Naked City

Michael Dell, sans tie and jacket (Photo By Jana Birchum)

Considering all the hype that preceded last week's Fortune 500 conference, the event itself turned out to be pretty anticlimactic. No press-stopping zingers from the CEO crowd, no Jaguars stolen, no violence from the anti-corporate protestors, and no baton beatings by the Austin police force, which, it turned out, overdressed for the occasion.

That probably means the gig was a success, and, on the face of it, things sure did run smoothly. But then, what is there to write about? Well, Michael Dell was a big hit. Okay, not him per se, but the fact that he was there, shaking hands and stuff. That was pretty neat. He was among the most casually dressed, too, sans tie and jacket. At a Friday morning session in the House Chamber at the Capitol, both Dell and Enron chief executive Kenneth Lay talked about how the new economy forced them to rethink the way they do business. Dell hit the Internet, where it now conducts more than half of its business. And Enron, long known as a tried-and-true energy outfit, is now mining the fiber-optic bandwidth field.

"Have we lulled them to sleep?" moderator Geoffrey Colvin joked at one point, looking out over the business reps in the audience. Unlike the usual residents of this House, these particular folks weren't milling about on the floor or sitting with their feet propped on their desks. This crowd was pretty tame. Or asleep.

Next up were Novell chief exec Eric Schmidt and Loudcloud CEO Marc Andreessen, who co-founded Netscape and then went on to become the chief tech guru at America Online. Andreessen, exuding nerdiness in a lovable sort of way, laughed about how his newest e-mail gadget, about the size of a pager, allows him to covertly tap out messages with his thumbs during meetings. As he spoke, Dell, seated up near the front, openly fiddled with a similar newfangled object, seeming fairly oblivious to what his colleagues had to say: something about the future of e-commerce. Often it's the most far-fetched idea that ends up turning the Internet on its ear, Andreessen observed of the e-commerce explosion. "Sometimes," he said, "a company like Napster will come out of left field and hit you on the side of the head, and you think, 'Why didn't we think of that?'"

Eventually, lunchtime rolled around, and the guests made their way back to the Four Seasons, the conference headquarters. At the press table, only two reporters sat at a huge table, lavishly set with 15 chicken dinners. The hungry journalists represented not the business press, but the alternative press, which tells you that some reporters will do anything for a free lunch.

The "anything" in this case meant sitting through the keynote address, given by Texas Monthly executive editor Paul Burka, who extolled the virtues of Gov. George W. Bush like you wouldn't believe. He made excuses for some of Bush's shortcomings, explaining that being brainy wasn't necessarily an asset in Texas politics. Same rule of thumb applies to oratory skills, Burka added. "That's not something that pays off here." Afterward, Burka entertained a few questions before the executives made their way toward the exit. There was just enough time for a smoke and a cell phone call before the next session, titled "Debunking the Genome Myths."