A big night for Picnik

By the time Picnik co-founder Jonathan Sposato walked on stage for the last time last night at the inaugural Seattle 2.0 awards, he was pretty much out of material. And with good reason. Sposato's online photo editing startup was the big winner at the packed event at the Pacific Science Center, taking home top prizes in four of the 10 categories.

"I feel like we are the Slumdog Millionaire of the night," said Sposato, after winning the award for "Best Seattle Startup." His company also won in the categories of "Best Bootstrapped Startup" and "Best Startup CEO." Picnik's Peter Roman was named the "Best Startup Product Designer." As Sposato was routinely called up on stage, he kept referring to his winning way as a "fluke."

That was especially the case in the "Best Bootstrapped Startup" category where he pointed to the efforts of fellow nominee Steve Murch of Big Oven, who he said had built an amazing service by himself.

The funniest part of the night came from TeachStreet founder Dave Schappell (appropriately named as host Renay San Miguel pointed out) who introduced the winner for the best venture capitalist. As a Seattle entrepreneur raising cash, Schappell was careful not to upset any of his potential funders.

Schappell said he wanted to go on our record that "we like all four of these nominees equally."

He then went on to offer condolences for the three three losing VCs, posing as a venture capitalist who was turning down an entrepreneur looking for money. Using all of the catch phrases that venture capitalists say when passing on a deal, Schappell had the crowd of entrepreneurs cracking up by the end of his remarks.

Madrona Venture Group's Matt McIlwain won the award, with partner Greg Gottesman accepting on his behalf since McIlwain was celebrating a wedding anniversary with his wife.

In fact, Draper Fisher Jurvetson's Bill Bryant was the only venture capitalist nominee in attendance which prompted him to humorously proclaim that you've "got to be present to win."

Voyager Capital's Geoff Entress, an investor in more than two dozen startup companies in Seattle, took home the top prize for top angel investor. He thanked the entrepreneurs in the crowd who he said are trying to change the world.

Nat Brown of iLike was named the "Best Startup Technologist."

Josh Maher of Lunch 2.0 -- whose two boys were handing out promotional stickers for the networking event -- won the award for "Best Social Event for Startups." Later, fellow nominee Nathan Kaiser of nPost joked with his friend that the voting was rigged.

Shannon Swift of Swift HR Solutions and a member of TechFlash's new "Top 100 Women in Seattle Tech" list was the only female winner, taking home the top prize for "Best Service Provider."

And TechFlash won for the "Best Blog for/about Startup." (Thanks to our readers!!! And thanks to Seattle 2.0 for hosting a fantastic event.)

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