 | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
Syncing documents among multiple computers and smartphones is a pain in the kisser. SugarSync, which offers subscription sync services for as low as $4.99 a month, has added a clever feature based on everyone’s favorite ad hoc backup mechanism: You can now email it in. Send an attachment to your SugarSync account from your computer or smartphone. SugarSync will automatically sync it to your other devices.
The company has also bulked up its maximum storage locker size from 250 to 500 GB, for $39. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
ErGo Media Capital is launching today to invest venture capital and private equity into entertainment and media firms.
The New York-based company is headed by Matt Littin, who was co-founder of Cinetic Media. The company plans to invest as much as $15 million per deal, but it did not say how much money it has raised altogether. The fund is backed by ErGo Ventures, a private investment firm with holdings in aerospace, food and wine, real estate and technology.
The company will fund companies in film, video games, music, TV, and new media. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: eMarketer | Category: Metrics
When your site slows down, how long before visitors click away?
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: eMarketer | Category: Metrics
Cross-channel online marketing makes the sale
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
Yahoo expands relationship with Twitter — Yahoo plans to integrate Twitter broadly through its various web sites. In December, Yahoo integrated Facebook into its site. [graphic: AllThingsD]
Apple appoints Avon CEO as co-lead for its board — After facing criticism its board has been too insular, Apple has added Andrea Jung of Avon as a new board member. She quietly took the position in December.
Bikinis go back into App Store – After an embarrassing censorship debacle, Apple reinstated a banned bikini shopping app created by Simply Beach. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
Yahoo expands relationship with Twitter — Yahoo plans to integrate Twitter broadly through its various web sites. In December, Yahoo integrated Facebook into its site. [graphic: AllThingsD]
Apple appoints Avon CEO as co-lead for its board — After facing criticism that its board has been too insular, Apple has added Andrea Jung of Avon as a new co-lead board member. She quietly took the position in December, and has been on the board for two years.
Bikinis go back into App Store – After an embarrassing censorship debacle, Apple reinstated a banned bikini shopping app created by Simply Beach. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: GigaOM | Category: Media
Spotify, one of my favorite new companies, is getting more money. Earlier today, Michael Arrington reported that he had heard from multiple sources that the Founders Fund has invested in the fast growing European start-up.
“We do not know the size of the investment; however, we believe [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
George John is CEO of display advertising technology company Rocket Fuel.
It’s fashionable to talk about online ad inventory as a commodity that can be traded on exchanges and priced fairly through a market mechanism, just like trading stocks on Wall Street. The analogy misses important differences between online ad inventory and commodities, ones that create opportunities for companies that have the technology to capitalize on the distinctions.
Here’s the thing — online ad impressions are more like snowflakes than stocks: no two are exactly alike, and they melt. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
It was only a matter of time before the European Union got around to an antitrust investigation of Google. Published reports say that the trade regulator has written to Google, asking a series of questions about its search functions and the way that it sells advertising.
The queries come after complaints from United Kingdom search site Foundem, a price comparison site; Ciao, an online shopping site owned by Microsoft; and ejustice.fr, a French site which handles legal services. The investigation is reportedly under the Lisbon Treaty’s’ “abuse of dominant position” law. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
Juniper Networks upped its offensive against rival Cisco today with the announcement of a $50 million venture fund. The Junos Innovation Fund will primarily target early and growth-stage startups that can help accelerate the speed and variety of network solutions. The company plans to deploy the fund over the next two years.
The move is likely intended to cultivate applications that can earn the “Junos Ready” moniker, in hopes of catalyzing a broad ecosystem of supporting apps. As platforms like the iPhone and Android have shown, an operating system’s selection of innovative third-party apps can help win over a lot of market share very fast. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
Fuel cells have catapulted into the public spotlight this week following Bloom Energy’s 60 Minutes debut of its powerful Bloom Box fuel cell. But before all the talk of these devices powering buildings and neighborhoods, there was buzz about hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles. Today, Pike Research revisited the topic, issuing a report predicting 2.8 million fuel-cell vehicles to be sold over the next decade — amounting to a $23.9 billion market.
