For the last 43 weeks I’ve consistently scanned all the press there is to scan about the Iowa startup community to put together the Welch Avenue Weekly (a super cool news digest of the top three news items each week). That means looking at the big community newspapers (and the small), the local blogs and the national tech press as well as trolling a few lists of startup founders to see who is writing about their companies. What I’ve found through that process is that there are five people who consistently write about the startup community. There are many others who will occasionally write about it — for instance when a community hosts an event like a Startup Weekend that business reporter for the local paper will often cover that event.

StartupCity Des Moines has been the Central Iowa “entrepreneurial center of gravity” in Des Moines for the past few years. Unfortunately, it’s planning for a hard stop at the end of September. That organization’s leaders have done a lot to encourage others in the community to build upon their work and establish some sort of successor initiative. Over the past several weeks I’ve been working with a few folks in the community and I think we have a solid idea.

Here’s a quick behind-the-scenes look at why we’re working to grow EntreFEST into Iowa’s entrepreneur conference and how it’s shaping up this year.

A guest post by Amanda Styron West

The round up of tech jobs in this state on our radar this week. Go get hired!