Last week’s Stirr event was definitely an indication that Silicon Valley is ready to socialize and network again. Yes, I know…before you start attributing everything to the hype of Web 2.0 and offer your premonitions of dotbomb 2.0, please read between the lines of the following wrap-up.

The truth is that a group of energetic and optimistic folks decided to help reconnect Silicon Valley and generate the impression that we are all ambassadors for the next chapter in technology innovation:

Sanford Barr, Co-Founder STIRR, The STIRR Network

Sean Ness, Co-Founder STIRR, Institute for the Future

Dan Arkind, Co-Founder STIRR, Indico Group

Joanne Wan, STIRR Business Development, Strategic Decisions Group

(photo: Joanne Wan)

Incase you missed the event, the Stirr format is all about bringing together “self-perceived movers and shakers,” “actual movers and shakers,” and cool people together in one place (BlueChalk in Palo Alto) to talk about themselves, the future of the Web and tech, new business ideas, blogging, as well as relive the latest industry parties they attended.

However, unlike other events listed on upcoming.org, Stirr is actually pulling together some really amazing people. Perhaps it’s the challenge of trying to attend an “invitation only” event…or maybe word is getting around that Stirr is actually onto something here.

Last week’s event drew an impressive array of VCs, journalists, bloggers, and tech leaders, including:

Nick Douglas from Valleywag

Mannie Ramos from KPIX along with film crewNicole Wong from San Jose Mercury News

Vic from Hotfromsiliconvalley

Baris Karadogan (blog), Partner, ComVentures

Tantek Çelik (blog), Chief Technologist, Technorati

Scott Beale (blog), primary tentacle, Laughing Squid

James Yu founder of BuzzShout

Kevin Murphy, US Bureau Chief, ComputerWire

Elisa Camahort, President, Events & Marketing, BlogHer

Rafe Needleman, Editor, CNET

Jessica Guynn, Senior technology writer, San Francisco Chronicle

Zoli Erdos (blog), Blogger, Zoli’s Blog / SVASE

An impressive list of other up-and-comers and already established business leaders included:

SiteKreator
Valleyschwag
CommerceNet
Metaweb Technologies inFreeDA, Inc.
co.mments
Socialtext, Inc.
Google sphere

Sanford Barr, Stirr (photo: Chris Heuer)

The evening featured four speakers who had the standard elevator pitch of 60 seconds to explain their company’s value proposition. Although, Nick Cage and Steve McQueen could steal a car in 60 seconds, everyone did great, especially with a KPIX camera in their face.Here is the list of presenters along with their notable “one liners:”

Gliffy, Chris Kohlhardt, Co-Founder – “Try Gliffy now.” http://www.gliffy.com

EchoSign, Jeffrey Zwelling, Co-Founder – “a secure web-based tool for sending, signing, tracking and storing documents that combines e-signatures, fax-to-email and online document storage system in an easy to use ASP.” http://www.echosign.com/

CrowdFactory, Alexander Mouldovan, CEO – “Nothing draws a crowd like a crowd: If you have an idea for a community and need a game plan call us for a free consultation.” http://www.crowdfactory.com

JAJAH – Free global telephone calls using your everyday phone! http://www.jajah.com

“To us it’s less about ‘movers and shakers’ and more about helping catapult entrepreneurs into success. Nothing speaks louder than a successful company in the Valley. If STIRR can help accellerate that process then we feel like we’ve done some good.” — Sanford Barr, STIRR

That’s it for now. For PR2.0, this is Brian Solis reporting. Until August, when I’ll see you at the next Stirr event.

(photo: hotfromsiliconvalley)

For additional pictures and info please visit::

Vic from HotFromSiliconValley.com hosted a podcast and published Chris Heuer published photos.

Holly from AOL Podcasts Sounds from STIRRThe general STIRR pool at Flickr (tag photos with ‘stirr’ when you upload): http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/stirr/

Tags: silicon valley, stirr, stirrmixer, valleywag, valleyschwag, web 2.0, web2.0, pr2.0, pr 2.0, chris heuer, technorati, brian solis, futureworks, networking upcoming.org, meetup, sitekreator, mercury news, kpix,