Hi Web 2.0-ers. I hope you’ve had a nice summer. Today marks the start of September, which to me signifies the start of the fall conference season, and what a season it’ll be.

The teams at O’Reilly Media and TechWeb have been diligently programming and producing these past two months – preparing for the second Web 2.0 Expo New York this November – and launching Gov 2 Summit & Showcase in a few short weeks, held in Washington D.C.

Gov 2.0 Summit: The Platform for Change. Over the past fifteen years, the rise of the World Wide Web has resulted in remarkable new possibilities and business models reshaping our culture and our economy. Now the time has come to reshape government. Gov 2 is chaired by Tim O’Reilly and Richard O’Neil (The Highlands Group), alongside an intelligent program committee – read on to see the speaker lineup or schedule.

Web 2.0 Expo New York. The Power of Less. Constraints drive creativity, whether in business models, design paradigms, or platforms. The power of the small screen, the thin client, the streamlined interface. The power of small teams, or even going solo. The paradox of power: sometimes the best way to gain power is to give it away, which is why during these challenging times, we are learning that nothing builds brands like a nurtured community. The power of data: of data-centric business models, and the power of data to inform our decisions and to focus us on what matters. The power of less is the power of creative destruction. It’s the power to change the world. See how to participate here!

And in between the two we’ll manage to host our fifth Web 2 Summit this Oct 20-22, an event I’m particularly proud to announce as this year I have the pleasure of working with program chair John Battelle to help it come to life. He just published the speaker line up and festivities. Exciting stuff!

Headliners I’m particularly interested in hearing is U.S. Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra - the man in charge of our $150 billion R&D budget; Steve Schneider – Program Director at WestEd who is establishing the first-ever standard for technology literacy across the U.S. (by 2012); Cynthia Warner – president of a biofuel company that just might have the answer to… well, energy – and Austan Goolsbee – Chief Economist for President Obama. He bantered well with Jon Stewart on the Daily Show, keen to see hear his opinions live on stage in front of a roomful of peers. Oh, and last but not least, eager to feed the little hungry geek that lives inside me with the info from Brady Forrest’s ‘Human Sensors Discussion’ – oh, that’ll be good.

In general, there are lots of things that impress me about a conference –

• its intelligence
• its ability to connect peoples, ideas, communities
• its momentary existence (because no two conferences are ever alike)
• its seamless execution (at least when event director Meghan Reilly is at the helm)
• its energy

And I’m really looking forward to experiencing all of that at Summit this fall. Earlier in the year Tim [O’Reilly] and John established the theme #WebSquared – an extension of 2008’s Web Meets World philosophy – and the schedule we’ll be announcing this week is comprehensive and relevant to the issues we are facing as a society today.

From Tim & John -

In our first program, we asked why some companies survived the dotcom bust, while others had failed so miserably. We also studied a burgeoning group of startups and asked why they were growing so quickly. The answers helped us understand the rules of business on this new platform.

Chief among our insights was that “the network as platform” means far more than just offering old applications via the network (“software as a service”); it means building applications that literally get better the more people use them, harnessing network effects not only to acquire users, but also to learn from them and build on their contributions.

Today, we realize that these insights were not only directionally right, but are being applied in areas we only imagined in 2004. The smartphone revolution has moved the Web from our desks to our pockets. Collective intelligence applications are no longer being driven solely by humans typing on keyboards but, increasingly, by sensors. Our phones and cameras are being turned into eyes and ears for applications; motion and location sensors tell where we are, what we’re looking at, and how fast we’re moving. Data is being collected, presented, and acted upon in real time. The scale of participation has increased by orders of magnitude.

Today, the exponential growth of Web has made its technologies service as the backbone of our everyday lives. If you want to discover more on the topic – download the whitepaper, and share your opinion on the Web Squared.

So there you go. That’s the reason we’ve all been so quiet here… there is a lot going on and we want you to explore and enjoy these live events. But if you can’t be with us in person, as always, you can catch the keynotes and recorded content on the various Blip.tv channels. There is currently only archived content, 2009 videos will get posted to these channels within a week of the event.

• Gov 2 Events
• Web 2 Summit
• Web 2 Expo

Stay tuned for more conference information and community announcements. Once again, let the games begin!

