BASES [Startup Digest] November 16, 2009
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Under the Radar: Mobility
[StartupDigest] Summary: NextGen Conference with Cory Levy
NextGen Conference was the last event I attended for this week. It took place yesterday all day so it might be a bit early for a summary but I’ll be adding in more content as it comes in during the week.
Full Disclosure: I had the pleasure to help organize, speak, and throw the after-party for the conference so I personally might be a bit biased in how cool it was 
The conference was put on by Cory Levy, 18 year old entrepreneur who has already worked for 2, yes 2!, venture capital firms at his age. He literally cold called me a couple months ago asking for advice and help with this conference idea of his and there was no way I could refuse. Here was the premise of the conference:
The inspiration
The Next Generation Conference is primed—uniquely so—to take on the extraordinary challenge of renewing our economy. It’s not recovery that is needed; it’s the revitalization that comes from innovation, creativity, value building, and entrepreneurial spirit invested in all of our work. NextGen has been founded to help you.
About the conference
NextGen is a one-day conference at Stanford University in the heart of Silicon Valley.
NextGen’s mission is to help you succeed, by providing lectures, panels and networking opportunities on areas that are vital in building and maintaining your business.
Some of the topics will include:
- How to pitch (what you need to present in your deck and how to be prepared)
- Importance of asking for help / mentorship
- And plenty more topics!
Overall the conference was a little long but a lot of fun. Here are some videos of the talk, the lineup of speakers, and a couple blog posts about it.
Video’s of Conference
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nextgenconf
Lineup of Speakers
http://www.nextgenconf.com/speakers.php
Blog posts about conference
http://www.corylevy.com/2009/10/05/nextgenconference/
http://www.danielbru.com/2009/10/04/nextgen-conf/
[Startup Digest] Summary: ETL Talk – Steve Blank, Stanford Professor and Serial Entrepreneur
Sadly I couldn’t make it to this weeks Entreprenuerial Thought Leaders series with Steve Blank 
but as I’ve highlited before in my last ETL post here, they are some of my favorite events and talks.
So for not being able to make it I thought I would highlight his last talk here and info on where to find future ETL talks:
All of Steve Blank’s E-Corner Video’s here:
http://ecorner.stanford.edu/authorMaterialInfo.html?mid=2048
MP3 of his 2009 ETL talk:
http://www.stanford.edu/group/edcorner/uploads/podcast/blank091111.mp3
Post about what is customer development by Eric Ries
http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2008/11/what-is-customer-development.html
For future ETL talks go here
http://etl.stanford.edu/
http://bases.stanford.edu/
[Startup Digest] Summary: Cal Poly Venture Challenge
Hey everyone and welcome to a new week of [Startup Digest] Summaries! The test last week of this new column went so well I am going to continue to write these summaries every week of the events I attend for the week.
This week was a bit slow for Startup Events but on Tuesday I had the pleasure of speaking at my Alma Mater Cal Poly San Luis Obispo during their entrepreneurs workshop series. A lot of big changes are happening at Cal Poly and I wanted to dedicated a summary to their main initiative the Cal Poly Venture Challenge.
Basically the Cal Poly Venture Challenge (CPVC) is a collection of a startup competition, engineering competition, speaker series, and summer incubator program very similar to what BASES at Stanford is doing. In fact we are copying much of what BASES has done at Stanford during its early years since its one of the best entrepreneurial organization models at a University I have ever seen.
The event I spoke at was how to effectively write an Executive Summary to move forward in the competition. Sadly there is no video or pictures of the event (Come on Cal Poly!) but here are a few links of interest about the program. And if you are in the San Luis Obispo area I would highly encourage you to get involved and attend all of their events.
Cal Poly Venture Challenge main website:
http://calpolyventurechallenge.com/
A few articles about the program
http://pacbiztimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=963&Itemid=47
http://calpolynews.calpoly.edu/news_releases/2006/July/iq_awards.html
http://www.ee.calpoly.edu/announcements/cal-poly-venture-challenge-and-innovation-quest
http://www.billtrammel.com/2009-ray-scherr/
A few of my own blog posts about the program
http://entrepreneurialactivism.com/2009/03/14/bill-trammel-cal-poly-business-plan-competition-the-wrap-up/
http://entrepreneurialactivism.com/2009/03/22/2009-cal-poly-business-plan-competition-photos/
[Startup Digest] Summary: SNAP Summit’s FailCon 2009
The last startup event for review today is SNAP Summit’s FailCon 2009 put on by event organizer extraordinaire Cassie Phillips and her company Room Full of People. Out of all the events I have attend this year, the theme of this conference was one of the most unique and interesting. Here it is in their own words:
About SNAP Summit
“SNAP Summit: FailCon” is a full-day conference focusing on the trials and tribulations of now successful entrepreneurs. You aren’t a real entrepreneur until you’ve had to deal with failure, and recovering from it – financially, emotionally, and practically – can be challenging. Hear how some major players in the industry have dealt with startup troubles, recovered, and kept a positive, tenacious, and energetic attitude through it all.
