April 2010 NY Tech MeetUp

HackNY Segment
Dropioke: Easily set up and share gatherings or "hangs". (http://dropioke.com,http://music.qoobster.com/)
Aviary Tennis: Add props to images and swap with friends. (http://aviary.techatnyu.com/)
Foursquare Candidates: Search Twitter for Drop.io music. (http://manhack.com/)

Student Segment
CabSense: Find the best corner to hail a cab. (http://cabsense.com)
Where do you go?: Heat map of where you've been. (http://www.wheredoyougo.net/)
Project Noah: Collaborative field guide. (http://www.networkedorganisms.com/)
Hangalong: Easily set up and share gatherings or "hangs". (http://www.hangalong.com/)


5-minute Demos
Parse.ly: Personalized content aggregator. (http://parse.ly/)
BantamLive: Social CRM for your business. (http://www.bantamlive.com)
Whistlebox: Augmented reality children's games. (http://www.whistlebox.com,http://www.docrew.com/)
ThinkTank: Ask your social graph questions; connect with the issues that matter. (http://expertlabs.org/thinktank.html)

Announcements
2010 Entrepreneur's Census: Measuring the entrepreneurial landscape in Boston, New York and Silicon Valley. (http://entrepreneurcensus.wordpress.com/)
Why 2K?: Petitioning the senseless $2,000 fee hurting entrepreneurs in NY. (http://nytm.org/2010/03/17/why-2k/)
Wikimania: Help bring Wikimania to NYC! (http://wikimania2010.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page)

Speakers
Game-based Marketing by Gabe Zichermann: Inspire customer loyalty through rewards, challenges, and contests. (http://www.amazon.com/Game-Based-Marketing-Customer-Challenges-Contests/dp/0470562234)

Fred Wilson's Gift To Me

Getting To Know Fred Wilson

I first came across the AVC.com blog. Frankly I thought the name was cheesy. VCs are not supposed to have blogs, I thought. VCs are supposed to be inaccessible, working in smoke filled rooms. A blog is the opposite of a smoke filled room.

Then I started visiting the blog once in a while, after having bookmarked it and not visited for months. I started liking it. It was a decent blog. It was interesting. The blog posts touched on many current topics of interest to me.

Then I started liking it a lot.

I got excited about Zemanta and Disqus before I realized they were Fred Wilson's portfolio companies. That made me respect the guy. It was only a matter of time before I realized he was an investor in Twitter, and sat on the Twitter Board. That was a big nugget to have come across in 2009. 2009 was Twitter's year. During the first half everyone was talking about Twitter. The icing on the cake was to realize no, Twitter did not pitch Fred Wilson. Fred Wilson pitched Twitter.

I like vision people. Clearly Fred Wilson was a visionary.

I wish there were a few top tech entrepreneurs who were as avid bloggers as Fred Wilson is. That would be a triumph. I wish all of the very top tech entrepreneurs were avid bloggers. Not even Kevin Rose is, and he is not exactly the topmost entrepreneur. Fred Wilson kind of stands out in the tech industry that way.

And then I realized Geocities also had been part of Fred's portfolio. I was a Geocities guy back in the days, an avid user. I was sad when Yahoo shut down Geocities recently. Geocities was the original online community.

Fred Wilson did not need to prove to me no more. This cat's got something going on, I thought.

Fred Wilson's Insight
Happy Holi
Fred Wilson: VC
Fred Wilson: A VC
Fred Wilson

AVC, Not For Me

If you are an early stage entrepreneur, you are, of course, looking to find the VC types. For a while I thought of pitching Fred. We even exchanged a few emails. If he was not going to come in himself, he was going to lead me to some people. But I was too early stage. Like too. And I did not articulate myself well.

Then I was resigned to the fact I just don't fall in his domain expertise zone. He does "web services." I am absolutely not in the dot com space.

But that did not change the fact that he was a visionary in the tech industry, and he had become my favorite solo blogger. I very rarely emailed him, but when I did, he replied. That was and is a big deal.

