It has been about 5 weeks since our phenomenal Startup Weekend Columbus and I am still on a quest to recreate that feeling of joy and creativity. I have attended several events since then and though some of the faces are the same, the gatherings did not capture the same magic. Although it leaves me disappointed at times, it also helps me appreciate how very special our SWC event really was.
The seeds of innovation live on….
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Photo Curtosey of jspiegz24
As it has been a few weeks since we came together and “birthed” the ideas for 11 great company concepts. I think of the 11 new bundels of joy all of us took home and I wonder what to do next. We spent 54 intense hours putting together a framework of a company that could be successful. Now you may be sitting here wondering “what happened to our momentum?”
I can say, I have hit that wall. I went to SWC with no idea what to expect, and no plan for a post SWC life. And now, I am part of a company that has great potential that is hit a brick wall. Why you may ask? Cause we hit the ground running and have not taken time to catch our breath.
The thing with child birth, you have 9 months to prepare for this new “child” to come in to your life. You paint the room, pick out names, buy diapers, formula, and plan for the the change of life style and schedules.
If you are one of these companies and you feel like you are running in place and out of steam, let me share this piece of advice with you, ‘RELAX!”
Take a few days from your project and bask in the glory of what you did. Decompress, process, and enjoy your successes. Some of us are in full blown lets “git-r-done” mode and are pushing for a rush to failure.
So here are a few of my ideas if you are feeling this pain.
1. Relax. Take a few days off and bask in what we did for a weekend.
2. Regroup. Plan a meeting 15 to 30 days out so your team members can plan to attend accordingly.
3. Organize. Lay out a plan with a minimal time commitment for each person to contribute.
4. Plan. Place some benchmarks and goals in to a plan of action that once you hit them, your commitment moves to a new level.
5. Execute. Stick to it, don’t give up, and push through.
The jist of this post, give your team time to soak in to what has happened, and allow them time to prepare for their new commitment.
Remember, you do not find out your having a child and give birth in less then a weekend. Why should our business ideas be the same way?
With some patience and planning, you may just make this in to the success you believe your start up can be.
Success to all!
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I was ready to get a wrap up from Dan Rockwell of spotWurk when Chris Anderson jumped in and stole the show!
Congratulations spotWurk Team!
→ 2 CommentsTags: SWC Startups · spotWurk
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Brian C. Zuercher
NEW WEBSITE clearwish.com enables universal personal ‘wish list’ that can be shared and customized with anyone you would like.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (July 21, 2008) - clearwish finally answers the old “what do you want for your birthday/holiday?” question by enabling users to add items discovered on the web or items they are randomly wishing for to a sharable online list. The site was brought from idea to beta launch at the Startup Weekend Columbus.
Clearwish.com is an interactive service that allows a user to create, grow and share their wish lists with family and friends. Users can capture their items from any site or location and add them to their wish list. Users can then share their lists with family and friends. It helps users tell anyone what they want. Merchants can suggest products to users as target advertising.
Further integration of functionality to the site is ongoing, but eventually the development team hopes to achieve a marketplace where wishes are constantly being made and granted both commercially and symbolically.
Please continue to follow the progress of clearwish at clearwish.com.
About clearwish
Your wishlist on the web. The universal sharable wishlist. www.clearwish.com
About TechColumbus
TechColumbus is a nonprofit organization that focuses on technology-based economic development in the 15 counties of Central Ohio. www.techcolumbus.org
About Startup Weekend
Startup Weekend hosts 54 hour events in cities across the country bringing together all types of people to create companies, projects, and great technology based communities over the course of a weekend. www.startupweekend.com
→ No CommentsTags: Press Release · clearwish
FindShelterNow.com Introduces Web Application - Help Is On The Way For Stranded Travelers
July 20th, 2008
Columbus, Ohio (July 20, 2008) Launched at Columbus Startup Weekend, FindShelterNow.com is a Columbus, Ohio based startup company focused on satisfying the needs of people traveling without hotel reservations. Industry studies indicate over 25% of hotel rooms are booked the same night as they are occupied. This represents over $80m of hotel revenue generated each day from these travelers. The FindShelterNow.com solution offers hotels the opportunity to assist these travelers to fill their needs across the country.
“Close friends of mine were recently traveling to their vacation destination and decided to stop along the way to split up the drive. They were unable to find a hotel room until 2:00AM. Use of FindShelterNow.com would have solved this problem,” says Dan Wesner of FindShelterNow.com.
Additionally, the FindShelterNow.com system will also be used by emergency management agencies in time of evacuation to direct people to hotels with room availability.
