The AVC Meetup in DC

Fans_of_fred_wilson_dc_meetup_at_mi
As promised, here’s a picture of the "AVC" meetup in Washington DC on wednesday night. Here are a few more pictures. It’s kind of funny to see a bunch of people gathered together because of this blog and not to be there. But as I said to Jeremy (the organizer) yesterday via email "I don’t scale, but this blog and it’s readership does".

Jeremy wrote a great blog post about the event.

Here are some stats culled from Jeremy’s post:

17 people attended

  • 33% from the VC world
  • 33% start-ups/programmers/techies.
  • 33% folks passionate about the Internet and its potential

How they read this blog

  • 75% via RSS
  • 25% via the website

How long they’ve been reading

  • About 50% had been reading since 2004 or earlier
  • The other 50% had started reading within the past year
  • Only one person who started reading Fred’s blog in 2005-06 timeframe.

Here’s some startup ideas that came out of the meetup:

And yes, that is a good elevator pitch. Sound bites make great elevator pitches.

I’d like to thank Jeremy for setting up the meetup. And if anyone else wants to do something like that, I’ll try to make it easy. Use meetup to set up the event and then let me know about it and I’ll blog about it.

#VC & Technology

Comments (Archived):

  1. Yakov

    Hi Fred,Cheers for the summary. I’m the president of Mixed In Key and I had a great time talking with folks at the meet-up. It shows that there are a lot of interesting people in D.C. and it’s not all about government contracts. I would happily come to one of those events again.

  2. Mattocks

    Fred–I am a trader with a proprietary trading firm in Chicago focusing on algo and automated strategies. Unfortunately, I am not a programmer myself, but I spend all day working with talented coders to bring my trading ideas into the market. I am now entirely fascinated with technology, start-ups, etc. In your opinion, is technical expertise a prerequisite for a young entrepreneur? I’ve recently started raising some small cash from family and friends, spoken with some reputable VC advisors, and searching far and wide for someone who can satisfy the technical side of the equation. How do suggest I best position my lack of programming knowledge to potential investors? If I have tech talent on board (I am literate, just don’t program) is it a non-issue?Also, any tech meetups in Chicago? Thanks for listening.Matt

    1. fredwilson

      Find a developer to join you asap.There is probably one in chicago reading this blogI need some way to make matches

      1. Mattocks

        We have put together a list of some people we know either personally or through friends that have been through the business building process before. It would be nice if we could get our product up and running on $300K, but I don’t think that will cut it to create a truly amazing user experience. Having someone with a belt notch or two on our team should give us better odds of being able to raise enough money. This is my first business, and above any type of reward or financial gain, I just want to see it in flesh. If that means recruiting some talented people and giving up a lot of equity, so be it. There will be many more businesses to come.

      2. jer979

        I think the way you make matches (and continue to improve the cohesion with your readers) is an online community manager. Here’s Seth’s post on the issue: http://sethgodin.typepad.co…And, if you need one, you can find him at jer979.com 😉

  3. fredwilson

    Its not that bad. Just tighten it up and add some punch

  4. Blacknox

    “Uncomplicated” is the thing that stands out to me as needing the most work. It sounds complicated…Work on your other phrasing as well. We don’t care that you make (we make), we care about what it will do for us.You have a few seconds to get my attention, so you need to focus on what it will do for me immediately.What will this provide to me? How will it make it easier for me to manage customer interaction? What are the benefits to me? Who are your customers? Average Joes? Do they know they need what you have? Are they looking for it? Do they know that the CRM world exists?How are you going to reach the folks most likely to benefit?I am not sure the average Joe knows he needs or wants.

  5. Blacknox

    Tried to give it a run and installed your software for a review on ClickBrain.com. I am staring at a screen that asks me if I have a license key or want to try the trial, but I can’t do anything else. ANy ideas?

  6. Blacknox

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