LeWeb3 - Digg's Kevin Rose: A great project doesn't need to be big

(Running notes from the LeWeb3 conference in Paris.)

-- by guest blogger Susan Kish

From the bus driver at La Chapelle, before I even had a chance to ask if the huge RATP unmarked bus was the right one to the conference's venue (guess the black and black outfit gave it away): "Oui Madame." 

Quotes from speaker Kevin Rose, founder of social bookmarking site Digg and co-host of weekly podcast Diggnation:

I started Digg as an experiment, and would have been happy if it paid my rent. …Then, I started three companies at once, and that was probably a mistake. 

Now, I see a lot of copycats… a little disheartening. 

It doesn’t have to be a big website to be a great project. 

You don’t have to be a coder or a hardcore geek to start a great project online these days,

When we started, all the cool people were at Google, and had Google stock, and all the great PHP people were at Yahoo!

I don’t know if I have groupies, but the podcast experience is a real thing with the fans, and that’s where we get the energy, and then we go out and get beers.

Had a lot of people who said they went to YouTube, saw the podcast and then went and checked out Digg. 

Silicon Valley makes it a lot easier. Anytime you can go to a party, or a bar down the street, and sit down and chat with the founder of Flickr, and have dinner with Zuckerberg of Facebook. It helps.