DemoBeat

DEMO’s visits to London and Boston show California is great place to launch

I’ve been on the road lately, in a continued effort to find and meet with the best companies around to launch new products at the DEMO conference, and have been developing some cool ideas for DEMO’s next conference in March. I’ll share more about those ideas in future posts.

First, here are a few thoughts, after wrapping up a trip to London this week, and Boston last week.

In each of these places, there are hordes of… Continue Reading

Demo ‘10 begins in Boston — calling all awesome startups

It’s been a few weeks since Demo took San Diego by storm, and I posted a few days ago about a few of the cool things that happened to some of the demonstrating companies.

More on that in a sec. But here’s a reminder that we’re gearing up to do it all over again with DEMO ‘10, March 21st-23rd in Palm Desert, CA.

The applications are already rolling in, which means it’s time for myself and other… Continue Reading

DEMO rocked! Now the party starts again

It’s been two weeks since the end of DEMO. I’m awestruck by the experience, both by all of the incredibly talented people that convened there in San Diego, and by the traction 70 entrepreneurs were able to get during those short few days.

Thank you to all of the people who came and make it such a terrific event.

I’ll talk about highlights shortly, but now it’s time to to start it all over again. We’re already… Continue Reading

WhoDoYouKnowAt: A more exclusive, private LinkedIn

When LinkedIn first launched, it touted itself as the premiere site for networking and personnel discovery on the web. Since then, it has grown massively, with people joining at all ranks and across all sectors. This has put a strain on arguably the most important component of the site: the ability to contact others who could help you further your career. As more users join, top-tier executives are becoming less and less inclined to provide… Continue Reading

VentureBeat is looking for a Chief Technology Officer

VentureBeat continues to roll. Our next big move: We’re looking to hire a chief technology officer.

The specs are listed below. We’re looking for someone who does more than fulfill the technical requirements of this job. We’re searching for someone who can think really, really big.

That means helping VentureBeat develop the best media platform on the Web. We’ve got several projects in the works, designed to allow our high-profile readership to interact with our quality content… Continue Reading

DEMO: Basically one big tech party (photo gallery)

The big draws at DEMOfall 09, the emerging technology conference co-produced by VentureBeat, were of course the 70 companies launching or previewing new products. But now that we’ve pointed out the best of the bunch, it’s important to note that DEMO isn’t just about the presentations. It’s also about hallway conversations, swapped business cards, and oh yeah, dancing.

So after covering 56 launching companies and 14 Alpha Pitches, here are some pictures of the rest of DEMO.

VentureBeat… Continue Reading

Best of DEMO — VentureBeat’s picks for the 10 best companies

VentureBeat’s staff has chosen our top 10 picks of DEMOfall 09, the emerging technology conference that we co-produced.

These picks are separate from the official DEMOgod award winners announced by DEMO. With 56 DEMO presenters and 14 DEMO Alpha Pitch companies unveiling their plans at the conference in San Diego this week, there are lot to sift through, so here are the ones that stood out from the crowd. We’ve ranked them in order of our… Continue Reading

DEMO: ShareGrove extends Facebook to conversations

Some criticize social networks like Twitter and Facebook for promoting superficiality over depth. When users post hundreds of miniature updates about their lives, what suffers are conversations, say the founders of ShareGrove, a San Mateo-based startup that presented at this week’s DEMOFall 09 conference.

While one of Facebook’s biggest aims is to strengthen the “weak ties” in a person’s social network, like distant acquaintances or friends from the past, most of a user’s online interactions tend… Continue Reading

DEMO: What everyone else is saying

We’ve bombarded you with our coverage of this week’s DEMOfall 09, the emerging technology conference that VentureBeat co-produces. But there were plenty of other reporters who watched the presentations and formed their own opinions. So I’ve pulled together some highlights from other publications.

First, some articles focusing on the individual companies that won the conference’s various awards, plus a cool DEMOlabs presentation:

Audio speakers get a new look and feel — “The idea behind the new speaker… Continue Reading

DEMO: Emo Labs founder reveals how “invisible” speakers work (video interview)

Here’s a video interview with Jason Carlson, chief executive of Emo Labs, the co-winner of the $1 million advertising prize at DEMOfall 09.

