Monday, March 30, 2009

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MySpace Embraces Microsoft Platforms For Mobile And Web Applications Top
Two Microsoft-related announcements coming from struggling social networking giant MySpace today: the portal is adding support for Windows Mobile-run phones to its new mobile application, due this summer, and bringing the Silverlight runtime to its developer program thanks to a jointly developed Open Source kit . The upcoming application will be created by MySpace in conjunction with Microsoft developers, and optimize the user experience for owners of devices running the latest version of Windows Mobile (6.1, which was introduced in April 2008). The company says it currently has 20 million mobile users and is focused on developing applications for all platforms, including the iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Palm, Nokia, etc. As MobileCrunch reported earlier this year, MySpace anticipates 50% of their total traffic to come from mobiles within the next few years, which is why it has recently launched a redesigned mobile website as well (see MC post for details). All basic functionalities for social interaction with MySpace friends are said to be included in the application (also see screenshots below), but more specific details are bound to emerge sooner or later. The app is supposed to pop up in Windows Marketplace for Mobile early fall 2009, and LG will be pre-loading the utility on its future WiMo devices (slated for shipping in the second half of 2009). More significant in my opinion is the announcement regarding Silverlight, Redmond’s answer to Adobe’s Flash / Flex rich internet application development platform. MySpace is going to include the Silverlight runtime in its Open Platform and offer a jointly built SDK, leveraging the JavaScript OpenSocial container used by most of the applications that run on the social networking service. Coincidentally, OpenSocial was created by MySpace in conjunction with Google, and both companies have a representative on OpenSocial Foundation Board. Silverlight developers now have the ability to build OpenSocial applications on MySpace’s Open Platform and make the user experience for its members a little richer. MySpace and Microsoft will be presenting a joint session at the Web 2.0 Expo on Silverlight on the MySpace Open Platform, which will take place on Thursday, April 2nd at 1:30pm PST. Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
IAB Reports Internet Advertising Grew 10 Percent Last Year; Outpacing TV Top
In an upbeat report this morning, the Interactive Advertising Bureau reported that internet advertising in the U.S. grew 10.6 percent to $23.4 billion. And the $6.1 billion fourth quarter (up 2.6 percent) was the first time Internet advertising surpassed the $6 billion mark. That said, the rate of growth declined both on an annual and quarterly basis. Even the 4.6 percent sequential growth over the third quarter was the lowest since 2002 (as was the annual growth rate). Search advertising dominated, with 45 percent of total Internet advertising market share. It also grew more than 20 percent for the year. The only category which grew as fast was rich media and video. Online video advertising grew faster than any other sub-category, with 123 percent annual growth (going from $324 million in 2007 to $724 million in 2008). Display advertising was able to eke out 8 percent growth for the year, but declined 4 percent in the fourth quarter. Performance-based advertising widened the gap over plain-vanilla impression-based advertising (CPM) last year, with 57 percent of all internet advertising revenues being performance-based versus 39 percent being CPM-based. That 18 percent gap widened from a 6 percent gap last year. The IAB also trotted out some numbers showing that Internet advertising revenues are outpacing TV advertising by some measures. The $23.4 billion in annual internet advertising spending exceeded advertising on cable TV for the first time (which was $21.4 billion), and took the No. 3 spot behind national and local TV ads ($29.8 billion) and newspaper ads ($34.4 billion). And in a new analysis comparing the first 14 years of Internet advertising revenues to the the first 14 years of cable and broadcast TV advertising, the IAB found that Internet advertising surpassed cable TV advertising in Year 4 ($907 million versus $499 million) and broadcast TV advertising in Year 10 ($9.6 billion versus $8.9 billion). Now, in Year 14, Internet advertising is almost twice as large as broadcast TV advertising was in its 14th year ($13.3 billion) and nearly four times as large as cable TV ($6.5 billion). Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
CrunchDeal: 24-inch Dell Monitor for $209 Top
Now THAT is a low price on a 24-inch monitor. Dell Small Business is selling the S2409W for $209 after $90-worth of instant savings, plus you can use coupon code 1Z829VM32T983V to knock another 10% off, bringing the final price to $188.10 after the dust settles . The monitor has a 1920×1080 resolution (16:9), DVI/HDMI/VGA connections, 1000:1 contrast ratio, 300 cd/m2 brightness, and 5ms response time. No built-in speakers but, hey, it's $188 — free shipping, too. UPDATE - Coupon code is dead.
