Conferenza

TechCrunch <20> 40 3+4 Community, Collaboration and Crowds

Session 3: Community & Collaboration

* Story Blender (Enfra Networks) - (Seoul, South Korea) online blending of rich media.
* TripIt (SF) - organizing travel data onto one site.
* Flock (Mountain View, CA) - Social Web browser long in development.
* MusicShake (Seoul, South Korea) - aimed at mixing professional-quality music.
* 8020 Publishing (SF) - hybrid Web and magazine media publication.

Session 4: Crowd Sourcing

* Cake Financial (SF) - social community investment service.
* DocStoc (LA) - online professional document library and retrieval.
* Teach The People (Astoria, NY) - online education social network.
* CrowdSpirit (France) - community built around product design.
* Ponoko - personal manufactoruing platform.

The two sessions had much in common - as judge Yossi Vardi stated, these are very much a part of a new generation of grassroots-built companies.

Expert judges: Jossi Vardi, Ron Conway, Don Dodge, Rajeev Motwani.

Graeme's Conferenza WrapUp

Graeme Thickens has written a most prolific series on the Demo conference.  He says there were 30 postings in all, but we didn't keep count.  In any case he has an excellent wrap up of the event here.

Demo's 3 Threes

Conferenza is going to start doing this for the conferences we cover, providing a summary of the three trends, companies and people that are the most memorable. For Demo, this proved to be a challenge because there were so many outstanding companies and demonstrators. After a couple days reflection, I still had trouble narrowing the people and companies down to three.

The three trends

• The tech industry is back in force.  There was no talk of bubbles or features v. companies. These 68 presenting companies gave compelling evidence that disrupting innovation is alive and well and growing.
• Search is exploding. Whether it's photos, vertical subjects, available source code or greater depth than Google gives you, there were more search companies than attendees would have imagined. Whether they collectively intrude on the Google throne or surround it remains to be seen.  But there is no doubt the search landscape is going to change and the user will be the winner.
• Web 2.0, the so-called "people's Web is what matters.  After years of amorphous drifting, the industry is coalescing into a new Internet, one in which the end user takes his r her rightful place at the center, rather than at the edge.  Instead of being marketed to, the emerging technology shows that the end user will have greater controls, greater freedoms and greater benefits.

The three companies

• Riya. Okay, Riya was one of the companies I had worked with.  But they were also the most discussed company at Demo and, in early returns, the most written about of the conference.
• Ugobe. Ugobe introduced Pleo the sensor-wired robot dinosaur that every child and many adults will simply have to have by the time Christmas roles around this year.
• Panoratio Database Images. Perhaps the least memorably named presenting company, I think it presented the most enduring technology of the conference in its elegant approach to extracting information from massive databases from laptops. We imagine seeing their technology in and held devices at some future Demo conference.

The three people

• Chris Shipley. Now in her 10 year as host-moderator, she has become Demo's icon and sets the tone for this dazzling event. In her opening keynote this year, she set the theme of simplicity in technology.  And the theme carried out throughout the event.
• Walt Mossberg.  There is simply no doubt, Walt is the person most desired in every Demo booth.  He is usually gracious, but often asks the most bare-knuckled questions. He also mderated the post-awards panel and did a superior job of it.
• Pleo.   Okay, Pleo is a robot toy, and not reallya person.  But everyone wanted to bring Pleo home and we think that gves the cute little feller a special place. More than that, it's rare that we see technology so lovably packaged.

The one complaint

Tempe's Pointe South Mountain Resort sucked as a venue, in the opinion of just about everyone. The food, service, layout and assorted amenities were decidedly inferior to the Westin Kierlund, where the event had been held for the last two years.  The surrounding area was a mecca f fast food joints and gas stations. While the conference producers insisted the move was forced by a scheduling conflict with the previous venue most attendees said they felt the producers had cheaped out. I would add a complaint of my own.  IDG seems to be fond of moving their conferences from one hotel to another each year. I think attendees like the sameness and familiarity of returning to the same place ear after year.

Final thought

Year after year, Conferenza finds Demo to be an outstanding conference. It is the best venue we know for introducing new technology and products.  The social networking is always superb. As the opening act in the tech conference circuit it also seems to set the tone for the remainder of the year. Based on what we just experienced, it looks like it will be a very good year indeed.

