Scobleizer - Latest Comments in The expo war over startups

Re: The expo war over startups

Engago Team — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 05:17:12 -0000

Seth Godin has his own view on launch PR and events:
The myth of launch PR

http://sethgodin.typepad.co...

"Here are some brands that had no launch at all: Starbucks, Apple, Nike, Harry Potter, Google, William Morris, The DaVinci Code, Wikipedia, Snapple, Geico, Linux, Firefox and yes, Microsoft. (All got plenty of PR, but after the launch, sometimes a lot later)."

Maybe we all should ignore TechCrunch50 (TC52) and DEMO completely.

Re: The expo war over startups

Dating — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 23:45:14 -0000

Nice to see the old technogeeks haven't let go of the good ol' web 1.0 mixers! Let the libation flow!

Re: The expo war over startups

Poetslife - Bruce Curley — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:04:21 -0000

Big stick....please...

Although I have no fear of arrogant, craven Mikey "censor" Arrington, I lost all respect for him when he deleted my comments about having chosen Ashton Kutcher as the celebabe for TechCrunch50.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2...

Then when I put "Arrington" + "Censorship" in Google I discovered he has censored dozens of people and companies over the years.

http://poetslife.blogspot.c...

With all that money and his legal degree, what's Mikey afraid of that he censors company's and blogger comments on TechCruch? I thought the whole idea was a free and open exchange of ideas and products?

His narrow mindedness, dictatorial personality, and humorless manner may mean that he has kept numerous good products off the market. Maybe there should be a blog dedicated to how many creative business people he has negatively impacted and how many products he has quietly deep sixed over the years? hmmmm....

At least another Silicon titan, Jason Calacanis, had the balls to show the process for how he picked the new speaker for Maholo Daily. Arrogant Mikey seems to do so much in secrecy, as in who is chosen to present new products at TechCruch50.

Here's an idea, Robert. If you go to TechCrunch50, why not follow Mikey "Howard Hughes" Arrington around with your camera to see what really goes on in his world. THAT would be great video!

Re: The expo war over startups

Gregory Birch DDS — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:13:33 -0000

Thank you Robert, and Mr Bogus, Robert for bringing resources to my doorstep, and H. Bogus for giving me a little hope.
Everywhere I look I see sharks swimming in dark waters, and I don't know who to trust. The TC application process was very pleasant, the interviewer was nice and I was comfortable with the whole thing, even though OY didn't get picked, I appreciated the transparency, and I will continue to be a TC fan. At Gnomedex DEMO seemed to be the most popular place to launch. I think there is room for both events as long as integrity is maintained, and we get protection from the sharks if only for a little while.

Re: The expo war over startups

Alex Hammer — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 09:33:39 -0000

Well written and gives insight into dynamics involved.

Re: The expo war over startups

Engago Team — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 06:06:38 -0000

Maybe this is similar:
Starz In Their Eyes
http://www.youtube.com/watc...

They'll be making sure you stay amused
They'll fill you up with drugs and booze
Maybe you'll make the evening news

And when you're tripping
over your dreams
They'll keep you down by any means
and by the end of the night
you'll be stifling your screams

Now why do you wanna go
and put starz in their eyes?

Re: The expo war over startups

Engago Team — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 05:48:38 -0000

For every startup the main quest is to reach users or customers.
Thus the question is what is the best way to get a potential user or customer attention? Launching at TC50 or DEMO? or Conventional PR?

After the first attention the startups need to sustain the interest. One needs to generate continuously interest.
Thus the launch and press coverage at a startup event is just a first boost. (like getting Digged or StumbledUpon)

During 2005 in the UK there was a Channel4 TV show on 3 start up companies: a ventilated bed, a fitness/diet website and a baby shampoo. They reached their potential customers directly by TV, which is still the best media. Thus they had to coverage by media and direct access to their customers.
Where do these 3 companies stand today? Freshbed seems to do OK. As for the other 2?

The game in Business isn't played at launch, but over time.
(and the world is larger than "The Valley")

Re: The expo war over startups

Humphrey Bogus — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:28:21 -0000

Who cares? I maintain that both are a bad deal for both presenters and attendees.

Each of these conferences costs over $2000 to attend. Which one startups choose to present at hardly matters in the grand scheme of the overall success/failure of the company.

For attendees, both conferences are populated entirely with VCs and Corp Dev types. The real list for TechCrunch is here - http://www.eventbrite.com/e... - not on Upcoming.

I went to TC40 last year as a VC, and the room was absolutely overflowing with my competitors as an investor. Why on earth would I want to go to that? Do you think the company is going to remember you as the 15th person in line to hand them a business card? Give me a tradeshow where I can walk the floor and see how the company interacts with customers, not how they do in a canned 5-minute demo with no ability for me to ask questions.

(Also, the judges were universally awful in my recollection, slobbering over "cool" concepts that don't have a prayer of making a dime.)

A friend of mine's company was selected to present at TC40 last year. Their launch was absolutely buried--even though people liked the product and they've since raised money from well-known investors and grown significantly as a business--because of the 39 other companies clamoring for press attention that day. DEMO has the same dynamic, with slightly twisted economics.