 
Online Journalists More Optimistic About The Future Of Journalism than Print Peers Top
The Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism released a study today that claims bloggers and journalists have an “uneasy” optimism about the future of news media on the web. But, the study says, their optimism definitely trumps that of broadcast and print employees in traditional media industries. According to the study, most journalists who work in the online news industry believe that the internet is having a negative impact on fundamental journalistic values, including a loosening of standards (45% of respondents felt this way), increased emphasis on speed (25%), and the addition of voices from outside the traditional media institutions (31%). While there’s no doubt that the internet is changing the way journalism is conducted and delivered, I’m hesitant to think that speed and increased diversity of viewpoints from outside the industry is detrimental to journalistic integrity. Online journalists are cautiously optimistic that their publications have viable business models compared to traditional forms of media. Over 60 percent of respondents reported that their online news units were making a profit. But only four out of every ten online journalists are “very confident” that online news can find a profitable business model for journalism, and are worried about the money-making prospects of internet advertising. Roughly two-thirds of journalists surveyed predicted advertising would be the most important form of revenue for news websites in three years. That in itself might be an overly optimistic projection for online advertising revenues, which today only accounts for less than 10 percent of overall newspaper advertising dollars in the U.S., and actually showed a slight decline last year. Print advertising, however, is diving faster than anyone expected. Photo attributed to Ken-ichi. Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
Charles River Ventures Raises $320 Million For Its Fourteenth Fund Top
At a time when limited partners are being stingy with their venture dollars, Charles River Ventures just announced it raised $320 million for its fourteenth fund, Charles River Partnership XIV. (The last fund it raised was $285 million in April, 2007). With the new fund, the firm now manages $2.1 billion. Raising any capital in this environment is an achievement in itself. But CRV has been able to return $600 million to its limited partners over the past two years. Some of the bigger liquidity events during that time included the IPOs of BigBand Networks, Netezza, and Virtusa, as well as the acquisitions of EqualLogic to Dell (for $1.4 billion), Acopia Networks to F5 Networks (for $210 million), and Compete to TNS (for $75 million). Current investments include Geni, Nantero, Scribd, Social Media, Twitter, Vlingo and Yammer, Earlier this month August Capital was also able to raise a new fund . Keep an eye on the VCs who are able to raise money post-financial collapse. They are the ones with recent positive returns. Crunch Network : CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
 
Kickapps Embraces Facebook Connect And OpenID Top
Even white label social networks like Kickapps realize there is no use competing with the viral social networking power of Facebook and MySpace. Instead, Kickapps now wants to ride on their coattails to engage clients in using their platform as a social network. Kickapps, a white label social networking startup, will now support Facebook Connect and OpenID on KickApps-powered websites. Clients will have the option to activate the OpenID and 3rd party registrations from their desktop console and then integrate their log-ins and profiles from social networks including Facebook and MySpace. Kickapps will automatically import data from from a client’s Facebook or MySpace profile for free. With Facebook Connect, a client can let members post a note on their Facebook news feed about what they are doing on a KickApps powered site with a link back to the site. The KickApps platform allows web publishers and marketers to create sites filled with social media applications to better engage audiences through social networking, user-generated content, and widgets. Kickapps’ has shown some success in creating branded social networks, but leveraging the power of the much more popular major social networks is a smart move because it will lower the barriers to joining a Kickapps-powered site. Crunch Network : CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
 
Google China Signs Big Music For Free MP3 Search Engine Top
Google China has taken the beta label off its dedicated, free MP3 search engine now that the local Google branch announced deals with all four major music labels (Warner, Universal, EMI and Sony) at a press conference earlier today. The website, which had been in beta for over a year, can be found here , or you can try the translated version (note that you won’t be able to download or listen to songs outside of the country). The site offers over a million music tracks thanks to a partnership with Top100.cn (a company co-founded by basketball start Yao Ming which Google has invested in), most of them Chinese but also foreign tunes approved by the government. For example, users can download the latest Metallica album free of charge, of which you can see a screenshot below. Apart from the four labels mentioned above, several major publishers and 140+ indie labels are said to be on board. Google will share ad revenue sold on the music site, generating sales for record companies in a market where 99% of all downloads are illegal, according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI). Google is making this move to gain more ground on Baidu , the leading search engine in China, which has been offering free MP3s for years, part of the reason why it became the leader in the first place (it has roughly double the market share in search than Google). A Baidu representative has already responded to the launch of the new MP3 search engine, saying Google is entering the game too late and that this particular ship has long sailed. The niftiest part of the music search engine is the Songscreener , an innovative way to discover new tunes based on your current mood and more specific details like the tone, timbre, age, language and genre of music you would like to explore. Google is also said to be experimenting with a voice search feature for the music search engine. The company has no plans to expand the service outside of China, a representative told Reuters . (Hat tip to Web2Asia - via Twitter - and Outdustry ) Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
