I wasn’t so hot on this panel, found there was a lot of navel-gazing and not enough direction. Also, I don’t know what world these guys live in but do they not also have to contend with marketing, business dev, crazy bosses with wild ideas? There was no discussion about how to integrate the real-life demands into collaborative processes. Nice people, but rubbish panel.
Creative Collaboration: Designers and Developers working together
Hammond @ Flickr
Dave Shea @ CSS Zen Garden
Matt Biddulph @ Dopplr
Simon Willison, ex yahoo, Django
George Oates @ Flickr (designer yahoo)
Dopplr release everyday, live testing done by turning features on for a few users at the time (awesome system, I’m deadly jealous!)
Designer husband, developer wife, like a partnership
Django created to support fast-paced development
Flickr was also of the release early, release often mentality
Barebones prototypes using real data strikes better discussion than mockups
that canadian girl 
Cesar Torres
This panel had the potential to be super cool, but I think you’re right in saying it lacked direction.
I was disappointed that more departments/experts weren’t included on the panel. Good startups include more than just developers and designers. One would assume that those represented in the panel recognized this since they work for pretty large startups or are well known weblebrities. Alas, marketers get the shaft yet again.