Several major automakers have recently announced intentions to get fuel-cell models into showrooms by 2015 — Daimler (its Mercedes Benz F-Cell is pictured above), Toyota (which just expanded its R&D program last month) and Honda chief among them. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: GigaOM | Category: Media
Security services firm ZScaler is out with its "State of the Web" report for Q4 of last year, which presents views -- many of them graphical -- of the changing habits and patterns of web users. While some results are predictable, there are a few surprises.
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
With rooftop solar panels becoming increasingly affordable, and more sellers entering the market, residential and commercial consumers alike could very well be paralyzed by choice. Should they go with standard photovoltaics? Thin-film panels? What’s a good price? Who do you get to install and maintain them? Now a startup called CivicSolar has emerged to answer these questions and deliver the best possible product.
Based in San Francisco, the company, which calls itself a direct solar distributor, has just raised $404,991 in seed funding — of a targeted $501,200 round — according to a filing with the SEC. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
Event management site Eventbrite launched a new service today for non-profits. Eventbrite for Causes is open to all US-based non-profits with 501(c)(3) status. It will charge non-profits 2% of the event ticket price plus 99 cents per ticket sold (the normal rate is 2.5% of the ticket price plus 99 cents per ticket sold).
Eventbrite’s new service lets attendees to an event share their attendance plans and make donations via social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, which Eventbrite hopes will increase sales by word-of-mouth. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: GigaOM | Category: Media
Aha Mobile’s newly revised mobile application includes news, podcasts, social media streams, and information about nearby businesses, with minimal finger gestures and onscreen reading required in an effort to ensure the safety of both drivers and the people around them.
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
We’ve known this was coming for some time, but Youtube has finally announced a date for the end of its Internet Explorer 6 support: March 13, 2010. Starting on that date, IE6 users who visit Youtube will be presented with the above message to cajole them into upgrading to a modern browser.
Youtube won’t be killing access to IE6 users — they will still be able to view videos, add comments, etc. — it’s just fair warning that new features will not take IE6 into account. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
Another big change is afoot in the world of mobile advertising. Millennial Media — the largest independent mobile ad network, and itself the subject of buyout speculation — announced today that it is acquiring the mobile analytics firm TapMetrics. The news follows Google’s recent acquisition of Admob for $750 million, and Apple’s purchase of Quattro Wireless, another mobile ad firm, for $275 million. Further details on the deal were not disclosed.
The addition of TapMetrics allows Millennial Media to offer mobile developers an online dashboard to manage application sales and revenue, as well as more analytics-rich features. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
It’s no secret that companies like Amazon, Facebook and Google study our behavior to recommend products or push advertising our way.
A Bellevue, Washington-based company called Strings is trying to do the exactly that, but with very explicit user permission. Users can track the books they buy on Amazon, songs they enjoy on iTunes or other types of behavior on hundreds of other web sites. Combined with aggregated, anonymized data from other users, Strings can suggest products a person might like using a combination of techniques including collaborative filtering. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
DocStoc, a popular site for uploading and sharing business documents, is opening the doors to its DocStore document marketplace today. Since the DocStore launch in August, the Los Angeles company has been working with a few select partners, but now anyone can apply to sell in the marketplace.
DocStoc is often compared to document-sharing site Scribd, which also has a marketplace, but the stated aims of the two stores are pretty different — the Scribd store is an e-book store that’s pitched as an Amazon alternative, while the DocStoc store is a way to way to sell business documents. [...]
Read more | Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Source: Venture Beat | Category: Technology
A 13-city mobile data speed test conducted by the serious wonks at PC World has validated a similar test by gadget blog Gizmodo in December.
“AT&T says it has worked hard to improve its much-maligned 3G network over the last eight months–erecting hundreds of new cell towers, using better-performing wireless spectrum, and souping up its cell sites across the country,” PC World writer Mark Sullivan explained. “The results of our latest 13-city 3G network performance tests suggest that the network has indeed undergone a drastic makeover. [...]
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