By Gary Sharma 5/06 10:00am

Goooood Morning Silicon Alley!

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Best Tech Events This Week (Ideas NYC, NY Tech Meetup, Digital Health Accelerator Demo Day, Investor Feedback Forum, GoGreen, Innovating for the Connected TV)

This is a guest post from Gary Sharma (aka “The Guy with the Red Tie”), founder and CEO of GarysGuide and proud owner of a whole bunch of black suits, white shirts and, at last count, over 40 red ties. You can reach him at gary [at] garysguide.com.

Last week I finally got to play with the (oh-so-elusive) Google Glass! It was fun to try it on, but I’m not convinced it’ll take off (at least not in its current form). That’s because it is simply an awkward experience from a human interaction perspective. Whether it’ll turn out to be a dud like the Segway or a very early iteration like the Palm Pilot, only time will tell. Meanwhile, here’s SNL’s hilarious take.

Tuesday (for some reason) has historically been the busiest day of the week for tech events. Last week, I think I ended up going to eight events! (A personal best, I’m pretty sure.) One of the events was a launch party for NY Angels’ Brian Cohen’s new book, which I’m looking forward to reading. Read More

By Nitasha Tiku 3/27 11:30am

Teach Me How to Startup

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Hot New Startup Trend: Trying to Make Money

Yesterday, Y Combinator (Silicon Valley’s ur-accelerator) hosted its biannual Demo Day at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View.

As cofounder Paul Graham announced last fall, YC downsized both the number of startups and the size of the investment in this current class. And fears that the accelerator bubble is about to pop were not lost on the 47 startups who presented, nor the 500 or so investors in attendance. Read More

By Gary Sharma 2/04 10:00am

Goooood Morning Silicon Alley!

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Best Tech Events This Week (Hearst Fashion Hackathon, Social Commerce Summit, NY Tech Meetup, PandoMonthly)

This is a guest post from Gary Sharma (aka “The Guy with the Red Tie”), founder and CEO of GarysGuide and proud owner of a whole bunch of black suits, white shirts and, at last count, over 40 red ties. You can reach him at gary [at] garysguide.com.

Congrats to the Ravens for winning the Super Bowl! Best of the commercials? That’d be Chrysler’s So God Made A Farmer ad. Beyoncé rocked the half-time show (and flashed the Illuminati sign?). Yes, there was a brief blackout, enough to unleash a torrent of funny tweets. Oreos won the night, social-media wise. And finally, there was Shaq, lip-syncing to Beyoncé’s “Halo.”  Read More

By Gary Sharma 9/17/12 8:30am

Goooood Morning Silicon Alley!

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Best Tech Events This Week (Mashable Social Good Summit, ERA Demo Day, Startup Weekend, GoGreen, Design for Manufacturing Summit)

This is a guest post from Gary Sharma (aka “The Guy with the Red Tie”), founder and CEO of Gary’s Guide and proud owner of a whole bunch of black suits, white shirts and, at last count, over 40 red ties. You can reach him at gary [at] garysguide.com.

iPhone 5 Day is coming, and you know what that means. That’s right–long lines are already starting to form outside Apple stores all over the world as folks clamber to get their hands on the all new slimmer, lighter and faster iPhone 5. A shout-out to Gary’s Guide member (and founder of a new social media startup, Vibe) Hazem Sayed, who is first in line outside the iconic 5th Avenue “Big Glass Cube” Apple Store. Go Hazem!

My friend Dave Lifson (product manager at General Assembly) along with Christina Chaey (associate editor at Fast Company) will be doing a free livestream this Wednesday at 2pm EST, on product management for non-product managers. You’ll learn what it takes to turn your ideas into functional products. And did I mention its free?  Oh, and everyone who registers gets a free copy of Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian’s new e-book, Making Something People Love. So go sign up!

The new Cornell NYC Tech campus has started accepting admission applications for its beta class of computer science students, slated to start January 2013. Deadline is October 1.

And now let’s see what’s going down in the Alley this week… Read More

By Nitasha Tiku 6/14/12 5:58pm

The Real TechStars of New York

Mr. Gaal

How to Ruin Your Wildly Successful TechStars Demo: Fudge Facts on Stage

You know what they say about karma, so don’t make us repeat it. It looks like good intentions backfired with Karma, a 4G hotspot provider initially founded in Amsterdam that presented this morning at TechStars Demo Day.