Rerflections of a DemoGod

Basking in the hangover of having won a DemoGod Award, iotum's Alec Saunders reflects on what it means and ffers some tips to other start up companies.

I Typoed my Own Client

This is what happens when I blog after several glasses of celebration well past my usual bedtime. In announcing the DemoGod Awards, I typoed the name of iotum, my own wonderful client. I also botched his link. I am soooo sorry.

BTW, co-founder Alec Saunders has a pretty cool blog.  His current entry sounds just a bit like he's accepting the Academy Awards. Alec and his partner Howard Thaw were just wonderful to work with, and they have some phone management technology that will improve a lot of people's lives.

DemoGods and Personal Glory

I cannot report on the DemoGod Awards without basking in a bit of personal glory. I'll get that part out of the way first, then resume our regularly scheduled posting. I coached three companies for their Demo presentations.  They are Riya, the photo search engine Krugle, the open source search engine and iotum, the Web 2.0 personal call management system. All three won DemoGod Awards.  I am very grateful to have worked with such talented teams and such promising new technology.

Equally deserving were six other companies, some of whom I mentioned in earlier postings, all of whom seemed to have been favorites of the attendees I spoke with. They are:

• Network Streaming, Inc., the appliance maker who claims it can provide affordable tech support to any computer in the world over the Internet.
• Panoratio Database Images, the company that promises to bring supercomputer powers to laptop computers by allowing complex data to run in memory.
• VSee Lab-, the affordable computer video conferencing and sharing system for the rest of us.
• Ugobe, makers of the lovable dinosaur we earlier reported was named Cleo.  In fact, it is Pleo.  We met the company's CEO Bob Christopher who told us Pleo will retail for $200 and will most certainly be on toy shelves before Christmas, if not sooner.
• Kosmix, the Mountain View search engine company that attendees seemed to agree was better in many ways than Google.
• FrontPorch, Inc. of Sonora, CA, a seven-year-old security company who introduced Porchlight Security Messaging, which directly messages end users when when activities and vulnerabilities expose them to security risk. We were out of the room for this one, but word of mouth for them was strong.
• SproutIt Systems who introduced Mailroom, an email management software system that gives companies too small to have IT departments the type of prioritization and archiving that usually only large companies have. SproutIt also suggests form letter replies which can be customized before being sent out.

The night was capped by commentary by a panel moderated by the Wall Street Journal's Walt Mossberg, Ziff Davis Content Chief Michael Miller, Forbes Staff Writer Victoria Barret and USA Today Tech Writer Ed Baig. I'm generally not high on panels, but this one was truly outstanding for insight, candor and authentic wisdom.  Perhaps conferences have it wrong all these years.  Maybe we should just haul up veteran journalists and grill them with tough questions instead of the reverse.

There will be one or two more posts regarding Demo after I have a couple of days to reflect on the people, companies and trends that I thought most contributed to making this conference the success I consider it to be.

TJ Lists Demo Bloggers

I was just about to start scraping Technorati to see who else is blogging demo, and found TJ has done a good job of it already. Thanks, TJ!

Farber Live blogging Demo

Dan Farber is doing a superior job of live blogging Demo at his Between the Lines blog.  I should just sit behind him and copy what he has to say.

Nine Demo Companies to Watch

Along with my four favorites, discussed in a previous post, there are numerous companies worthy of mention. I say this based almost exclusively on their stage demonstrations. Conferenza usually spends a good deal f time listening to and pondering attendee comments  We will still do that in our newsletter which will come out several weeks from now.  If you want a copy of that just email me. In any case using a very subjective first-person voice, here are the companies I found that seemed promising:

• MyPeople of Birmingham, Ala. is a nationwide home phone service that uses interactive voice processing and VOIP for services. The nicest component is the ability to use VOIP for international calls directly from a residential line, cutting costs from about $1.40 a min to four cents. You use voice to make calls, rather than dialing.  The service lets you call in for weather reports and there's even a wake up service with a snooze option. Much of this may sound old hat, but this implementation s for residential users and it's $25 a month flat for all of these services..

