When SXSW sets up its festival, you have to assume they want the best and most engaging keynotes possible. If the public reaction to Umair Haque’s interview of Twitter co-founder Ev Williams is any indication, they failed. Badly.
I wish I could take credit for the title here, but it is all Mike Monteiro, appropriately, by way of Twitter. Below, find a sampling of some of the other best tweets about the keynote. As someone who was in the audience, all seem pretty accurate.
Williams had some news to announce during the talk too. Sadly, he got that out of the way in the first two minutes and then it was completely overshadowed by the mass exodus of the crowd and the humorous tweets as the interview went on.
Update: Ev Williams just tweeted out that he’s heard the talk about the interview and is willing to answer 10 questions over Twitter. Send away.
It’s really difficult to do a compelling live interview, especially for a group of cranky, hungover social media douchebags.
I can only judge the guy so much. Glad it wasn’t me up there!
I weep for the future of technology
Was at the Gary Vaynerchuk talk right before @ev talk and it was packed, engaging, inspiring. not sure “hungover social media douchebags” applied in that case.
Agreed! His talk was completely amazing and ended in basically a half-standing ovation / rap party. Definitely the best of the conference so far.
Danah Boyd rocked her keynote as well.
I think that by definition an audience that was wowed by an impassioned Gary Vaynerchuck style would not be impressed by an academic like Umair haque.
Our tongue in cheek analysis of what went wrong over here:
You make a good point. Also, I think it’s extremely classy of you (Jodie) to not join in on the hate mob that’s about to go down on this poor guy.
*Jolie (I apologize)
Tom, you have to be kidding me, if you were actually there you would know that this is not a “poor” guy. Watch the video of the interview, @umairh had his own agenda and it wasn’t to interview @ev!
If Ev’s such an interesting guy, why doesn’t he just give a real keynote? I don’t understand this interview format nonsense. SXSWi shouldn’t be modeled after Barbara Walters.
I was going to ask: “was it an interview or a keynote?” naively thinking that it had to be one or the other; but you’re actually saying that some bastard child of the two exists?
Kill it, kill it dead before it spawns.
Seriously if your keynote speaker can not put together their own material get another. You’re not doing them or your conference any favours.
That interview was a travesty. Ev is one of the smartest and most visionary minds in tech and I learn from him every day.
Near the beginning of the interview he had a monster quote that sums up what is so unique and powerful about his thinking” “Whatever you assume when you start out, you’re wrong.”
With a skilled interviewer, that alone could have made for an hour of spicy and exciting discussion. Instead, Umair completely disregarded everything that came out of Ev’s mouth so that he could relate another of his self-absorbed tales from vacation.
Twitter is indeed kicking ass and changing the world’s access to information and truth, but it is not without controversy and danger. Ev knows this and wouldn’t have been afraid to talk plainly about what lies ahead and what could ruin the dream. If only he had been asked something the least bit provocative.
Such a missed opportunity. I hope we get a chance to hear from Ev himself soon.
i see he just tweeted out asking for questions over twitter – that’s a good move.
Sacca, nothing unique or powerful about that quote except for its slathering of weaksauce.
The problem wasn’t the interviewer, you sorry kiss-ass. The problem was that Twitter had nothing new to say. @Everywhere is hugely boring, and totally ignorable.
> Ev is one of the smartest and most visionary minds in tech and I learn from him every day
Really?
Really? Because from where I’m standing, Twitter seems to be the social equivalent of the atom bomb. More destructive, perhaps, but in a “force for good kind of way.”
Pulitzer are you paying attention? Don’t let this train leave you behind. We’re all dying to read the first Pulitzer-Winning Tweet.
That would have to be one super-badass tweet. Bring it on.
Lol ;-)
Amir is usually funnier on CollegeHumor. He was just off today.
I wasn’t there, but I think the problem is trifold:
a) too high expectations on @ev
b) audience suffers from massive ADD, and can’t focus on anything longer than a tweet
c) @ev is not an exciting speaker and Umair is not an engaging interviewer..
A & C are kind of the same, and I agree, but the same audience hung tight for danah boyd two days ago over the whole hour. What changed?
both guys were pretty boring.
Just when you thought things couldn’t get much worse than the Sarah Lacy – Zuckerberg interview in 2008, this hack steps in and ups the ante.
Props to Umair.
Seems that SXSW interviewers don’t do too well. I would like to see Andrew Warner do the interview next time. He interviews CEOs/Founders non-stop, I think he has the hang of it now better than anyone else.
Why did you make an entire article out of twitter updates? Isn’t that what Twitter is for? The title sounds like some valley girl outburst.
Oh, come on… You can tell Umair spent a lot of time in deep thought and preparation for his interview! Look, it was conducted Monday, March 15th, and his personal twitter feed tells us the following:
@david_a_eaves ha. dude, i’m doing a keynote :) 8:45 AM Mar 11th
questions for my keynote interview with @ev at sxsw? suggest away. 10:57 AM Mar 12th
questions for my keynote interview with @ev tomorrow at sxsw? suggest away. 3:50 PM Mar 14th
@GelatinousCubed ha. it’s gonna be a conversation. you can send questions over for me as well if you like. 3:59 PM Mar 14th
And a conversation it was… Clearly he was so prepared that he needed to solicit help on questions from his 23,500 followers on twitter the day before the interview. Does anyone sense a heightening desperation as he asks for help twice over the weekend? Hard to say.
Anyway, terrible shame. Plenty of folks, myself included, would have loved the opportunity to ask Ev some deep and challenging questions. That said, let’s give Umair guy a break. It happens! I’d be lying if I said I was always perfectly prepared for every speaking engagement I’ve had in my career. But then again, a keynote at SXSW is a pretty serious responsibility.
I was really looking forward to hearing Evan speak about the future of Twitter. What it means for society. How it’s changing the world. And yes, even about the long elusive business model.
But his interview, Umair Haque, completely missed the mark. He reminded me of my ivory tower b-school professors who can’t help trying to fit things into MBA academic frameworks. That may be okay with your freshman MBA class, but is definitely not cool with the sxsw crowd, which is much more about doing stuff (they’re mostly techies, for one). On a personal note, Mr. Haque came across as arrogant and pompous. People couldn’t wait to get out of there.
What was even more disappointing was the lack of depth and insight from his questioning of Evan. Between repeating things that Evan had said (as if he had really come up with them) and asking inane questions about “the meaning of openness,” the interview was tragic and bizarre.
A suggestion for the sxsw organizers:
I know you all worked very hard, and overall you did a great job. One little thing. Please screen your keynote interviewers much more carefully, and don’t fall for fancy associations like HBR. As someone who paid a lot of money to attend this conference, I (and your 7000 attendees) expect a much higher standard when it comes to the keynotes.
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The demythologizing of the wonder-boy Umair Haque has been long in coming, but it is satisfying to see that it has finally begun.
Could someone please explain to me the modern miracle of how someone like this avoided having a Wikipedia entry ever appear on themselves?!
i think you are both boring