About Us

Technical.ly is the country’s longest-running news organization dedicated to innovation economies, covering entrepreneurship, jobs of the future and the local effects of technology. Our editorial is free to read, widely shared and surfaced by social platforms and AI tools, for far greater reach than paywalled media. 

Our mission is to connect and challenge a community of technologists and entrepreneurs invested in where they live. Our vision is to make innovation accessible to anyone anywhere — to ensure all places thrive. We contribute to this vision by gathering and distributing news and information about and for technologists and entrepreneurs. This includes people and startup profiles, context on programs and resources and economic data analysis.Our team values include being welcoming, connective and challenging. Find our strategic vision here.

The Technical.ly beat is in three parts: high-growth entrepreneurship, jobs of the future and the local effects of technology, including artificial intelligence.

We focus first on the entrepreneurs, technologists, scientists and other builders: of ecosystems, companies and brands. Through them, we cover how local economies change.

Technical.ly reports wherever entrepreneurial and innovation ecosystems are invested in and prioritized. Place-based economic development organizations financially underwrite where our independent reporting can focus – though our newsroom remains editorially independent. 

Currently, Technical.ly reports in Baltimore, Washington DC, Delaware, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh; in addition to Louisiana, Nebraska and Kansas City. We are expanding coverage nationally through our Innovation Ecosystems Map and data-driven reporting.

Our readers are primarily entrepreneurs, STEM workers and their supporters, which includes investors, economic development leaders, workforce professionals, policy makers, researchers, other journalists, and anyone invested in how innovation changes communities.

About 150k+ readers visit our site monthly. We have 50k weekly newsletter subscribers and 100k professionals in our database — one-quarter entrepreneurs, one-third tech and science workers, plus investors, HR pros and civic leaders. Our audience has gender balance, and is almost 40% people of color. Our readership is concentrated in innovation regions from NYC to DC, Boston to the Bay Area, though wherever we report, we grow a local audience.

Beyond our dedicated audience, our creator-led social media strategy and optimization for AI-powered chatbots mean we’re a platform for extending your ecosystem story.

Technical.ly is funded primarily in three ways: financial underwriting, advertising and research. We pursue philanthropic funding for journalism projects that fulfill particular community needs.

Economic development groups financially underwrite our reporting to spotlight innovation in their states and regions. 

Additionally, tech employers, service providers and others that need to reach our coveted audience of technologists, entrepreneurs and their supporters advertise through our content, newsletters and curated events. 

We also produce research and reports, and attract issue-specific philanthropic funding for journalism on economic, technology and workforce issues related to representation, accessibility and accountability.Learn more about working with Technical.ly in Our Services.

Our newsroom operates under clear ethical guidelines, including transparency, fact-checking standards, conflict-of-interest policies and a strict separation between our newsroom and client services. Our editorial team decides what we cover, independent of funders or advertisers.

Others in business media and custom publishing sell access, sometimes called “pay to play.” Technical.ly does not. Financial underwriting determines where we report, not what we publish. Our newsroom work is never previewed. That credibility is what earns attention from founders, investors and policymakers — and ensures stories have lasting value. For guaranteed messaging, we also offer clearly labeled sponsored content through our client services team.

Find our Ethics Policy here.

We value accuracy, transparency, civility, local context, community engagement and a belief that innovation should benefit more people in more places. We tell stories that illuminate systems — not just celebrate successes.

The Technical.ly newsroom is always open to relevant story ideas about entrepreneurs, technologists and local economies in change. Our newsroom is only interested in stories relevant to the geographies we currently serve.

Our contact page has a process here. 

Please include background information, relevant links and your contact details. One piece of advice: Find another recent story we’ve published that is similar to the one you hope told and include that in your pitch. Each story’s author has contact information.

Yes, selectively. Contributors should provide unique insights supported by data or relevant experience. Contact our editorial team before submitting a draft. Our contact page has a process here. We do not pay for contributed articles, op-eds and guest commentary.

We do occasionally pay freelance journalists for pieces of journalism beyond the work of our full-time newsroom.

Organizations work with Technical.ly in one of a few ways: Pitching the newsroom on a story or coordinating a media partnership to promote an event (at no cost); advertising a service, engaging the newsroom for research or by financially underwriting a series on a topic or place.

In each ecosystem we serve, Technical.ly identifies “preferred partners” for key areas that our community seeks business introductions to, including startup lawyers, commercial banking, accounting, real estate, software development and career advancement, among others.

Contact us here, and learn about Our Services here.

The Technical.ly Innovation Ecosystems Map is the most comprehensive resource to navigate entrepreneurial and tech economies.

The map is a national, data-rich directory of state and local startup and tech ecosystems. It helps readers and partners understand the data-backed narrative of each U.S. state and the most dynamic innovation ecosystems in the country. Find the map at technical.ly/ecosystems.Technical.ly is the country’s longest-running news organization dedicated to innovation economies, covering entrepreneurship, jobs of the future and the local effects of technology. Our editorial is free to read, widely shared and surfaced by social platforms and AI tools, for far greater reach than paywalled media. 

