The Marvians hit London #FOWA09

October 7th, 2009 by Jons Janssens

Last week we visited London to attend the yearly ‘Future of Web Apps’ (FOWA) conference. After last years success, we were really looking forward to getting inspired, learning new skills and meeting internet rockstars. That is what FOWA is all about…

I am a great enthusiast of conferences, because it’s a great way to meet people in real life in this predominantly online industry. If you ask me, meeting people and creating new relationships is done in the real world and online communication is only to maintain relationships. Great conferences are all about the details and that is exactly what FOWA (Carsonified) is known for. The hand writtin ‘Welcome!’ cards and durable goodie bags were a great example at last year’s conference.

However this year the credit crunch seems even to have hit FOWA. Do it yourself badges, 1 conference room (no split in dev & biz track) and a lot of sponsored speakers… My biggest disappointment was the quality of speakers. At FOWA08, I was really blown away by the number of diverse and inspiring speakers. You really had to keep up with the schedule, not to miss out on anything. Carsonified should really keep up with their reputation and get the sponsors of the main stage. It is ok, to meet them in the lobby or at a workshop, but not for a talk on innovation about their @#$%& product on main stage!

The cool thing about twitter at these (tech/nerd) conferences is that you get almost instant feedback on the atmosphere and the quality of speakers. A great way to get tips on improving next years event. No more feedback forms to fill out…

Apart form the conference we set up some appointments with UK publishers and entrepreneurs to expand our business abroad. We are setting up some interesting pilots!

All in all we had a great time at FOWA09, but the contrast to last year’s conference was too big…

Carsonified will be posting all the content (slides, videos, etc) on their website and you can check the schedule.

Best of FOWA09:

* Mike McDerment - Vital Marketing Systems | FreshBooks
* Lynne D Johnson - The future of Print | Fastcompany.com
* Dave McClure - Startup Metrics | Founders Fund
* Francisco Tolmasky - Introducing Atlas | 280 North

Worst of FOWA09:

* Addison Berry - Open Source Lessons | Lullabot
(…awesome, …shit…, …awesome,…shit… etc)

* Cat Lee - The Future of Facebook Connect | Facebook
(Was she a robot?!)

# Arnoud and Robert rocking it…