I am headed out to Google I/O and am really looking forward to it.  I greatly enjoy developer-oriented conferences and am looking forward to seeing a bunch of interesting demos in the Sandbox. 

This afternoon, I will be on a panel.  While panels often suck and I have been on my share of those, I believe this one will at a minimum be entertaining – since it has a bunch of people who all speak their minds, including Dave McClure, Chris Dixon, Brad Feld and Paul Graham – and to top it off, the panel will be moderated by Dick Costolo (who has already received one request to open with a standup routine).

The topic of the panel is “Technology, innovation, computer science, & more: A VC panel."  Questions likely to be covered include:

• Would you bet on a start-up with only non-technical founders? Why and how does tech-led innovation drive startups?

• We’ve seen the rise of open source and a general embrace of openness in the market, but closed and proprietary platforms like Apple’s perform extremely well. How do you think about open vs. proprietary on the investment side?

• What factors contribute to sustainable competitive advantage? Will that term continue to be meaningful or does the pace of innovation mean competitive advantage windows will be smaller and smaller?

• Which platforms are of interest? How do you think about the distribution and monetization options available via Facebook, Twitter, iPhone and Google?

These are probably some of the most important questions not only for investors but for anyone starting a company on the web today.  Should be a lot of fun and I am hoping I will get at least one sentence in …

I am headed out to Google I/O and am really looking forward to it.  I greatly enjoy developer-oriented conferences and am looking forward to seeing a bunch of interesting demos in the Sandbox. 

This afternoon, I will be on a panel.  While panels often suck and I have been on my share of those, I believe this one will at a minimum be entertaining – since it has a bunch of people who all speak their minds, including Dave McClure, Chris Dixon, Brad Feld and Paul Graham – and to top it off, the panel will be moderated by Dick Costolo (who has already received one request to open with a standup routine).

The topic of the panel is “Technology, innovation, computer science, & more: A VC panel."  Questions likely to be covered include:

• Would you bet on a start-up with only non-technical founders? Why and how does tech-led innovation drive startups?

• We’ve seen the rise of open source and a general embrace of openness in the market, but closed and proprietary platforms like Apple’s perform extremely well. How do you think about open vs. proprietary on the investment side?

• What factors contribute to sustainable competitive advantage? Will that term continue to be meaningful or does the pace of innovation mean competitive advantage windows will be smaller and smaller?

• Which platforms are of interest? How do you think about the distribution and monetization options available via Facebook, Twitter, iPhone and Google?

These are probably some of the most important questions not only for investors but for anyone starting a company on the web today.  Should be a lot of fun and I am hoping I will get at least one sentence in …