The Start Conference 2008, A Review

It must be scary to run a conference for the first time.  How will people respond to it?  Did you invite the right speakers?  Will the content remain topical?  Will I spill coffee on my shirt before I even take the stage?  And the biggie…is the content of this conference relevant?

A day after attending the first-ever Start Conference, I’m happy to report that the answers to all these questions are positive (even the coffee-spillage, but that was me in the car, not any of the speakers, that I know of).  A few months after Jeff Veen left his post at Google, and merely hours after Bryan Mason left his long-time position at Adaptive Path, the show was on.

Start is a one-day conference in San Francisco designed for smart, talented Web people to take hold of their ideas, follow their dreams, and start their own companies.

The conference charter speaks directly to me as someone who routinely bores my friends and family with “million-dollar” ideas.  I’ve had some success with hundred-dollar and even a few thousand-dollar ideas, so I am hoping to eventually come up with something that really makes a difference for those that come across it.  If you are the entrepreneurial type like me, you already know the what and who, and we all have our own why.  The Start Conference attempted to put a little how on the map.

So, why did Veen and Mason feel that they were the people to wrap this information up and hand deliver it to the attendees?  Simple.  These guys have been there and done it.  And done it well.  Adaptive Path is a well-respected user-experience consultancy that Veen founded and Mason steered for a decade.  Jeff also took Measure Map to Google when it was acquired by the giant.  Clearly, they have a good sense of vision for web-based companies.

The venue was golden.  Fort Mason is a really nice introduction to the history and views of San Francisco for out-of-towners.  For locals, transportation and/or parking is easy.  The Cowell theater was a perfect size for the 200 or so attendees, and had plenty of modern conveniences despite the age of Fort Mason overall.

An on-time start brought Bryan and Jeff to the stage in their typical pro-sumer fashion.  Having never met either of them, and only ever seeing Veen in a dress before, I have to say that Jeff is seriously a cross between James Hetfield and whoever the hell the tallest guy on Earth is (full disclosure: I know Hetfield kinda well). It was quickly apparent that both men were personable, approachable, and listened to their own advice.  And they also knew a lot about the topic of Starting a web business.

George Oates joined the duo on stage to manage the backchannel, or, the conversations on Twitter, email and IM going on in the room during the day.  She certainly brought that element into the conversations onstage, but it was a rare enough occurrence that it was a little disconnective whenever she stepped into the conversation.  Perhaps a bit different stage setup may have brought her into the flow better.  But the contributions she brought to the conference were certainly valuable.

Without much delay, we got into a fast-moving stream of conversations between our hosts and the guest speakers.  Evan Williams and Matt Mullenweg lead the way.  They were followed by a trio of entrepeneurs that had physical storefronts and offered a different type of startup story.  The conversations were couch-comfy and casual.  The guests clearly had a pre-existing relationship that helped the discussions feel warm.  We got not only tails of trial by fire as businesses were being established, but a good idea of the various ways that ideas can become companies and take on a life of their own.  The sessions continued with Mena Trott, Narendra Rocherolle and Julie Davidson, then a panel of professionals including an accountant, a lawyer and an HR expert.  They offered advice in their own areas of expertise in relation to the topic at hand.

Lunch was well-served, and all the breaks overall were well structured.  Bathrooms were close at hand, refreshments fully stocked, and polite stewards always making sure we knew where to go.  A unique twist was the availability of ice cream (stacks of It’s It, no less) and beer at the afternoon break.

The afternoon began with the incomparable Merlin Mann making a compelling argument for staying small (does anyone really know what Merlin “does”?)  He was as funny and charming in person as he is on the web.  Marc Hedlund then told us about his story and funny VC David Hornik wrapped up the session.  This was by far the best grouping of the day because all three speakers were successful in their own way with completely different types of businesses.

Matt Haughey made a quick appearance to demo his new app, Feully.  We then heard from teacher Dave McClure and Om Malik.  The final session of the day featured the guys behind Get Satisfaction giving their VC pitch, followed by a few other pitches and an American Idol-style panel of pitch-listeners to coach them.  A couple of guys from the audience got to pitch their businesses, and then after a quick appearance from That Phone Guy, Merlin Mann appeared again to give his hilarious FlockedUp pitch.  I’m not sure I’ve seen anything so funny in person, and it was a sharp way to bring the day to a close.  An afterparty followed with food and beverages that gave us a few hours to network.

Overall, the value of this conference was very high.  I can barely take a piss for $200, so in comparison to the typical $800 or more for a conference full of big name internet achievers, I came away quite satisfied. In a time when its easy to subscribe to the 37Signals mantra of doing it all yourself, hearing the flipside argument from those who have taken that route is a nice change.  I think Jeff and Bryan put on a great show, with clearly relevant content in this current environment of startup hotness.  I’ve chatted with a few people I met at the conference, and they seem pretty well satisfied with the takeaways as well.  I hope they can take this conference on the road and share it with others in the industry, and grow it to include even more valuable information on building a successful internet business.