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MESH Conference Day 2 - Corporate Blogs
.jpg) Jen Evens of Sequentia Communications is moderating the topic of "Corporate Blogs - How and Why?" The panelists are: Tara Hunt, marketer Debbie Weil of WordBiz.com and Jeremy Wright, president of b5media.com They are asking audience members for questions. Audience: Are business blogs just PR vehicles? DW: Bob Lutz of GM is trying it by allowing the CEO to connect with their customers. It is a corporate communications channel though. JW: I'm not a fan of it. There is no two-way communication. And I don't see that the company has listened to customers. JW: Has anyone bought something because of a business blog? No? Audience: I didn't buy something on the Dell site because of a comment I saw on the site. DW: In Feb Lutz posted that he was upset about the perception of his brand. He asked the audience how they could improve their company. Moderator: Can a blog message be translated into a corporate environment? TH: I don't believe in corporate blogging - I do think they should put themselves out there to see how the market responds. 37signals gets away with a lot because they are a hip company. Moderator: Mark Cuban was fined for his blogs... DW: In his case he has an extra hundred thousand dollars and can afford to mouth off. It's a tool to transfer information. Audience: How does a corporation get involved in blogging when we're damned when we do and damned when we don't? JW: The blog has to be in line with the corporate strategy. DW: Wells Fargo's blog was on the San Francisco earthquake and was very interesting. TH: It's the people within the corporation who do the blogging. Audience: Our firm's legal department has clamped down on the external blog... What are the top benefits of corporate blogging? (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/16
MESH Conference Day 2 - Does Web 2.0 Need VCs?
.jpg) Mark Evans is moderating Jason Fried of 37signals.com and Rick Segal of J.L. Albright. JF: They decided not to use venture capital because they didn't want to change the company. They've been around for seven years. They use word of mouth to build their company. They make sure everything they do is profitable. ME: RIck, you're a traditional VC, how does a traditional VC play within that environment. RS: They are an anomaly. There are six companies in the room that we are talking with. If you can do it without money do it. He is happy to do ten deals at $600k each and if he can return $20 million then that's great. ME: The luxury Jason has is that he charges for his products - he is not desperate. JF: He changes for products. People like to pay for things that are useful. If you can build good tools you can be profitable tomorrow. Businesses don't mind building things. It is important for developers to show that their tools make money. RS: Free sucks! It is important for companies to generate money fast. Take a look at nuvvo.com which is free but there is a fee schedule for some things... that works. JF: They have a free version of all of their products - give 'em a hit - if they like it they'll buy it. Most of their paying clients go through free to upgrades. ME: What's the Web 2.0 investment climate in Canada? RS: In this room there are nine people. Yes, there is interest. We need to get more success stories. You don't have to go south to succeed. Audience: We have to create an environment that says, "Create your company here." What can work in Canada? See http://www.innovationcommons.ca RS: Rick says he has a standard (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/16
MESH Conference Day 2 - Tara Hunt on Building Community
.jpg) Tara is a Canadian who has gone to California. She is a big part of the BarCamp movement. How many people read blogs? All of the audience. Tara is talking about how blogging is changing the marketing landscape. People are pissed. Two thing shave changed. There are companies offering alternatives. Look at http://www.thresdless.com - SHOP-PARTICIPATE! and FireFox (The Web Browser). There is a video called "Bowiechick." Go to YouTube.com. A teen girl is showing the personalities a piece of face-tracking software on her Logitec webcam allows her to adopt. It's a remarkable example of what I'll call the simulacra of identity the Internet allows. The crowd loves it. Tara wants the audience to reflect on the nature of citizen media on marketing. We are all taking a moment to talk with the people around us. People have seen examples of the face-tracking personal video before. Some discussion about what happened to Kryptonite Locks when the Net found out about how easy it was to open them. That cost the company 40% of its sales. Audience: Speaking out for "Expert" analysis rather than just people making funny faces. Audience: It shows the power of product placement online. Some are wondering if the video - which became hugely popular - was a marketing setup. Tara: Peer to Peer stuff is powerful. Audience: I thought it was much more powerful than any traditional advertising. How does one define expertise? Audience: If an expert stepped up and did the same video it would not work. It goes around MySpace because it is a kid. Tara: The Pinko Principles are: 1) Inbound rather than outbound messages