This year’s conference brings together a full spectrum of attendees, including independent developers, up-and coming startups, all the way up to large companies looking to get in on the next big thing.
The conference will debate questions such as:
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- What variables do VCs watch for to preemptively prevent a company going under?
- How do you financially prepare for the possibility of failure: legally, fiscally, and in your team?
- What have some of the leading executives today learned from their past experiences?
- What are you watching out for with the current social web and rising companies?
- How do you layoff or fire an employee or partner?
- How do you save a failing company?
- How do you recover from a failed product or marketing campaign?
They brought a great line of speakers to the event http://snapsummit.com/speakers/ who got a chance to speak freely and openly about failures. One of my favorite talks was by Max Levchin who talked about his company before PayPal which failed during his trip to Chicago trying to raise capital. And instead of thinking about why this happend he just jumped right into his next company with no fear, all because of his desire to create something great and follow the entreprenuerial excitement.
Sadly there isn’t a full collection of video’s but here is some media about the event, a video of one speaker, and pictures.
Video of Mark Pincus’ talk
http://www.justin.tv/failcon
FailCon Pictures
http://www.sivajitv.com/movie-gallery/failcon-2009-meet-photos.htm
NPR Interview with Max Levchin
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=114271856&ft=1&f=1006
Article about the event
http://www.womenentrepreneur.com/2009/11/failcon-entrepreneurs-explain-where-they-went-wrong.html
Interview with Cassie Phillips
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/jenniferlindsay/2009/08/21/Featured-Guest-Cassie-Phillipps-Organizer-FailCon
[Startup Digest] Summary: Startup School 2009
I’m probably a little late in writing a summary about Startup School 2009, but this is one of my favorite events of the whole entire year. I’ve been to Startup School twice (2008 and 2009) and the agenda both times has had some of the highest quality speakers in the shortest period of time, and some of the highest quality attendees from all around the country.
For everyone not familiar with Startup School, it’s an annual conference put on by YCombinator, Paul Graham, Jessica Livingston, and BASES. There is not official description of the event on their website http://startupschool.org/ but basically its an invite only full day conference which brings together some of the top startup entrepreneurs of our times http://startupschool.org/speakers.html and brings together a diverse mix of geeks, technical founders, and aspiring entrepreneurs (very much the YCombinator crowd)
Below are a collection of videos, pictures, reactions, summaries, and press about the event.
My favorite talk by Jason Fried from 37 Signals
Here is a collection of videos from all the speakers on Justin.tv
http://www.justin.tv/startupschool
High quality pictures of all the speakers from Gary Tan
http://garry.posterous.com/yc-startup-school-2009-thanks-to-yc-and-the-s
Awesome summary of all the speakers talk by Mark Bao
http://journal.markbao.com/2009/10/startup-school-2009-summary/
Official Startup School Wiki
http://wiki.startupschool.org/doku.php?id=start
TechCrunch Coverage
http://eu.techcrunch.com/2009/10/29/startup-school-2009-37-signals-has-some-lessons-for-european-startups/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/24/startup-school-ev-williams-and-biz-stone/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/24/startup-school-tony-hsieh-on-delivering-happiness/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/24/startup-school-sequoias-greg-mcadoo-on-the-opportunities-of-a-recession/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/24/startup-school-paul-buchheit-on-why-he-sold-to-facebook/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/24/startup-school-an-interview-with-mark-zuckerberg/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/24/startup-school-wired-editor-chris-anderson-on-freemium-business-models/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/24/startup-school-mark-pincus-talks-about-becoming-a-great-ceo-with-tony-robbins-help/
[Startup Digest] Summary: Finance4Founders – Startup Hiring: I’ve hired all my friends – now what?
The other week I went to the Finance4Founder’s event put on by the Master of 500 Hat’s Dave McClure, Flowtown’s Dan Martell, and Event organizer extraordinaire Cassie Phillips.
