Loic Le Meur - Latest Comments in Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Guest — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 09:52:51 -0000

Geraldine & Loic,

Whatever the outcome; being fast to the gun, straightforward and sincere is the sign of true excellence.

Thank you for the explanations and for your dedication to making this event a great experience for all.

Kind regards,

Andrew Paterson
laneo.org

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Doc Searls — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 20:19:50 -0000

Loïc, Geraldine, I loved the show -- and your whole team -- for what you tried to do. A big tech conference in a new space with a theme of love is hard to pull off, even if Murphy doesn't prevail. That some stuff didn't work is unfortunate, but forgivable. We live and learn. Life at its best is a constant experiment. Meanwhile the love is the main thing that matters. In fact, it is the only thing.

LeWeb is a work of love, not of greed or opportunism. At that you did a great job this year, and I'm glad I had an opportunity to enjoy it, and to contribute in my own small ways. Please don't be discouraged.( And please don't use Swisscom again.)

Hugs,

Doc

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

David Marcus — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 19:03:42 -0000

Loic & Geraldine: I was very disappointed of not making it to Paris this year. I followed some panels through Ustream and enjoyed the content I managed to watch. Large scale events are always full or surprises. The only thing I want to say is that people who never organized a single event in their whole life and complain all over the place are real douchebags. They have absolutely no idea of the amount of work and moving parts that come with organizing events, let alone, when you happen to live 6,000 miles and 9 timezones away. As far as I know, there are no other web conferences of that scale in Europe, so keep up the good work, and count me in for 2009! (try to get a penalty clause from the next IP provider for each hour of full downtime ;-)).

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Nicole Simon (Berlin, Germany) — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:11:40 -0000

Well, I got the usual fever and cold (I actually was able to read the tweets and put on some more clothes for the first day but still) and as much as I do not enjoy french cuisine or coffee or the language and yes there where a lot of issues - I actually liked the venue and enjoyed the people I've met again or for the first time.

We had that discussion about the wifi before and this year there where tables and cables for the bloggers. There still being problems is another issue, but there is only so much an organizer can do. Next years provider could impress people with providing deals beforehand for the conference and really *use* this not only to bank money but provide a professional service (one can dream, right?).

From the catering I have met only one friendly person the whole event and it really is a shame that this is what you do get for the money - I suspected already that you paid more than enough for this result yet you should go next year for somebody who actually understands what is needed for such an event of two days. It does not need to be overboard, but most people wanted food instead of 'artsy miniatures'. If that means changing the venue again, it is sad but then has to be. [I'd be happy to write up my complaints about the service to the caterer in regards to not making a professional offering for this kind of event - unflexible, unimaganitive and unresponsive]

Regarding the programme - if you are smart enough to attend leweb you should be smart enough to realize when not to watch a speaker and use the time for networking. If you where just there for the content you should have stayed at home and watched the streams and twitter.

As you said in our interview - it is about the networking. There is more than enough to complain about and also say good about the event, the question is if the sum of everything makes it worth your while to attend or not. This is a decision everybody has to make for themselves and not everybody has the same needs or interests.

Which point did I not like, although I understand why they did not do it? The amount of speakers never mingling with the audience - they gave away a huge chance to increase their personal value / brand and such while others made a huge impression. We should find something for next year which allows both sides to have a win win situation without taking too much advantage of either side.

As said before - as much as I *really* do not enjoy Paris, the food or the language, I am looking forward to next year for another paneuropean event with additional countries in the mix. ;)

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

guillaumelecoz — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:02:40 -0000

@Nic Sur ce point là je suis pas d'accord avec toi, je pense justement que c'est une bonne chose de montrer la cause du problème, Swisscom doit prendre la responsabilité de son échec.

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Nic — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:24:01 -0000

Tout le monde peut avoir des problemes de logistique et on apprend en faisant. Je trouve neanmoins pas du tout profesionel le fait de designer du doigt les boucs emissaires et de nommer precisement les tiers parties et les budgets avec lesquels Loic a travailler.

