

Freezing cold, no Internet, boring: it's a French web 2.0 conference - danw
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/dec/10/startups-internet

======
ojbyrne
Personal reminiscences warning: One of the weird things about my digg
experiences was where I sat in the conference hierarchy. Kevin would go to
London (FOWA), Paris (LeWeb), etc, and listen to a bunch of other fake people
talk about fake stuff. They sent me to 2 conferences. Webmasterworld in Las
Vegas, which was all SEO, lots of hustlers, the best party I've ever been to
(a Yahoo party in the Hugh Hefner suite at the Palms), met Matt Cutts; and
then they sent me to Reflection/Projections in Urbana-Champaign (why would we
want to go there?) - which included Steve Yegge and Randall Monroe (XKCD), and
was probably the best conference I've ever been to. You pose, poseurs gather
around you. You get pushed into the background, you meet lots of interesting
people.

~~~
unalone
I'm guessing you don't have the fondest recollections of the Digg team? (Not
trying to be snarky: I just don't recall ever reading you talk directly about
Digg before.)

~~~
ojbyrne
I have good memories of most of the people I worked with there (in fact
engineer no. 2 now works for me). The 2 people at the top I have zero respect
for.

~~~
jgrahamc
You just went up in my opinion by a large amount.

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gruseom
Upmodded for this splendid morsel of malicious British wit:

 _That's right — LeWeb was entirely without the web. Which I suppose makes it
simply "Le"._

~~~
cabalamat
This bit's good too:

 _Day one's keynote firesider was Paulo Coelho — the favourite author of that
girl you met on the first day of university who spent her gap year in Thailand
and like totally found herself. "Everyone has something interesting to say,"
Coelho said at one point, clearly showing that he's never had a conversation
with one of his fans._

~~~
scott_s
I skimmed over that until I thought "Coelho" is a strange name. Then I
realized he wrote The Alchemist, which I read at the behest of a girl that
pretty much fits that description.

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lawrence
That was the best conference write up I've ever seen.

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tarkin2
I like how the article descends into a rant about how it would all be a lot
better if we all just got drunk, a typically British answer to just about
anything.

~~~
dant
You make it sound like that's a bad thing.

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lionhearted
I'm cracking up laughing here. Here's some perspective for my fellows
'mericans who haven't been to this part of the world. English people _love_ to
pan everything French for any reason whatsoever. Most English folk will openly
say, "I hate the French" - they don't actually hate the French. It's just that
they really, really get off on having a laugh at anything and everything
French.

I was cracking up laughing when I saw the headline - and then saw it was from
the Guardian. The article's probably all correct, but the really gratuitous
tone the author takes, like he's glad the conference was a mess because it
made him able to write this article hardcore "taking the piss" out of the
conference? Yup, it's an England thing :) I love it, and mind you, I'm a
quarter French and a quarter English so I'm pretty neutral in the whole
affair.

~~~
peakok
I'm French and I enjoyed the article. This Loic LeMeur guy has always been a
self-proclaimed ambassador of whatever he wants, but he's just blow hard. He
needs the bad press so he'll disappear sooner (I hope so).

And you're right about the gratuitious French bashing, it's a cultural thing
and it takes part on both sides of the Channel, there's nothing to be offended
about, it's funny if you take the right stance.

~~~
fallentimes
If it makes you feel better his startup his failing badly.

~~~
sgrove
I can't imagine that would make anyone feel better. I enjoyed following his
videos when I was first starting up, and his energy is certainly infectious.
Since his layoffs I've had a bit of a more dour opinion of him, as it seemed
opportunistic, and he does tend to jetset quite often.

That said, I hope he does well. I can't see the value in what he does, but
then I'm not likely his target market (though I certainly tried Seesmic, and
tried to like it). And I haven't a clue as to where the revenue stream was
supposed to materialize (product placement? Brand communication channel?) But
as an entrepreneur, I would hate to see him fail badly, as you put it - his
family is here, he's put a lot of effort, etc.

Although I suppose you didn't explicitly state that you take pleasure in
watching another who's risked quite a bit fail spectacularly, I thought I
might just drop my two cents.

~~~
jasonmcalacanis
Loic is actually a really great guy who works very hard. I wouldn't pass
judgement on him without getting to know him. All entrepreneurs share the
common struggle, and it's very easy to attack people you don't know in forums,
blogs and on twitter.

Truth is he is a serial entrepreneur who's had great success, who works hard
and makes a ton of mistakes like all of us do. No one is perfect, and trust me
layoffs SUCK for everyone including the person who has to do them. I've had to
do layoffs at two of my four startups and those days were the worst days of my
professional life.

give the man a break... he created an event for startups to come together and
the wifi didn't work.... and it was cold.... and maybe it was a little boring.
however, i'm sure the parties and networking were great... and it's Paris.

i mean, come on... it's paris! (note: i canceled my trip because i've got
project A launching on Monday and i needed to be focused. )

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nihilocrat
A web 2.0 conference with no Internet access?

Actually, a conference occuring sometime this century with no Internet access?

He's joking, right?

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Ras_
Sauna and licorice vodka!

Finnish Tourist Board approves of this message.

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akshaye
Hugh's take: <http://www.gapingvoid.com/Moveable_Type/archives/004739.html>

~~~
petercooper
Just to save readers 10 seconds. All Hugh says is: "It's been an intense but
fun couple of days." That's it.

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prakash
Absolutely fantastic! For a moment there, I though this article was actually a
skit on _A bit of Fry & Laurie_.

This quote specifically: _And even more satisfying than all of that is the
fact that the idea of a huge state-sponsored piss-up is such an anathema to
Americans that there's no way they can outdo us_

~~~
iron_ball
Our drunken bouts are all the result of good hard-working private industry.
The government will get our rye whiskey when they pump it from our cold dead
stomachs!

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babul
Paul Carr is just as funny, yet honest, in person (especially after a pint at
DrinkTank <http://blog.huddle.net/?c=DrinkTank> or such).

Twitter gives a good flavour <http://twitter.com/paulcarr>.

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vaksel
why is France the face of European tech scene? Shouldn't Britain have that
job? I mean for Brits its easy as hell to release world wide apps since
English is so popular.

~~~
markessien
No, Germany should be actually.

~~~
gaius
It's very difficult to start a company in Germany. You need X amount of
capital and masses of paperwork, etc. Talinn in Estonia should probably be the
European startup capital.

~~~
markessien
Just like Delaware is the startup capital of the U.S, ya?

~~~
gaius
The analogy doesn't hold because there isn't a coherent legal system or common
language (tho' in practice everyone speaks English) across Europe.
Incorporating in Estonia and doing all your business in Germany isn't nearly
as straightforward as Calfornia/Delaware.

