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This entry was written by and posted on September 5, 2006 at 3:11 pm and filed under Friends & Family, MinneDemo, Minneapolis & St. Paul, Technology, Web 2.0. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.
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2 Comments
Garrick, great meeting you last night at MinneDemo…
yes, I was struck, too, by that particular quote of Robert’s
there is way too much wishin’ and talkin’ that goes on in this town about getting back our mojo as an IT capital — no shortage of blathering, but a definite shortage of action
case in point: I didn’t see a single VC at last night’s event — and maybe only one angel (a guy I encouraged to come)
I’m with Robert — we need a winner to get people’s attention,
and god bless him if he can be that one! (and keep the business here)
we have a lot of great developers in Minnesota (Robert actually is convinced he can do better, faster development here than in the Valley!)…and I was energized just being in a room full of them last night….on top of that, we have a world-class business school in Carlson, with a great ventures program (and a great VC-in-residence there, my friend Gary Smaby)
and Robert figured out a way to leverage that to his advantage
granted, no community will ever duplicate what Silicon Valley has, or anything close to it (many have tried)….but, the Twin Cities is underperforming, and it bugs the hell out of those us who know we can do better
leaders can come from anywhere, including the development community….Robert is emerging as one, but he sure as hell can’t do it alone
still wishin’ and hopin’
(but wanting, too).
Graeme
I also invited an angel’er, but he had an angel meeting. He was very interested in the Barcamp/Minnedemo concept.