Happy One Year Anniversary, Jerry
By xaby | June 20, 2008
Tomorrow marks Jerry Yang’s one year anniversary of his first day as CEO of Yahoo.
What a year it’s been. Yahoo failed to sell itself to Microsoft, handed its search marketing business to Google, and lost nearly all of its key executives. It’s shareholders are in open revolt, and the board appears to be ignoring the situation.
In a blog post on his first day on the job, Yang thanked former CEO Terry Semel, praised President Sue Decker, saying she has “a fierce focus on winning.” And he outlined his joint vision for success that he shared with Decker:
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: Search Engine News | No Comments »
Not So Social: Google And Facebook Face-Off At Supernova
By xaby | June 20, 2008
Today at the Supernova conference there was a panel about who owns the social graph. The panelists were Kevin Marks from Google, Joseph Smarr from Plaxo and Dave Morin, Facebook’s Senior Platform Manager. The conversation turned very interesting when moderator Tantek Celik pointed out a post by David Recordon that showed how Facebook is blocking Google’s Friend Connect product, and not allowing users to extract their Facebook social graph through Google. Morin from Facebook said that the reason they’re doing it is because Google’s implementation didn’t comply with the terms of use, while Marks from Google responded saying they strongly believed they were within the usage terms, and others suggested that there may be an ulterior motive for blocking friend connect.
Topics: General, Search Engine News, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Kaltura Releases Revamped MediaWiki Extension
By xaby | June 20, 2008
Kaltura, the open-source video platform, has released a new version of its MediaWiki extension that allows users to embed and edit video, images, and audio on wiki pages. MediaWiki is a wiki software package that was initially developed for Wikipedia and has since been used by a number of other sites.
Kaltura says that the new release “includes a fresh look & feel for the video player, a simplified interface for the online video editor, improved administration capabilities (patrolling capabilities, detailed history and diff pages, etc.), localization to several languages, and better documentation”. While none of these changes sound groundbreaking, the patrolling and history improvements help make the extension better suited to wikis - a necessity given that Wikipedia has partnered with Kaltura to bring video content to the site.
Kaltura launched at TechCrunch 40, and was the winner of the People’s Choice spot.
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: Up and Coming?, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Microsoft Gets Into Interactive TV Ads; Buys Navic Networks For An Estimated $200 to $300 Million
By xaby | June 20, 2008
Microsoft is going after the $70 billion spent on TV ads every year. This morning it announced that it will acquire Navic Networks, a company based in Waltham, Massachusetts that delivers interactive ads across cable TV networks.
The price was not disclosed, but a source close to the company pegs it at between $200 million and $300 million. Navic raised about $43 million between 1999 and 2001 from Himalaya Capital, Highland Capital Partners, Pequot (now FirstMark Capital), Pilot House Ventures, and Gary Lauder.
Navic’s ads are interactive overlays similar to what some advertisers are trying with online video. Except that they are targeted by zipcode to each cable subscriber. As you are watching a regular TV commercial, for instance, you could click on an overlay that opens up a window with more information on the screen, or ask for a brochure to be sent to you via e-mail or regular mail (since the cable company has your address, that’s easy).
TV still represents the majority of advertising spending, and Microsoft needs to be a player there if it wants advertising to become a significant portion of its revenues. While Navic brings interactivity to TV advertising, it does not yet tie back into online advertising campaigns. Microsoft could bridge that gap.
Google is already experimenting with TV ads that can be bought through AdWords and measured on Google Analytics. But Google is confined to Echostar satellite TV subscribers, because the cable companies don’t want to give it access to their subscribers (and have their own effort, the Project Canoe, to crack this nut). Spot Runner is also moving towards integrating online and TV ad campaigns. Although, it runs regular video ads on TV, not interactive ones.
As I’ve argued before, what we need is the interactivity and targeting ability of Web video ads on TV. Perhaps this is a step in that direction.
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: Internet Marketing, Search Engine News | No Comments »
Update: Reddit Tries To Compete the Open-Source Way
By xaby | June 20, 2008
It is not easy being No.2. As we hinted yesterday, Reddit, the news voting site that was bought by Conde Nast in 2006, is making the code behind its site open source. (The code can be found here). That means anyone can now make their own Digg-like site. Not that there has been any lack of Digg clones in the past. Reddit’s move to open-source its software is merely an acknowledgment that it is already a commodity.
