Spoonfed and The Courvoisier Future 500 in Observer Magazine

Big news at Spoonfed HQ this week! Henry and I were picked as one of the five winners of  The Observer’s Courvoisier Future 500. The Future 500 is a business network for the UK’s brightest entrepreneurs providing inspiration to businesses across the world.

As part of our inclusion in the CVTF500 we were invited to the Courvoisier Chateau in Jarnac to discuss Spoonfed and our future plans. Joining us on the trip and also in the top 5 are Freddie from Secret Garden Party, Lily Jones of Lily Vanilli cupcakes and founder of Enternships Rajeeb Dey.

I’m in the US until tomorrow so haven’t seen a copy of the article yet, but a friend of mine was kind enough to send me through a scan of the front page.

The full article is now available to read online. There are lots of great companies joining the network this year and we’re really proud to be a part of it.

Award Season

2009 just gets better and better for Spoonfed and as we appraoch the first year anniversary of the site Spoonfed has been honoured with our first awards! Two weeks ago Spoonfed was named as a winner at the Archant North and West London Business Awards in the Best Use of Technology category for our innovative Event Radar iPhone application.

A few days Henry and I were excited (and a little embarassed) to be honoured as finalists at the O2 X Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award. It was a very glitzy event and we had a great time. Sadly we didn’t win but it was a great opportunity to meet some fantastic entrepreneurs, particualrly the winner of this year’s Young Entrepreneur of the Year, Raj Dey of Enternships – a site that hooks up enterprising students and graduates with a placement at a small but fast-growing company.

Spoonfed Teams Up with London for London

We’re always in the charitable spirit at Spoonfed so when London for London asked us to get involved with their big charity event, we jumped at the chance to help out a good cause. London for London is a charity event that aims to help combat anti-social behaviour amongst young people by encouraging bars, clubs and pubs across the city to invite every person who walks through their door that night to donate just £1 to charity. Spoonfed are providing full event listings for every venue taking part, which can be accessed on the London for London and Spoonfed websites.

We’re really proud to be involved with this great charity event, to find out how you can get involved too check out http://www.londonforlondon.com

I Heart Spoonfed Party

To celebrate what’s been a brilliant year in the world of Spoonfed we’re having a party for everybody who’s supported us during the past few years and all the site’s users are invited too! The party, co-ordinated with the regular I Heart DJ nights, is at The Macbeth in Shoreditch on September 11th. Come down and join the fun!

For more details check out the listing on Spoonfed.

Update: Read how the I Heart Spoonfed party went over at the newly revamped Spoonfed Blog!

Get Voting for Spoonfed at SxSW

This year Spoonfed has come up with some great panel discussion topics that we want to present at South by South West and you can help us get there by voting for our proposal. SXSW is part tech conference and part film/music festival, which takes place every year in Austin, Texas. Industry experts regularly look to the event for innovative ideas, exciting directors, new technology solutions and of course, great bands.

We’re really proud of the depth and breadth of content that Spoonfed produces, and we’re ready to share our passion for great on-line editorial with the wider tech community. Our two proposals focus on how to effectively create and manage original content and the reasons why this is so important in the Web 2.0 era.

Content is King: User vs. Editorial Content

Managing Your Content Management System

Voting is a quick and simple process and once you’re signed up you have access to thousands of fascinating proposals. There are dozens of great companies from the UK taking part this year like Huddle and Songkick and you can vote for as many discussions as you like.

So what are you waiting for? Get voting, spread the word, and hopefully one of our panel will get picked!

Voting closes September 4

Spoonfed in the News

Earlier this week Henry and I had a good chat with Alex Bellinger from Small Biz pod. This regular podcast gives advice to small business, and our interview also focused on how Spoonfed all began and covered our plans for the future.

UPDATE: Our interview with Alex Bellinger is now online, listen to it here on Small Biz Pod.