Streamzy Done Streaming, Up For Sale On eBay Top
Now that popular music streaming service SeeqPod has decided to sell its source code to developers to spawn more clones, one of the media search startups that built upon its API is apparently calling it quits: Streamzy , which we profiled in July 2008, is selling itself on eBay at a starting bid of $1,000, provided it’s not a lame April Fools joke (the bidding ends April 1). Update: Streamzy co-founder Brian Kantz says it’s definitely not a joke, and claims: “The music industry is the worst industry to be in. I don’t want to deal with any annoyance from them. Its not worth it when i could spend my time on other areas of business.” The service amassed merely 2,400 registered users since its launch in early 2008, and has a monthly visitor rate of only 7,000. The back-end runs for free on Google App Engine and the Flex front-end code will be included should someone decide to pick up the site. For context: the music labels aren’t only targeting SeeqPod anymore but also developers who use its API , so we’re not sure anyone will be inclined to bid, unless of course if it’s just for the name, logo and domain name. Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
Twitter Hiring A Concierge To Pamper Celebrities. Requires Schmoozing. Top
I don’t care much for the celebrity culture, but clearly I’m in the minority judging by the amount of people who read gossip magazines and websites in order to get updates on every move their idols make. Twitter has already proven to be a great way for a number of celebrities to bypass the media and let their audience know what they’re having for lunch straight away, unfiltered, unless of course there’s a PR machine doing the 140-character typing for them. Either way, Twitter has gotten a ton of (occasionally unfavorable) press thanks to celebrities who join the service and provide their fans with some glimpse into their activities and whereabouts, and even sometimes engage in conversations with them online or by SMS. Now Twitter is hiring a VIP Concierge to pamper said celebrities, according to their latest job opening on JobScore. His or her job? Make sure the celebrities on Twitter are ‘happy’ and use the service effectively, whatever that means. You can read the rest of the job description on JobScore, but basically Twitter is hiring someone who will have to sway new celebrities into joining the micro-sharing service and make sure the ones who are already on there keep tweeting their hearts out, so the startup can get even more press. (Via Adam Jackson , image credit to Forbes ) Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
The Wounded U.S. Newspaper Industry Lost $7.5 Billion in Advertising Revenues Last Year Top
Last year was the worst on record for the U.S. newspaper industry.  Total advertising revenues (both print and online) declined 16.6 percent to $37.85 billion, according to the latest figures from the Newspaper Association of America .  That is $7.5 billion less than in 2007.  Print advertising alone declined 17.7.  Classifieds were down 29.7 percent. And even online advertising was down 1.8 percent to $3.1 billion. Newspapers are shuttering their print editions, laying off staff, or closing entirely as a result of this severe contraction in revenues brought on by the double whammy of economic recession and competition from the Web. Drilling down into the fourth quarter numbers, total advertising dollars shrank 19.74 percent, making it the tenth straight quarter in which revenues have declined, and the sixth straight quarter in which the rate of decline has been accelerating : 3Q07: -7.4% 4Q07: -10.3% 1Q08: -12.85% 2Q08: -15.11% 3 3Q08: -18.11% 4Q08: -19.74% The rate of decline in online revenues also seems to be accelerating.  .Online revenues were $778 million, which was 8 percent lower than the year before.   The year-over-year decline was also greater than the 3 percent decline in the third quarter and the 2.4 percent decline in the second quarter (which was the first quarter when online ad revenues for the newspaper industry went down). (Photo by Scott Glovsky ). The table below shows both online and total (print and online) advertising revenues for the newspaper industry for each quarter of last year.  The “total” column below includes both online and print revenues Yea r Quarter Online % Change Total % Change 2008 1 $804.05 7.20% $9,229.53 -12.85% 2 $776.58 -2.40% $9,601.64 -15.11% 3 $749.84 -3.00% $8,942.43 -18.11% 4 $778.27 -8.10% $10,074.65 -19.74% And here are figures for annual newspaper advertising revenues for the past five years.  The newspaper industry is still huge, but the print portion is just getting decimated. Meanwhile online revenues still account for less than 10 percent of the total (8.3 percent, to be exact), and even those are facing challenges. Year Online % change Total % change 2004 $1,541 26.7% $48,244 4.5% 2005 $2,027 31.5% $49,435 2.5% 2006 $2,664 31.5% $49,275 -0.3% 2007 $3,166 18.8% $45,375 -7.9% 2008 $3,109 -1.8% $37,848 -16.6% Crunch Network : CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
 
Spiceworks Adds Social Media Widgets To IT Networking Software Top
