Web 2.0 Summit: A Montanan’s Perspective
Friday, December 8th, 2006 by Steven S. -- Product DesignWhen I told people at the Web 2.0 summit that we were from Montana, the reactions were either:
- Stunned bewilderment: “Montana? How did you end up there?”
- Envy and intrigue: “Montana? How did you end up there?”
(Yeah, they usually said the same thing)
“We ran out of gas in Missoula on our way to Seattle, so we just decided to start our company there.”
Because, well, you wouldn’t intentionally run a high-tech company out of “Mowwwntayyna”, right? Actually, there might be some truth to that.
On our last night in San Fran, I met someone who said Billings, MT was her favorite city. Later, at one of the mixers, I met Christopher Carfi, CEO of Cerado. He had just visited Missoula with his significant other, Lisa Stone ( An award-winning journalist and media strategist, originator of BlogHer) , who conducted one of the workshops at the Web 2.0 Summit. Lisa is originally from Missoula and misses her hometown. Small world.
I later realized that when someone handed me their card, I almost never made an effort to learn where they were from. I guess it would be like if you were the sole representative from Mars and came to Earth for a conference. It doesn’t really matter if someone is from New York, LA, or Nebraska . They’re all on a different planet.
Now, you might be saying to yourself “Geeze, that’s not a very productive or positive attitude.” And, to that, I say “Good point.”
We weren’t the only aliens at the conference, as attendees came from all over the world. The internet is allowing people to reside in places where they enjoy living, instead of places they “have to work”.
The conference was a really great experience and we made a quite few contacts. I talked to at least 4 people who wanted to explore partnerships with Grupthink, and it was good to get feedback from so many knowledgeable folks.
Some of the people I talked to, in no particular order:
- Christopher Carfi, CEO of Cerado
- Matt Kaufman, Edgeio
- Chris Nuttall, Technology Correspondent at Financial Times
- John McKinley, President of Digital Services at AOL
- Pete Flint, Co-founder of Trulia
- Nick Cubrilovic, CEO of Omnidrive and TechCrunch writer
- Randal Leeb-Du Troit, National ICT Australia
- Nick Seirlis and Chris Saad from Faraday Media
Their business cards could slice through a New York steak. Thanks, guys, for recommending Eve Online. I’m trying the demo now. - Pat McCarthy, Director of Business Dev at RightMedia
- Ellen R Tauber, Principal at Sliced Bread Design
- Greg Cutler, Swisscom
- Drew Farris from TextWise
- Olavi Toivainen Director of Product Management at Nokia
- Efrat Moshkovittz, Director of Online Marketing at Esnips
- Ian White, Urban Mapping, Inc.
He showed a neat example of Panamap, a convenient way to put GIS technology on paper. - Rolf Herken, CEO of Mental Images
- Christopher Sun, Storm Ventures
- Chris Messina, “Agent Provocateur” at Citizen Agency
- Ethan Stock, CEO of Zvents
- Justin Caldbeck - Bain Capital Ventures
- Matthew Dickinson, Geek Strategist at iMega
- Ashley Randall, Product Manager at TripAdvisor
Ok, Iguess I know who TripAdvisor is, after all
This was one of those lame times where I couldn’t remember a company by name.. “Oh, and what does Trip Advisor do?” It’s only a world renowned collection of over 5 MILLION traveler reviews… - Barbara H Lange, Director of Publications at IEEE (Is that not the coolest company name ever? Well, maybe if they added an exclamation mark.)
- Adam Sutherland, VP Business Analysis at Discover Communications (Discovery Channel)
- Naveed Anwar and Geno Yoham, Directors at AOL
- Matt McGlynn, CTO of Care2
- Chris Nimsky, Edmunds.com
- Steve van Zutphen, CEO at Coil
Coil/Sparc is a file-sharing, messaging, and application service, all through a simple downloadable java application. You’ll be hearing more about them soon. - TJ Kang, CEO at Thinkfree
Great alternative to MS Office, and it’s online.Thinkfree is going to be packaged Coil, soon. - Larry Halff, Founder at Ma.gnolia
- Peter Childers, VP at RedHat
- Eric Berto, Etelos
- Alan Warms, CEO at Participate Media
Thanks to the following crew for adopting me one evening and sneaking me into the wine party!
- Patrick S. Chung, New Enterprise Associates
- TJ Mahony, Compete
- Eve Phillips, Greylock Partners
- James Chan, Bessemer Venture Partners
- Ben Choi, VP at Greystripe
December 8th, 2006 at 10:56 pm
Bravo Steve. It’s true — since I left home for college in 1984, the leading response I get when people find out where I’m from is:
For me, the irony in the responses you received is that Missoula is so accessible now, from within and without. It’s nearly impossible to explain to my kids what it was like to live in Missoula in the 1970s and early ’80s, pre-cable television, before the mall was built, before MTV existed, back when the most up-to-the-minute printed news you could get was a three-day-old New York Times that was flown into town on an airplane.
Yet today Grupthink is there, the New West Network is there. Hell, the new Old Navy store is a serious threat to the old new mall.
So I say, selfishly, perpetuate the hick-myth. The fact that there are still some folks who see the state as an inaccessible backwater gives me hope that they will stay away. Meanwhile, you’ll continue to be one of the geeks allowed to “to reside in places where they enjoy living, instead of places they “have to workâ€?.”
Just save some room for me. Look forward to meeting you next time!
June 13th, 2007 at 10:03 am
I agree, the new old navy store is attracting a lot of people.
July 1st, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Thanx For sharing such a beautiful resource. I really appreciate it..