Silicon Beach Fest Showcases Southern California’s Digital Innovation

To showcase the digital innovation happening all over Southern California, the first Silicon Beach Fest was held in Los Angeles last weekend. To bring you the inside scoop, we went to three panels at Hotel Erwin in Venice, CA, to hear digital media experts working onThe Grammys, Team Coco, Fox Broadcasting, the Smashing Pumpkins, Social TV plus a Social Enterprise Panel doing social good. While many view Silicon Valley as the start-up hub, Silicon Beach is on the rise.After organizing 7-8 panels/month, Digital LAcreated this conference that was presented by engage: BDR. The conference included keynotes (Eric Garcetti, LA City Council Member), a hackathon and themed venue hub events organized and / or hosted by companies (PromoJam, Google, TechZulu), accelerators (StartEngine, Amplify), as well as coworking spaces (Coloft, CoWorks, io/LA, Cross Campus, and Working Village.)

Some of the panel hubs featured were the Startup Hub, Leadership Hub, Hollywood Hub, Branding/Ad Hub and Hollywood Trek. Fest attendees and speakers included invited celebrities, start-ups, VCs, movie and music studio execs, agencies, fashion, content creators, artists, social media gurus, developers, and more that traveled from all over the country to Southern California.

The Music: Discovery and Social Media Panel included Rynda Laurel (1968 Media, Digital Manager, Smashing Pumpkins), Andrew Mains (Mobile Roadie COO), Lindsay Gabler (The Grammys, Social Media), Ricardo Diaz (TBWA/Chiat/Day, Director, Creative Technology) and Thomas Ford (Soundrop, US Ambassador.) The group debated the best ways to create a new experience for music fans through social media and live events. Another hot topic was whether artists should give music away for free to attract audiences to live events or protect their IP online.

This music panel was interactive, and took a poll about how people find music, and many raised hands for Spotify, Pandora, and Tumblr. Lindsay Gabler, The Grammys, spoke about their most recent awards show that was the biggest social media event ever, “This past campaign was huge in terms of our mobile strategy. Grammy Live is a 3-day live streaming of all Grammy coverage. We had our iPhone app, the iPad app, basically wherever you want to experience the Grammys or music, we’re there. And that’s how we look at everything.”

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Congrats to everyone who participated in this first Silicon Beach Fest. And big shout out to Kevin Winston (Digital LA Founder and former Fox Interactive Media/MySpace co-worker) and the 150 volunteers on your huge success. For more digital entertainment panels and events in Southern California, visit http://digitalla.net

© Liz H Kelly @LizHKelly, National Digital Entertainment Columnist, Goody Awards,http://goodyawards.com