Music startups are nothing new. But what if I told you that one of the guys involved in creating the song “Jai Ho” (otherwise known as the Slumdog Millionaire song) teamed up with one of the guys who helped make the audio in the iPhone to create a music startup? Would you be interested? Of course you would be.
That’s NoiseToys, a new startup by three Standford graduates (who just moved to New York). The main idea is to turn music listeners into music influencers. That is, to make music of a social experience in a more meaningful way than it has been up until now. → Read More
Frank Quattrone, the Godfather of tech investment banking, sat down in a fireside chat with Michael Arrington today at Disrupt. Quattrone is back in tech boutique M&A with his new investment advisory firm, Qatalyst Partners. Recently, he advised Palm on its $1.2 billion acquisition by HP and two years ago he worked for Google when it tried to cut a search deal with Yahoo.
The conversation ranged from Quattrone’s remembrance of a 25-year-old Steve Jobs coming in to talk to his Stanford business school class before Apple’s IPO to his early days at Morgan Stanley and his thoughts on the prospects for the tech IPO market ever opening up again. On the IPO market, he notes that the market is waiting for “category-defining, earthshaking companies” to file to go public, but hasn’t seen them yet. Investors are waiting for Facebook, Twitter, or Zynga to go public. And just how much could Facebook be worth? Quips Quattrone: “$18 Gazillion dollars.” → Read More
I think these are great, but to be honest I kind of question their practicality. I mean, they’re big — and that’s the point — but I think the novelty would wear off after a bit. 256 grams isn’t really that much, but it’s a hell of a lot more grams than one of these things. I like that they’re stackable, though. [via HardOCP] → Read More
Well, this is interesting. As you probably know, Twitter yesterday made some changes to its Terms & Conditions, effectively banning third parties from inserting paid tweets into users’ timelines.
Further digging by Silicon Alley Insider and MediaMemo revealed that in addition, Twitter appears to also plan to start charging publishers and developers a cut of advertising revenue “where Twitter content is the basis (in whole or in part) of the advertising sale.”
Looks like those changes have already claimed a first victim. → Read More
The mania surrounding “Lost” continues. It has emerged that the series finale now holds the record of being the most downloaded TV show in the history of TV. The final two episodes, within 20 hours of appearing online, were downloaded some 900,000 times. Quite a bit, yes. → Read More
Consumers are increasingly socializing their shopping decisions and product reviews on Facebook or Twitter as e-commerce intersects with social media. In fact, half of all online shoppers look on a social network site before making a purchase decision. Launched today at TechCrunch Disrupt, Compass Labs is a social e-commerce startup and ad network that aims to provide targeted advertising on social networks like Twitter and Facebook around what users intent to purchase.
So Compass Labs looks at Twitter streams and tries to determine when someone has an intent to purchase something, then it serves up related ads either through direct messages or through banner ads on third-party Twitter clients. So if you Tweet, “I’m looking for a Canon camera” it will reply in stream or on a banner with an ad from a camera retailer for that camera. Compass Labs uses natural language processing to parse out the Tweets that have serious intent versus just talking about a product generally. Campaigns can be set to target people at different parts of the purchasing cycle, from exploratory to ready to buy right now. → Read More
It seems like the idea of checking-in to a location, restaurant or venue has become more of a mainstream activity thanks to Foursquare, Gowalla, Loopt and other location-based services. Many of these services reward users with special badges or even coupons when they check-in to a certain venue. Enter WeReward, which is launching at TechCrunch Disrupt today, which has a different take on the rewards system for check-ins. WeReward, which is an iPhone app and standalone site, allows you to earn points and cash for check-ins or tasks.
The free app allows you to access a list of businesses in your area, which are tied into CitySearch’s Citygrid, where you can earn points. For example, you can earn 1000 points for checking into a certain restaurant. And if you can check-in via Foursquare and Twitter with a photo to verify you are actually at the business directly from the app. You can search for venues by subject and even access reviews and location and hours information from the app. Each 1000 points is worth 1 cent and consumers can cash in the points they accumulate for money through WeReward. → Read More
While the realtime web brings us a wealth of instant information on-demand, it’s often necessary to use filters to consumer information from the social web. Tickreel, which is launching at TechCrunch Disrupt today, is launching a powerful filter based around users’ web activity and interest graphs.
The application aims to streamline the web around topics instead of people; and you can follow a specific topic manually. Whereas search engines map keywords and social networks map relationships, Tickreel merges the two. Sort of. You can structure people and sites around a specific topic. → Read More
Microsoft is losing two high-profile executives. Both J. Allard, “Chief Experience Offer” and Entertainment and Device Division’s CTO, and Robbie Bach, President of Entertainment and Devices Division, are leaving the company per a Steve Ballmer email from this morning. These are the guys behind the Xbox, Zune, Project Natal, and the dead Courier project — so basically all of Microsoft’s hit entertainment projects from the last decade.
