On my way to LAX I passed a Pollo Loco that was no ordinary fried chicken extravaganza. It was a warning.

Leaving Los Angeles is confusing. Like Twitter, it holds so much promise. As soon as I land and see would-be The Hills cast members I am comforted. Surely being proximal to those whose biggest problem is running into old frienemies at Vice will rub off. I can walk their walk, talk their talk. (more…)

LOS ANGELES—Do fashion and geek mix? Well at the Techcrunch/Popsugar Meetup they did. It all happened April 10 inside the grotesque Hollywoodland club Vanguard—complete with flocked wallpaper and Perry Ferrell Macintosh Dj-ing.

Was it fun? It was weird. In some ways glorious. Beautiful people in head-to-toe Kitson and Abbot Kinney lined up outside (they hadn’t figured out how to register online and the club was full) while dudes in rumpled t-shirts and department store jeans breezed by fingering iPhones. There were many fashion tribes inside but the mix was candy for my eyes. Grey-haired suits (walking money) orbited the tables of cash-starved startups like Meebo and Picapp who gazed hungrily on. Laguna Beach was represented as were the flocks of tiny pretty girls in thigh-baring polyblends and patent pumps. And of course, the ill-fitting-t-shirt-wearing geeks.

Joe, a coder from ThisNext, working his green t-shirt told me that this was the biggest meetup he’d ever attended. He looked a little uncomfortable and seemed to draw comfort from the computer he was attached to via transparent umbilical cord.

What was most remarkable is that Joe, and others, were very kind. And not in the AC/DC “You Shook Me All Night Long” way. And no girl fights in the bathroom over mirror space. People were talking business and ideas despite the ear-shattering music, darkness and relentless press of the crowd.

Unfortunately, very few people used the dancefloor properly. Being from Toronto and starved for dancefloors without sexual predators or pretense, I couldn’t be stopped.

While the aspies in the coding and tech world would certainly only last at a meetup like that for a couple minutes, for order and kindness, it rivaled my best Hollywood club night ever.

Take that Hyde club! Lindsay and Paris take note…a new nightlife is emerging.