• ZinkKat LLC introduced Chili, a cordless device for teenagers accessing Internet content like podcasts, RSS feeds, ski reports, voice-activated Craig's list and Internet radio from anywhere in the house. It is an extremely simple to use device with only two buttons on it. While we think it is a good example of moves toward making the user's life simpler, ZinkKat seems to be competing with all sorts of entrenched devices, that have massive dollars and established name brands behind them. We haven't had a chance to ask them about pricing r market plans yet.
• Transparansee Systems, Inc. of New York City introduced its BestMatch Search Engine which is yet another example of how the search for better search is evolving. Transparansee is addressing the problems we've all experienced with structured data. When users are asked to define preferences, the database traditionally has lacked the common sense to recommend, near misses. The company showed how BestMatch shows contextual options on a house hunters search. A request for 5-bedroom home for $500,000--$600,000 in a nice zip code neighborhood, can be adjust t show some good four bedroom options, or options in the next neighborhood over, etc. Users can use a slider to make bedrooms more important than price, r the reverse.  In fact, the company maintains, --searches structured data such as a real estate listing.  Gives you options that are close, but don't match. such as one more bedroom at same price.  Stops you from getting too many results, goes for lowest price and highest value. You can move sliders to change what's most important between price and bedroom.
• AOL acquired a Silicon Valley startup named Truveo a while ago,and the child f that marriage AOL Video Search was launched today. It is a video search engine that the company claims makes it easy to find and extract the clips you want from the 20 billion video streams available today on the Internet. AOL describes this as a new video platform that will at some unspecified point in the future allow you to watch any and all web-based video on your TV.
• Zimini of Elmhurst, IL is the newest of a long line of companies over many years claiming to provide end users with promotional offers that they really, really want.  Their Demo backed it up to some degree. In an era of web-based services, Zimini offers a free software download in which customers are supposed to enter their interests, then start receiving coupons and promotional offers that are relevant to them. Zimini keeps offers current. Merchants can use it as a promotion server and have the tools to track results. We are usually skeptical of anything that takes a presence in our computers and gets to scrape personal demographic data from individuals. Whether Zimini is the exception or not remains to be seen.
• Sprout Systems of El Cajon, CA introduced SproutIt MailRoom, which sorts and organizes small business email. Gives template answers to standard inquiries to save time. This s old news for global enterprise denizens, but Sprout is dedicated to businesses of 10 or less people. Small business is oft overlooked in technology, in part because they are late adopters, and in part because they are a horizontal and difficult t sell to.
• iotum, of Ottawa, yet another company I consulted briefly, introduced a system for managing when calls get into your life and stay out of it, automating and simplifying the job of a hum executive assistant. In the course of a day, the context of who is and is not a top priority caller changes, and iotum, the company says, is smart enough to know when the wife's call needs to get in and when it should not. It also seems to vastly simplify the annoyance and confusion that pervade many conference calls.

• Vivid Sky LLC of St. Louis, MO introduced SkyBox, an apparent must for people who attend live sports events. It does lots of neat things likes gives you a map to your seat and let's you order your beverage and hot dog from the concessionaire who then delivers to your seat. But what puts it over the wall is that you have a personalized chance for an instant replay of that great catch, pass, fumble or dunk you missed while looking in the wrong direction.  Skybox can access any TV camera in the stadium to let you see the shot
• NewsGator introduced Hosted Solution--for publishers such as newspapers to RSS enable content and serve it to users. This is an indication of what co-founder and CTO Greg Reinacker has been talking about--taking NewsGator into the corporation where a server strategy can be much more lucrative than a consumer strategy. Of greater relevance to those of us on the front end is that the incredible potential of RSS may start moving more rapidly beyond bloggers as more and more static Internet content starts getting directly fed to those who want it..

Snowflakes, Simplicity & Aging Demonstrators

Every Demo conference, seems to me to be a bit like a snowflake. They are like all the others in many ways, but on closer look they are also very different.  There are some trends forming which I'll discuss in a later posting, but one observation is that the Demo Class of Winter 2006 is older in years than any I can recall. There are no MBAs in short pants with dreams emoting from the stage. On one hand we miss them.  On the other, I remain impressed with the solid, credible presentations we are seeing.  We think the graying of the presenting teams may be a factor of investor predilections toward putting money on horses that have been around the track before.

The morning class continued to make the collective and demonstrable point that disruptions started a few years ago have been refined.  Kluginess is on the decline, professionalism is on the incline and and simplicity seems to be the central theme of the year.

I also feel that the industry has finally shaken off the past.  There has been nary a reference to the famous Bubble of yore.  Nor has a single investor asked aloud "is it a feature or is it a company" a question to which I have never had an answer.