| Find out about franchises, how to buy one
Sparks residents considering buying a franchise are invited to attend a seminar from 7:30 to 9 a.m. Thursday at the Washoe County Complex, 1001 E. 9th St. in Reno. Participants will have the opportunity to learn about small business and franchise facts, strategies for finding the right business, the legalities of franchising and how to properly investigate franchises. To register, visit www.sparkschamber.org .
Village Coffee brews up growth
Village Coffee is branching out. Village Coffee founder Tommy Lowery currently owns three stores -- the original in Troy and two in east Montgomery -- and he's sold licenses in Millbrook, Prattville and Enterprise as well as one in California. He says he's negotiating a dozen other license deals. The Alabama-based company is growing through licensing, which allows the buyer a more affordable and more flexible opportunity than franchising, Lowery said. Under a franchise agreement, the store operator follows instructions from corporate on almost every aspect of running the business. In a license agreement, the store owner has permission to use a company's name and sell its products, according to Daniel Slocki, a counselor at the Auburn University Small Business Development Center.
Net Neutrality: Online Publishers Providing Little Backing To The Network Neutrality Campaign
Net neutrality remains a hot topic, even when it seems not to grab any more the top tech headline news. Photo credit: Hypermania and Rui Vale De Sousa - Photo mash-up: Robin Good Network neutrality is about a principle that is applied to residential broadband networks, and potentially to all networks. A broadband network free of restrictions on the kinds of equipment that may be attached and the modes of communication allowed, and where communication was not unreasonably degraded by other communication streams would be considered neutral by most advocates. Since the early 2000s, advocates of net neutrality rules have warned of the danger that broadband providers will use their power over the "last mile" to block applications they do not favour, and also to discriminate between content providers, and particularly their own competitors.
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