Digital Lab Live’s 2014 SXSW Coverage

1.) The SXSW Accelerator:

Discovering new and innovative startups is always a thrill, but seeing so many packed into one room, all being recognized for their dedication and hard work, is almost as rewarding for us as it must be for them. A particular highlight of this year’s SXSW Accelerator was The Eye Tribe, an eye-tracking technology company based in Copenhagen that was honored as the Most Innovative Company. To learn more about them, check out our behind-the-scenes video interview with their Co-Founder and CEO, Sune Johansen.

2.) The Brands and Wearables Panel: “OMMA: Do Brands Fit in With Wearable Computing”

As ‘Wearables’ were undoubtedly the biggest buzz at this year’s festival, it was a pleasure to be able to attend a panel devoted entirely to discussing how brands can take advantage of this rising trend. We had a chance to catch up afterwards with panelist Shiv Singh, SVP Marketing & Brand Transformation at Visa, who showed his enthusiasm for how Visa has already been able to incorporate wearables into their digital strategy. Check out the interview here!

3.) Tom Standage of The Economist taught us how to “Tweet Like a Roman.”

Tom Standage, Digital Editor of The Economist, was at SXSW to present his latest book, “Writing on the Wall,” a study of the longer human history of social media. His presentation elaborated on the book’s premise that our current methods of social media communication are not too dissimilar to those used in the age of the Roman Republic. We snagged a backstage interview with Tom here!

4.) The Tech Playground:

For the technologically inclined, (or really anyone who is still in touch with his/her inner child,) SXSW Interactive can sometimes feel like a digital playground. The Digital Lab had a fantastic time demoing some of the latest toys in tech, and some of our top picks include: Virtual Foosball (courtesy of 3M Ideas,) Bass Egg, a speaker that reverberates on hard surfaces to amplify sound; and EyeFly 3D, a screen that can make any device into a 3D screen...without glasses! On the surface these products may appear to just be toys, but they are also harbingers of our culture’s technological direction. Peruse our Live Blog to see all of the various tech toys at SXSW this year.

5.) And last, but certainly not least, Grumpy Cat. We know the cat has little to do with technology, but still...

Thanks to everyone who followed us on our journey to SXSW Interactive 2014!

Cheers,

When asked about monetization of Jelly,  Stone said it was “cart before the horse to start working on the business model when you have eight people,” but he had ideas for allowing paid-for product recommendations in the app. However, sticking to the ‘doing good’ theme that ran through the conversation, he added “People can only give us money if they’re really helping people on Jelly.”

Stone said that Jelly was conceived by mistake after a discussion with his co-founder about what would happen if they built a search engine from scratch, harnessing the power of a more connected world where “six degrees of separation has become four… Someone who has a modest social network, we can give them much wider reach,” through harnessing a broader network within the app. He noted that the drawing feature was almost removed before launch but Stone insisted that they ship with it as it was so much fun to draw on a touchscreen.

Stone said that a use case he imagined for Jelly while it was being conceived was for sharing information about how to care for a wounded seal trapped on a beach. While this may not have actually occurred yet, Stone said that most of the use cases he imagined for Twitter before launch did indeed come true. These included a farmer in Africa wanting to know the current trading price for grain at a market 50 miles away before he makes a trip there – something that eventually came true, albeit in India, according to Stone.

Although he said little new about his time with Twitter (which ironically suffered a serious outage during the session) , when asked about what each of the founders of Twitter brought to the table, he replied “Ev had money, I had design skills and product skills and experience building social networks and Jack had programming skills and a unique vision for wanting to see a city in the form of its multiple status reports.” No mention of ‘forgotten founder’ Noah Glass, then.

1. Owning the spirit of your brand

Whether it was HBO turning pedicabs into Thrones again or Brivo Labs handing out webcam covers (the company launched a security API, and privacy was a hot topic due to appearances by Snowden and Assange) – brands that made strong connections between their offering, their audience, and their shtick were clear winners this year.

Being timely and sticking with your best core products gets people excited to interact with your brand.

2. Breaking a few rules to meet a need

While criminal activity can’t exactly be lauded, brands that broke a few rules to serve a higher purpose definitely earned some extra credit.

For example, in the face of the Austin Police Department warning people not to use Uber (since the service fails to comply with strict local taxi regulations), SXSWi attendees took to Twitter en masse, proclaiming #AustinNeedsUber! And the more it rained, the more they tweeted in support of their beloved Uber.

Whether you’re willing to pay the surge pricing, of course, depends on your loyalty and wallet size.

3. Having some fun with the community

There’s never a shortage of sales bros, wanna-be tech celebs and snake oil salesmen peddling their wares at SXSWi, which is why the people and brands that help to create the carnival-like atmosphere without going for the hard sell are big winners in my book.

I really appreciated the super-hero clad pedicab drivers, the party bus overflowing with overzealous karaoke singers, and the truck that stopped in the middle of traffic to feed my whole team free cookies. These are the people that make SXSW fun, not the booth babes adorning logo-ed short shorts.

My good friend Dave McClure, founder of 500 Startups, was also a huge hit with his “Super Fantastic Half Baked Extravaganza,” a hysterical startup improv party held with our friends at Up Global where, in between fireball shots, entrepreneurs competed for prizes while being given 60 seconds to pitch their best ideas for nonsensical startups. Think “NascarSquirrels” (“the fastest on-demand pit crew ever powered acorns and Red Bull…”). No real product pitch, just good, geeky fun.

4. Making a little mystery

From Secret’s SXSW feed to AT&T’s mysterious mobile pop-up (that later resulted in good news), companies that built buzz through an element of surprise certainly got people whispering.

5. Bringing diversity to the forefront

While the ratio of male to female was still low this year, the instance of International Women’s Day on Saturday got people talking across the show. Panel after panel covered how to break down barriers for women in tech.

While there’s a lot more to be done, organizations like Springboard Enterprises and WIM were rallying the troops at SXSWi, and are leading the charge.

While I’m fairly exhausted from all the mayhem, you can be sure that I’ll be back in 2015, eager to see what savvy marketers and entrepreneurs have in store. If you plan to stand out from the crowd, you’d better start your brainstorming now… and if you’re really smart, you’ll start booking your hotel rooms soon too!