Author Archives: Julie Blaustein

The Web 2.0 Expo Hall features over 75 exhibits, a Non-Profit Pavilion, a Long Tail Pavilion and The Solutions Showcase Theater that will have 10 minute presentations from the sponsors and exhibitors. I walked, talked and took pictures of  folks on the floor. There is tons of FREE schwag from branded cups, T-shirts and cups to incredible give-aways such as photo & video shoots, iPAD’s and even cash prizes of up to $10,000!

iStockphoto Photoshoot

iStockPhoto offers royalty-free photos, illustrations, video, audio and Flash files through advanced search. They also pay out royalties to artists. They are offering free portraits from the photographer Tyler Stallman available for viewing here. They will be presenting on Wednesday at 2:35 pm in room 2016 to share lessons learned in the image industry.

Lights, camera action! You can win up to $10,000 by entering the contest How do YOU.com,  sponsored by VeriSign.  You will be videotaped for up to 2 minutes to share your story of how the Internet has changed your life.  It was a ton of fun when I shared my story. What is yours? They can be found in the Long Tail Pavilion at Kiosk 27.

Have you been trying to get a cool domain but you just are unable to be cause they are all taken? .CO offers an alternative. It is the new domain extension approved by the ICANN that gives you a truly global, recognizable, and credible web address for branding your online presence. Stop by Booth 714 to learn more about how you can secure the domain of your dreams.

An International flavor is very present on the floor with companies traveling to the Expo from Berlin, Spain, Germany and Brazil eager to chat with you in the language of your choice.

So many great companies and so little time! Fortunately the Expo Hall is open on Wednesday from 10:30am – 6:00pm and don’t miss the Booth Crawl from 4:30pm – 6:00 pm.

.CO

Mashery

Neustar

80legs

Microsoft Tag

Pearltrees

How Do You.com

By Julie Blaustein

Speaker Aliza Sherman

Web 2.0 Expo has arrived! It is the annual event that brings together the people, ideas, products, and companies that shape the next-generation web and mobile apps at the Moscone West in San Francisco held this year from May 3-6. If you are able to attend in person, there is a schedule full of engaging content to choose from with over 75 sessions, workshops and intensives with well represented speakers from the industry.

Part of the excitement of being at the Expo in person is you can participate in silly but fun networking games. You will need to download the Microsoft Tag to your smartphone for The Scavenger Hunt. Clues are provided for you to locate  and tag throughout the conference. Great prizes are awarded too such as Xbox games and HD Zunes! Another game to play is the Paparazzi Photo 2.0 contest where starting on Tuesday May 4 -6 the Web 2.0 Expo Team will tweet 5 photo-related tasks from @w2e each day. The tasks involve you taking pictures with other attendees and you MUST be in each photo. Cash Cards up to $50 each will be awarded each day.

If you are not able to attend you can feel as if you are there by following the vibe of the conference through its Twitter tag #w2e or follow the Web 2.0 Team @w2e. There will be a Live Stream of the Keynotes. Also most speakers will provide their slides as found here from 2009.

Aliza Sherman’s workshop Create a Successful Social Media Plan: The Seven-Step Program provided a great overview of how to get started with the right objectives and tools to reach your target audience. Most importantly she stressed that social media is not about sales but rather about the conversation to make conversions to make the sales. Her numerous presentations on Social Media are available, not surprisingly, online. Once you get your community up and running you will want to to track it and you will need analytics to provide that data. Applied Communilytics provided great data including leading vendors of analytics – BitCurrent, ForSeeResults, HootSuite, CrazyEgg/KISSmetrics, comScore, Omniture and others.

Applied Communilytics Panel

There are tons of events happening at the Expo.  Monday night Ignite was held at Mezzzanine where speakers have five minutes on stage to present 20 slides that are rotated automatically after 15 seconds. Check out this past Ignite presentation by Justin.TV.

