The second day of speakers was highlighted by an energetic Brian Wong, a cannonballing Eddie Huang, and Wufoo’s Kevin Hale with an unheard of 29000% return to his investors.

Rigo got interviewed by Silicon Prairie so look out for that.  He also made a quick $150 writing a couple of ios prototype apps.

Dinner was highlighted by a zaarly bet which we’ll blog the details of somewhere else. 

All in all, Big Omaha was a great conference for us.  It’s easy to say we’re planning on coming back for 2013.

We didn’t get back until 2 am last night from the Urban Wine Company.  This was the kind of experience that makes everybody talk about how great Big Omaha is.

First off, the wine company was great atmosphere.  The music was down low enough that people could talk easily.  There was a nice patio where half the crowd hung out.

Then the amazing part of the night was how the speakers from the day stuck around all night and were still there when we were leaving.  We got to talk for awhile with Savil Lavingia and Philip Rosedale.  Check out Rigo’s tweet about laying on the floor - they’re supposed to be meditating.

We also had some great fun talking with Uncle Dave for awhile.  Our intro went something like, “We’re instin”…”What the hell is that?”…”It stands for einstein without the e’s”…”oh, i see, a couple of brilliant guys making apps so now your einsteins”…”we build education apps”…”oh wow….”

And just like the first night, we made a bunch of new conections with other small guys trying to do the same thing we are.  Nick was one that stood out because he’s doing location based advertisements too.  

There’s no way to fit everything and everybody into this post, but all in all, just this event was worth the trip to Omaha.

-Keith

Today’s Big Omaha speaker lineup put on an amazing show!

Ted, Ben, Sahil, Jim, Seth, Yael and Philip set a high bar for tomorrow’s crew.  

Here’s a sample of my favorite moments:

• Sahil talking about logging into his BOA account and seeing $8 million
• Ben saying his form of meditation is to have a beer and fall asleep on the couch
• The picture of Jim’s friend Bob and how using his persona has driven square to build the right thing - also very interesting is how much money he can make glass-blowing
• Philip’s whole talk - crazy good.

Seriously, you should watch them all once silicon prairie posts the videos.  I’m definitely going to.

So we just got back from opening night at the slowdown.  For a couple of first timers at Big Omaha, it looks to be everything we had hoped.  

Everyone attending the conference fit into one bar and it was easy to both introduce and be introduced to new faces.   

A few of interesting connections I made and plan to follow up with represented a vastly different set of companies, from the kauffman foundation, to small valley based startup Kullect, to juggernaut interactive, a teacher led group called ActiveGrade and many others.

Pumped to hear the talks on Day 2!

It’s going to be my first time attending Big Omaha this year.  I’ve watched the videos the past couple of years and if the talks are anything as good as they were then, I know I’ll have a great time.

The speaker lineup looks great again.  @jp, @seth, and @2000f are a couple of the ones that stuck out to me.

I’ll check back in and hopefully blog some updates from the conf.

Here’s hoping we come back on Fire!