Archives: March 2006

Hey YouOS!

Posted by: Steve Hamm on March 31

Where do people get the nerve to do things like this? YouOS, a four-person startup in Silicon Valley, has just debuted a beta of their technology, which they call a...

YouTube: New NBC or New Napster?

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 31

When someone from YouTube told a gathering at PC Forum a few weeks ago that it was serving 30 million video streams a DAY, no small number of people there...

"Tom Is Not My Friend"

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 30

Poor Tom Anderson, the cofounder of MySpace. (Well, not really poor, having sold to News Corp. last year for $580 million, but anyway.) It seems the most popular T-shirt...

Trip Hawkins vs EA

Posted by: Steve Hamm on March 30

Electronic games industry pioneer Trip Hawkins is still stewing over comments made last week by Mitch Lasky, senior vice-presidnet of EA Mobile. Previously, Lasky was CEO of Jamdat, the mobile...

What Will Google Use $2 Billion For?

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 29

As if it doesn't already mint money, Google's raising $2.1 billion more in a new offering. You sure don't need this kind of money to develop Web services, do you?...

Another Perspective on Facebook

Posted by: Peter Burrows on March 29

In Student Monitor's monthly report on what's hot with the collegiate set, Josh Weil highlighted what the market researcher says is some remarkable momentum for Facebook. He writes: College students...

Facebook for Sale; But $2 Billion?

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 28

So says our Steve Rosenbush in a story today. Apparently, the social-networking site turned down an offer for $750 million. Even that's way more than the $580 million News Corp....

Wireless Citizen Journalists

Posted by: Olga Kharif on March 28

British telco 3 lets citizen journalists get paid for photos and videos they snap with their phones. I wouldn't be surprised if this proves to be a highly profitable service for 3.

eBay's Skype Sued by StreamCast

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 27

According to VoIP Watch's Andy Abramson, StreamCast Networks has sued Skype, claiming StreamCast owns the FastTrack peer-to-peer technology powering the Internet phone phenom Skype, which eBay bought last year for...

Yuchun Lee's big scores

Posted by: Steve Hamm on March 24

Yuchun Lee won't say how much money he made as a member of the club of MIT-related brainiacs who regularly make killings at America's casinos. "It's good money," is his...

Azure Capital: A New Twist on the VC Game?

Posted by: Peter Burrows on March 24

As we were closing a piece for the magazine this week on Azure Capital, the news broke that the obstruction of justice charges against Frank Quattrone had been overturned. Normally,...

Edgeio's New Blog Platform

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 24

When Edgeio soft-launched a few weeks ago, it got a lot of deserved attention for its novel idea of vacuuming up classified-ad listings logically tagged "listing" on millions of blogs...

Cell Phones: Intel Inside

Posted by: Olga Kharif on March 23

"Intel Inside" labels will soon start popping up on cell phones. That should give Intel's efforts to dominate the cell phone market a major boost.

PayPal's Goin' Mobile

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 23

eBay's PayPal is getting back to its roots as a person-to-person payment service with a new mobile service. You can find out more here, but essentially, you can use your...

Nokia to Up the Ante on Mobile Games

Posted by: Olga Kharif on March 21

On March 20, Nokia announced its premium game platform, an approach that I think could change mobile gaming as we know it and deal a blow to rivals like Sony.

AirPlayTV: Marrying Cell Phones and TV

Posted by: Olga Kharif on March 20

I recently talked with Morgan Guenther, former president of TiVO, who on March 20 announced his latest venture, a very different kind of a mobile gaming company. AirPlayTV, which will launch in September, will make mobile games designed to be played while watching TV shows.

Free Thinking on the Web

Posted by: Steve Hamm on March 17

T.J. Kang, the CEO of ThinkFree Inc., is a never-say-die sort of guy. Ever since 1983 he has been building desktop productivity applications as an alternative to Microsoft's dominant Office...

Web Advertising's Flight to Quality

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 17

My colleague Steve Baker has a story on what's coming next in Web advertising: tracking not just our clicks but our actual behavior in viewing ads. The race is on...

Omidyar Network Pays Attention

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 17

I'm trying to get educated on the concept that our attention online is a valuable commodity that we can and should be able to take control of--even get compensated for...

New Addition to the Memeorandum Family: Group Gossip

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 17

Missed this a couple days ago, but if you love celebrity gossip, check out WeSmirch.com, described as an "automatic dirt digger." It's not exactly my thing, but Memeorandum founder...

Juniper Drops Message Board Users Lawsuit

Posted by: Olga Kharif on March 15

Networking gearmaker Juniper just dropped its lawsuit against Light Reading message board users. Kudos to Juniper for nixing a lawsuit that only resulted in bad publicity for the company.

You Know the Next Big Thing Is Near...

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 15

... when people are saying there won't be any such thing anymore....

Why Would Vodafone Sell Verizon Wireless?

Posted by: Olga Kharif on March 14

There have been lots of media reports speculating that Vodafone will sell its stake in Verizon Wireless to joint venture partner Verizon. I think such a sale doesn't make sense for Vodafone. Unless, that is, Verizon is willing to pay a super-fat premium.

Amazon's Newest Product: Storage

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 13

Huh? That's right, the online store with "Earth's biggest selection" of everything from books to zithers will announce Tuesday morning that it's adding a new and different kind of service:...

Nucleus to SAP: Gotcha!

Posted by: Steve Hamm on March 13

And we thought the war of words between software giants SAP and Oracle was bad. Now the German company that dominates the corporate application market is trading verbal jabs with...

If Selling Out to Google Isn't a Good Business Model...

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 09

... why does it seem to work so well? The latest to get scooped up: Web-based word processing startup Writely. I agree with the many folks who worry that there...

Bag Borrow or Steal

Posted by: Sarah Lacy on March 07

This time it's not my horrible pun in the headline-- that's the name of a Seattle startup wants to be the Netflix for ladies' luxury goods from Tiffany's jewelry to...

MySpace: Your New Classifieds Service?

Posted by: Olga Kharif on March 07

Popular social network MySpace is ramping up its classifieds advertising efforts. I think it could prove to be a formidable competitor to current classifieds heavyweights: newspapers and sites like Craigslist.com and Monster.com.

Google Ratings: More Chips at eBay's Armor

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 06

Scot Wingo, CEO of the online merchant services firm ChannelAdvisor, notes that Google appears to be developing a reputation system for Google Base, which many folks already think is a...

Craig on Your Coffee Table

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 02

Just spied this job listing--on Craigslist, where else?--for someone to write a coffee-table book on the classified-ad service that's roiling everyone from newspaper chains to eBay. The employer: Michael Ferris...

Out in the Ether?

Posted by: Rob Hof on March 02

First flagged by TechCrunch, Ether has just launched as a sort of eBay for services. You can sign up, get an Internet phone number, and start offering your expertise over...