Interesting type of meet-up. 3 minute pitches sound good in theory, but if the pitch is to get someone to "buy in" to the idea that a person is pitching, and the ideas are largely an emotionally investment, 3 minutes probably isn't enough time to get a developer to care enough to ask more questions about the ideas being pitched. Maybe push the pitches to 5 minutes and cut the presentations down to 8 max for a better result. Just a thought.

Rideorama, Best Presentation
Vertway, Best Idea

I think Nate's feedback in right on target. Difficult to assess meaning in that time frame. Great job and thanks.

I agree. I would like to try five minutes next time. Do we make it a 3 minute pitch and 2 minutes of questions, or a 5 minute pitch?

I also concur with Nate's comments. 3 minutes is really too short. With 2 more minutes, I think the pitches could have conveyed a lot more passion and detail and garner more interest from potential developers. Do 8 pitches for 5 minutes each.

As a presenter, I would have preferred to be able to click through the slides myself and make it more engaging. I understand you want to put them all together to facilitate going through them quickly and that's fine, just pls share a clicker with us!

Good point. I will definitely get a clicker for the next meetup.

As much as I see value in shared questions, if your goal is to offer more pitches, I think the time would be better left to the presenter. I felt like I had 1 minute to explain the problem, 1 to convey my solution, and 1 to convey my needs. If I could have had 2-3 minutes on the solution, I think I would have garnered more interest.

As Alon and I discussed afterwards, it depends on where the entrepreneur is at. We've had some folks who are pretty far along with their ventures, so their technical needs are very specific. But then there are people like me who are really asking for help to transform an idea into reality, and don't know exactly what the technical needs are. If you're doing that, you need more time to explain the idea. Maybe ask entrepreneurs to supply a 1-page overview that developers can read ahead of time.

All in all I had a good time. It is interesting to see all the different niches that appeal to people. I plan on attending again.

I would rather see fewer pitches and more time, which leads to better presentations. How about 4 min presentations and 2 minutes questions? The extra 2 minutes would also give presenters a chance to clarify things, or mention something they forgot during the presentation.

If we do 8 presenters and 5 minute pitches, we can still keep the presentations to under an hour. If we go with 5 minutes it's going to start getting long.

I think a pre-event writeup by presenters could be helpful. Mike mentioned in the discussion forum that some answers to questions about technology, funding, and stage of development would also be helpful.

The event would be a lot more fun if we could energize the breakout session. We need food! Someone had the great idea of having presenters bring snacks. What better way to get developers to come talk to you then by having something tasty to offer! :) (Thank you Daniel, Tim, and Mikael. I'm not sure which one of you came up with this idea.)