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/16
MESH Conference Day 2 - Fifteen Minutes of Fame
.jpg) The three companies presenting for five minutes each are: www.kinggary.com, Favorville.com, and TakingITGlobal.org. Favorville is an online community that allows people to build connections with one another by exchanging favours. Their goal is to build a sense of neighbourhood. It is organized by city. Users rate their experience with one another, a process that allows for longer term relationship to develop. The audience is being scattered by a repetitive, 120 DB fire alarm. We're on hold for fifteen minutes. OK, we're back and none the worse for wear. Gary King - High School student at www.kinggary.com. He is telling a story about how the web can empower a person. He is attracted to the organic nature of the Internet. Self-taught. His lessons: Keep things simple and focused. (Editor's note: If I had been as focused as Gary when I was in high school I'd be running the world...) TakingITGlobal is the world's most popular web sites for youth interested in social change issues. they've been around for a couple of years. It has a global nature and reach. Taking it Global was founded in Toronto by a team. it now has a team of thirty contributors. They are sponsored by some major companies including Microsoft. Go online and join - especially if you are between 13 and 31 in age. Get involved!
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/16
MESH Conference Day 2 - Keynote Conversation: Dr. Paul Kedrosky - Venture Capital and Web 2.0
.jpg) Matthew Ingram talks with Dr. Paul Kedrosky on Venture Capital and Web 2.0. He was an equity analyst and is now doing venture capital. He is with Venture West as well and is a Canadian. MI: Is this another bubble? PK: In a sense we've returned full-cicle to '95. In a sense it sure feels like one but so what, it takes a lot of dead bodies to fill a swamp. We've got to waste a ton of money before we figure out how things work. There is way to much enthusiasm. A UCLA economist writes that the first bubble - tulips - was not a real bubble but was not as euphoric as it was painted - we spot nine bubbles before one actually happens. MI: There is money and people have to make investment. PK: VC is at record levels - even more than in the nineties. The venture industry is a rigged market because the big investors fish from the best pond. the smaller players have to fight for the scraps. For example, one fund looked for 250 million but got offered 3 billion in the same week. Cash is falling on your head. MI: Do entrepreneurs need VCs today? PK: If you don't need money don't take. You'd be an idiot not to keep 100% of the stock. The trouble is that some markets need money. A lot of the consumer-centric Web 2.0 companies don't need a lot of money. Technology has democratized the ability to start a company. Audience: Companies can raise money with no business model. Like YouTube. PK: They might be the next television... Google initially had no idea what their business model. they had 30 million and had no model. The trouble they have now is because they are spending money like Amazon. (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/16
MESH Conference Day 2 - Keynote Conversation: The Future of Marketing
.jpg) Stuart MacDonald talks with Steve Rubel of Edelman and Micropersuasion.com This is a summary of a much longer discussion. SM: How is blogging impacting the practice of Public Relations? SR: It allows PR firms to have a closer relationship with people. In fact, they have to. SM: Richard Edelman, the son of the founder, has bet the farm on blogging and other ideas around consumer self-organization. Peers are the most trusted source of authority when people look for recommendations. SR: Advertising is still working though. The question is how dollars are slipping away from TV. Marketing isn't dying, PR isn't dying but new disciplines are evolving. SM: Is the industry fearful of these changes. SR: There is a lot of fear but there are also success stories - they need numbers and proofs. SM: How can you tell who is credible? SR: The community will tell us who is credible - links are the benchmark. The community does a good job