How To Succeed In Silicon Valley By Bumbling And Failing...

Afterwards, I went over to congratulate him on his award and also say how much I enjoyed his speech. Rebecca Buckman, one of Forbe's top journalists, was also there. He then started to tell us a very interesting story, about how Silicon Valley VCs could have saved the newspaper industry--back in 1996.

He also spoke about the importance of Stanford university and its encouragement of entrepreneurs. Other universities look down upon business people.

Judy Estrin: Silicon Valley Unwilling To Fix Structural Problems Around Innovation, Blame Others

Kay Koplovitz: We Need More Women Entrepreneurs

Vinod Khosla: How To Succeed In Silicon Valley By Bumbling And Failing...

- Second quarter VC investments jumped to $1.2 billion in 85 deals compared with first quarter $836 million in 59 deals.

- Solar power was once again the leading investment segment at more than $330 million.

- One of the drivers for steady second quarter venture investment was the promise of stimulus monies offering startup investors a non-dilutive funding source.

- Early-stage and late-stage investments dominated, while mid-stage funding was harder to come by, and the average round sizes were slightly smaller.

- No giant $100 million+ solar or biofuel rounds as in 2008.

- Second quarter was more balanced investments across sectors:

Talenthouse aims to be the first online community for artists worldwide. It allows them to exhibit their work and also to connect with each other to collaborate on projects.

"With Talenthouse we eliminate the age-old artistic struggle for recognition and instead focus on creative excellence,” said Roman Scharf, CEO of Talenthouse. “We are filling a tremendous void felt by the artistic community."

The site has won support from international artists:

She said that women haven't had the access to capital and she urged Silicon Valley to "open your hearts" to more women entrepreneurs.

Her Bio:

Kay Koplovitz is currently a principal of Koplovitz & Co. LLC., a media investment firm and is the founder of USA Network, the first basic cable network delivered via satellite nationwide. Koplovitz was the first woman to head a television network when she founded USANetworks under the banner of Madison Square Garden Sports in 1977. Ms. Koplovitz co-created Springboard Enterprises, a national organization that fosters venture capital investments in women-led high growth companies. Since its inception, Springboard has presented over 380 companies that have raised $4.4 billion in new capital. She also co-founded Boldcap Ventures, a venture capital fund backed exclusively by leading women executives. Ms. Koplovitz is Chairman of the Board of Liz Claiborne, Inc. and a board member of CA.

Please see:

Judy Estrin on the Gender Gap in Silicon Valley

Ms Estrin again voiced her concerns during her speech at the SDForum Visionary Awards 2009. She was one of four recepients of the annual awards.

She said that Silicon Valley has been living off the innovative work that has been created over the past 30 years but that there needs to be new work done to support future startups.

"What I've been struck by, and concerned by, is that although everybody seems to understand that we have significant structural problems, few are willing to acknowledge their role in the solution. Each group tends to point to someone else that needs to change. The VCs need to take more risk, Wall Street needs to be less short-term focused, government is too involved, government is not involved enough... This is natural because change is hard. But isn't innovation and change what this valley is all about?"

She said that there is a need for "sustainable innovation" so that our future generations, our children, can experience a quality of life at least as good as we have had.

Here is her speech:

Now he has sworn off FriendFeed and Twitter, saying that those services are "hurting long-time knowledge." This about turn comes on the heels of Mr Scoble berating Kara Swisher at All Things D for not taking part in the real-time web.

It’s interesting that neither Kara nor Walt show up very often on friendfeed, which is the best example of the 2010 Web right now. Kara Swisher has made a total of five comments there. Walt is even worse, doesn’t bring any items in there, and only has six comments. How can you know what the 2010 Web is, if you don’t use it and don’t participate in it?

However, by largely avoiding the real-time web Ms Swisher and Mr Mossberg have chosen to protect their largest asset -- their web site traffic.

By neglecting, Scobleizer, a web site run by Mr Scoble's employer, Rackspace, traffic to the site has plunged.

In just two months, from March to May 2009, Compete.com reports that traffic to Scobleizer fell from 181,500 unique visitors to 91,792. That's a nearly 50% drop in unique visitors!!! If the traffic for June can be projected, it looks headed for a 75% plunge.

I can imagine that Rackspace isn't too pleased to have such a massive drop in audience for its advertising and outages reports.

I'm sure that Robert can bring back the traffic but it's clear that its going to be difficult for him to also be active in all the other places, Building 43, Google Reader, email, Twitter, FriendFeed, FaceBook. And there's a lesson here for others too. You can't do it all.

“We’re here to help nonprofits master the social Web to bring about meaningful social change,” said J.D. Lasica, a consultant and author of four books about emerging technologies. “There’s nothing else like this on the Web for nonprofits, social change organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and educators. Socialbrite's mission is to shine a light on the best practices, social tools and strategies that will benefit each of these important constituencies.”

He told me that the @Cisco news site is run by journalists, and gets more traffic than the top computer trade newspapers. At the time Cisco was publishing more than 200 RSS streams. The penny quickly dropped and it was another of many "aha!" moments I have had since leaving the Financial Times five years ago.

These days more people understand the term and what it means to companies. However, not everyone understands what it takes to be a media company. If you are going to do it well It's a hell of a commitment.

His acceptance speech was short and very good. Excellent advice for entrepreneurs.

Also, he talks about failure, which I have long advocated is Silicon Valley's strength.

A couple of years ago I met with a delegation of Russian diplomats, VCs, and government officials. They were visiting Silicon Valley and wanted to meet with me as part of their tour. They were looking for ways to create several silicon valley-like regions in Russia.

During our meeting, I told them I would tell them the secret of Silicon Valley. I paused. They all leaned in a little closer...