I recently attended The Brave New Web conference put on by the MIT Enterprise Forum at the Colonnade. The great thing about this show is that I do not go into a complete boring detailed transcription of the event because, in this age of on-demand media, there were blogs about it even as it happened – check out Allen Sterns Center Networks blog with a complete blow-by-blow.
All in all, it was in great conference with a good turnout that had a few key takeaways or thoughts for me as it relates the New England and Boston Web 2.0 technology space:
- Jeremy Allaire does a pretty good job at pulling-off that “nice guy” entrepreneur thing…the “King of PR maven” also managed to gloat that Brightcove has not invested a dime in Marketing “Invest in Thought Leadership…NOT Marketing”.
- Jeff Taylor of Monster.com and Eons.com fame is pretty darn cool (albeit a bit of an ego maniac)…he also took the opportunity to rib Allaire for that “build it and they will come” comment later in his panel.
- There is a direct correlation between the quality of a panel discussion and the moderator. The first panel, Connecting The Dots included a good lineup of industry experts but also a great moderator in Joseph Lassiter III (Harvard) who kept the discussion on topic and the company grandstanding down to a minimum. The other 2 panels that I sat through, although dotted with excellent points, seemed a bit directionless.
- As pointed out in one of the early panels, Boston really is starting to build out a strong base of web 2.0 / forward thinking companies that just have not hit their stride yet. It stuck me that one of Boston’s issues is a PR one – the area just has not had a high-profile ”home run” IPO of acquisition in this area and needs to work on the image of the area as being a little behind the times.
There was a good setup of local tech start-ups that I had a chance to talk with while I was there. The lineup included:
- Tabblo (Cambridge, MA) A creative space for pulling together pics (ala Flickr) and text to create narrative web pages. This is a very interesting development that has evolved significantly since it’s launch last June. Founder Antonio Rodriguez was one of the highlights of a later panel…you can find his blog here: http://theonda.org/
- wis.dm (Cambridge, MA) “The smarter social network”…Keep an eye out for their public beta to start THIS FRIDAY, this is like a del.icio.us meets Squido – social networking around topics of interest.
- Compete (Boston, MA) Addicted to the incredible inaccurate numbers of Alexa? Try the local alternative with a larger sample base!
- Pawspot (Somerville, MA) “Where local pets and people meet”…another great local social network around your four-legged friends.
Also at the show but I did not get a chance to look at were Referral Monitor (word-of-mouth referral marketing), Scrybe (web-based Calendar and To-do’s ). Foneshow (Narrowcast radio and podcasting over the cell phone network) and Podzinger (search inside audio).
NYC based Expo TV was also there – the video based ePinions start with a strong VOD footprint as well.
As I mentioned, I no longer need to give you the nity gritty…you can read all about it on theses posts:
Brave New Web Conference – Wrap Up Post
Live: Brave New Web – Keynote – John Furrier – podtech.net
Live: Brave New Web – Where do I get my Web 2.0?
Live: Brave New Web: Connecting the dots – includes a Web 1.0 vs. 2.0 discussion
Live: Brave New Web – Jeremy Allaire Keynote Discussion
In the moment… notes from the MIT Enterprise Forum 2007 Winter Conference
The Brave New Web? It’s all business
Jeremy Allaire on video & startups at Brave New Web conference
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