of self-monitoring. There is an inclination to go with numbers but it is not a numbers game. It's like a "T" with the horizontal bar being the overall audience but the vertical element a much smaller but more important structure to the whole. It is a different model. SM: What's got to happen for the agency world to get them to wake up to this demand? SR: They are beginning to get it - they have to understand that narrow or niche is good. We learn as we go. Audience: Are blogs impacting the executive suite? SR: Not by direct blog post but by the subsequent press coverage. SM: MySpace doesn't register in the general discussion Canada. SR: Look at social-networkinng in general - look for the centres of gravity. What are the terms of service for that community. How (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/16
MESH Conference Day 1 - Stuart MacDonald Introduces mesh
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
MESH Conference Day 1 - The Future of Newspapers
.jpg) Mathew Ingram talks with Angus Frame, editor of globeandmail.com, Tomi Poutanen of Yahoo, and Tomer Strolight, president of Torstar Digital. The followinng is a summation of the panelist's comments. Introduction: Craigslist sucks millions out of local personal ad markets every year - Fifty million(?) alone from San Francisco. "The Roman empire of media is breaking up..." MI: To Angus Frame - what is like to take an old entity like the Globe and Mail into the Web 2.0 age? AF: It is a slow, daily conversation. The first phase is that they are publishing 24/7 which was a shift for the company. Control issues have to change. They are no longer the only voice. The Globe allows people to comment but many within the org resent that. We are leaders in trying to get this new kind of thinking. MI: To Tomer Strolight - Are you finding resistance within the organization? TS: Torstar is coming along and is going after, for example, Craigslist. They are building products that attract advertising. Their value proposition remains good content. Newspapers are getting better at the technology. AF: Social Networking allows suppliers of aggregated news like Yahoo the ability to overcome the issue of focusing only on the most base topics to attract multiple clicks. AF: The online Globe reader is mid-forties and is no more tech inclined than the print reader so surveys tell them. Audience: Really informed tech people are not going to traditional media. AF: People go to the content they like the best. Audience: Newspapers are backtracking on their demand for registration... TS: It was a lose-lose proposition. People gave fake names and when it was removed readership went up by 50%. Audience: There is a site http://www.bugmenot.com that offers login info for registration sites . . . (I'm there after (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
MESH Conference Day 1 - The Future of Broadcasting
.jpg) Barnaby Marshall talks with podcaster and G4TechTV broadcaster Amber MacArthur, CBC broadcaster Jian Ghomeshi and Rocketboom co-founder Andrew Baron. We paraphrase their discussion here. BM: What does the Web 2.0 mean to traditional media? JG: Old media is going to win because they've learned the lesson of the media business. Old media is doing it very effectively for example with MySpace. Online readership of the New York Times has surpassed the print version... they've done a good job of diversifying. The NYT will not die. AB: They have learned their lessons but the music industry did lose a degree of control. Apple now owns the music industry - Apple is the single industry that is controlling prices and is playing a gate keeping role. Rocketboom is an example of how the Internet is allowing small groups access to an audience, including a global audience. Their advertising garners 3 times the CPM value of television advertising on programs like "Lost." AM: The power of the web is in its degree of reach. My blog can reach people almost everywhere. Broadcasters have to learn how to deal with this or they'll be left behind. JG: The ability to be heard if you're a band has profoundly changed. Pandora is a brilliant resource and great news for artists... The turning point will be when there is ubiquitous wifi in the automobile. AB: The most profound thing the movie industry is going through is that you've needed money to make films until now. The technology allows almost anyone to put out a movie. Audience: Why will old media win? JG: The moneyed interests of old media are willing to take the risks and will offer $500 million for a company they want. The really good stuff stands the chance of being co-opted. This panel's meta-theme (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
MESH Conference Day 1 - Can Blogs Influence Politics?
