Mark Zuckerberg to speak at Startup School 2011
startupschool.org
startupschool.org
I'm much more excited about Max Levchin and Drew Houston. From past talks I've seen them do, I feel their message will be better focused and higher yield for the startup audience. The best talks last year were from entrepreneurs who had tasted a mix of failure and success - Dalton Caldwell and Brian Chesky.
The only time he gave a talk was the first time, in 2007. That was anything but stodgy.
I'll keep my mind open. I think Jessica is a fantastic interviewer and has the potential to make this year's talk with Zuck the best one yet.
The other repeats I see (Ron Conway and, of course, the person I'm replying to) will have no problem coming up with things to talk about, given their position in the startup ecosystem. In fact, I felt that the combination of subject matter and the speaker's experience with it outweighed some rough edges in delivery for all the speakers last year.
This event is a life-changer.
I don't disagree that for people who are now in the early stages of launching what they hope to be the next big thing, there isn't a 1:1 application of advice from the creator of the current big thing. I'm just puzzled that your initial comment seemed so puzzled about what value having Zuckerberg speak could bring.
The guy started a fantastically successful startup. He's bought a bunch of other startups. That would seem to make him a good candidate for talking at a startup-themed event (even if his current company isn't really a startup anymore).
Not really, by the time Facebook became a proper "company", it was already huge and growing faster. This is where we must draw a distinction between a "website" and a "startup". When Facebook became a startup, it was already in a position (vis a vis growth) that 99.9% of startups never achieve.