire

Haaris:
NICE!!!!
14. Heavy Rain - Boris
15. They Dream - Bear In Heaven
16. Lemonade - Sophie
17. The Gold Chair Ate the Fireman - Le Butcherettes
18. Chimes - Hudson Mohawke
19. Forerunner Foray - Shabazz Palaces
I went a bit overboard, sorry

Drew:
Blake Mills new songs are amazing
20. If I am Unworthy - Blake Mills
21. Waiting for Loretta Too Long - Joe Purdy

Tracy:
22.Don’t Wanna Dance - MØ
23. Rather Be feat. Jess Glynne - Clean Bandit

Tad:
24. Time Stand Still feat. Aimee Mann - Rush
25. Save Me - Aimee Mann

Jacob:
26. Mission Statement - Weird Al
27. The Line - Phish
28. Quality Control - Jurassic 5
29. Montana - Frank Zapata

Mobile Santa Barbara, a meetup group created on Meetup.com, is hosting an awesome event at Oniracom this Thursday, July 24 at 6PM.

The event is all about iBeacons, which may be the key to the next technology revolution! It’s a combination of hardware and software that allows a phone to know when they are near a “beacon.” This allows companies to deliver highly location and contextually-aware content. It’s most immediate applications are in retail, with Apple using it in all of its stores to know when you’re there.

We will be joined by Christian Smith of Phone Halo, a local Santa Barbara company with over 6 years of experience in this field, Procore Technologies, a company that provides cloud-based construction management software to clients across the world, and us—Oniracom!

If you’re interested in mobile technology, you should definitely check out the event. We’re located at 720 East Haley Street. The event will be from 6PM - 8PM on Thursday and food will be provided by Procore. For more info, head to the meetup event here!

The official Storywall Case Study for the Jack Johnson Tour (2014).

The Earth Day celebration at Alameda park this past weekend was a huge success. Boasting an extensive array of exhibitors and vendors, some highlights include the eco-marketplace, green car show, local food vendors, and a morning yoga session, among many others. Focused on celebrating Santa Barbara’s “local roots,” this year’s Earth Day Festival hosted a farm-to-table dinner in the park Saturday evening, and emphasized the way in which our local efforts can “make a global impact.” Over 300 volunteers came out to make this weekend’s festivities possible for the 37,000+ attendees who enjoyed the celebration in the park. We partnered with Earth Day official host, Community Environmental Council, to build the live Earth Day site, and develop the 2014 festival’s five initiatives: Ditch Plastic (#ditchplastic), Go Solar (#gosolar), Eat Local (#eatlocal), Drive Less (#driveless), and Choose Electric (#chooseelectirc). Oniracom’s Storywall platform, which displayed and auto-updated live stats on community member pledges to festival initiatives and photo feeds from attendees, was a huge success on all the screens across the Social Media Lounge. The Lounge, which was shared by LoaTree, also featured a photo booth and information on pledging to do our part to make the earth a cleaner, healthier place.

Check out the photos from the event below and be sure to look out for our Storywall platform at the SB Bowl soon!

All photos taken by Tad Wagner

Matisyahu came to Oniracom to upgrade the web presence and produce a new splash page to announce his new Album. We chose StageBloc as the e-commerce partner for the splash page. The page is responsive and features merch bundles and the official lyric video for the single.

Our wonderful office designer Matthew has been working on a pretty cool project to enhance our office space even more. If you’ve been following us on Instagram, you’ve probably already seen the finished product.

We’ve had various Oniracom elephants in all shapes and forms scattered around the office, but we have never had something as epic as this!

Matthew used krylon flat clear spray paint to create this faux frosted window look. That’s a mouthful. Try saying ‘faux frosted window look’ 5 times in a row.

We love the finished look. It’s going to put a smile on our faces to see our Oniracom sign every day in the office!

Last night we held the S’more StartupSB: Fireside Chat about music, techs & startups event at our office and had an absolute blast. We were joined by Brad Barrish, formerly from Topspin Media, Eric Shiflett from Santa Barbara Bowl, Tucker Bodine from Playback Recording Studio, and Aaron Foreman from SONOS. Our very own Mike Wald moderated the chat about digital music marketing and technology. An interesting new startup called BeatStream also gave a great presentation about the new social music platform they are developing. We were also stoked to present the debut of our new product and app, Storywall! More information and news coming on that soon.

The event was also catered by one of our local favorites, Rusty’s and of course we finished off the night by making tasty s’mores by the fire. Thank you to StartupSB for asking us to host their great event at our office for the second year in a row. It was a wonderful night filled with interesting people and interesting chat!

Check out some of the Instagram shots from the night below!

Santa Barbara Entrepreneurs rally around startups, music, and technology at Oniracom on January 30th at S’more Startups and Music.

SANTA BARBARA, CA – Jan 27, 2014 – StartupSB is kicking off the New Year with a January 30th event featuring music industry professionals, musicians, and startups at one of Santa Barbara’s most creative office locations, Oniracom.  The evening event, titled “S’more Startups and Music”, will feature a fireside chat with Brad Barrish, Head of Operations @ Topspin Media, Aaron Foreman, Head of Digital Marketing @ Sonos, and Eric Shiflett, Program Director @ The Santa Barbara Bowl.  The panel will cover topics surrounding entrepreneurship in the music business and the intersection of music, technology, startups, and opportunity for new ventures.  Beat Stream, winner of Startup Weekend San Luis Obispo, will also present their winning music streaming application, and local singer/ songwriter/musician Jesse Rhodes will play songs around the fire while attendees roast marsh mellows and eat s’mores. 

StartupSB is a Santa Barbara community based organization focused on celebrating local startup companies, fostering entrepreneurship and building a startup community in Santa Barbara and the Central Coast.  The public is encouraged to attend.

“We are excited to be hosting a StartupSB event and this amazing group of music professionals”, said Jacob Tell, Oniracom’s CEO and Creative Lead, “This should be a great night of entrepreneurship, music, startups and networking.”

“This should be a great kickoff to a year of StartupSB events”, Kyle Ashby StartupSB’s executive director stated,  “We are planning to have a lot of fun with the fireside chat theme for this event… think campfire songs, stories, inspiration… and s’mores.”

S’more startups is the first of StartupSB’s 2014 event series.  The series will consists of 10 events hosted at Santa Barbara based startups and the headquarters of Santa Barbara’s most entrepreneurial companies.  Two of these events will be Demo Nights featuring Santa Barbara startup companies showcasing their companies, products and technology. 

