• Stuart on Zennström's keynote lacked... Zennström

  Gerald,

  I completely agree! I would have lambasted Niklas for not trying to use his technology like he did two years ago and Supernova when he phoned in and it sounded horrible. There is no excuse for Skype and PulverMedia not to have a backup plan. The program promised a video conference, generally that means there will be a feedback loop too.

  Similarly there was an hour to get the presentation slides to / should have been there for one of the Skype guys to turn the pages on.

  I wanted to blog a long piece on "Amateur Hours with Skype" after Tuesday. The Developer evening was a disaster in my book. As the so called "evangelist" I definitely felt let down by the organisation. In the end I sent a couple of messages. I think Phil put it politely.

  Cheers
  Stuart

• Gerald on Zennström's keynote lacked... Zennström

  Can’t help commenting on this one: I was among the third of the audience who walked out and I have to say the whole thing was just plain embarrassing.

  The way Niklas and Skype handled the whole keynote mishap was disastrous. The next two speakers generously accepted to cover for Niklas, but the Skype team was still on the stage trying to get the connection going during their speeches. When his Majesty Niklas eventually spoke HE NEVER APOLOGIZED to the audience, the organizers or the previous speakers. He just read (i assume by the tone of it) a long and boring speech. No slides, nothing. It took 20 min to the Skype team to get his picture on the screen! You’d think someone who’s planning to do a teleconference would understand the benefits of having slides ready for the audience. Skype should also be aware by now that he’s not the most riveting speaker in the world, which, again, would point toward the use of slides. Presentation 101 is about back up plans should a technical glitch happen. Executives of much larger organizations than Skype go through the trouble of preparing back up plans. The fact that Skype did not deem necessary to foresee that along with the total lack of apology from Niklaas demonstrated a total lack of respect for the audience. Skype can’t pretend to be a scrappy startup anymore…

  The typical VON crowd is a friendly audience. Most of us have been working in the space for long enough to get excited at the amount of traction it now gets. Most VON attendees see the Skype phenomenon as positive for the whole industry and certainly welcome the attention it generates. Unfortunately, Skype has been physically absent of all the US events to date, which does not help when it comes to justifying the total disrespect shown for the audience yesterday.
  

• skibare on Zennström's keynote lacked... Zennström

  wonder WHAT Meg Whitman is thinking NOW that I have always said EBAY is over Paying in their OWN AUCTION for a NON REVENUE producing asset!!!???????

• Muppetmaster on Zennström's keynote lacked... Zennström

  The liability that is Mr Zennstrom's unwillingness to travel to the US has just become apparent to eBay.

• Rick on Zennström's keynote lacked... Zennström

  That's a shame people feel that way. Nicholas needs to go eat dinner with Bill Gates and exhange ideas. There are few of them. Is Skype creating a monopoly? Is that the sentiment?

• continued in the Skype Journal Comment River: 200 fresh comments

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