Wednesday, April 4, 2012

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Zynga Grabs RockYou's Julie Shumaker For VP of North American Sales Top
julie-shumakerZynga is bolstering its brand advertising efforts by bringing on Julie Shumaker from RockYou as the company's new vice president of North American sales. She'll report to Jeff Karp, Zynga's chief marketing and revenue officer. The move should help cover at least one recent vacancy. The company's global director of brand advertising, Manny Anekal, recently defected to mobile advertising startup Kiip to serve as chief operating officer. This is a key time for Zynga's nascent advertising efforts as the company puts its weight behind a new gaming destination off Facebook. With its own gaming platform, Zynga should be able to earn a greater revenue share from ads than it has historically. Last year, Zynga earned just $47.1 million or 5.7 percent of its total revenues from advertising. The lion's share came from virtual currency sales.
 
Need A New Name For Your Website? Why Not NameStation? Top
Screen Shot 2012-04-04 at 12.44.33 PMYou've dropped out of college, met a dude who is totally into PHP, and you're ready to build a startup. Where do you begin? With a name, silly! That's where NameStation.com comes in. It's basically a naming tool for creators and creatives who need to build a bunch of odd names on the fly. In the short time I spent with the app, I found a few great website names including a name for my new gaming start-up, fragron.com, and my artisinal pig delivery service, porkst.com. Ok. Maybe they need a little work, but you get the idea. The service can offer potential names in multiple languages and even "reads" the name out loud for you in case you weren't sure how to pronounce it.
 
PayPal Debuts Tiered Suite Of Online, Offline And Mobile Payments Options For Small Businesses Top
PayPaAs we heard over the past few months, PayPal is ramping up its payments options for large and small merchants. The payments giant debuted an in-store payments platform for large retailers; PayPal Here, a card swiper that attaches to a mobile phone for small businesses; and hinted at a brand new PayPal wallet. Today, PayPal is rebranding its services for small businesses as PayPal Payments, which suite of business products with three tiers of capabilities to give US small businesses multiple payment options that work for them. Peter Karpas, North American Vice President of Customer Engagement at PayPal, tell us that this is next evolution of PayPal's payments product for small businesses. "As the lines between online, offline and mobile are blurring, we are doing a comprehensive revamp of our products, allowing small businesses to get paid however they do business."
 
Canonical Metal-as-a-Service: Not Quite As Cool As It Sounds Top
metal-onlyCanonical, the corporate sponsor of the Ubuntu Linux distribution, has been doing a lot of interesting development work across a number of different computing segments: their on-going work with the Unity interface for Ubuntu, Ubuntu TV, Ubuntu for Android, and a whole lot more. Ubuntu, according to Canonical, is the world's most popular OS for public, private, and hybrid clouds. Not content with being a tenant, Canonical is pushing to make Ubuntu the number one OS for running clouds, too. Similarly uncontent with existing descriptors like Platform-as-a-Service (Paas) and Infrastructure-as-a-Service (Iaas), Canonical is announcing their own Metal-as-a-Service (MaaS). When I first heard the term "Metal as a Service", I admit that I immediately envisioned Ubuntu's Jono Bacon distributing heavy metal free software songs. MaaS is, in fact, a new server orchestration solution cooked up by Canonical.
 
Google's Augmented Reality Glasses Are Real And In Testing Top
glass_photos4After weeks of speculation and rumors, Google has officially pulled back the curtain on what they have come to call Project Glass -- a pair of augmented reality glasses that seek to provide users real-time information right in front of their eyes. "We think technology should work for you—to be there when you need it and get out of your way when you don't," wrote Babak Parviz, Steve Lee, and Sebastian Thrun, three Google employees who are part of the Google X skunkworks. "We're sharing this information now because we want to start a conversation and learn from your valuable input." Something tells me that they won't be hurting for feedback.
 
With Picnik's Demise, Aviary Brings Its Slick, HTML5 Photo Editor To Flickr's 75 Million Users Top
aviary-1Aviary, the company that makes it easy for mobile developers to integrate image editing into their apps, is debuting a huge partnership today. The New York-based startup will be powering photo editing for Flickr's 75 million users. Picnik was the default photo editor for Flickr for some time now, even after Google bought the startup. But Google decided to shut down Picnik, and and editor will be removed from Flickr as of April 19, 2012.
 
