In 2009 I attended The Europas Awards in London (above), celebrating the best European tech startups. It was a very boozy, rowdy, and fun event presented by Mike Butcher, Editor of Techcrunch Europe.

I couldn't make it this year but I'm sure that the 2014 awards very much the same in tone and booze. Mike Butcher was the MC, and even one of the winners was the same: Soundcloud. The other 2014 Europas winners included: FoodPanda, Babbel, Startup Bootcamp, Brainient, Supercell, EyeEm, GoCardless, DataSift, Petcube, BlaBlaCar, BigHealth, ZenMate, Bitstamp, Hailo, Evrythng, Swiftkey, FarFetch, CodeClub, Index Ventures, and Telegram.

[At the time of writing I found no US coverage of today's Europas Awards, not even at Techcrunch. I scooped the US press. It shows how little interest there is in European startups.]

The above video captures some of the boisterous nature of the Europas, it's nothing like the sedate US "Crunchies" startup awards. I shot it during a week-long Traveling Geeks trip to London and Cambridge in July 2009.

It's a little pixelated at first but settles down quickly. You'll see plenty of familiar faces, such as Craigslist's Craig Newmark, Robert Scoble, Rocky Barbanica, Sarah Lacy, Paul Carr. You'll see a young(er) Hermione Way interviewing me, and also European entrepreneurs Alexander Ljung, founder of Soundcloud; and Mathys von Abbe, founder of Dutch startup Moby Picture.

- - -

Traveling Geeks: A Guardian Newspaper Media Panel, Twitter, From Back to Front And Beyond... -SVW

Innovation And Culture - Reflections On My UK Trip -SVW

Ewan writes:

Le Web 2009 was like a diamond, a few flaws but on the whole brilliant and sparkling and deserving of its place in the Conference Crown Jewels of tech land.

...cards on the table, I think that the Le Web from 2007 is still the Le Web to beat...

...Le Web is probably only second to SXSW in getting that certain cross section of people into one place. The true value of any conference is in the networking and Le Web delivers that both in those who attend and the time and space that you can find to interact.

...For Le Web 2010 I would not allow a speaker (or a host of a fireside chat) on stage if they had appeared in 2009...This would at a stroke force speakers to be found from new sites, companies and people with different views than who we heard this year. And many many more Europeans on stage please!

...I felt like I was back at University being lectured rather than watching presentations and panels at a web conference. Where was the encouragement to have a two way conversation? ... Why were there no questions from the audience?

...I abhor the idea of "fireside chats" in a program. If you have to bring back Marrissa Mayer and Michael Arrington ... then rather than an almost scripted talk, send Michael into the crowd to take questions from the audience to the Google VP. Same goes for any of these softball opportunities.

... The event could be so much more, and I hope that a bit more swashbuckling, danger and risk are present in the 2010 event.

You can read the whole post and more points from Ewan here:

Thoughts on Le Web 2009 : Ewan Spence's All New Musings.

But there is an important difference, as Beth Blecherman at Techmamas recently found on a visit to LeWeb:

While Silicon Valley geeks put on a clean tee shirt for tech conferences, European geekstake it up a notch. Here is a random geek waiting in line for LeWeb. I told him I was chronicling European Geek Chic. He looked confused but smiled for the camera. To top it off, he and many other Euro-geeks paired the geek uniform of jeans with a nice pair of (non-sneaker) shoes.
Just to keep up with the style, I put on every black and stylish piece of clothing I had. If I had time, I would of shopped from the assortment of beautiful french scarves to take my outfit up a notch.

Please see the full post, where Beth also looks for European girl geeks, which are even rarer than here:

Techmamas: Geek is a Global Language - But Twitter is Not (yet)

They all share many things in common: smart, passionate people with lots of great ideas and with innovative business strategies. It almost seems as if 'geek' has become the new lingua franca of startups the world over.

Today, if I were founding a startup, I believe that a hybrid strategy is best. The following is based on some of the conversations I've had this year and over the past few years with startups from many countries.

[Please note: The following advice depends upon the type of startup and is not intended to apply to all types of companies.]

The New Rules Global Startup:

- Diversity is very important, make sure you have people from many different countries, cultures and a diversity of experiences.

- Site your research and development in France and take advantage of the 50 per cent R&D tax credit.

- Cities such as Paris offer very good incubator centers where you can find cheap office space (500 Euros per month) with included support services such as meeting rooms, broadband, telephones, common workshops.

- Cambridge in the UK is a great place to recruit smart engineers and with a fantastic culture of innovation that stretches back hundreds of years.

- Put your CEO and CMO in San Francisco/Silicon Valley area. This provides close access to capital for expansion. VCs don't like to travel. Also, this is where much of the media that covers tech and startups has become concentrated.

There are also lots of events and conferences that will save a fortune on travel costs. Plus, your top executives get to practice their English language skills if they don't yet have them. English is the international language of commerce and that won't change in a hurry, even in China executives are learning English.

- Make sure your marketing and sales departments are located in the US. The amount of effort you put into expanding your business in your home country goes much, much further if you do it in the US first.

Plus, success even of the smallest kind in the US, is multiplied in perception in your home country (and in other countries). Just as Frank Sinatra sang about making it in New York, you can then make it anywhere.

- Have people in key urban areas such as San Francisco, Santa Monica, New York, London, Paris, and Berlin. Businesses need to understand the culture in which they want to be successful. If they aren't in it they won't know it. Cities are also where emergent cultures can first be spotted.

- Have software engineering work done in low cost regions such as Bangalore, Manila, etc. Even better, choose regions such as Krakow, where there is high quality and low turnover. Some development teams in regions such as Bangalore and Pune can be 100 per cent a year, while in places such as Krakow, turnover is around 5 per cent a year. High turnover means longer time to market, which can be fatal to a startup.

- Use as much open software technologies as possible, wherever they make sense.

- Use independent contractors as much as possible, again, where applicable. We live in an increasingly atomic society, whether we like it or not.

- Make use of social media, blogging etc, as much as possible and encourage your staff, wherever they are, to be mini-media brands. You should know where your customers and potential customers are online and offline and they should know you.

Everyone in your company should be an evangelist. If they are uncomfortable in that position maybe they should be in a different position.

- Try to build up as much of the company without resorting to VC investments. You'll raise your valuation. And you can focus on making money from your market rather than being constantly distracted by having to raise capital at regular intervals.

- - -

I'll be adding more rules for the Global Startup over the coming weeks. If you have some suggestions please let me know in comments or email.

[I'm trying to support my habit (journalism) with consulting projects. It'll be first come first serve. Let me know if you need any help: tom at foremski.com or 415 336 7547. (I'm in the UK until end of December.)]

- - -

Please see:

Paris Diary: Cultural Barriers To French Startups...

Paris Diary: Putting "French" Back Into Entrepreneur

Innovation And Culture - Reflections On My UK Trip

UK Diary: Friday - Cambridge Startups

UK Diary: Thursday - A Visit To Accell Partners - UK Is Tough On Startups

UK Diary: Tuesday - Seed Camp's Highflyers

Our fellow Traveling Geek Olivier Ezratty has been a wonderful guide to Paris and also to the Parisian startup scene. Olivier makes some angel investments and he consults with French startups.

I had mentioned that I was quite impressed with the quality of the French entrepreneurs. [Paris Diary: Putting "French" Back Into Entrepreneur]

He agreed that things had improved over the past few years but he also mentioned some of the issues that French startups still need to work on. Here are some notes from our conversation:

- Engineers have a higher status within French business than sales and marketing people. This means there is less importance attached to marketing skills.

- French startups try to start in France, then expand to French speaking countries, then Europe, then US. This is not the right way to do it.

- French startups should do what Israeli startups do - goo for the largest markets. Israel has virtually no domestic market so its startups have to try for the largest markets.

-It is very difficult to make sales in France if you are a French company. You know the old saying, "No one gets fired for buying IBM." Well, the same is true in France, there is a perception that no one gets fired for buying from a US company. Despite French nationalism, there is the perception that US companies are better than French.

- Few French entrepreneurs have good language skills, few speak English well.

- French startups need to diversify their staff. It is much better if they have different nationalities. Diversity is very important within a company.

- French startups would do better if they sited their sales and marketing in the US and win reference customers there. That would make it easier to make sales in France. They can keep their R&D in France and get the tax credits.

- The French culture has a mistrust of business people. Making money or becoming rich is viewed with suspicion. This attitude can be traced back to the early eighteenth century.

- People think twice about telling their families that they work for a startup. You can be considered a failure by family and friends if you do not work for a large company.

- - -

Please see: Olivier Ezratty on Traveling Geeks.

Also his blog: Opinions Libres

• Leweb 2009 - Sponsor speakers
• Leweb 2009 - Gurus and illustrious speakers
• Leweb 2009 - The Scorecard
• With the Traveling Geeks @ Orange
• With the Traveling Geeks @ Cedexis and Parrot
• With the Traveling Geeks @ Pearltrees
• With the Traveling Geeks @ Paris Incubator
• With the Traveling Geeks @ La Cantine
• With the Traveling Geeks in Paris

At LeWeb I was part of the Traveling Geeks group, and the group was producing a lot of great content. Here is a selection:

An excellent roundup of day two by Matthew Buckland:

matthewbuckland.com » Le Web 2009, Day 2: The good, the bad and the vacuous

The Andrew Keen panel on "Content vs Conversation: The Debate over Realtime Search" delivered quite nicely. You can't help but feel though that Keen, author of "Cult of the Amateur," is being contrarian for the sake of contrarian. What this means is that you tend not to take him seriously most of the time. He just becomes an actor, a clown, rather than someone who asks critical, important questions that test us and leads to insight. It's a pity because it's important to ask the difficult, unpopular questions -- but not at the expense of being frivolous.