.jpg) Are Canadian politics influenced by blogs? Will we follow the path of the US? Here is a synopsis of the discussion: This afternoon Warren Kinsella lawyer/consultant talks with Paul Wells of Maclean's, Andrew Coyne of the National Post and Brad Davis, National Director of Policy and Internet Strategy, of the Michael Ignatieff Leadership Campaign. Andrew Coyne of the National Post - and an economist - is leading off the panel. The power of the blogosphere is its ability to break down issues into small pieces that can be studied and reconnected. He calls this phenomenon "Horizontal Editing." The benefit is how it breaks up the group-think of the main-stream media. Now, because of blogging, issues are less predictable. Brad Davis says that he is inspired by blogs. During the recent election, he had twenty people across Canada following the various political blogs. This continues with the leadership campaigns. They are managing the relationship with bloggers as though they are as influential as MSM. Blogs to the Ignatieff team is a way to inform their campaign. Paul Wells of Macleans says he doubts that blogs will have an influence. He talks about the Dean campaign in the US. There is a boom and bust cycle related to blogs - too much attention leads to a pull back of support. Wells is waiting to see blogs influence the leadership campaign. But his blog seems to have influence, at least with the Ignatieff campaign. He has not seen evidence that it drive votes. Next month that might change. WK: There is an MIT study from '04 that says 65% are male, 80% are white, etc. Will bloggers ever include other demographics? Panel: The "recombinant loops" are changing the way politics is communicated. It is accelerating the way the message gets out. Messages get out (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
MESH - Fifteen Minutes of Fame - Three Companies
Using the popular TorCamp technique of giving presenters five minutes to tell their stories, MESH is letting Canadian Web 2.0 companies give their pitch.PixPo is a Victoria based Web 2.0 that allows you to access your media from anywhere. They just closed $6.5 Million financing last week. They don't have a Mac version though. areyoufrank.com wants more people to be frank about transparency. They want to collapse the distance between the CEO and customer. Take the quiz ... Devshop is a project management tool. It is launching this fall. It watches tyour project and spots risks. It serves the 15 Million worldwide developer market.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
MESH Conference Day 1 - Second Keynote Interview - Dr. Michael Geist
.jpg) Michael Geist is a leading policy thinker about where the Web 2.0 intersects with the law. He is a law professor who writes the popular http://www.michaelgeist.ca blog. Rob Hyndman, a lawyer and one of the MESH organizers, is interviewing him. Geist has an encyclopedic grasp of Web 2.0. His question to the audience is: What is the legal policy that will support the growing Web 2.0 trend? Geist's position is that there is a market force playing out that the government must let evolve. Arbitrary legislation that favours the recording industry, for example, might slow it down. Here is a synopsis of the interview. RH: Where do we go from here? What role will policy makers play? MG: Canadian policy makers are not getting it right - as we will see in the coming months. There are content producers driving the Web 2.0 market who might lose their ability to produce. The policy reforms being studied are about controlling markets. RH: The political reality of where we are now suggests we will see more restrictions. MG: The lobby group (CRIA) behind the changes is one of the most effective there is. But when Canadian musicians speak out against it they received considerable attention. When Steven Page and Avril Levigne speak out against the reforms politicians listen. Audience: There is a cultural clash coming with the restrictions of copyright. Will this cause young people to get political? MG: An increasing number of people see this as their issue. Audience: Where are "Mashups" of available data going in terms of violation of copyright? MG: People will want to be paid. Some revenue streams will evolve and while we are smart we don't know what the market will look like in three to five years. Ottawa must get out of the way. Audience: A (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
MESH Conference Day 1 - First Keynote Interview - Om Malik
.jpg) Om Malik is a respected blogger and Web 2.0 analyst with Business 2.0. Mark Evans of the National Post is interviewing him on "The Future of Media." Here are some paraphrased excerpts: OM: This is a flux point in media. There is a need for traditional "Brand" media outlets like the New York Times and the National Post. ME: Traditional media cannot figure out the value proposition. OM: This is Darwinian - they have to figure it out to survive. Forbes.com is doing well, for example. ME: Jeff Cole of Annenberg Univ. says that newspapers will be gone. OM: Each newspaper will have to find its own niche. He'll be happy to see a lot of papers go.... People don't listen to what the market wants. ME: Three Cs - Credibility , Content, and Cash are the drivers of an effective blog. OM: There is no difference between the old and new worlds relative to credibility. People read and make judgement calls. They decide if you are the real thing. It is harder to be found now. The world needs the editorial leader right now. Rating services help.... Local blogs like "Gothamist" are growing rapidly. it is a new kind of local news. there is an opportunity here. the economics of doing this are low. (Note: as editor of local news service, http://www.readingtoronto.com, I know that his remarks here are accurate). Update Audience: Opinion is important. OM: With so much info available what becomes important is context - why does it matter to me? You can build a brand around bringing context which is the biggest thing missing in the media right now. Audience: Ads are the lifeblood of blogs - what is the value proposition for blogging? OM: Advertising is seriously lagging in the blog space. It is 1.0 approach (...read more...)