The event starts at 6pm and is located at Oniracom’s office at 720 East Haley Street in Santa Barbara. To RSVP for the event please visit http://www.meetup.com/startupsb.  For more information about StartupSB, and to become a StartupSB member, vist: http://www.startupsb.com.

About StartupSB
StartupSB began as a Meetup group and has grown to a membership base of nearly 800 Santa Barbara area entrepreneurs and startup enthusiasts.  The group, run by local Entrepreneur and Startup Evangelist, Kyle Ashby, hosts monthly events at local startups and is heavily involved in helping the startup community grow in the Santa   Barbara area. For more information visit: http://www.startupsb.com

About Oniracom
Founded in Santa Barbara in 2001, Oniracom is a proven partner for brands and organizations looking to cultivate and expand their audience.  Jack Johnson, Deckers,  Warner Music, Topspin, Universal, SONOS – these top brands and many more trust us to produce authentic stories that rapidly increase brand growth and awareness.  http://www.oniracom.com

Contact Kyle Ashby at 805.323.6160, or .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) for more information.

New year, new resolutions. Naturally, we made a playlist that gets us pumped up, motivated and ready for whatever crazy event the new year may bring. These are songs that get us up and moving physically and mentally.

I am pretty satisfied that Venga Boys made it on the list. Well done Justin.

Justin:
1. “Good Vibrations” - Marky Mark And The Funky Bunch
2. “Space Jam” - Quad City DJ’s
3. “Let Me Clear My Throat - DJ Kool
4. “We Like To Party” - Venga Boys
5. “C’mon N’ Ride It” - Quad City DJ’s

Haaris:
6. “Wu-Tang Clan Aint Nuthing Ta F’ Wit” - Wu Tang Clan
7. “Freedom” - Rage Against the Machine
8. Who Gon Stop Me” - Jay Z & Kanye West
9. “Cosmonaut” - At the Drive-In

Calia:
10. “XO” - Beyoncé
11. “Gun” - CHVRCHES
12. “Livin’ It Up” - Ciara
13. “Can’t Hold Us” - Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

Tad:
14. “Mr. Blue Sky” - ELO
15. “Soul Meets Body” - Death Cab for Cutie

Jacob:
16. “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” - Michael Jackson
17. “Whats The Difference” - Dr. Dre
18. “Make The Money” - Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
19. “A Day At The Races” - Jurassic 5
20. “Bang Bang” - K’NAAN

Tracy:
21. “Lies” - CHVRCHES
22. “Don’t Hold the Wall” - Justin Timberlake

Cheyenne:
23. “Days Are Gone” - HAIM
24. “So Close” - Kidnap Kid

Lucy:
25. “Wild Child” - WEKEED
26. “Changes” - Faul & Wad Ad vs. Pnau

Elvis:
27. “Fatty Boom Boom - Die Antwood

Everyone here at Oniracom wishes you a happy new year! Here’s to a prosperous and innovative 2014!

The Santa Barbara Bowl, built in the 1930s, has hosted many amazing shows throughout its history. The Bowl has been home to many big names in music over the years, as a venue to stop at when traveling between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Some highlights that we picked out are:

Bob Marley + The Wailers - November 25, 1979

Bob Marley and his band, the Wailers, went on tour in the Fall of 1979 to promote their album, Survival. Marley had been diagnosed with cancer two years earlier, and this was the second-to-last tour for Marley. His entire set was recorded, and would eventually be released as in DVD format in 2003 called “Bob Marley” The Legend.

Jack Johnson - October 13 & 14, 2010

No stranger to Santa Barbara or the Bowl, Jack Johnson headlined two shows at the Bowl on his 2010 Tour for “To The Sea”. He played a two-hour set after opener G. Love, and his mellow and lighthearted demeanor graced the audience of families and children alike.  To The Sea was one of the top-selling albums that year, and both sold-out nights of his Bowl performances were filmed and became the official music video for “To The Sea”.

Read more >>

In this interview with Backstage Business, Jacob shares the top 3 tips for identifying the right digital marketing firm for your brand, how to genuinely connect with fans and clients online despite the constant changes in technology, and marketing pitfalls to avoid based on 12 years of providing website design, website development, and marketing strategy to artists, labels, and management for some of the world’s most successful entertainment properties.

Thanks for the feature John Lucchetti!

It’s an important day for us today. No, not just because it’s Friday, but because it is America Recycles Day! Many are celebrating by using the hashtags #AmericaRecyclesDay and #WeRecycle to show what they are doing to help this important cause.

Jack Johnson has been featured on EPA Connect: The Official Blog of EPA’s Leadership for his recycling and overall environmental efforts. Jack discusses his work with the Kokua Hawaii Foundation and why it’s important to support waste reduction and recycling.

Don’t forget to snap a photo, post a tweet, etc. with the hashtag #AmericaRecyclesDay to help promote this wonderful cause and day!

The elephant is a proud recycler! Are you?

The Oniracom offices are going under some improvements yet again. The little fixtures and details will never stop as we are always looking for ways to enhance and improve our beloved office space. Matthew has been in and around the office a lot lately, painting Jacob and Sean’s doors to be more vibrant, and working on another surprise element. We will keep you updated as to where the Oni Elephant is going to be placed! Luke, our videographer is also working on his unique space here at Oniracom. More news to come of that soon!

Homage is a great new brand that sells stylish boot wraps for your Uggs! They’re getting ready to launch in several Nordstrom stores nationwide. We built them a custom responsive site to help promote their brand and unique product. When you hit the page, check out the HTML 5 animation that shows how the product looks and works right off the bat.

We are very excited to be helping out Homage with their #yourhomage campaign via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and more. LIKE them on Facebook to stay in the loop about their innovative new product. Find out more about Homage here and be on the lookout for all their styles at your nearest Nordstrom November 4th!

The Santa Barbara Bowl Foundation features updated branding, intuitive navigation and killer social network integration. The design focuses on the beauty the SB Bowl has to offer by accentuating its unique architectural and environmental elements. Oh yeah, it’s tablet & mobile friendly too!

It was an honor to be given the opportunity to revamp the SB Bowl’s website. The Bowl is a historic, renowned and iconic landmark in the Santa Barbara community. We’re proud to share the finished product with all of you and we hope you love it as much as we do. Stroll over to their site here and take a look at all the features it has to offer. Can’t wait for the next concert season at the SB Bowl!

