The call of the West was too strong and Los Angeles' lure too great. Submitting to my weakening will, I went willingly and arrived in Tinsletown for my 2nd Cocktails with Courtney. Ah, Hollywood! Beverly Hills! Brentwood! Century City! Los Angeles! The second in our trio, CondeNet's 5th Annivesary party was now making it's presence known in LA at Lounge 217, in Santa Monica. The party was a wonderful mix of interactive advertisers, creatives and solid dot-com types. Among the digerati VIC's Brad Nye, RampRate's Tony Greenberg and Ross Sonnabend, LawNMower's executive director Molly Lavik and 1hope.com's COO Chat Knowles were lounging. The Substitute Producer Steven Bakalar, Hillary Branchflower, Menus.com's Deron Quon, and Hype House's Mark Sejvar were enjoying the salmon hors d'oeuvres as they chatted it up. Internet.com's managing editor for LA Arthur Gordon and advertising director Susan O'Neill were there and I made sure to introduce them to The Cyber Scene writer for LA, Krysten Johnson.
Making sure none of their top-secret conversations leave the room, Suissa Miller's director of interactive marketing David Shaw and director of direct and Internet marketing Michael Tankel handed me a napkin NDA stating "to never disclose the discussed ideas of the evening no matter how much alcohol you give me." V-Span's Patrick McMichael, management consultant Stephen Graham and HLR Associates Howard Rudzki came out to meet new folks and see old friends. NY-based Comet Systems' Luke Haseloff was in town and introduced me to his friend, who worked at one of the big studios. Fox Interactive's director of operations Luke Letizia and 24/7's Jean Marie Whitaker sampled the fine hors d'oeuvres comin' round the room. Goldman Sachs' Cherie Alcoff brought along her friend Rustic Canyon analyst Pam Wasserstein. E-Media's new LA office showed up and I met LA manager Jennifer Hurley and Johnathan Gibbs. JetSetTv.com's Robert Burnside, who recently moved from NY to LA was doin' his best schmoozin' and JumpCut's Beth Howard told me about their stunning new LA and NY offices. Mouse Jockey CEO Dave Conlan and I chatted about his software that can track email forwards. Ole!
CondeNet's Jennifer Cole, Barbara Knight, Wendy Mure and Emily Smith were all dressed to the nines and mingled with their guests, advertisers and LA new media folks. We made sure people knew about their newest property-Style.com and all the other great CondeNet properties: phys.com, epicurious.com, swoon.com and concierge.com. The guests got to learn about them as they sipped complementary Bombay cocktails. ClickZ's Jim Kelley, eTeamz SVP Kelly Perdew, BeamX's president and CEO Manel Sweetmore and Tanya Sowden were having a good time till the very end and then rounded some late-night treats next door with me at Voda. LA didn't disappoint in its trendy uber cool group of networkers and style-makers at this soiree and we hope to see them at the next one!