IT software maker Spiceworks has developed a set of customized plugins and widgets in a variety of categories for the Spiceworks desktop. Spiceworks’ ad-supported, free IT management software allows IT managers at small to mid-size businesses keep track of their network assets, run a helpdesk, monitor activity, receive reports and troubleshoot network problems. The plugins let you keep track of alerts, tickets, new software, and new hardware, as well as a inventory summaries. Widgets include a help desk widget and reports and inventory widgets and allows users access this information easily. Spiceworks also lets users add themes and skins to the desktop, create customized user portals, and lets users drop in news widgets from RSS feeds and social networking widgets for Twitter, Digg, Facebook, and MySpace. Spiceworks has also created an IT news community destination for the users of its software. In the community, you can see information that other Spiceworks IT professionals have submitted and also features content that is directed towards the small to medium sized business IT professional community. Spiceworks says that there have been over 16,000 downloads of its 53 widgets in the past week. The company says that the most popular widgets are the help desk widgets and there have already been 16 language plugins created by the software’s users. Whats Up, another IT network management software, has created mobile access for clients but doesn’t seem to have incorporated the social networking features into the platform. Spicework’s software has been built around creating a community among IT managers, so its no surprise that the company is now rolling out social media features to its platform. The software lets users connect with other IT managers. When problems come up users can post questions, submit answers and use group-edited wiki articles, etc. The software, which now includes a dashboard, RSS feeds, social networking widgets and a IT news sharing community, seems to almost be turning into a pseudo-social network itself. Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
First Look: Lala's iPhone App Will Stream Your Music Library From The Cloud Top
Online music may be a treacherous space right now, but there are still a handful of music startups that may be coming close to getting it right. One of our favorites is Lala , a streaming music site that allows users to put their digital music library in the cloud , which can then be accessed from any computer. And soon, they’ll be able to access every song they own from their iPhones too, without having to worry about storage capacity or syncing. Unlike music sites like http://music.myspace.com”>MySpace Music, which largely revolve around playlists and streaming individual albums, Lala is meant to serve as a web-based music library. The site has forged unique deals with every major record label (and many indies too) that allows users to populate their online library with the music they already have on their computer (legally acquired or otherwise). Users simply install the Lala Helper app, scan their computer for music files, and sign into Lala to find their entire music library in the cloud. From there, users can browse through Lala recommendations and see what their friends are playing. The site has a unique buying model that allows users to purchase ‘web-only’ versions of songs for a mere 10 cents a pop - a price point that is very addictive, but also gives Lala a legitimate monetization scheme beyond advertising. Users can listen to these web-only songs as many times as they want, but only through the browser - if you want to load it on your iPod, you need to pay an extra 80 cents to download it. So while Lala has been fairly impressive until this point, it has still kept users chained to their desks. That may change soon, when Lala releases its iPhone application that will allow users to stream any song from their music library, whenever they want (provided they have an internet connection). While some of Apple’s traditional iPods have massive storage capacities, many people have abandoned them favor of iPhones, which offer more functionality but much less space for the money (most people have either 8GB or 16GB models). And given that these devices are also used to store applications and video files, many of us find us having to pick and choose which songs we want to carry around with us. With Lala, you don’t have to worry about that. The app streams the songs from Lala’s servers, in much the same way Pandora does. But unlike Pandora and similar radio apps, you can chose any song from your music library whenever you want. Unfortunately, it still may be a while before everyone can get their hands on the app. Lala says that there isn’t any concrete release date for the iPhone application, explaining that it still needs work on a number of fronts. For one, the app still has obvious bugs (some text fields don’t update correctly, and sometimes a button won’t work). But perhaps more important, it sounds like the company may still have some legal hurdles to wrangle, and it also needs to fine tune its monetization strategy. Hopefully it won’t be too long - this app would be a boon for users with large music libraries, and would also offer a huge boost to the Lala service as a whole. Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
 
Risk Aversion And The Perils Of Selling Too Early (Israeli Startups, Part II) Top
Right now I'm at an un-conference called KinnerNet . It's hosted by famed Israel entrepreneur Yossi Vardi and set near the Sea of Galilee. Funny thing: There are a few hundred entrepreneurs here, mostly Israeli. And only one has said something negative to me about my post earlier this week about the poor venture returns for Israeli startups that incited such passionate feelings everywhere else in the world. No one is arguing that the returns have been good for Israeli companies in the last eight years. But there are some legitimate questions about how Dow Jones (whose numbers I used) slices its data and how the numbers could be quite so low. Since 2001, according to Dow Jones, $10 billion in venture investments have yielded only $860 million in IPO and M&A exits. The study of venture economics is at best imperfect, so it's quite likely there are several big Israeli exits the numbers are missing. It's like measuring Web traffic. Most Internet companies will tell you their traffic logs report higher numbers than measurement agencies like Hitwise or comScore. But the Dow Jones numbers aren't likely to be off by, say, a factor of 50 or 100. And since the same sources—usually venture firms—give firms like Dow Jones the investment data and the liquidity data, the relationship between the money going in and the money going out is pretty reliable, even if the absolute numbers are not. Put