Proto.in

If you think that this is a strange parallel to draw, well, I was thinking of the same a few months ago. lately, I am starting to see quite a bit of striking similarities and very little of differences.

May I request you to step back two paces and hear this out? I am sure you’ll see some sense in what I am talking about. I promise.

lately, I see more and more of the Proto.in alumni start getting involved in what goes on behind the stage and I am wondering if there is any difference at all between the way open source projects are managed and how we as a community are growing.

Let me quote you something from Eric Raymond’s Book (Source Wikipedia), the Cathedral and the Bazaar.

Raymond makes the distinction between two kinds of software development. The first is the conventional closed source development. These kind of development methods are, according to Raymond, like the building of a cathedral; central planning, tight organization and one process from start to finish. The second is the progressive open source development, which is more like a “a great babbling bazaar of differing agendas and approaches out of which a coherent and stable system could seemingly emerge only by a succession of miracles.”

What we are building is a community of startups, entrepreneurs, aspiring entrepreneurs and everyone who supports them – venture capitalists, analysts, mentors, entrepreneurial organizations and the media (That would be the product). If this community is the product, then every edition of Proto.in is a release that we make. And with every release we simply have to improve on what we are building, constantly listening to the customers, and those we work with – shoulder to shoulder, which would be you and I, the entrepreneurs ourselves. To me that sounds more of a bazaar, than a cathedral that we are building.

Who are “we”?. I’d be comfortable with the definition of “We the entrepreneurs”. Just like any open source project, while there are a few key doorkeepers, it is essentially open for everyone to contribute. Which is why we started a group for all the volunteers who want to get involved to sign up right away.

It is my and our strong belief that it is “our” community that we are building. It is through this community that we will find the strength, the knowledge, the how-to, the means and the guiding star to building India as a leader in technology and product. It will be this community which will have nurturing startups, and coming up with solutions for each of their problems as their mandate.

If you agree with me, I urge you to join hands with us. May the startups win!

Ladies and Gentlemen,

We introduce the finalists for this edition of Proto.in to you. Out of the 84 nominations that came here, these were the final 17 that were shortlisted out of which 14 of them took the stage on the day of the event. The other three (un)fortunately had some very prospective client demos, one with a major retail store (BlinkMedia) and the other with one of the media Giants (Rawdata), hence they couldn’t be available on the day of the event. Since Proto is essentially about leveraging potential and interesting startups that are popping out of this place, we gave them their place in the booklet as well.

These are the List of companies that made it to the final shortlist. The details of the companies can be found in the booklet here.

:: Internet:
atonePlace.com
The Viewspaper
Hover.in
Antya
Instablogs

:: Software ::
Deskaway – Synage Software
SpiceBird – Synovel Software
inSync – Druvaa
Instarad – MedSphere

:: Telecom/Communication ::
Enpaq Business Gateway – Elina
Yambi Platform – Mundial
Mobitop Platform- Mobisy

::Logistics & Management ::
Myntra
Nadhi Systems
Dogears Print Media Pvt. ltd.

::New Frontiers::
BlinkMedia: Intelligent Shopping Cart
Rawdata Media Monitor

If One person would lead, ninety nine would follow.
If one person would lead, ninety nine would surely follow.
If one percent would lead, the ninety nine percent would blindly follow.
We, entrepreneurs, are that one percent!

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The dates for the next edition of Proto.in are announced to be on July 18th and 19th in Delhi. We have the dates finalized, and are looking for those on the ground to help manage things.

If you are keen on contributing, leave a message in the comments. I will get back to you right away!

Alternatively, sign up to become a volunteer.

I am sitting here with a open browser and my cursor blinking on screen, wondering how to capsulate the experience that I am hearing of, and personally had with this edition of Proto… ah, I mean Proto.in. Yep, thats the first one. We realized how important that “.in” is in our identity. We are about india, our focus is on India and Indian Entrepreneurs and our mandate is to do everything to make the best and differentiated startups here in India by giving them traction in the market. Did we achieve that? I am going to wait to hear from the companies and let them talk about it, but the response at first sight has been awesome.

