The air felt different at this year’s SXSW, the annual March festival where tech meets pop culture in Austin. I was reminded of the 2019 SXSW when people packed downtown, and snake lines formed out of local ventures.

Attendees said it was like that again this year, though my friend, who lives in the area and has attended many times, admitted that some stuff has changed. For instance the festival is now two days shorter than it used to be. It was also “decentralized,” mainly due to the demolition of the Austin Convention Center, which scattered events and panels throughout downtown venues. That made the whole conference feel less overwhelming but also less connected.

The event is also still recovering from the pandemic, during which it laid off staff and went two years without much income. It’s switched hands since then and, as of this year, has adopted a new strategy.

Greg Rosenbaum, the SVP of programming at SXSW, said this year, the conference’s 40th anniversary, was its most “ambitious reinvention” yet. He cited changes like the new Clubhouses, for recharging, networking, and special programming, that attracted 5,000 people daily. He noted how attendees were experiencing “more of Austin and the downtown community.”

For at least the tech founders I spoke with, the conference remains immensely valuable, and everyone had the same advice: conferences like these, you get what you give.

After all, there were people to meet and panels to speak on. The Grammy-nominated Lola Young performed, Vox threw a hot party, the new Boots Riley film premiered, while Serena Williams and Steven Spielberg had keynotes. (I also moderated a panel about AI and taboo topics like relationships and money, which was pretty good if you ask me.)

Ashley Tryner-Dolce, an investor and founder, said the conference was still an “incredible gathering of ideas.” Like many festivals, though, she found the most “meaningful moments” happened at the side events — like INC’s Founder House party, where she connected with other founders and CEOs.

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“It’s less about the main stage and more about who you’re sitting across from,” she said.

James Norman, a managing partner at Black Ops VC, didn’t even have a proper badge to the festival. He threw an event to connect founders with opportunities and attended some film screenings and dinners.

“If you’re just showing up without the right connections or proximity to the rooms and conversations that matter, you’re going to struggle to unlock the real value of the event,” he said, which is exactly what Jonathan Sperber, a founder who participated in the SXSW pitch competition, also expressed.

“The value tends to depend on how well you prepare for it,” Sperber said, adding that his team made sure to have meetings lined up and a clear strategy going in. He called it an “effective setting for connecting with large enterprises and other key stakeholders.”

The talk of SXSW being dead has circled the industry for years, but that never seems to be the case. For every batch of tiring founders, emerges a crop of fresh eyes and ambition, ready to take advantage of what lies in the festival’s wake.

For example, this was Simon Davis’ first SXSW. He said that his overall impression was that it was “a media conference with a tech angle, not the other way around.” He praised the diversity of the event compared to other tech events (which we will spare to mentioning).

“At SXSW, you get a much wider range of people, backgrounds, and experience levels,” he continued. “The live music programming reinforces that. It’s a different energy entirely. Not somewhere you’d necessarily go to do deals as a tech company, but a great place to share and learn.”

This year, SXSW introduced a new badging system, meaning each person had a different experience, depending on what track badge they bought — film, music, or tech. I, for example, felt surrounded by conversations about AI and technology, and overheard other tech people talking about how the festival once had a stronger music focus (though it did seem, for sure, that there were more tech-focused panels this year

SXSW rebounds as a top networking, ideas festival for founders and VCs