Maybe A VC For Me

But I was not going to give up. You can't bemoan not having a 200 billion dollar tech company in New York City, and stay stuck in the dot com space. I took a friendly swing at Fred Wilson in a blog post. When I started work on that blog post, I had no intention to do so. But a few paragraphs later I was doing it. What the heck, I thought. Tell it like it is. (Fred Wilson's Insight)

Fred Wilson's Gift To Me

Finally it happened. Fred Wilson gave his gift to me. It happened in his comments section to this blog post: Yochai Benkler On TheBroadband Plan. Yes, he is open to going beyond the dot com space, he will invest in broadband if the spectrum is opened up. Opening up the spectrum is a political battle. I am well suited for a political fight like that one. Taking a singular focus to a revolutionary proposition. I could do that. I am itching for the fight.

My Comment:

"There isn't enough competition on the access side of the Internet, both wireline and broadband. The rest of the Internet stack is hypercompetitive and is innovating at a mile a minute. But in access, we have monopolies who go at whatever speed suits them. There's nothing pushing them to go faster."

Finally, for the first time, Fred Wilson and I are "talking."

(1) Hardware (2) Software (3) Connectivity.

Paul Allen wanted MSFT to do both hardware and software. Bill Gates vetoed that. He said no, only software. He was right. But by now the biggest virgin territories are in sector three: Connectivity. That is where the big fortunes stand to be made. Hardware and software will hum along, but the biggest disruptions stand to be made in sector three. The dot com space is kinda saturated by comparison, although that space will always stay fertile because the human mind never satiates. But sector three is where big things will be done in the next push.

Fred Wilson's Comment:

i think you may be right, but i am scared of the capital costs involved. if wireless spectrum was dregulated, i might get interested

My Comment:

"....if wireless spectrum was dregulated...."

That has to be the primary push.

That is all the opening I need. This fight is not entirely as complicated as what happened in Nepal in April 2006. (The First Major Revolution Of The 21st Century Happened In Nepal) This tech entrepreneurship challenge speaks to my political strengths.

My company wants to bring hundreds of millions of new people online. Internet access is the voting right for this 21st century. Take me to the fight.

Andrew Parker

And then Andrew Parker happened out of the blue. I'd love to do a May 2010-May 2011 stint with Union Square Ventures. I think my startup will have covered more ground in three years with this stint than without it. I hope I get to do it: fingers crossed.

Who Is Andrew Parker?

Fred Wilson (financier) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Twitter Employees Cheerlead Top Investor's Bombshell Post...‎

Net Neutrality Is The Internet's DNA
Twitter Needs To Eat Into Its Ecosystem
Farmville Farmer's Market: My Idea
Startups And Immigrants
Fat Can Work, But Lean More Often Does
Measuring Your Twitter Influence
The New York City Subway
Broader Broadband
Tumblr: Casey, Nina, David, Fred
Broad Broadband
Silicon Valley Vs. New York City
The Foursquare Rap: Badges Like Us
Location! Location! Location!
An Immigrant Story For Brad Feld
Craig Newmark, Dennis Crowley, Jennifer 8 Lee: Koreatown
Anu Shukla Has Found The New Frontier In Advertising
I Just Became Friends With Anu Shukla

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Net Neutrality Is The Internet's DNA

Fred Wilson: Internet Freedom

..... the net neutrality camp (which I am very much in) is on its heels .... the era of permissionless innovation that has characterized the first fifteen years of the commercial Internet ....... If we lose Internet Freedom, we won't have any companies we would want to invest in and we'll close up shop and move on with our lives.

Albert Wegner: The Price Of Internet Freedom Is?

Here there is much less of a market force at work as a potential corrective because in many local markets there is only a single broadband provider available and at best most markets have a duopoly.