another way, if Dow Jones is missing some exits, they're likely also missing some investments going into the country. In any case, the returns are down dramatically from the 1990s—period. Be mad at me all you want; those are still the numbers. The more interesting question—and I think what's creating such passion around the topic—is why the numbers are down? We're actually going to do a session on this tomorrow at KinnerNet. It's also the one question I've been asking Israelis pretty much non-stop for the week I've been in the country. Two interesting cultural answers have emerged that I wouldn't have imagined. Both have to do with a phenomenon that's hurt venture returns in the United States too: Entrepreneurs selling companies too early. Both Roi Carthy (who occasionally writes for TechCrunch from Israel) and Matthew Hertz, who's starting a deep-web people search company called Pipl.com , said many Israelis live in the "temporary." Put another way, when Matt heard I was filling in for Michael Arrington "temporarily" in February, he laughed and said, "We Israelis know temporary is the most permanent state there is. Short-term is a way of thinking here." (True enough, it's March, and I'm still here writing on TechCrunch.) That "temporary" mindset drives the same unabashed courage that makes quitting a job and starting a company so natural for Isreali entrepreneurs. But both Carthy, Hertz and a dozen or so other entrepreneurs I spoke with said there's a flip side to that: When you live for the short term, and you get a $30 million acquisition offer; you're more likely to take it. In other words, several entrepreneurs here have described themselves as having a huge appetite for taking risk on the front end; but being risk-adverse when it comes to turning down a huge chunk of money for a $1 billion IPO dream. In my last book, David Sachs, an American entrepreneur who was the COO of PayPal and has started Geni and Yammer since, put the same feeling another way: Most people in the world would take the certainty of $1 million over a chance they could make $30 million. I'm not knocking that. I'll sell SarahLacy right now for $1 million. (Takers?) But I tend to think of people who make that decision as being risk-adverse. What was surprising to me, is that people who have a huge tolerance for risk on the front end– literally creating something out of nothing—become risk-adverse when they've proven that it's actually worth something. I was discussing this idea last night with Nimrod Lev, who sold kSolo to MySpace and has worked in the Israeli Internet scene since its earliest days. He had a different cultural take on the same phenomenon. He said the fun part for Israelis, or at least for him, is solving a hard, technical problem. In other words, "the art of the hack." Once it's solved, managing the company, growing revenues, taking on HR problems—all of that is the boring part. He loves starting companies and has been successful at it, but he has zero desire to build one into the next Google. There are a lot of guys like that in the Valley, too, but they've also got a huge pool of experienced managers to hand the company off to. I'll give Israel another reason that returns have fallen so hard on a percentage-basis. And it has nothing to do with Israeli culture. In fact, it's something the United States screwed up: Sarbanes Oxley . SarbOx put a chill on small-but-growing companies' ability to go public on the Nasdaq. The costs of being SarbOx-compliant are so high, that unless you have more than $40 million or so in annual revenues and strong growth, it's just not cost effective. And other regulations surrounding the Chinese Walls between research and trading mean that small companies get little research coverage and are too thinly traded to really be considered liquid stocks. This has hurt the Valley, when it comes to returns, for sure. But the Valley also is replete with large companies that buy each other for enough money that investors can eke out enough to keep going. Geographic proximity does help in working these kinds of things out. (You think YouTube didn't benefit from sharing an investor with Google? VCs actually count this as one of their so-called "value adds.") A good number of European companies have gotten around the SarbOx problem by going public on the London exchange over the last few years, to the extent where several articles were written about the London Stock Exchange becoming a bigger financial force than the Nasdaq. So if it was a problem for all startups, why do I bring it up in relation to Israel? Because pre-Sarbanes Oxley, Israel had more Nasdaq-traded companies than any other country. Outside the Valley, they were, by definition, the most vulnerable to the change. Perhaps in the intervening years, it's not the entrepreneurs that have lost their mojo; there's just no good financial system for their investors to profit off of said mojo. That's certainly a hack I'd like to see a smart Israeli pull off because its not just hurting the Israeli startup ecosystem—it's dragging down returns for investors everywhere. (Photo by Hans Splinter ). Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
 
InternSHARE Blends Internship Postings With Ratings Top
internSHARE is an all-in-one internship job and review portal where students can not only find a internship but also access the reviews of internships at companies, submitted by former interns. Internships can often be a hit or miss in terms of experience. Some companies merely make interns fetch coffee and make copies while others let interns step into the roll of a full-time junior employees. Regardless of how a company decides to handle its interns, it’s always helpful to know exactly what your role will be prior to the internship. The site’s reviews seem fairly comprehensive, offering overviews (provided by Wikipedia) and reviews of a range of companies including Research in Motion, IBM, and Amazon.com. The site also has a feature where existing interns can post descriptions about the interview process and give prospective interns tips about the interviews. Another cool feature is the ability to use Facebook Connect to integrate Facebook friends and features into internSHARE. internSHARE, which