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Sandrine Plasseraud — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 09:04:16 -0000

It was my first LeWeb and yes it was cold and the wifi was an issue but I had a great time, met lots of interesting people and I'm already looking forward to the one in 2009!

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

snoopynette — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 07:13:31 -0000

Merci Loic et Geraldine pour le web. J’ai regarde toutes les videos et suis tres heureuse qu’un tel evenement existe.
J’ai ete contente aussi d’apprendre ton depart pour les Etats-Unis pour fonder seesmic, j’adore l’esprit d’entrepreneur. Ni l’Etat (et surtout pas l’Etat francais) ni personne n’a main sur la liberte individuelle.
J’ai aussi tout de suite aime et vu l’interet de seesmic.
Bravo a vous et a toute l’equipe: j’aime les personnes qui FONT les choses et qui mettent les mains dans le cambouis (gerer toute l’organisation) pas les blablateurs, Y’a qu’a-Faut qu’on-Moi je-Il suffit.
Merci de concretiser tous ces projets et de les faire exister.
C’est aussi a nous auditeurs de nous hausser au niveau de l’evenement; c’est la qualite de nos questions et reponses qui doivent faire l’evenement et pas se contenter d’adopter une attitude passive d’auditeur qui va voir defiler des presentateurs.
Quel est le degre de votre besoin pour ces nourritures spirituelles? Ceux qui n’ont pas faim, qu’ils s’en aillent.

En attendant le prochain le web.

Snoopynette.

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

andree — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 05:21:59 -0000

hej
i was just watching a few vids from leweb at ustream. seems like you got a whole bunch of interesting people at one place. nice job.
in regard to your post, what i felt is kind of lacking while watching the videos (might have been due to just watching): is a little more sexiness at the conference. do not know whether thats due to the rather cold environment or due to the geeks ;) - do not get me wrong here, but you might know what I mean...

however, thx for the job, see you

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Scobleizer — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 02:21:55 -0000

I used to plan conferences in the 1990s for programmers and we often had some of the same issues. I remember one time asking my audience if the temperature was too cold. Half the hands went up. Then I asked who thought it was too warm. The other half the hands went up. Lesson I learned? If you are pissing off people you probably are doing nothing wrong.

I didn't like the venue because it wasn't intimate for the speakers and audience. But that wasn't something you could have experienced before trying this venue. Especially one that was new, since you wouldn't have been able to sit in a session to check it out yourself. The parts you did have control over, the networking and the content, were outstanding and better than most conferences I've attended this year (and I've attended a lot).

Thanks for putting together a great conference and hopefully sometime soon we'll all figure out how to do conference wifi right. I know a lot of people claim they can do it right, but not many do. I think we need to have a way to compare vendors there so that other conference planners can be warned ahead of time.

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Loic Le Meur — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 01:36:06 -0000

thank you all for your comments

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Rick Calvert — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 00:51:12 -0000

One more thing I meant to add. Very few people realize what a struggle it is to get good internet service at any conference center. Techcrunch had challenges, Web 2.0 had challenges and I know we have them as well. It is a constant fight to provide quality internet service for our attendees. If people only knew how hard you fight for them they would appreciate it much more.

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Rick Calvert — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 00:48:13 -0000

Keep your head up Loic. It looks like most folks had a great time and I wish I could have been there. Dave M is absolutely right. It can be a thankless job sometimes but you are providing a very valuable service to our industry. Please keep it up and I will definitely be there next year!

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

shareme — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 23:53:55 -0000

Loic,

Sorry that you had trouble with organizing LeWeb. If it is any consolation its easy to organize LeWeb right now than obtaining seed capital for a start up right now..

From what I viewed thus far the main audience was happy with the content and thus you did well..

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Natacha QS — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:08:22 -0000

Evoluer, c’est prendre des risques et il est difficile de réussir à 100 %

Le deuxième jour, cela allait beaucoup mieux, et peut-être qu’il faudrait inciter tout le monde à prendre des clefs 3G l’année prochaine ;-)

Merci de continuer à organiser Le Web, pour nous, c’est un rendez vous très riche de rencontres, et nous savons que si Géraldine et toi n’étiez pas là, il n’existerait tout simplement aucun équivalent en Europe.