Jack Johnson hit the road this fall touring at historic intimate theatres across the US and Europe. The Oniracom crew was ecstatic to get a chance to see Jack at the historic and beautiful Arlington Theatre in Downtown Santa Barbara this past Sunday.

Bahamas did a wonderful job opening for Jack. The crowd was swaying to their calm and soothing tunes. Santa Barbara was Jack’s last stop on his long 7 week tour with Bahamas, so naturally he made this last show a special one playing for two hours with appearances by J RADIO and Paula Fuga. The show went on for a full two hours, with Jack jamming out to “Bubble Toes”, “Staple It Together,” “Brushfire Fairytales” and also some new tracks from From Here to Now to You. Arlington’s intimate setting made for a great atmosphere. We were able to grab a great video of “Bubble Toes.” Check it out below!

The New Noise Festival is back at it in Santa Barbara and we are stoked to see all of the amazing artists and panels that are organized for this weekend. It’s New Noise’s 5th anniversary, so they’ve of course given us a killer line-up that includes FMLYBND, Cayucas, and HAIM (yes, HAIM) at the Block Party on Saturday. The festival kicks off tomorrow with some great artists at various venues sprinkled around lovely Santa Barbara. Some artists on Thursday include Ghost Tiger, The White Buffalo, and Andrew W.K.

Our very own Mike Wald will also be moderating a panel at the conference on Friday called, “If Music Could Talk: Marketing Your Brand.” The conference is a great way to learn about the music and entertainment industries. Our staff is excited to sit in on these panels!

The festival will come to a close on Saturday with the Block Party on Mason Street. What better place to rock out to Dante Elephante, Grizfolk, FMLYBND, Cayucas, and HAIM than in the Funk Zone?

Check out the full festival schedule here, and get your tickets as there is a limited supply!

We’ve dubbed September as “TV Month” here in the office. Why you say? Well, not only were The Emmys this week, but some great TV series have come to an end this month, and a bunch of new seasons are beginning to start up again as well. Dexter and Breaking Bad have come to a close, while we’re still excited for other shows like Homeland, New Girl, Parks and Recreation, and more!

In honor of “TV Month,” we’ve compiled a playlist of our favorite TV Show theme songs. So go ahead and reminisce with us!

Calia:
1. “In The Street” from That 70’s Show
    - That 70’s Show is a gem to me, and so is this song. Reminds me of hanging out with my friends in high school, watching this series and just being all around goofy together.
2. “California” from The O.C.
    - I love playing this song while driving up the 101, thinking of Marissa, Ryan, Seth, Summer ... and Captain Oats.

Tad:
3. The Muppet Show
    - My favorite part of the week as a kid was tuning into the Muppet Show.  Such a trip back in time for me.
4. Cheers
    - Love the sweet lonesome melody.

Justin:
5. Goof Troop
    - The iconic mix of classic Disney with young 90’s kids culture, bright backpacks, skateboards and a cartoon puppy named Max. Quintessential.
6. City Guys
    - The late nineties brought us one of the most under rated pre-teen dramas on the after school lineup. City Guys is a diamond in the rough characterized by that fantastic hip-hop theme song and inter-racial friendships.
7. “Hey Sandy” from The Adventures of Pete and Pete
    - Thank Nirvana for inspiring the New Wave version of grunge rock that become so essential to “rock” music in the nineties. This theme song always got me off the couch and flexing my temporary tattoo. God bless Danny Tamberelli.
8. All That
    - The intro says is best: “Fresh off the block. Stop! Look and watch. Ready yet? Get set! It’s Alllll That!”

Relix Magazine came to us for a brand new design and concept for their site. We built them a custom website with a responsive design fit for mobile, tablet and desktop devices. We’ve been a long time reader & supporter of the magazine, so we’re ecstatic about this new look and functionality!

Relix Magazine has been a publication since 1974, so you can imagine the large amount of content that needed to be migrated over to the new site. Never fear, we were able to swiftly migrate it to their new Expression Engine platform. To grow Relix’s social network audience, we leveraged current audiences, fans and partners for a multi-platform promotion.

Be sure to check the site out on your mobile and tablet devices: 

We’re stoked about the new look and functionality of Relix’s brand new web presence and we are excited to help maintain and manage their web presence with them through the months to come!

We here at Oniracom have no shame in our song choices, so we are bringing you our ultimate guilty pleasure playlist. There’s everything from Usher and Britney Spears to… Creed. Yes, Creed.

It’s surprising that we haven’t chosen this theme sooner, but here you have it, the Oniracom Staff Guilty Pleasures Playlist. Enjoy!

Calia:
1. “Semi-Charmed Life” - Third Eye Blind
2. “Burn” - Usher
3. “Feel So Close” - Calvin Harris

Jacob:
4. “What’s the Difference” - Dr. Dre
5. “Haven’t Met You Yet” - Michael Buble
6. “Read My Mind” - The Killers
7. “So Damn Lucky” - Dave Matthews

Justin:
8. “Tarzan Boy” - Baltimora (from Turtles 3: Turtles in Time)
9. “Lucky” - Britney Spears
10. “Crazy for This Girl” - Evan and Jaron
11. “Dreams” - The Cranberries

This playlist was probably our most fun yet. I asked all of our staff members to come up with a few songs that are quintessential Oniracom.

All of the songs below remind us of our amazing office and the friendly environment that comes with it.

Some of our staff provided descriptions to each of their choices as well, which makes it all the more fun! Take a listen and soak in the Oniracom vibes.

Haaris:

1. ‘Go With the Flow’ - Queens of the Stone Age
Working in this environment is different from day to day. One must be able to adapt.

2.‘Sitting Waiting Wishing’ - Jack Johnson
Creative environment where we can contemplate creative campaigns and make them real.

3. ‘Clique’ - Kanye West
The quality of our work is extremely high, that can only be created by an all star team of individuals.

4. ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ - Guns n Roses
For this really busy days…

5. ‘Good Life’ - Kanye West
This is a GREAT place to work, I can’t say that enough.

Jacob:

6. ‘Hope’ - Jack Johnson
7. ‘Brighter’ - Matt McAvene
8. ‘Jerusalem’ - Matisyahu
9. ‘Let Love Rule’ - Lenny Kravitz
10. ‘Sunshine’ - Matt Costa

Oniracom teamed up with Hear it First to integrate its popular music discovery site with the Topspin ArtistLink platform.

We created the new site with the best features available including responsive design and social network integration. ArtistLink integration allows bands and managers to claim their official channel on ArtistLink and edit brand content on HearitFirst.com. We are very excited about how this awesome project turned out.

