Friday night was the annual Tech Crunchies awards and there I sat among the cute geeks. The male to female ratio at these events is always startling- like 80/20. That’s not why I went, besides all the guys are half my age. But they all have their iphones because the day of the event, everyone received an email that said:
We want to make sure that everyone with an iPhone installs the TechCrunch/Loopt social network application. If you install it and turn location awareness on, other people at the event will be able to see your picture, name and basic bio and will be able to send you messages. Even if you can’t physically find them among the 900 attendees, you can send a message to them on their phone and choose a quiet corner to meet in person.
Wow, talk about social networking in action, that was too cool. I was the only one holding my Blackberry. I felt so out of place- almost like carrying a walkie-talkie when everyone is carrying around cell phones!
The Tech Crunchies is always a fun event and even in a soft economy, there are companies that are bootstrapping it and making it happen. I like how they mix with the big guys as Microsoft, Yahoo and Facebook were there. The founders of Twitter walked away with some award so keep twittering away. Here is the list of winners.
One of my favorite acceptance speeches was from one of the founders of a company who said that at the last minute he found out that one of the Venture Partners had pulled the plug on giving them 1million and he was pretty freaked out. That same morning, he received an email from a user in Sweden saying they liked his app and then asked if they needed funding. He was able to secure half million from that user. The lesson learned is- always open and respond to emails from Swedes!
I’ve been writing away and put my 2009 Top Trends in Inside Sales. Email me for a copy.
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