Well, Big Omaha is here! The "nation's most ambitious conference on innovation and entrepreneurship", has truly been *the place to be in the midwest these last couple days. For me, someone who won a free ticket last minute in a fairy-taleish kind of way, it has been unbelievably exciting. Top notch speakers, indispensable networking... world changing conversations and ideas. It's all so BIG. For Omaha, anyway...
Now, as the last day of activity is about to commence, I thought it would be fun to highlight some of the people and ideas that have stood out to me, thus far...
FUNNIEST/SEEMINGLY POINTLESS award goes (of course) to Ben Huh owner of the "Cheezburger Network". Yes- he's the lolcats guy. Probably the most educational nugget I acquired from his talk was this enlightening picture from 1905. It is the first recorded lolcat:
Of course he had other provocative things to say, like:
"Crap is now gold."
COOLEST GOVERNMENT GUY award goes to Aneesh Chopra, America's new Chief Technology Officer.
He had lots of cool interesting things to say about technology...government...and stuff. But unfortunately I was too busy creating this image in "PicSay" and tweeting it via my Droid. Yes that's my brother:
MOST TOUCHING MOMENT award goes to entrepreneurial expert Shervin Pishevar and Silicon Prairie News (SPN) founder Jeff Slobotski when, in the middle of Shervin's presentation he called on the audience to give Jeff a standing ovation.
He exclaimed that he didn't "know anyone that's doing what Jeff's doing". I think there might have been a tear in Jeff's eye. (He may deny that...)
COLDEST PERSON award goes to Princess Lasertron founder Megan Hunt.
So glad I wasn't wearing that outfit yesterday... especially during the first half of the talks.
CUTEST COUPLE award goes to Daniel Muller and Lauren Christie.
Ok- Dusty and Marlina Davidson were pretty cute too. They're a close second...
BEST HAIR award goes to John Henry Muller. 'Nuff said.
MOST ELEGANT/GENEROUS PREGNANT SPEAKER award goes undoubtedly to Sarah Lacy.
Not only was she 24 weeks pregnant (just like MY wife!)- but she also gave *everyone at Big Omaha a copy of her new book! For free! (Actually- I think she made Jeff buy them for everyone.)
BIGGEST CAMERA HAM award goes, hands-down, to Kaitlyn Fillipini.
I just call them as I see them...
GREATEST FAIL award goes to poor Alex P. Gates of WHAT CHEER for only seeing the Star Wars films for the first time very recently. So sad. Can you really call his childhood a childhood? No you cannot.
GREATEST WIN award goes to Marc Ecko for naming Star Wars as the most inspirational startup. (Take that Alex P. Gates!) May the Force be with you, Marc.
GREATEST HIGH FIVE goes to both myself and SPN intern Brittany Mascio.
You only get half of it in this photo... but it was pretty darn epic.
GREATEST HUGZ and GREATEST FASHIONZ awards both go to Steve Gordon of RDQLUS fame.
We had a great little talk after yesterdays sessions, and he gave me an awesome bro hug. It was so manly. Plus, there's something about hugging a man with RDQLUS gear on. It's a very affirming thing. So beautiful.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Alright- Dusty and Jeff just came on stage... the last day begins! It's time to get going...
All images were taken by Malone & Company and can be found on the Silicon Prairie News Flickr.
No comments:
Post a Comment