The Expo Hall opens on Tuesday at 10:30 am and closes at 3:30 pm. Wednesday the hours are from 10:30 pm to 6:00 pm. Don’t miss the booth crawl on Wednesday from 4:30 pm to 6:00 pm. There is lots of free stuff at the Expo including a free Expo Pass by using the discount code EXPOPASS.

By Julie Blaustein

Wednesday, February 3rd  I attended the kickoff of Motally’s moChats. Motally plans to hold a moChat the 1st. Wednesday of every month at their cozy headquarters in SOMA.  MoChats are casual talks designed to share insights about successful mobile development and optimizing mobile sites and apps through analytics. Analytics is what Motally provides, not only for mobile devices on the iPhone, Android and Blackberry platforms but also for the Apple iPad.

Pizza and drinks, including adult beverages, were served while sitting around a projector and chatting about Motally. Many features were discussed including the 2-way communications, user statistics such as unique users, page views, top referrers, top devices etc.  Also discussed was their search tracking feature.  When someone does an internal search on a mobile website, the website publisher can track what happens after the search to determine whether an action took place.  For example, say an individual searches for pizza on a mobile website and then later makes a phone call to place an order.  This is the type of data that is captured by Motally’s analytics and is particularly useful for sites that have strong search functionality. In fact, Yelp,  the local search and review site is one of its customers. Other clients include Fandango, IAC , Portable Zoo, and Verve Wireless.

Connect with Motally on Twitter at and keep up with them and all the excitement at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona February 15-18th or if you are in Barcelona, Motally will be at RIM’s App Planet in Hall 7, booth 7B26. You can also join them at the next Motally moChat on Wednesday, March 3rd.

The Motally Team at the AppShowcase/Buzzworthy Event.

By Julie Blaustein

There were a number of great speakers the first day of the SuperNova Conference, but Chris Anderson made it most clear to the audience. The theme for the conference is “Networks are central instruments of the changes sweeping our world… and networks themselves must change to address novel demands.” The first day of this 3 day conference focused on Changing Networks: The evolving infrastructure.

Chris Anderson is the editor of Wired Magazine and well known for his book The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More. He also has a degree in physics and has conducted research at Los Alamos National Laboratory. As he sees it, “The past decade was about finding new post institutional models on the web. The next decade will be about applying them to the real world.”

Having recently released his book Free which examines the rise of pricing models which give products and services to customers for free, he spoke about the democratization of tools from the web that make this possible. He talked of how 3D printers started out at about $7,000 and can now be purchased for only about $700. But he really hammered home his point that the web has been democratized and enables all kind of  new possibilities when he talked of his latest company. DIY Drones works with folks that build amateur Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). Its a company with no infrastructure, no office and when Chris was seeking a partner, the most qualified, talented candidate found via the Web turned out to be a 19 year old from Tijuana!

If you are unable to make it to the conference, you can tune into USTREAM‘s SuperNova Channel or join the conversation at their Twitter Hashtag #sn09.

Chris Anderson, Speaker at SuperNova Conference

A Forum for Change in the Network Age

Founder Kevin Werbach, Bradley Horowitz of Google, Jonathan Zittrain of Harvard and Werner Vogels of Amazon

By Julie Blaustein

What a fun evening at Varnish Art Gallery where Technologizer held their Tech The Halls Holiday Party. It was a full house with an open bar and delicious food for all. Lots of personal technology was available to check out courtesy of sponsors SugarSync, Marvell, Eastwick Communications, and MarketWire. But the highlight of the evening was possibly the very first ever Twitter Proposal by @dalelarson to @lauralagassa.

Dale proposes to Laura on one knee with all the guests of Tech the hall as Witnesses.

Dearest @lauralagassa, will you marry me? Yes, yes, yes, darling Yes!

Dale Places the Ring on Laura's Ring Finger.

Laura is in Shock - Is this Really Happening?

At Last The Long Awaited Kiss.

The Adorable Happy Couple.

The iPhones that Made It All Possible to Twitter