The sessions on the first day were great. It was interesting to hear entrepreneurs speak and dig out of their own experience. During the later part of the day when I was talking to some of the folks from the Investor community, the discussion was on how a lot of folks are depending on ‘entrepreneurial resources’ from the web, and most of them are so heavily biased as per the valley tradition and don’t work here in India. It’s crucial to hear from those who have built companies here in India and understand what their experience has been. And I believe our conviction of having this as a forum “For Entrepreneurs, By Entrepreneurs and Of Entrepreneurs” is turning out to be right on the money and is going to be that way for the gazillion editions to come. As much as you don’t see “Investors” in that category, you would be surprised as to how many of the Investors do have an entrepreneurial background and they DO stand out. In my book, they are some of the corner stones who will make this ecosystem.

There are already blogposts turning up on the web about this event with the tags of “Proto, proto.in” etc. I will collate them later on in the day and add them here – both the good and the bad. I am much more curious and eager to get to the bad ones first, as they are the ones that point us towards giving us the guidelines as to shaping this movement in a better way.

One of the impacts for the presenting companies this edition has been the amount of buzz among the investor community as to which companies they like, with a secret rating going on amongst themselves, and also the way the investors, the veteran entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals were so openly providing feedbacks and leads on matters they should look into. That was the moment when the Proto philosophy of building the support system around a startup, truly came to life!

I am still recuperating from the past three months of work and effort that went into this initiative. But give me a half a day and I’ll be back on my toes, to write more about this and what we have in mind in regards to future plans.

May the startups win.

The first day of the third edition of Proto in Chennai has come to a close. The day has been full of stirring presentations, talks and mentorship sessions for the companies that would be presenting tomorrow.

There were some very interesting talks by speakers such as Laura Parkins, Mohanjit Jolly, Sujai Karampuri, Rajesh Jain, Alok Kerjiwal, Vishal Gondal, Ravi Narayan etc and if you notice the trend, as promised, they are all entrepreneurs. The difference certainly showed!

We did try liveblogging for a short while, but I guess the sessions were far more involving and that got abandoned, though that would be pursued more actively tomorrow. Do keep an eye on that.

I can see a lot of smiles in the faces of the entrepreneurs that are presenting, and I suppose that that is a good sign of what is to be seen in a few hours!

PS: For those wanting a ride to reach the venue, the bus (with a proto logo on its side) will be awaiting for you at Madhya Kailash at 8am.

It has been quite a ride preparing for this edition of Proto with lots of new announcements. We are broadcasting live via Secondlife, Liveblogging, we have a mobile version of the site (http://m.proto.in), we have an anthem, we have fifteen darn-good companies presenting, we have participation from far and wide, we are launching the startup-alliance program, and Phew! I am out of breathe just mentioning all of it.

We just filed our last participation request clocking at 300 participants. I know we would love to have more eager folks with us, but we are turning down requests and I feel sorry about it, but that’s the max that we can accomodate for this edition.

As mentioned before, the next edition of Proto will be in July will be held in Delhi on the dates of July 18th and 19th 2008. Keep an eye on the blog for the venue details. The event after that is to be in Bangalore, followed by one in Mumbai (most probably in the BSE Convention centre) afterwhich we might go for an edition overseas in Singapore or so. As you can see, there is quite a roadmap laid out and with every edition, just like the startup alliance (Freshers for Startup) program, we have a lineup of activities that will be launched to keep the ecosystem active with a flurry of activities. Does it sound like my calendars are already booked? Absolutely.

Well everyone, its been loads of fun prepping for this edition and I really look forward to seeing you all at the venue. This year seems like a fantastic year ahead, and as I always say ‘May the startups win!’