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News from the #sxsw frontline; Addiply hits Austin

For those that know their Twitter hash-tags, the next six days could see #sxsw figure large in anyone’s #nefollowers queue.

For as the great and the digitally hopeful gather in Austin, Texas, for the ‘Interactive’ bit of South-by-SouthWest 2012, so the North-East is doing the UK proud.

Alongside me and @addiply – now re-housed for the week at 3414 Enfield Road, Austin, courtesy of the rent-a-room genius that is AirBnB – there are three other, fellow North Star investments making the 9,000-mile round trip to the liberal heart of Texas in the shape of Palringo, Recite and Thrive Software, aka Solo.

Throw in the likes of ShareMyPlaylist, Happiest and Cupple who are also in the mood to network State-side and it is easy to see why #sxsw may come to dominate one or two North-East Twitter feeds this week.

For what was once a folksy, spring music festival in Austin has now morphed into a 45,000-strong gathering of music, film and digital folk. The latter, in particular, are growing ever more in number.

Organisers reckon on 40% of this year’s delegates being in town for the online side of the show, as some 800 Brits meet and greet like minds from all four corners of the globe. The Berlin contingent behind Mashero ‘reached out’ last night for a beer with Addiply at five this Friday.

Add the prospect of some major media publishers floating about the place in search of collaborative partners and then top that off with a sprinkling of famed VCs in town to see what new is out there and it is a heady mix of opportunity and connection.

There is, if truth be told, also a chance to ‘star’ spot.

For anyone who has ever watched ‘The Social Network’ – Hollywood’s ‘take’ on the rise and rise of Facebook – Monday’s solo session with Sean Parker, the founder of Napster, promises to be intriguing. Parker is the character played by Justin Timberlake; the one who parties hard into the night – much to Mark Zuckerberg’s eventual embarrassment.

How much is Hollywood myth and how much is Valley legend may all become slightly clearer come five o’clock on Monday.

In between time, Addiply is booked up to have ‘Tea With The Brits’, ‘Breakfast With The Brits’ and, on Saturday, to join a coach trip to Britannia Manor – the home of astronaut-turned-gaming mogul Richard ‘Lord British’ Garriott whose palatial residence sounds something akin to Wayne Manor.

All three of which have arisen through a tie-up with the UKTI and their ‘Digital Mission’ brief to send 40 UK tech companies into #sxsw battle under their marketing umbrella.

What else might Austin offer Addiply?

Well, I have one conversation I really want to pursue; unfinished business down the road from Mountain View.

In the Easter of 2009, Addiply launched out of the hyper-local journalism sites run by the University of Berkeley in California; one in Mission, the other in Oakland.

It withered on the vine; principally due to the fact that the J-School graduates to whom it was entrusted wouldn’t sell ads – they were there to write stories.

The better part of three years on and lessons learned, we now have an automated commission sales programme that will let third parties sell that advertising space for the J-School reporters. Third parties such as the Business School kids, for example.

In 2007, with Addiply barely two months old, I travelled to New York to speak at a conference at the City University of New York, NewsInnovation. There I met a guy called David Cohn; he helped me with the wifi connection.

David returned home to San Francisco afterwards to run a not-for-profit website called Spot.Us. Late last year, he took up a new role – running the hyper-local websites for the University Of Berkeley. One in Mission; one in Oakland. Both, of course, are right under Google’s nose.

He is well worth a beer in Austin this weekend. After, of course, the boys from Berlin.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Rick Waghorn .