Scripting News for 9/18/07

A killer app? 

Mint sounds like something I’ve been waiting for.

Like something everyone will want.

Now, should I trust them with my data??

BTW, it’s refreshing that someone, whoever they are, saw their way through the maze of BS products that Silicon Valley keeps coming up with and made something obvious and widely useful. That’s the kind of stuff I like to see. 🙂

PS: I did a search and found out that Mint is one of the 40 products announced at TC40. It should win the $50K award, if the execution is anything more than passing. Best idea at the show, by far.

PPS: Fred Wilson writes to say Mint is not a new idea, that Wesabe, a company he has invested in, has been offering a similar product for over a year. He also sent a pointer to their Security and Privacy FAQ, a very inspiring document.

Is a tech bust coming soon? 

Fred Wilson thinks so.

And I agree.

The reason the tech sector runs in cycles of euphoric booms and deep busts is that there is little support for long-term investment in tech. The new concepts that will fuel the next boom cycle are already here, but there isn’t enough money flowing into developing them. The ideas that are getting investment are more and more derivative of the original idea that fueled the boom cycle that is now (likely) coming to an end.

If you look back at the last two busts, there was one in the early 90s when the software boom had run out of juice, and then in the early 00s when the web boom had run its course. In both cases, the seeds of the next boom were already planted, but the investors weren’t pushing money in their direction. The savior after the early 90s bust was the web, and the second was what they call Web 2.0, which is a really lame way to describe the networked creative environment, what I called the Two-Way Web.

I’m going to be in NY in October, and I hope to meet with Fred and other investors to talk about how we can soften the busts and enhance the booms.

Networking in SF hotels? 

Here’s a problem that some investment dollars help solve.

Apparently, the TechCrunch 40 conference isn’t streaming to the outside world because the Palace Hotel has incredibly lame networking, and they won’t allow conference promoters to bring in more wires? This is what I hear, although it’s not confirmed. Emails to the conference promoters yesterday were not responded to.

I’ve also received emails from a number of companies announcing products at the show who want coverage on Scripting News, so my interest is not entirely idle. 🙂

So what does it take to establish one hotel in SF as the default tech conference hotel? Networking! Geez, you’d think it’s obvious by now. We do things that require networks. Look in any conference room around the world for a clue. And supposedly San Francisco is the central node in the network of technology bringing all this great stuff to the rest of the world.

So where is the hotel that gives us the very most basic technology to wire up conferences so that the whole world can participate?

Do we need to move the tech industry to another city?

Someone please ask the Mayor or Google or someone in charge when they’re going to fix this problem. It should have been solved in 1997, and it’s already 2007.

BTW, here’s a clue: there are some great business opportunities, beyond conferences, for the first physical location in downtown SF to solve this problem. Just ask Loic. 🙂