Startup Camp This Week

Posted 7 July 2008

I’m really excited to be heading to Startup Camp toward the end of this week. This is a gathering of folks from seven startups, plus a dozen or so startup veterans, investors, and advisors, to talk about making our ventures successful. I feel really fortunate that my startup, Collective Knowledge Works, was chosen from the more than 80 companies that submitted applications.

At the beginning of Startup Camp, each company gives a lightning talk describing itself. The format is like the Ignite events: 20 slides, which are automatically advanced every 20 seconds, giving you about seven minutes total. It’s a demanding and inspiring format.

I started with an edit of my standard pitch but decided that there really was no point in having word slides at this speed. Spurred on by the book “Back of the Napkin,” I’ve been creating illustrations to anchor each slide. It’s a little daunting how easy it is to spend two hours on a slide that’s going to be shown for 20 seconds, but it’s a great discipline for really clarifying your thinking and figuring out what your main points are and how best to communicate them.

Another great thing about Startup Camp is that getting into it also grants admission to O’Reilly’s Foo Camp, which immediately follows it. Foo Camp invitations are highly coveted, thanks to the incredible collection of people that it gathers and the wonderfully free-form way the even unfolds.