An organization that used to be able to hold meetings at an eight-person dinner table now barely fits into a 500-person venue.
The Venice Interactive Community, a non-profit new-media trade group, has exploded in its three-year history. Now boasting some 4,000 members four times its 1997 membership level VIC has emerged as one of L.A’s leading tech organizations.
The slightly inaccurately named Santa Monica-based organization intends to add venture-capital forums, a CEO-meeting series and a professional development series to its already packed agenda. VIC currently hosts monthly after-work networking events, a breakfast lecture series, a softball league, an industry newsletter and a job-listing board.
The list of activities may belie the true value of the organization, which is getting L.A’s top new-media executives together to forge a tight-knit community. Industry pundits and venture capitalists alike point to that kind of rapport as critical in developing a booming tech industry such as those of Silicon Valley and Boston.
“You’d think that as the ‘city of hype,’ L.A’s tech community would be doing better than it is,” said Brad Nye, VIC’s executive director and co-founder. “VIC started when several of us in the CD-ROM community needed to talk abut the new world we were suddenly in, sharing common problems, concerns and resources. Although VIC has since exploded in size, our intent stays the same. We’re just now attracting people from all over town and from the Internet, broadband, game development and even digital animation industries.
“With this many people showing up to our events, there is a clear need for this kind of organization,” he said.
VIC is not alone in working to aggregate L.A’s geographically and technically diverse industry. Similar groups include the mayor’s New Media Roundtable, Lawnmower, and the Los Angeles Regional Technology Alliance.
But VIC members say it stands out from other groups with its grassroots emphasis. The top tech players in town come together to find out what each other are doing, and just to have fun.
“VIC has become a linchpin in our tech community, bringing together the people who are really driving the industry,” said Kimberly Brooks, chief executive of L.A.-based Web-development studio LightRay Productions. “Also, where else can I hang with my friends and really talk about our trials and tribulations?”
As a member of both VIC and the New Media Roundtable, Chris Paine, the president of Santa Monica-based Internet Outfitters, emphasized the organizations’ different functions. According to Paine, the roundtable has a “macro approach,” working to promote L.A. as a tech center on the national level and to attract new corporations to the region. In contrast, VIC has a more local focus. Members report having found new employees, joint ventures and financing through contacts made at VIC.
“I’ve noticed that VIC has become the unofficial gateway to L.A.’s new-media industry,” Paine said. “New companies looking to expand their reputation show up, as do new people looking to break into the industry. One event is the equivalent of 30 business lunches for me. In this town, that means a lot of saved time.”
Paine himself has hired staff and made financing connections for Internet Outfitters through his participation at VIC.
To help bankroll its expanded agenda, VIC is instituting a $50 annual membership fee for the first time. The vast majority of the organization’s funding will continue to come from corporate sponsorships, from such companies as Microsoft Corp., Yahoo!, GTE and Digital Domain.
Ultimately, Nye envisions VIC as being a major player in the international Internet scene.
“We want to be to the Internet industry what the American Film Institute is to the motion picture industry,” he said. “With VIC gaining so much momentum and support, I see that as very attainable goal.”