Take a look at some screen shots and our exclusive video walk-through below!

Our client KCON released their official trailer for KCON 2013, which is being held at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena in downtown LA on August 24th and 25th. Tickets are on sale NOW!

We were excited to revamp KCON’s web presence by creating a bright and simple responsive site that promotes their awesome K-POP Music Conference.

Don’t miss the K-POP sensation and be sure to check out the splash page we designed for more information!

Andrew Stockdale came to Oniracom to develop an album release campaign based around a google map and a custom SoundCloud player. The page boasts a stream of the entire new album along with an interactive photo stream of Instagram photos tagged with #KeepMoving.

Check out the full video walkthrough below!

Summertime is most certainly upon us. We’ve got the Summer Solstice festivities kicking off in Santa Barbara this weekend, and the rays have not stopped shining! June Gloom is burning off and turning into a spectacular summer.

With that being said, the last thing we need to make this summer even more perfect is an awesome playlist. Check out the tracks our staff has picked for our Summertime June Playlist:

Calia:
1. “Let’s Get Out of this Country” - Camera Obscura
2. “Verona” - Geographer
3. “In the Sun” - She & Him

Jacob:
4. “Doin’ Time” - Sublime
5. “Hot Stuff” - Donna Summer
6. “Summer Teeth” - Wilco
7. “All Summer Long” - The Beach Boys

Tad:
8. “Step” - Vampire Weekend
9. “Bros” - Panda Bear
10. “At the Zoo” - Simon & Garfunkel

Haaris:
11. “My God is the Sun” - Queens of the Stone Age
12. “Food Fight!” - Be Your Own Pet
13. “Bull In The Heather” - Sonic Youth
14. “Summertime” - DJ Jazzy Jeff & Fresh Prince
15. “Ice Cream” - Wu Tang Clan
16. “Feel Good Hit of the Summer” - Queens of the Stone Age

Justin:
17. “Cayucos” - Cayucas
18.“I Know What I Know” - Paul Simon
19. “Taper Jean Girl” - Kings of Leon
20. “Mansard Roof” - Vampire Weekend
21. “Finger Back” - Vampire Weekend
22. “Will ‘The Thrill’” - Cayucas
23. “East Coast Girl” - Cayucas

Tracy:
24. “I’m in Here” - Sia
25. “Chasing You” - Capital Cities

John L:
26. “Heaven” - Bitter:Sweet - The Mating Game
27. “People Keep Comin’ Around” - Tindersticks

John Jubilee came to Oniracom in need of a web presence to field inquiries from fans of his talk show and weight loss program. Users can contact John’s team and access various resources related to John’s brand and method. The website has a blog and links to each episode of John’s talk show available through iTunes.

John Jubilee’s site is also integrated with Gigya social share links. Take a browse around yourself!

Check out our expert, Jacob Tell of Oniracom on Expert Beacon!

Greetings fellow dreamers! This month we are giving you a jam packed playlist that’s essential for any and all road trips. We’ve got a whopping 118 tracks on this playlist that’s sure to last you on long car rides. Enjoy and feel free to *collaborate* if you have an Rdio account. Click our playlist below and then simply click “collaborate” to add your own personal tracks to the mix!

My picks:
“July” - Youth Lagoon
“Recover” - CHVRCHES
“Hold On” - SBTRKT
“You Make My Dreams Come True” - Hall and Oates

Tad:
“Movin’ Right Along” - The Muppets

Tracy:
“San Francisco” - Foxygen
“When My Time Comes” - Dawes
“Don’t Let me Down” - Solange

Justin:
Sam’s Town - The Killers (In its entirety)
The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me (In its entirety)
From Under the Cork Tree - Fall Out Boy (In its entirety)
Aim and Ignite - FUN (In its entirety)

Mike:
“Casey Jones” - Grateful Dead
“Ramble On” - Led Zeppelin

Haaris:
Enter the 36th Chamber - Wu Tang Clan(In its entirety)
I Love You its Cool - Bear in Heaven (In its entirety)
Sea of Cowards - Dead Weather (In its entirety)

Oniracom developed an interactive album release campaign for Everfound, a new band out of Colorado. The campaign leverages Twitter hashtags as a means to vote for songs. Fans are able to listen to previews of every track from the album and vote for their favorites. The song with the most votes is released at a set time based on the countdown timer on the website.

Get a full video walk-through of the site below, and be sure to visit it here!

Oniracom Portfolio | Everfound (EverfoundMusic.com/Listen) from Oniracom on Vimeo.

Marc Beauregard has been featured on Rareform’s first episode of their Ambassador Series. Check it out!

Spring has officially arrived. The flowers are blossoming and the nice mix of sunny and gloomy days in Santa Barbara are a refreshing change of pace.

Now all we need is a good springtime playlist to get us through spring cleaning and all of our spring projects. Here you have it, the April staff playlist:

Calia:

1. “Never Wanted Your Love” - She & Him
2. “The Sweetest Thing” - Camera Obscura
3. “Santa Cruz” - Gold Motel

Jacob:

4. “Make The Money” - Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
5. “Mexican Cousin” - Phish
6. “Never Know” - Jack Johnson

Tad:

7. “The Desert Babbler” – Iron and Wine
8. “Morning Has Broken” – Cat Stevens
9. “What a Day for a Daydream” – The Lovin’ Spoonful
10. “Prelude in C Major” – J.S. Bach

The Santa Barbara Earth Day festival took place this past weekend at Alameda Park and it was an absolute blast! We were excited to share the Social Media Lounge with our friends over at LoaTree, hangout with the Community Environmental Council crew, enjoy good music, and have an overall good time.

It’s an honor to be a sponsor and marketing partner for the Community Environmental Council of Santa Barbara. Like last year, we designed and developed a live site that displayed all the fun that was going on at Earth Day from Saturday-Sunday. You can check out the live site here.

This year, there were 35,895 festival-goers and over 200 exhibitors. The food was tasty and the local music was fresh. SB Earth Day also presented two “Environmental Hero Awards” to Van Jones and Bill Nye.

Check out some of our Instagram shots below. To see more, search for the hashtag #sbearthday and you’ll see over a thousand Earth Day photos!

We just finished and polished a nice infographic for a great company called RingRevenue, who are located right here in Santa Barbara. RingRevenue simplifies call marketing automation in order to drive more revenue for their customers.