Accuracy is core to our mission. If you see an error, contact us here, or email the author of the story in question. Each Technical.ly author byline has an email associated with it.

We review all concerns quickly and update stories transparently when needed.

You can read our full ethics policy here.Our privacy policy is here.

You can subscribe to the national Technical.ly newsletter, our local newsletters, the ecosystem building-focused Builders newsletter by our publisher Christopher Wink and Breaking Alerts at technical.ly/subscribe/.

Support comes through reading, sharing our work, subscribing to newsletters and tipping us off to important stories. In addition, our financial backers ensure our reporting is freely accessible.

Place-based economic development and other ecosystem leaders can financially underwrite our reporting to amplify your state, region or county. Service providers can advertise or become a preferred partner. Learn more here. 

We believe strong local journalism requires strong local partners.

Our team includes full-time journalists, product managers, revenue strategists and operations staff located in several regions. Meet the team here.

The Technical.ly executive team includes founder-publisher and CEO Chris Wink, Client Services Director Aileen McNulty and Editorial Director Danya Henninger.

Technical.ly has a contact page here. Individual team emails can be found here.

We do have a general phone number, with a voicemail we do check, at 215-821-8745.

We allow limited republication with attribution under specific circumstances. Contact [[email protected]] for permissions.

We tell the story of local innovation — how technology and entrepreneurship shape real communities. Unlike national tech outlets focused on Silicon Valley or major corporations, our lens is grounded in regional economies, everyday innovators and community impact.

Technical.ly is unusual in that it has a national reach but with a local lens.

Ecosystem storytelling is Technical.ly’s approach to reporting on the systems, networks and relationships that help entrepreneurs and technologists succeed. We focus on the people and institutions that make local innovation possible — not just the outcomes.

Ecosystem storytelling is an ongoing communications and engagement strategy for amplifying and connecting a tech and startup economy. 

Many industries use the “ecosystem” metaphor, in which many different species work together within a narrow environment, but few have adapted it so formally as entrepreneurial ecosystem building, which now offers certifications and formal strategies. 

First released in 2019, the influential Kauffman Foundation ecosystem building playbook identifies seven key strategies for fostering a healthy entrepreneur support system and storytelling is one of them. Read more here. 

A strong storytelling strategy delivers clear, measurable results for innovation economies. Technical.ly’s analysis of 50 regions found that consistent, ecosystem-focused reporting leads to:

• More visibility: Regions with dedicated storytelling generate 58% more follow-on media coverage, helping attract investors, talent and partners.
• Stronger identity and alignment: Human-centered stories help residents understand their ecosystem, highlight overlooked voices and build connections across founders, funders and institutions.
• Faster startup growth: Over a decade, storytelling-supported regions saw their startup economies grow to about twice the size of comparable areas without storytelling.
• High economic return: The added media exposure created hundreds of thousands to over $1M in value per region — often far exceeding the cost of storytelling.

Bottom line: Storytelling doesn’t just document progress. It creates it by building shared narrative, momentum and resilience.

Yes. Though no longer primarily an events organization, Technical.ly hosts regular curated dinners and receptions for our community and clients. Our newsroom is also frequently a media partner of other ecosystem events.

Most prominently, we host our annual Technical.ly Builders Conference which is focused on storytelling strategies for ecosystem builders and entrepreneurs. Learn more about Builders here. 

In its early days, Technical.ly founded Philly Tech Week, Baltimore Innovation Week, Delaware Innovation Week, the NET/WORK tech jobs fair and other events that brought smart people together. Over time, we transitioned these events to others so we could focus on storytelling.

Yes. Our stories are easily accessible to search and AI platforms. Editorial media, such as a news organization like Technical.ly, are the primary source material of chatbots and other AI tools. We consider this a primary way we distribute the news and information we gather. 

We are actively developing guidelines to ensure visibility, accuracy and fair use of our work as AI evolves. Technical.ly has produced a well-regarded policy for our ethical use of AI here. 

Regions can sponsor their placement on the map or collaborate with Technical.ly on deeper ecosystem storytelling packages. Contact our partnerships team for details.

Technical.ly was founded in 2008 by three friends and recent Temple University graduates — Chris Wink, Brian Kirk and Sean Blanda — who launched a reporting project together after struggling to find journalism work during the Great Recession. On February 9, 2009, Wink published the first story that would become Technical.ly, and the trio grew the beat, audience and events in its early years. Blanda departed in 2011 on friendly terms, and Kirk left in early 2019, also amicably. Since then, Wink has served as Technical.ly’s primary founder-leader, guiding its overall strategy.

No! Our beat is so specialized it’s very unlikely to be regularly covered by other local media . Instead, our reporting leads to more coverage from local, industry and national publications and from individual creators. We participate in news collaboratives and co-publish series.

The Technical.ly newsroom certainly competes with other national and local tech and business media on select, high-profile stories that are highly relevant to our beats. However, our coverage is so specialized, more often than not we are not competing with other news organizations.

Instead, Technical.ly’s competition is more tied to our business model, including other communications strategies for place-based economic development and advertising and research providers. 

In a broader sense, like all journalism organizations, Technical.ly competes with any one that intends to leave our community less informed about the world.