IndyHall/Mashable event at Cavanaugh’s brings crowd

In a mixed crowd of several hundred at Cavanaugh’s River Deck on Delaware Avenue last night, Mashable came to play with curious, if reserved, portions of Philadelphia’s tech community, including significant presences from our co-working scene and notable Web 2.0 players.
The event, held in conjunction with Independents Hall, the venerable Old City co-working brand, and Mashable, the social media blog founded in New York City, morphed with River Deck regulars and a crush of bar crawlers after 10 p.m. in the cool night.
The Mashable event is part of a big weekend. Tonight Ignite 3 throws down at Johnny Brenda’s in Fishtown.
Rain threatened and delayed use of the bar’s popular outdoor, deck seating, with a beautiful view of the Ben Franklin Bridge, but not longer than an hour after the 8 p.m. start, the skies cleared.
Read about who made appearances and see other photos after the jump.

The event was the victim of auspicious fortune — suddenly clear skies, more than 300 scheduled attendees and many other groups, including the dozens-strong bar crawl crowd. The DJ was no match for the fireworks display, one old lady doing the Robot, and, yes, an early evening Fall Out Boy concert echoing over from an adjacent pier.
A number of major players in our community came to see what the event was about, including Viddler Co-founder and president Rob Sandie, RedLasso CEO Al McGowan and President Kevin O’Kane, with whom we recently spoke.
Segments of our venture capital scene was out, including Rob Finn, an associate with Edison Ventures based in Lawrenceville, N.J.
Philadelphia’s rich blog scene was well represented, including Eric Smith and Tim Quirino of Geekadelphia; Ben Kessler of Unbreaded; Dave Martorana and Johnny Bilotta of Two Guys on Beer; Jesse Middleton, a founder of Open Chefame and many others.
There was also a New York presence, including the Mashable team, Tony Bacigalupo, chief of co-working outfit New Work City and others.
After 10 p.m., Cavanaugh’s was crowded, as Juan “Che! Digitz” Vasquez and Ryan “Dr. Kellsworthington” Kelly of GrownManTV, depicted below, made their way through the masses to interview the event-goers, including IndyHall co-founder Alex Hillman.

Hillman did impressive work, boosting the event, working the crowd and carving out sponsors, as listed below. We’ll even forgive him that Cavanaugh’s somehow remains the only bar in Philadelphia with a meager draft stock — not even lager, really?
How did you enjoy the party? Share your photos, videos or experiences of the event!

Staff writer Sean Blanda contributed to this story.