This infographic is used by RingRevenue to explain and sell their services to potential and current clientele. We used a unique design that leveraged data and key performance indicators for RingRevenue. Our goals were to market RingRevenue with an engaging infographic that also showcased their creative marketing efforts.

We love how it turned out! Check it out below and visit RingRevenue online to find out more about their awesome company.

Mighty Bright came to Oniracom to build a fresh web presence for their Lux brand of consumer application LED lighting products. We built the site to showcase the many uses of the products, while creating a strong value proposition for Lux.

Check out a full video walk-through below!

We are pleased to add a wonderful new Independent Sales Representative to the Oniracom team. Welcome, John Lucchetti! John has a background in online marketing, media production, and jazz guitar! He founded the blog Backstage Business, which you may be familiar with, as John featured Jacob a couple months ago. You can check out that feature here.

We asked John a little bit about his blog. He describes it as “a community for musicians, film makers, artists, writers, techies, entertainers, and designers to model, remix and share the best business ideas and resources from around the world. New innovations and insights frequently come from cross pollinating ideas from multiple disciplines, so my intent for the site is to help fuel their projects through stories and advice from successful creative entrepreneurs.” He also adds, “Oniracom is a company that I’ve been a fan of for some time due to their innovative work in the entertainment business, so I’m thrilled to join this world class team!” And we are excited to have you!

Check out John’s blog Backstage Business here, and be sure to *like* his Facebook page! 

We’ve finally done it. Each staff member chose their favorite apps that they can’t live without. Take a look at who chose what, and click on each app to see why they rock!

Jacob, Mike, and Haaris hit up SXSW, the great tech and media conference, in Austin, TX last week.

The Oniracom crew had a great time connecting with new and old brands and businesses in Austin, and are now back with fresh ideas and ready to ring in Spring!

Be sure to take a peek at all of the fun Instagram shots below! We are feeling nostalgic for SXSW already, see you in a years time Austin!

A HUGE congratulations is in order for our video production partner, Cool Hand Look for winning two Central Coast Bronze ADDY Awards! We are so proud of Luke Archer of Cool Hand Look for receiving this great honor.

The ADDY Award Gala took place yesterday, March 13 and recognizes award winning marketing and advertising techniques, strategies, and presentations. Cool Hand Look received these two bronze awards for two awesome projects he produced for our clients Ron Whiteand Rolling Pet Vet. The two awards were for “creative excellence in the art of advertising, including a Bronze ADDY Award for the web series ‘Rontourage: On Tour with Ron White’ and a Bronze ADDY Award for an Integrated Campaign for the launch of local mobile veterinary hospital, Rolling Pet Vet.”

It’s March, which can mean a few things. Spring, St. Patrick’s Day, and… March Madness! We’ve compiled a great sports themed playlist that is sure to get you on your feet, clapping, and cheering along. Are you ready?

Jacob:

1. “Whoomp! (There It Is)” - Tag Team

2. “Hit The Road Jack” - Ray Charles

3. “Jump Around” - House Of Pain

Justin (with a little intro):

SODO MOJO! - ” ‘Who Let the Dogs Out’ was last year’s unofficial national anthem of sports, particularly in Seattle, where A-Rod had it played almost constantly throughout the season. With A-Rod gone and the Baja Men dispatched to one-hit wonder obscurity, fans have visions of providing the Mariners with the next great theme song.”

4. “Who Let The Dogs Out” - Baha Men

5. “Up Around The Bend” - Creedence Clearwater Revival

6. “Baba O’Riley” - The Who

7. “Space Jam” - Quad City DJs

8.“The Way I Sing It (Ft. Ken Griffey Jr.)” - Kid Sensation

If we had three of our all time favorite, most memorable, and flat out amazing albums with us while stranded on a desert island, we’d probably be alright. This is what would keep each of us going if we were unfortunately stranded. What would you choose?

Jacob: The Beatles’ “Magical Mystery Tour” - Each song is actually a single (many were released as singles and later compiled into this proper LP release) so the experience does not tire with each new listen.  This album is fun (Baby, You’re a Rich Man), psychedelic (I Am The Walrus), insightful (The Fool on the Hill), uplifting (Penny Lane), whimsical (Strawberry Fields Forever) and just plain genius (All You Need is Love).  Thank you John, Paul, George & Ringo for making mysterious magic for generations to fall in love with.”

Talking Heads’ “Remain In Light” - The pairing of David Byrne and Brian Eno is one of the all time collaborations since Lennon/McCartney, and despite being the ‘Heads worst selling album of their career it ends up being my favorite.  Released two months after my birth, I am completely connected to the songwriting, incorporation of African polyrhythms, production of samples/loops and horn line arrangements.  This masterpiece, front to back, never sounds tired!

Phish’s “A Live One” - Being my favorite live band, it’s only fitting that I would choose Phish’s certified platinum double disc live produced record.  Each track was recorded on their 1994 tour at a different venue, but is seamlessly stitched together to mimic their classic two set plus encore live format.  One of the best tracks is titled “Montana” and is actually a few minute excerpt of a jam from a show in Bozeman, Montana (hence the title) that flawlessly sets the stage for an epic “You Enjoy Myself.”

Calia: Bon Iver’s self titled sophomore album - This album is a beauty. Everything about it is gorgeous. Lyrics, tunes, melodies, and the emotion. I think if I had this album with me while I was stranded on a desert island I’d still be able to see all of life’s beauties.

Phoenix’s Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix - Something to dance to.

Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs - This album is pure gold. Why wouldn’t I want it with me forever?

Happy happy Friday! This month we’ve featured Calia, our new Executive Assistant for employee spotlight! She’s a great addition to our office and we love having her around. Find out more about her below.

Where’d you go to University and what did you study?

I went to UCSB and studied English and Communication.

Where is your hometown?

Santa Clarita, CA

How long have you worked at Oniracom?

Just 3 months! But I interned here for 6 months.

Just what is it you do here?

A lot of different things! As an Executive Assistant, I assist our executive, sales, accounting, and HR teams. I also manage all of Oniracom’s social media accounts and come up with creative copy for our blog, Solutions for Dreamers.

It’s almost 2013, and what a year 2012 has been! We’ve had a lot of amazing experiences and moments this past year at Oniracom. Our staff breaks it down with their top 10 Oniracom moments of 2012. We hope you enjoy reading and reminiscing these wonderful moments with us.

10. Holiday Party. We had a great time bonding and playing one of our favorite gift exchange games, White Elephant. The Mitt Romney Chia Pet gift was a classic.

