WEB SUMMIT: THE FORGOTTEN SENSE OF SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
It has been more than a week since I came back from the Web Summit, but despite the excitement deriving from a well-organized event that brought together 60.000 attendees from all over the world, I can’t shake off the feeling of disappointment.
Not only was the quality of presentations (and their Q&As) not always the highest, but some of the most long-awaited talks and panels (for me personally, the ones pertaining to the subjects of blockchain tech and ICOs) were simply demagogic, passing common knowledge for insider’s insights, adding some geeky jokes once in a while to steal a bit of healthy laughter. So overall, the objective of providing quality education to attendees fell a little short.
As disheartening as this may already sound, that wasn’t all. The situation often also turned sour for a group that composes a large portion of the Summit’s attendees: the ambitious dreamers and creators, also known as entrepreneurs. Startups spend close to $1,000 to be there and expose the products, milestones and traction they have developed and earnt with blood, sweat and tears. Their mission, beyond finding new business leads, is to get critical feedback (positive or negative), validation, tips, or interest from the powerful side-kicks of the industry: VCs. Most VCs like to depict themselves as the supporters — or enablers — of real-life heroes (read, innovative founders). They like to come off as humble and available, and generally try to distant themselves from the stereotype of being arrogant, judgmental, know-it-all individuals. So, what better chance to actually prove it than an interactive 4-day event with hundreds of talented startups? As it turns out, these efforts don’t quite come through.
Warren Buffet suggests that, “If you’re in the luckiest 1% of humanity, you owe it to the rest of humanity to think about the other 99%.” Venture Capital players often come from brilliant backgrounds and past achievements. If that isn’t enough to spark some humbleness, in 90% of the cases VCs are managing somebody else’s money, so there should be no arrogance in their approach, but rather cautiousness, eyes wide open, and dedication to make the very best out of their most important resource, time. Time is the only justifiable reason — together with one’s own endurance to digest new information — why investors should choose to limit the number of feedback sessions given to the startups that trustfully paid a “pricy” ticket to be in a Summit. Within their fee, these startups are signing up to get visibility and learn something new about the future direction of their venture from who has the “power”, competence and experience to enable their growth. Simply put: even considering all difficulties involved with an intensely-packed event, too many startups (especially early stage companies within the ALPHA category) were left empty handed without receiving the vital takeaways that such a summit should and must commit to deliver.
You could now argue: “They probably didn’t hustle enough, that’s life”. My cynicism would normally lead me to share this view, but having analyzed the overall event dynamics, the low response rates on the Web Summit messaging app, and having spoken to as many startups as I could to give and collect feedback, my conclusion is that there are far less commercial and notorious tech events which offer a better ROI for attendees’ time and cash. Don’t get me wrong, Lisbon is a fantastic city, the Web Summit’s hectic schedule is pleasantly vibrant, pub crawling in Bairro Alto is refreshing, and the constant tech gatherings surrounding the main event (out of which the very best are invite-only) makes you feel like there is not a second to waste. This is all great if you are there on an all-expenses-paid business trip to scout for trends or show presence. For a new business striving to grow — aiming perhaps at being the bigshot in the future who has time and money to carelessly blow in big Summits — the situation is quite the opposite.
Hats off to founders, techies and investors who can say they have done their very best to truly contribute to the innovation industry whilst in Lisbon two weeks ago. Let’s hope more and more players navigating tech waters will take up the responsibility of pushing for an inclusive and nurturing environment that can efficiently foster emerging ideas.