...the marketing/PR panel "How brands and marketing have to adapt to this new worldwide real time 'word of mouth'" with Steve Rubel of Edelman Digital, Brian Solis, Founder & President, Future Works, Seth J. Sternberg, Co-Founder & CEO,Meebo and others. It was well moderated by the respected Chris Brogan, but ultimately disappointing. It was marked by vacuous buzzwords and statements, with little real argument, insight or practical example. My feeling is that these types of talks were important five years ago when we needed evangelism for online marketing or social media (i.e.: to tell everyone its important and they must do it!). But we've passed that phase. We get it. Let's delve deeper and have some original insights -- at least for the savvy audience of Le Web.

By David Spark:

The cool and not-so-cool of LeWeb

Not-so-cool - Who didn't pay to go on the main stage? - It appears about half of everyone who appeared on the main stage (panelists possibly excluded) paid in some manner to be there. It could be more. It's obvious because so many sponsors were on the main stage. None of these seemingly paid appearances were disclosed. I've been to plenty of conferences where there were paid presentations. Many disclose that information in the printed programs with the note, "Sponsored presentation." For a community that keeps talking about the need for "authenticity" online, I think it would be nice if there was some authentic disclosure as to who did and didn't pay to be on stage.
Not-so-cool - LeWeb is an old boys' network - I was thinking this and then I heard it repeated by a few of my colleagues. Loic gets many of the same people to present, interview, and moderate, such as Robert Scoble and Michael Arrington. Since they're friendly off stage, their on stage presentation has this sense of being an old boys' network. It's not the most welcoming feeling for the people in the audience. People were definitely unnerved by it.

By Robin Wauters from Techcrunch:

Niklas Zennström Talks European Entrepreneurship At Le Web 2009

Zennström said being an entrepreneur is a lifestyle, and requires complete dedication. Real company builders should forget about spare time and hobbies, and prepare for a lot of sweat and hard work. On the other hand, he said, riding that wave can prove to be very rewarding.

Le Web 2009 Roundtable: What Makes A Platform, Exactly?

Ryan Sarver (Twitter): we feel we have no choice but to treat developers within our ecosystem extremely well, we need that alignment.
David Jacobs (Six Apart): It's important to have an open platform, and the iPhone is a unique case for a multitude of reasons. But anyone else would be playing with fire doing it the way Apple does today.
Ethan Beard (Facebook): We have more than 350 million members now, so that's our key asset, it's what can make our platform unique. What's important to us is that user experience has to come first. I actually feel for the guys at Apple for having to manage their platform the way they are supposed to. But then again, our developers demand changes too, and we listen to them.

By Frederic Lardinois from ReadWriteWeb:

Pearltrees Beta Launches on Wednesday: Will Let You Archive the Links You Share on Twitter

Thanks to the new Twitter feature, which will put all of the links you share on Twitter into a drop box on Pearltrees, you can now easily create a complete archive of all the content you share. You still have to organize this content yourself, however. Pearltrees does not feature auto-tagging.

Jack Dorsey Talks About Square at LeWeb: Wants Dongle to be Available for Free

According to Dorsey, one of the original ideas for Square was to use the iPhone camera to take a picture of a credit card and then use OCR software to read the data. As Square wants to be able to offer its service on multiple platforms, however, the team decided to use a dongle that plugs into an audio jack.

Chad Hurley: YouTube Needs to Improve Search - More Live Programming Coming Soon

Hurley noted that a handful of users on the site make more than $1 million per year from their videos on YouTube...
Asked about YouTube on television and in the living room, Hurley said that his vision is basically a "box, an Internet connection and pizza." He did note, though, that all television will move towards an on-demand model.

Initially, there were complaints about there being 'too many Americans' and that the quality of the panels was poor -- too much fluff and self-promotion, and little substance.

But by the afternoon things improved a lot and there was an 180 degree turnaround in opinion - at least among the people I spoke with.

It's true that there were lots of Americans. I seemed to be constantly bumping into familiar faces, people I see all the time, such as Jeremiah Owyang, Dave McClure, Cathy Brooks, Chris and Kristie Wells, Robert Scoble, Brian Solis, Gabe Rivera, Steve Gillmor, and many more.

[Please see: Silicon Valley Goes To Paris... Le Web '09]

As much as I love them all, I've been trying to spend as much time as I can making new contacts and catching up with people I rarely see in the US.

Also, I'm not as interested in web 2.0 products as I am in the broader business picture, the culture of innovation and the differences between European and US startup environments. Fortunately, I've managed to do pretty well on fulfilling that goal, as hopefully you will see in current and future posts.

BT WiFi

The WiFi network at LeWeb has a long history of being a joke - there seems to be a curse on whoever tries to provide the service. This year, BT, the UK telecom giant agreed to run it.

I ran into JP Rangaswami, BT's Chief Scientist, a week ago, and he was concerned about taking on such a crucial role in such a public forum.

He needn't have worried. I can vouch for the fact that the connection was rock solid despite all the heavy users around me.

Chandeliers and champagne...

At the end of the first day of LeWeb, the Mayor of Paris invited everyone over to city hall (Hotel de Ville). It's a huge and hugely impressive building, built in 1882 in the grand chateau style.

Inside, we were greeted with a long staircase that led to the Salle des Fêtes, a stunning ballroom fitted with seemingly acres of chandeliers, gilded furnishings, and ceilings and walls painted with figures and historic scenes.

I ran into lots of people, such as Barak Hachamov, founder of my6sense, a very cool iPhone news filtering app. Barak is one of my favorite serial entrepreneurs, and it's always great to catch up with him.

I ran into Tara Hunt, once in San Francisco, now running Shwowp, a startup in Montreal. Also, Bob Rosenchein, CEO of Answers.com (a Traveling Geeks sponsor); Natasha Friis Saxenberg, representing the Danish based Webcom Labs, which helps develop startups; Jean-Xtophe Ordonneau from Melcion, Chassagne & Cie; Stephanie Hospital and Lionel Fumado from Orange; Rodrigo Sepulveda from Sepulveda.net; and Pierre Bellanger of Skyrock.com.

Silicon Valley exile

The highlight of my evening was meeting up with Dave Galbraith, a good friend who used to live in San Francisco and is now living in Geneva. It was Dave and Om Malik (GigaOm) that encouraged and inspired me to become a "blogger" -- nearly six years ago.

Dave is a serial entrepreneur and one of a very small number of people that I consider to be original thinkers. Dave is invariably a few steps ahead of everyone else.

Dave, Om, and I used to meet up at Harrington's pub in downtown San Francisco, Thursday evenings after work and have conversations that would spark ideas for days afterwards.

I miss the "Harrington sessions" because it's not easy finding people that share the same understanding of media, and insights into the 'web 2.0' business world. It's a type of language that few people understand well, even in Silicon Valley.

After the mayor's party we were going to go celebrate Brian Solis's birthday, but what was a small group had grown much larger and the logistics had become complex.

Dave and I decided to duck out, an easy choice, especially since I see most of those people on a near weekly basis.

Dave used to live in Paris and so we went to one of his favorite bars to have some dinner and catch up. It was great walking along ancient Parisian streets, lined with old buildings with that characteristic bowed profile. Dave is an architect by training and he explained that the bowing was because of the timber framework behind the facades, which imparts a flexibility that enables these buildings to survive hundreds of years.

When in Rome...

The place was small but perfectly sized, with a Parisian Bohemian decor and a lovely horseshoe-shaped bar counter of green marble, and a dining area in the back.

I ordered Tartare de Boeuf, one of my favorite dishes but one that most Americans would consider a suicidal choice: raw minced steak with a raw egg on top. It is eaten by mixing raw onions, capers, and dijon mustard. It's delicious.

Dave said he's been missing San Francisco and its startup community and being around people that shared an understanding of media, business models, and technology.

Even when he lived in New York, he said it was difficult finding like-minded people. In Geneva it is worse, there is no startup community at all, everyone is focused on money and little else.

It is easy to take San Francisco and the Silicon Valley startup community for granted. I often do it myself, it sometimes feels small and even insignificant.

When people ask who my audience is I often say, "I write for the 'high school cafeteria,' the 400 or so people that run Silicon Valley and that influence its trends and culture."

My traffic on SVW is much more than that, but still tiny compared to the a Techcrunch, or Mashable. However, I'm constantly impressed and flattered to find out who reads SVW. It's not about numbers of eyeballs, but who those eyeballs belong to, and I'm glad that they belong to some very key people, people whose influence is global.

And its this community that Dave belongs to -- hopefully he'll be back sooner than later.

- - -

[I'm in Paris as part of the Traveling Geeks, a group of journalists, bloggers, and PR people meeting with French startups and attending the LeWeb09 conference.]

Virtual tour of the Paris Hôtel de Ville (City Hall)

Why I'm Leaving (My Heart in) San Francisco | HPC

David Galbraith's Blog

The quality of the French startups we have been meeting with all week, has been very good.

It seems as if the French can once again claim back 'entrepreneur' instead of it being sometimes derisively labelled as an oxymoron in the French context.

But it seems to be a fairly recent phenomenon and one that relies on a compelling mix of government programs and tax breaks. While many countries have tried to encourage the formation of startups through various incentives, the French appear to have gotten the mix just right.

It wouldn't surprise me if in the near future, some US startups might choose Paris as a headquarters because of some of the advantages they can gain here, compared with an indifferent US government.

Kemal El Moujahid, CEO and Founder of Paris-based Teacheo, which provides a platform for online tutoring and collaborative tools, is a good example of a top quality French startup, of a type that we've (Traveling Geeks) I've been meeting with over the past three days.

Mr El Moujahid was born in Morocco, studied Information Technology in Paris, and has an MBA from Stanford university. He says that the French government has done a lot over the past few years to encourage entrepreneurs.