9. Doheny Days. Oniracom staff and friends had a great weekend at the Doheny Days festival in September. As Haaris put it, we were “celebrating the fruits of our labor” at the festival. Fun times!

8. New Noise Music Conference and Festival. Oniracom ran a social media workshop this year at New Noise, and it went great!

7. StartUp Creativity. We had a get together in honor of StartupSB at our office. It was great seeing so many developers and other startups from the Santa Barbara community.

6. SXSW. We had a booth in the trade show at SXSW. We are stoked for another SXSW experience this coming March!

If you’ve ever been to Santa Barbara, you know that there are a bunch of amazing local spots to grab breakfast, lunch, or dinner at. From Japanese to French cuisine, we’ve got some special local restaurants that are dear to our hearts here in Santa Barbara. The staff has chosen their ultimate favorite places, which I’m sure was extremely hard, as there are just so many great eateries sprinkled throughout Santa Barbara county.

Jacob chose Bouchon. “The most fresh farm to table comfort food paired with hand picked wines. Worth every dollar.”

Matt picked a French favorite, Renaud’s. “Love the chicken sandwich on their freshly baked French roll.”

Mike went for the ramen at Itsuki. “Amazing Ramen and Udon, great sizzling plates, highly recommended in their new location, although sadly they moved 8 miles farther away from me! I still proudly support.”

Sean picked a great local favorite, Lily’s Tacos. “They have eyeball tacos (which are delicious by the way).”

Before we dive into all the holiday tunes and listing the top albums of the year, we decided to compile a nice covers only playlist! We have quite the eclectic staff. You’ll see covers from Bon Iver, System of a Down, Johnny Cash, and Adele. Enjoy our interesting mix below!

Happy November! Before we break for Thanksgiving, we have a new employee spotlight for our newest developer, Matt Nish!

Where’d you go to University and what did you study?

I studied Film & Media at UCSB and completed their Technology Management Program (TMP).  But I really believe in independent self-education.  I believe that if you’re truly motivated enough, you can learn anything.

Where is your hometown?

Santa Clarita, CA (aka Valencia). It’s a suburb a little north of LA with Magic Mountain and Cal Arts.  Lots of films/tv series are shot here, so you can often see our town in the backgrounds of random scenes.

How long have you worked at Oniracom?

Since July?  Not sure.  3-4 months?

KOCT came to Oniracom  to overhaul their online brand presence. We worked closely with the team at KOCT to develop a system for managing and publishing their broadcast schedule. We were able to build a robust platform to accurately handle their large volume of content, including a live stream of the two public television channels operated by KOCT.

Oniracom Portfolio | KOCT (koct.org) from Oniracom on Vimeo.

Dwight Yoakam came to Oniracom through Topspin and Warner Music Nashville for an interactive album release splash page. The splash page featured staggered promotions and contests leading up to the release of Dwight Yoakam’s album “3 Pears.”

Oniracom Portfolio | Dwight Yoakam (3Pears.DwightYoakam.com) from Oniracom on Vimeo.

We just recently finished a project for our client Buyvite which we are extremely proud of! The process included various elements such as, consulting, building storyboards, designing a unique inforgraphic, writing a script, recording voice overs, and animating and editing a video for Buyvite’s website. Our lead strategist Justin worked very hard on implementing and creating unique ideas, which is definitely conveyed in the finished product.

Justin explains the step by step process from consulting to the animation:

This past weekend was full of New Noise Santa Barbara festivities. The New Noise Music Conference and festival kicked off on Wednesday with a couple of shows, and continued on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Thursday was filled with musical performances at various venues sprinkled around downtown Santa Barbara. Artists such as Tyrone Wells, American Dirt, Naked Walrus, and The City performed at Muddy Waters, SOhO, Whiskey Richards, and Velvet Jones.

Friday was fully packed with interesting panels all about new media and the music industry. This year, Jacob Tell and Mike Wald of Oniracom  lead a hands-on workshop about New Media for Traditional Business. Gideon Rubin Local Market Launch and Kyle Ashby of Kaldera Marketing were also panelists at Oniracom’s workshop. During the panel, Oniracom discussed how traditional businesses can use the internet and new media to captivate audiences and develop unique web presences. The audience even received a “digital marketing plan” worksheet to help them organize their own plan for their traditional business.

Sacred Hills EP is a short, sweet snapshot of the long and winding journey of a man named Matt Costa. The E.P. has four tracks; two unpolished (but superior) classics hidden in the middle surrounded on either end by more sing-along, bigger produced songs. In other words the intro/outro tracks are nice, but like a geode, the gems are in the middle.

The single and opener, “Good Times” is a large celebratory sound reminiscent of the The Beatles, with colorful horns and that happy folk-rock feel, but the lyrics are somber, speaking of a return to hard times…a return to truth, to “the man I once was.” Back to reality. Matt is clever here, offering an economically timely piece. Roundabout the second chorus you get this feeling of, “Aha! I see what you’re doing here!”

The second track, “Never Change”, is the stand-alone classic.  It could have come from the past 80 years of music. The soundscape is reminiscent of Donovan or even an old Woody Guthrie ballad. Costa’s tired voice hinges on the feeling of a theme song or the ending credits to an old Western.  It’s almost got a smirk to it though…actually the whole album does. While the album spins, especially during “Never Change,” you feel a satisfactory buzz and when it ends, you wish it hadn’t.

It’s the end of the month already, which means its time for another unique Oniracom staff playlist. Since it’s October, and Halloween is just a few days away, we decided to provide you all with a spookier playlist than we’re normally used to. As you listen, you’ll notice Zombies as a track title trend and pockets of other eclectic tastes. October’s playlist features 25 tracks!

Mr. Tad Wagner chose:

1. “She’s Not There” - The Zombies - Album: The Original Studio Recordings

“Always enjoyed the suspenseful sound of this song.”

2. “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper” - Blue Oyster Cult - Album: The Essential Blue Oyster Cult

“So smooth for a creepy song (and of course, more cowbell).”

Haaris chose some wonderful spooky tunes:

3. “Halloween” - King Diamond - Album: The Best of King Diamond

“Every day is Halloween when talking about King Diamond. This is what Halloween is all about, Metal, Makeup & the Macabre. Sure he is from the 80’s, but King Diamond will never DIE.”

4. “Electric Funeral” - Black Sabbath - Album: Reunion

“Another Halloween pick, plus these guys invented METAL.”

