I just got back from the TechCrunch party at August Capital and all I have to say is that party simply rocked. There was more than 500 people for sure. The atmosphere was awesome. Music, food, booz and conversations were just great.
It was a much more impressive gathering than the one Karen and I went to in New York. People knew each other well and loved mingling. I could see that even though I was not part of the crowd. My job was to explain Semantic Web to fairly drunk technical and business people.
But seriously, the demos went very well. People got BlueOrganizer instantly. A lot of people heard about us before but did not quite know what we did. Some thought we were like StumbleUpon, but after the demo the difference was obvious. People loved the fact that we recognized objects. They asked me to go to different pages and to show how BlueOrganizer worked on the pages, on links and on text. It was good to see that people genuinely get it and like it.
I had a fairly long chat with Eghosa Omoigui from Intel Capital, who specializes in Semantic Technologies that have direct consumer focus. I was really thrilled because we were on the same page about the right path to Semantic Web. He said that for years he has been advocating a gradual, top-down approach to weaving semantics into the web. He also believed that basic intelligent agent, such as BlueOrganizer is a good step towards a smarter web - that was great to hear.
I had a few other interesting technical conversations but most of my time was spent giving demos to people who poped up. SmartLinks looked fantastic on a bright, 32″ monitor, as did our new SmartLink Feeds - we will release them officially next week, so stay tuned.
I am flying home tomorrow early morning and have a lot to think about, as this was a very productive trip. The party was definitely a great way to end the trip. Experiencing the energy and the vibe of the Silicon Valley tech community first hand is great. If you have a chance to go to the TechCrunch party next time, definitely do it!
{ 6 trackbacks }
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Sounds like fun and a productive business time as well Alex!
Alex, you party animal — you’re even convincing drunk people you have a great product! How do you get them to remember what you told them, though? Time for some followup emails now…. LOL!
g
Graeme,
It is all about subliminable mesages as you know :)
Alex
Alex, great job at techcrunch - I was one of the people that made the instant comparison to stumbleupon! ;)
You did a great job of explaining the differences and provided a very effective demo
Installed the plugin and will share with all my friends!
–