Don’t be fooled by Bing Gordon’s buttoned-up sounding job title as a partner at top tier Silicon Valley venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers — he’s known as easily one of the most fun people to talk to in the tech industry. So when we saw him in Austin, Texas at the South By Southwest Interactive conference this weekend, we pulled him aside for an interview with TechCrunch TV.
His career first took off as an executive at Electronic Arts in the earliest days — so he’s an expert of sorts in all things gaming (and these days, gamification.) Today, Gordon leads up Kleiner Perkins’ sFund, which is dedicated to investing in next-generation social apps such as Path, Klout, Flipboard and Shazam. He also sits on the boards of Amazon and Zynga, among others. In short, he’s about as plugged in as it gets to what’s going on in the tech world.
Watch our pretty wide-ranging chat above to hear his insights on gamifying without gimmicks, how the Facebook IPO will impact the startup ecosystem, why tech applications today need 10 million users to be taken seriously, what the next golden ticket is for mobile apps, and what separates the amateur founders from the pros.