Date: July 27, 2000

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The Industry Standard's 2nd Annual "Internet Summit" was held
July 15-18, 2000, at the Ritz-Carlton, Laguna Niguel, California
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Dear Clients, Partners, Friends, Surfers (actual and figurative), and Fellow Seekers of The eTruth:

Hey, dudes (and dudettes), just back from a stylin' laid-back time at the beach. Cool! -- shoulda been there. Big waves, big food, big parties, big fireworks (literally and figuratively)....and, you know what? The Big Kahuna was there, man!

...actually, several *mega-Big* Kahunas! It was, like a t*o*tally awesome, e-blowout experience, duuuuude.....

Ah, yes, the Internet conference trail hits the world-class beaches of South Orange County....at arguably the primest property on the entire California coast. Hosting *the* most exclusive gig of the year for New Economy execs. What a place! (One of my favorite old haunts, top surfspot Salt Creek, is right next door.) With weather, waves, views, sunsets, and glitz the travel magazines would kill for...

And enough New Economy insights to make your brain...well, ache, man.

But, rest assured, I gathered up a large majority of these pearls of wisdom to share with you--my valued and (for some reason unbeknownst to me) loyal readers. Hey, I may not have got 'em *all*, friends, but I got enough to be dangerous--and my hand is till sore.

If you weren't there--well, I'm your best bet, because I sat through the entire, fricking *over-packed* two-plus-day program, gang.....which I'll guarantee you no other press attendee did! So I have the *definitive* collection of notes. [na, na, na, na, na]

Now, the challenge to reduce it all for you. What a bitch. Do you guys know how *really difficult* you can be sometimes?

I hope, therefore, you'll bear with me. And let me decide what I'll talk about and what I won't--cuz no way I can cover it all, in anything less than book length. Hey, maybe I should have you *vote* for what I report on....yeah, that's it! (More in a minute.)

One panel that was nothing to write home about, unfortunately, was the music panel. Heard it all before. The only answer I wanted was: what the hell is Napster's business model? And all I got was a lousy comment by Hank Barry, the lawyer-cum-president of Napster, late in the discussion: "It's hard to come up with a business model when you're fighting legal battles 24 hours a day." Yawn... okay, I'm glad I didn't pay the $4200 bucks to hear *that.* (I thought a bunch of VC money is in that thing? With no plan? Attention entrepreneurs everywhere-- ignore everything you previously heard.) Anyway, want to read about the music/ entertainment panel? Then here's the AP story (via CNet) that appeared a couple days after the event.

No way can I be as fast as the AP--so I'll let them do the breaking (non) news stories. (Why can't the media seem to leave this Napster thing alone? All over it, whether anything's happening or not. The forces of good and evil, or something. Talk about a herd mentality--buncha lapdogs!)

Oops, so sorry, my kind and generous press colleagues.... I, I...don't know what came over me there!

Aaaaanyway, here's what I sat through, the main events of this oversold (again), glitzy and almost painfully clubby, high-buck affair:

1) - Steve Case interview: "Defining the World's First Fully Integrated Media and Communications Company for the Internet Century" (it didn't--but sure was a nice, friendly chat with Mary Meeker, one of the co-hosts)

2) - "The New Pioneer: Asia and the Internet"--An Interview with Richard Li, Chairman of Pacific Century Group. (how you say "da man" in Cantonese?)

3) - Panel: "E-Commerce--It's About Platforms" (the heads of CNet, Amazon, Yahoo, Priceline, eBay)

4) - "The State of the Global Capital Markets," a firehose presentation like none I've ever seen/heard/experienced, by analyst-buddies Mary Meeker and Ruth Porat of Morgan Stanley.

5) - Panel: "The New face of Venture Capital" (eCompanies, Internet Capital Group, 12 Entrepreneuring, and CMGI)

6) - Panel: "The Future of Wireless Applications and Services" (NTT DoCoMo, Phone.com, America Online)

7) - Panel: "Beneath the Surface - Infrastructure" (the heads of LoudCloud, Akamai, Genuity, and Exodus)

8) - "How I Saved $100 Million Using B-to-B E-Commerce," by the CEO of Carrier Corp.