"There are a lot of programs that help startups raise funding, find office space, help hire people, and also fund research and development," he says.

About four years ago the French government began a series of programs to encourage innovation.

Here are some of the things it did:

- There is a French tax that is levied on wealthy individuals based on their net wealth, it is separate from tax on income. However, if they invest in a startup, they will receive a 75% tax credit. "That means that an investment of 100,000 euros costs them just 25,000 euros," says Mr El Moujahid. Because there is very little VC activity in France, this has become the main source of funds for startups.

- There are many government and city-run incubators. We visited the Paris Reunion Incubator, which specializes in digital media companies. It has 20,000 square feet of space housing 25 startups, fully wired with lots of shared office support services.

Startups pay just 500 euros per month for a 4-year lease. (I have a video interview with Martin Geurin, the manager (Chef de Projet) of the Reunion Incubator that I will post later.)

- France has the best research tax credit in Europe. Companies receive a 50% tax credit in their first year, and 40% in their second year.

- It is very easy to start a company. There is an 'auto entrepreneur' web site, and an almost one-click process that handles the paperwork and issues tax id numbers, etc.

- There are many government agencies that provide a variety of services to startups, such as HR.

But there are still some archaic obstacles in various sectors that seem to punish online companies, says Mr El Moujahid. For example, there is a 50% tax credit offered to parents that hire a tutor for their children but this does not apply to online tutors.

Also, there are cultural issues that can make it difficult to hire people, says Mr El Moujahid. He explained some of the issues:

- Top graduates tend to want to find a job with a large company rather than a startup. There is considerably less status in working for a startup. This is changing to some degree especially because of the slow economy.

- Hiring can be tough. Some candidates want to be paid considerably more than they would be paid at an equivalent job at a large company because of the risk in working at a startup, and they don't see much value in stock options. "Those candidates eliminate themselves," says Mr El Moujahid.

- Firing people is near impossible. They can sue their employer and always win a favorable judgement. "The best way is to negotiate a departure. You can tell them they have permission to apply for jobs while still working for you." This also works both ways, it is difficult to leave an employer in the lurch and take IP with them to a competitor, he says.

- Being fired from a job can be a good thing for an entrepreneur because they can receive two to three years unemployment at almost full salary and they are allowed to build a business during that time.

- Identifying yourself as an 'entrepreneur' doesn't have a great standing in some circles. But that is changing and the poor economy is creating new entrepreneurs across all age groups as conventional jobs dry up.

Mr El Moujahid says that he misses the 'can-do' attitude of SIlicon Valley. "Every US startup wants to takeover the world and they tend to be much more optimistic than in France. Sometimes that optimism is misplaced, they want to fight Godzilla with a plastic spoon - but the enthusiasm is great. In France, people are less ambitious and they focus on more modest goals."

He adds that sometimes there is distrust of the ambitions of entrepreneurs, a pursuit of money is viewed with suspicion.

Also, there isn't much room for failure. Unlike in the US, where entrepreneurs can fail many times and be concerned better for the lessons learned, French society is much less forgiving.

Is it easier to build a startup in the US?

"This is a question I often discuss with my American and French friends. I'm not sure. There are a lot of government programs and tax credits that make things easier here. But the US offers a larger market, access to capital, and a much more supportive culture for entrepreneurs."

"I think that learning how to build a startup is what's important and that that experience can be applied anywhere. At some point I know I will return to the US and apply what I have learned here."

[I'm in Paris all this week as part of the Traveling Geeks, a collection of journalists, bloggers, and PR people meeting with French startups and also attending LeWeb, France's premier Web 2.0 developer and business conference.]

I'm totally surprised because I had a totally different expectation. France has a reputation for bureaucracy ( a French word), for strikes, (the taxi drivers were on strike on Tuesday), and for archaic attitudes such as a strong belief in a maintaining a work/life balance, six-week vacations, a 35-hour week, and making it near impossible to fire a worker (you will receive as much as three years full salary if you are fired).

It seems amazing that France's economy hasn't shattered into pieces by now, and the country hasn't fallen below the waves of the ocean as a modern day Atlantis.

Instead, France has the highest labor productivity levels of all the G8 nations. And the quality of its entrepreneurs (another French word) is excellent.

I will be writing in more detail about some of the companies and people I've been meeting, later this week. And I'll be diving into why there is such a great current of innovation happening in France.

The French model might even become a template for other countries. That's because people from other countries are coming to France to set up their startups. Other countries risk a brain drain if they don't act to create a similar environment.

I'll let you know tomorrow about some of the reasons why France is enjoying an upswing its startup communities. I think you will be as surprised as I was.

[I'm in Paris all this week as part of the Traveling Geeks, a collection of journalists, bloggers, and PR people meeting with French startups and also attending LeWeb, France's premier Web 2.0 developer and business conference.]

I took the EuroStar train from London on Sunday afternoon and in less than 3 hours I was in the middle of Paris. That trip always amazes me and it is so much nicer, (and greener) than flying.

When I arrived it was raining off and on but that didn't matter because I was back in Paris after a ten year break.

I had to find my hotel, about a couple of miles from my terminus at Gare Du Nord but being short on cash I decided to walk in roughly the right direction, trundling my wheeled travel bag across cobble stone streets, and relishing being in one of the great cities of the world.

Because it was Sunday, there wasn't much traffic and there were few pedestrians, it was a rare and almost private experience.

I rattled along, enjoying the old buildings, and noticing the wonderful street names such as Lafayette, in honor of the heroes of the American revolution. And Place Stalingrad, and lots of narrow streets and tiny squares named after many heroes from many countries.

At times it seemed as if the entire city were dedicated to the memory of all those that had struggled for liberty, equality and fraternity... I loved it.

Near enough...

I managed to get to within 200 yards of my hotel on Rue Roy before I gave up and asked for directions. I was quite proud of my zig zag route sans Google maps or any other navigational aids...

That evening I met up with my fellow Travelling Geeks. Eliane Fiolet, publisher of the excellent gadget news site, Ubergizmo in San Francisco, and a native Parisian, picked out a modest little restaurant for dinner.

There were about 20 of us, half local French geeks and entrepreneurs. And it wasn't long before it felt as if we'd all known each other for years, laughing, showing each other family photos, and comparing notes about life in Paris and Silicon Valley. Yet another miracle of shared food, shared experiences, ... and wonderful red wine.

Monday monday...

Monday was a very full day, lots of meetings with French startups, lots of presentations by French geeks. I'll have more to say about some of the great business ideas we came across in later posts, but right now, I wanted to say how similar the Parisian geeks are to our Silicon Valley geeks.

They have the same way of dressing, the same way of talking about technology, the same passion, the same understanding of the issues we think about and talk about all the time in Silicon Valley.

Even though we sometimes struggled with each other's broken French and English, it was remarkable how much we still shared a common language, and how much we understood each other. We all spoke Geek, this was our lingua franca.

I had a similar experience in the summer when I was with the Traveling Geeks in London and Cambridge.

It's as if there really is an international fraternity of geeks, a common culture that celebrates innovation, and transcends language and borders. And that's very encouraging...

(Please return for more Paris diary posts all this week.)

- - -

Here are some photos from Renee Blodgett, our tireless Traveling Geeks organizer Renee Blodgett:

Traveling Geeks Kick Things into Gear in the Marais

Also, I wanted to thank Eliane Fiolet for all her work in making this trip possible.

You can follow the whole gang on Twitter with the hashtag #TG09.

met with my fellow Traveling Geeks

I'll be attending Le Web as part of the "Traveling Geeks" [misspelling deliberate], organized by Renee Blodgett. Also on the trip: Eliane Fiolet, , Robin Wauters, ]]> Mon, 30 Nov 2009 04:13:42 -0800 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000 https://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/tooling-up-for-the-online-world---traveling-geeks-top-apps/ https://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/tooling-up-for-the-online-world---traveling-geeks-top-apps/240560

I spent much of July in the UK with the "Traveling Geeks" a group of journalists and bloggers meeting with leading European startups.

JD Lasica, the tireless organizer of the trip, recently put together a list of our favorite tools and apps: Coolest power tools of some top geeks.

With so many choices out there, I'm always fascinated by what others are using. Personally, I try to use as many cloud based apps as I can so that I can work from any computer, mine or maybe yours. Here's some favorite Traveling Geek apps, please see the original post for full list:

JD Lasica

- I just started using HootSuite 2.0, a Web-based, Ajax-smart Twitter application that I find superior (so far) to the downloadable Tweetdeck and Seesmic Desktop apps. (I'm @jdlasica on Twitter.)

- Zoho Writer and Zoho Sheets, which are superior to Google Docs (though I use the latter when forced)

- Snapz Pro X, to capture images and movies from any Mac computer screen

- Paparazzi, a wonderful tool for Mac users to capture entire Web pages -- even the portions that appear below the fold

- iPhone apps: Google maps (for location), Stanza and eReader (for reading), experimenting with Twitterfon, Tweetdeck, Twittelator and Simply Tweet for Twitter, Evernote (for keeping notes online), Loopt and Google Latitude for geo-awareness, Yelp for restaurants, Rocket Taxi, iTalk and QuickVoice (for interviews and recording random thoughts)

Robert Scoble

- Friendfeed ("Friendfeed is my chat application.")

- PeopleBrowsr, for social media search

- Mindjet, for mindmapping presentations

Howard Rheingold

- CopyPaste Pro: "If I had to recommend only one tool for Mac users, this would be it. It remembers the last 200 objects of any media type that I cut or copied to the clipboard."

- Social Media Classroom

- Diigo, a research and knowledge-sharing tool

- iPhone GS for video and Mobypicture and Pixelpipe apps

"Sky" Schuyler

- FeedWordPress: Sky configured this plug-in to suck our individual blog feeds into the TravelingGeeks.com WordPress blog.

