Overall Gnomedex was terrific, I learned a lot from the discussions and we spoke with many people about RawSugar, almost all very positive.
The most interesting discussion Saturday for me were Ethan Kaplan and Phil Torrone. Kaplan works in the web group at Warner Brother Records and on his own runs the top REM fan site, so he had a lot of good information on how record companies and bands do, can and should use the web. Torrone, senior editor of Make Magazine, gave a fascinating, rapid fire presentation on open source hardware and how entusiastic amateurs (helped by a few far-sighted companies like Roomba and Lego) are creating a new round of homebrewed electronics.
While I wish him nothing but luck, Chris Pirillo’s closing session on whether his TagJag tag metasearch service should get funding (angel, venture or sweat equity) was a sad waste of time. Since he knew this would be happening weeks ahead of time and is friendly with quite a few knowledgable investors and entrepreneurs–Chris had Rick Segal, Jeff Clavier and Michael Arrington on stage for the discussion–his preparation was surprisingly inadequate.
No quantitative information at all from the use of Gada.be, the predecessor effort and little more than a handwaving at how many people, other resources and time needed to build his vision. Nothing more than a hope that the underlying search engine companies would waive their stated terms of service for him. Despite the polite answers from the three investors he would have gotten the boot long before finishing if this had been a real funding meeting.
I had a great flight back from Seattle Saturday night, very empty and no one else in my block of three seats so I could lie down the whole time. TS1 overcame her fear of night driving and picked me up–thanks sweetie!
Sunday morning was nowhere near as enjoyable because my contact lenses were getting protein buildup again from some kind of allergic reaction; I had to put on my two year old, no longer correct prescription, glasses. Watching France beat Brazil, even though I knew the results, didn’t make things better. I do recommend catching the new Robert Plant episode of Soundstage if you get the chance, he and his band blast classic Zeppelin and Plant solo tunes through brand new, African-inspired arrangements.
Fortunately, we had our annual eye checkups this morning. The doctor found that the allergic reaction is also causing a slight corneal inflamation. I have to wear my old eyeglasses for at least 10 days to let it clear up and even after that I might only be able to use daily wear lenses. If true, that’s really annoying since I was totally getting used to life without glasses.
Happy Fourth to you all!
BillSaysThis 