is student-run, recently merged with Coop.com, another Canadian-based internship database, boosting its users from to 8900 and creating over 2400 reviews for companies. Its seems that the site is slightly Canadian-centric. Most of the mid-size and smaller companies reviewed are Canadian based. And the job data base, whose listings are pretty paltry (there are currently only 6 internship listings, all in Canada), needs to be expanded in order for the site to really serve as a all-in-one solution to prospective interns. InternshipRatings provides a comprehensive database of U.S. internship reviews but doesn’t feature internship listings. InternshipIN and AfterCollege just offer internship listings. I think internSHARE has a good idea in trying to be a comprehensive database for students but needs to add internships in a variety of areas to appeal to U.S. students as well. And the site needs to offer more than 6 prospective jobs to college students. Crunch Network : MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
 
Dell Belatedly Buys Adamo.com Domain For Its Hot Notebook Top
Last week, a blog post hit Techmeme detailing how Dell had screwed up by not securing Adamo.com for its ultra-thin notebook, which CrunchGear’s John Biggs spotted at SXSW a day before its official release on March 17. It’s not like they tried: the former owner of the domain name, Tucows subsidiary YummyNames , has no record of ever even being approached for a sale or lease of the internet address. Dell claims they had a broker contact the firm anonymously, who was quickly convinced the price would be too high (yet YummyNames leases domains from $750 per month). The computer manufacterer instead went with AdamoByDell.com but belatedly realized it wouldn’t be such a terrible idea to own or at least use Adamo.com too. Now they’ve finally made a move and acquired it outright for an undisclosed sum which was probably much higher than what they’d have paid a couple of weeks ago, according to Domain Name Wire . Both domain names now redirect to the product website. As DNW points out, Apple also purchased the iPhone.com domain name after launching the product, and there are many more historic examples of this. No doubt, companies will keep making mistakes like this in the future as well. Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
TechCrunch Europe meetups - Saturday and Monday in San Fran Top
Everyone knows there are plenty of Europeans already in Silicon Valley, but Web 2.0 Expo San Francicisco provides a reasonable opportunity for those of us on the other side of the pond to invade en masse. Which is why TechCrunch Europe is organising a couple of meetups as part of our particular invasion. How about that - a TechCrunch invasion from a different continent. The first involves a bunch of British and Irish firms on a co-ordinated attack on the Valley. WebMission09 involves 20 companies rattling around the Valley meeting investors and making contacts. TechCrunch Europe is co-hosting them tonight (Saturday) for the WebMission09 Cocktails @ Ozumo bar , adjacent to the Harbor Court Hotel in downtown SF. And on Monday night it’s an ad-hoc meetup in downtown SF just prior to Web2Expo. Logistics-wise we don’t have a venue for the meetup right now right now but it’s likely to be within striking distance of the Galleria Park Hotel on Sutter St. Sponsors of the bar are very welcome! To get an update on the venue for Monday, leave a comment on this post or follow Mike Butcher, TechCrunch Europe editor on Twitter , or follow the official WebMission09 hashtag of wm09 - you’ll find us. Crunch Network : MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.
 
Does Hunch Have All The Answers? We Take Flickr Founder's New Startup For A Spin Top
Earlier today Flickr co-founder Caterina Fake announced the release of her latest startup, Hunch , in private beta. The site revolves around helping users make decisions spanning a wide array of topics. To help users make their decisions, Hunch presents them with a brief series of questions that have been submitted by other members, using their responses to help them make their ultimate decision. It’s a great idea that combines the crowd-sourced nature of Wikipedia with services like Yahoo Answers. But does it work? We’ve managed to get our hands on an invite to the service, and have put it to the test. From the start, it is clear that the site is very clean and unintimidating despite an already-large amount of data. Users are presented with a handful of featured topics on the homepage, most of which have been ‘played’ through many times before so they have complete sets of questions and answers. To the right of the page is a widget enticing users to anwer questions about themselves, which helps the system make more accurate judgements (the placement of the widget is clever - users are constantly invited to participate but aren’t forced to toil through a lengthy initial signup to ‘teach’ the system). And the questions used to analyze users are actually pretty fun (I was asked goofy questions such as “Do you believe in alien abductions” along with more conventional questions like “Where do you live”). The bottom of the home page includes social features, including an activity feed and a listing of active users and members who are most similar (and dissimilar) to you. The site appears to employ a Twitter-like ‘follow’ system, so you can keep tabs on your favorite users. All in all the site looks slick, but does Hunch really have all the answers? At this point the site covers around 500 subjects, ranging from topics on computers and gadgets to relationships and dating. Some of the questions are just for amusement (which Star Wars character am I?), but most of them aspire to be genuinely helpful. After picking a question you’d like to have answered, the site presents a series of multiple choice questions (you always have the option to skip a question if you don’t know how to answer it). At the end, the system presents an answer, along with its next-best guesses ranked according to how confident it is with its decision. For example, say you were looking to decide between purchasing either a PC or a Mac. The site will present a series of