From: Steve Ballmer
Sent: Tuesday, May 25, 2010 11:01 AM
To: Microsoft – All Employees (QBDG)
Subject: Executive Leadership TransitionsAfter almost 22 years with the company, Robbie Bach has decided to retire from Microsoft. I have worked with Robbie during his entire tenure at Microsoft, and count him as both a friend and a great business partner and leader. Robbie has always had great timing, and is going out on a high note – this has been a phenomenal year for E&D overall, and with the coming launches of both Windows Phone 7 and “Project Natal,” the rest of the year looks stupendous as well. While we are announcing Robbie’s retirement today, he will remain here through the fall, ensuring we have a smooth transition. → Read More
Group buying sites such as Groupon have proven to be a lucrative model for social e-commerce. Today, ChompOn is launching at TechCrunch Disrupt to bring a white-label group buying service to the space, allowing business owners to create their own deal of the day.
ChompOn’s platform allows businesses to easily create a deal of the day (which is hosted on ChompOn), and set limits on the discount, how many people can access the sale and how long the sale is available for. The business can send the deal out via a link on Twitter, over email, and on Facebook. ChompOn also aims to help businesses create repeat customers by offering extra discounts for users who Fan their Facebook page, share the deal on Twitter or write a Yelp review. → Read More
As users flock to location-based services like Foursquare and Gowalla, local businesses and media organizations are beginning to use the check-in as a marketing tool for events and campaigns. Geotoko, which launched today at TechCrunch Disrupt, a platform that allows businesses to run contests and sweepstakes using location-based services.
Co-founded by Adarsh Pallian, Geotoko gives businesses a dashboard, where they can create a designated site for a promotional campaign. On the site, Geotoko will aggregate check-in and geolocation info from Foursquare, Twitter and Gowalla (and perhaps soon Brightkite and Facebook) for the businesses location along with the details of a campaign or promotion (i.e. prizes, free gifts). The business can Tweet out the link to the page to potential users, who can check-in to the locale as a sweepstakes entry. → Read More
Ready for your daily dose of viral marketing? This Lenovo video is just that, but it’s also an interesting look at the development of Lenovo‘s upcoming ThinkCentre M90z all-in-one workstation. These folks know all-in-one desktops and the M90z looks to be the best yet. Launch data and specs should drop soon. Hopefully. → Read More
Back in March, Ben Horowitz of Andreessen Horowitz wrote a post called The Case For The Fat Startup, where he outlined some of the reasons why a fledging company might want to consider taking a large amount of funding — a strategy that contrasts with the ‘lean startup’ model that has become common in Silicon Valley. Fred Wilson, another well known VC, countered with a post of his own explaining why Being Fat Is Not Healthy. Today, both men took the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt for a semi-formal debate, where they critiqued each others stances in person. The full video of the debate is below. → Read More
Looks like Netflix has decided to go with Microsoft’s PlayReady DRM for all upcoming Netflix-ready devices. If all goes according to plan you shouldn’t even notice the DRM being there, but we all know how well DRM has worked in the past. → Read More
Your phone is now your hotel key. Well, could be your hotel key. Holiday Inn will trial new software for the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android that will let you use your phone to open your hotel door. Even better: you can use the software to check out without having to futz around at the check-in desk. Convenient. → Read More
Don’t cry to AT&T or Apple if you crack your iPhone screen. They don’t care. Besides as this pictures and Cnet story clearly shows, with a bit of patience, nearly anyone can replace an iPhone screen. This 10-year boy used a $20 kit available from 3gcrackedglass.com to replace the glass on his dad’s iPhone and in turn saved him from the $200 repair bill that Apple would have charged for the same service. → Read More
Computer and software security company McAfee has acquired Trust Digital, a company that provides security software to mobile phones. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Trust Digital provides enterprise smartphone security and management software for government organizations and various companies. IT organizations use Trust Digital to secure and manage smartphones, including a variety of mobile operating systems including iPhone OS, Android, Web OS, Windows Mobile, and Symbian. McAfee will use Trust Digital's technology to help business secure and deploy applications on smartphone devices, such as the Android and iPhone. → Read More
You know what’s coming up in just a few days? Apples Worldwide Developer Conference. With WWDC comes new iPhones.. and with new iPhones, comes the death of an old one. Apple may very well still offer the 3GS after the fourth-generation iPhone is on the shelves — but offering the fourth-gen iPhone, the 3GS, and the 3G? Probably not going to happen. The first herald of the iPhone 3G’s impending death has come. → Read More
Note to self: keep an eye out for unreleased smartphones in ridiculous places. Hanging out in a random beer garden in Palo Alto? Oh, hello there, fourth-generation iPhone. Hitting the gym? Lookie here, it’s the unreleased Motorola Shadow Android phone for Verizon! → Read More
People might not be buying houses and cars at the pre-recession levels, but laptops are flying off the shelves led by netbook sales. (Quiet, don’t tell John. He hates netbooks.) → Read More
