South by Southeast?
Clear Your Calendar the Week of November 5th
BY JOE PROCOPIO •
10.9.12
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Filed Under: NEWS: Startups
I've heard the words "South by Southeast" more than a few times over the last 12 months, and there have been overtones made to ExitEvent more than a few times to play a role in a big fat event of that nature.The thing is, it's kinda-sorta already happening, and ExitEvent is kicking it off November 5th. That's the night our entrepreneur-and-investor-only Startup Social gloriously returns to Durham. We're the dirty, speakeasy-style opening act.
It's a Monday, and on Tuesday the people who bring you Internet Summit, the largest digital conferernce in the Southeast, kick off a new conference called Startup Summit, a two-day feast of all things entrepreneurial, with panels, startup presentations, networking, an after-hours reception, and a speaker list that includes Pando Daily's Sarah Lacy and 500 Startups Paul Singh, among a bunch of others.
Then of course you get Internet Summit on Wednesday and Thursday, which has blown up with speakers at the national level plus its own set of panels, presentations, and two, yes two, receptions.
And speaking of a solid party, the week goes final with IS Rocks, a mini-music festival at three different venues and featuring The Connells, The Love Language, One Leg Rooster, Jay D Clark, National Hotel Sound System, Spaceship Days, Wordsmith, Tokyo Rosenthal, Spongecake & The Fluff Ramblers, and Shawn Deena.
That's a full week.
The two new additions to the Internet Summt schedule stand on their own, although all are a part of TechMedia (for the record, ExitEvent is not, but we are working with them). And while I was coordinating the ExitEvent Startup Social schedule with TechMedia, I naturally asked Scott Hedrick, the guy making all this happen, what the spark was for the expansion.
The short answer? Keep adding value.
Startup Summit has been in the works for about six months, and the goal is deliver "a super power-packed two days worth, and bring a lot of value at a low price." Hedrick and TechMedia are interested in building the startup community in the Southeast as well. After all, a lot of today's startups become tomorrow's Internet Summit presenters and panelists.
So rather than creating a new event at a different time of year (after all, they've got Digital East, Southeast Venture Conference, and the Deck Parties to deliver as well), Hedrick and TechMedia decided that as long as the resources were spun up for Internet Summit, why not expand its breadth and reach to provide more value for startups (and, well, who doesn't like music?).
It also allows a more defined line to be drawn at Internet Summit, allowing that to reach more people as well -- Startup Summit for the entrepreneurial and Internet Summit for the digital.
The result is a weeklong festival of startups and tech. Seems like a natural fit for ExitEvent.
And it's not just in terms of our Social. I'll be speaking on a panel at Internet Summit, and we're also
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