While it seems as though every other post we’ve written lately can be taken as evidence that Silicon Valley is currently in a very optimistic phase, “Facebook Now Worth $50 Billion In Secondary Trading” pretty much took the cake, until this one.
Perhaps a better marker of the “good times” tipping point than the rumored Groupon acquisition (AND the subsequent Groupon for Groupon spoof), the highly contested Tech Bubble of 2010 now has its own Twitter address at @the_tech_bubble. → Read More
The Founder Institute, a very early stage startup accelerator and entrepreneur training program, was launched in 2009 by Adeo Ressi. The company now has programs in a variety of cities in the U.S. and around the world – ten cities at the last count.
That’s a lot of startups flowing through the program, and Ressi often gives advice to young companies even after the program is over. One thing he doesn’t like are people and companies that do things that add friction to the already difficult task of building a company (or otherwise piss him off). And he usually doesn’t waste a lot of time before jumping right in and slamming anyone he thinks is guilty of being an “unsavory character.”
Today, for example, he began publishing a blacklist of these companies, available only to people who’ve gone through the program. First on the list is a law firm, Gunderson Dettmer, that often represents venture capitalists and startups. Over-lawyering by the first apparently caused one venture deal to fall apart. → Read More
If you own either a Sprint Epic 4G or Evo 4G, and love to game (not necessarily as much as this guy) then you should listen up, as Gameloft are now offering a buy-one-get-one-free deal for Sprint customers.
Announced on their blog today, Gameloft are offering the deal throughout the holidays on all of their “HD” titles.
Follow me through the jump to see a list of titles, as well as instructions on how to get in on the deal. → Read More
A week ago, it was revealed that Apple executive Phil Schiller was using Twitter. Actually, he had been on the service for about two years, but he wasn’t active, nor was he verified, so no one was sure it was him. Well, now we know it is him and all of a sudden, for whatever reason, he has decided to become an active user.
And since stories like ours pushed Schiller from 800 or so followers to about 16,800, he has stepped up his game another notch: he’s actually started answering @replies with questions pointed towards him. Perhaps this shouldn’t be too surprising, since this is the same Schiller that took matters into his own hands in August 2009 when there was growing discontent among iPhone app developers. But he is still an executive at Apple, the notoriously secretive company. → Read More
In October, after the COICA bill was postponed (until now, essentially), I suggested that as long as the internet was bound by a DNS system centralized enough to be gripped at will by the United States government, it was in fact too centralized. An alternative to traditional DNS, currently presided over by ICANN, seems the only option if the current level of freedom of information on the internet is to be maintained.
I was (and am) speaking as a layman; I know virtually nothing about the technical details of DNS, and the dangers and difficulties accompanying a departure from that system are numerous. But the benefits would be considerable, and it’s beginning to look like it has to happen sooner or later. Now Peter Sunde, a man somewhat more acquainted with the way things work on the internet, seems to be of a similar opinion. → Read More
The Arlington, Va. clean tech startup, OPower, closed a $50 million series C investment led by Accel Partners and Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers (KPCB) and joined by the company’s earlier investors New Enterprise Associates (NEA) the firms announced Monday.
OPower’s software-as-a-service helps electric and gas utilities understand who their residential energy consumers are, and how they are using power. Home owners get access to OPower programs through their utilities. OPower’s applications let them see if they’re more or less energy-hogging than their neighbors, allow them to set personal goals to reduce their own energy consumption at home, and receive alerts if they’re headed for a large bill at the end of the month among other things that are meant to inspire a behavior change. → Read More
Although I’m partial to old-school watches, these newer, hard-to-read-yet-stylish devices are tempting. The new Zub Zayu from Nooka features an interesting asymmetric design that may or may not feel right on your wrist. → Read More
It was just a few weeks ago that Accel Partners sold off around half a billion dollars of Facebook shares at a company valuation of $35 billion. If you thought that was insane, and a lot of commenters did, then don’t read the rest of this post. You’ll only get more jealous.
Around $40 million changed hands last week in a Facebook share auction held by SecondMarket. The end price per share was $20.76, and about 1.9 million shares were bought and sold. And based on there being around 2.5 billion shares outstanding after a 5-1 stock split earlier this year, that values Facebook at around $50 billion. As far as we know, this is an all time high.