- YARPP (Yet Another Related Posts Plug-in), a Firefox plug-in for Firefox that finds related posts within my blog and I have configured it with a special CSS so it also displays little thumbnails next to the suggested posts.

- PGP to encrypt email and confidential data on his computer.

- Zemanta, the Firefox plug-in. "I can't believe how much better my posts are, how much more relevant and complete they are."

- BBEdit for plain text processing ("I use this more than any other app except browsers")

- OmniGraffle: Like Visio, it lets you create diagrams to group concepts together graphically.

VMWare Fusion is the VM he uses to run Windows XP and Ubuntu 8.04; he "tests" incoming viruses by running WMWare "sandbox," which he then throws away after infected.

Meghan Asha

- Shopstyle, a shopping application that provides a visual search for online goods.

- Tumblr, a blog platform and app that lets you publish videos and pictures from your cellphone, especially useful for lifecasting or moblogging.

- iPhone apps: Mint, Yelp, Stanza (free app that lets you download and read from a selection of more than 100,000 books and periodicals), Pano ($2.99 app that lets you take seamless panoramic photos on your iPhone), and TalkBubbles ($4.99 app that lets you add dialogue in comic strip-like bubbles to your photos)

- Skitch lets you annotate websites with comments, drawings, arrows, etc., then upload the sketch to their website and share it or blog it. "It's just plain fun," she says.

Susan Bratton

- MobyPicture for syndicating my photos and videos from my iPhone and Mac across all my social nets simultaneously.

- TweetLater Professional for scheduling tweets in advance.

- Trackur for online reputation management and social listening.

Craig Newmark

- Pine, an old-timey email application

- iPhone apps, including Rimshot and Trombone (sound effects)

Renee Blodgett

- EasyTweets: manage multiple Twitter accounts, SMS and email keyword alerts, schedule, import feeds, and more

- GroupMail, a way to send personalized email marketing campaigns from your Windows desktop

- Acronis for data backup

- MobyPicture

- Sharpcast for syncing your data across the Web

- Voyij.com for travel searches.

Tom Foremski

- Ecto to post when offline but he is switching to MyBlogEdit and MovableType for their additional functionalities.

- He uses the su.pr url shortener from Stumbleupon for tweeting posts -- now or later.

- iMovie 8, "a great tool for quick video editing and upload"

Ayelet Noff

Some of the tools Ayelet used most during the Geeks' trip:

- FriendFeed

- iMovie

- Tweetdeck

- iPhone

From:  Coolest power tools of some top geeks.

My recent trip with the Traveling Geeks to the UK was an intense week consisting of many events and meetings with European startups, government agencies, conferences, panels, and some remarkable experiences.

My son Matt joined me part of the way through. In this video you'll see my fellow Traveling Geeks and friends: Robert Scoble, Rocky Barbanica, Renee Blodgett, Ayelet Noff, Sarah Lacy, JD Lasica, Meghan Asha, Craig Newmark, Susan Bratton, Jeff Saperstein, Howard Rheingold, Sky Schuyler, Mitzi Szereto, Heddi Cundle, Mark Adams, Paul Carr, Hermione Way, Mike Butcher, Mathys van Abbe . . . and many more.

[BTW, the Facebook video embed is so much better quality than YouTube and many other video sites.]

It was a very good trip. Here are some notes:

- There are some well established UK startups with good business models and they are profitable. One example is Seatwave.com, which trades show tickets between fans. Spotify and Spinvox are also doing very well. Are they still startups if they have a business model and are profitable?

- Startups face the same problems as those here - funding. There are very UK VC firms and few angels. One estimate I was given was that in the Cambridge area there was just 5 million pounds ($8.26m) available for VC investments. A puny amount. Some startups are seriously considering relocating to the US for better access to investment capital.

- Successful European entrepreneurs have a tendency to go sailing and not come back. But that's not always true. I met some serial entrepreneurs in Cambridge: Stuart Evans, chairman of Novacem, a developer of a unique type of "green" concrete; Richard Green (photo), CEO of Ubisense; the very impressive Sherry Coutu, (photo)a rare woman serial entrepreneur and one of the hosts of our Cambridge tour; also Steve Kennedy from Nettek.

- Cambridge Innovation. The area around Cambridge University is known as Silicon Fen and represents the European innovation capital. There is more money invested in innovation in this region than anywhere else in Europe. A key part of this infrastructure is the organization Cambridge Angels. I met a couple of the Cambridge Angels (Stuart Evans and Richard Green.) It's an impressive organization with an interesting portfolio.

- Lots of government agencies and organizations to encourage innovation. At times it seemed as if we were meeting with larger numbers of representatives of groups encouraging startups than with innovators.

East of England International, which helps companies get established in Silicon Fen. I had met him

-

-

- Monday - Reboot Britain - The Traveling Geeks Help Out Monday - The Geeks Eat Dinner At The Top Of The World

- Tuesday - It Never Rains But It Pours . . . More BT InnovationTuesday - Guardian Newspaper Media Panel . . .

-

- Wednesday - Humpday - Lunch With SkypeWednesday - Time-Off For Good/Bad Behavior

- Thursday - Ecoconsultancy At Shakespeare's Globe - Why Innovate?

- Friday - Cambridge Startups

- Friday - Looking For Ghosts In Peterhouse College Founded 1284

Also, lots of excellent coverage from my fellow Traveling Geeks Syphan Technologies; Michael Litman; Kai Turner, head of information architecture at Intruders.tv; Nancy Vega, Said Business school Oxford; Alistair Morely technology director at Cambridge Consultants; Oo Nwoye co-founder of Onepage; Professor Ian Leslie, Cambridge University; Amanda Horton-Mastin, Innovation Director at Comic Relief; Rudolph Rosini, Ecec VP at Cellcrypt; Nitin Dahad at Techspark; William Tunstall-Pedoe, CEO of Trueknowledge; Luke Brynley-Jones, Managing Director at School For Startups; Matt Rogers, co-founder of Aroxo.]]> Mon, 20 Jul 2009 05:08:33 -0700 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000 https://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/uk-diary-friday---cambridge-consultants-nokia-and-microsoft-research-labs/ https://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/uk-diary-friday---cambridge-consultants-nokia-and-microsoft-research-labs/240420

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iT3hro-BsQc

Friday afternoon the Traveling Geeks visit Cambridge Consultants and visit the William Gates III building for meetings with researchers from Nokia Labs and Microsoft Research Labs (MRL).

Cambridge Consultants has helped bring to market products such as:

- Virtually waterless washing machine

- The "connected patient

Low cost cellular base stations.

The Microsoft Research Labs are part of the academic community at Cambridge university and the work is open and peer-reviewed. In the video our guide is Cambridge university lecturer and successful entrepreneur Jack Lang, also Ken Wood, deputy director of MRL, Tim Regan, Research SDE at MRL, and presentations from their colleagues. The video also shows some of Microsoft's research projects.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uo_aUaJlAFA

Friday and the Traveling Geeks are in Cambridge, the innovation capital of Europe.

After presentations by Cambridge university representatives and also from government agencies helping startups, the Traveling Geeks take part in a panel and also hear presentations from local startups:

- Alert Me

- Broadersheet

- Hot Prints

- Magic Solver

- Movie Storm

- Pocket Places

- Trueknowledge

- Taptu

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8z7odjIZdw

After a hard-packed day of visiting with Cambridge startups, government agency representatives, Cambridge tech incubator, meeting with Nokia research labs, meeting with Microsoft Research Labs - and punting on the river Cam, the Traveling Geeks are invited to dinner at Peterhouse College.

According to my excellent guidebook "Cambridge Colleges" by Janet Jeacock, Peterhouse College features one of the finest collections of Pre-Raphaelite stained glass, by Morris, Burne-Jones, and Madox Browne. It is the oldest of all 31 Cambridge University colleges, founded in 1284.

As the rest of the TGers are shmoozing on the lawn, my son Matt and I explore the building. We're hoping to find some ghosts. Please see the short video above.

Next: More Cambridge innovation. . .

It's Friday Morning and it's an early 7.30 am start for the Traveling Geeks...

JD Lasica is the unsung hero of the Traveling Geeks. He has invested hundreds of hours in organizing this trip.

By Friday morning, his normal patience-of-a-saint is evaporating as he attempts to herd the TG cats into a coach that is far smaller than expected.

Plus, my son is with me this morning so space is even tighter. And on top of everything, last night was a late night and we are all still a little groggy from the grog and the good times at the Europa Awards (please see: ).

Soon, however, we are on our way to Cambridge and the start of another jam packed day. It's a gorgeous day, not too hot, as we drive through the English countryside, the yellow and green fields and billowing clouds set against an azure sky.

It doesn't take long before we are in the Pitt Building in Cambridge, the site of Britain's oldest publisher. And the very impressive Sherry Coutu is running a very tight meeting with presentations from several government agencies and university representatives.

Next: Another panel and we meet Cambridge startups...

UK Diary so far:

• - SVW Goes To The Europas . . .



• - Ecoconsultancy At Shakespeare's Globe - Why Innovate?



• - A Visit To Accel Partners - UK Is Tough On Startups



• - Time-Off For Good Bad Behavior



• - Humpday - Lunch With Skype



• - Dinner With Agency.com



• - Guardian Newspaper Media Panel . . .



• - It Never Rains But It Pours . . . More BT Innovation



• - Seed Camp's Highflyers



• - The Geeks Eat Dinner At The Top Of The World



• - Reboot Britain - The Traveling Geeks Help Out



• - A Meeting With Intel's Government Guy



• - Arrival and Tweetup in Chelsea



• - Cambridge And Professor Stephen Hawking



• - UK Startups Look For Funding And Escape From Echo Chamber

It's Thursday evening and the Traveling Geeks are at the Europa Awards to celebrate European startups.