Show me one business that blew the doors off at one of these conferences and I'll show you 100 more that didn't and still got funded and went on to great success. The fact is, going out and getting real customers is going to win every time.

These conferences serve no one well except the organizers.

Re: The expo war over startups

Zuke Mager — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 15:31:04 -0000

> us new school types

Robert, please! You're twice as old as Zuckerberg. If you don't want to be called old school, you can at best be called "middle school" =8-(

The TechCrunch monopoly needs to be broken, but it won't be RWW or D, who will do it. SAI and VentureBeat have a better chance, but I things CNet with Dan Farber will lead tech blogging back to serious and usable journalism.

Re: The expo war over startups

Jeremy Toeman — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 15:21:00 -0000

1 - using Upcoming as a barometer of anything is just a bad idea. It's simply not as well-used by anyone as it *could* be, which often leaves it bereft of useful data points. For example, if you were hoping for coverage from USA Today, Time, Newsweek, and Forbes magazines, and you had to pick an event to attend, can you find reporters from those outlets registered with Upcoming? No.

2 - as we talked about at Gnomedex, while a "good" PR person might pick one show over the other, a "great" marketing person will tell their company/clients to avoid both for fear of dilution. Regardless of whether or not TC "beats" Demo, it's a lose-lose to the industry, the startups, and the media.

Re: The expo war over startups

Josh — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 11:06:27 -0000

Well... this kind of thing is hardly unexpected given bloggers have always been notorius for ego and opinion =)

Re: The expo war over startups

andydavies — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 10:14:44 -0000

I don't know either side in this but there just seems something distasteful about the way Techcrunch went about this.

but then I often wonder whether Techcrunch is written to be about startups or just stroke Michael Arrington...

Re: The expo war over startups

Jonathan — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 10:05:52 -0000

@steve garfield remember when robert sees something it is "launched" as rober tis better then tech crunch and demo lol

Re: The expo war over startups

Robert Scoble — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:43:19 -0000

Eric: I'd expect most people would think Demo would last longer. It has a longer history, a bigger brand name, and all that. But there is change in the wind.

Regarding fear. I agree with you. I wish they hadn't gone head-to-head, but I think TC did this for strategic reasons and that those reasons will need two more years to play out before we can really call the winner.

Re: The expo war over startups

Robert Scoble — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:41:34 -0000

Steve: a friend of Qik showed me Qik before they were really ready to launch. That was on a Saturday night. By Sunday they had tons of signups and they were launched without even trying to launch.

Re: The expo war over startups

Steve Garfield — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:30:26 -0000

Hi Robert.

What do you mean, " we launched Qik from an Apple store without even having a company employee present. "

Re: The expo war over startups

Eric Norlin — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:29:06 -0000

Robert-

(full disclosure: Chris Shipley is an advisor to Defrag)

The bit in your post about how PR folks are "fearing" Arrington speaks to a phenomenon that's something beyond distasteful. It takes the whole "journalism v. bloggers" meme and flips it on its head -- by showing the worst actions that the blogosphere can offer (if what you imply is actually happening).

As for the DEMO v. TC50 stuff: I've asked tons of folks - and have found that outside of the echo chamber that is the Valley, most folks are picking DEMO. In fact, I did a twitpoll about which one would be around in 4 years, and 100% of respondents picked DEMO.

I'm not sure what that all means, but I don't buy into the "DEMO is going down" thinking that's going around. Chris has been doing this for too long, and is too good.

At the end of the day, I think a lot of people have been turned off by the "demo must die" stuff that Mike said, along w/ a lot of jason's "payola" comments. I think they would've been better off to say nothing, and just go about building their conference (which obviously has value).

People would really rather see the industry collaborating around helping startups versus a whole conference started because it wants to "destroy" something else.

What's the upshot of it all? I'm actually getting companies approaching me that have decided they'd rather launch at Defrag versus getting "lost in the noise" that will be the endless articles of "demo v. tc50" that week (which will result in no one getting the launch they want).

www.defragcon.com

Re: The expo war over startups

Da Bourz — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:28:01 -0000

And again, it's just about PR, not real. It's not about what your product is but what people are saying about it.

Re: The expo war over startups

Robert Scoble — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:22:45 -0000

Allen: name another place that has more tech professionals looking for events. I can name one: Facebook. But I can't link to the event calendars in Facebook, so Upcoming wins and wins big time.

Re: The expo war over startups

Jake Tracey — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:14:56 -0000

I agree with you, even though it would seem there is, moreso than ever, an incredible opportunity for anyone to break their site over normal, organic traffic.

Kudos to the businesses that throw their lot into TC50 this year though.

Re: The expo war over startups

allen stern — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 09:10:08 -0000

upcoming is the "source" for where tech professionals are going? - that's hilarious. absolutely hilarious.

Re: The expo war over startups

Mark Dykeman — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 08:55:43 -0000

After reading this post, it almost feels like Techcrunch is the Microsoft of blogging. Not the Google of blogging, the Microsoft.

Thing is: do the best products, with the most loyal followings, really get launched under the wing and coverage of Techcrunch vs. other outlets? I wonder. Maybe there are more success stories coming from elsewhere?

In other words, is there really that much power behind that big stick?