In press materials for the spring class, Karma’s one-line descriptor was: “Simple, honest 4G provider,” a sentiment repeated throughout its introductory blog post. But shortly after Demo Day ended, Travis Kalanick, the CEO of request-a-ride car app Uber, tweeted that Karma’s CEO Robert Gaal had not been honest in mentioning a partnership with Uber during the company’s pitch in front of crowd of more than 700 at Webster Hall. Read More

By Nitasha Tiku 6/13/12 4:47pm

The Real TechStars of New York

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The One TechStars NYC Startup That Won’t Be Pitching At Demo Day Tomorrow

In March, TechStars NYC announced that it had selected 14 startups from an applicant pool of more than 1,600 for the chance at 13-weeks of mentorship and $100,000. But only 13 companies will be presenting at tomorrow’s Demo Day at Webster Hall. Betabeat has learned that StockTouch, which described itself as “revolutionizing finance with mobile data visualization,” did not participate in the program.

Managing director David Tisch would only say that the decision was mutual. We have reached out to StockTouch for comment and will update the post when we hear back. StockTouch CEO Jennifer Johnson was one of five female CEOs (and six female cofounders) accepted into the spring 2012 class. Read More

By Kelly Faircloth 4:28pm

Demo Daze

Demo Day!

Meet the Graduates: It’s Demo Day at the Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator

Upon arriving at the NYIT Auditorium this morning for Entrepreneur Roundtable Accelerator’s second-ever Demo Day, Betabeat found what could only be described as a crush. The lobby was packed with sharply-dressed investors enthusiastically meeting and greeting. An (admittedly unscientific) survey of name tags revealed several managing directors and partners. Meanwhile, T-shirt sporting founders milled about, charm turned up to the max.

Attendees filtered only gradually into the theater, but eventually ERA cofounder Charlie Kemper called the meeting to order. After a few words about ERA itself, he warmed up the crowd by pointing out that all 10 presenting companies already have users and product in market, while 60 percent already have revenue. Not too shabby.

We outlined this class of ERA attendees back when they were first announced. Here’s how they turned out.  Read More

By Gary Sharma 1/30/12 6:00am

Goooood Morning Silicon Alley!

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The Best Tech Events This Week (Aarrr!!! Edition)

This is a guest post from Gary Sharma (aka “The Guy with the Red Tie”), founder & CEO of GarysGuide, Mentor at ER Accelerator and proud owner of a whole bunch of black suits, white shirts and, at last count, over 40 red ties. You can follow him at @garysguide and reach him via email at gary [at] garysguide.com.

An absolutely crazy, crazzzzzzy week in tech coming up with a ton of really good events including hacker townhalls, demo days, Startup Weekends, TEDx-es, hack days, incubator openings, happy hours, roundtables and more. Lets take a look, shall we? … Read More

By Nitasha Tiku 9/01/11 10:51am

Demo Daze

500

500 Startups Demo Day at General Assembly: Oversubscribed Startups, Cobra Kai-Fives, and White People Problems

The advent of 500 Startups first-ever Demo Day in New York drew a standing room only crowd to General Assembly yesterday for a long night of seed stage pitches and free beer that went an hour past its 9pm bedtime. Betabeat knew we were in the right place when we overheard, “We want to create a better music experience, better than Pandora,” pass for small talk over by the cheese and crackers table. The sight of TechStar’s David Tisch in a backwards baseball cap and khaki shorts (“business shabby” strikes again!) high-fiving Dave McClure was another promising sign.

All of the startups pitching were graduates of Mr. McClure’s 500 Startups, a Mountain View-based accelerator program, and many flew in from the Valley in search of local froth and perhaps a glimpse of the tall buildings. Each co-founder walked out to their own theme music, with soon-to-be baby daddy Jay-Z making a surprisingly popular choice. Read More

By Ben Popper 8/10/11 8:56am

Demo Daze

Pick Your Ponies: DreamIt Demo Day is Here

There is nothing Betabeat likes better than squeezing into a tightly packed mob of investors and watching a cattle call of young start-ups strut their stuff on stage (more metaphors, please! –ed). The tweets are flying fast and furious while handshakes and checks are being exchanged. At least that was the scene at our first rodeo, when we attended TechStars NY Demo Day at Webster Hall. Today Philly-based DreamIt Ventures will unveil their first class of New York start-ups.