Their monthly dinner is an invite only event and here is some more info about the dinner on their website:
ABOUT
Finance4Founders is a group of Silicon Valley geeks, entrepreneurs, & investors dedicated to educating and helping the next generation of internet startups around issues of fund raising, option pools, and term sheets. We meet monthly over dinner to discuss relevant topics in raising capital, working with investors, and compensating great teams.
The co-founders of Finance4Founders are Dave McClure & Dan Martell; organizers also include Cassie Philips & countless others. Finance4Founders draws inspiration from (and plagiarizes liberally) Startup2Startup, Round Zero, Silicon Forum, and numerous other previous & future Silicon Valley geek and entrepreneurial events.
The primary goals of Finance4Founders are:
- Learn about financing & startups
- Celebrating success stories
- Meet promising new geeks & entrepreneurs
- Eat, drink, & have fun
This month’s dinner was called “Startup Hiring: I’ve hired all my friends – now what?”and featured both Peter Pham of Billshrink.com and Dan Arkind of Jobscore.com Here is a bit on their bio’s from the Finance4Founder’s website:
Peter Pham
As CEO of BillShrink, Peter drives company expansion and is an advocate for customer rights and transparency among service providers. He was previously vice president of business development at Photobucket.com, where he was the fifth employee and was responsible for driving user acquisition, strategic partnerships and corporate development. Photobucket was acquired in 2007 by Fox Interactive Media, a division of News Corporation.
When Peter left in 2008, Photobucket had grown to more than 61M users, making it the #1 photo sharing site and the 38th most visited site in the U.S. Prior to Photobucket, Peter was in the enterprise space for more than 8 years working in sales, marketing, reseller channel development, product and strategy for multiple startups in the fields of mid-range server computing, software as a service, solid state storage and mobilization of enterprise software.
Peter holds a bachelor’s degree in biological sciences and a minor in business management from the University of California, Irvine.
Dan Arkind
Dan is a 14 year veteran of the startup recruiting wars. He has filled every role at venture backed startups from employee 0 to 100, including connecting founders with one another. Dan is currently the CEO of JobScore, an online recruiting solution in use by 50+ Bay Area employers. In 2006 Dan co-founded STIRR, an entrepreneur networking group.
Here are the Dan Arkind’s slides from the event rightfully called “Hiring Hacks”, blog post about the event, and twitter account for Finance4Founders:
Slides from SlideShare: http://www.slideshare.net/danarkind/hiring-hacks-for-founders
Dan Arkind’s Blog post on JobScore about the event
http://blog.jobscore.com/hiring-hacks-for-founders
Also be sure to follow the Finance4Founders twitter account for event updates and great tid bits about financing and startup issues
http://twitter.com/Fin4Founders
[Startup Digest] Summary: ETL Series at Stanford – Innovation in the Changing Music Industry: Quincy Jones III & Chamillionaire
If you haven’t heard of the Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders (ETL) Series Talks at Stanford, you should check it out here http://etl.stanford.edu/. I remember listening to these PodCasts in college on iTunes and now that I’m living in the Bay Area its been awesome to hear them in person and help out as a guest Staff member for a few of the talks.
Here is a short blurb about the ETL speaker series from their website:
What is ETL?
The DFJ Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Seminar (ETL) is a weekly seminar series on entrepreneurship, co-sponsored by the venture capital firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson, BASES (Stanford’s entrepreneurship group), and the Stanford Technology Ventures Program.
The seminar is free and open to public. It also functions as a class called Management Science and Engineering 472.
And if you are around the silicon valley bay area here is when these talks take place
What is the time and location for ETL?
ETL takes place every Wednesday 4:30 PM to 5:30 PM in Skilling Auditorium, Stanford University. Click here for directions to Skilling Auditorium.
They are literally free and open to the public so if you are around the area I would highly suggest checking them out. At the talks expect to hear from some of the top innovators in the world like Eric Ries, Steve Jurvetson, Mark Pincus, Steve Blank, and may others with the occasional informal meetups after the talks with some entreprenuerial Stanford Students.
Last week they had a talk with Quincy Jones III and Chamillionaire about “Innovation in the Changing Music Industry”. Here is the video, reaction from others, and media covering the event.
Official PodCast: http://ecorner.stanford.edu/authorMaterialInfo.html?mid=2278
Official announcement of event on Chamillionaire’s blog
http://www.chamillionaire.com/home/post.html
Stanford Daily’s summary and reaction to the talk
http://www.stanforddaily.com/cgi-bin/?p=1035441
[Startup Digest] November 2, 2009 – Top Startup Events in the Bay Area
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[Startup Digest] The Top Tech and Entreprenuership Events – 10/26 to 11/4
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