The place is already filling up when I get to the venue for the Europa awards in south London. Things don't look good because I have just one invite and I have my son Matt with me and my friend Heddi Cundle. And security is very tight -- they are turning away everyone without a ticket (it's a $100 entry).

However, a little smooth talking, and a little confusion at the front, and we slip in fairly easily.

I won't bore you with who won what. (The Europas: The Winners and Finalists)

Throughout the week I'd been hearing complaints from various startups that the awards favored the pals of TechCrunch Europe and specific VC firms but I can't verify those claims. There were certainly lots of very worthy startups that didn't get a mention. And a lot of the awards went to well established firms like the popular Spotify, and the highly funded SpinVox - hardly startups.

Mike Butcher, the very capable editor of Techcrunch Europe did a great job of MCing an increasingly loud and alcohol fueled event of a type we don't get in the US.

(Throughout the trip fellow TGer Craig (Cheap Date) Newmark constantly remarked and marveled at the amount of drinking by the Brits. The ubiquitous TG companion Paul Carr said his drinking was inspired by Charles Bukowski.)

I had a great time at the event and I spoke with lots of interesting entrpreneurs. I'd like to single out for special attention Mathys von Abbe from the fast growing Dutch startup Moby Picture; also, the impressive Hermione Way, founder of Newspepper; and Alexander Ljung, founder of Soundcloud (Europa winner.)

You can see them all and more, in the short video of "SVW Goes to the Europas..." (It's a little pixelated at first but settles down quickly.)

Thursday afternoon the Traveling Geeks are at The Swan, which is attached to the recreation of Shakespeare's Globe theatre on the Southbank.

The event is organized by Econsultancy , a digital marketing firm, and led by Ashley Friedlein, CEO and Co-Founder (See my photo above.)

There are about a hundred people gathered in a large room. I'm sitting at one of several tables, crowded with people and bottles of water, and we're talking about innovation.

There are many people from large UK firms at the table, all talking about how they try to encourage innovation within their companies. It's not easy.

I make several points about innovation. The most important one is that large companies want innovation badly but they can't innovate. But they want to innovate because there is no end of consultants that tell them they will die if they don't innovate.

Well, they will die anyway. There is a finite lifespan to large organizations and that's just the way it is -- innovation or not.

An organization is successful because it knows how to monetize a particular business process. Each organization is very bad at changing its culture of monetization. Much better to buy-in the innovation.

Afterwards, I talk with Mathys van Abbe, the founder of Moby Picture, a fast growing Dutch startup (and one of my current favorites.) "Why don't corporations just concentrate on doing what they do better? They can't innovate and they don't need to." I agree.

Thursday morning the Traveling Geeks head to Accel Partners, one of the top European VC firms, to hear presentations from:

• Errol Damelin, founder and CEO of Wonga

• Kristian Segerstrale, founder and CEO of Playfish

• John Newton, founder, Chairman and CTO of Alfresco

• Joe Cohen, Founder and CEO of Seatwave

• Michael Smith , Founder and CEO of  MindCandy

• Celia Francis, CEO of WeeWorld

[Please see Susan Bratton: http://blogs.personallifemedia.com/dishymix/accel-partners-london-hosts-the-traveling-geeks-tg2009-who-is-coming-to-lunch-find-out/2009/07/07/ ]

Accel is still making investments, which is very rare among European VC firms (and Silicon Valley firms too).

I chat with John Newton, an American based in London and CEo of Alfresco, and also Joe Cohen from Seatwave, about the UK startup scene. Here are some highlights:

- It is much harder to found and run a startup in the UK.

- Government policies do not favor startups, there are unfavorable tax provisions for stock options. And the government doesn't get the digital economy.

- It is hard to find the right people with the right skills in the UK and they cost more.

- Government buys software from the large vendors, very little from startups, 85 per cent of government spending on IT goes to the top 8 US vendors.

- Large US companies headquartered in London tend to tie up much of the top local talent.

- Some UK startups are restructuring outside of the country to take advantage of more favorable tax and other conditions.

- London has a huge number of foreign nationals. You can run a foreign office from the UK by hiring any nationality, it reduces need for larger staffs in local regional offices.

- Risk taking in the UK is changing for the better.

I spend a good chunk of my free time posting and catching up with my online persona. Then I'm off to the Southbank Centre for a cup of tea and a couple of glasses of wine with some friends from my university days.

In the evening Renee Blodgett invites me to "Calendar Girls" at the Noel Coward theatre just off Piccadilly Circus. Robert Scoble and his sidekick, producer Rocky Barbanica, join us part of the way through the play.

Afterwards, Renee complains of a scratchy throat and heads back to the hotel. (We learn later that one of the panelists at the Guardian media event the prior night came down with swine flu. Renee and fellow Geekettes were sitting in the front row.)

Robert and Rocky head off for a taste of the old country (McDonald's) then come back and join me for late night drinks with an old pal from San Francisco now living in London, Heddi Cundle (@HeddiCundle).

I like to say that Heddi makes you dizzy. After the initial shock of contact it doesn't take long before they are big fans of the Cundle experience.

After closing down one pub we walk the cobbled streets over to Covent Garden where we find another one that's still open.

The next morning, a rather slower moving Robert says to me "I'm blaming you!"

---

Don't miss Thursday on UK Diary: The absolutely mental experience of the "Europas Awards." All hail Mike Butcher!

That's a welcome break after our hit-the-ground-running start to our trip since Sunday.

Even better, lunch with Skype is in our own hotel.

I wander down into the basement dinning room of the Malmaison hotel and sit next to Sky. Already, he has accumulated several of our laptops and wireless comms dongles, and is trying to figure out some of our connection problems.

I pay particular attention as he attempts to debug Susan Bratton's dongle because I have the same connection problem.

Renne Blodgett says that top executives from Skype were scheduled to join us but had to rush off at last notice for a board meeting. I wonder what's brewing.

Renne Blodgett has an interview between fellow TGer Robert Scoble and Skype's top blogger Peter Parkes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8-p_X8p-dQ&feature=player_embedded

Renee Blodgett interviews Peter Parkes and Neil Dodds, Windows Experience Manager at Skype:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yz8Bp774-s

Our fourth event for Tuesday was dinner with Agency.com and assorted clients and friends -- in Soho at Soho House. It was great to be back in this vibrant part of London because this is where I got my start in journalism in 1982.

It was a great place to work and a great time to be a young man around town, with plenty of small bars, restaurants, cafes, and after-hours clubs.

We sat at a very long table and we introduced ourselves and spoke briefly about what it was that attracted us to social/new media. I managed to get video of most of the replies, my apologies because I missed a couple of people.

http://www.blip.tv/file/2353961

Please also see Susan Bratton: DishyMix: Susan Bratton Podcasts & Blogs Executives

We left BT and managed to hail a few black cabs amid the rain and made our way over to the Guardian newspaper for a panel on the future of media.

I was thinking that maybe the death of newspapers is just nature's way of helping us all to reduce our carbon footprint.

Some of our fellow Traveling Geeks were on the panel, our Geeketes were at the front of the room, which must have had a distracting effect (see photo - by JD Lasica) while the rest of us were mostly at the back Twittering onto a big screen at the front of the room.

Here was my take on it, an extract from: A Guardian Newspaper Media Panel, Twitter, From Back to Front And Beyond...

The Butcher of Fleet Street

I was sitting at the back of the room next to fellow TGer Craig Newmark of Craigslist. And inevitably, the panel's moderator couldn't resist asking him to stand up and explain himself for killing the newspaper industry.

Craig is mightily fed up with this question. And I agree. It is not his fault that the newspaper industry is in trouble. But Craig handled it all very well, throwing in a line "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition," which drew laughs and distracted the panel from further pursuit of a tired line of questioning and drew the discussion back to the favorite subject of the day: Twitter.

Ayelet Noff posted a video of the event:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FUs9acyk4o&feature=player_embedded

Here is JD Lasica:

The podcast just went live. Stream or download (Time 51:13):

(You can also listen to it, naturally, on the Guardian site.)

A few highlights

The entire 51 minutes is well worth a listen -- I think it's one of the smartest podcasts I've been a part of. A few snippets:

• I returned to the problem of newspaper culture that punishes, rather than rewards, experimentation, innovation and failure (without which innocation is impossible). But harping on newspapers' failures is like shooting dinosaurs in a barrel.

• Sarah Lacy suggested that we may see 10 metropolitan cities without a daily newspaper by the end of the year. (I think the time frame is more likely on the order of two to three years.)

Here is Jeff Saperstein:

...The Barbarians are at the Gates in every sector of the communications industry. Advertising agencies are being decimated by the Google model, Encyclopedias and paid resource media have been annihilated by Wikipedia, Network television conglomerates have been supplanted by Cable subscription channels and digital narrowcasting, and the movie studios are enraged by You Tube and other web sources to download feature films outside the movie theatres, on and on with the music industry and I-Tunes , etc.

In other words, the journalism industry is not unique in its economic viability being challenged. The Internet/digital media content delivery model is not just a hiccup, but a tectonic shift. Our Traveling Geeks are players and informed commentators in that shift.

The Guardian Dialogues « Traveling Geeks in London

Here are some of my Tweets during the event:

- Blogging and traditional media have a lot in common - lack of a viable business model :)

- Paper or electron is shouldn't matter. Newspapers need to transition into news services imho...

- The media is dead long live the media! We have more media in more forms today than at anytime in history!

- Newspapers have been communicating in 140 characters or less for hundreds of years: In news headlines!

- The panel has seems to have an "us verus them" attitude. Surely media today is about "us and them" which is a good thing

- If a blogger blogs in the blogosphere does anybody blog it? Takes time to build an audience

- Blogs build credibility over time, they don't get it just by being. It takes time to build a media brand

- Bloggers aren't all very free wheeling, they have reputations to defend just the same as regular media

- News has always been a collaborative venture, taking the story further. Why should it be a problem today?