Spoonfed has also been getting some great press for our iPhone app recently and today has been a good reminder of all the nice things people have been writing about the company recently.

Here’s a few quick links to some of our excellent recent press:

Pocket-lint’s Website of the Day
iPhone app of the week: The Spoonfed Radar
iGizmo’s iPhone App of the week
Killer Startups – What’s going on in London
Shiny Media – Stuff we like
Spoonfed’s Free iPhone app

Reuters @ Spoonfed HQ

Today was a special day at Spoonfed towers as we were paid a visit by Matt Cowan, Reuters Technology Correspondant otherwise know as @londonjourno. It was a great chance to talk about our iPhone Event Radar Application and also talk in more general terms about our exciting plans for the second half of 2009. Personally it was an interesting experience to be filmed and interviewed at the same time, especially in front of the whole team. Check out the video below to see how it went.

My Lifelong Dream

Today I had the most special chance to watch the Wimbledon Men’s Final, Roger Federer vs. Andy Roddick upon the Lawns of the All England Lawn Tennis Club.  King Roger won 5-7 7-6 (8-6) 7-6 (7-5) 3-6 16-14  to surpass Sampras’s 14 Grand Slam wins and regain the title he lost in “that match” to Rafael Nadal last year. To say it was epic would not be enough.  I leave it to Niall Sullivan to describe what it was like to be there.

I wasn’t present when Ali bluffed out Frasier in Manilla
nor when the Reds pulled three goals from the abyss
but I was there in the Centre Court commentary box
watching the grass blaze through tinted glass
during the 5th set of the2009 men’s final

6-6

Wow, what a match eh?
We’re not even halfway through
a dust storm blows around Roddick’s feet

7-7

I only take photographs of the scoreboard
want to take in each moment with my own eyes

8-8

Sampras offers his rehearsed smile
as the page where his record is printed
begins to smoulder

9-9

Someone jokes that Fed’s wife
is about to give birth any moment
one more held serve
and we all will

10-10

Both men stare at each other
across the net in disbelief
before the next ball crashes down the line

11-11

A dragonfly buzzes
inches away from the cool glass
it cannot hold back the sound any more
as we finally begin to roar
along with the crowd

12-12

The rest of the tournament
stops existing
we have entered a world
where there are no records to break
the stats on the screen to the side
shrug their shoulders
and refuse to comment

13-13

Unlucky for everyone that isn’t here right now
Unlucky for two men thinking the same thought
“Surely he’s got nothing left?”

14-14

After Fed’s 50th ace
Roddick re-cooperates
looks to the scoreboard
he can’t believe it either
to avoid getting dizzy he glances back down
at 8mm of ryegrass and creeping fescue

15-14

Fed hits the magic number
we have no breath left to cheer the winner
should the winner ever come
I imagine the game still going
in a hundred years time
before a congregation of skeletons

16-14

Federer jumps up, spins
and roars to the crowd
the greatest ever
two weeks of pent up emotion
finally erupt
the carpet is rolled out for time and reality
to return
and I make for the exit
too exhausted to watch him lift the trophy
to return to a life
of telling everyone
I was there

Spoonfed Shortlisted for Tech Crunch Award

At the beginning of this month the well known technology blog, Tech Crunch launched the Europa Awards, the first Europe-wide tech awards ceremony in London, we today we’ve found out that Spoonfed has made the shortlist!

Click here to see the shortlist for the inaugural Tech Crunch Europa Awards.

The judges are going to review this shortlist and combine their scores with your votes to pick this years finalists. So sign up and get voting now to help Spoonfed to the finals of the first Tech Crunch Europa Awards.

Interview with the Guardian

It was a big coo for Spoonfed this week as I was interviewed by Jemima Kiss for the Guardian TechWeekly Podcast. The interview took the format of an elevator pitch which was a good way to introduce Spoonfed to a new audience and talk about our plans for rest of 2009.

You can download the Tech Weekly podcast and have a listen yourself at Guardian online.