Last night, Oniracom and StartupSB came together for a night of creativity and inspiration! StartUp Creativity was a success, and Oniracom would like to thank everyone who made last night possible. Thanks to CreatorUp, an awesome organization that offers web series tutorials online for presenting, Rusty’s Pizza for providing us with delicious food, StartupSB for letting us host this event in honor of Startup Weekend, and of course to everyone else who made it out to our office!

New month, new employee spotlight! This month we’d like to feature our lovely designer Tracy Ibsen! Here are Tracy’s “sparkly,” (as she would say) answers below!

Where’d you go to University and what did you study?

Miami University. I majored in Graphic Design and minored in Interactive Media Studies

Where is your hometown?

Solvang (Danish Capital of America), CA

How long have you worked at Oniracom?

3 years

Oniracom will play host to StartupSB and an event entitled Startup Creativity. The event, organized and moderated by StartupSB, a 600+ member meetup group of startup entrepreneurs, will focus on inspiring creativity by highlighting creative local startup endeavors, the local Santa Barbara startup community and the upcoming Startup Weekend Santa Barbara.  Startup Weekend Santa Barbara will be held November 2, 3 and 4 at Citrix Online.

Startup Creativity will take place on October 25th at 6pm at our office (720 East Haley Street Santa Barbara, CA). Food will be supplied by one of our awesome clients Rusty’s Pizza, as well as libations from Telegraph Brewery. All of Santa Barbara’s favorites!

On October 25, you’ll hear from Jacob Tell and Mike Wald about their current creative projects that will be sure to excite the development community. You’ll also hear from CreatorUp, a Startup Weekend Santa Barbara #1 team, who will discuss their online web series school.

Our very own Justin Davis has been featured as Chill’s Curator of the Week! Chill is a social networking website that makes it easier for you to discover and share videos. You can post videos, follow other users, and more!

A few weeks ago, we launched our client CapoSonic’s awesome webpage, and now we have officially launched CapoSonic’s Kickstarter! Kickstarter is a funding platform for various types of projects. A funding goal is created with a deadline. If the project succeeds its goal, all “backers” who offered to contribute money are charged, if the project does not reach its goal, no one is charged. It’s up to YOU to give CapoSonic its kick start!

We at Oniracom have crafted a fully packed playlist with songs that have been personally selected from each staff member. This marks the first ever edition of our “Monthly Staff Playlist.” Be sure to come back at the end of each month for more and more playlists created by our staff here at Oniracom. This month includes loads of tracks from Frank Ocean, as our office just can’t stop listening to his new album Channel Orange. You’ll also see other tracks from new album releases such as Love this Giant from David Byrne and St. Vincent, The Sound Of The Life Of The Mind by Ben Folds Five, and many more. While listening, take a look at which staff member chose what and why!

Santa Barbara is on track for going solar thanks to the Community Environmental Council’s subcommittee called Solarize Santa Barbara.

Solarize Santa Barbara is dedicated to being “fossil free by ‘33”. The program is making it easier and cheaper for local homeowners to go solar in many ways. They have “a group purchasing model [which] helps local homeowners install solar electricity through a streamlined and hassle-free process, at a discounted price,” (Solarize Santa Barbara) and initiated this “group purchasing model” by working with solar contractors on receiving and securing a discounted price for solar installation. Solarize Santa Barbara not only provides stellar discounts, but they also focus on your home’s specific needs by filtering and matching what your home exactly needs in order to continue with a proper installation.

Another remarkable savings option that Solarize Santa Barbara offers is the opportunity to lease a solar panel. This allows the upfront costs to be significantly reduced or eliminated, and maintenance is usually included, which is a huge benefit! Their financing pamphlet states, “Payments are made on a monthly basis, as a lease payment for the equipment or as a payment for electricity (the latter is known as a power purchase agreement).” This option opens up many different avenues for solar installment. Last year, 52 homes were solarized!

The time has come for some employee spotlights! This edition, we’d like to feature our cheery Account Manager, Haaris Ahmed! We asked Haaris to answer a bunch of quirky questions about himself and here’s what he came up with:

The Oniracom Doheny Days crew had a blast this weekend at Doheny State Beach in Dana Point, CA. It is always amazing to see our artwork come to life. Our Art Director Tad Wagner implemented and designed this official logo for the Doheny Days music festival.

Autumn Reeser is a long-time client of Oniracom. With this most recent update to her web presence, we were able to advance her website to be more in line with her blossoming career. Her website still follows the same project-centric formula, with a clean and simple design to complete the experience.

This year’s Santa Barbara Earth Day Festival was sponsored in part by Oniracom, along with The Community Environmental Council (CEC), SONOS, and Horny Toad. The weekend-long festival saw plenty of visitors from the local Santa Barbara community along with local vendors of environmentally conscious products and services.

We just launched a new decked out site for Kurt Daradics. Check it out!

Educate. Entertain. Inspire. Simple one word statements that create the framework of Kurt Daradics new site. Here we highlight and evoke these core values and translate it into a web presence that is simple to navigate, but has layers of complex functionality that makes for a unique and personal experience. Don’t believe us? Judge for yourself…

We will miss our rock star Client Liaison, Adam Cohen.  Tracy knew how to throw the perfect Adam party: good people, nachos from his local spot, homemade margaritas and top it off with fresh baked muffins.  We also had some Pacifico beers to go with the nachos as you can see Drew & Adam clinking bottles.

Be sure to scroll down for a couple funny videos as well.

For he’s a Jolly Good Fella!

Adam loves his Tad Wagner original poster!

We recently returned from an insane ten-day trip to Austin, TX for this year’s main event in music and technology: SXSW 2012. SXSW (Pronounced “South by Southwest,” or simple “South by”) is a massive festival/conference gatherings of tech, film & music professionals, entrepreneurs, and enthusiasts. This year’s SXSW saw its high points and higher points.

We are sad to see our long time friend and Account Manager Jimmy Straayer leave the Oniracom family.  We had a fun party where we presented Jimmy with some fun gifts thanks to our art director Tad Wagner.  Then our own Drew Franklin performed some great cover tunes to cap off the fond farewell.  The cold Pacifico brews definitely help ease the pain.

WE WILL MISS YOU JIMMY!

Everyone tries to find themselves!

Jimmy appreciating Tad’s awesome work.

Drew the troubadour entertains us.