- Why is there a distinction being made between blogger media and newspaper media? It's all media.

Next stop on this rainy Tuesday: Soho and Agency.com dinner

We were a little wet from dodging torrential rain bursts. But the afternoon sessions are interesting.

Meghan Asha was impressed by BT's programmable broadband service:

BT's Open Broadband is a BRILLANT solution to broadband issues for businesses. What is it exactly? As far as I can understand, it allows companies to easily program broadband strength with a couple paragraphs of XML for specific websites. This is fantastic for stream gaming where you're gaming via the cloud. In short, this is perfect for any application that needs guaranteed bandwidth. I love this idea, if only someone would implement it in the US. My first site request would be YouTube (bah!).

Click here for more info on the development of Open Broadband.

BT's Programmable Broadband!

Innovation apprentice

We also heard about BT's apprentice program, which involves several hundred high school students every year. BT sets up day camps where young people brainstorm new ideas. Then it offers to show them how ideas are developed into commercial products. It's an excellent program. Interestingly, school drop outs are encouraged to attend -- it's more about ideas and passion than it is about how well someone did at school.

A level playing field

BT is tightly regulated and it must provide equal access to its telecom infrastructure to any company. This is fine for BT because it is keen to have many companies create innovative applications on top of this platform, in addition to the new services it is rolling out itself.

I asked JP Rangaswami, Managing Director of Innovation and strategy at BT, how does BT avoid the impression that it could become a competitor to the companies it is hoping will use its advanced communications platform.

"We make sure that we only innovate around platform services and leave the applications alone," he said. "We want to avoid the criticism that others such as Microsoft have had about this issue."

I mentioned that four years ago I was at an event where Rob Hull, a business development manager at BT Group was talking with local entrepreneurs and hoping to lure them to the UK and have them use BT's telecom platform. Mr Hull said that BT would split the revenues with the startups 80 percent, with 20 percent for BT.

However, should their service become hugely popular, BT reserved the right to port the application to its machines and reverse a 20 percent / 80 percent revenue split in its favor! I was shocked.

(Silicon Valley startups told: Come to London ... BT wants your business! - SiliconValleyWatcher)

Mr Rangaswami said that this provision no longer exists. Since he joined BT in 2006, he's made sure to ensure there is very competitive platform for developers without fear of BT coming in and scooping up the rewards from popular services.

Next: We're back into the rain and off to the Guardian newspaper...

(Photo Susan Bratton.) Tuesday morning the Traveling Geeks were at Seed Camp. I couldn't make it but here are some of our reports:

Susan Bratton: My Impression of UK and Euro Entrepreneurs from Today's Seedcamp NESTA "Speed Dating" Adventure

We started off the day today with a fun event created by Reshma Sohoni and Alasdair Ball ofSeedCamp. SeedCamp is an early stage fund that also provides exacting business support and grooming for UK and European start ups who are socially-oriented. Typical investments are up to 50 thousand Euros for about 10% of the business.

By the caliber of the entrepreneurs and the quality of the business ideas I witnessed today, Reshma and her team are making smart investments and providing wise and plished council for the entrepreneurs they back.

Every single one of the thirteen companies was, in my estimation, a great idea combined with a terrific leader or team. The most successful to date include Spotify, the European version of Rhapsody's "all-you-can-eat for one monthly fee" celestial jukebox...

My Impression of UK and Euro Entrepreneurs from Today's Seedcamp NESTA "Speed Dating" Adventure

Craig Newmark reports:

Hey, the folks at Seedcamp, with NESTA, have done remarkable work with a number of British Net-related companies. My fellow geeks spoke with the following day; I was consistently impressed, these guys have real stuff. I've already started using some of their work:

Basekit Rapid website design and development tools.



Groupspaces Group webspaces.



Huddle Huddle.net combines live conferencing,

project management software and document sharing.



Kwaga creating a new revolutionary service that will

help you manage your mail.



Moo miniature business cards



Qype Local reviews on everything



School of Everything puts teachers in touch

with potential student



Skimlinks hyperlinks keywords in websites



Spotify legally downloading songs.



Stupeflix automatically arranges and animates

banks of pictures.



Ubervu meta-web 2.0, merges and tracks

conversations and feeds across the web.



Zemanta dynamic text editor that assists in

content creation and addition



Songkick music concert online database.

I missed the first event of the day for the Traveling Geeks because I was hunting local shops for an Ethernet to USB converter as I, (and we collectively) struggled with Internet connectivity issues.

Sky Schuyler was our resident IT support guy and fellow Traveling Geek. He has the patience of a saint. Every morning we'd dump our laptops, BT dongles, and cell phones in his lap and beg him to perform his particular form of magic and get them working and connecting again. He has unlimited patience and good humor -- it's no wonder that he was chosen by the Dalai Lama Foundation to be its Chief Technology Officer.

(Photo by Susan Bratton from the post: "Communication is how we connect to others at a deeper level," Jim "Sky" Schuyler)

Please see: BT Openzone Wireless Broadband - Sky's Blog

It was a rare honor for us to be hosted by BT CEO Ian Livingston and his top team of managers. This giant European Telecom is quite a surprise, very innovative and very aggressive. You might expect the opposite. Yet it is the US telecoms companies that appear slow and Luddite in comparison.

The innovative energy is sparked by strict European Community regulations that ensure a level playing field for competitors. This is unlike the US system, which seems designed to prevent new competitors from entering markets and results in telecoms companies that turn-off mobile phone functions and control what applications and services can be offered.

I met quite a few of BT's top management team and all of them exude a spirit of industry and innovation that was very refreshing. The leadership for this culture comes from the top with CEO Ian Livingston.

A stand out is JP Rangaswami, Managing Director of Innovation and strategy at BT, who has managed to craft a team that shares his passion for innovation. And he writes a very good blog: confused of calcutta -- a blog about information

Originally an economist and financial journalist, I've been an accidental technologist for over a quarter of a century. I've spent most of my adult life working in that strange space where finance meets technology, for a number of very large firms.

Also, I want to pick out for extra special mention and attention: Sian Baldwin, Director of Broadband & Content Services at BT Wholesale. Ms Baldwin is extremely impressive and was recently recognized as one of the top managers under forty in telecoms. (Photo by Renee Blodgett.)

It was an excellent evening in a spectacular setting with one of the top corporate innovative teams in Europe. I'm always impressed with the access I continually get to such top people. (I'm just a guy with a laptop.)

Here are some more views of this evening from my fellow TGers:

Craig Newmark was very impressed that Ian Livingston interacts with customers:

Apparently the guy publishes his email address, and gets a few customer service emails every day. He answers or delegates each one.

I don't believe the CEOs of AT&T or Verizon do that, nor do they have any direct reports doing something like this. (Related: this is why a President needs to keep his Blackberry.)

cnewmark: Ian Livingston, CEO, British Telecom

Renee Blodgett has a gallery of photos from the event:

down the avenue: BT Tower by Night

Howard Rheingold:

The day starts with an exercise in cat-herding, with the whole crazy crew piling into three London taxis. Try putting any five of those rather strong individual personalities into an enclosed space and "intense" is the only word for it.

... It was the first time I had spoken publicly about a subject I've grown passionate about - 21st Century Literacies. You know you've hit the mark when people are still sitting at the end of the last session of the day. I finished speaking, acknowledged warm applause, sat down -- and people kept sitting. So I got back on stage and fielded questions for another 20 minutes. Thank you, London, for making my day!

http://www.smartmobs.com/2009/07/07/reboot-britain-first-stop-on-traveling-geeks-tour/

There were lots of interesting panels.

Renee Blodgett:

On the panel, "is the web female?" moderated by BT's JP Rangaswami, four women talked about their opinions around a) what does the web 'being female' mean and b) should there be the "divide debate" at all?

...The debate in the hallway was mixed but most didn't feel that technology was geared towards men. They haven't been to Silicon Valley I was thinking. 99% of my client CEOs and head honchos have been men as have the majority of their engineering team. There's always a token woman or two among us but I never feel as if they're the main decision drivers. Bear in mind that this is the majority of my experience but not all.

down the avenue: Is the Web Female?

Renee Blodgett posted a short video of Jeff Saperstein's talk:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Pr9ePqvm84&feature=player_embedded

Craig Newmark was on a panel talking about his favorite topics.

Meghan Asha:

FixMyStreet.com: A website that allows users to report, view, or discuss local problems (like graffiti, street lighting, or broken paving slabs). Craig plans to employ a similar site in the United States. Thus, using social media to employ change in the public sector.

GovLoop.com: A social network that connects the government community. You can join if you're a government employee, organization, contractor, or student. This social network cuts through the bureaucracy, empowering government officials for change.Check out Craig's blog, he plans to lead grassroots effort using social media growing the engagement of others from millions to billions in the next 20 years.http://meghan.nonsociety.com/lifecast/136352109--

Here are Craig's thoughts...

My focus was on how a lot of people in the US, gov't and private industry, know how to get stuff done. That's equally true of the UK.

That is, there're already a lot of solutions out there, but getting people to work together is required. Online social media can be used to do that.http://www.cnewmark.com/2009/07/at-rebootbritain-tech-and-risk-taking-can-help-restore-a-govt-and-an-economy.html

But first we have breakfast with Tristan Wilkinson, Intel's Director for Public Sector for EMEA.

Renee Blodgett:

He tells us about a program called One Goal which will be launched in August and piggyback off the South African World Cup. The goal is to get 30 million online signatures in an effort to help make poverty history. Take note: 75 million children still don't have access to primary school education in the world.

down the avenue: Redefining Digital Inclusion

Mr Wilkinson said he wasn't much interested in technology but what technology could do for people and for countries in terms of improving the quality of life through better economic opportunities.