structured questions set up by other users, such as “What do you intend to use the computer for?” In theory this is supposed to be better than asking the question on a general Q&A site like Yahoo Answers, because you won’t have to deal with the bitter flamewars that inevitably result. After entering ten questions or fewer, the system will spit out your answer. The questions asked by Hunch, and ultimately the decisions it produces, are determined by user input. After ‘playing through’ each decision, users are asked if they don’t agree with the results, and can vote to change the way their answers were judged. Hunch also keeps track of which of the questions it asks have objective answers (”How much are you willing to pay?”) and which of them are more subjective, weighting each of these accordingly and taking the user’s personality profile into account. For those topics that are highly controversial (like the aforementioned Mac vs PC decision), Hunch also tracks items that are seeing a large amount of activity and can regulate them. I ran through a number of trial questions, ranging from deciding if I should rent or buy a car to figuring out a good line to use on a date. For the most part I was impressed, though it quickly became clear that Hunch isn’t capable of magically making up your mind for you. After walking through questions I was often met with answers that were presented with around 55% certainty - not nearly enough to blindly follow Hunch’s guidance. Hunch would provide explanations for why it felt a certain option was best for me, but the fact of the matter is that decisions are rarely black and white, and there isn’t much Hunch can do about that. At this point I’m optimistic about Hunch - the site still has too few users to really be considered comprehensive, but many of the questions and resulting decisions I found were genuinely helpful. That said, Hunch is still going to be fighting an uphill battle: most people have been using resources like Wikipedia, Google, and Yahoo Answers to conduct research for years, and it’s going to be tough to break them out of the habit no matter how well Hunch works. Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
 
Is Facebook Purposefully Lowballing Its Official User Numbers? Top
Facebook updates its official user numbers periodically on a statistics page that currently says 175 million users. They say that they update it every 25 million users, but many of us have long suspected that they may trail by much more than that. So how many users does Facebook really have? Check out this video (which we’ve clipped above), where Facebook developer Wei Zhu seems unsure how many users they’re allowed to say they have, until someone official steps in and corrects him with “200 million.” Zhu says Facebook has “250 or 60 million users,” then says “280.” At that point someone off frame says “200″ in an official voice, which Zhu then sticks to. But he doesn’t look like he’s happy about it. Comscore, which if anything tends to under report user numbers for most sites, says that Facebook had 276 million monthly visitors in February. Active users and monthly visitors aren’t the same thing, but they’re close, and with a closed site like Facebook, they should be very close. If Facebook has far more than 175 (or 200) million users, why aren’t they proudly announcing it? Perhaps because of all of the speculation on Facebook’s absurd growth over the last year . Specifically, all that growth is leading to outside analysis of Facebook’s costs, and when they might need more money . Conspiracy theory or a coverup to hide the true costs of running Facebook? You decide. Update: Zhu comments below, effectively neutering the coverup theory: Michael, I really just made a stupid mistake when I said "250-260 million users" instead of "150-160 million" :-). There is no conspiracy of any sort. I normally remember the number correctly, though. Oh wait. I was in the middle of a bad cold when I gave the talk and am still resting at home today. It must have been the cold. Wei Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 
Breaking: Former AOL Chief Jonathan Miller To Become News Corp.'s CEO Digital Media Top
Jonathan Miller , the former CEO of AOL, is taking over the digital assets of News Corp., we’ve confirmed independently - his new title will be CEO of Digital Media. This will include Fox Interactive Media and other duties. Peter Levinsohn , the current president of Fox Interactive, will be leaving his current position but will remain at News Corp. This is more than a little ironic. Miller currently works with Ross Levinsohn at Velocity Interactive Group - and Ross Levinsohn was the head of Fox Interactive before Peter Levinsohn took the position in late 2006. This means Miller is now running MySpace and other News Corp. digital assets, making him MySpace CEO Chris DeWolfe’s fifth boss in the last few years. Miller was under contractual obligations with AOL not to work with AOL competitors until this month. Time Warner vetoed his appointment to the Yahoo board of directors last year under the agreement. We and others have been speculating for weeks that Peter Levinsohn would soon be replaced (particularly since his champion, Peter Chernin, recently announced his own departure ) along with a possible reorganization of FIM. Levinsohn is definitely out. What isn’t clear is how the division is being reorganized, but the job will almost certainly be bigger than running the existing FIM assets. Stay tuned. Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
 
Facebook "Definitely" Raising Capital This Year; Google Considered Acquisition Top
