I’ve been blessed to have some good opportunities while in the San Francisco Bay Area and this past week was no different. Last Monday, my adventures took me to San Diego to attend the Fall 2009 edition of DEMO. If you don’t know, DEMO is one of the biggest stages out there for companies to launch their products. Interestingly enough, this season’s edition of DEMO took place a week after one of their competitor’s held their own startup conference.

The premise behind DEMO is simple. Companies or startups apply and the ones that are selected are the ones that will be launching a product that very day. I’ve found the selection at DEMO to be pretty different than the ones featured at TechCrunch50. DEMO is more focused on both the consumer-facing applications and the enterprise model, while it seemed that TechCrunch50 is just on the consumer side.

DEMO winners are awarded $1 million to the two best consumer and enterprise company – $500,000 each…not a bad takeaway, huh? This year the winners were Emo Labs for their invisible “zero-footprint” speaker systems and also Liaise for their automation of the capture & management of KeyPoints buried inside emails, IMs and other communications.

This year was somewhat of a transition for DEMO as after 13 years, executive producer Chris Shipley will be stepping down and turning the reins over to VentureBeat’s own Matt Marshall. It seems to be that VentureBeat will be handling the planning for DEMO moving forward.

As a disclosure, I was asked to be the official event photographer for DEMO and had a great time meeting people at the conference and it’s definitely one to rival that of TechCrunch’s prized conference. I felt that they could work on the performance of the wireless Internet though as I’ve found it pretty spotty throughout the entire conference – perhaps a sign I need to get a EVDO card for my laptop?

But here are some photos of the event, credit (of course) going to the fine folks at DEMO who put on a remarkable conference. Definitely worth going to, if you want to see the latest and greatest launching.

Welcome to DEMO Fall 2009 in San Diego!

The Opening Reception at the DEMO Conference.

Mashable’s own Ben Parr & Jennifer Van Grove were on scene at DEMO to report on the startups.

MyOwnRealEstate.com on the main stage presenting their product.

The OrganIP team at the DEMO pavilion.

Karl Long & the Traackr, Inc. team in the DEMO pavilion.

LeapFILE team in the DEMO pavilion.

Satish Dharmaraj, Omar Hamoui and Anu Shukla on the DEMO main stage to recap the presentations.

VentureBeat’s Matt Marshall dancing with Chris Shipley (executive producer) at DEMO.

Chris Shipley officially turning over the reins of DEMO to Matt Marshall.

One of the winners of the $1 million prize: Emo Labs with Matt Marshall and Chris Shipley.

The second winner of the $1 million prize: Liaise with Matt Marshall and Chris Shipley.

Congratulations Chris! DEMO wishes you well and much success.

More photos from DEMO can be found by clicking here.

by Michelle Lentz

cc:Betty made its (her?) debut at DEMO09 this week. Slightly reminiscent of the now defunct I Want Sandy, cc:Betty helps organize your inbox (and therefore your life).

I have to say I’m intrigued by cc:Betty. Having a Gmail account (or two) has had an adverse affect on all of my email accounts. Whereas I used to subscribe to the Empty Inbox theory, I now keep everything my 4 IMAP accounts throw at me. I rely heavily on Smart Mailboxes and search functions, but sometimes the search fails me. cc:Betty may be the answer to my problems.

cc:Betty creates a mailspace for you. A mailspace is a web page that is constantly updated with your email conversations, making it easier for view, follow, sort and make sense of the 50 emails around that one phase of your project. It threads your email and turns it into a conversation. Before you say it, I realize that Gmail also threads, but not everyone can use Gmail for work, which is why so many people are left with Mail.app and Outlook.

Additionally, cc:Betty creates photo albums for you out of images you send. Dates are turned into downloadable appointments, maps are created for addresses, media is playable from the mailspace, and documents and links are organized for you.

Right now, cc:Betty is free and in beta. To use it, all you need to do is cc: Betty in your email. Need more than that? Sign up for a free account and then cc: betty@ccbetty.com in your emails. Your mailspace will be automatically created for you.

__

Contact Michelle with news, stories, events, and more.
Email: michelle[at]writetech[dot]net
Twitter: @writetechnology, Friendfeed: michellel
Blogs: Write Technology, Wine-Girl.net

by Brian Solis

Chris Shipley kicked things off at DEMO09 with a humbling, yet inspiring introduction that embraced the state of the economy, “This show is smaller with 39 companies instead of the usual 70-plus we typically showcase. The economy has had its effects.”

However, she noted that things always have a way of resetting so that they can flourish and prosper in a more meaningful way.

