Software Marketing Pranks
I envy software marketing types. They get to stay kids forever: pull pranks and even get paid for it.:-) Today’s example comes courtesy of TechCrunch: PayPal competitor WePay dropped a 600lbs ice block at the entrance of the Paypal developer conference. They got chased away and Moscone security removed the ice block. My question: who [...]
Dawn of a New Day
I was reading Ray Ozzie’s blog this morning, and this struck me (quoting at length): In 1939, in New York City, there was an amazing World’s Fair. It was called ‘the greatest show of all time’. In that year Americans were exhausted, having lived through a decade of depression. Unemployment still hovered above 17%. In [...]
CloudAve Special: 3 – No, 5! – Free Tickets To Defrag
Every year, when we get depressed about the darkness that is going to engulf many of us on the northern side of the country after the Daylight Savings time change, the only thing that keep our spirits up is the upcoming Defrag Conference. No this is not a hyperbole but a fact which many of the [...]
Earn your Defrag XP
If you’re a gamer, you’re familiar with earning “XP” (experience points). If you’re not familiar with it, your kids are probably staring at you right now and wondering why you’re so weird. Basically, you accrue XP by playing a game over time – and that XP is good for boosting the benefits associated with your [...]
Open: The Ultimate Buzzword
Yesterday morning, while exercising, I found myself thinking that I wanted to write a blog post about “open vs. closed” and how the whole argument (open source, openstack, open business models) had gotten so confused that the word “open” meant NOTHING anymore. And then Apple released it’s earnings. Apparently, I’ve got some sort of secret [...]
29 Days and Counting
We’re 29 days from Defrag, and things are about to all fall into place. The final agenda gets posted this week. The registrations are rolling in. The amazing people are prepping to gather. And you do NOT wanna miss what’s sure to be our best Defrag yet. With that in mind, here’s how Morning 1 [...]
Are You Interested in Monitoring Social Media?
Murray Newlands is hosting yet another event in San Francisco this Thursday October 21st; this one is all around social media monitoring and features great speakers such as Marcel LeBrun (CEO of Radian 6), Jennifer Zeszut (chief social strategists at Lithium Technologies), and Timothy Jordan (developer advocate at google). I spoke at Murray’s last event [...]
Be Careful not to Become a Conference Ho
You know the type. You see them on Twitter, Facebook or Plancast plotting out their next 12 conference. You see their Tweets from airports across the globe. Look at me! I’m in Spain! Now I’m in France. Next week I’m speaking in Cabo San Lucas! They are professional conference attendees. They are CEO’s addicted to [...]
Defrag Keynote: Alex Wright
The opening keynote at Defrag will be given by Alex Wright. I’ve been emailing back and forth with Alex a bit about the topic, title, etc — and thought I’d share The Deep History of Oral Culture and Social Networks As the Internet continues to evolve into a global real-time conversation, we are witnessing the [...]
On Windows Phone 7
Last week at the GigaOm’s Mobilize conference, I got a chance to play with a Windows Phone 7 device briefly. I was looking forward to playing with the device as I was optimistic on Microsoft’s new mobile operating system. After using the device briefly, it didn’t feel right. Microsoft went for the cool factor this [...]
This Week’s Keynote Presentations
I have often complained how much I hate sitting on panels. The reason is that conferences usually pack them up with speakers to maximize the number of high profile guests in attendance to sell more general admission tickets. So with a panel of 5-6 people and 30-45 minutes it’s hard to have a real conversation. [...]
Mobile is the New Computer. Join us at the Mobilize Conference Tomorrow. Discount Inside.
Astute readers may have noticed we’ve been writing more and more abut mobility. No, we have not changed focus – it’s computing that has changed a lot. Cloud computing and mobility are more and more intertwined. We still won’t be reporting about iPhone games, the best video tools, the huge advertising potential in location / [...]
The Kauffman Foundation Entrepreneur Scholarship
I’m overjoyed to be able to finally announce something we’ve been working on for a while: The Kauffman Foundation Entrepreneur Scholarship for Defrag. If you’re not familiar with the Kauffman Foundation, this blurb might help: “The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation was established in the mid-1960s by the late entrepreneur and philanthropist Ewing Marion Kauffman. Based [...]
What I *Would Have* Said at TechCrunch Disrupt
What do you get when you combine 7 panelist plus one moderator on to a stage for 30 minutes to talk about a serious topic? Answer: Not much. And that was evident on today’s Angel vs. VC panel.It’s a shame. There are real changes in the venture capital industry and it would have been fun [...]
Defrag: Summit or Conference?
I had a really interesting phone call with Sameer Patel yesterday. The last couple of times that we spoke Sameer had taken to describing Defrag as a “summit-y feel” or “more of a summit than a conference.” Yesterday, when he said that again, I asked him exactly what he meant by that (and now I’m [...]