9) - Panel: "Who Controls the Future of B-to-B?" (the heads of Healtheon, FreeMarkets, Ventro, and VerticalNet)

10) - An interview of Keith Krach, CEO of Ariba (by Bill Gurley, the other host)

11) - "The Return of Interactive Television," a presentation by Mitch Kertzman, CEO of Liberate.

12) - The music panel (but who cares about that)

13) - "What's in a Name?", an interview of Stratton Sclavos, CEO of Verisign, focused mostly on talk about recent acquisition Network Solutions.

14) - An interview with Jim Clark, on "The Elements of Start-up Style." (the billionaire's billionaire shares some interesting perspectives on life in the e-fast lane)

15) - Three new companies' business models: pitches by the CEOs of Village Ventures, Epinions, and iWon.com (three young turks out to knock our socks off)

16) - Panel: "Over There - The Internet in Europe" (yes, they've seen the movie, and look out)

17) - A (reeeally) informal talk by Bill Joy, Chief Scientist at Sun, on "The End of Technology."

18) - And a final interview: the Bill & Mary team go at Yahoo! CEO, Tim Koogle.

Do I hear 19? Man was I tired when it was all over. But, ya know, in a scan of my notes afterwards on several of these sessions, much of the banter comes up less than profound. Lots of softball questions, and just a shortage of time in many cases to really drill into the big issues. Plus, no way could many of the audiences' questions get addressed after each talk, with some 800 people in the room--and the damn event running so late all the time! One had to read between the lines a goodly amount at this thing, and try to string it all together to get some decent take-away meaning. (Which is exactly why I gotta be at these things in person--just can't stay away!)

Anyway, vote by number on the above, please, dear readers. Give me, say, up to 5 of your choices. And I'll try to accommodate by summarizing the sessions that seem to be of most interest to the list.

But don't choose 8, 9, and 10....because, for starters, I can already give you a rundown on the B2B sessions -- a quick story I did for Conferenza.com last week, recapping that portion.

Also, for more you can read right now, check out a great overview of the whole shindig by Gary Bolles -- just posted on http://www.Conferenza.com. The man is good. And the site I highly recommend (he said shamelessly--they pay me). You may need to register for a free trial to view the story. Also sign up for their great email newsletter.

A few other thoughts and happenings from The Internet Summit, while they're on my mind (features I often include in these reports):

- Coolest new company name I noted: Vizzavi, a European wireless portal play....followed closely by Nerds.com.

- News heard while schmoozing & cocktailing: yeah, wouldn't you just *love* to get that! I'd tell ya, but they'd have to, well...you know. And the cliff at the Ritz is a long drop....

- Interesting people I met and talked with, and old acquantainces I ran into again: watch for this in my next send.

- Whom I noted in attendance from my hometown: Nobody, unless you count Ann Winblad, who's from the Twin Cities originally. (And she ain't no nobody!) There were a few attendees I noted from the Midwest--but, as far as press representation, I was it.

- My votes for best moderators/speakers/panelists: Jonathan Weber (The Standard's editor-in-chief) gets my vote again as best moderator....as far as panelists, Meg Whitman of eBay always seems to having something thoughtful and interesting to say, and Sky Dayton (whose insights bely his years) was another good one, I thought....the 'best sound-bite artiste' award goes again to Mark Walsh, the *former* CEO (now Chairman) of VerticlaNet....who must have sealed the deal with Joe Galli of Amazon at the conference (they both were on panels) ....and,finally, my votes for best interviewees this time would go to Stratton Sclavos and Jim Clark. Smooth....

That's it for now....more soon.

(to subscribe, just hit the email link below....and don't worry about the voting thing referred to above--that's already closed...but you'll get the report that resulted from it)

your faithful, unstoppable, ever-roving conference reporter (heading
next to LA-LA Land, dahlings, for "Herring on Hollywood," 7/31 - 8/2)
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Graeme Thickins, Founder & Principal Consultant
GT&A Strategic Marketing Inc.
*Twin Cities *LA *San Francisco *Anywhere
Voice: 612/944-1672
Fax: 612/944-1673
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