The email sent out to auction participants is below. A new auction is beginning shortly. We’ve reached out to SecondMarket for comment. → Read More
The MID, mostly lately personified by devices from Archos and OQO, is very close to being an extinct category of device. I don’t see that as sad, exactly — we’ve just moved on to better devices. But I do feel a pang of pity for the final generation of this once-loved form factor. The OCS1 looks like a slick little device — or would have a year or two ago, when devices like this were still considered practical. → Read More
In an interview with Mobilized today, Acer CEO Gianfranco Lanci mentioned that they are working to create a Windows Phone 7 powered handset.
Gianfranco also talked about why they originally turned to Android (over Windows Mobile 6.5), and why Windows Phone 7 has them interested again.
Jump on past the break for the quote, and an unrelated video. → Read More
Today, people around the world are learning that the best Star Wars movie of them all — Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back — was not directed by George Lucas. Unfortunately, they’re learning it for the worst of reasons; its actual director, Irvin Kershner, has passed away at 87. Kershner was one hell of a director; beyond Empire, he was best known for directing RoboCop 2 and one of the best Bond flicks of all time. I know it has become a bit cliche to say “May The Force Be With You” when anyone in the Star Wars Crew-niverse passes on — but if there’s anyone that the Force is with, it’s Kershner. Raise a glass of Bantha milk tonight, folks. → Read More
For reasons inexplicable, a “Today I Learned” thread on Reddit has turned into how to make Google Translate beatbox for you, among other things. It must have taken some intense experimentation for Redditor Harrichr to get here but it seems like a peculiarity of the German translation setup in Google Translate is allowing for playing consonants in a way that sounds like drums. Or, more specifically, a delightful way that sounds like drums. → Read More
Not long after the original Nook came out, it was hacked, and progress on that front has been consistently documented over at NookDevs. The latest update to the Nook Color page indicates that yes, the new device has been rooted in part, a new UI installed (LauncherPro), and apps side-loaded to the “extras” section of the native UI. → Read More
Do you remember that 4″ beast from LG that we talked about the other week? Well, a member of the Android Forums managed to get his hands on one, and has done a little photo-shoot with it. He’s also unearthed a name and some specs.
First up, the name: LG Star. No idea if that’ll make it to retail, but that’s what it’s called at the moment.
Jump on past the break for the specs. → Read More
In the peak of the Internet bubble, a company’s valuation– and press attention– would soar simply by whispering the words “John Doerr is an investor.” But in early Web 2.0 days, the once-everywhere venture capitalist seemed to fall off of the tech press’s radar, at least when it came to Internet investing.
But boy, has Doerr made up for lost time this year: Keynoting both of our Disrupt conferences, holding press conferences at Facebook, and generally leading the charge on the messaging that Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers is serious about investing all over this mobile-social wave of digital innovation. The lastest move was his signing of Wall Street analyst Mary Meeker as a Kleiner Perkins partner– a deal he personally negotiated with Meeker, according to an interview we did with both of them this morning.
So I had to ask while I had him on the phone: Whatever happened to Doerr’s belief that cleantech was the next big thing? → Read More
In October, after the COICA bill was postponed (until now, essentially), I suggested that as long as the internet was bound by a DNS system centralized enough to be gripped at will by the United States government, it was in fact too centralized. An alternative to traditional DNS, currently presided over by ICANN, seems the only option if the current level of freedom of information on the internet is to be maintained.
I was (and am) speaking as a layman; I know virtually nothing about the technical details of DNS, and the dangers and difficulties accompanying a departure from that system are numerous. But the benefits would be considerable, and it’s beginning to look like it has to happen sooner or later. Now Peter Sunde, a man somewhat more acquainted with the way things work on the internet, seems to be of a similar opinion. → Read More
Two weeks ago, Google launched Hotpot, a new site related to Google Places that makes it easy (and sort of fun) to rate your favorite venues and see what your friends have recently liked. The tech press seemed to take notice of the site for two reasons: first, it’s got a nice design and is more fun than you’d expect. And second, Hotpot is a pretty strange name.
Now, it didn’t take long to figure out that this was a reference to the Chinese meal hot pot, but many people have never heard of that, and Google didn’t really go out of its way to explain the choice. Now, two weeks after it left people scratching their heads, it’s posted an explanation to its Places blog that gives a bit more background: → Read More
Yeah, that’s pretty damn cool. Project magazine, which we detailed last week, will go live tomorrow. We’ll check it out and give you the whole story then.
Video inside. → Read More