Wall Street Journal: Court Backs Comcast Over FCC On "Net Neutrality"

"The court in no way disagreed with the importance of preserving a free and open Internet, nor did it close the door to other methods for achieving this important end," said FCC spokeswoman Jen Howard........ the idea that Internet providers should treat all forms of Web traffic equally ...... The court's decision prompted calls Tuesday from Democrats and consumer groups for Congress to pass new legislation to give the FCC more authority to police Internet providers. "They may have won the battle only to face a larger war" ...... Republican lawmakers have generally opposed net-neutrality rules. ....... AT&T said the FCC's current net-neutrality principles work and it will continue to abide by them. ....... Verizon Chief Executive Ivan Seidenberg said, it isn't a "slam dunk" that net neutrality is the right policy. ...... Time Warner Cable Inc. said the decision doesn't change its commitment to providing the "high-quality, open Internet experience" its customers expect...... President Obama supports net-neutrality rules

Daily Kos: What Happens Now With Net Neutrality

...... Comcast, which has asserted its right to slow its own cable customers' access to file-sharing ........ not an out and out win for Comcast .... there are a number of ways forward from here for the FCC. ..... the Supreme Court might reverse ..... The Supreme Court might disagree. ...... Congress might amend the Federal Communications Act to create a new source of jurisdiction to regulate broadband. To do this one would need at least 60 votes in the Senate. Good luck with that........ under its Title II jurisdiction, the FCC can require open access requirements, which would be even more valuable for purposes of promoting freedom of speech and innovation. ....... the FCC might decide that the better solution is to retrace its steps, correct the mistake it made in 2002, and reassert Title II authority over broadband ..... an FCC that under chairman Genachowski has been a strong Net Neutrality advocate

TechDirt: Court Tells FCC It Has No Mandate To Enforce Net Neutrality (And That's A Good Thing)

......it's now official that the FCC has no power to mandate net neutrality or to punish Comcast (even with a gentle wrist slap) for its traffic shaping practices. Lots of people seem upset by this, but they should not be. ......Even if you believe net neutrality is important, allowing the FCC to overstep its defined boundaries is not the best way to deal with it...... Comcast .. should still be punished -- but by the FTC, rather than the FCC -- for misleading its customers about what type of service they were getting, and what the limitations were on those services. As for the FCC, if it really wants a more neutral net, it should focus on making sure that there's real competition in the market, rather than just paying lip service to the idea in its broadband plan.

Net neutrality is the Internet's DNA. This is the Internet Century. Take away free speech and America is just a landmass. Take away net neutrality and the Internet is glorified cable television. It is not the Internet no more.

Net neutrality has received a temporary setback. But the anxieties are very real. Net neutrality is here to stay, but that does not mean there isn't work cut out for the net neutrality enthusiasts, which is pretty much everyone I know.

This judicial decision reminds me of the Supreme Court decision against campaign finance reform a few months back that Obama spoke against in his State Of The Union speech. The judiciary is capable of nonsensical decisions. This is one of them. One reason might be the judges are not term limited like the politicians. Maybe there ought to be a 12 year term limit rule for the Supreme Court justices.

We are nowhere close to losing the net neutrality fight, but the fight we have not even waged yet is the fight that will bring true competition in the high speed internet access arena. It is the fight to release the spectrum. The spectrum war needs to be taken to Comcast's doors.  

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Twitter Needs To Eat Into Its Ecosystem

Measuring Your Twitter Influence
Who Is Andrew Parker?
Farmville Farmer's Market: My Idea
Social Media Week: The Best NY Tech MeetUp Ever
Twitter Should Go For A Netscape-Like IPO
My Talk On Social Media At The Science House MeetUp

Fred Wilson: The Twitter Platform's Inflection Point (My Comment)

"Twitter really should have had all of that when it launched or it should have built those services right into the Twitter experience." 

There you go. That has been my point. Twitter needs to eat into its ecosystem. Windows did that. Bill Gates' last threat was he was going to incorporate antivirus software right into Windows. Good thing for Norton that he retired instead.

And Twitter needs to appeal more to the mainstream users. The first page is not welcoming for new users. For one, it is cluttered. Tumblr could teach here.