Yapp Raises Funding From Kleiner Perkins To Allow Anyone To Create Mobile Apps For Events Top
YappMaria Seidman helps organize a monthly womens' networking event for her business school alums in New York City but was frustrated with some of the options for creating a dedicated mobile app for an event. So she decided to create a DIY mobile app creation platform herself. Today, her brainchild, Yapp is launching as an online service where a consumer — even if they lack any technical or design skills — can create a beautiful mobile app in minutes. As Seidman explains to me, she believes that one day everyone will be able to create a mobile app but doesn't believe that one platform can create apps for everyone and that consumers, developers and even companies need different options for various skill sets. She's targeting the consumer audience with Yapp, which wants to make it as simple to create an app as it is to create an online invitation.
 
Pulse Adds 20 Titles From Popular Science Publisher Bonnier To Its Reading Stream, Its Biggest Launch Yet Top
Pulse Bonnier mag screenshotIn the landgrab among reading apps that aggregate content to make it more accessible on tablets and smartphones, one of the early movers, Pulse, is today announcing a deal with magazine publisher Bonnier that will give its offering a significant boost. Bonnier is adding 20 titles from its special-interest magazine portfolio to the Pulse reading stream, including titles like Field and Stream, Parenting, Saveur, Scuba Diving, Skiing and Sound + Vision. Pulse, which already had some 300 content partners on its platform, says the Bonnier deal is its biggest yet.
 
Real Estate Search Company Trulia Brings Its Rentals App To iPhone Top
map_srp_popupReal estate search company Trulia is adding to its mobile lineup today with the launch of Trulia Rentals for iPhone. The app joins its Android rentals-only counterpart, which launched back in September. Like the former, the new iPhone app will also offer a dedicated view of nearby rentals, including property details, photos, as well as other neighborhood rental info, including where restaurants, schools and other points of interest are located. In addition, the app will offer new property listings sent out via push notifications, the ability to save search, and a feature that connects you with a broker or landlord right from within the app.
 
FanDuel Raises Another Round For Its Clever Take On Fantasy Sports Top
top-10-fanduel-fantasy-opening-day-picks-1059175-flashDaily fantasy sports operator FanDuel isn't subject to online betting laws in the US thanks to daily fantasy sports games being exempt under the carve out in the 2006 Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act. That means it's virtually a license to print money in the US. However, FanDuel is 100% legal as it is classified as a game of skill not of chance. FanDuel says its revenues hit 4x in the past 6 months with the company giving out over $10m in fantasy payouts in 2011 and it plans to pay out up to $4m per month for the baseball season. Off the back of that success today the site has raised another $1.3m round of funding from existing investors, including Pentech and Piton Capital taking its total raised to date to $7m.
 
Acceleprise Wants To Be The 500 Startups For Enterprise Tech Top
BigAccelepriseLet the proliferation of vertically-themed startup accelerators continue! Today, a new accelerator focusing on the enterprise sector is launching in Washington D.C. Called "Acceleprise," the program's goal is to invest in 60 enterprise software companies over the next three years. Participating startups should be trying to solve problems facing large organizations, whether the Fortune 5000, large nonprofits, or government.
 
Fly Or Die: Nokia Lumia 900 Top
Screen shot 2012-04-04 at 10.29.30 AMThe Nokia Lumia 900 is set to be the question mark of the week. The embargo lifted last night, so everyone and their brother is posting a review, proudly giving yeas and nays on the first hard-core Nokia/Microsoft mobile offering. But what do John and I think? Well, the answer is two-fold, but the big guy and I always find common ground somewhere. With the Lumia 900, it's Windows Phone itself.
 
PhoneDeck Is A Game Changer For Small Businesses, Divorce Attorneys Top
Screen shot 2012-04-04 at 10.01.51 AMI sold mortgages over the phone in a previous life. That involved calling over 100 people a day using an archaic but functional web-based phone system. That system cost the company a fortune to implement and required a dedicated support staff. PhoneDeck does most of it for free. And it works directly with Android and S40 phones. This is disruption defined.
 
Strange Bedfellows: Google, Paramount Ink Deal For New Digital Movie Rentals Top
godfatherGood news, Godfather fans -- Google has just recently announced on their official YouTube blog that they've inked a licensing deal with Viacom-owned Paramount to bring some 500 new titles to YouTube and the Google Play store over the coming weeks. Google first started toying with the notion of movie rentals via YouTube in early 2010, and their rental catalog has since swelled to nearly 9,000 titles. Bringing movie rentals to the Android ecosystem took a little bit more time, with the feature launching in the Android Market in May 2011. With Paramount now in tow, Google has licensing agreements with five of the six major motion picture studios, with Fox being the only big player still sitting on the sidelines.
 