The truth is that it is not the technology that makes sites like Digg or Reddit successful. It is the people who use them. And the more people who use them, the more useful they become. It is a classic, network-effect, winner-take-most market.
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: General, Up and Coming?, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Twitturly Living Up To Its Potential As Great News Source
By xaby | June 20, 2008
I wrote about twitturly in April. The service scans Twitter, looks for links that people are talking about then organizes them by popularity on the home page, and the stories then degrade over time. Anyone who uses Digg, TechMeme, Reddit or other news aggregators will feel at home there.
Right now, for example, the page is dominated by Firefox and Flickr news, which hit the headlines yesterday. I expect over the course of the day new items will start to take mindshare with Twitter users.
The best comparison for the service is Delicious Popular, which also shows popular links and degrades over time. Twitturly has the added benefit of seeing what users are saying about the links as well.
Based on the quality of the data (I was worried in my original post about spam) and the modest traffic growth at the still-young site, this looks like a winner. By winner I mean a service that I at least will check multiple times per day for possible news, and anything useful tends to have staying power. Twitter is becoming THE place that world news breaks first, and Twitturly is one of the tools that people can use to quickly filter what’s going on. The next time something big happens, I’ll try to remember to check the site and see how long it takes to filter from random Twitter messages to a top spot on Twitturly.
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: General, Up and Coming?, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Will 2008 Be Google’s End Of Innocence?
By xaby | June 20, 2008
2008 may be the year that Google’s innocence ends, as media and governments start to cast a less forgiving eye at the behavior of the company that controls 60% of the search market and perhaps as much as half of all online advertising revenue.
In 2007 the Federal Trade Commission opened
an antitrust investigation into Google’s $3.1 billion acquisition of DoubleClick. The deal was eventually approved, although the EU took a lot longer to give their stamp of approval (The EU in general isn’t a fan of Google).
This year, though, things might not go so well. Politicians are lining up to question Google’s recent search marketing deal with Yahoo. The deal was clearly structured to try to slide past regulators, but it isn’t clear that this time Google will get a pass.
Topics: Search Engine News | No Comments »
Confirmed: Yahoo’s Jeff Weiner To Split Time at Accel And Greylock
By xaby | June 20, 2008
Jeff Weiner, the executive VP in charge of Yahoo’s network division (which includes the portal, search, media, and communications products) is officially leaving.
The news, which already leaked last week, is that Weiner will become an executive in residence at both Accel Partners and Greylock Partners. He will advise portfolio companies for both firms, and help evaluate new investments.
Joining two competing VC firms unusual, especially since he may become privy to competitive information. But Weiner is obviously valued enough by both firms that they decided to share him. He starts in September.
In any case, it should be easier for an executive in residence to recuse himself from discussions where conflicts may arise than it would be for a full partner. The executive in residence position is typically a sabbatical of sorts for talented business leaders in between jobs. Looking at all those deals is a great way to find the next great startup in need of a CEO.
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: Search Engine News | No Comments »
Sue Decker’s Email To Yahoo Employees On Weiner’s Departure
By xaby | June 20, 2008
The news is now official - Yahoo’s EVP Jeff Weiner has officially bailed. President Sue Decker addresses the troops in an all hands email, below. These types of emails leak regularly, of course (I actually think companies would be disappointed if they didn’t), so they tend to read like a press release.
Nevertheless, it is amazing how she can talk about the “amazing progress” at Yahoo as though she doesn’t have a care in the world. And why is this letter about such a high-level departure coming from Decker instead of CEO Jerry Yang? Oh yeah, he has other things to worry about.
The full email is below.
Full Story at Techcrunch
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: Search Engine News | No Comments »
Google’s Joe Kraus Discusses the Social Web At Supernova Conference
By xaby | June 20, 2008
Google’s Director of Product Management Joe Kraus (the guy behind Open Social and other Google products) is talking today at the Supernova Conference in San Francisco on the topic of “social computing” and the how Google Friend Connect fits into the ecosystem with OpenID, OAuth, etc. The live stream is below.
Note: The video halts around the 9:23 mark because of bad reception. You’ll need to manually seek past that point to continue watching until the end.
Sphere: Related ContentTopics: Uncategorized | No Comments »
« Previous Entries Next Entries »