peHUB First Read

* Larry Cheng: If a board meeting was like the State of the Union * Wall Street tries to put a price on the Volcker rule. And some of its more tone-deaf denizens try to reposition themselves as victims. * All VC firms talk a good game on innovation. Only a select few, however, display any substantive innovation when it comes to their own business models. First Round Capital is one of them. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London rises early, European shares gain on commodities, the Nikkei falls on exporters and China shares drop on Beijing tightening. * Martha White: Can Obama make you get an IRA? * How a tweet brought makeshift 911 services to life in Haiti * Rob Go says that the iPad will revolutionize the textbook industry. Should Chegg.com and its clones be worried? * 81% of men say opportunities to move to middle management are gender neutral. Only 52% of women agree. * Charlie O'Donnell has a message for MBA grads looking to join startups: "Let me break the news to you bluntly—most of you are going about this startup thing completely ass backwards and no early stage startup that I know of is really dying to hire an MBA. What they want is a ninja, and a hundred grand or so later, your diploma is not universally recognized as a “I haz ninja skillz” card."