Ctrl-Alt-Del

This DEMO is much more intimate and productive. I’ve been able to meet every company, see demos and sit down and host deep, wonderful conversations with incredible people, which just isn’t typically possible at most events. I’m enjoying this experience tremendously.

Now, with that…this is the first DEMO that witnessed the changing of the guard for the first time in 13 years. Chris Shipley introduced Matt Marshall of VentureBeat to the DEMO audience and he was warmly welcomed. We’ll miss Chris indeed. Under Matt’s reign, we anticipate greatness.

I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story…

Chris Shipley passes the torch to Matt Marshall

Rafe Needleman, CNET

Home-Account

Don Dodge

CC:Betty

Citrix Online

Walt Mossberg

Loyal2Me

Skout

Matt Marshall, Eric Tilenius, Bryce Roberts, David Hornick, Christine Herron

Christine Herron

David Hornick

Matt Marshall

Touch Book

Avaak Vue

Mirasol

DEMO Jam Party

Shuly Ghalili and Deb Schultz

Ravit Lichtenberg and Eliane Fiolet

Palm Desert

For more pictures from DEMO, please my albums on Flickr:

Opening Reception

Day One Morning

Day One Afternoon

DEMO Jam

Connect with me on:
Twitter, FriendFeed, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Plaxo, Plurk, Identi.ca, BackType, or Facebook

by Brian Solis

I’m in Palm Desert attending DEMO09 and much to the disbelief of tech economists, the vibe and outlook is positive here. The companies are strong, the entrepreneurs are motivated, investors are evaluating options, and media, analysts, and bloggers are enjoying the more intimate atmosphere and actively meeting and covering presenting companies.

I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story…

Steve Larsen

Sobees

Matt Marshall and Don Dodge

David Needle

Graeme Thickins

Microsoft BizSpark

Eliane Fiolet Don Clark

Sarah Perez

Hashtag

Lisa Peterson

David Mason and Kevin Mobley

For more pictures from DEMO, please my albums on Flickr:

Opening Reception

Day One Morning

Day One Afternoon

Connect with me on:
Twitter, FriendFeed, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Plaxo, Plurk, Identi.ca, BackType, or Facebook

by Brian Solis

This weekend I’m headed to Palm Springs to cover DEMO 09.  The opening reception kicks-off on Sunday with the first company taking the stage on Monday morning.

This is a particularly exciting DEMO as it will be the first to feature VentureBeat’s Matt Marshall who will officially take the reigns from Chris Shipley starting with DEMO Fall 2009. The duo will co-host this event.

Here’s the lineup, which was just released today:

7 Billion People, Inc.; Austin, TX
Always Innovating, Inc.; Mountain View, CA
AppZero Corp.; Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Asurion Mobile Applications, Inc.; San Mateo, CA
Avaak, Inc.; San Diego, CA
BitGravity, Inc.; Burlingame, CA
bluBuzz, LLC; Holland, MI
Cc:Betty, Inc.; Palo Alto, CA
Citrix Online, Goleta, CA
Coveroo, Inc.; San Francisco, CA
deskNET, Lausanne, CH
Document Depository Corp., LLC; Wayne, PA
eFormic, Ltd.; Stuttgart, DE
Ensembli, Ltd.; Sheffield, Great Britain
Evri, Inc.; Seattle, WA
Gazaro, Inc.; Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
HAM-IT, Inc.; North Andover, MA
Home-Account, Inc.; San Francisco, CA
HowSimple, LLC; Huntington Beach, CA
Jadoos, Inc.; Sunnyvale, CA
Kutano Corp.; Burnaby, BC, Canada
Liquid Media, LLC; Arvada, CO
Ontier, Inc.; Portland, OR
Primal Fusion, Inc.; Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
Promptu Systems Corp.; Menlo Park, CA
Purewire, Inc.; Atlanta, GA
Qualcomm MEMS Technologies, Inc. San Diego, CA
Qubes, Inc.; Taipei, Taiwan
Silverstone Solutions, Inc. San Francisco, CA
Skout, Inc.; San Francisco, CA
SmartyCard; San Mateo, CA
Symantec Corp.; Mountain View, CA
Technicopia, LLC; Carmel Valley, CA
Transformyx, Inc.; Baton Rouge, LA
Vokle, Inc.; Santa Monica, CA
Xandros, Inc.; Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
XMARKS; San Francisco, CA
Zipadi Technologies, LLC; Bluffdale, UT
Zuora, Inc.; Redwood City, CA

Connect with me on:
Twitter, FriendFeed, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Plaxo, Plurk, Identi.ca, BackType, or Facebook