Natacha & Sacha

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Anand Krishnan — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 20:42:16 -0000

Food, wireless, heat, whatever - that stuff is noise.

What was cool - startup competition, arrington, winetv, gillmor gang, dan'l, marissa, the guy from U of Manchester, several Day 2 panels in the startup room, networking opps, venue

Would like to see more of - probing questions during interviews, calling BS on stock responses or non-answers

Great job on making this happen. I'm glad that this comes together every year

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Jackie Danicki — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 20:11:51 -0000

Organizing an event is always a stressful experience, but one on this scale must be an absolute nightmare. I was only there for part of the first day, Loic, and did not see you during that time, but Geraldine was running around trying very hard to make everything work. My heart goes out to you guys - I don't know how anyone can call into question whether or not you tried your best to make this a success. Of course you did!

Also remember: People love to complain! Don't let it get you down. I know you won't. :)

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

davemc500hats — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 19:45:59 -0000

loic -

as a conference organizer myself I know it's often a thankless job. sometimes even with the best of plans & intentions, "shit happens". that said, I still had a good time, and regardless I accomplished my main objective -- to meet interesting new people & startups from Europe.

if you only succeed in one area, that one seemed to go well :)

congrats, keep iterating, and better luck next year!

I'll be back again :)

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

gabdesva — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:54:02 -0000

honnetement,

La nourriture était de bonne qualité, meme si c'est vrai que la quantité n'était pas la !

Je pense que les gros appétits ont du halluciné, c'était assez Diet !!

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

arno — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:06:25 -0000

Loic,

Bravo, moi j'ai adoré surtout le show de gary et le panel d'Ouriel, très instructif. Pour les aspects logistiques, bravo pour la transparence mais bon, c'est souvent difficile. Si tu veux un bon traiteur j'en connais un.

Moi juste une chose m'a étonné. Tu as invité le patron d'Orange et tu as choisi Swisscom comme opérateur, ca m'a surpris.

Encore bravo et bonnes fêtes

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Henry Michel — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:58:25 -0000

Ta franchise et ton ouverture face aux critiques t'honore. C'est une preuve d'intelligence et de professionalisme. Bravo.

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

alan p — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:27:34 -0000

As a continuous partial attendant on Le Web TV (which was a fascinating experience in itself by the way - well done on doing that!) I missed the no wifi, food and cold so I was fine :)

But well done on Le EuroTED :) Some of the non web stuff was fascinating, other stuff wasn't, but thats what a Conference is all about

As Tom Morriss says, you have carte blanche to give the presenters a harder time - the IM backchannel certainly was :-)

(I blogged about that - it was a fascinating lesson in itself - see thoughts on that here

http://broadstuff.com/archi...

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

warzabidul — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:21:36 -0000

There's something I appreciated more than anything else at Leweb this year and it has nothing to do with wifi, 3g or room temperature. It has to do with the people that I had the opportunity to meet. In particular I'm thinking of all the seesmicers that were present. We're a community that is quite spread out and Leweb gave us an opportunity not only to spend two days to talk between ourselves but also to network with people further afield.

Personally I enjoyed Leweb for the people I could meet and the conversations I could have. Being online or being warm wouldn't have contributed that much to my appreciation.

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Rachel — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:56:54 -0000

Loic,

the infrastructure problems were and issue and you captured them all. And, as Tom says, some of the interviews were soft, especially the sponsor ones. But on the whole, I got a lot out of it and enjoyed the experience

Re: Apologies for organizational issues at LeWeb

Stephanie Booth — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:48:37 -0000

Thanks so much for the explanations! I think a post like this does a lot to apease those who feel cranky about the above issues.

As I said, there is always a lot of noise (also from me, I'll admit it) coming from the "empty half" of the glass -- let us not forget everything that went well. I personally loved the venue, heard some interesting talks (and that doesn't happen to me that often), enjoyed the atmosphere, loved the lounges, and despite being over-tired and stressed out (for non-LeWeb-related reasons) I look back on these two days with pleasure: I had a nice time.