Windows Phone Marketplace Growth Keeps Up The Pace, Tops 80,000 Apps Top
windows-phone-7-marketplaceWindows Phone 7 is an excellent new mobile operating system — there's no doubt about that. But every rose has its thorn, and on Windows Phone it's a lack of apps. Luckily, the Marketplace seems to be growing at a rapid pace, today topping 80,000 apps. The platform has been slowly but steadily picking up steam, topping 50,000 apps in December, 60,000 in January, and 70,000 in March.
 
Yahoo Cuts 14 Percent Of Workforce; 2,000 Given Pink Slips; Will Save $375M Top
yahooYahoo has made its massive round of layoffs official. The company just released a statement saying that 2,000 jobs have been cut, or 14 percent of it total workforce (which was previously around 14,000). We've pasted the release below. "Today's actions are an important next step toward a bold, new Yahoo! – smaller, nimbler, more profitable and better equipped to innovate as fast as our customers and our industry require. We are intensifying our efforts on our core businesses and redeploying resources to our most urgent priorities. Our goal is to get back to our core purpose – putting our users and advertisers first – and we are moving aggressively to achieve that goal," said Yahoo's CEO Scott Thompson. "Unfortunately, reaching that goal requires the tough decision to eliminate positions. We deeply value our people and all they've contributed to Yahoo!."
 
Eight Mobile Ad Companies Get Behind ODIN In A Quest To Replace The UDID Top
odinMore than a half-dozen mobile ad companies are getting behind a working group called ODIN to find a new way of tracking and identifying iOS users that still respects their privacy. This is happening because Apple is pressuring developers to stop using an older method called UDIDs (or unique device ID numbers) faster than previously thought amid criticism that it compromises privacy. Velti, Jumptap, RadiumOne, Mdotm, StrikeAd, Smaato, Adfonic and SAY Media are hoping that by collaborating, they can influence the new standard that the rest of the mobile advertising industry will adopt. "We need to get everybody on the same page so that we have a uniform solution that ends up working for everyone," said Krishna Subramanian, who is Velti's chief marketing officer.
 
Show Us What You Got, Virginia: Let's Schedule A Quick Meeting Next Week Top
Old_GreggAs you may well know, we're having a series of three mini-meetups in DC, Norfolk, and Richmond next week. You've probably already RSVPed, but I'd like to spend Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday mornings visiting some cool companies in the area. I think I'm already full in Norfolk - someone is dragging us around - but DC and Richmond are wide open. If you have a cool office, a cool product, or a hardware start-up, we want to hear from you. Are you building an iPhone app or a robot? Let's talk. Are you building a B2B marketing platform for the Albanian market? Maybe bring your pitch deck to the meet-up. Our time will be short in these cities and I'd like to shoot some cool video so ideally the more visual the better. We'll have plenty of time to talk at the event that night. So if you have something for us to see, email us at john@techcrunch.com with the subject "COOL STUFF [city of your choice]" and we'll try to schedule some meetings. Sound good? Good.
 
Mogreet Nabs $4.1M For An Easy Way To Share Rich Media To Any Mobile Device Top
Screen shot 2012-04-04 at 5.16.04 AMMogreet, a Los Angeles-based mobile video marketing startup, is today announcing that it has raised $4.1 million in strategic capital. The round was led by Black Diamond Ventures, with participation from existing investors, including DFJ Frontier, Ascend Ventures, Bryant Park Ventures, and Draper Associates. The new infusion of capital brings the startup's total funding to $14.1 million.
 
Founder Of Dubai's First Startup Accelerator Looks To Educate, Inspire Global Entrepreneurs Top
Screen Shot 2012-03-13 at 6.18.52 PMWith how much TechCrunch and other tech publications cover incubators and accelerators in Silicon Valley and in the U.S., it's refreshing to occasionally get a glimpse of what's happening outside North America, especially those places where startup incubation and entrepreneurial activity is on the rise. One such example is a relatively new startup accelerator and seed fund called SeedStartup, which makes its home in Dubai, UAE. SeedStartup was founded by Rony El Nashar (who is also a managing partner), an entrepreneur an investor who is dedicated to finding and cultivating tech talent in the Middle East, which he says has seen an explosion of entrepreneurial enthusiasm over the last year. While SeedStartup was designed to begin to address the lack of funding and mentoring, the process starts with education. Especially education from the brightest minds and leaders in the tech sphere -- as they are the people that can help get would-be founders excited about taking the entrepreneurial leap of faith. To aid in that endeavor, Rony recently launched a side project called Cofounder TV, which is meant to be an educational resource for international entrepreneurs -- specifically in video form.
 

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