~ ~ ~

Note: Janetti Chon is now Web 2 Summit’s Producer at Battellemedia, a partner of O’Reilly Media & TechWeb.

If you had five minutes on stage what would you say? What if you only got 20 slides and they rotated automatically after 15 seconds? Around the world geeks have been putting together Ignite nights to show their answers.

Join us for another Ignite NYC IV, hosted by Web 2.0 Expo conference co-chair, Brady Forrest of O’Reilly Radar.

For speaker details and updates join Ignite on Facebook or see the O’Reilly Ignite community site. This event is free; cash bar. RSVP here.

Evening Schedule: Doors open at 6:45pm for cocktail hour. 8pm Film Contest. 8:30pm Ignite presentations, ending with bar service.

Update: Deadline extended to midnight PST on Friday, 5/29

Happy Friday! Happy long weekend! HappyMemorial Day!

A quick reminder that if you’re interested in speaking at Web 2.0 Expo New York, which takes place November 16 – 19th at the Javits Center, our call for papers closes on Tuesday, May 26th!

If you’re passionate about the power of the web, share your knowledge and insights with your peers at Web 2.0 Expo New York. What kind of submissions are we looking for, you ask? Visit the Web 2.0 Expo New York proposals page for more details and a link to the submission form. Need a little guidance on creating an eye-catching proposal? Check out the great tips from Program Co-Chair Jennifer Pahlka on how to submit a successful proposal.

We had a fantastic inaugural event last year in New York and if you want to be involved for 2009, here’s your chance.

Our advisory board is already reading through submissions so yes, go enjoy some sun and time off but don’t miss your chance to submit.

Cheers,

~ Janetti

Updated with new speaker information.

Ignite NYC is a pocket-sized conference-like event for geeks, part of the family of Ignites that are held in different cities. Hundreds of geeks come out to drink, play, and listen to talks of any subject matter—just as long as they’re deemed striking. Ignites usually have two parts: a contest to start off the night, where people make things, and the talks, where presenters get 20 slides and five minutes to make their point!

Ignite NYC III

6:30pm – midnight

Rocketboom will kickoff the night with “Know Your Meme: The Game Show! Pwn, Win, or Fail!” Hosted by the cast of Know Your Meme: Jamiedubs, Elspethjane, and Yatta. The game show that tests your knowledge of all things Internet in just twenty questions and a lightning round.

Contestants: Rex Sorgatz, Gavin Purcell (Attack of the Show / Jimmy Fallon Show), Peter Rojas (Engadget / RCRD LBL), and Kelly Reeves (URLesque) vs. Michelle DeForrest, Bre Pettis, Caroline McCarthy, and Tim Shey.

6:30pm Happy Hour: $2 Buds and $5 mixed drink
7:30pm Know Your Meme: The Game Show! Pwn, Win, or Fail! with Rocketboom
8:30pm – Ignite Talks

Ignite Talk Speakers Confirmed!
Jen Bekman- “Overcrowded”
Alex Bisceglie- “DataVisualization: Muppet Fur Coats”
Dennis Crowley- “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Family Feud in Under 5 Minutes”
Cory Forsyth- “How to Piss Off the FCC”
Michael Galpert- “Images On the Internets Seem Realer Than They Are”
Andrew Hoppin – “NASA 2.0″
Jonathan Kahan- “Cutting Edge Technology: The Samurai Sword”
Jaki Levy- “How to Screw up Your Reputation Or the Reputation of Your Company Online”
Jooyoung Oh- “Unemployment 101″
David Overholt- “Fail Often”
Ed Purver- “A Show of Hands”
Scott Rafer- “An Overnight Success in Just 15 Years”
Britta Riley- “R&D-I-Y”
Karen Sandler- “Unchain My Heart”
Naveen Selvadurai- “In Case of FIre, Break Glass”
Rob Seward- “The Collective Unconscious of 1980s Florida”
Noah B. Zark- “Near Future Augmented Reality Systems”

~ ~ ~

Facebook Group Page ::  Facebook Event Page :: Ignite NYC Webpage

Follow @ignitenyc ::  Subscribe to RSS

This event is going to rock! Bummed to miss it so have double extra fun that evening everyone!!

Last week Jeff Jarvis of BuzzMachine (writer, professor, blogger and media guru) launched his new book: What Would Google Do?

