Oral History: Sex! Drugs! Apps! SXSW Interactive At 20 | Fast Company | Business + Innovation

Twenty years of wild parties, legendary product launches, and heated controversies: how an unlikely mix of “nerds, rock-and-roll hippie freaks, and business suits” grew into the tech world’s most-talked-about annual gathering.



When South By Southwest Interactive launched in 1994, there wasn't much to it: a couple hundred participants and a handful of panel discussions, all crammed into a few rooms at a Hyatt in Austin. Back then, the festival was really only half a festival--as evidenced by its title, SXSW Film and Multimedia--and was eclipsed by the vastly more successful SXSW Music Festival, from which it had spun off.' Link to complete story