Techcrunch40: Conference Review, How did Mint win? and many Thank You’s!

Now that the first TechCrunch40 conference is complete, this post will serve as my final conference review and recap. Some of the startups asked me about full, in-depth reviews. I am going to do my best to review each one over the coming weeks, please be patient.

Many thanks!

Before I get into the conference recap, I would like to offer some thanks. First, thanks to everyone for coming over and saying Hi. I was shocked at how many people read CN! :) It was great to meet so many people and some of the people I have met for the first time (after chatting for a long time) include: Roi, Orli, Frank, Clint, Duncan and Joyce. And thanks to Mike, Heather and Jason for allowing me to attend. I do have a surprise coming next week for everyone who gave me their business card so you better watch this space!

Conference Posts:

• Day 2 Full Transcription
• Exit Strategies Panel
• Kaltura Wins People’s Choice
• Entertainment
• Rich Media and Mash Ups
• Getting Funded Panel
• Revenue Model and Analytics
• Google Product Launch – Presentations
• Productivity and Web Applications
• Should There Be a Disclosures List?
• Day 1 Recap
• Keynote: Zuckerberg
• Crowd Sourcing
• AOL Product Launch – Bluestring
• Commmunity and Collaboration
• Keynote Panel – Hurley, Filo, Andreesen
• Mobile and Communications
• Search and Discovery

Conference Recap:

Mike asked me last night what I thought about the conference and I told him I rate conferences in three areas: facility, networking and content. So here goes:

Facility - they score top marks. Hardwired Internet for press? Damn. Internet that actually works? Damn. There weren’t enough seats and I heard from a birdie that this was somewhat planned. Nice setup overall and they score about an A- for the facility.

Networking - Mike noted that this was the real reason people paid for a ticket. I am sure several deals were made during the conference. I think the networking was top notch. It was definitely a business crowd (not a developer/designer crowd) and I enjoyed the discussions around business and marketing.

Content - This was the area that probably needs the most work if they plan to do this again. The demos were too tightly spaced, some of the demos were canned, the audience had almost zero participation (even after Jason continuously twittered that the attendees would be involved), the demo pit had very little time so you had to either go demo pit or go main ballroom if you wanted a real look at any of the demopit presenters. The experts were basically boring as hell. Very little constructive criticism, a few of them barely spoke, hammer threw in some buzz words to appear relevant. Some of the presenters have no vc, and this was an important time for them to get some real-world advice.

There were also some questions around some of the chosen firms and it seemed to me like many of the companies were sleeping with someone else – either associated with one of the experts, a sponsor or one of the panelists. One person noted that it was like a Mafia-family board meeting. I am sure that Mike/Jason will counter this by saying that it would be hard to find someone not associated with one of the groups I listed. I disagree.

There also needs to be more women both presenting and on the panels. And I am not talking about "apparently drunk" women as those who presented one of the startups, nor am I talking about those fake-ass d-level models Zivity had.

Final thoughts

While I know Jason thinks I am scum, I think he did a very good job as the public-facing host. He kept things moving as best he could and seemed spot on overall. Heather led a good panel and I think it would have been even better earlier in the day. Nothing like a former accountant hearing EBITDA to get my blood flowing :) Mike interjected himself appropriately into the panels and the discussions. While I am sure they all wanted to score a home run, I would give them a sliding-double.

Mint wins the $50k

This was an absolute shock and quite disappointing to me and many of the CN readers and other conference attendees. Mint’s demo wasn’t great and they couldn’t answer my questions about security. Mike didn’t even see a demo of Mint, yet they got into the 40? Mint is this year’s silicon valley darling and has received more hype (even though the beta testers couldn’t talk about it) than the iPhone and I am willing to bet that’s why they won. Why give it to a Korean or Russian startup who leaves the country never to be seen again when they can give it to the guy who is at all the parties, certainly helps for local buzz. Check out Rafe’s review from over at Webware. In fact, SpendView in the demo pit understands more about security by offering an upload option. Here are some of the other comments I heard/received after the win:

• Boy, must be nice to win knowing you have an old TC writer working for you
• Two of the votes for the winner come from Mint investors! That’s 10% of the total vote!
• At least 10 people talked about their security
• Oh, you do realize Mint sponsored a fatty-ass party for Mint – basically a semi-conference sponsor

They are also heavily funded and I guess that’s why Jason noted about giving it to charity. Personally I have absolute concerns (which many of the TC commenters seem to agree with) about giving "some startup" my financial details when they are live 1 day. Trust is earned my friend.  I hope Mike and Jason will provide some insight as to why they were selected.

Thanks again to everyone and look forward to meeting you all again real soon!