His team has been working for four years on a set of speakers made out of clear plastic. This technology astounded everyone with both its simplicity and great sound quality. It’s good to see such great unexpected innovation. Look for major speaker companies to launch the product under a license sometime next year.

Please… Continue Reading

DEMO: Matt Marshall inherits Chris Shipley’s dancing shoes (video)

We smuggled this grainy police video out of the hotel at DEMOfall 09 today. It is proof positive that our fearless leader, Matt Marshall, can dance. Sort of. At the close of the presentations at the event in San Diego today, Chris Shipley, the executive director of DEMO for 13 years, handed the reins over to Matt. As part of the deal, Matt had to learn Chris’ signature dance. As awkward as it seemed at… Continue Reading

DEMO: Up close and personal with Intelius’ DateCheck app (video interview)

It didn’t win the big prize at the DEMOfall 09 event. But Intelius‘ DateCheck app for the iPhone was one of the most-talked-about at the show.

The DateCheck app runs background checks on your date in real-time so you can figure out if it’s time to make an excuse and head for the door or stick around.

John Arnold, executive vice president of Intelius, explains to us in this video what the app can do, it’s implications… Continue Reading

DEMO: Emo Labs and Liaise win $1M media prize

Two companies have been selected as winners of this week’s DEMOfall 09 conference and will receive a total of $1 million in free advertising. (That’s $500,000 each.) The winner on the consumer side was Emo Labs, which developed a speaker that delivers great sound, despite the limited space in high-definition TVs. The enterprise winner was Liaise, which makes email more useful by looking at the contents of your inbox, figuring out which items require action,… Continue Reading

DEMO: Gogrok uses voice for better document collaboration

Gogrok is launching a better way to work with others on documents — not only are you able to co-edit a document in real-time, but you can also annotate it and chat with your collaborators using instant messaging and phone calls using voice over IP. That means disputes and confusion can be resolved much more quickly.

Gogrok is launching at today’s DEMOfall 09, the technology conference co-produced by VentureBeat. The company says you can share individual… Continue Reading

DEMO: ePulze uses sentiment analysis to build better advertising

A company called ePulze has created a search engine that monitors public opinion and sentiment as expressed in the news and elsewhere online. The company has developed this technology specifically for advertisers, so that brands can change advertising campaigns as needed if public perception shifts.

EPulze is launching today at DEMOfall 09, the technology conference co-produced by VentureBeat. Judging from the presentation on-stage, it’s easy to use — you can enter one brand, or two if… Continue Reading

DEMO: Burt launches Rich to deliver rich data on ad campaigns

Advertising software company Burt is launching a new analytics service called Rich. The service breaks down all its data into a single report page, which the company says is tailored to the needs of creative agencies. It’s supposed to answer questions like, “How long was the ad visible?” and “Did people actually notice it?”

The company launched Rich today at DEMOfall 09, the emerging technology conference co-produced by VentureBeat. Like any good analytics service, it includes… Continue Reading

DEMO: CallSpark gives salespeople data to make smarter phone calls

Ever feel like you were making a sales call that you didn’t have enough information for? CallSpark says it can help, by integrating data from Facebook, Twitter, Salesforce.com, Whitepages, and more. So before and during a sales call, you can see the latest social updates from your client, and then update their status in your customer relationship management (CRM) service afterwards.

This isn’t just for salespeople, though. Callspark also gives you a much wider selection of… Continue Reading

DEMO: Glam Media’s Tinker.com connects advertisers to real-time conversations

Advertising company Glam Media is launching Tinker.com, an application that helps advertisers engage with the real-time conversations on social services like Facebook and Twitter. It showed off the new application at the DEMOfall 09 conference today.

Not only does Tinker.com help advertisers search and browse conversations on those sites, it lets them create their own topics and events. The goal is to give them a broader picture of the conversation, rather than getting mired in individual… Continue Reading

DEMO: OrganIP hopes to make phone numbers a thing of the past

A new service called OrganIP makess it possible to speak anyone’s name and call them using voice over IP technology. A company called Digitrad developed the service by combining its Yes.tel unified identity technology and its messaging services — just as OrganIP says it wants to destroy the business card with Yes.tel, it now says you may never have to remember a phone number again.

OrganIP can connect your calls using online communities or social networks,… Continue Reading