PerfectMarket

Perfect Market Toasts ‘Iced’ Diggnation Live

 

It was a misty San Francisco eve and there was not a geek to be found, that was, until you entered the doors of a dark alleyway into the venue hosting Friday night’s most geek-a-licious event.

The occasion being the Revision3 five-year anniversary party and live Diggnation recording by our ever-so-popular heroes: Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht. Hordes of fans, engineers, gamers and techies filled the dark-lit hall which was plastered with spotlights, tech banners and tunes that were blasting from everywhere.

Ford’s Fiesta, a new compact techie car that is about to debut in the States, was displayed outside behind a rope and security. I have to hand it to Ford for doing a great job building a techie, feature-packed compact that can clock hybrid-like mileage while still being affordable to the masses. As a geek, I admire the amount of effort Ford put into engineering techie features into its cars while also sponsoring events like Revision 3 and the do-it-yourself expo Maker Faire.

Once all the Revision3 magic performances ended — they included nail-in-the eye squirms, fire-swallowing amazement, and cinder block smashing; the guys behind Revision 3 came out and welcomed the crowd. The horde of geeks and nerds seemed to be anxiously awaiting Kevin and Alex’s’ arrival for Diggnation Live.

The live Digg show looked to have brought in fans from many distant places, including some we met from Ireland. The laser lights turned on while the other music and lights went down. Everyone stared at the projector screens trying to figure out what was about to happen.

A cool cut-scene, a desaturated short video, began to play. The video featured Kevin and Alex as they drove the Ford Fiesta around San Fran in car chase spy-style leading them up to the doors of the venue. The crowd cheered loudly. The Diggnation theme started and Alex and Kevin jumped up onto the stage from the crowd.

Kevin and Alex were quickly united with their iconic beer stash. This time a dedicated box of Bud Light had been tampered with like a man in the middle wifi hack attack.

Instead of beer, inside there were two large bottles of Smirnoff Ice. As is well documented in Digg culture, the ritualistic prank, “You’ve been iced,” commenced. In this new prank, any box at the Digg (or Facebook or Perfect Market) offices can be “iced” by slipping a bottle in. After being unknowingly accepted by a recipient, tradition dictates that the “ice” must be chugged. Kevin and Alex assumed the position as the crowd chanted “get on knee.”

After several readings of Digg stories, and making fun of the audience’s responses from our buzzed hosts, Alex, a PC fan boy, came out with a surprising truth: He now owns the latest Apple product. Yes, the feature-endowed, ever sold-out, ever-so-long-waited-for-iPhone 4.

Meanwhile, Kevin, a known Apple fan boy, had yet to claim an iPhone 4. Alex did a quick straw-poll to survey the audience about its phone of choice. Half the crowd held up their iPhones while the other half held up their Android. A shouting match over technical superiority, quite common among our fellow geeks, diverted the event for a few loud minutes.

After all the stories, free swag (seriously, how many hundreds of red squishy dice were shipped to Digg this week for the event?), our hosts appeared among the crowd for quick pictures, much like Hollywood super stars. Rushing fans, geeks, and dice were being held off by security. Each fan shouted out their Twitter, Facebook, Digg account names like they were at a bingo event or horse race.

The event was a blast, and set the stage for many more successful years of Revision 3 broadcasting. If you have not heard of Revision 3, go check them out at revision3.com. They are one of the Internet’s most up-and-coming online television networks, producing some really great tech-minded shows such as: Diggnation, a spot light for the extremely popular social news site digg.com, and The Totally Rad Show which covers today’s geek news.

From a technology standpoint Apple “i” products, and mobile platforms, like Android, were clearly all the hype. The growing trend of accessing formatted content on mobile and tablet devices should push content providers to seriously evaluate their market and targeted audiences in order to provide the best possible user experience.

— Chris Germano, Engineer

Follow Chris on Twitter: @NetSlayer

Photos: Top: Alex Albrecht (left) and Kevin Rose host Diggnation Live at Revision3 five-year anniversary party in San Francisco. Center: Alex and Kevin get 'iced' on one knee. Bottom: Kevin Rose with Perfect Market's Chris Germano. Photos: Chris Germano, June 25, 2010.

Tags: digg, diggnation, kevin rose, social media, perfect market, chris germano, alex albrecht,