Tom Foremski:

He posed an interesting question: Do the people that enjoy the benefits of the digital economy have an obligation to help those that don't have the same access and skill sets?

UK: Digital Inclusion And The Moral Obligations Towards Tech Education - SiliconValleyWatcher

We discussed the technology divide or was that the wrong divide to consider these days?

Ayelet Noff:

Scoble, part of the TG party, also reiterated the idea which he calls the "Friend Divide" - this is to say that even if you have a computer and are able to get online, you're still at a major disadvantage to people who have already built a rich network of friends which they can use to get and spread information.

Blonde 2.0 » Blog Archive » Traveling Geeks - On the road in the UK

Interestingly, Mr Wilkinson doesn't think much about social networks. He says he'd rather be climbing trees with his kids. The TGers gang up on him about this and by the end of the meeting he says he will rejoin Twitter. You can find him @IntelTristran.

He later posts on Twitter: "Reflecting on the day, deciding social networks can't be ignored any longer." And he's kept it up, tweeting 6 times on July 9th. Our work is done.

JD Lasica conducts a quick interview with Mr Wilkinson:

Intel exec on social media literacy from JD Lasica on Vimeo.

By Sunday all of the Traveling Geeks had arrived and checked into our hotel, Malmaison (Bad House?) in Charterhouse Square close to St Paul's cathedral.

Fellow TGer Craig Newmark had discovered that we were living above an old "plague pit" where tens of thousands of bodies had been buried in 1384. Maybe this was why we were all to suffer from terrible Internet connection problems throughout our stay?! It would be cool if our wifi were haunted, and ghostly pictures would be uploaded to our flickr accounts during the night.

I was running late to our first event of the trip, a Tweetup in the fashionable Chelsea district. By the time I got there, it had spilled into the street and I saw my colleagues chatting with people, interviewing or being interviewed.

http://www.blip.tv/file/2352740

I met a lot of entrepreneurs and had many excellent conversations. Funding was a common theme, the lack of it. Very similar to Silicon Valley.

(Photo by Craig Newmark.)

- - -

I was interviewed by Micha Benoliel from Digitrad which has a cool service offering one point of access for all your voice communications. Here is a discount code if you'd like to try it out: VIP69007.

Tom Foremski - Digitrad - Traveling Geeks from Micha Benoliel on Vimeo.

You can also see interviews with fellow TGers here: http://vimeo.com/channels/digitrad#5489395

Next up: Monday - Reboot Britain and dinner with BT at the top of the 381 ft tall Post Office Tower - a revolving restaurant closed to the public since 1980 and once blown up by the IRA.

Please see: UK Startups Look For Funding And Escape From Echo Chamber

One highlight of the trip was on Saturday night. My son Matt and I were looking for a place to eat. We just happened to choose one of the favorite spots for Professor Stephen Hawking. It was a huge honor to be in the same room as Britain's top scientist.

The photo shows his two blond assistants helping him with his high-tech wheelchair.

Tuesday evening our third event that day for the Traveling Geeks (but not the last) was to take part in a media debate at The Guardian newspaper's offices in north London.

The Guardian is one of the UK's largest newspapers and its media section is superb -- anyone that is anyone in the media industry reads it, and anyone that's interested in media -- reads The Guardian's media section.

It was a very good turnout for the event despite horrid downpours. Part of our TG gang (Robert Scoble, Sarah Lacy, and JD Lasica) were on the panel discussing the future of media with the Guardian's Emily Bell, and the BBC's technology correspondent, Rory Cellan-Jones.

It was a good discussion but it felt very "2005" in terms of the subjects, which kept returning to blogger/social media versus mainstream media.

The Butcher of Fleet Street

I was sitting at the back of the room next to fellow TGer Craig Newmark of Craigslist. And inevitably, the panel's moderator couldn't resist asking him to stand up and explain himself for killing the newspaper industry.

Craig is mightily fed up with this question. And I agree. It is not his fault that the newspaper industry is in trouble. But Craig handled it all very well, throwing in a line "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition," which drew laughs and distracted the panel from further pursuit of a tired line of questioning and drew the discussion back to the favorite subject of the day: Twitter.

From Back To Front

It was fun publishing from the back of the room and having our Tweets projected onto a big screen in the front of the room.

Here is the evening's Twitstream.

And here are my contributions:

I've been meeting a lot of UK entrepreneurs as part of the Traveling Geeks trip and I'm hearing a lot of the same things US startups tell me. They are looking for funding and also fed up with seeing the same people at their meetups.

Funding is a big problem in the UK because there are very few European VC funds actively investing. And very few angels. Many startups are looking to the US for funding but they tell me that most US VC firms have closed their UK offices.

One entrepreneur told me: "We're thinking of relocating some of our team to San Francisco so that we can be closer to the VC firms. Several VC firms have told us that they love our product but we are not over there. And so they wouldn't consider investing."

That was a common theme: that US VCs won't invest in startups unless they are in Silicon Valley.

I didn't have the heart to tell people that even if you are in Silicon Valley funding is really tough right now.

I ran into Don Thorson from Silicon Valley based Ribbit yesterday. Ribbit had a very nice exit about a year ago when BT bought the company for $105 million.

Mr Thornson was in town for a board meeting at BT. We began talking about startup funding and he was complaining that the Silicon Valley VCs aren't doing any investing. He says there are some very good startups around but many have just a few months of runway left.

This is a serious situation. If we can't have sustained funding we won't have a crop of next generation companies to harvest when exits open up.

It's one thing to have no exits but it's another to have no companies to exit. That means no new money to reinvest in Silicon Valley.

The UK entrepreneurs regularly get together at various events but many are getting fed up seeing the same faces and hearing the same stories. I can relate.

- One entrepreneur told me: "I've started going to fewer events because I wasn't getting much value from them. And everyone's business ideas started sounding very similar. I'd rather spend some time developing some original ideas."

The UK entrepreneurs are heavily into social media and Twitter. Some hope to be acquired by larger startups that have the potential to go public once financial markets open up. But when that happens is anyones guess because the UK economy continues to splutter.

Right now, it seems that a few seed investments would go far in the UK. A few angel investors could make some smart bets at good valuations.

I'll mention some of the startups I've been meeting in a later post.

He posed an interesting question: Do the people that enjoy the benefits of the digital economy have an obligation to help those that don't have the same access and skill sets?

The way the question is phrased doesn't invite much debate because it shoots straight for the moral high ground.

Mr Wilkinson says he isn't "selling anything" but he clearly is. As a representative of Intel, it is natural that he would be of the opinion that more technology and more people that know how to use the technology, the better for society and the earning power of individuals. And thus better for Intel as the dominant building block infrastructure provider.

There is a lot of truth to the view that people with technology skills will have better employment opportunities but will this always be true? Our experience constantly shows that as certain technology skills become more ubiquitous, their potential earning power diminishes proportionally. You constantly need to keep climbing up the value chain.

New technologies do provide new jobs as new types of businesses are created but they are also used to reduce the costs of operating a business and that means eliminating jobs.The overall effect over the long term, in my humble opinion, is that our use of new technologies will reduce the number of jobs, it is not a zero sum process. [Please see: The Internet Devalues Everything It Touches, Anything That Can Be Digitized.]

This all leads to a much more interesting question that we face in the not too distant future, which is not about who gets the new tech jobs.

I'd like to know what happens when, say only 20 per cent of our population needs to work in order to provide all the goods and services for 100 per cent of our society?

We constantly create new types of "divides," our economy thrives on new systems of haves and have nots. At some point, because of the incredible productive capacities we are able to build and to manage as a result of our technologies, we won't have to have everyone working to produce the goods and services we all need.

In such a scenario, a system of division becomes meaningless and useless -- so how will we deal with that? How will we equitably divide up the spoils of our technological progress and prowess?

I strongly believe we have a moral obligation to begin discussing these types of questions before we have to deal with their inevitable arrival.

Mr Wilkinson spoke about the importance of using technology to educate African children. He quoted statistics that show that an extra year of primary education among African children significantly improves the health of babies, and reduces AIDS infection rates. So yes, if we, the beneficiaries of the digital economy are able to improve the primary school education of African children then that is a good thing, and it is a moral obligation that we do so.

Fellow Traveling Geek Jeff Saperstein made a great point that removing trade restrictions between the European Community (EC) and African countries would do much more for the health and wealth of African children than using technology to improve education. Trade would lessen the need for aid. Trade is a sustainable form of development -- charity is not.

We also discussed "Digital Inclusion," which is a fancy term for digital divide. Mr Wilkinson said that we have moved beyond the simple issue of access and we need a more ambitious definition.

Robert Scoble said that he has little interest in digital divide issues, the issue for him is more of a "friend divide." People without rich networks of "friends" will suffer because they will find it more difficult to find jobs, and gain access to people and knowledge.

Interestingly, Mr Wilkinson started off our meeting by saying he doesn't get Twitter, he would rather be climbing trees with his kids. But by the end of the meeting, and because of constant cajoling from the Traveling Geeks, he registered on Twitter: you can find him @IntelTristan.

He also spoke about being an "immigrant" into the technology world and that it doesn't come naturally to him, unlike for children, which have a natural digital literacy. I disagreed with this common view of digital literacy. I don't see a generational divide when it comes to technology but only an experiential divide. If you don't do it, you don't know it.

The average age of the Traveling Geeks is probably somewhere in 40s, we are no spring chickens, yet we are in the forefront of using many emerging technologies. Anyone can do the same - regardless of age.

When Mr Wilkinson says he doesn't feel comfortable using certain technologies that's because he has chosen not to spend sufficient time with them -- which is unusual for someone with his job in giving advice to government organizations. You can't understand much about social media if you aren't involved in it.

