Atlanta Startup Weekend 2

In case you were wondering.  Going a little bit healthier this year.  With the exception of Sunday morning.

All veggie friendly.

Thanks to Jen Bonnett, John Cottingham, and Blake Perdue for helping to pull this together.

Read this.  My thoughts.

Add yours in the comments or send them directly to me and I will create a list.

Getting lots of questions on what prep needs to be done in order to present a concept. Here’s the deal.

After you register there will be a volunteer taking concepts. You need a concept name and a one sentence description of the concept.

After we go through some housekeeping items and sponsors have their say it will be time to present concepts.

Round one. You have up to 60 seconds to give your elevator pitch. If there is time folks can pitch a second concept as well. Everybody votes on the concepts they would like to work on. You can vote for up to three concepts.

Round two. Top 15 or so concepts get to go again. Looking where the vote count falloff occurs will determine exactly how many. You give your elevator pitch, add more detail, or take Q&A. 3 minutes max. We vote again.

This should decide it. If not rinse and repeat.

PowerPoint is not allowed. Hard stops will be enforced.

This is fluid. Any of this can change as the group agrees.

Except the use of PowerPoint.

Schedule
Registration officially starts Friday night at 6pm. If you want to come earlier to hang out and help out that is cool too. Presentations start at 7:00pm sharp. It ends when we have the concepts and teams selected.

Saturday is 9am - 9pm

Sunday is 9am- 9pm

You may come and go as you wish. We won’t chain you down unless you like that.

Food & Drink
Dinner is being provided on Friday night.
Light breakfast, lunch and dinner are being provided Saturday and Sunday.
Beverages are being provided throughout the weekend.
More details soon. Trying to make all meals veggie friendly.

Location
ATDC
75 Fifth Street
Hodges Room Suite 335
Atlanta, GA 30308

Here’s a map and directions.

Marta stop at 10th is a nice short safe walk.

Parking
You can park in the Centergy parking lot as outlined in the directions but it might get a little expensive. There is free parking on the street around the building after 6:00pm on Friday. They generally don’t ticket on the weekends but you take that risk.

Dress Code
You have to be dressed.

You might want to wear layers, the rooms tends to heat up with lots of people in them and cool down with fewer.

Stuff We Need
Wireless routers seem to help quite a bit. The wireless APs can get overwhelmed with a group this large.

Smart people with good attitudes that are open to new experiences.

I got a call from Glen Gordon last week.  He wanted to learn a bit more about Startup Weekend and if Microsoft could get involved.  Seems like they had a huge announcement of great interest to the startup community.  He thought that Startup Weekend would be a great way to share news of the program and get engaged with software entrepreneurs.  After a bit of a discussion Glen said he and Microsoft would love to get involved.  So they did.

And yesterday Microsoft announced BizSpark.  BizSpark is a big move by Microsoft and it represents a huge value for startups who are considering the Microsoft platform.  From my understanding startups can qualify to receive free Microsoft development tools, platforms and server products for up to three years.  Startups have to be engaged in software development, have under $1M in revenue, be less than 3 years old, and be privately held. You must also be sponsored by one of the Network Partners that have the power to grant the free software and services to any startup that qualifies.

Don Dodge of Microsoft has a more detailed post on the program.

So on Friday night Glen and his colleague Chad Brooks are attending and will be explaining the program in detail.  They also intend to participate throughout the weekend.  One of the things I want to learn is what ATDC needs to do to become a Network Partner.  If you are considering the Microsoft platform spend some time with Glen and Chad over the weekend to learn more.

I am impressed with the support that Glen and Microsoft are providing the startup community.

The Atlanta CEO Council is the Southeast’s most prestigious invitation-only organization where decision makers create relationships and develop business partnerships. They facilitate professional networking, promote entrepreneurship and encourage community activism. It’s where all the big boys and girls hang out.

So why are they sponsoring Startup Weekend for the second year in a row? Well part of the mission of the council is to promote entrepreneurship within Atlanta by assisting professionals starting their careers or entrepreneurs creating new ventures. So they are stepping up to the plate at Startup Weekend to achieve that end.

The council is the best networking in Atlanta but it is a pretty exclusive. You have to meet their membership requirements to attend their events. $1 million in funding or $5 million in revenue gets you in the door. When you get your startup there the Atlanta CEO Council is a must join group.

There are exactly 96 hours to the start of Atlanta Startup Weekend 2. Registration kicks off at 6:00pm on Friday. If you want to come a bit before then to lend a hand to getting things organized or just need a place to hang out you are welcome to do either.

See you in four days.

Presidential politics will soon be behind us but there is still some interesting voting to do.

There is a lively conversation currently taking place on the IdeaShare.  IdeaShare is an Atlanta Startup Weekend 2 UserVoice account where you can submit, discuss, and vote on ideas.  There are currently 26 proposed projects with 44 comments that have generated 109 votes.