Drew Franklin covers Simon & Garfunkel

Drew Franklin covers Mumford & Sons

What started as the first successful online marketplace selling music and related media, has recently been focused on establishing new pop-icons, leveraging their traffic with co-branded promotions. iTunes is still the titan of online media, but while the Apple-run marketplace has been focused on film and television sales, new media technology platforms have been innovating and perfecting music release campaigning. Musicians use sites like Justin.tv and Ustream.com to host CD Release, and private listening parties prior to releasing their albums to market. These and similar techniques have been very successful for artists, generating plenty of social buzz and blog coverage, surrounding their album release….

Last Wednesday night, a crew of us jammed down to LA after work to hit up a house party and special Zee Avi concert at Brushfire Records. The event was one of many surrounding the release of Zee Avi’s upcoming record, ghostbird, which hits stores August 23rd and is on pre-sale now

We hustled through surprisingly no traffic, and got to Brushfire Records just in time. After chatting with our buddies there and hitting up the killer tacos they had grilling in the back (SO GOOD), all the guests gathered into one of the rooms in Brushfire’s backyard recording studio, the Solar Powered Plastic Plant. Once the crowd was in place and ready to go, her tiny Greatness, Ms. Zee Avi, walked in guitar in hand and smile wide. Followed by a film crew from Starbucks who were on site filming the event, she plugged in and welcomed the crowd with her infectious demeanor and subtle hilariousness.

We recently mentioned how 170 Million Americans for Public Broadcasting came to us to create the home of their Raise Your Voice! campaign, and it’s now in full swing! Here’s the official Press Release:

170 Million Americans for Public Broadcasting and ANTI-Records are pleased to announce the release of Raise Your Voice!, a 16-track compilation of music from ANTI- artists being offered as a free download to advocates for public broadcasting. Anyone who signs up to join the campaign can download the compilation—available for a limited time only—by visiting RYVoice.org. Supporters will also have the opportunity to share Raise Your Voice! with their friends and social networks.

I always thought I was pretty on top of my music knowledge, and had a good grip on the various kinds of genres, top hits, and artists out there. But, as I have recently discovered, I thought way too highly of my knowledge of music. For some of you this may come as a shock, but until about three weeks ago, I had no idea who Fleet Foxes were, and had never heard their music. I was introduced to them by a friend because he could no longer stand the idea of having to drive to work with me again while listening to “my” music. He burned me a CD of songs he felt were “better” than mine and that was when my narrow and limited knowledge of music became very apparent. 

This idea of discovering new bands and artists started to intrigue me since I had been so stuck in my ways of only listening to my music, that I never really gave myself the chance to go out and explore. But, as I quickly learned, this exploring thing was not as easy as I thought. There are thousands of artists out there with multiple albums and I suddenly became very overwhelmed and defeated. This task was way larger than I anticipated and I was very close to giving up on my new project. Luckily, I was sent an article about an online site that makes the process of discovering new artists and bands a lot easier. GoRankem.com is “crowdsourcing the music discovery process. By aggregating the expertise of the existing fanbase for every artist, the prospective fans can more easily embrace a new artist or dive deeper into a catalog than they ever had before” (GoRankem). The site not only offers rankings on the artist’s best songs, but also provides interactive features between its members.

Marketing over social networks used to be easy. You would create a MySpace page, upload a few songs and a picture or two and let millions of users do the rest by virtually spreading the word. Fast forward to now – boy, has that changed. With a seemingly ever-expanding plethora of social networking sites all trying to appeal to as broad an audience as possible, marketing yourself over these platforms has moved from hobby to chore to nearly a full time job. The typical artist must manage and keep up-to-date their Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, website, and any other social media platforms they’ve chosen to market themselves over. Most artists will confess that constantly updating each and every one of their online marketing platforms takes much longer than they’d prefer. The process is arduous at best, and any artist will acknowledge their true desire to use that time creating music. Yet, in the modern age it’s an integral portion of anyone’s marketing strategy.

Enter Musedash, a new online application that lets musicians manage all their social network profiles from one main dashboard. From this dashboard, you can post content (be it status updates, links, news, or photos and videos) and choose to which networks you’d like the content to appear on. So you could simultaneously post a news article on your Facebook profile, your Facebook page, your Twitter, your MySpace, and any other applicable network – all with just one click. Musedash sets itself apart from competing services like Hootsuite and Ping.fm by catering specifically to musicians. And, recognizing that most musicians are not computer geeks in their spare time, creator Hilke Ros and the rest of the Musedash team have made user-friendliness a top priority. The result is a clean, simple and straightforward application designed to make social networking easier, not more complicated. Potentially, using Musedash to manage multiple social networks simultaneously could save valuable time and frustration, and would eliminate the possibility of mistakes or inconsistent information on different networks.

Late last month, the unveiling of Google+ prompted the world over reconsider the future of social media and online networking, and many began to wonder if The Goog’s latest product would boast enough innovative features to dethrone Facebook, king of the social networking realm. Speculation has run rampant as the search giant’s latest foray into new media gains momentum, much of which attempts to size up Google+ against Facebook. Many in the tech world are projecting whether or not + will be successful both in stealing existing social network users and attracting new ones. But here at Oniracom, my compadres and I have been interested in how Google+ will integrate into the larger scheme of social media marketing and brand growth strategies. While wishful thinking would allow Google+, Facebook and others to harmoniously coincide with each other in the virtual world, it is becoming ever-more clear (as is obvious with Facebook’s Skype contract retaliation) that there really may only be room for one. It’s impossible to know which network, if any, will prevail, but Google+ is making a strong attempt by promising features and upgrades not available on Facebook or other social networking sites.

William Duvall, lead singer of Alice in Chains, approached Oniracom for a custom blog site to host his personal thoughts and day-to-day happenings. We skinned his Tumblr blog with a custom background image, social navigation, and a Topspin widget in the header of the page. Our design compliments the intuitive functionality built into Tumblr, and this option eliminates any needs to learn a content management system. We also created and branded William’s social networks as a foundation for his future brand health.

Visit WilliamDuvall.com to see this project in action!

Reggae artist Duane Stephenson is one of our amazing clients. He’s currently touring all throughout summer and hit recent single “Better Tomorrow” is generating some serious buzz and airplay, along with the song’s music video. Duane and his team have truly been a pleasure to work with. If you haven’t check it out yet, head over to duanestephensonmusic.com to see what we created and learn more about this fantastic artist.

Today Oniracom turns 10 years old!  We are proud to be serving the music and entertainment industry for the past 10 years.  Here is to another successful decade in Santa Barbara, CA!