Last October we wrote about how Facebook’s breakaway growth combined with a declining advertising market was forcing the company back to the capital markets . The company has been all over the place with on record comments about fundraising since that post. In November Founder Mark Zuckerberg firmly said “No” in response to the question “"Do you need money?" But in December Zuckerberg told me the company was open to raising more capital , but only at the previous $15 billion valuation : We discussed Facebook fundraising issues and valuation. He said some of the speculation was true and some wasn't. he confirmed that Facebook's $15 billion valuation round was still open and that CFO Gideon Yu was open to new investors at that price. But he denied that Facebook was pitching for new money at a lower valuation. "We're not actively going around trying to raise money from a lot of different people. It's more just a follow on to that [previous round]." Fast forward to last month, when Facebook board member Peter Thiel told BusinessWeek the company did not need to raise any more money and had sufficient cash to continue at its current growth rate. And then yesterday BusinessWeek reported that Facebook is looking to raise new debt capital to replace a $100 million line of credit. So Are They Raising Money Or Not? Yes, they are. eMarketer projects Facebook revenues of $230 million in 2009. Our sources say this is way low, and that Facebook will hit at least $300 million in 2009 revenues. But the costs of running this ginormous company are staggering. Facebook may be burning though $20 million or more per month, even on top of revenues. The problem with Facebook’s growth is that it’s all international, and those users just aren’t as profitable to the company (see our model from last summer ). Our sources tell us that Facebook probably has around $300 million left in cash. If growth were to freeze at this point they’d have 15 months or so of runway. With their staggering growth rate, it may not last that long. We’re hearing they plan on raising money sometime this year to give themselves enough cushion to get to an IPO, or at the very least get through the economic downturn. Our sources say they’re pitching the company at a $10 billion valuation, but would be “thrilled” with a $5 billion valuation. Google Thinks Facebook Is Worth $2 Billion. We’ve also heard that there have been very low level conversations between Google and Facebook around an equity investment or outright acquisition. But these conversations never made it to the senior execs at Facebook. Perhaps because Google’s internal modeling may have valued Facebook at just $2 billion. There’s no way Facebook is going to take that valuation without a fight. So what will happen? Our guess is Facebook will take as much debt as they can to give themselves some breathing room. If revenue growth is as healthy as we’re hearing it is the company may be able to justify a higher valuation when they inevitably do take more equity funding. The big question is, what exactly will Facebook’s next valuation be? Update: A new source now tells us that Facebook’s internal revenue projections for 2009 are over $400 million, much of which is driven by the self serve ad system. We’re also getting confirmation on Facebook’s $300 million in current cash. Crunch Network : CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors
 
OMG, OnStar May Soon Let You Twitter From Your Car Top
All you Twitter addicts stuck in traffic, some good news. You might not have to risk your life any longer sending out one-handed Tweets on your Blackberry or iPhone, while trying to hide the fact that you are doing so under the dashboard. If you have OnStar in your car, you may soon be able to send and receive hands-free Tweets through OnStar’s voice-activated calling system. Andru Edwards at Gear Live discovered the potential feature. Your voice messages will be converted into text and sent to all of your Twitter followers. (Don’t worry if the translation is not perfect, everyone will think you are just using Twitter’s abbreviated style). It is not clear, however, whether or not the system tells you if you are over the 140-character limit. I can just see it now. Instead of listening to the radio, people will start listening to everyone they are following on Twitter (your Twitter stream can be read to you by the OnStar system). Then you are lost, and instead of using teh OnStar GPS, you ask your followers for directions. And they each give you a different way to go. This is definitely a sign of the Armageddon. Crunch Network : CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.
 
Lawsuit Forces TheFunded To Shutter Service (or early April Fools joke) Top
TheFunded , a website that rates venture funds based on first hand experiences from readers, is shutting down on April 2, according to a notice posted on the site today. This very well may be an April Fools joke, although founder Adeo Ressi has not returned our email requesting comment. The fact that the service isn’t shutting down immediately also suggests this is fake. The site has been controversial from the start , and many investors have never been pleased with TheFunded. Last August the company was involved in a lawsuit brought by a venture capitalist trying to track the identity of an anonymous commenter. TheFunded recently opened a new section of the site listing banned investors - that part of the site is no longer live. We’ll update when Ressi confirms its real or a joke. The last part of the message, below, is so rife with sarcasm that I’m leaning towards it being fake. The message: Conclusion: Investors are Great “On Friday, March 27th, TheFunded, Incorporated (’TheFunded’ or ‘we’ or ‘the Company’), in conjunction with counsel has concluded that venture financing and the purchase of preferred equity, herein referred to as ‘investing’ or ‘investment’ or ‘investors’, is both broadly and generally good for companies worldwide. TheFunded will officially cease reviews on April 2nd, 2009, which, from time to time, reflect negatively on the many innumerable benefits of investors or investment or investing. We encourage companies to consider seriously taking investment, and we apologize for the following statement made in haste: “investing is predatory”, “over 75% of investors are bad”, “avoid banned investors.” The Company further apologizes for making any other statements and causing questions to be raised regarding the ethics and the good reputation of investors. Further updates are forthcoming Wednesday, and we encourage every Member to take an investment and then post feedback on the positive and rewarding experiences in Open Letters. Thank you.” Crunch Network : CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0
 

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