I will have some video of our discussion coming up later. If you'd like to find out what my fellow Traveling Geeks have to say about this meeting, and also further accounts of our trip during this week, please visit: Traveling Geeks where the posts are being aggregated. You can follow the Tweets with the hashtag #tg2009.

I'm particularly interested in the startup culture here in the UK and how it differs from Silicon Valley. I'm always looking for what makes Silicon Valley different from anywhere else and why it is so difficult to create Silicon Valley-like regions around the world.

Clearly, to create a sustainable center of innovation it takes more than building a business park around a university and injecting some startup capital. The answer must lie in the culture of Silicon Valley. But can that culture be exported? Do regional innovation centers have unique cultures specific to their particular brand of innovation?

Maybe I can find out some answers during this trip.

Also, I'll be posting about some of the companies and personalities I meet during this trip. So please check back regularly. Also, you can follow my colleagues on the Traveling Geeks website and Twitter -- and if you get a chance, join us at some of the open evening events. Here is our agenda.

Here is a brief overview. We'll be at...

A NESTA-sponsored conference about moving forward in the new economy, a U.S./U.K. Speed Date with Seed Camp Winners and UK Leaders; eConsultancy Innovator's Open Discussion; the TechCrunch Europa Awards; University of Cambridge's Judge Business School Roundtable on Open Innovation; as well as meetings with Nokia Labs, Microsoft Labs, East of England International, Skype and others.

The blhttpoggers will also be speaking and participating at a Reboot Britain event and the Guardian's first Media Talk Live event, as well as organizing a TweetUp in central London on the evening of July 5, 2009, which is being sponsored by NESTA and The Conversation Group.

My Twitter is: http://twitter.com/tomforemski

My Friendfeed is:  http://friendfeed.com/tomforemski

Twitter hashtag for the trip is #tg2009

Fellow Traveling Geeks:

Robert Scoble

Robert needs no introduction. He is a social media factory!

Blog: Scobleizer.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/scobleizer

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/scobleizer

Craig Newmark

The Craig in Craigslist and a one-man support machine that rivals a dozen call centers.

Blog: cnewmark.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/craignewmark

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/craignewmark

Sarah Lacy

Sarah is an editor at Techcrunch and a prolific writer and book author.

Blog: Sarahlacy.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/sarahcuda

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/sarahcuda

Howard Rheingold

Howard used to edit the Whole Earth Review and is one of the leading thinkers of the digital age.

Blog: http://www.rheingold.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/hrheingold

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/howardrheingold

Meghan Asha

Meghan is one of the micro-celebrity It girls from the East coast.

Blog: http://www.nonsociety.com/meghan

Twitter: http://twitter.com/meghanasha

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/meghanasha

JD Lasica

JS works with non-profits helping them to use social media tools for social change.

Blogs: Socialmedia.biz & Socialbrite.org

Twitter: http://twitter.com/jdlasica

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/jdlasica

Susan Bratton

Susan is co-founder and CEO of publisher Personal Life Media.

Blog: Dishymix.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/susanbratton

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/susanbratton

Jeff Saperstein

Jeff is a co-founder of Traveling Geeks. He consults with large corporations on business strategy.

Website: Creatingregionalwealth.com

Blog on Israel: http://www.sapermktg.wordpress.com

Renee Blodgett

Public relations maven and co-founder of the Traveling Geeks.

Blog: http://www.downtheavenue.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/MagicSauceMedia

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/reneeblodgett

Jim ("Sky") Schuyler

The CTO for the Dalai Lama.

Blog: Sky.dlfound.org

Twitter: http://twitter.com/jimsky7

Ayelet Noff

Aylef is based in Israel where she runs a marketing consultancy.

Blog: http://www.blonde20.com/blog/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/blonde20

FriendFeed: http://friendfeed.com/blonde20

I'll be particularly interested in how the startup scene differs in the UK compared to here. I keep coming across companies that are moving here, or at least having co-HQs here. Over the next few months I'll be profiling these Silicon Valley debutantes in a special section. So please let me know if you, or a company you know has recently moved to the San Francisco/Silicon Valley area. And also if you'd like to publish a guest post on why you moved here. More on this later...

In the meantime, here is our agenda for the London trip, come join us at one of the events.

Also on the trip is:

The Geeks

Robert Scoble

Robert is a blogger, video producer and social media fanboy.

Blog: Scobleizer.com

Twitter: @scobleizer

Friendfeed: scobleizer

Craig Newmark

Craig is the founder and customer service representative of Craigslist.

Blog: cnewmark.com

Twitter: @craignewmark

Friendfeed: craignewmark

Sarah Lacy

Sarah is the author of "Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good: The Rebirth of Silicon Valley and the Rise of Web 2.0." She is a reporter for BusinessWeek and co-hosts the Web video show Yahoo Tech Ticker.

Blog: Sarahlacy.com

Twitter: @sarahcuda

Friendfeed: sarahcuda

Howard Rheingold

Howard is the author of Tools for Thought, The Virtual Community and Smart Mobs.

Blog: http://www.rheingold.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/hrheingold

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/howardrheingold

He was editor of Whole Earth Review; editor of The Millennium Whole Earth Catalog; founding executive editor of Hotwired and founder of Electric Minds, Visiting Professor, De Montfort University, UK

He has taught Participatory Media and Collective Action at UC Berkeley, SIMS, Virtual Community/Social Media at Stanford and UC Berkeley and Digital Journalism at Stanford.

Current projects: The Cooperation Project and Social Media Classroom

Meghan Asha

Blog: http://www.nonsociety.com/meghan

Twitter: http://twitter.com/meghanasha

Friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/meghanasha

What you should know about me: You can find Meghan at whatever tech conference is happening this week (TechCrunch50, CES, Digital Life & Design in Munich, etc.). Meghan lives in New York and travels frequently to Silicon Valley, where she grew up. She's an unapologetic geek.

JD Lasica

]]> Thu, 25 Jun 2009 07:14:50 -0700 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000 https://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/friday-fishwrap-the-age-of-bronze----and-other-tales-of-disruption/ https://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/friday-fishwrap-the-age-of-bronze----and-other-tales-of-disruption/240797

[Wrapping up the week in three dots . . .]

. . . Congratulations to Mike Arrington's TechCrunch on its four year anniversary. I went to the celebration at the TechCrunch offices in Palo Alto and had a really nice time, connecting with a whole bunch of people, some I hadn't seen in a while. There was Gabe Rivera from Techmeme, and I got to meet his "chief reporter," Atul Arora (@Atul) who seems to have become Gabe's human powered algorithm for choosing hot posts. (Some pics courtesy of the ubiquitous Brian Solis here.)

. . . Congratulations to Robert Scoble's Building 43 launch. It's a new online community sponsored by Robert's employer Rackspace. I went to the launch (combined Techcrunch birthday party) with and it was good to see Rocky Barbanica, Robert's long-time sidekick and camera operator-producer-editor. It turns out that Rocky was the one that introduced Robert to the Rackspace people. I'm looking forward to spending time with them both on the upcoming Traveling Geeks trip to London in early July.

. . . Uber-marketeer Guy Kawasaki seems puzzled why his Alltop automatic post aggregator isn't more popular in this post: The new economics of entrepreneurship. He goes on to point out that this is a great time to be an entrepreneur because nearly everything is nearly free, including talent.

Sorry, I'm not a warm and fuzzy guy, but the truth is that there are lots of talented people who are unemployed or under-employed right now. If there was ever a time to get great people for free or cheap, this is it.

Also, marketing is nearly free too:

Sucking up to bloggers takes effort and swallowing your pride, but it's not expensive.

Is that really all it takes? It sounds very 2005... Plus, Mr Kawasaki employs a couple of people to Twitter for him under his name which doesn't sound cheap.

. . . From my Twit stream: http://twitter.com/tomforemski

- The irony of a cloud knocking out Amazon's EC2 cloud services ... http://su.pr/2E2K3Y (I'm always on the look out for such delicious ironies.)

- I wish there was a week in every day so I could get things done. Plus the weekends would be great

- Google lawyer says "There are diminishing returns from more search queries." http://bit.ly/qe4Vo

- This is how VCs innovate these days: "Innovations in fee management" http://bit.ly/Gi0zA

- Best Apple coverage and analysis from @stevegillmor: http://bit.ly/w5OJ

- Good points here by @markivey 7 habits of "just good enough" marketing http://bit.ly/d0oBF

- RT @mediaphyter: Are you still up? If so, will you donate $1 to help me raise money to research blood cancers? http://bit.ly/jltnt

- No exit strategies and no money. . . And here's more bad news for VCs: Sand Hill Slave is Back! http://bit.ly/H58W9

- Sunday is gradually becoming the new Monday...

- Check my math: Yahoo's China "police informant" role sparked a $47.5 billion slide in market value http://bit.ly/11McsI

- Heck. We haven't yet reached Internet 0.3 yet our media (@Scobleizer @karaSwisher) argue about Web 3.0 http://bit.ly/4yJsiB

- RT @chrisheuer: great video from our friend @cathybrooksabout why she is now 'active' in politics http://bit.ly/18AnEL

- Orwell feared truth would be concealed...Huxley feared truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance http://bit.ly/4lqUX6

- Orwell feared those who would ban books. Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book http://bit.ly/4lqUX6

- In Huxley's vision people will adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think. http://bit.ly/4lqUX6

- German seems ill suited to Twitter - words too long :)

. . . The disruptive Bronze Age. It's good to be reminded that we've been dealing with the effects of waves of disruptive technologies for thousands of years. For your Friday Watch viewing pleasure, here is Bronze Orientation Day from "That Mitchell and Webb Look."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpeqPdVyQd0

]]> Fri, 12 Jun 2009 00:42:03 -0700 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000 https://content.presspage.com/clients/150_2054.jpeg?10000