One way to eat into the ecosystem is to go on a buying spree. For that you need money. You get that money by going public. (Twitter Should Go For A Netscape-Like IPO)

You should hire me and put me to work on this. (Who Is Andrew Parker?)

Don't get me wrong. Blogger remains my favorite social media platform (My Talk On Social Media At The Science House MeetUp) And my enthusiasm for Twitter is well documented. (Measuring Your Twitter Influence) It is not possible I lack respect for Evan Williams. But I think I can help.

Hire me for a year, and let this be my first project. :-) Seriously.

10 years back a lot of people wanted to go online so they could get Hotmail. Twitter has to reach that level of appeal.

" I think the time for filling the holes in the Twitter service has come and gone."

True. But not true. 2009 was Twitter's year. True. 2010 is the year for location, random connections and the inbox, as I see it so far. That list might look different in six months, I don't know.

But Twitter could still do it. It needs to eat into its ecosystem.

Right now I feel like Bill Clinton felt when he was applying for colleges. The dude applied to just one college: Georgetown in DC. He wanted to be in DC, Georgetown was a good college, and it had a strong foreign service program. Right now when I have decided to get the first real job of my life and to postpone work on my startup by about a year, I find myself wanting to work at Union Square Ventures and no place else. The more I think about it, the more I want to do it. There are currents and counter currents of thoughts.

• Fred Wilson is too big for me. 
• They might not even hire me. 
• They will definitely not hire me. 
• What am I thinking?

Some of the counter currents:

• What if I end up being a VC in a year? That would be horror. I have enormous respect for VCs, but I don't want to be one. 30 years from now I want to be known for a company I created.
• What if it feels like a corporate job? What if it is not entrepreneurial enough?
• There must be holes in my abilities. There most definitely are if the idea is to find a photocopy of Andrew Parker. Andrew Parker's tumblog is definitely better than mine.

What I want.

• I do want it, and I am going to do my best this month to try and get it. But I am not going to email Fred, although I have emailed him several times on frivolous topics like, well, Happy Holi Fred Wilson. (Happy Holi) If they want me, they will email me. If they get someone else, I will read about it on Fred's blog that I have taken to reading daily. His mantra: blog daily. My mantra: read daily.
• Doing my best is to put out a series of blog posts at my blog. They are not asking for a resume, they are asking for a blog. That is insurance that this is going to feel like a startup, and not some ossified corporation.
• Words like guru, don come to mind. Fred Wilson is a big shot who is hugely accessible. I mean, the guy has a blog that is so good he could be mistaken for a pro blogger. 
• I want a decent six figure salary.
• Can I do 10-6? I don't need a lunch break. But I am not going to be happy working only 40 hours a week. I have that personality type that wants to work long hours. But I like flexibility in how I spend some of those hours. What is the USV version of Google's 20% time? Let me spend 20% of my time going to events in town and networking in the industry, hanging out with startup people. 
• Take Twitter public in 2010 before Facebook. I want that to be my first project. If I fail, I am just a guy with a six figure salary. If I succeed, I want a percentage. So if USV owns 10% of Twitter - I don't know what it owns, it is very likely less - I want to end up owning 1% of Twitter, something like that.
• Invest in Chatroulette, help it avoid the Twitter mistakes, turn it into the leading Random Connections service.
• Help take FourSquare to the next level.
• Find the next FourSquare. 
• These are some of the things I would want to work on.
• Andrew's title was Analyst. I want mine to be Junior Partner. He has a better tumblog than I do, but other than that I bring more to the table. 
• It might be a good idea to hire one a half people plus an intern. One would be me. 
• I have never had health insurance. Push ups have been my idea of health insurance so far. If I am hired, to me it is going to feel like Obama made Fred Wilson give me health insurance. Okay, okay, that sentence sounds convoluted, but I did put numerous hours into Obama 08. (Jupiter And Obama, Switching To Obama)
• The tweet is to the web what the atom is to the universe. Twitter has to prove that. Twitter is lucky that there is no Gowalla around, but it sure needs to feel the time pressure. 

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Andreessen, Conway, Hornik