Andrew Chen

New here? Check out my list of featured essays

Man, I’m kind of bored by the Web 2.0 conference…

Comments

My Web 2.0 conference T-shirt, remixed

I’m hanging out at the Starbucks next to the Web 2.0 conference in Moscone West, and I have to say, I’ve been underwhelmed by the conference. I think the core reason is that the space has received so much scrutiny, and people (including me) have been up to date through TechCrunch and the sorts, so that new, unique information is hard to come by.

Furthermore, when you have keynotes like Jeff Bezos and Eric Schmidt, in front of thousands of people, they are very sensitive in terms of what they are saying. Thus, you end up in a situation where everything is super polished and they are just rehashing things you sorta already knew.

Another factor at work is that Web 2.0, as many know, is such a nebulous term that the set of companies there are pretty incoherent. Can you really go to a hour long session on tagging, followed by hearing WebEx talking about their “web 2.0″ initiatives?

Anyway, perhaps I’m overly negative here, but I’d enjoy hearing other opinions on the matter.

Written by Andrew Chen

April 17th, 2007 at 1:03 pm

Posted in Uncategorized

«
»
  • David Chen

    this blog on raph koster's panel at Web 2.0 Expo is very interesting...


    http://www.lukew.com/ff/entry.asp?519

  • I agree with Kevin. I think it's a matter of this movement maturing. I think you feel the difference moreso because Web 2.0 really started out as a grassroots/organic thing that you were a part of, and you probably miss that.


    Man I love playing blog psychiatrist in comments!

  • David Chen

    I think it all depends on what were you looking to get out of this conference. I'm guessing you didn't find what you were looking for there...

  • I stayed for 40 minutes yesterday...of which I spent 20 minutes on the phone and another 20 minutes trying to figure out where the hell the rest of the conference was.

  • You are experiencing the maturation of an industry. It's an endless cycle that is being revisited in your world.


    As the masses embrace what you've been part of, you'll move on to new and exciting things that push the envelope. Conferences are one way of understanding when it is time to move on to new and exciting things.

  • I'm glad it's not just me -- I blogged about the same thing last night.

  • SmellyPoop

    All I can say is "nyah nyah haha I'm not there".


blog comments powered by Disqus
Recent posts

Want more? Featured essays and book recommendations