The first full AlwaysOn conference, the AO2005 Innovation Summit, at Stanford University kicked off today in an unusual manner. AO founder Tony Perkins and Marketwatch columnist Bambi Francisco conducted a remote interview with Draper Fisher Jurvetson founder Tim Draper and Skype Technologies SA CEO Niklas Zennstrom. The unusual part was that Draper and Zennstrom were in Tallinn, Estonia, where Skype is based. Draper, a Skype investor, was in town for a board meeting.

The videocast was powered by Skype's new videoconferencing technology, which was previewed for the first time at the conference. The video was a little dark and one observer said, "They sound like they're in Astonia (sic)."

The moderators started out slow with a few softball questions such as how did Draper meet Zennstrom. But, it turned lively due to the buzzing online bulletin board, which is visible in the conference room and on the AO Web site. It generated lively comments from online viewers and conference attendees alike.

So, when I posted a comment asking whether Yahoo! Inc. recently offered more than $100 million to buy Skype, the moderators thankfully took the question up and asked it, much to the discomfort of Draper and Zennstrom. The conversation quickly turned from a folksy chat with lots of chuckling and Draper arm raising to one prompting Zennstrom to pull out classic corporate double talk, "We don't comment on rumors."

They also dodged the question about what they're going to do when Yahoo!, Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp. offer identical telephony services on their far-reaching platforms. They were candid enough to answer Francisco's hardest-hitting question of whether they would accept a $250 million buyout offer from Google, with an immediate, "Certainly not." — Joshua Jaffe

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