Publisher Harper Collins describes it as such:

In a book that’s one part prophecy, one part thought experiment, one part manifesto, and one part survival manual, internet impresario and blogging pioneer Jeff Jarvis reverse-engineers Google—the fastest-growing company in history—to discover forty clear and straightforward rules to manage and live by. At the same time, he illuminates the new worldview of the internet generation: how it challenges and destroys, but also opens up vast new opportunities. His findings are counterintuitive, imaginative, practical, and above all visionary, giving readers a glimpse of how everyone and everything—from corporations to governments, nations to individuals—must evolve in the Google era.

Along the way, he looks under the hood of a car designed by its drivers, ponders a worldwide university where the students design their curriculum, envisions an airline fueled by a social network, imagines the open-source restaurant, and examines a series of industries and institutions that will soon benefit from this book’s central question.

The result is an astonishing, mind-opening book that, in the end, is not about Google. It’s about you.

Jeff’s been working on this book for a while and he presented some of his thinking, and relevant case studies at last fall’s Web 2.0 Expo New York. Co-presented with BusinessWeek, take a look at the pearls of wisdom Jeff shared with our attendees in his session: What Would Google Do? How Media Must Revolutionize Their Thinking.

And if you’re in NY tomorrow for 2009′s inaugural NY Tech Meetup then you’ll get a special treat as Jeff will present a book talk. The rest of NYTM will focus on the theme: “Mobile Meets Social” and there is a great line up of East Coast companies that will demo for your favor:

Peek (the award winning email device for everyone)
Xtify (the API for location-based apps)
OMICU (OMG you’ll love this)
Mobile Commons (the SMS back-end for some of the world’s most important campaigns)
Coovents (where’s the cheap beer?)
Flixwagon (are you live-casting this?)
&
viaPlace (the platform for marking things around you)

Web 2.0 Expo conference chairs Jen Pahlka and Brady Forrest will also be attending the meetup, so stop by, say hello and let them know your thoughts.

Have fun NY. Miss you & wish I could be there!

~ Janetti

The team rolls on preparing for the launch of the very first Web 2.0 Expo New York… and we’re looking forward to some celebratory drinks, alongside great conversation and company at Wine 2.0′s Tasting event – held at the now-historic NYC landmark, Webster Hall.

Opening day keynote and star of WineLibrary.tv Gary Vaynerchuk will have a live-taping of his show at this event. Don’t miss it!

Join Wine 2.0, Wine Library TV, and Web 2.0 Expo for an exciting evening of wine and technology. Wine 2.0 New York will feature over 1,000 friends from the wine, technology and venture capital community tasting over 100 wineries best wines. On display in the Wine 2.0 technology showcase will be the hottest Wine 2.0 startups who are changing the way wine is made, marketed or sold.

EVENT SPECIFICS

Date: Thursday September 18th
Doors Open: 7pm 11pm, after party from 11pm 4am
Where: Webster Hall, 125 E 11th Street, New York, NY 10003

Directions: Google Map API

Phone: Wine 2.0, (415) 596-1191for more information or Cornelius@winetwo.com

General Admission: $45 pre-register / $75 day of event
Reserve Room: $125 pre-register / $225 day of event

Purchase tickets here.

Wine 2.0 is presented by Webster Hall Digital, Wine Tasting Network and Hosted by Gary Vaynerchuk

Tim O’Reilly wrote on his blog, as it relates to the theme for Web 2.0 Summit 2008 -

In an era of looming scarcities, economic disruption, and the possibility of catastrophic ecological change, it’s time for us all to wake up, to take our new “superpowers” seriously, and to use them to solve problems that really matter.

Inspired by this theme, Web 2.0 Expo New York is happy to announce the participants of our Non-Profit Pavilion. We selected 8 non-profit organizations who use Web 2.0 tools and technologies to achieve their mission. They will have booths on the Expo floor, and the pavilion is called out on the map in our Program Guides.

Stop by their booths, visit their website – lend your support!

ChangingThePresent lets you make the world a better place, one gift at a time. Choose from among 1,500 opportunities, such as preserving an acre of the rainforest, funding an hour of cancer research, or providing books for children. It’s easy to give these gifts to friends and also use them for your own charitable giving.

