The rain may have a kept a few people away yesterday, probably a few less booths than last year, the quirkiness factor was a little too high in certain cases, and there was the absence of a certain larger-then-life personality. Still TechCrunch Disrupt is unique. Not too many events compress the startup whirlwind on both coasts into a manageable three day techfest.
Within the space of an hour or so after I arrived, I was chatting with the founder of Videolicious, which has a raw video to quality Web-ready news short app, met up with the Israeli-founder of a NJ-based peer-to-peer car rental service called rent2buy, had a silk-screen shirt made for me by a Crown Heights, Brooklyn startup (Go Brooklyn!), heard Dennis Crowley talk about Foursquare’s very bi-coastal work arrangements for its employees, and watched a Battlefield player call KurbKarma explain how parking behaviors can earn karma points.
Like last year, I’ll be doing the very popular “Tales from Startup Alley” profile posts. And I’ll be tweeting away, time permitting, at @agreenjay.