The attendance for the Houston Web 2.0 & Social Media Happy Hour far exceeded everyone’s expectations last night (75+ people at the last count). OK, we get points off for not having any photos, but you get the idea.
A Big Thank You goes out to Marc Nathan with HTC, Erica O’Grady with PeanutButterMedia, and Laura Mayes with Sk*rt for getting this great event kick-started and to everyone else for showing up.
Here is some of what was seen and overheard:
- I spoke with Cliff Kurtzman of MyCityRocks and he told me that they have seen a lot of success nationally (even more so than in Houston). We first wrote about MyCityRocks here.
- I learned of a new startup called MeetYourBand that has actually been out for about a year, but is soon to release some new features on their site. MeetYourBand is “a social network for musicians, blending classified ads with permanent, searchable profiles. Musicians can post information ranging from their talents and preferred genres to audio and video clips.”
- You can also find out more information on MeetYourBand on our Houston Startup Directory.
- I learned about another new startup called NutShellMail that is still in double-secret mode, but they have just recently opened up their blog site, so you can learn more about it there. In a nutshell (sorry, couldn’t resist), their service will provide a means to aggregate and manage messaging from multiple email and social networking accounts. Sounds very interesting and look forward to seeing more soon.
- Also seen: (updated)
I’m sure that Josh will have a few things to add to this post, but I can say that based on the turnout last night, we will definitely be turning this into a monthly event, with the next one in January. Stay tuned for details…
Did you go? Tell us what you think in our comments section.





Awesome turn out, very impressive. A great mix of people and careers, and i will def be back in Jan. Great job!
I had a great time meeting up with everyone again. One small correction, Always Creative wasn’t there. Always Creative is a 4 person design studio operating out of The Creative Space in Downtown Bryan. Ryan Plesko (of BuildingProcess.com) and I (of BuildingProcess.com and Coursevote.com) also work out of The Creative Space, and were in attendance.
Hopefully next time I’ll be able to get the Always Creative crew to come down also
Arrggh. Sorry for the error Bill and so glad you both made it! (I’ve fixed the post) Hopefully you found some great people to talk with.
I also saw some other wonderful people from:
OpMom
The Houstonist
yippykya.com
Tulsana
HoustonPatentLaw.com
LatinSpace.com
Advologix.com
Linux Journal
YouData
Sorry if I left anyone off the list…it was a crazy night. Thanks to everyone for making it a success. We will be doing this regularly so more on that soon.
Marc, Erica, Laura, Kurt and Josh — thank you for setting up such a great event. Since that evening we’ve gotten one article lined up for the magazine and have been introduced to a Rails developer (which we’ve been looking for), both thanks to people we met at the Social Media happy hour.
We’ll be at the next one for sure. Let us know if Linux Journal can help in any way.
All our best,
Carlie, Katherine and Mark (the LJ people)
Also forgot to mention:
Podcast Ready
Thanks to StartupHouston, Sk*rt, HTC, Marc, Erica and everyone else involved in organizing this thing. Had a great time meeting and chatting with the Houston Web 2.0 and Social Media community. Great to see this group as active and excited about next gen web stuff coming out of H-town.
Mucho Kudos Guys! Had a great time and got to see some companies I knew about, but never seen. This was the best Houston tech startup get-together I have ever participated in. I look forward to building on the success of this event in the future.
Kurt,
Thank you for the nice write up on NutshellMail. Our development team is working hard and long into the night to roll out a beta by late January 2008. I look forward to updating you and the Startup Houston community on our progress. In the mean time, please feel free to check out our blog at blog.nutshellmail.com to read about anything and everything related to email and social networking.
The Social Media Happy Hour was fantastic and I can’t wait for the next one.
Oh man I can’t believe I missed this one, I would love to go if there is another event coming up. Do you know of any???
WHAT?! I can’t believe I missed this event. How did I not hear about it?? Please tell me that there is gonna be another one coming up soon…
Great night. Great people. I can’t wait for the Jan event!
This is definitely going to be a monthly event and we will be announcing the January date some time this week. Let us know if you have a favorite venue for future consideration.
Kurt,
Have you heard of Lucky’s Pub? Check out the site at http://www.luckyspub.com/
Do you guys have a mailing list I can join so I don’t miss the next event?
Great event! Thanks again for the invitation. Loads of interesting people swirling @ Sonoma.
Troy Williams is in stealth mode with peoplepad.com …….shhhhh. Does anyone know what it is?
Looking forward to the event in January!
Best and Merry Christmas…!