Amoration is an interactive 3D media organization producing groundbreaking works in health, education, human rights and sustainable cleantech innovations. From virtual world design and development to videos, events and festival art installations, Amoration can guide you through the nuances of compassionate social media for live campaign success.

Creative Commons is a not-for-profit organization, founded in 2001, that promotes the creative re-use of intellectual and artistic works, whether owned or in the public domain. Through its free copyright licenses, Creative Commons offers authors, artists, scientists, and educators the choice of a flexible range of protections and freedoms that build upon the “all rights reserved” concept of traditional copyright to enable a voluntary “some rights reserved” approach. Creative Commons was built with and is sustained by the generous support of organizations including the Center for the Public Domain, Omidyar Network, The Rockefeller Foundation, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, as well as members of the public.

DonorsChoose.org is a nonprofit organization that provides an easy way for everyday people to make a difference in public schools. Teachers across the U.S. share their ideas for classroom projects on our website. Then, citizen philanthropists like you choose projects to fund, and then hear back from the classrooms.

Knowmore.org describes itself as a “Corporation-Watch Search Engine,” designed to aid activists and responsible consumers in shopping with a conscience.

Social Actions connects people with opportunities to take action in an effort to increase the scope and impact of the citizen sector. We have built a search interface and open API that syndicates actions from 20+ social action platforms, including Kiva, DonorsChoose, Idealist and Change.org.

The US India Business Alliance (USIBA) is a dynamic 501(c)(6) not-for-profit organization, organized with the mission of improving trade and investment between the United States and India. With offices in Washington, DC and New Delhi, we function as a bilateral trade organization. USIBA has been at the forefront of issues that impact US and Indian companies in growing trade between the two countries.

The Computer Information Systems program at the University of Denver University College can have an immediate impact on your career and your life. Gain the vision to see whats coming in your field, the focus to ensure technology meets your business needs, and the insight to maximize technology investment value.

(repost from Nate Westheimer, organizer of Web2Open New York)

In two weeks, technologists and media experts will converge on the Javits Center in New York City for four days of workshops, speeches, panels, and product demos from the leading edge of the Web 2.0 Industry.

During the historic Web 2.0 Expo, I, along with an amazing team of fellow volunteers, will be hosting the Web2Open Conference, right from the very floor of the Expo.

Web2Open is the free un-conference side of the Web 2.0 Expo and takes place on September 17th and 18th, during the Expo. Inspired by the BarCamp movement, Web2Open is where the attendees lead create the conference content. Its volunteer organized, and offers a fresh, community-oriented take on tech conferences.

One of the best parts of the Web2Open is that its free! To register, sign up for Expo pass using the code webny08opn (attendees with conference pass may also participate).

Wondering how you can get involved?

The most important thing you can do is show up, participate in attendee-led sessions, and even propose a session yourself (most sessions are pitched and decided on on-site!).

Also, as youre gearing up to come to the Open, sign up for the Web 2.0 Expo CrowdVine community and interact with other attendees. There, people are already pitching Web2Open session ideas, and some will be selected as pre-programming in the weeks that follow.

Lastly, we still could use some volunteers! Volunteers will help staff the Web2Open welcome desk, introducing folks to the Open format, helping folks understsand how they can get involved.

Anyway, Im quite excited about having the Web 2.0 Expo in town this month (personally, I cant wait for my panel with Kevin Ryan, David S. Rose, and Karin Klein), and especially the Web2Open, where we the New York Tech community make the conference!

PS: Get excited for the Speeddating Q&A event on the 18th and 3pm! There, youll be able to meet and ask anything to Tim OReilly, Deborah Schultz, Brady Forrest, Jen Pahlka, James Au, Dennis Crowley, Gary Vaynerchuk, and Cal Henderson!

As a leading (and very large) conference and expo we understand the importance of doing our part to help make this world a better place. We are continuing our efforts to green-ify our event and curating thought-provoking sessions about the state of our environment.

We’re also big fans of organizations committed to social change and action.

At Web 2.0 Expo San Francisco this past April we established a Non-Profit Pavilion and teamed up with groups that spread the gift of philanthropy, knowledge, health, political transparency, entrepreneurship, social change, empowerment… and more.

We plan to bring the goodwill to the East Coast so at Web 2.0 Expo New York this September we’re happy to offer a select group of non-profits a booth in our Pavilion.