About FindShelterNow.com
is a national, consolidated, centralized one-stop data source of hotels with rooms to sell tonight, used to re-located evacuees to “commercial shelter”.
http://www.FindShelterNow.com/
About TechColumbus
TechColumbus is a nonprofit organization that focuses on technology-based economic development in the 15 counties of central Ohio.
http://www.techcolumbus.org/
About Startup Weekend
Startup Weekend is an intense event bringing brilliant tech minds together to create companies, projects and great tech communities!
http://startupweekend.com/
→ No CommentsTags: Find Shelter Now · Press Release
Here are the podcasts recorded at SWC using Utterz.com. Thank you to the following participants:
→ No CommentsTags: Find Shelter Now · SWC Startups · freight chatter · upropel
So we’re all impressed with the energy and community that Startup Weekend has brought to Columbus. Dan is ready to do this thing again. I’m ready for it again. But the planning for a possible Startup Weekend Columbus II can wait (at least a year) for me.
So here’s my idea to keep the community and the ideas and implementations flowing. Why don’t we do mini un-branded startup events. With no sponsors. No pre-determined location or time. Just a group of people, say 10 max, getting together and launching products. Ideas could be piched on a wiki, like we did with Startup Weekend Columbus. Whittle it down. Pick an idea. Ten people agree to get together. Then just flesh it out and launch it. If we get enough people interested, we could have one of these things occuring every week. Now that would be cool.
→ 8 CommentsTags: Uncategorized
Those who stayed to the end know how intense Startup Weekend was. There was a lot to do in our 50+ hours of work. Could it be done in three?
That was the topic of Startup Weekend founder Andrew Hyde’s talk at OSCON with Gavin Doughtie of Google.
For a taste of what they had to say, here’s their slidedeck:
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: info@eventstart.com
EventStart promises the ultimate event experience
COLUMBUS, Ohio (July 22, 2008): EventStart was born out of Startup Weekend Columbus, an intense entrepreneurial event focused on launching several new companies within a single weekend. Equipped with an all-star team the company is aiming to create the ultimate event experience for organizers, sponsors, and attendees.
The website which is slated to be released late August 2008 will provide organizers with the tools they need to quickly and successfully launch their next big event. Within minutes an organizer can generate a complete event website, including user registration capabilities, blog, and wiki. The company also has plans to provide organizers and sponsors with the means to identify and attract mutually beneficial partnerships.
“EventStart’s services don’t stop here”, said one founder. “In the age of Twitter and YouTube, event goers are using these new social and media networks to communicate before, during, and even after events”. The company intends to allow event participants to have their communications and media streams aggregated into the event’s website. “Whether it’s realtime event feedback from an attendee or an announcement from one of the organizers, EventStart allows any of its participants to rapidly find and exchange information.”
The team at EventStart clearly recognizes the impact of social networking and technology on events and conferences. “With the growing pervasiveness of technology, there is a huge opportunity here to change the way we experience events. An event is much more fun and exciting when you are fully engaged with everything that is going on”, stated another founder.
EventStart also sees an opportunity for participant interaction even after an event’s formal conclusion. “Just because the event is technically over and we have to go home doesn’t mean the experience has to end here. Our application is unique because it affords organizers and attendees alike with the means to keep communicating.” The company’s website will enable organizers to get the important feedback they need to improve their next event, while allowing ongoing networking opportunities for attendees.
To keep up to date with the company’s latest news and happenings, visit http://eventstart.com
About EventStart
EventStart was born out of Startup Weekend Columbus, an intense entrepreneurial event focused on launching a new company within a single weekend. Equipped with an all-star team the company is aiming to create the ultimate event experience for organizers, sponsors, and attendees. http://eventstart.com
About TechColumbus
TechColumbus is nonprofit organization that focuses on technology-based economic development in the 15 counties in central Ohio. http://www.techcolumbus.org
About Startup Weekend
Startup Weekend is a intense 54 hour event bringing together brilliant tech minds (developers, designers, marketers, ect.) together to create a company (or as many as the community wants) from concept to launch! http://startupweekend.com
→ 1 CommentTags: EventStart · Press Release · SWC Startups
COLUMBUS, Ohio (July 20, 2008) — You know what makes the world go round? These days that’s a hard question to answer if you’re in the business of trying to understand your customer. In the world of design, advertising and marketing you need data, it’s simple as that. Data comes from you, me, that guy over there eating a pizza; it’s everywhere and its golden because data can tell you a story, a future story of what could be.
Today’s consumer is under siege with mass media mayhem, rising gas prices, and credit card crunches. All the while your brand is fighting to keep up with what they are doing, and more importantly, what they are thinking. Consumers are willing to help you out- help you make sense of things if you’d simply engage them, talk to them in a way that is fun, addicting, honest and interesting.
spotWurk™ is a new service that connects brands, market researchers and advertisers to consumers by engaging them on a whole new level of ubiquitous computing.
We make consumers part of the design process by tapping into the pulse of now. As an added benefit, brands get back on the radar, they engage, research, discover trends and begin to understand their dynamic consumer.
spotWurk™: a collective of souls that met on the eve of Columbus StartUp Weekend™, collaborated on a vision and saw the future together in a way that’s hard to explain other than to say - Wow, and you’ll be seeing us soon.