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
MESH Conference Day 1
 The MESH Conference kicks off today and Toronto, the centre of Canada's commodity and Income Trust based financial markets, may never be the same. MESH is the brainchild of five local innovators who looked around the entrepreneurial landscape and decided that there is an emerging Web 2.0 movement here with the momentum of a runaway tornado. They write:Canada needs a conference like mesh. Web 2.0 is happening all around us, as the Internet becomes the place to communicate, collaborate and entertain. mesh is brought to you by people who want to inspire enthusiasm, creativity and opportunity; by people who believe that for Canada to remain vibrant and competitive, we have to connect with each other and share our ideas about what the Web should be. The people bringing us MESH are: Mark Evans - senior technology reporter, The National Post Mathew Ingram - technology and business writer, Globe & Mail Mike McDerment - CEO, 2ndSite Online Invoicing Rob Hyndman - business lawyer, Hyndman | Law Stuart MacDonald - entrepreneur, marketer, founder Expedia.ca Gagglescape is covering the conference today and tomorrow. We will take a look at the people, technology, and capital behind Web 2.0. Let us know if there is something you would like to see covered. What's on today?
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/15
And Now For Something Completely Different
We're here at BarCamp Toronto today after an informative two day stint at the Canadian Venture Forum. Take a look at the videos from both to appreciate the difference in style between the two events. To say that BarCamp Toronto is rough and ready doesn't do the experience justice. It's just different. Update What is Bar Camp anyway? BarCamp is an ad-hoc un-conference born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos and interaction from attendees. This event is part of the TorCamp phenomenon started last November. It's grown from about 50 attendees at TorCamp 1 to over 140 at the last TorCamp DemoCamp.
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Posted by R. Ouellette on 05/13
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Local News
The Ontario government is doing something truly unique and laudable says John Albright of JLA Ventures. Last week Ontario's Ministry of Research and Innovation announced a new $205-million fund to help stimulate the province's early-stage ventures.
According to a University of Laval Professor, Canada's Labour Sponsor Funds kill innovation rather than create it. Read the press release here. MediaScrape lands new venture round of $3.2 million. Chris Dingle has been appointed President and Chief Technology Officer. Mr. Dingle was the founding CTO of 24/7 Real Media which sold recently to WPP for $637 million. University Technologies International (UTI) - IGNITE - announces the closing of two first-round financings for two IGNITE companies, Profero Energy Inc. and Circle Cardiovascular Imaging Inc. Kleer Inc. based in California but with a plant in Ottawa landed a $28 million round for its wireless audio product development. The Ottawa Citizen ran this story a few days ago. We've been saying this for years now. When will the public sector make it easier for investment in the province's tech sector? Rick Nathan of the Canadian Venture Capital Association has an optimistic view of the current credit crunch. MSBi Capital announces the addition of two new partners François Gauvin and John Elton. Celtic House Venture Partners of K-W invested in Dublin-based RedMere last week. Rogers Media and CTVglobemedia Inc. announce that Rogers Broadcasting will acquire certain Canadian conventional and specialty television services from CTVglobemedia Inc.
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