Just answer this question as a comment for your chance to get a booth on our Expo floor, on-site branding, and inclusion in our program guide addendum. We’ll even throw in Internet drops

What are some cool ways your non-profit has used Web 2.0 in the fulfillment of your mission? Share some case study stories.

We want to hear your stories!

And if you’ve got any questions – please post them here and I’ll get back to you.

~ ~ ~

An internal Web 2.0 Expo committee will select the booth recipients and announcements will be made the first week of August.

TechWeb and OReilly Media are thrilled to be hosting its first Web 2.0 Expo New York this September at the Jacob Javits Center. First and foremost, a heartfelt thank you to our planning committee who spent endless hours reading the almost 750 session and workshop proposals. And for the months of intense discussion and debate on how to shape our conference program.

Were so impressed with the line-up of speakers weve got on our schedule that today were kicking off the first of a series of Web 2.0 Expo New York speaker interviews.

Starting with Charlie ODonnell, founder of Path101 and New York technology group nextNY, we share with you some speaker thoughts about our inaugural event and tidbits of self.

Q. How do you feel about Web2Expo coming to NYC? What gets you excited about it?

What’s exciting is the buzz that Web2Expo will generate for the NYC tech & startup community. Because there are so many prominent industries in NYC (like finance, advertising, the arts, fashion, etc.) it’s sometimes difficult to get the tech sector top billing and O’Reilly/TechWeb is clearly top billing as far as I’m concerned.What I hope is that we do a good job marketing the event outside of the usual suspects that we reach out to local schools and young people so that they can be made aware of all the interesting things going on in their backyard.

Q. What is your talk about? Why should attendees go see it?

Albert Wenger from Union Square Ventures and I are going to give a startup workshop. Both of us have actually been on both sides of the table on the financing side and at startups. I think anyone who is in the early stages of a company or is even thinking about starting something should come. This isn’t one of those “meet investors” events or a pitch session. It’s an opportunity to have an interactive discussion of the best practices of getting your idea off the ground and on its own two feet from two people very passionate about strengthening the NYC startup community.

Q. Can you share some history on why and how nextNY got started?

nextNY was completely organic and highly unplanned.I just thought it would be neat to get to know some of the up and coming folks attending the NY Tech Meetups better.If 15 people met out at a bar, I would have considered that a success.Instead, 75 people showed up to our first gathering in February of ’06. Now we’ve got close to 1800 participants.

New York is just such a big, noisy place we needed a group where you knew there was a critical mass of other people going through the same tech, digital media, and startup issues you were.

I think the best thing about it is the combination of online and offline.We have great discussions on our listserv, but we also make it a point to get together in both larger and smaller events from a talk about hiring at a startup to impromptu Shake Shack flashmobs. We’ve had some industry specific spinoff groups, like Fashion 2.0.There are nextNY folks playing on soccer and dodgeball teams, and we also inspired a video interview site about NYC startups that bears our name. Plus, it really is community driven. No one officially runs it, and any member can create their own event.

Q. What other projects are you working on these days?

Well, far from an “other project”, I’m spending 110% of my time on Path 101, which is a company I co-founded aimed at helping people figure out their career. There are plenty of places out there to find a job, but there’s a serious lack of information on what job you should even be doing in the first place. In real estate, you need to figure out what neighborhood you want to live in before you go searching for houses and we’re aiming to be that kind of a guiding resource for your career.

Q. What else do you do to occupy time in the city?

Admittedly, I’m the one who got the nextNY crew into dodgeball. I play a lot of team sports softball, dodgeball, football, kickball, and I also kayak on the Hudson River at the Downtown Boathouse. I teach an entrepreneurship class at Fordham, which is great because it puts me right in front of college students twice a week.

Q. What’s an NYC Web 2.0 factoid that you can share with us?

Jason Calacanis and I both grew up in Brooklyn, both went to Fordham, and both have black belts from the same Tae Kwan Do organization although he’s a 6th degree and I’m just a 1st.

~ ~ ~

Thanks for the interview Charlie.

Catch Charlie ODonnell and Albert Wengers morning workshop on Tuesday, September 16 – Casing the Startup Joint: Real Life Examples of Startup Opportunities, Issues, and Strategic Decision Making