ben-brown

Secrets of the worst websites — revealed!

Owen Thomas · 03/08/08 11:30PM

Andy Baio created Upcoming.org, a plausibly good group-calendar site he sold to Yahoo. Shirt-doffing VC David Hornik of August Capital has funded some plausibly good companies like Six Apart and Splunk. The two served as judges for "Worst Website Ever," a gag panel at SXSW where entrepreneurs gave their all to the worst startup pitches they could come up with. The ideas were funny enough — Sickr, Image Search for the Blind, My Happy Netbox, and the like. (See the photo gallery, after the jump.) But there was something sour about the whole business.

Ben Brown (and his nipples) at SXSW

ndouglas · 04/21/06 12:51PM

Ben Brown, founder of up-and-coming dating site Consumating, scored a starring role in the Independent Film Channel's SXSW 2006 retrospect. The IFC's online film, Behind the Badge, covers this year's music, film, and interactive fests at Austin's South by Southwest convention. Ben does a stellar job representing the geeks — and by "stellar" I mean that he gets sloshed and shouts "woohoo" a lot.

More bangs for the buck: Ben Brown IMterview

ndouglas · 04/03/06 01:14PM

Online matchmaking is just like the real world: shit happens. The Wall Street Journal points out a few failures and the new effort to perfect it — we can do it better with TECHNOLOGY — from eHarmony, True, and Match.com. And the goal is always marriage.

To-Do: Monday night at SXSW

ndouglas · 03/13/06 09:37PM

Great party list for SXSWers tonight. Start at the Lifehacker party, hosted by our slick big sister, at The Side Bar (that's 602 East 7th). From 9 to 11, drinks will flow and Gawker Media stars Joel Johnson (the Gizmodo/Consumerist/Gawker-tech-group genius) and Gina Trapani (the aforementioned Lifehacker's lead) will entertain. You might even glimpse some of Gawker's behind-the-scenes folks.

Getting Real with Ben Brown

ndouglas · 03/02/06 03:43PM

Consumating founder Ben Brown IMed me with a little fun at the expense of web developer and 37signals founder Jason Fried. Note to Jason: We kid because we love. Please don't delete our Basecamp accounts.

Geek pickup lines from Anil, Om, and others

ndouglas · 02/14/06 02:47PM

Geeks are the best lovers — and not just because of those toned finger muscles from twelve-hour typing days. They're sweet-talkers too. Here are pick-up lines submitted by some of the Valley's smoothest operators.

Valley sluts on the Slut-o-Meter

ndouglas · 02/10/06 01:26PM

Big sister Lifehacker gives us the best "productivity" tool ever: the Slut-o-meter gives a safe-to-unsafe result ratio, or basically a promiscuity rating. Since computers are never wrong about sex, I ran some bold names through the meter for an official Valley Slut Register: