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November 30, 2006

Resistance is Futile: Diggrz: Lifestyles and Relationships

Lucaso's Note: It's the lifestyle of the new millenium: digitally enabled, creative, environmental conscious, community minded, and productive. We are a band of merry travelers and crafty curators, contributing our new gifts to a world uninhibited by the constraints of the past. We are the people we've been waiting for.

Introducing our new Diggrz lifestyles column is ZigZag. ZigZag is a writer, life coach and poet. She calls herself a practical mystic. You can usually find her inspiring everyone she meets to live their dreams. She has her own life coaching practice, is working on her first book, and takes the stage with her spoken word. Her blog, mszigzag.com, "exposes the unexposed" as she gets personal about dating, relationships, bikini waxes and good books.

By ZigZag for Sillicon Valley Watcher

Whether you are sitting in a cubicle, wearing an Italian suit, bartending, or working for “the man,” odds are you have a project or a dream separate from that working life. You might be conjuring up the newest technological brainstorm, fire dancing on Sunday nights in vinyl Speedos, or strategizing your way into a new galaxy of modern voo-doo. We are the Diggrs, a kultur of the 21Century, and we are on a mission.

One thing I have discovered is that it ain’t easy to have a mission. For instance, my mission is to build a successful business as a writer, speaker, poet and life coach. I have become my own one-woman show, and this is no easy task. To some degree we are all a one-person show, creatively growing and discovering new pathways to inner peace, financial freedom, and a world of unlimited potential.

However, don’t be fooled by the hype. At first it sounds delicious. It’s a world of possibility, but the first thing to know is that you will resist. We are children of habit, so breaking free from a lifetime of comfort zones can be daunting. As you enter into the “discomfort zone” remember that resistance becomes your friend. Think about it, how many times have you heard yourself saying things like: “I don’t have time to do this, ” “Maybe this isn’t my thing, ” or "I'll do it later." Listen to your cues, if you think you are in resistance, it means you’re on the right track. Billboard_1

As a society stuck in fear, our friends and family might try and get us to take the safe road. Afterall, we might fail at something, and so we shoot low hoping that at least we walk away with a small prize because we don’t think we deserve the grand prize. Luckily, we know that we can shoot high, instead of aiming low, because the truth is that all successful people fail. They just recover fast and keep going.

“Races are not won by the fastest athletes. Fights are not won by the strongest men. But the races are won and the fights are won by those who want to win most of all.” – Tommy Lasorda

They say that there is a lot of tension when you embark on a journey or mission, and the tension builds slowly until the most tension is felt right before the biggest breakthrough. The problem is that most people give up at 11:59 when they should have held on until 12:00.

So hold on tight. Enjoy the ride. Make it bumpy. Fall down a few times, and then, when you’re ready, fly...or should I say, dig.

US and Polish Web 2.0 companies swap notes at Stanford

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

Wednesday evening I was cursing to myself as I tried again, and again, to find the James H Clark Center on the always confusing, sprawling Stanford University campus. One last try and then I would leave, I told myself, and that's exactly when I found it, a striking, all-glass building. And I found the circular auditorium buried in the center of the complex.

The panel was already well underway and there were quite a few people on the stage. I sat down and looked around at a reasonably full room, to see who else was interested in this event: "Web 2.0 Wave in the US and Poland. "

Top Polish entrepreneurs from Meetro, 3S Generator, Onet, plus senior people from Google, Intel, Linked In, and PBwiki were on stage[Please see panelist names at end of article.]

I was glad that I persevered in finding my way because it was an excellent panel discussion (I've sat through many hundreds of panels and I've slept through quite a few too... :-)

Also, this was a very young looking set of panelists and refreshingly so, because we didn't get the same hackneyed Web 2.0 stuff trotted out by the regular John Battelle et al Web 2.0 crowd of regulars. Different faces did produce a fresher Web 2.0-or-whatever-it-is, conversation.

There were some excellent gems in the conversation, here are some, and my notes and observations on the evening:

There was a question about what type of business models the companies had.

-"We have what we call 'oh shit!' business moments," said Ramit Sethi, co-founder of PBwiki. We look at our what our users are doing and where they come from and we find out things such as the fact that educators are our largest user group and they are recruiting others.

We also found out that our China users are growing really fast and doing all sorts of interesting things and then suddenly we lose them all because the China firewall has locked them out. It's 'oh shit' because we didn't know we had a business in those groups...

-The Polish companies were asked how to create new companies. One said get a garage. Marcin Malinowski, director of Onet, Poland's top portal, said, put passion into your code and then attach a business model to it. Paul Bragiel, head of top Polish gaming and social networking sites said find something you love doing and just start, start doing it.

-Poland has a very high quality software engineering community, Polish coders regularly win international competitions. It has a history of expertise in math especially in algorithms. Also, it know Western European culture very well, it has always been very westward looking.

"My Polish programmers totally 'get it' which isn;t true in other places such as China," said Mr Bragiel.

[I think this is a very important point because understanding culture is vital for any business that wants to succeed in that culture. Cultural literacy is learned over many years through experience, there is no quick way to teach it.]

-Poland has a population of 40m, half are under 35, with about 30 per cent Internet penetration.

-The pace of change for businesses in Poland and elsewhere is fast and getting faster and faster, said Mr Bragiel. [He just might be the fastest English speaker I have heard.] He says that companies that can listen will do well, and that means listening to the young people in organizations because they are better tuned into the times.

[I agree. I often have the most interesting conversations with the youngest people within organizations because they haven't been taught how not to do things. They see things with a fresh eye and see how things are changing. But few organizations have the will or the process to tap into this resource.]

I liked the comments made by Konstantin Guericke, vp marketing at business social networking site Linked In:

- In the beginning a social network has little value because the value is from the users and their connections. We just look at what they do, how they try to increase their productivity and try to support that as best we can with new features. We've begun to show users what other users are doing, so that it encourages them to do similar things, such as promotions, or the number of contacts added.

-Our users are our marketing, they recruit others. VC love it when users market to user but you have to give up control. It costs us about 3 cents to acquire a user , and when they pay for premium services is about $300.

Another good contributor was Greg Welch, Director of Strategy and Industry Initiatives at Intel (Intel is an SVW sponsor) who contributed a lot of insightful and intriguing comments:

-Second Life is not a fad and that it represents Web 3.0 it is the way we will all interface with the Internet. All product design is done in digital, and has been for a while, now it can be tested out in virtual worlds such as Second Life. A hotel company is building a new type of hotel in Second Life where its design can be tested in the digital world before building it in the analog world.

-WiMAX technologies will enable Poland to quickly bridge the digital divide without having to dig trenches to carry copper Internet connections.

-Intel is always looking to help develop viral technologies that are spread by users and can get around the IT department within enterprises. Consumer adoptions will lead to enterprise adoptions. [Important point, IMHO the IT department is the most conservative and resistant to change organization within the enterprise.]

-You will be amazed by high definition video conferencing, I've seen a demo bn a quad core Intel chip running over regular internet speeds.

-I love anything that sucks mips!

A man in the audience said that he recently re-read Snowcrash, the 1992 science fiction novel because so much of it has come true.

[I have to agree, I have been thinking about Snowcrash myself since I became a journalist blogger because so much of it has come true, or is coming true, it is a truly remarkable book--my favorite concept is " hacking the brain stem."]

Mentioning Snowcrash sent the panelists' heads nodding vigorously, and they threw out a few other seminal favorites such as Code by Lawrence Lessig, Interface and Mirror Worlds.

Greg Badros, director of engineering at Google and its Adsense business, gradually warmed up and became quite interesting:

-Pagerank doesn't work as well in enterprise search because there is less user data, however there is also less spam, so it requires a different approach.

-The more user data Google acquires the better its language translation, which is based on a statistical analysis of which words are used and their order within sentences. No special artificial intelligence is required.

-I wish people would put more data into Google Base, I wish people understood it more, I wish we at Google understood how to use it better, I wish we had much more structured data.

The Polish panelists said that they were envious of the huge number of early adopters in the US. In Poland there are lots of great ideas but you have to fight for the early adopters. You could have something totally cool and killer but it could fail because of the smaller pool of potential users.

This is why Polish internet companies have to have a global strategy from the beginning. But Poles are very interested and passionate about new Internet services and applications, for example Poland is the third largest Skype market.

- - -

It was a very good evening and one of the key organizers was Clay Bullwinkel Board Member, U.S.-Polish Trade Council and a key connector between US and Polish companies in various joint projects.[Bullwinkel (at) usptc.org]

I'd love to see more such events, but in a different venue. I don't see the academic world contributing much to the conversation about the social/conversational online worlds and economies that are being created here, in Poland, and everywhere else. A better venue would be San Francisco but I'm biased because that's where I live. Also, $70 at the door to get in is steep and a barrier to other contributors.

Some additional info:

Panelists:Greg Badros, director of engineering at Google Inc., Greg Welch, director of strategy and industry initiatives for Intel’s Software and Solutions Group; and Marcin Malinowski, director of the business incubator department at Onet, Poland’s 20-million subscriber version of Yahoo.Paul Bragiel, CEO of the Meetro social networking site; Michael Faber, founder of BiznesNet.pl; Konstatin Guericke, vice president of marketing for Linked In; and Ramit Sethi, co-founder and vice president of PBwiki.

The event was moderated by Dr. Charles Petrie, Stanford Consulting Professor and founding executive director of Stanford’s Network Research Center.

It was a pleasure to meet George Slawek, a local entrepreneur and president of the US Polish Trade Council. Like myself, Mr Slawek grew up in the United Kingdom. He has been here since 1986.

The US-Polish Trade Council is a group of U.S.-based international business leaders with professional and technical accomplishments in both Poland and the U.S.

US-Polish Trade Council

785 Market Street, 15th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94103

(415) 762-0706 or info@usptc.org

kultur shock : string sling

By Maria Mouk for Sillicon Valley Watcher.

Its that time again, so get your days-off with your kicks, beats, and percussions-in.

Friday Eve

The Kronos Quartet performs Friday evening at Stanford University Lively Arts Center. Talented string musicians that have been at it for the last 30 years, Kronos differsifies by covering a very broad range of musical genres.(Past work has included movie soundtracks, experimental, Mexican, etc...)

Also Friday evening; the Unity Church of San Leandro (501 Joaquin Ave, San Leandro, CA)will have a showing of the movie "The Secret". Though the concepts behind the movie are simple, they are groundbreaking in the sense that there is finally a practical presentation for the ideas that focus on the law of attraction and manifestation. If you don't watch it now, check it out online. It's worth the watch.

After you've blissed out, head over to Ambiotica, a new edge salon, hosted by record label Cyberset and collective Anon Salon, from 8:30 to 3am. This month's trip will begin with the MindMeld discussion circle at the Lofty Thoughts Gallery (1286 Folsom Street) followed by an evening of inspired music, art and interaction at the adjacent Anon Salon Gallery/Climate Theater. MindMelt topic spans "What is your religion?" with Erik Davis, author of Techgnosis, Visionary State (Religion of Vision), Chris Deckker; founder Earthdance International (Religion of Peace), and Jim Wanlesscreator, creator of Voyager Tarot. Musical performances will include B. Smiley, Medicine Man, Leslie Shill, Neptune, Irina Mikhailova, Estas Tonne, amd Waterjuice. I'll be on hand serving smart Amazonian herb cocktails. Chillin_flyer

If all that sounds like outer space, get grounded, at the Chillin Productions Holiday Sale Fashion Show. Mezzanine will host 60 fashion designers, 80 painters/photographers, and 60 filmmakers, with musical performances by DJ JOHANSON, Russell Vargas, DJ Laron, Kerowack, Dirtyhertz, Dave Madix, and more. A personal fav presenting will be KAYO, with her winter line of fleece apparel. Drop on in, and leave with something saucy.

Saturday Eve

Saturday night, Addictech presents a breaks breakdown, with peformers spanning the globe, including Autobots, Lawgiverz, SOTEG, Kosmikniel, and locally loved Eskmo, Audiovoid, Ripple, Dov, Aaron Jae, Friction,Evan Bender, Bertzerker & Hypnotech! Go big or go home.

Also Saturday, techno collective Kontrol makes you itch with Fred Giannelli aka The Kooky Scientist's live PA. Talk about ooold school. From his early work with Psychic TV to collaborations with Richie Hawtin and Dan Bell, this man has seen and done it all, twice. If you missed out on the DEMF this year, this is your opportunity to catch this tick. Playing also is [a]pendics.shuffle, LA's multi-monikered maestro with dirty, dance-floor destroying minimal.

If you're looking to go the distance or to a strange Gypsy slinging rockout, Primus plays with Gogol Bordello opening, at the Berkeley Community Theatre. A bizarre combination indeed but its sure to be a night of well, like I said, Gypsy slinging.

After you've recovered from any weekend overextension, there's still time in the weekend to make the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition's Winterfest at SomArts. Bikes, apparel, gourmets, designers, and salons, will be on hand, ready to convert you or confirm your cycling love.

After The Buzz Wears Off

And dont forget First Tuesdays of the month mean free museum crawl. So take an early day or extended lunch, and take advantage of one of SF's creative possibilities.

11.30.06: Google's Wi-Fi invest, patent obviousness, and oh yeah, Vista

Google is one of several bridge investors in Meraki Networks, a wireless mesh provider that Google has shown interest in regarding the San Francisco WiFi Project, Katie Fehrenbacher writes on GigaOm.

co-founder Sanjit Biswas Biswas wouldn’t specify the amount but said the round was under a million dollars. “We’d bootstrapped the company so far, so this cash is really just for growth/acceleration . . .and for the development of some products we plan to launch next year,” says Biswas. The company currently sells a $49 wireless 802.11b/g router (beta price) that allows users to build a wireless mesh network or extend the range of a municipal network.

Microsoft officially released Vista and Office 2007 to business customers. But after so much delay and build-up, the official launch of Vista is fairly anti-climactic, especially since it's still not available to consumers. Infoworld:

This is a big launch for them but for everyone else it's ho-hum," said James McQuivey, a professor for Boston University's College of Communication who specializes in marketing research and business management. "It's the biggest wait-and-see event of the week. Customers are going to wait and see when they need [Vista] and if they need it."

Paul Kedrosky points to the transcript of oral arguments (PDF) before the Supreme Court in closely watched patent case. The case has big ramifications for software because the Court may reject the current "obviousness" standard for awarding patents.

This is important stuff, and changes -- which look inevitable, based on justice comments this morning -- could have a wide-ranging impact across a range of companies in all sectors, from consumer products, to life sciences, to information technology. We had justices calling the curent Federal Circuit standard vague, gobbledy-gook, and generally un-useful to everyone except the lawyers being paid to lawyer the thing. Here is Justice Scalia pointing out how absurd the current non-obviousness standard remains, despite its supposed universality: "It is misleading to say that the whole world is embraced within these three nouns, teaching, suggestion, or motivation, and then you define teaching, suggestion, or motivation to mean anything that renders it nonobvious. This is gobbledygook. It really is, it's irrational."

November 29, 2006

11.29.06: Another video deal for Verizon

The best thing is mobile, apparently, is video. A day after cutting a deal with YouTube in which Verizon users will be able to download YT vids - and more importantly - upload them, Verizon announces a deal with Revver.com, according to an AP report.

Revver.com shows ads at the end of each video and shares revenue with uploaders; however on Verizon's V Cast service, there will be no ads. Rather folks who upload videos to Revver via Verizon will get a share of revenues when their videos are played on the site.

"This is a breakthough for our creative base in that they will be paid 50 percent of all the revenue that's generated from this relationship with Verizon Wireless," said Steven Starr, founder and chief executive of Revver, which he said has 40,000 content contributors.

Writing on The DailyReel blog, Kevin Nalty notes of the YouTube deal:

It makes perfect sense. Carriers are vying for customers and lack any rich-media content beyond annoying ring tones. Video sites need growing distribution to substantiate their business models and delay disintermediation.
For the past year, Verizon and other wireless carriers have been quietly circling the independent film scene; knowing they needed short-form content but lacking any traction in this emerging medium. Now the carrier has decided to enter the market with help from a company that has developed learnings, content, eyeballs and a brand.

- Richard Koman

11.29.06: BitTorrent snags $25m, founder Cohen is out as CEO

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Om Malik reports that BitTorrent has raised $15 to $25 million in venture funding. But that big investment comes at a cost: Founder Bram Cohen is on his way out as CEO. Following up on Om's lead, Michael Arrington pegs the number at $25 million from Accel Partners and Doll Capital Management. And says Arrington:

CEO Bram Cohen, who created the BitTorrent protocol, is definitely on his way out. The company has retained the well known headhunting firm Heidrick & Struggles to find a replacement as soon as possible. No word on what, if any, role Cohen will have going forward.

At ValleyWag, Nick Denton notes he received a comment from an anonymous VC investor: "I don't understand any 'platform for rent' business models these days. I think investors are paying up for brands like bittorrent and brightcove without digging into the business fundamentals."

BT has cut deals with major TV and Hollywood players to sell movies and shows for $1 a download. That would way undercut the prices Apple was able to get. But as Om notes:

BitTorrent has not yet launched its long-awaited video store. Perhaps this latest funding will boost the company’s e-commerce rollout. BitTorrent spent some of the year announcing truces and partnerships5 with Hollywood, but it has been quiet lately.

November 28, 2006

Italians investigating Google for abuse videos

Google is facing more legal trouble in Europe. Italian prosecutors are suing Google over some videos showing a Down's Syndrome patient being abused, AP says.

Oddly, the suit seems to fly right in the fact of EU law, which excuses Internet providers for content uploaded by users.

"As far as I understand, the entire European Union has decided there is no responsibility for the Internet provider for content. You can't blame the Internet for being a means of diffusing something whose causes lay somewhere else," said Carlo Alberto Carnevale Maffe, president of Assodigitale, a think-tank on digital technology. "You can't blame the manufacturer of paper because someone prints an insult on it."

The investigation is sought by Vividown, a Downs advocacy group.

Vividown President Edoardo Cenzi said that although Google removed the content within 12 hours after they reported its existence to authorities, the group took further action because "we don't believe these videos should be circulated without controls."

But Google says they don't want to "hide behind laws," said Stefano Hesse, a spokesman for Google Italia.

"We have clear policies about content and we always remove what we think is illegal content and what our users flag as illegal content," Hesse said. But he acknowledged that sometimes what is deemed offensive varies by culture.
"It could be religious. It could be pornography. It depends on the culture or the way of thinking of the people looking at the video, since it is a worldwide platform," Hesse said.

No money down: How IBM leverages Silicon Valley's VC billions

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

IBM, the world's largest computer company, has a successful venture capital group operating in the heart of Silicon Valley, yet it makes no investments in startup companies. Instead, it tells VC firms what types of startups it might want to acquire and waits for the Silicon Valley innovation machine to do the rest.

It's a very good system for IBM. There is no need to make risky investments, to spend years on boards helping to nurture and grow startup companies, and certainly no need to hit the road to raise new venture capital funds.

It is a beautiful system that leverages tens of billions of dollars of other people's money, and it can all be done with just a few people. IBM's Venture Capital Group in Menlo Park consists of just half-a-dozen specialists plus some support staff.

Because there is virtually no tech IPO market to provide exits for investors in thousands of startups, VCs are more than happy to offer IBM the cream of the startup crop. Since the IBM Venture Capital Group was formed in 2000, it has had a hand in 15 acquisitions, and that rate is increasing.

But acquisitions are just one way IBM benefits from Silicon Valley's bountiful crop of startups. It also partners with about 1200 startups in various endeavors in which it uses their technologies in IT services deals through business partnerships. Business partnerships as a whole account for one third of its annual revenues, or about $27bn.

There is also a very nice business to be had in selling technology licenses to startups. IBM has a massive portfolio of patents and it offers favorable terms to startups. This might be a good insurance policy since Big Blue has lately become much more aggressive in pursuing companies that it believes are using its technologies without payment. (See News.com: IBM: Amazon violates our patents – October 23, 2006.)

Tomorrow on Silicon Valley Watcher: Interview with Drew Clark, co-founder of IBM Venture Capital Group - find out what types of startups are on his shopping list.

- - -

Additional info:

VC-backed ISVs: Open Source Opens Doors

Startups to have access to IBM's entire patent portfolio with simplified terms

IBM announces formation of Venture Capital Advisory Council

IBM launches new initiative to help developers in emerging markets build skills and open standards solutions

November 27, 2006

Weeklet- November Reload

By Maria Mouk for Silicon Valley Watcher

Whether you celebrated or not, I'm sure you've gotten your fill of turkey stuffing and stuffy grocery stores. Time to burn off the mind-halt and not let the cooling nights deter you from gaining inspiration and riding on productivity.

Tuesday Eve

Head over to the Independent for an 8:30 show by The Coup and Mr.Lif. Politically radical and banging out lyrical beats since the early 90's, 'Coup' is characterized by electronic sounds and bass driven backbeats overlaid by humorous, cynical, and sometimes violent lyrics criticizing American politics.

Wednesday Eve

Get your art snob fix, by going over to SF Camerawork for their 2006 Auction Preview Reception of fine photographic prints(6pm). Scope out the shots worth your walls before bidding at the Live Auction on Saturday afternoon.

Also, Wednesday is the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) for Web 2.0 Presentation. Held in Mountain View, at Google Inc. from 6 to 9pm, the event will focus on increasing traffic, ranking, and structural barriers limiting indexability and maximizing the spiderability of web sites.

Speakers for Web 2.0 include Adam Lasnik-SEO Strategist-Google, David Hahn-Director of Advertising-LinkedIn, Markus Hoevener-Chief Visionary-Bloofusion, and Joelle Kaufman-Vice President Experience-of Engage.com. The event is hosted by the Silicon Valley WebGuild with a focus on providing a collaborative environments within monthly meetings.

Thursday Eve

Drop into the Commonwealth Club, for Defining the Self in a Virtual World: Online Personas. They are founders of the most successful and innovative web sites allowing people to interact, trade, meet and network. They will explore how their sites are evolving to keep up with the future of online networking.

Do some physical networking beyond the screen Thursday eve at DNA Lounge, for Reload, brought to you by tech talkers and music junkies. Included will be a Second Life virtual and live performance, with the assistance of Electric Sheep Company, an intro Podcast meetup, drink specials thanks to Splashcast, blog cast/ mp3 casts through IODA Promonet, including music with DJ Cez, Pants Pants Pants, Black Fiction,Halou w/ Zoe Keating, and DJ Tom Thump. For information you email crazywanda@gmail.com

Editor's Note: We're trying something new here at Diggrz and including a link to the band's music for you to preview before the event. Check out Black Fiction:

"Magic Hands" (mp3)
from "Ghost Ride"
by Black Fiction
Howells Transmitter

Buy at iTunes Music Store
Stream from RealNetworks / Rhapsody

11.27.06: Google settles with two Belgian groups

Google has settled with two of the five Belgian publishing groups suing the company for damages in a Belgian court, according to Bloomberg. The deal with Sofam, representing photographers, and Scam, representing journalists, removes the groups from the suit and allows Google to use their content in exchange for some undisclosed payment.

This could have a ``huge impact'' on how Google is approaching content providers and could even ``have an impact on their business model,'' said Stijn Debaene, a lawyer at Allen & Overy in Brussels.

Deals like this, and one with AP last year, suggest that Google News will have to pay its own way, compensating publishers for the content it uses, even if it does push traffic to newspapers' sites.

- Richard Koman

11.27.06: Psiphoning off censorship

The New York Times reports on psiphon, an effort to beat back censorship in repressive countries.

“The problem is growing exponentially,” said Ronald Deibert, director of the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab, which designed psiphon. “What might have started as censorship of pornography and Western news organizations has expanded to include blogging sites, religious sites, health information sites and many others.”

How it works: A user in an uncensored country runs the psiphon software, essentially turning her computer into a proxy. Someone in a restricted country can access that machine via an encrypted connection and get full access to the Net. If he clears his browsing history and cache, no record of his viewing censored material will be stored on his computer.

The breakthrough may be in psiphon's simple operation, so no technical expertise is required. In addition, the anti-censorship browser will allow users to post to blogs and to Wikipedia.

“So far it’s been tech solutions for tech people,” said Dmitri Vitaliev, a human rights activist in Russia who has been testing psiphon in countries where the Internet is censored. “We have not had very good tools so everyone has been eagerly awaiting psiphon.”

- Richard Koman

11.27.06: Apple working on tablet, chip deals, bringing Beatles to iTunes

Fortune's Tim Arango:

Although Apple and the Beatles were recently sparring in court, it looks likes the Beatles' AppleCorps will give iTunes limited exclusive rights to be the online store for the Fab Four.

GigaOm:

PortalPlayer, in the process of being acquired by Nvidia, is providing an applications processor for the forthcoming iPhone and a new graphics chip for future video iPods. Total value of Apple-Nvidia/PortalPlayer deals: $280 million.

Smarthouse's David Richards:
Apple researchers have built a full working prototype of a Mac tablet PC and three Companies in Taiwan are now costing a product for a potential launch in mid 2007. Sources in Taiwan say the focus is on the home and the education environments. This could be a touch screen to control a home media center Apple plans to launch in 07.

BBC:

OS X has a bug in how it handles disk images (DMGs), which can cause system corruption and allow hackers to hijack a machine.

- Richard Koman
November 27, 2006 | Permalink | Comment on this post | Tag: News Watch
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November 24, 2006

11.25.06: French film firm sues Google Video

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

More franco trouble for Google. After appearing in a Brussels courtroom today to defend its use of Belgian publishers' news content, Google lawyers might as well hang around the continent to deal with this suit (reported by UK-based PC Advisor)

Flach Film says that Google acted as a fully responsible publisher (rather than a passive host) when Google Video users streamed or downloaded the filmmaker’s documentary, "Le monde selon Bush" ("The World According to Bush").
The film, which is no longer available on the French Google Video site, had more than 43,000 views in a short period of time, Flach said.

Flach wants compensation for the unpaid views on the video site. Google says it doesn't have liability because its user agreement forbids uploading copyright material and because it quickly took the video down when alerted. The case is file in France so American protections for online services wouldn't apply unless similar protections are offered by French law.
November 24, 2006 | Permalink | Comment on this post | Tag: News Watch
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11.25.06: Security flaw in Firefox 2 as browser battle heats up

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

With the upcomng release of Vista and IE7, Microsoft is putting Mozilla on notice that it go through the open source program with a fine tooth comb looking for security flaws. Robert Chapin, an independent IT consultant and Microsoft- certified systems engineer, found a good one today. Firefox is susceptible to a hack - the reverse cross-site request - that reveals a user's stored passwords, NewsFactor reports.
On sites that allow users to enter HTML into a form, a hacked form can trick Firefox into sending its stored usernames and passwords. Because the site would be otherwise trustworthy, the antiphishing mechanism won't kick in - and because the form can be invisible, it would be impossible to visually identify a compromised site.
It's a thin line of distinction for Microsoft, though, because Redmond admits IE is also susceptible to RCSRs, but Firefox's method of storing passwords makes it a more likely target. Concerned? Turn off password autosave (Tools/Options menu.)
November 24, 2006 | Permalink | Comment on this post | Tag: News Watch
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11.25.06: Google heads to Brussels court in copyright suit

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Google will get its day in court today, as a Belgian court reconsiders an earlier decision to fine Google as much as a million euros a day for copyright infringement against Belgian news publishers, AP reports. The Court of First Instance also ordered Google to remove the publishers' content from Google News.
"We're glad to have the opportunity to argue the substance," a Google spokeswoman said. "We think that search engines are real benefit to publishers and drive valuable traffic to their Web sites."

Google argues that it's counterproductive for publishers to block their stories from appearing on Google News as the site drives a huge amount of traffic to publishers' sites. Most blogs would kill to get a prominent link on News - but because the site is heavily weighted to traditional news sources, that is a very rare occurrence.
Google's new Sitemaps product, released last week, aims to make it easier for publishers to specify what content Google should index.
In other developments, Google has agreed to pay The Associated Press for stories and photographs. No terms released.
November 24, 2006 | Permalink | Comment on this post | Tag: News Watch
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November 22, 2006

11.22.06: Anatomy of a spam node

Niall Kennedy notices a weight-loss column at the top of Digg and deconstructs how that particular bit of spam leveraged various social networking engines to work its magic. A fascinating read.
- Richard Koman
Scanning the sidebar links and adjacent content it was obvious this content was out of place on a page optimized for dental insurance. The webmaster of i-dentalresources.com had inserted some Digg bait, seeded a few social bookmarking services, and waited for links and page views to roll in, creating a new node in a spam farm fueled by high-paying affiliate programs and identity collection for resale. ...

November 22, 2006 | Permalink | Comment on this post | Tag: News Watch
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11.22.06: Blogger kings' spitball fight

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Something to file under "Who Gives a F-": Jason Calcanis and Nick Denton pissing on each other on respective blogs and comments, with Dave Winer, Mike Arrington and Robert Scoble all chiming in. Somebody wake me when its over.
On Monday Denton said that Calcanis' departure from AOL was not out of loyalty to fired boss Jon Miller but because his performance at Netscape.com sucked rotten eggs.
The numbers are brutal: in the middle of June, before Calacanis overhauled Netscape's front page, the property commanded over 130m pageviews per week. Within two months, traffic had declined nearly 70%.
One of Jason's great strengths is his shamelessness: a willingness to spot good ideas, copy and improve them, fast. He'd offered to buy Digg for $4m, and been turned down; his solution for Netscape was to steal Digg's model, and some of their star contributors. Classic Calacanis.
Except Netscape visitors, most of whom only stuck with the neglected portal out of habit, were the worst subjects possible for Jason's radical experiment. Traffic the week of June 18th, before the Netscape team remade the front page, was 137m pageviews. The following week, as Netscape decommissioned areas such as news and weather, it declined to 115m. The new front page, a clone of Digg.com, went live on June 29. The first full week after the change, traffic had plummeted further, to 72m pageviews. The Comscore numbers, which help advertisers allocated their budgets to different internet properties, mirror this decline.
Calacanis has resigned from AOL ostensibly out of loyalty to Miller ... Valleywag's more cynical theory: he messed up Netscape.com, and used Miller's departure as cover.

And later that a comment from Calcanis:
Another classic Nick Denton hit and run story about a competitor...

Some facts:
1. If you look at unique users before and after the move uniques are down only 22%--which is just fine given that we move the email users over. In fact, the webpage views are up if you take the email users out.
2. We DIDN'T LOSE THE EMAIL USERS... we moved them to another domain inside of AOL (i.e. aim.com). AOL did this because they didn't want to manage the old Netscape email system which was not keeping up with new free email standards (think 2gig free).
3. The email page views are worthless--no one buys email inventory on the web.
4. The reason why the uniques are still high and the page views went down was because the email users do 100's of page views a day--AND WE DIDN'T LOSE THESE PAGE VIEWS... WE MOVED THEM TO AIM.COM.
5. The stats were not leaked--you're talking about COMSCORE. Give me a break.

Feel free to slam me Nick... I know you're having fun taking down anyone who competes with you during your time on Valleywg. First John Battelle... now me. Don't let the facts stand in your way of course.

You should do a blog post on Engadget vs. Gizmodo, Joystiq vs. Kotaku, and Autoblog vs. Jalopnik and how Weblogs, Inc. has crushed Gawker media in the only three verticals we ever competed in.
Or maybe you should do a blog post about how you're always asking your bloggers to out people--I've heard this from three Gawker bloggers so far.
Anyway, good to know that you're still the hit-and-run, facts are secondary, publisher you've always been.
We don't expect anything less from you Nick!
best j

And more opinions from Arrington (Denton's piece a poorly researched hit job), Winer (Maybe Mike is protesting because the new Valleywag is getting a little close to TechCrunch? Nahh, couldn't be), and Scoble the peacemaker (TechCrunch is all about building companies and people up while Valleywag is all about tearing companies and people down. Both functions are needed. If you have hype without anti-hype, no one will believe the stuff that really should be listened to.)

But by now I've forgotten what all this cross-linking is about ... Why Calcanis quit AOL? Apparently, there are some people who care.

The acceleration in the disruption of media

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

I'm often invited to talk to groups of people about what's going on in the media sector, and I often start with a simple observation: At no other point in our lives will we be witness to such a massively disruptive/destructive time in the media industry.

That's exciting to me because the transition in the underlying business models in media are happening much faster than in software, hardware or anything that Moore's Law has been able to unleash. The disruption means there are many opportunities to create new types of very viable media businesses while the old guard figures things out in committees.

The dark side of all of this, however, is not very appealing and it is something I've been writing about for nearly two years. To put it simply, what happens if the old media dies before the new media learns to walk? By which I mean what happens to us if we lose the "Fourth Estate" - that fourth vital "component" of our society?

I look at media--in all of its forms--as the way society thinks things through ...

, how it moves through a process and solves problems. The serious "60 Minutes," the investigative "Frontline," and the fluffy entertainment- type Fox news shows are all important in that process.

But this type of mainstream media is being torn apart--not by blogging--but by search engine marketing. Quite simply, it is more effective to sell products and services next to a search box than next to journalism.

That's not good. I'm not blaming GOOG or YHOO for the success of search engine marketing. But I'm asking who will pay for high-quality media?

We are in trouble if we don't find that solution. We need high-quality, trustworthy media, so that we can make the right decisions as a society.

And we have some very tough collective decisions to make: about the environment, healthcare, foreign policy and many other serious issues. How can we make the right decisions with an increasingly fragmented media sector, one that is rife with misinformation?

But that can be the exciting part, and the worthwhile part, in all of this. There is an opportunity to help in the speedy transition to a new media, a new society, one that is better than the old.

We can have a future media world that incorporates the best qualities of professional journalism, citizen journalism, and what I call "smart machine" journalism--the automated aggregation through search algorithms of relevant sources.

I'm confident that we will get to this type of better media world. But I'm concerned that we will first have to go through some troubling and challenging times. And some of those troubling signs are in the acceleration in the pace of disruption in the media sector.

This acceleration is seen in the recent revisions upwards of online advertising spend, across all markets. Here is a recent Merrill Lynch report:

Raising ML U.S. online ad forecasts - We are once again raising our online forecasts to account for both the Q3 IAB results and our higher Q4 growth estimate. We are now forecasting Q4 growth of 30% y/y, up from 27%, and FY06 growth of 34%, up from 31%. For FY07, we are now forecasting slightly higher growth of 23.3% v. 22.5% previously on the continued strength of search and branded.

Here is the full report: http://rsch1.ml.com/9093/24013/ds/072_4149.PDF

The old media companies can't benefit much from more online traffic because they can't monetise that traffic to the same extent as the new media companies GOOG, YHOO, and the others.

When I worked at the Financial Times my employer collected advertising revenues so that it could pay my salary so that I and my colleagues could produce high-quality independent journalism.

GOOG and YHOO have no interest in collecting advertising revenues to pay for journalism--no matter how useful that would be to societies and communities. Their content deals cover just a fraction of the cost of producing top notch journalism.

And that's the difference between the old media and the new media companies--the awareness of a social responsibility IMHO.

November 21, 2006

11.21.06: Update: Google 500

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Google hit 500 today, closing at $509.65. That puts the company's market cap at $155 billion. Is this crazy?

No way, analyst Jordan Rohan told Forbes. There's just no underestimating the earnings potential of the search and ad giant.

"The bigger deal is what they’ve done to the Internet landscape. “Google 500 underscores how important it is as a disruptive force on the Internet. If there is no disruption there is no change and change is generally good.
"Google has an unparalleled ability to monetize traffic or restate it to internet viewers into advertising revenue for the portals they visit,” Rohan said. “No other company has a machine with that sort of power.”

Anthony Noto with Goldman Sachs told the Times that Google is running a “flywheel.”

“They can reinvest at a faster rate, they can innovate at a faster rate, they can create value for advertisers and users at faster rate."

And Paul Kedrosky points to this calculation of Google's market cap as a percentage of Microsoft's.

UPDATE: From Tom Foremski

Roger Ehrenberg over at Information Arbitrage has a great analysis of how simple it is for GOOG to make money by simply acquiring users at a price far below the money it can make per user:

“The Tube” spends most of its dollars on technology to route, upload, access and search videos, based on user requests. Google paid $1.6 billion for 72 million unique monthly viewers. That equates to an acquistion cost per customer of $22. You can argue over the 72 million users, so if we cut that in half (to forestall any arguments) to 36 million, that’s a cost per customer of $44. So to Google, a YouTube customer cost somewhere in the $22-$44 range.
3. Other Media Outlets - By the Numbers

TV

Fox’s American Idol has 21.1 million viewers. At $660,000 for a 30 second spot, a 1-hour show would have close to 15 minutes of commercials yielding a revenue of $950 million a year (30 spots a show X 4 shows a month X 12 months), or an implied value of $45 per user.

NY Times

The New York Times Company, has seen better days. In the last 2 years the stock has gone from the low 40s to the low 20s. Imagine that - 50% of its market cap erased in 2 years - a direct result of online media taking its toll on MSM. NYT currently has a market cap of $3.3 billion, Net Income of $259 Million, and a 5% profit margin. They have 1.7 million print subscribers and 37.7 million unique web viewers per month, which includes About.com. For arguments sake we’ll put them together for a total of about 40 million viewers. Using our admittedly rough methodology a NYT customer appears to be worth approximately $82.

The Googleplex

With a market cap of a stunning $144 billion, Net Income of $1.4 billion and 25% Profit Margin, what is a customer worth to The Beast? In the strictest sense Google is all about advertising, and it has rapproximately 380 million unique monthly users according to Neilsen/NetRatings - spending an average of 22 minutes on the site. The market cap divided by the number of unique users per month nets a per customer value of $380. Zowie.

4. YouTube - the Verdict

With YouTube valued at $22-$44 dollars a user, Google must see this and be licking its chops. Or, to me, “This is a grand arbitrage opporunity.” Google knows what it can squeeze from a user, how it can scale users and how much it should pay to acquire users. I’d say that $380 in vs. $22-$44 out represents the kind of margin of safety value investors can get their arms around. Even if the ad market gets increasingly competitive (say, if Yahoo! can ever post a credible challenge), and they can monetize even at the levels of the NYTimes, that’s a YouTube valuation of $2.8 billion ($82 X low-end 34 million customers). In short, this represents a pretty nice IRR given the likely monetization time horizon. Even a little exposure to the Googleplex can go a long, long way.

Read more here: http://www.informationarbitrage.com/2006/10/google_a_ben_gr.html

Cisco's M&A Chief talks with Wharton about acquisitions

Ron Piovesan from Cisco writes:

Hi Tom, I thought you'd be interesting in podcast we have posted, which is an interview with Dan Scheinman and Wharton management professor Saikat Chaudhuri. It's a great 16 min conversation about the art and science of M&A, the importance of integrating an acquired company, and the importance of timing when making a deal.
I know you've spoken with Dan before, but as background, Dan has overseen over 30 Cisco acquisitions including Airespace ($450M), Linksys ($500M) and Scientific Atlanta ($7B).

Cisco SVP Dan Scheinman and Wharton's Saikat Chaudhuri Discuss Acquisitions and Innovation, Part I: An Innovation 'Ecosystem'

http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/tln/services/media/scheinman_acquisitions_and_innovation.mp3

Cisco Podcasts

http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/tln/services/etl_podcast.html

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November 20, 2006

11.20.06: ValleyWag speculates wildly on Benioff visit to WSJ

By Richard Koman for

Nick Denton has been furiously following up on his Friday scoop that Salesforce.com's Marc Benioff had Wall Street Journal reporter Pui-Wing Tam (one of the several reporters tailed by HP) arrested when she tried to get close to the five-acre estate he's building on the Big Island.

Denton says that Benioff also flew to New York with a money-looking fellow Journal reporters assumed to be a lawyer, specifically to "brow-beat" top brass about the reporter's activities. Denton offers no details of that meeting but plenty of speculation that the meeting was responsible for the fact that the Tam's story makes no mention of the incident. To be clear, Denton is accusing the Journal of squashing that part of the story out of some sort of gentlemen's agreement with Benioff.

That the accusation is the wildest of speculation based on the thinest of evidence is apparent from Denton's own words:

It's not clear whether Benioff's visit to the Journal's headquarters came before publication, [if] he [was] trying to head off publication, or at least mention of the incident; or, less likely, that the visit came after publication, and an effort to head off further such intrusive coverage. ...
The Journal, and [managing editor Paul] Steiger in particular, deal with aggrieved CEOs on a regular basis. The usual tactic is to be mollifying, without making any firm commitments. These discussions are generally off-the-record, so the paper would not normally feel able to disclose the fact of the conversation, or the content of Benioff's complaint. The paper, also, tries to keep its reporter's personalities, and their subjective personal experiences, out of the way of the story. However, the arrest of a reporter would be unusual enough normally to pierce even the Journal's usual discretion. ...

I suppose Valleywag is still looking to hire that seasoned reporter with strong journalistic instincts....

11.20.06: Internal memo: YHOO's peanut butter strategy is what ails the company

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

The Wall Street Journal has a hard-hitting memo from Yahoo senior VP Brad Garlinghouse that calls on senior management to radically restructure the company, cut redundant positions and do away with confusing competitive services.

We lack a focused, cohesive vision for our company. We want to do everything and be everything -- to everyone. We've known this for years, talk about it incessantly, but do nothing to fundamentally address it. We are scared to be left out. We are reactive instead of charting an unwavering course. We are separated into silos that far too frequently don't talk to each other. And when we do talk, it isn't to collaborate on a clearly focused strategy, but rather to argue and fight about ownership, strategies and tactics.

Our inclination and proclivity to repeatedly hire leaders from outside the company results in disparate visions of what winning looks like -- rather than a leadership team rallying around a single cohesive strategy.

I've heard our strategy described as spreading peanut butter across the myriad opportunities that continue to evolve in the online world. The result: a thin layer of investment spread across everything we do and thus we focus on nothing in particular.

I hate peanut butter. We all should.

Perhaps Garlinghouse's diagnosis serves to explains Yahoo's immoral actions in China. If Terry Semel isn't willing to change Yahoo China's policy, there may be no one else in the company who can own issues like this and push forward an agenda of corporate responsibility. It's a shame Garlinghouse doesn't address Yahoo's China problem because because it seems to me a sign of the problems he does point to.

"We're scared to be left out," he writes. Exactly. Yahoo is scared to be left out of China and it doesn't know where its values are. What would not cooperating with China look like? Yahoo doesn't know. They can't miss out, so they can't say no. Go back to Semel's "Nazi Germany" quote, reported in the Journal and plucked out of obscurity by ValleyWag:

One attendee asked Mr. Semel if Yahoo would have cooperated with Nazi Germany the same way it has with China. His response: "Yahoo has a basic obligation not to have a point of view on basic content, and to present content ... and aggregate things and to allow people to make their own choices. I don't know how I would have felt then."

OK, here's the full memo - because you never know when things will go behind the wall at the WSJ:

Three and half years ago, I enthusiastically joined Yahoo! The magnitude of the opportunity was only matched by the magnitude of the assets. And an amazing team has been responsible for rebuilding Yahoo!

It has been a profound experience. I am fortunate to have been a part of dramatic change for the Company. And our successes speak for themselves. More users than ever, more engaging than ever and more profitable than ever!

I proudly bleed purple and yellow everyday! And like so many people here, I love this company.

But all is not well. Last Thursday's NY Times article was a blessing in the disguise of a painful public flogging. While it lacked accurate details, its conclusions rang true, and thus was a much needed wake up call. But also a call to action. A clear statement with which I, and far too many Yahoo's, agreed. And thankfully a reminder. A reminder that the measure of any person is not in how many times he or she falls down - but rather the spirit and resolve used to get back up. The same is now true of our Company.

It's time for us to get back up.

I believe we must embrace our problems and challenges and that we must take decisive action. We have the opportunity - in fact the invitation - to send a strong, clear and powerful message to our shareholders and Wall Street, to our advertisers and our partners, to our employees (both current and future), and to our users. They are all begging for a signal that we recognize and understand our problems, and that we are charting a course for fundamental change. Our current course and speed simply will not get us there. Short-term band-aids will not get us there.

It's time for us to get back up and seize this invitation.

I imagine there's much discussion amongst the Company's senior most leadership around the challenges we face. At the risk of being redundant, I wanted to share my take on our current situation and offer a recommended path forward, an attempt to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

Recognizing Our Problems

I hate peanut butter. We all should.

We lack clarity of ownership and accountability. The most painful manifestation of this is the massive redundancy that exists throughout the organization. We now operate in an organizational structure -- admittedly created with the best of intentions -- that has become overly bureaucratic. For far too many employees, there is another person with dramatically similar and overlapping responsibilities. This slows us down and burdens the company with unnecessary costs.

Equally problematic, at what point in the organization does someone really OWN the success of their product or service or feature? Product, marketing, engineering, corporate strategy, financial operations... there are so many people in charge (or believe that they are in charge) that it's not clear if anyone is in charge. This forces decisions to be pushed up - rather than down. It forces decisions by committee or consensus and discourages the innovators from breaking the mold... thinking outside the box.

There's a reason why a centerfielder and a left fielder have clear areas of ownership. Pursuing the same ball repeatedly results in either collisions or dropped balls. Knowing that someone else is pursuing the ball and hoping to avoid that collision - we have become timid in our pursuit. Again, the ball drops.

We lack decisiveness. Combine a lack of focus with unclear ownership, and the result is that decisions are either not made or are made when it is already too late. Without a clear and focused vision, and without complete clarity of ownership, we lack a macro perspective to guide our decisions and visibility into who should make those decisions. We are repeatedly stymied by challenging and hairy decisions. We are held hostage by our analysis paralysis.

We end up with competing (or redundant) initiatives and synergistic opportunities living in the different silos of our company.

YME vs. Musicmatch
Flickr vs. Photos
YMG video vs. Search video
Deli.cio.us vs. myweb
Messenger and plug-ins vs. Sidebar and widgets
Social media vs. 360 and Groups
Front page vs. YMG
Global strategy from BU'vs. Global strategy from Int'l

We have lost our passion to win. Far too many employees are "phoning" it in, lacking the passion and commitment to be a part of the solution. We sit idly by while -- at all levels -- employees are enabled to "hang around". Where is the accountability? Moreover, our compensation systems don't align to our overall success. Weak performers that have been around for years are rewarded. And many of our top performers aren't adequately recognized for their efforts.

As a result, the employees that we really need to stay (leaders, risk-takers, innovators, passionate) become discouraged and leave. Unfortunately many who opt to stay are not the ones who will lead us through the dramatic change that is needed.

Solving our Problems

We have awesome assets. Nearly every media and communications company is painfully jealous of our position. We have the largest audience, they are highly engaged and our brand is synonymous with the Internet.

If we get back up, embrace dramatic change, we will win.

I don't pretend there is only one path forward available to us. However, at a minimum, I want to be part of the solution and thus have outlined a plan here that I believe can work. It is my strong belief that we need to act very quickly or risk going further down a slippery slope, The plan here is not perfect; it is, however, FAR better than no action at all.

There are three pillars to my plan:

1. Focus the vision.

2. Restore accountability and clarity of ownership.

3. Execute a radical reorganization.

1. Focus the vision

a) We need to boldly and definitively declare what we are and what we are not.

b) We need to exit (sell?) non core businesses and eliminate duplicative projects and businesses.

My belief is that the smoothly spread peanut butter needs to turn into a deliberately sculpted strategy -- that is narrowly focused.

We can't simply ask each BU to figure out what they should stop doing. The result will continue to be a non-cohesive strategy. The direction needs to come decisively from the top. We need to place our bets and not second guess. If we believe Media will maximize our ROI -- then let's not be bashful about reducing our investment in other areas. We need to make the tough decisions, articulate them and stick with them -- acknowledging that some people (users / partners / employees) will not like it. Change is hard.

2. Restore accountability and clarity of ownership

a) Existing business owners must be held accountable for where we find ourselves today -- heads must roll,

b) We must thoughtfully create senior roles that have holistic accountability for a particular line of business (a variant of a GM structure that will work with Yahoo!'s new focus)

c) We must redesign our performance and incentive systems.

I believe there are too many BU leaders who have gotten away with unacceptable results and worse -- unacceptable leadership. Too often they (we!) are the worst offenders of the problems outlined here. We must signal to both the employees and to our shareholders that we will hold these leaders (ourselves) accountable and implement change.

By building around a strong and unequivocal GM structure, we will not only empower those leaders, we will eliminate significant overhead throughout our multi-headed matrix. It must be very clear to everyone in the organization who is empowered to make a decision and ownership must be transparent. With that empowerment comes increased accountability -- leaders make decisions, the rest of the company supports those decisions, and the leaders ultimately live/die by the results of those decisions.

My view is that far too often our compensation and rewards are just spreading more peanut butter. We need to be much more aggressive about performance based compensation. This will only help accelerate our ability to weed out our lowest performers and better reward our hungry, motivated and productive employees.

3. Execute a radical reorganization

a) The current business unit structure must go away.

b) We must dramatically decentralize and eliminate as much of the matrix as possible.

c) We must reduce our headcount by 15-20%.

I emphatically believe we simply must eliminate the redundancies we have created and the first step in doing this is by restructuring our organization. We can be more efficient with fewer people and we can get more done, more quickly. We need to return more decision making to a new set of business units and their leadership. But we can't achieve this with baby step changes, We need to fundamentally rethink how we organize to win.

Independent of specific proposals of what this reorganization should look like, two key principles must be represented:

Blow up the matrix. Empower a new generation and model of General Managers to be true general managers. Product, marketing, user experience & design, engineering, business development & operations all report into a small number of focused General Managers. Leave no doubt as to where accountability lies.

Kill the redundancies. Align a set of new BU's so that they are not competing against each other. Search focuses on search. Social media aligns with community and communications. No competing owners for Video, Photos, etc. And Front Page becomes Switzerland. This will be a delicate exercise -- decentralization can create inefficiencies, but I believe we can find the right balance.

I love Yahoo! I'm proud to admit that I bleed purple and yellow. I'm proud to admit that I shaved a Y in the back of my head.

My motivation for this memo is the adamant belief that, as before, we have a tremendous opportunity ahead. I don't pretend that I have the only available answers, but we need to get the discussion going; change is needed and it is needed soon. We can be a stronger and faster company - a company with a clearer vision and clearer ownership and clearer accountability.

We may have fallen down, but the race is a marathon and not a sprint. I don't pretend that this will be easy. It will take courage, conviction, insight and tremendous commitment. I very much look forward to the challenge.

So let's get back up.

Catch the balls.

And stop eating peanut butter.

11.20.06: YHOO, GOOG pick over the remains of newspapers

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Yahoo today announced a deal with 150 newspapers to sell ads through the online portal, following a similar deal that Google cut with 50 papers. The chains in the Yahoo deal include Cox Newspapers Inc., Belo Corp., Hearst Corp., the E.W. Scripps Co., MediaNews Group Inc., Lee Enterprises and the Journal Register Co. Through these deals newspapers will be able to pick up a piece of the national advertising market because national advertisers won't have to deal directlly with dozens of papers to make a buy. (AP)

But isn't there something terribly sad about this, that an entire media industry is unable to aggregate itself for such an obvious purpose, that it needs the relatively simple technical assistance of the big Internet engines to pull this off. One may argue that advertisers would rather deal with Yahoo and Google than say the Classified Advertising Consortium (I just made that up). It's clear that news industry efforts have failed to catch fire.

So Google and Yahoo will aggregate newspapers and take a cut in the bargain. Papers could create a stand-alone for profit company to do this work and use the profits to provide technology resources across papers. But instead, newspapers will aid Yahoo's bottom line while their own continue to shrink, newsroom cuts continue and young readers continue to scan headlines through the Web, cellphones, and cable news.

November 19, 2006

Podcamp West full of great advice

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

I usually try to keep my weekends geek-free and spend it with my kids. But I did pop in to show my face at Podcamp West, organized by Vic Podcaster and friends, at the Swedish American Hall. [BTW, this venue in San Francisco is quickly developing as a center for the SF tech/new media scene, it has just the right type of funky style and goes well with Cafe du Nord for the pre and after event parties.]

I caught the following panel which was full of great advice:

Veteran Podcasters' Share the Tips and Tricks/Do's and Don'ts (Panel) - Joe Klein, Michael Geoghegan, Michael Butler, JaDonnelly, Vic Podcaster, Marcus Couch - Long-time veteran podcasters pass along their experience and wisdom. Topics include starting a podcast, promoting the podcast, building and maintaining a loyal listener base, keeping the content fresh and compelling and resisting premature "Podfade."

I'll summarize:

Just do it. Don't worry too much about the quality, just get it out there. A podcast can be any length, whatever is comfortable to you. Don't let the technology get in the way, just get it done. Don't worry about how many listeners you have. Find something you are passionate about. Don't feud with other Podcasters. Keep doing it.

I'm certainly going to start a podcast, watch this space!

Link to Podcamp West

SVW Vidcast: Chris Pirillo at Peet's - also Robert Scoble and Chris Heuer

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

Chris Heuer introduced me to Chris Pirillo, who was in town for his pre-wedding party thrown by Robert Scoble. We went to Peet's on Market Street and spoke about his new project to create a publishing platform. Robert Scoble and Chris Heuer join in.

You might be thinking why another publishing platform? Well, I agree with Chris, we don't yet have a publishing platform that has been designed by publishers and Chris has been publishing online for many years.

"None of the publishing platforms, and that includes Wordpress and Drupal have all the features that I want as a publisher, there is a lot missing. Also, I need a better way to monetise my content and so what we are developing is in essence the type of tool that I need. It will all be open source so anyone can use it. We'll make money on the services side for businesses," said Chris Pirillo.

Link to Chris Pirillo

Fortune looks at Larry Sonsini and links to "sleazy behavior"

Roger Parloff in Fortune profiles Silicon Valley's most powerful man: Larry Sonsini and asks is he too close to his clients and does he have too many conflicts of interest?

This is the story of how a modest securities lawyer became the most powerful man in the most crucial sector of the American economy. And what it means when a player noted for his probity and unfailingly good judgment suddenly finds his name being linked to some pretty sleazy behavior. . .

. . . These entrepreneurs were so eager to use him that they did not seem to mind that he often also represented their competitors. For a period in the 1980s, Sonsini was representing Seagate Technologies, Conner Peripherals and Quantum, which were then the country's three largest disk-drive companies - and bitter enemies.
"It's a tradeoff," says Steve Luczo, Seagate's chairman and former CEO. "Because he's counsel to the three biggest, he's also most aware of the issues that face the industry. That's what you want." In addition, Luczo says, he trusted Sonsini to keep his confidences. "We're not idiots," he says. "Would you do that all the time? No. With Larry? Yeah." . . .

. . . Though Sonsini sat on nine public boards in February 2002, today he's down to just one, and he says he expects to phase out that one soon too. He's come around to the view that "the presumption" should be against sitting on public boards. "It' s a question of the evolution of independence and objectivity in corporate governance," he says.
Last year Sonsini considered retiring from law practice to become chairman of the private-equity firm Silver Lake Partners. But having turned down the offer, he says he plans to continue practicing for the foreseeable future.

Source: Silicon valley lawyer Larry Sonsini is hurt by scandals - November 27, 2006

Laughing Squid: Be there...

The place to be Saturday was afternoon at the Podcast camp at the Swedish American Hall, and then at Scott Beale's Laughing Squid party in the evening. Lots of familiar faces... Nick Douglas, Nick Denton, (Nick Denton has been doing a stellar job in filling in for N.G ) (N.G still won't tell me what he is up to...)

Chris Pirillo and Robert Scoble cruise by in a stretch limo ...

Also: This is the first time I've seen Scott Beale without a camera around his neck... Mrs Beale was dealing with the guest list and doing a very good job of it. Inside, lots of music, but not too loud to chatter.

I usually try to avoid weekend events but these ones were worth while. And they show a growing San Francisco geek community, which is interesting.

November 17, 2006

Kultur Shock: laugh with the squid: Decade 2; Here kitty, kitty, kitty; Synergenesis

by lucaso for Silicon Valley Watcher

Just back from an Alaskan blizzard experience and I'm ready to shake off the land of the midnight sun and wreck havoc on a sucker-free jaunt through the city of love. Diggrz weekend Kultur Shock begins NOW!

Tonight, shake your thang with Luke Vibert at the Rx Gallery(132 Eddy St.). An eclectic DJ grounded in hip-hop cut-and- paste aesthetics, Vibert is sure to get your body moving with BA-Ba-BASS, dig?

If shakin' it ain't your thang and you feel like ploppin it in front of the silver screen for a few good laughs, then head out to the movies and catch "Borat."(sure to have you in stitches) If you haven't seen Borat, then check him out on youtube(too funny!)

Heerrreeee kittty, kitty, kiity... REORRW!

That's right, it's the CFA International Cat Show! This weekend in San Mateo it's time to take a stroll with the finest felines in the world! Garfeild, Hello Kitty, and Morris impersonators welcome! ROAR!

Laughing On...

Saturday night will be one to remember as Laughing Squid celebrates their 11th anniversary at Mighty. Laughing Squid is one of the Bay area's top portals and has to be one of my personal favs. The diggrz will be there to shoot a vidcast of the event.

The Camp before the Squid...

Need a lil intellectual stimuli before(or after) the big squid down? Then head over to PodCamp West to catch up with all of the west coast podders and talk shop.

If you're looking for something with a unique and diifferent vibe, then head over to the Red Ink Studios for the third annual Synergenesis. From Synergenesis:

"Synergenesis is evidence of a world that does not yet fully exist, a world that we are calling into being through the experience of this event. This is intended to be a magnetic portal, bringing diverse yet aligned people together to exchange ideas, share resources, observe art, integrate experience and create culture."

That means Sunday I'll be kicking it, watching the game! Until next....

November 16, 2006

11.16.06: SEC launches inquiry into HP spying

News.com reports:

Hewlett-Packard disclosed Thursday that the Securities and Exchange Commission has moved ahead with a formal inquiry into the company's controversial investigatory practices.
"HP has been informed that the Securities and Exchange Commission has issued a formal order of investigation in its inquiry," the company said in a regulatory filing Thursday with the SEC. HP also said it has "received a request from the Federal Communications Commission for records and information relating to those leak investigations."
The company has already been under scrutiny from a variety of corners with regard to the tactics used during the company's investigation into the unauthorized release of information to the media. As part of that probe, investigators hired by HP obtained phone records for more than a dozen people using false pretenses, a practice known as "pretexting." In addition, investigators also employed physical surveillance and HP has said it sent a false e-mail tip with an electronic tracer to a CNET News.com reporter.
HP said in September that it had received an additional request for information from the SEC, but, until Thursday, the company had not yet noted that it was the subject of a formal inquiry.
The company would not say when it learned from the SEC that its inquiry had been made formal. "We're not providing the date of when the request was received," said HP spokesman Ryan Donovan.
"We do not believe this represents an escalation or broadening of the investigation and are continuing to cooperate fully," Donovan said in an e-mail.

11.16.06: Shakeups at AOL

Following the ouster of Jon Miller (who is Lou Reed's "kung-fu brother"), Jason Calcanis is also out at AOL. Here's Om:

An anonymous tip dropped into our inbox, claiming that Jason Calacanis, one of the co-founders of Weblogs Inc., and architect of the new Netscape has resigned from AOL, following the¹ resignation of Jon Miller.

On his blog, Jason says no comment². When we IMed him, he offered the same, No Comment. If the news is indeed true - we are still trying to nail down the details - then AOL might have lost one of the handful of people who were outspoken enough to shake AOL from its polite slumbering ways. Not many saw eye-to-eye with Jason, but most agreed that his heart was in the right place.

On the ouster of Miller, we are as confounded as you are. Falco, despite his resume³, isn’t the kind of executive you would put in charge when your main rival is someone as nimble as Google, or as cash rich as Microsoft or as dogmatic as Yahoo. Sudden executive changes when a company is in transition to a new free model can cause anxiety amongst rank-and-file.

Falco’s appointment is another proof of the bumbling ways of Time Warner, a company known to have the uncanny ability to turn a pot of gold into a bucket of mud water. On a side note, just wondering how the great Time Warner movie machine is doing these days in terms of profits.

11.16.06: ValleyWag's Douglas fired for shooting off his mouth

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

On Monday, Nick Denton announced that editor Nick Douglas "is leaving." Reading through Denton's post, we concluded that Denton had in fact fired Douglas.

Robert Scoble asked: "Where did you hear that Nick was fired? I knew Nick was leaving Valleywag for at least a month. That doesn't indicate someone getting fired."

Well, yeah, fired. The Times has an email to staff from Denton's #2, Lockhart Steele, that lays out why "we let Nick Douglas go." It includes accusations of getting too cozy with sources, favor trading and inappropriate ego elevation. But what got Steele and Denton frothing is apparently this interview, in which he said Valleywag was baiting for a good, solid lawsuit from News Corp. or another giant.

We don’t report stories to “finally get sued.” We report stories because we think they deserve to be out there. Whatever follows from them is whatever follows from them. Sarcasm or not, it’s quotes like these that could make us look really foolish — or worse — down the road.
These are issues that we repeatedly spoke to and warned Nick about. It finally reached a break-point where changing editors was the only solution.

But Denton's clearly been spinning that the change was about beefing up the site's gravitas, not dumping a problem editor. Gracious of him, I suppose but Denton of all people should know that the truth always comes out online.

In his public post and later press interviews, Denton intimated that the move was all about editorial direction. Here he is in the announcement post:

Nick Douglas ... will be a great journalist. And we will look stupid for letting him go. But, to helm the site, we're now looking for someone with, ideally, some background in reporting. An old-media career, useful in the sparkling new world of blogs. Who would have thought?

And in an IM chat with the Chronicle's Al Saracevic:

ND: ... I think there's a real hunger for unadulterated news on the Valley
ND: and I wanted to bring in someone as fearless as Nick Douglas, but with more authority
Al: Yeah, the traffic looks good.
Al: You hinted that some of recent posts were too sex-oriented. Can you elaborate? Was it (Nick Douglas' recent) item about Sergey Brin and Marissa Mayer dating?
ND: no, they're both public figures, and that rumor was going around, and Nick said it seemed pretty crazy
ND: but we're going to pick less on civilians
Al: So, no specific item triggered this?
ND: no

11.16.06: Craigslist not liable for discriminatory ads

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Another reason why it's better to be online than to be a newspaper: A federal judge in Chicago ruled today that, unlike newspapers, Craigslist is not liable for discriminatory housing ads on the site. If published in a newspaper those ads would violate fair housing laws. Online, they don't.

Background on the case from the Chicago Trib:

The Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law sued San Francisco-based Craigslist in February, claiming that during a six-month period, the site published more than 100 housing ads in Chicago that violated the federal Fair Housing Act.
Those ads included such declarations as "Non-women of Color NEED NOT APPLY" and "African Americans and Arabians tend to clash with me so that won't work out."

Basically, the case put two federal laws in conflict and the court had to decide how it plays out. Under the 1968 Fair Housing Act newspapers and other publishers of ads deemed discriminatory can be held liable for violating the law. The law says it's illegal to:

[M]ake, print, or publish ... any notice, statement, or advertisement, with respect to the sale or rental of a dwelling that indicates any ... discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status, or national origin.

But the 1996 Communications Decency Act (CDA) shields websites from liability for the contents of user posts:

No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.

What's a court to do? Bottom line: Craigslist is surely a "provider ... of an interactive computer service" and neither the Fair Housing Act or any other law that punishes publishers for the content of ads will apply (er, not counting intellectual property claims.)

But in finding for Craigslist, the court rejected the site's argument of unlimited immunity for online providers. The Trib reports:

"We are heartened by fact that (the judge) forcefully rejected the unlimited immunity advocated by Craigslist," said Laurie Wardell, fair housing director for the Chicago Lawyers' Committee.

Judge Amy St. Eve ruled that Craigslist is immune only if it is treated as a publisher of third party content.

St. Eve's ruling implies that online forums can be liable for third-party postings for reasons other than being a publisher, though they could not cite a good example of another avenue of legal pursuit.
It's not easy to pursue a claim against a site like Craigslist without acknowledging publication, said Jim Speta, a communications law expert at Northwestern University's Law School. But it's probably possible, he said.

The decision bothers ICANN director and blogger Susan Crawford, who finds the decision unnecessarily "crabbed." She notes that the CDA was famously upheld in a Fourth Circuit decision, Zeran v AOL, that concluded, "Congress considered the weight of the speech interests implicated and chose to immunize service providers to avoid [the] restrictive effect" of holding providers liable for user-posted content.

The craigslist opinion (from a lower court, not an appellate court, but noting dicta in a 7th circuit opinion) in dicta disagrees with the traditional Zeran reading of Section 230 in a couple of crucial respects. First, the court asserts that sites/services are protected by the statute only for claims that would treat them like a "professional" publisher -- like someone who edits and chooses what to post. Claims that have to do with the site's role in simply making available the material are not barred, in this court's view.
That's strange, because the universe of claims that have as one of their elements a fingerpointing assertion that "you are an editor" is small. (Indeed, the fair housing claim in this case is one of the few. Plus defamation.) This reading of Section 230 narrows its immunity function substantially.
Second, the craigslist court opines that if a site actually alters material that is then made available (and the altered material sparks a legal claim), then the site shouldn't be immune under Section 230. This is a big deal, because mere editing and selection so far hasn't been enough to make the site liable as an "information content provider". The court hastens to note that the alterations would have to be part of the challenged material, but this really muddies the waters.

Crawford also notes that none of this matters for Craigslist; Craig's off the hook. And it doesn't really matter for anyone else because it's only dicta (legal asides) in a District Court ruling. But it does open the door to weakening protection for websites. If the Seventh Circuit (where Chicago is located) were to adopt this reasoning, then federal courts would have to choose between two interpretations and the question could make its way to the Supreme Court.

So a victory for Web 2.0 (and other) sites that depend on user-generated content but one tinged with a slightly bitter taste.

11.16.06: Small bits from Google

Big Three agree on sitemaps standard

From TechCrunch:

In an encouraging act of collaboration, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft announced tonight that they will all begin using the same Sitemaps protocol to index sites around the web. Now based at Sitemaps.org, the system instructs web masters on how to install an XML file on their servers that all three engines can use to track updates to pages. This should make it easier to get your pages indexed in a simple and standardized way. People who use Google Sitemaps don’t need to change anything, those maps will now be indexed by Yahoo and Microsoft.

The protocol is offered under an Attribution-ShareAlike Creative Commons License, so it can be used by any search engine, derivative variations using the same license can be created and it can be used for commercial purposes.

Google acquires iRows, shuts it down

Via TechCrunch:

iRows may be remembered as the first Israeli company to be acquired by Google but that's all. Their iRows site will be shut down and founders Yoah Bar-David and Itai Raz will go to work for Google, clearly on Docs & Spreadsheets. The company is providing instructions for its users to move their data to Google Documents.

11.16.06: Zune doesn't work with Vista

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley points out that Microsoft's Zune player, so heavily hawked by Ballmer and Gates, is incompatible with a even more heavily hyped MSFT product: Microsoft Vista.

So far, the Softies haven't provided any public info (that I've heard/seen) about when the company will introduce a patch or update enabling the Zune to work with Vista.
I already know Microsoft's justification: Vista only RTM'd on November 8. So there was no way that the Zune team could have made sure the final Vista bits would work with Zunes.
All I can say is Microsoft really needs to have a Vista update — or at least a public Vista support strategy — for Zune by the time the company does the business launch of Vista on November 30.

But News.com reports that Softie Scott Erickson says a patch will make Zune compatible by the time Vista goes on mass sale in January.

- Richard Koman

Thursday Mainstream Media Headlines

San Jose Mercury

Bill Gates has whirlwind day in Silicon Valley
Bill Gates came to Silicon Valley Wednesday in the role of the world's most famous do-gooder, not software mogul.

Tech leaders gather for innovation summit

Bay Area home sales slower, median prices flat

A's unveil field of tech dreams

Ex-HP board chair pleads not guilty in leak case

Dean & Nooch
Our week with the Playstation III
» Inside Silicon Valley: Riya founder Munjal Shah
» Dean & Nooch: An early look at Christmas presents

Animal care and behavior:
Humane Society Silicon Valley

San Francisco Chronicle

Why Valleywag got fired; Slide gets funding

Wall Street Journal

• "Wiki" Book: Pearson is joining with two top business schools to create a business book authored and edited by a "wiki."

Time Warner Names NBC's Falco to Lead AOL

Dell to Delay Results as SEC Begins Probe

Taiwan's Acer May Take Bronze

Pearson to Create a 'Wiki' Book

Sprint Launches Mobile Local Search

Microsoft Learns to Love Online Advertising

New York Times

The Internet: How to Make Your Web Site Sing for You

Annan Faults ‘Frightening Lack of Leadership’ for Global Warming

The Shape-Shifter

Blogs Take Lead in Reporting Polling Problems, With Supporting Evidence on YouTube

TechWeb

Microsoft Launches Office Live Out Of Beta

Online Ad Startup Aims to Automate Marketing

LucidEra Launches On-Demand BI

Google Sets Aside $200M+ War Chest For YouTube Indemnification

Live HDTV From Space Makes History, Project Leader Says

IBM Teams With DOE To Build Supercomputer 30X Faster Than BlueGene

Cingular To Offer Mobile Banking

Report: WiMax Is Gathering Momentum, On Its Way To 20 Million Users

Second Life Shop Owners Threaten Suit Against Virtual World's Creator

IBM Boosts Spain's Tech Reign

Newsfactor

AOL Upgrades Instant Messaging App

PS3 Supply Woes: Which Console Wins?

Microsoft and Novell: Harmony or Heartache?

Boost Launches Phone Tracking Service

Microsoft Forms Interoperability Group

SMBs Get Early Invites to Vista Party

The Outlook on Intel's Quad-Core Chips

Lenovo Introduces a New Tablet PC

Using CRM on the Go: Six Tips for Success

Microsoft Rolls Out Six Windows Patches

News.com

Digital Life

Media 2.0

Cutting Edge

Silicon Valley Watcher

November 15, 2006

TechNet: Silicon Valley billionaires all agree - life is getting better!

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

I didn't go to today's TechNet Innovation Summit in Silicon Valley but I did receive a candid report from a member of the press, who would prefer to be nameless:

"The event was so much hot air. I got fed up of hearing all these tech billionaires talking about how life is getting better. It is certainly getting better for them!

And the Charlie Rose interviews were so full of *!@#. I couldn't believe how he let people like John Doerr use his show as a platform for their agenda. Who do they think they are telling the President what he should be doing! As if they are so important because of their money. The entire event was a waste of time."

Pretty strong words and I'm glad that I didn't go. Silicon Valley's attempts at doing good in the world are quite pathetic, they can't even improve things in their own region. Cisco says it will build a high-tech ball park yet it can't build a high-tech school system - that's an infrastructure investment if I ever saw one.

Am I being harsh on our local leaders and businesses? No, nobody has called them on this stuff and they are big boys and girls and hopefully they can stop patting each other on the back so vigorously and exhaling gobs of carbon dioxide and do some good. Do No Evil is passive. Do Some Good is active, IMHO.

The event, moderated by eminent television journalist Charlie Rose, coincides with the announcement of TechNet's new Green Technologies Initiative, which will push for a heightened U.S. commitment to adopt innovative green technologies to fortify national security and address global energy and environmental challenges.
Today, the technology industry is creating new alternative and renewable energy technologies including advances in solar, wind, biofuel and fuel cell technologies, as well as developing technology solutions that drive energy efficiency, environmental protection and economic competitiveness. These groundbreaking innovations hold the potential to be the next great disruptive technologies.

Held at Stanford's historic Memorial Auditorium, the TechNet Innovation Summit featured Bill Gates, Chairman, Microsoft; Scott McNealy, Chairman, Sun Microsystems; Reed Hastings, Founder, Chairman and CEO, Netflix; Jerry Yang, Founder and Chief Yahoo, Yahoo! Inc.; John Doerr, Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers; Brian Halla, Chairman and CEO, National Semiconductor, KR Sridhar, Co-Founder and CEO, Bloom Energy and Charles Giancarlo, Senior Vice President and Chief Development Officer, Cisco Systems and President, Cisco-Linksys, LLC.

A View from Within on US Companies and China

[This is from the comments section on my entry "Dissidents within YHOO and GOOG will make ethical companies." I'm publishing it as an entry to give it wider distribution. -Tom Foremski]

By David Scott Lewis

This is a tricky issue, Tom -- as are many issues pertaining to China. As a Silicon Valley expat living in China and working in their R&D/IT sectors, I often wonder what response firms like Google and Yahoo (and Microsoft, for that matter) should have.

Among expats, we just kind of accept things the way they are. Kind of like rules we don't like, but those are the rules, so we have to play by them.

Semel's remark about Nazi Germany, however, is scary. If he really said, it should be grounds for his termination. But we can't put today's China on the same footing as Nazi Germany.

Yes, Beijing often feels like "Berlin, 1936", but the rest of China generally isn't this way, certainly not in SH. And most Chinese don't really care about this stuff: They're happy that their living conditions are improving each year (I'm speaking of urban Chinese). See my http://doiop.com/wang article which was one of the most widely read AO columns last year.

Personally, I'd like to see Google, Yahoo and Microsoft take the moral and ethical high ground (of course, I'd like to see the White House and new Congress do this, too). But then what about IBM? And Motorola? Where does it stop?

Do ALL American firms play hardball with China? Maybe. It would be fun to watch. (I'd be looking for a job, but it would still be fun to watch!)

Most of us expats get frustrated, but we learn to adapt to the rules. Also, there's a sense that the restraints and constraints might be "temporary," i.e., lasting for no more than a few years. Hard to say. Neo-Fascism/ultra-Nationalism is easy to whip up here (hence, the "Berlin, 1936" analogy). So it's a tightrope that American firms have to walk.

But, back to Semel, if he really said what ValleyWag said he said, then he should be terminated. Even giving this a second thought borders on hideous evil.

My advice as someone living in China: Develop scenarios for how to play the China card. Take into account that China may well indeed become a hostile enemy of the United States. (Not likely, but possible.)

Don't be reactive to what happens in China, be proactive. And figure out if the China market is really worth all the effort. For some, it is. For most, it may not be. As a development center, sure (but that's my bias; that's what we offer).

Keep core IP in the States. Be prepared for completely asinine responses from various levels of government and potential China-based competitors. (Our notions of Western logic do not prevail here. China never went through an "Enlightenment" period.) China is the Wild West where anything (and everything) does happen.

David Scott Lewis can be contacted : goldentriangle+svw (at) gmail.com

How Can Silicon Valley Help the World's Poor? The UN/RiOS Challenge

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

On Thursday, Santa Clara University will host the Silicon Valley Challenge Summit, which will address UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's challenge to the region to "broaden its horizon and bring more of its remarkable dynamism and innovation to the developing world."

There is an impressive list of speakers (see list at end) including a keynote by Craig Barrett, chairman of Intel. I spoke with Paul Braund, head of the RiOS Institute, an organization that is "dedicated to harnessing design innovation and anthropological research as tools to improve social and technological development projects."

"The goal of the summit is to get everybody under one tent and figure out what Silicon Valley is doing to help fulfill the UN's goals," said Paul Braund. He said that the RiOS institute can direct tech and other resources in ways that will better target helping the developing world. Sometimes well meaning resources are not utilized in the best ways.

One example is the one laptop per child initiative. Mr Braund is a strong supporter of that initiative yet sometimes more basic things such as getting electricity to villages has to come first.

Mr Braund is very much encouraged by Craig Barrett's involvement in this initiative and also the strong support demonstrated by many other Silicon Valley business and technology leaders. And he hopes that the dialogue on this topic will continue to grow following the summit.

But I'm not sure about that. The reason is that Silicon Valley cannot help the poor in its own backyard.

The public school system is a glaring example of Silicon Valley's failure to make a difference. Silicon Valley companies have been touting the benefits of their technologies for years, the collaborative tools, the distance learning, the computer communications technologies, the productivity apps, etc. etc.

Yet look at the SF/Bay Area public schools. Most are a mess. John Chambers, CEO of Cisco Systems, told me last year that the public school system is broken and can't be fixed. "We tried," he said. Well, Cisco didn't try hard enough. Cisco can crow about building a high-tech baseball park in Fremont. How about a high-tech school system for a fraction of that cost?

Silicon Valley's schools should all be showcases - not basket cases.

Let's see how Silicon Valley companies do here locally, along with how they go about helping the world's poor. Or is the summit (and the Tech Awards today) mostly all about local luminaries saying all the right things but little getting done?

Here's Bill Coleman, Silicon Valley Leadership Group, founder, chairman, and CEO, Cassatt Corporation.

"I believe that the innovation and entrepreneurship that made Silicon Valley the birthplace of the Information Revolution can and should be part of the solution to sustainable global development. This Summit is our opportunity to join with the global organizations that are leading the charge by leveraging our considerable skills and experience. I urge all of the Valley Leaders to come forward to help us work for a better future."

Wednesday Main Stream Media Headlines

SJ Mercury

VC firms seek open borders for growth

Microsoft's big, bold step falls short

Quinn: Today's valley loser could be tomorrow's big winner

Cisco's gadget-heavy baseball experience

Sony moving over; apartments moving in

SF Chronicle

Arraignment today for ex-chair of HP

Tech leaders, immigrants want change

EU Faults Microsoft Order Compliance

WSJ

Microsoft Enters Municipal Wi-Fi Realm

Comverse Sinks on More Accounting Woes

Cingular to Offer Cellphone Banking

New York Brings Net-Gambling Charges

Google to Add Staff in Ireland

Microsoft Motives Suspect in Linux Buy

Freeing Google From the Desktop

Reuters

Microsoft to do online test of "Halo 3" in 2007

"Niice!" - Kazakh state Web site a hit after Borat

Zune music player's slow first day no surprise

Now online: retailers' Black Friday secrets

TV scribe simpatico to "Housewives" video game

Nintendo to ship 400,000 Wii units for Japan debut

Japan sets up panel to study Net neutrality

Cingular plans mobile banking service for 2007

PayPal founder's photo slideshow site gets funding

Control Room to air Universal acts' shows on Web

News.com

Threats

Exterminating the nuisance of spam (Newsmaker)

Access

Digital Life

'Second Life' faces threat to its virtual economy

Media 2.0

November 14, 2006

11.15.06: Slide lands another round, making it a top-funded 2.0 co.

VentureBeat: Slide gets big VC round for its slideshow product

Slide, the San Francisco start-up that lets you create slide shows from your photos or other content, has raised a large third round of funding from Khosla Ventures and Mayfield Fund.
The amount remains undisclosed, but we've heard it is more than the company got for its second round, which was $8 million. That gives the company near or north of $20 million in total funding, putting it comfortably on the list of best-funded Web 2.0 companies in Silicon Valley -- and apparently making it the biggest of any of the latest generations of photo-related sites.

11.15.06: MSFT Zune campaign comes with a loyalty oath

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Apparently, Microsoft lawyers are running a loyalty oath for blogs and websites that they advertise on. Autumn Davis writes on WebProNews that MSFT contracts include this friendly clause:

Microsoft sent out agreements to bloggers and sites which it advertised on stating that, "You may not display the Logo(s) on any site that disparages Microsoft or its products or services, infringes any Microsoft intellectual property or other rights, or violates any state, federal or international law."

Andrew Baron of Rocketboom decided he couldn't sign that oath. He told Microsoft:

I have been losing sleep over it and decided this is just not going to be right for Rocketboom. While I expect this will be a big traffic loss for us, at heart, I really love Apple and will stick by them in this competition. I also remembered from last year that Microsoft was the first company to really make me feel as though I was being taken advantage of personally.
We are not in this to side with a player. In fact, I hope that people who do enjoy the Zune will enjoy watching Rocketboom on their Zune players. This can happen however without the need to cross promote each other.

Also, with regards to the logo agreement, just by having the Zune logo on our page would mean we would not be able to make disparaging comments about Microsoft and that's just not a reasonable restriction for Rocketboom.

11.15.06: Cisco will make A's a stadium of hi-tek delights

InfoWorld: Cisco plans high-tech ballpark for A's

Cisco Chief Executive Officer John Chambers hosted a news conference Tuesday at which he was joined by A's owner Lewis Wolff, Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, and others to unveil plans for a proposed US$400 million to $500 million ballpark in Fremont, California, 22 miles south of the current home of the A's in Oakland, California.
The 34,000-seat Cisco Field will feature a wireless network on which fans can use handheld devices to watch instant replays, order food and beverages, communicate with friends and keep score. Fans will be able to buy tickets online, receive their ticket as a file on a smartphone to show at the gate and visit kiosks inside the stadium to upgrade to nicer seats. Stadium employees will use other handheld communicators that use radio-frequency identity (RFID) technology to locate and talk to each other.

Scoop: Browster acquisition in works - News Corp likely buyer

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

My sources tell me that Browster, based in San Francisco, will soon announce that it has been acquired. The buyer is understood to be News Corp, which owns MySpace. The financial terms are not known at this time.

Browster's technology works with the Microsoft and Firefox browsers and downloads the page behind links. When a user moves the mouse cursor over the links, the web page instantly pops up.

The company recently created a new version that has been customized for MySpace (PDF). It was this move that caught the attention of News Corp. With the MySpace Browster, News Corp. can help keep users on the MySpace site. Plus, downloading MySpace pages in the background will enable News Corp. to show a higher traffic count, which will strengthen ad revenue.

. . .

Please see SVW:

Browster—a nifty search utility or a new way to "frame" third party web sites?

Browster helps you sift through search results by adding instant page previews. But there could be some ugly side effects, such as a backlash from content owners and a massive increase in bandwidth use.

Mid-Week Events: Lords and Masters; Pink Martini; "Howl"

by lucaso for Silicon Valley Watcher

The diggrz have been on the road this week. Mouk is in Northern Cali enjoying the trees and ladyQi and I have been fighting a blizzard, filming a documentary vidcast up in Alaska.

But that won't stop the diggrz mid-week-let events listings!(altho, this week we're keeping it quick and dirty :)

Boo-yah! And we're off...

Tonight, head over to 12 Galaxies for Vertiver and get your dose of some home grown music by a SF based music.

Not in the mood for home grown music? Then head over to the Warfield to hang with the Lords and Masters of GWAR, sure to be a horror-fying show! (and their Cyber-Fortress website is quite bloody...)

Quieres algo mas? How about hitting the 10th annual International Latino Film Festival. This afternoon at 2pm is the Animation & Indigenous Shorts at the CCSF Visual Arts Building.

Tomorrow, head over to the 50th year Anniversary Celebration of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl" at the Commonwealth Club of California.

Or, if you're still itching for some good music, hit the Warfield for Portland's Pink Martini. Always a beautiful show, Pink Martini delivers classy melodies with energetic rhythms! Great event for pre-show wine and post show snuggles.

Didn't get enough geek-ery at Web 2.0? Then head to SF Beta November: The Web 2.0 Mixer at Shine Lounge Thursday night. From meetup:

Got a lack of tag clouds in your life? Looking for that perfect Rails mashup? Feeling like you're on the short end of the longtail?Welcome to Beta, a new monthly mixer for the San Francisco Web 2.0 community. Join us for a relaxed, informal evening full of entrepreneurs, developers, bloggers -- anyone with an interest in the future of the web.

Gotta luv the things that get you through the week!

For me, I need an automatic blizzard remover to get me on a plane and out of Alaska(please God!) Until then....

11.14.06: Ballmer: Zune will morph into video-sharing phone, but if its tech against style, Jobs will win every time.

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Bloomberg reports that Microsoft's Zune will eventually share videos wirelessly and hook onto a cellphone somehow, Steve Balllmer said.

Ballmer apparently sees the video function as a YouTube kinda function, with customers sharing user-created video. Microsoft is promoting Zune's wireless functionality for music sharing. It uses 802.11 for wireless transfer between Zune's but doesn't support Internet access. Under the terms, a user can play a received song three times before having to buy it. One problem is that, without Internet access you can't instantly buy the song from Microsoft's site. You'd have to go online from a PC to make the purchase and then transfer that file to your Zune.

Steve Jobs dissed the wireless functionality (and showed he understands the iPod demographic) in an interview with BusinessWeek:

I’ve seen the demonstrations on the Internet about how you can find another person using a Zune and give them a song they can play three times. It takes forever. By the time you’ve gone through all that, the girl’s got up and left! You’re much better off to take one of your earbuds out and put it in her ear. Then you’re connected with about two feet of headphone cable.

(At 37 Signals, Jason pegs the subtext of the line, showing Jobs is a master of postmodern messaging. "With a subtle style all his own he’s saying Microsoft = Cold tech and Apple = Humanity. MS scares her away, Apple gets the girl. That’s a sharp, clear, and powerful distinction. Whether it’s true is up to the customer, but Jobs understands how to bait the hook like few others.")

Zune goes on sale today for $249.99. ``The race is on,'' Ballmer said. ``I'm confident we can keep up. They have brand and image going for them, and we have some innovative ideas.''

It's true, iPods are light on functionality. No connectivity, no radio, no recorder. But as the Jobs quote above shows, Microsoft should not underestimate the power of brand and image.

11.14.06: Open source Java: too little too late?

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Jonathan Schwartz is moving quickly to shore up some of the missteps the company has made under Scott McNealy. Releasing Java as open source is an obvious one. But IBM says the move is insufficient. Released under the GPL, which forbids proprietary redistribution, effectively prevents its use in a number of open source efforts.

There are two Apache projects IBM is involved with that aren't GPL friendly - Harmony (Java SE) and a Java ME project that Motorola has signed on to. IBM's Rod Smith said in an IBM statement that Sun should have released Java under multiple licenses, including Apache's license, notes News.com's Martin LaMonica.

"In light of the Apache projects, we have discussed with Sun our strong belief that Sun should contribute their Java technologies to Apache rather than starting another open-source Java project, or at least make their contributions available under an 'Apache friendly' license to ensure the open-source Java community isn't fragmented and disenfranchised, instead Sun would be bringing the same benefits of OS (open-source) Java to this significant and growing open-source community," the statement said.

Schwartz responded: "I find it a little curious that IBM would oppose the GPL. I sure wouldn't want to see them turning their back on the open source community."

In other words, any criticism of the license is tantamount to turning your back on open source. Kinda like any criticism of Israel is anti-Semitism, nu?

Ars Technica notes: "Schwartz's comment is particularly ironic when one considers the fact that Schwartz severely condemned the GPL last year, characterizing the license as "predatory."

Still, what is IBM up to. Ars Technica concludes:

There has been some speculation about IBM's motives, primarily fueled by IBM's prominence in the Java software ecosystem. At this point it simply looks like IBM is trying to protect its investment in Apache's Java activities, but some analysts think that IBM's confrontational position reflects a desire to exercise broader control over the future of Java technology.

Tuesday Headlines in Mainstream Media

SJ Mercury

Venture dollars pave way of new media

Chart: Firms receiving funding in Q3 2006

Previous venture capital surveys

Deal adds mobile social networking plan

Microsoft exec goes after the iPod

Study finds Web isn't teeming with sex

Intel set to unveil quad-core processors

SF Chronicle

Valleywag update: Nick Denton speaks; YouTube parties with Beach Blanket Babylon

Find friends by cell phone

Loopt application's GPS program can beam map location-Ryan Kim

INNOVATIONS

Google, Apple among best firms at turning cost-efficient research into products-Tom Abate

New York Times

Microsoft Aims to Improve Its ‘Works Well With Others’ Score

Coming Soon via Your TiVo: Internet Video on Television

A DNA Chip Maker Acquires Gene-Sequencing Company

Apple Hires I.B.M.’s General Counsel

With a Dish, Broadband Goes Rural

Wall Street Journal

PowerPoint Pet Peeves

How Videogames Turn Physics Into Fun

Motorola to Acquire Netopia

New TiVo Feature Allows Sharing of Videos

Sony Says PS3 Can't Play Some Old Games

Movie Gallery Climbs on Revenue Gains

Intel Rolls Out Xeon Chip Line

Apple, Airlines Strike iPod Deal

News.com

Extra: Apple's iPhone is calling

Crave: USB Warmer Gloves

Blogma: Linus Torvalds officially a hero

Images: 35 years of Intel chip design

Blog: Win a 'Second Life' island

Video: Sony PS3 and Nintendo Wii

Reporters' Roundtable Podcast: Will they swoon for the Zune?

Holiday Gift Guide 2006

Intel's quad-core processors go live

Yahoo's Semel: Internet ad potential underestimated

IBM's chief steps into 'Second Life' for incubator launch

Images: IBM chief's 'Second Life' avatar

Reuters to syndicate blogs

Newsfactor

AMD Discontinues Low-Cost PC Program

A Good Technology Deal for Motorola

Sun Gives Open Source a Jolt of Caffeine

Report: Mobile TV Will Get More Personal

Sun Microsystems Lifts the Lid on Java

Jim Allchin Clarifies Windows Antivirus Remarks

Google Spiffs Up Private-Label Tools

New Zune Has Everybody Talking

Yahoo Brings Instant Messaging to E-Mail

Gates: Vista Survived Rivals' Attacks

Dissidents within YHOO and GOOG will make ethical companies

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

BusinessWeek recently published a news story on Reporters without Borders and its protest against Internet censorship in many countries:

BusinessWeek: Nations that Censor the Net

Some 17,000 attendees of the protest voted for the nation they believed is most in need of greater Internet freedom, and China came in second, with 4,100 votes. Myanmar, under the militaristic regime of the Junta party, was believed by 4,500 participants to present its citizens with the greatest threat to freedom of press on the Internet. The remaining nations, in descending order of votes received, were Belarus, Iran, Tunisia, Cuba, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan, Vietnam, North Korea, Syria, and Uzbekistan. . .
. . . China is described by Reporters Without Borders as a pioneer of Internet censorship, dedicating more resources than any other country to restrict online freedoms.

There should have been a companion piece on US and other companies that enable censorship and oppression of dissidents. Such as Yahoo for example.

What will happen is that Yahoo' s and Google's own dissidents will help to lead those companies onto an ethical and moral pathway.

Recently, Terry Semel, Yahoo's CEO was booed at an internal gathering. Semel reacted by telling the Boo-ers to go work somewhere else!

Semel is the one that will be working somewhere else. Wall Street should look for a change of leadership if leadership is not exercised by the executive suite of Yahoo. And the times will demand a leadership that is in tune with our times, and invokes an ethical and moral YHOO leadership (GOOG too).

Here is ValleyWag on Mr Semel and Nazi Germany and tell me if I'm wrong:

One attendee asked Mr. Semel if Yahoo would have cooperated with Nazi Germany the same way it has with China. His response: "Yahoo has a basic obligation not to have a point of view on basic content, and to present content ... and aggregate things and to allow people to make their own choices. I don't know how I would have felt then."

November 13, 2006

11.13.06: The new frugality

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

If you're worried about Web 2.0 frothing over into full-scale bubble, here's reason for hope. The Great Bubble was based on huge amounts of venture money, which led to companies being taken public, getting insane valuations, and on to the pop. But today, venture capitalists are scrambling for companies to invest in, because it can be done so cheaply - Meebo was founded on $4,000 of credit cards - that entrepreneurs are loathe to take the big money and the business control.

A Times article profiles a few VCs who are learning to play the new game of small ball.

Just last week, Charles River Ventures announced it would offer loans of $250,000 to entrepreneurs as a way to gain access to promising start-ups. Other firms are also giving out small loans, albeit not as a part of any formal program.
For its part, Mohr Davidow Ventures has increased the number of “seed” investments — small sums given to embryonic companies — to about 10 a year from 5. And Union Square Ventures, which was formed in 2003, has made nearly half of its investments at $1 million or less, a departure from its initial plan to make first-round bets of $1 million to $3 million, according to its Web site.

A firm called Y Combinator is comfortable funding very small amounts. Their target investment is $6,000 per employee. For startups that would total up to somewhere between $36,000 and $48,000. Even with today's low startup costs, that's not a hell of a lot of money. The point, cofounder Paul Graham said, is to make it last.

[Y is] not looking for computer science entrepreneurs who want to be pampered: “C.S. grad students at M.I.T. currently get $2,000/month to live on, so this represents three months’ living expenses. Though in fact most groups make it last longer.”

11.13.06: Denton fires Valleywagger Nick Douglas

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Nick Denton reveals on his Valleywag site that he has fired Nick Douglas, the cub reporter who's been blogging away on the dirty skinny from Campbell to San Mateo.

Denton notes that the site needs a little more hardboiled reporter - "But, to helm the site, we're now looking for someone with, ideally, some background in reporting. An old-media career, useful in the sparkling new world of blogs. Who would have thought?" - and a little less sex.

We're still going to break open secrets ... but I suspect we're going to tone down the personal coverage of civilians, because they haven't done anything to seek out attention, and their personal lives aren't that interesting. Unless they are. Anyway, more money, a little less sex: that is Valleywag's new gossip mantra.

Matt Marshall at VentureBeat talked to Denton briefly, who said, as talented as Douglas is, the site wasn't living up to expectations to deliver Wonkette-level audience.

Marshall predicts hurtin' Wired News will pick him up.

UPDATE: From Tom Foremski

Nick Douglas did a fine job with ValleyWag although by the time he left he had burnt a few bridges/contacts.

Nick Douglas will do well, he has a great nose for a story. But surviving in SF on the kind of wages Nick Denton pays is very difficult even if you are a young (ex)student.

That's a key weakness for the Gawker business model, find good writers, train them up a little bit, pay them very little and then watch them go places where they can make more money-- and then have to do it again, and again.

I'm sure Nick Denton would rather be doing something else, such as running his business than having to do a job that pays peanuts. Which goes to show that Nick Douglas's departure was rather sudden.

Some clues on Nick Douglas's next project over at 10 Zen Monkeys:

Interview With Valleywag Nick Douglas - 10 Zen Monkeys (a webzine)

Nick Douglas did send me a note saying he was open to a new gig, especially in video.

11.13.06: Tired of all the 2.0 hype? Here comes Web 3.0

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Noting, in the aftermath of the O'Reilly summit, that Web 2.0 "has in recent months become the focus of dot-com-style hype in Silicon Valley," John Markoff writes in the Times of Web 3.0:

[The] goal is to add a layer of meaning on top of the existing Web that would make it less of a catalog and more of a guide — and even provide the foundation for systems that can reason in a human fashion. That level of artificial intelligence, with machines doing the thinking instead of simply following commands, has eluded researchers for more than half a century.

Markoff equates Web 3.0 with the Semantic Web, which academics like Tim Berners-Lee and others have been talking about for five years or so. But Nova Spivey, CEO of Radar Networks, who is quoted heavily in the piece, questions the terminology:

I agree with Markoff that the Web is moving towards a new era of more intelligent apps. I also think that this intelligence will be enabled by adding more semantics to the data. But does this evolution qualify for a new name like Web 3.0?
Web 3.0 is about making all this technology and content smarter -- by adding semantics to the data (using the Semantic Web and microformats, etc.) and by adding more smarts to applications so that they can do a better job of helping humans (natural language search, semantic search, recommendation agents, etc.).

For a hint of what Web 3.0 is, or could be, Markoff offers the University of Washington's KnowItAll project, run by students and financed by Google. A sample system called Opine takes user reviews and comments and returns a recommendation. For a demo hotel search site:

Whereas today’s travel recommendation sites force people to weed through long lists of comments and observations left by others, the Web. 3.0 system would weigh and rank all of the comments and find, by cognitive deduction, just the right hotel for a particular user.
“The system will know that spotless is better than clean,” said Oren Etzioni, an artificial-intelligence researcher at the University of Washington who is a leader of the project. “There is the growing realization that text on the Web is a tremendous resource.”

Companies like Radar, Danny Hillis' Metaweb and Doug Lenat's Cycorp all have deep ties to the intelligence community, Markoff points out.

Hillis says: "People haven’t realized this spooky thing about how much they are depending on A.I." So is Web 3.0 an organic evolution of Web 2.0 or the revenge of the AI nerds? Maybe both. Maybe AI has struggled for 50 years for lack of enough stuff to apply intelligence to.

“With Flickr you can find images that a computer could never find,” said Prabhakar Raghavan, head of research at Yahoo. “Something that defied us for 50 years suddenly became trivial. It wouldn’t have become trivial without the Web.”

Monday Morning News round up: Today's headlines in the mainstream media

In Today's Online Media

New York Times

E-Commerce Report: Shopping Site Offers a Way to Raid a Celebrity’s Closet

Microsoft Counting on a Twist to Make Zune Shine in Shadow of iPod

The Online Auteurs

Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense

Identity Thief Is Often Found in Family Photo

For Start-Ups, Web Success on the Cheap

Wall Street Journal (Subscription)

Software Upstarts Are New Force

Avatars at the Office

SJ Mercury

Sun opens up source code for Java

News.com

Cray to introduce new Opteron supercomputer

Sun picks GPL license for Java code

Deutsche Telekom CEO to resign

SF Chronicle

Digital marketers increasingly have the goods on consumers

Options have lost their luster, but many still lust for them / Stock-based compensation a powerful lure for companies that call Silicon Valley home

Reuters

Samsung says DRAM demand for Q1 2007 "very strong"

Holiday sales seen modestly higher: survey

Newspaper giant Gannett pursuing Tribune: reports

IBM to join Citigroup bid for Chinese bank stake

Techweb

Tech Job Recovery Seen

49 Million U.S. Adults Notified Of Data Breaches

Make Money Fast? Site Pays Bloggers For Product Reviews

Allchin: Vista So Safe I Don't Need Anti-Virus Software

Ziff Davis

Alarm Raised for Critical Broadcom Wi-Fi Driver Flaw

Sun to Open-Source Java Under GPL

Why Young Vets May Be the New Face of IT

Researcher Finds 'Trusted Computing' Chip in Apple Models

Phishers Cast Bait for Bigger Catch

Microsoft Posts 'BSOD' Prank Software to Developer Site

November 10, 2006

Hot search redefined; Helping entrepreneurs blog; PopGloss is new from Wists; Hubbub on social media; Web 2.0 Poles coming to Stanford; Becoming a hamster.

I'm still digging out from my recent India trip, here are a few bits and pieces...

. . .

Here is a hot search engine that gives old meaning to that term: http://www.MsDewey.com

(Hat Tip Dida Kutz)

. . .

I recently spoke at an event organized by SVASE, the Silicon Valley Association of Startup Entrepreneurs and I can heartily recommend its programs. Co-founder Mark Addison set up the lunchtime session and I found it interesting talking with entrepreneurs who hope to leverage blogging in their businesses.

ACTEVA:CXO Leadership Forum - Blogger Confidential: A Conversation ...

. . .

My buddy David Galbraith, co-founder of Moreover and co-author of RSS 1.0, just launched his second Wists shopping blog. Wists is a universal wish-list, with a click or two users can save images of things they like or might want to buy.

Dave's first Wists product is Cribcandy. His second, PopGloss, "covers women's clothing and accessories, an eclectic mix of quirky and fun or innovative design - fashion without the attitude. It has a similar feel to Cribcandy, lots of pictures, few words, updated dozens of times a day and with the ability to save pictures and links to anything you like with one click."

. . .

Giovanni Rodriguez officially launched his PR agency HubbubPR, which is a great name. Social media PR is his focus and he says things are going very well. Here is a recent piece he wrote about social media in the enterprise.

"The essay is based on a survey I conducted of 40-plus publicly available case studies. My thesis: the business benefits of social media are becoming quite apparent, but the pressure to stand out -- and do something different -- is mounting," says Giovanni. Read it here:

http://hubbub.typepad.com/blog/2006/11/peer_pressure.html

. . .

Coming up at Stanford University is Web 2.0 Wave in the US and Poland. I'll be there to check it out on November 29 at Stanford's Clark Auditorium. Book your tickets here:

ACTEVAWeb 2.0 Wave in the U.S. and Poland User Contribution, Data Analytics, and Monetization

Clay Bullwinkel helped to organize the event along with the US-Polish Trade Council. Clay says: "Did you know Poles are much more Web 2.0-oriented than other people? Check out Wikipedia’s home page. The quantity of Polish articles ranks 4^th after English, German and French. And this is with a much lower percent of PC ownership and broadband connections."

Clay says that Poles continue to win world champion computer coding events. Case in point: Marek Cygan, who beat out programmers from IBM, Microsoft and Baylor University.

. . .

Interesting evening at Sun Microsystems' media dinner Thursday night about eco issues. This was the first time I had heard of PG&E's incentive program for data centers running virtualization software. PG&E's Mark Bramfitt, High Tech, Biotech & Health Care Segment Supervisor, said that by using renewable sources of energy and by encouraging businesses and residential customers to save power, PG&E has saved the equivalent of 25 power stations.

I mentioned that PG&E should wire up all the treadmills and stationary bikes in all the gyms in California. That way, it could pump up the power grid, we could even get paid for working out, (or our gyms would pay us to go there! (Hat tip Elsa Butler). And our healthcare service providers would provide us with big cost breaks, we'd be independent of Middle East oil, and we would all look damn good
...

11.10.06: Lou Reed pissed off at rude geeks

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

By far the funniest thing I've read in the Chronicle in a long time - far better than Mark Morford - is Dan Fost's review of Lou Reed's show at the Web 2.0 Summit. Just on the face of it, Lou Reed at Web 2.0 is wrong, wrong, wrong.

This intuitive truth was made manifest when the geeks and suits in attendance kept talking through the beginning of his set. Spake Lou:

You got 20 minutes. You wanna talk through it, you can talk through it. I can turn the sound louder and really hurt you. Frank, turn it up.

Enter Tim O'Reilly to save the day.

O'Reilly, who was said to have the flu and who generally looked exhausted roaming the Sheraton Palace halls, started dancing feverishly through the audience. A woman joined him. And gradually, people got out of their seats and pushed toward the stage.

Lou was obviously impressed with the reaction. How else to explain this heartfelt bit of stage chat?

He had been introduced by AOL Chairman and CEO Jonathan Miller, who said Reed had connected him with his Kung Fu teacher. Miller called Reed "my senior Kung Fu brother."
Now he said to the crowd (which was, by the way, typically tech in its preponderance of men; Six Apart's Mena Trott guessed the male:female ratio to be 20:1) - "Just let me know, I'm here to serve. It's the moment I've been living for my whole life. I was on St. Mark's Place and I thought, someday there'll be a cyberspace, and an Internet, and I'll be introduced by my Kung Fu brother Jon Miller.

Oh, Marc Canter makes an appearance, too - in typical fashion.

Just Say No to our Digital Leashes

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

I recently met Timothy Ferriss, a kindred intellect. Timothy has packed more lives into his 29 years than Steve Jobs has in his 51.

He's finishing up a book called The Four-Hour Work Week: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich , due out in April, and it is packed with some great tips for our harried times.

Tim is already a successful entrepreneur, and one that discovered the aimlessness of entrepreneurism at an early age. "I was constantly on the go, running around, making lots of money but hating to think that I would be doing this for the next 40 years. I'd already seen enough people do that and end up with quadruple bypass surgeries in their 50s, but I didn't know how to get off the tread mill," he said.

So a couple of years ago, Tim took off to the closest airport, and picked a destination at random. "I didn't know where to fly. I saw London on the board and bought a one-way ticket. Until then, the whole of my life had been scripted, I wanted to do something spontaneous."

Hallelujah, I can relate to the thrill of unscripted adventures. Tim ended up traveling the world, he lived in London, in Ireland learning Gaelic, in Japan learning Japanese and spent six months in Argentina learning Spanish.

[BTW, Tim is also a linguistics scholar, a neuroscientist and a competitive wrestler...]

"Argentina is an incredible place, it has every type of climate and you can get a great apartment for $400 per month. And there are more wireless networks there than anywhere I've ever been. Incidentally, Japan has none at all, I couldn't find any."

And that's where Tim gave up his Spanish studies and took up Tango classes. I had just been reading about Tango in a collection of short stories: "Sex, Death and God in L.A" One of the stories talked about how Tango can become a very addictive pastime...

"Soon, I was doing 6 to 8 hours of tango lessons every day," says Tim. "I was in a class filled with beautiful women and there just two guys." [Surely there must be more to tango than just beautiful women, I need to investigate further...]

Tim is by nature an athlete, a competitive wrestler by earlier choice. It's no surprise that he soon got into competitive tango and got as far as the semi-quarter finals of the world championships(!)

Getting back to his book, one of Tim's themes we discussed (at SVW's 24 hr meeting booths at the Lucky Penny Diner) was digital leashes.

"I've upset many a relationship because I couldn't get off my email. I'd be managing my email or my alerts and instant messaging, getting interrupted all the time. I had a desktop computer at the time, and that screen would always be on, bright and beckoning. Now, I use a notebook so that I can close it shut."

I know what Timothy is talking about and so do my readers. Not only do we have to deal with information overload, in this day and age we also have to deal with what I call "conversation overload."

I like to joke that I love BlackBerries, except for the email feature. Every time I peek into my inbox I lose two to three hours--and I'm still not done.

And some days I don't get to manage my email because I'm out and about visiting with people, trying to get interviews and scoops. Then when I get back to my desk, I'm writing and ignoring my email until my writing is done, or I fall asleep. Some days several days worth of email gets backed up in my inbox at which point I fantasize about blowing it all up.

When Tim went traveling he put himself on a one-day-a-week email diet! "I went from being addicted to email to checking it just once per week. I also left a message on my phone that I would not be checking voice mail messages but to send me an email."

It is difficult saying no to our digital leashes but I believe that being able to "just say no" is going to become an essential character trait for survival in our always on society. Tim's upcoming book has lots of great tips on this and many other subjects related to our modern lifestyle and culture, stay tuned for more...

Two hours plus to get to Seagate Boss's Beach House

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

It was two hours and 25 minutes for Seagate's car service to bring me to the Aptos beach house of Seagate's CEO Bill Watkins, a long way to go for dinner.

It was nice having a driver and I read the newspaper, wrote a couple of posts and took a nap, yet when I looked out the window, we were still about an hour away...

Finally we get through the traffic and head on to a road that winds through a state park. We drive slowly along a narrow street that seems to turn into a trailer park, then there is a row of wooden beach huts and outside each one there is a very large sign that says "Do not park here." At the end of the street looms a very large house and that's where I get out.

After my long time getting there, I was ready for the bathroom, and then the bar. I looked for familiar faces and fortunately there were many, Michael Kanellos, Cnet's editor at large was there; Don Clark of WSJ of course; Therese Poletti from the Merc; Jean Baptiste Su US chief of the French News Agency; John Dvorak my favorite grumpy columnist; the always impressive Erika Brown from Forbes; and pretty soon nearly all the press is crowded together at one end of the living room -- normally not a good sign.

We sit down for dinner, a five course dinner cooked in a large, open kitchen by a top chef from Napa. Each course is paired with a fine wine. The dinner's many courses include a lobster bisque soup, crisp sea bass, delicately tender filet mignon, and salads, and cheeses -- a very nutritionally balanced meal.

I'm sitting next to Peter Burrows from BusinessWeek and I tell him him how much I liked BusinessWeek's recent cover story on the greed and gluttony of private equity funds. George Anders from WSJ is sitting across the table. I get to chat with Audrey Webb and Joanna Andrade from Eastwick.

Don Clark mentioned that WSJ has started writing obituaries for the first time. We joked that it was chronicling the gradual demise of its newspaper readers.

I didn't get a chance to talk to any Seagate people. And I had trouble picking out Mr Watkins, who was dressed in T-shirt and jeans. I initially thought that he might be one of the workmen that had been rushing to get the renovations done in time for the first annual Seagate Media dinner but I was told that it is his signature dress style.

Then a long ride back to SF... And I left my phone in the car.

I can't say it was a good use of my time, four hours of travel, and I didn't learn anything new about Seagate. But I did get to chat with my media pals over a very good dinner, within a beautiful house.

Let me suggest an SF location for the second Seagate annual media dinner, and at a restaurant that won't be snooty about T-shirts and jeans.

November 9, 2006

11.09.06: Democratic takeover: What impact on tech?

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Now that the Democrats have control of both houses of Congress, how will Internet policies change? News.com's Washington correspondents take a look at the the tech fall-out of the election.

On a wealth of topics--Net neutrality, digital copyright, merger approval, data retention, Internet censorship--a Capitol Hill controlled by Democrats should yield a shift in priorities on technology-related legislation.

First and foremost, net neutrality. Since a neutrality provision lost by just one vote in the Senate committee controlled by Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska, look for Dems to move that issue into law.

"Clearly, we're going to have to address the question of network neutrality," Rep. John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, told reporters on Wednesday. Dingell, who has served in the House for more than 50 of his 80 years, is set to be the next chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which writes telecommunications laws.
"Internet freedom should not be a partisan issue. But Republicans have consistently been standing in the way, and there is zero doubt that the increased Democratic control of Congress will be fantastic news," said Green, whose group lobbies on the topic.

Next, electronic surveillance. The Republican-controlled Congress refused to draw the line on domestic spying but the new Congress is sure to set up higher boundaries. The issue of electronic surveillance represents another partisan divide. House Democrats cast 62 votes against the 2001 Patriot Act, but only three Republicans opposed it. Similarly, not one Democrat opposed a more recent amendment requiring the executive branch to disclose its data-mining technologies, while 165 Republicans did.

Caroline Fredrickson, director of the ACLU's Washington office, said she hoped the new Congress would investigate the National Security Agency's domestic spying program. "The illegal spying program should be a primary focus of congressional efforts to investigate this administration's abuse of power," Fredrickson said. "The president himself has admitted to authorizing this warrantless spying in direct contravention of the dictates of FISA," or the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
But Democrats have their eye on the prize of the 2008 Presidential election and the possibility of holding onto Congress for a dozen years, like the Republicans did from 1994-2006. That means they'll be somewhat shy about appearing to be anti-security, while wanting to be bold against privacy invasions.
The ACLU is pinning some of its hopes on Rep. John Conyers, the Michigan Democrat who is set to be the next chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Conyers has suggested imposing greater controls on government surveillance and is in a key position to lead a high-profile investigation.

News.com looks at other issues too, like digital copyright, data retention, China and telecom policy.

11.09.06: Google Video sued - but by whom?

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Google Video has been sued, according to an SEC filing, AP says. The disclosure didn't provide any details, however. The filing does concede that the company could face more liability as a result of its acquisition of YouTube, as well as from Google Video.

TechDirt notes that:

Just because someone sued, it doesn't mean that Google is guilty or in trouble. In fact, as we've seen, Google seems to live for these types of lawsuits where they can fight them to set the precedent and make it clear what's legal and what's not.

That is spot on, as the Times established with a profile of Google's bring-it-on legal strategy.

“I think Google is wanting to push the boundaries,” said Jonathan Zittrain, professor of Internet governance and regulation at Oxford University.
“The Internet ethos of the 90’s, the expansionist ethos, was, ‘Just do it, make it cool, make it great and we’ll cut the rough edges off later,’ ” Professor Zittrain said. “They’re really trying to preserve a culture that says, ‘Just do it, and consult with the lawyers as you go so you don’t do anything flagrantly ill-advised.’ ”

11.09.06: Bidding war for LA Times?

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

In the aftermath of the forced ouster of LA Times editor Dean Baquet, it looks like a bidding war is erupting for the troubled paper. Baquet and former publisher Jerry Johnson had made headlines by publicly - in the paper - resisting Tribune Co-ordered staff cuts. Johnson was fired in short order, while Baquet held on. Then in New Orleans he made a speech urging editors to fight back against cuts.

"It is the job of editors of newspapers to put up a little bit more of a fight than we have put up in the past," Baquet said in a speech before the Associated Press Managing Editors here. "Don't be shy about making the public service argument."

Baquet was fired in the middle of election night, throwing the newsroom into turmoil. Kevin Roderick of LA Observed reported:

Chicago has toppled the regime by kicking out editor Dean Baquet and publisher Jeffrey Johnson, but Tribune's new governor-general, David Hiller, and Col. (James) O'Shea (the new editor) are viewed by many in the newsroom as occupiers. Yesterday, before Hiller stood on a desk here to dryly confirm the coup before angry and teary-eyed reporters and editors, he heard a voice on the speaker phone from Washington quip that bureau staffers had (figuratively) just hung Tribune CEO Dennis Fitzsimons in effigy. Hiller did not look amused. While he addressed the gathering, at least one staffer in L.A. symbolically turned his back. A Times security officer stood nearby, the first time that anyone could remember a publisher being escorted into the third floor newsroom. Baquet clapped courteously after Hiller spoke, but not many others did.

Into this maelstrom comes what looks like an extremely solid bid from supermarket magnate Ron Burkle and homebuilding mogul Eli Broad to buy the entire Tribune Co. Since the two were considered enemies and "well-known control freaks," the fact that they're working together makes the bid seem viable. (Tribune Co execs clearly want to take the company private and they might just be happy to hand the whole rotting empire off to someone else.)

If this is a culture war between LA and Chicago, who better to ride in like the cavalry than the king of content, Hollywood's own David Geffen. Roderick points to LA Weekly's Nikki Finke, who gossips that Geffen is hot and heavy to take over the Times, pour money into it and restore it to its former glory - and he likes its 20 percent profit margin too.

I’m told Geffen is starting to plan what he intends to do at the paper once it’s his. Here’s what he’s saying to friends: He’ll pour money into more hires. He plans to staff -- more like stuff -- the paper with name writers and journalism stars. (Of course, he’ll raid The New York Times, where Frank Rich and his wife, Alex Witchel, are his good friends and occasional overnight guests. So are Nora Ephron and Nick Pileggi. So are a lot of literati.) He’ll demand quality. He’ll ratchet up the Web site (even though he hates how prohibitively expensive it is to do that). He’ll figure out a way to bring in Latinos as readers. Geffen loathes how boring, badly written, inconsequential and pedestrian the L.A. Times’ editorial and opinion section is. He thinks nobody reads it. He knows nobody talks about it. Most of all, he wants his newspaper to be talked about. He’ll put the newsroom ahead of the ludicrous profit margins demanded by Wall Street and the Tribune Co.

11.09.06: Skype 3.0 pushes e-commerce

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Speaking at Web 2.0 yesterday, Skype CEO Niklas Zennstrom unveiled Skype 3.0, which will expand the eBay-owned company's click-to-call program. Businesses can place a click-to-call button on their websites, which will let customers place a call to a traditional phone number, Reuters' Eric Auchard reports.

The move is part of a concerted effort to build revenue from e-commerce opportunties, as telecommunications increasingly looks like a free service.

"Our long-term goal is to have much more balance between e-commerce and telecommunications revenues," he told Reuters.
Speaking to an audience of Internet industry insiders at the annual Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco, Zennstrom reiterated that Skype must move to replace communication revenue as phone calls eventually become free.

November 8, 2006

Kultur Shock: Wknd Night Light: green.nuskool_breaks.messy_monkeys

[diggrz: an SVW tag for arts, culture, trends, and events in and around Silicon Valley- new from SVW] -

By Maria Mouk for Silicon Valley Watcher

Days have gotten shorter, so embrace the longer nights as the Bay culture saturates the darker hours with possibility. Thursday evening starts off with the SF Sustainable Business Happy Hour at Elixir (16th St. @ Guerrero.) from 6:00 - 8:00PM, where this week Michelle from Organic Vintners will be pouring Pinot Grigio, Cabernet Savignon, and Tawny Port samples. Also, Green Zebra will be joining in to promote their new coupon book for green businesses.

Modeselektor_1 Friday; Modeselektor, of label BPitch, and recent release 'Hello, Mom' are performing at 1015 Folsom. Coming all the way from Berlin and hailing a pretty amazing IDM glitch hiphop sprawl, this show is not to be missed. Also on deck will be Adam Freeland, a UK based DJ and Producer specializing in nu skool breaks with quite a history of his own, and keep your ears open while you're out for the free special underground venue performance.

Dont forget to stop by to the Grist Happy Hour on Friday. The environmental news and commentary publication from Seattle will be at 111 Minna Gallery serving up conversation and a variety of organic food and cocktails.

Saturday afternoon, the Messy Monkey Arts has teamed up with the Ghetto Gourmet, voted BEST OF THE BAY for their exclusive gourmet dinner parties. Also voted BEST OF THE BAY, will be Das Frachtgut, known for their legendary veggie-fueled orange party bus to take you on adventure throughout the City & beyond.

Messygbn6836_5 The "Teacher With the Bus" will pick you up and stop at different hidden pockets to engage in intriguing activities such as painting with brooms and feet to live music by our special guests, the Bluebellies; as well as engaging in an enticing 4-course meal, with only the finest cuisine prepared by the Ghetto Gourmet. Between intervals, guests will hop back on the bus where drinking and dancing are both allowed and encouraged. It will end with champagne toasts and a fashion show. Vague and interesting.

If you're feeling political, with the voting agenda that befell this week's activity, be the riot at BeThe Riott. On Saturday, a huge concert lands at Bill Graham Auditorium, with artists such as The Rapture, Diplo, Saul Williams, Breakestra, and more. The Riott aims to be a culture expo, featuring the most cohesive representation of music, street fashion, and art in the nation. Should make for an exciting evening and culturally diverse evening.

Scorpio Ball also falls on Saturday night, at Kink.com's Porn Palace.This years theme is titled "The Tropic of Scorpio", so slather on the bain du soleil and dive deep into the sounds of Eskmo, Dave Seied, Ripple, Syd Gris, Mozaic, and then some.

Lasting all weekend is the San Francisco Green Festival (Nov 10th- 12th), at the San Francisco Concourse Exhibition Center. Speakers, exhibitors, individuals, business and community leaders will come together to discuss social and environmental issues of personal, local, national, and global concern.

[diggrz refers to the nomadic lifestyle offered by mobile digital technologies and gadgets - creating a "nomadig" culture. The diggrz name is also a tip-of-the-hat to some of the ideas of the Diggers, a democratic group that arose in 1649, out of the English revolution .

The Diggers were a radical group that cultivated and protected common lands, and sought to create egalitarian, self-sustaining communities. The Diggers would have found kindred spirits in today's software engineer culture, and the focus on creating commonly owned technologies through egalitarian open source community projects. - Tom Foremski]

Tag: diggrz

11.08.06: Web 2.0 Launchpad

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Richard Macmanus offers a rundown of the 13 startups profiled at the Web 2.0 Summit's Launchpad. They range from mashup music games to sticky notes to a 3D social network.

Here are a few of the ones Richard liked best:

Sharpcast, - "It synchs data across PCs, the Web and mobile. Sharpcast Photos was the first such product, but today Gibu Thomas the CEO is launching a product code-named Hummingbird - which synchs all files."
Stikkit - Created by former O'Reilly resident geek Rael Dornfest (wonder how he got a slot), Stikkit "makes messy data smarter and allows you to share that data. So it's a very granular data-sharing app."
3B - a 3D social network that requires no extra software. "You can use MySpace, Hi5 or Bebo pages or photos you've loaded onto Flickr, Photobucket or any other web service. ... It's also a visual search tool, allowing you to order search windows in the 3D space. You can change the wallpaper and create 'personal 3D spaces.' It looks like it uses scraping to put other web content inside this 3D environment. "

11.08.06: Riya launches Like.com image search

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

On a day when the political sands have so fundamentally shifted after a blowout night for Democrats and Donald Rumsfeld has resigned, is it a little out of whack to focus on the technology breakthrough that allows people to better find watches similar to ones that adorn Paris Hilton's fetching wrist? Yes, but you know where to turn for political news so ....

Riya has launched Like.com, an image search engine that does mathematical analysis of images to find similar images. This, Michael Arrington notes is a breakthrough because it's not based on crappy metadata:

The Like.com engine takes both text and images as queries, something no one else does. To return results based on an image query, Like.com compares a “visual signature” for the query image to possible results. The visual signature is simply a mathematical representatioin of the image using 10,000 variables. If enough variables are identical, Like.com decides the images are similar.
If you enter a text query, like “brown boots pointed toe,” Like.com will convert that query into variables in the visual signature and look for related image results.

Matt Marshall says he finds the service, which only works on watches, shoes, handbags, etc, "compelling."

Like is a classic Silicon Valley play, heavy on engineers, and stoked with about $19 million in venture capital from Bay Partners, Leapfrog and Bluerun. We’re still waiting for Google to release its competing visual search, which some say is better.

Which raises the key point: Google can only do so many things, but search is at the heart of everything they do. If image search is important, Google will put resources into it. If they can't do what Riya can do, they'll buy them. Clearly, venture capitalists are investing in startups with winning proprietary software not for the IPO payday but for that conference call with Larry, Sergey and Eric.

11.08.06: At Web 2.0, Schmidt denies legal fund rumors, competition with MSFT

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

We're not at Web 2.0 (at least I'm not, I'm happily sitting on a love seat with a view of a lovely November morning) but many people are, so we offer up a mishmash of blog posts on the conf so far.

The Guardian's Bobbie Johnson on Eric Schmidt's talk: Google won't suffer backlash against megalopolis companies because they think about users and they won't try to lock in customers from going elsewhere: "It's a pressure valve on bad business practice." Also, docs.google.com is not competitive with Microsoft Office. ""Our focus is on casual sharing, not business," he says. "Except in as far as [businesses] need to use them." That nice sidestep, Bonnie notes, "fooled no one."

More importantly, Reuters reports that Schmidt denied a rumor being flogged by Mark Cuban that Google had set aside $500m to settle copyright disputes as part of purchasing YouTube. He also said that Google has "visited as many media companies as we can" to cut licensing deals.

November 7, 2006

Web 2.Uh Oh Week in SF - Where are the Users?!

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

The Web 2.0 conference is happening this week in San Francisco. And these days, lots of startups characterize themselves as Web 2.0 companies because their products offer collaborative tools, sharing of virtually anything, and their products use AJAX.

Most of the Web 2.0 companies offer products that are very, very similar to each other. They all enable communities to share or not share their content or applications, and to do it in many different ways, from using 3D Avatars, to sending out their content to mobile phones - it all melds into a blur.

It is difficult mustering any interest in Web 2.0 companies unless they have a community of users. And I don't mean "registered users." I've registered for at least 100 sites and never went back.

If a Web 2.0 company can show it has a large enough and growing community of users, then I'll take notice. Just because a Web 2.0 company offers a Swiss-army knife array of collaborative functions, and/or it uses AJAX, means nothing.

Show me your users and that's when I'll take notice.

Is YouTube a Web 2.0 company? Yes. Is that why it achieved a value of $1.6bn? No. It is the huge community that YouTube managed to coral into one place - that's the $1.6bn of value created.

11.07.06: Palo Alto schools technologically behind

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

From my edtech blog for ZDNet, "Palo Alto, ground zero of Silicon Valley, lags in edtech, school quality":

In the middle of Silicon Valley, the hub of computer software and hardware manufacturing, public schools in Palo Alto are lagging far behind when it comes to classroom technology, reports the Palo Alto Daily News.

A study recently released by Partners in Education found that compared with five of the nation's best school systems, the Palo Alto School district lack funding for technology, has the fewest and oldest computers and limited staffing and instruction to teach computing.

"Performance-wise, we're right in there ... but we're
operating with a lot less staff than other school districts," said
Susan Bailey, president of Partners in Education, a nonprofit
organization that raises private funds for Palo Alto
schools.

In a statement, Partners in Education said funding woes stem from the fact that California schools have "the most restrictive public funding model due to Proposition 13 and no ability to adjust funding annually, except through private donations." Proposition 13, which passed in 1978, grandfathered low property valuations for tax purposes.

Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, a watchdog group dedicated to protecting the proposition, countered that "the problems with education have nothing to do with money."

"We are now spending 30 percent more per pupil, on an
inflation-adjusted basis, than we were just prior to Prop. 13, when
education in California was thought to be the nation's best," Coupal
said.

11.07.06: Nvidia buys PortalPlayer, HP gets Mercury, Verizon/YT deal?, NTP sues Palm ...

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

HP completed its purchase of scandal-tainted Mercury Interactive for $4.5 billion in stock. ()

Nvidia is buying PortalPlayer, famed for manufacturing chips for Apple iPods, for $357 million in cash, or $13.50 per share. (Reuters)

Verizon is discussing a deal with YouTube/Google to make the videos available on cellphones and through its new television services. In both cases, access to YouTube would be a premium service. (Reuters)

Patent troll NTP, which successfully sued Blackberry-maker RIM to the edge of existence, filed suit against Palm, saying the Treo and other wireless Palm devices infringe on wireless email patents. (AP)

11.07.06: 24 hours against censorship

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Today is not only Election Day in the US but also Reporters Sans Frontieres' (Reporters Without Borders') "24 hours against censorship." A good and noble effort but one that unfortunately seems more about techno bells and whistles than anything substantive.

You can launch an interactive map to vote on which of 13 repressive countries is most repressive. You can record a very short message to Jerry Yang to protest Yahoo's actions in the case of Shi Tao. And you can sign up for a fee-based blog network. Hmmm.

In any case, it's a good moment to review Yahoo's complicity in China's arrest and sentencing of Shi Tao to 10 years in prison.

In September, the Dui Hua Foundation translated Shi's conviction into English, exposing the fact that Yahoo acted as a police informant for the Chinese government. Shi committed the crime of journalism by emailing to foreign websites an email his newspaper received from the Chinese government, warning about the dangers of "social destabilization" from commemmorations of Tiananmen Square.

Reporters Without Borders denounced Yahoo at the time:

“Yahoo! obviously complied with requests from the Chinese authorities to furnish information regarding an IP address that linked Shi Tao to materials posted online, and the company will yet again simply state that they just conform to the laws of the countries in which they operate,” the organisation said. “But does the fact that this corporation operates under Chinese law free it from all ethical considerations? How far will it go to please Beijing?”
Reporters Without Borders added: “Information supplied by Yahoo! led to the conviction of a good journalist who has paid dearly for trying to get the news out. It is one thing to turn a blind eye to the Chinese government’s abuses and it is quite another thing to collaborate.”

For more, see Tom's posts on the topic: Despicable behavior by Yahoo and Time to Do Some Good.

11.07.06: MS Virtual Earth 3D blows past Google Earth

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Microsoft's Virtual Earth 3D, released yesterday, looks to truly blow Google Earth out of the water. It currently features computer-rendered versions of 15 US cities with a stunning realism. Check out this high-res image of San Jose (from the Mercury News).

When I first clicked, I thought it was just an aerial shot. What's the big deal? Then I realized it was rendered. MS general manager Steve Lawler explained to the Merc:

Lawler, who heads Virtual Earth's team of research scientists and engineers, said the cities are built using automated computer algorithms that extract precise architectural features and measurements from images taken by airplanes flying over the cities and trucks driving the streets.
Lawler said the average cost of producing a city was $150,000, which he said was about one-tenth the cost of current manual methods.

The bad part: a download and Windows and IE6/7 required. I don't think you can do this in a generic browser. Yet.

Just like the real world, Microsoft's virtual world is up for sale. Fox, Zip Realty and Nissan are participating in the launch.

`We are just going to experiment at first,'' Lawler said. ``You can imagine a billboard on SBC Park and you click it and get tickets to the ball game. . . . You can imagine a Nike `Just Do It' ad on top of Mount Rainier.''

Yuk.

Silicon Valley's Most Innovative Thinker Warns of Big Problems

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

It was a very dull 60th anniversary celebration for SRI International, one of the world's largest contract research institutes.

Spun out of Stanford University, it lives in the heart of Silicon Valley and started a long time before there was a Silicon Valley. It has contributed a massive amount of ideas and technologies, so it was disappointing that the event was such a dull dud.

I turned up with my 18 year old son Matt, we were primarily interested in Doug Engelbart, the legendary inventor and the most innovative thinker in the computer industry. He was on a panel with other SRI luminaries (scientists but mostly administrators.)

As we walked into the auditorium at the Computer History Museum, Curt Carlson, SRI director (see SVW interview here) was finishing his welcome keynote. The place was full, but it wasn't that full, which surprised me.

Soon, Paul Saffo, professional futurist, was up on the stage and introducing the four panelists which he would be moderating. They included Paul Cook, Phil Green, and Donald Nielson.

Mr Saffo tried to raise the level of energy in the large room but it wasn't working and what followed was a fairly slowly paced session. Things did start to get going about 35 minutes into the panel, but Mr Saffo, saying he would "honor" the schedule cut things off right on time at 45 minutes.

This puzzled me because how often do you get a panel together such as this one? Let it run longer would have been my choice and I'm sure no one in the audience would have minded.

At one point, the panel was asked about what problems needed to be solved. Mr Engelbart said that humanity faces a serious problem in being able to collectively make intelligent decisions. Unless this is addressed, we will face big problems.

This strikes at the heart of Mr Engelbart's work for more than 45 years: creating tools for a collective approach to solving big problems through the use of technology as a tool to augment human qualities and abilities.

By the way, Me Engelbart is still looking for funding to continue his work.

The best part of the evening was when Doug Engelbart spoke about how he decided on his career path. He was a second world war veteran and ex-Navy technician. He decided it would be a good idea to combine his professional work with something that would produce a big benefit to humanity. It was as simple as that!

And so he embarked on a career path that has influenced an incredible number of people and led to much of the technology we use everyday.

Here is my short video of Doug Engelbart explaining his career choice:

. . .

Also Please see my interview with Doug Engelbart and essays on his contributions:

What if Buckminster Fuller were still alive and looking for funding? I'm still in shock at Silicon Valley's blindness regarding Doug Engelbart

What if Buckminster Fuller were still alive and looking for funding?

Part 3 of our series: Tom Foremski is still in shock at how Silicon Valley has ignored the continuing work of Doug Engelbart, inventor of many technology concepts that we take for granted today. June 15, 2005 12:55 AM

Excellent piece on Doug Engelbart by Ross Mayfield

Ross Mayfield, CEO of SocialText, points me to his post on Doug Engelbart, and it's an excellent piece of work. June 14, 2005 11:10 AM

Exclusive interview with seminal 1960s computer visionary Doug Engelbart -- he's still here and looking for funding

Exclusive interview with Doug Engelbart

Part 2 in our series: How the 1960s counterculture of individual expression nourished the birth of the PC - and smashed the work of leading computer researchers whose ideas didn't fit the paradigm. June 10, 2005 03:41 AM

A tribute to one of Silicon Valley's most influential and forgotten researchers at Xerox Parc event

Doug Engelbart: a tribute to a hugely influential figure

He's not just the inventor of the mouse. A book promo at Xerox PARC is dominated by acknowledgements from dozens of computer pioneers of Engelbart's revolutionary, pervasive ideas. June 9, 2005 05:50 AM

November 6, 2006

diggrz: Week-let: Web Shock

[diggrz: an SVW tag for arts, culture, trends, and events in and around Silicon Valley- new from SVW] -

By Maria Mouk for Silicon Valley Watcher

This week starts out immediately productive if you have made it your agenda to attend the Third Annual Web 2.0 Conference at Palace Hotel in San Francisco, lasting Nov 7th to Nov 9th. The Web 2.0 Conference focuses on emerging business and technology developments that utilize the Web as a platform and will be a gathering of top-notch presenters, leaders, and experts in the field. Be sure to catch Wednesday mornings' discussion on "Net Neutrality" with Tim O'Reilly , Vinton G. Cerf , and Robert Pepper, or "What Google Knows" on Thursday with Marissa Mayer (with many more on the schedule for you to explore.)

Wednesday evening find yourself at the Creative Commons monthly salon at Shine, with this weeks lineup featuring Flickr, Annalee Newitz, Bittorrent, the Homebrew Mobile Club, and the music of the Kleptones. Goes all eve, so show up, even afterhours. Alternately (or in addition to) drop over to Dorkbot, where Greg Hazel will present Incoherence: Stereo Field Spectrum Analysis which displays stereo field and frequency information together, in real-time. It can show frequency-dependent phase information in an intuitive way. The demo will include an introduction to the display layout, basic functions, and music demonstrations. Matt Chisholm and Ross Cohen present The Neighborhood Project, a map of city neighborhoods based on the collective opinions of internet users.

Still if you're looking for stimulation beyond speculation, Wednesday 6pm-8pm, put your physical efforts and gusto into setting up for the two day Web 2point2 Unconference at the Microsoft Conference Center (1 Market Street) held on Nov 9th and 10th; Web2Point2 aims to be an event driven by participants and based on conversations, not powerpoints, though they're surely booking hype from their larger Web 2.0 brother event (or those who can't pocket to attend.) Email kristie@brainjams.org or call 415.577.9022, if in fact you're interested. Afterparty at Fluid (662 Mission) on Thursday, and free admission with event badge.

Thursday evening, at 111 Minna Gallery, the good people of Grist, (Environmental News and Commentary) are in San Francisco to host a Grist Organic Happy Hour. Chat it up to the writers and join forces, or just offer suggestions, and if the amazing menu isn't enough (choc full of local organic delicacies and libations from Square One Vodka, Bison Brewery, Organic Vintners, Sambazon juice and Guayaki Yerba Mate,) Flexcar will be there as well donating 5 free memberships that include 5 free hours a month for 6 months, and Clif Bar will be offsetting all emissions for the event via their Cool Tags program with Native Energy. RSVP now.

Thursday night rocks on with Canadian Ninjatune artist Kid Koala at the Mezzanine, with 12 dollar advance tickets. His recent tours have included up to 8 turntables and sounds: unforgettable! Think jazz-hop-scratchathon.

SFlickr; a monthly meeting of San Francisco Flickr users, starts 7pm at Crossroads Café (699 Delancey St.) This is an opportunity to meet local Flickr users and discuss camera specs/ photo tips. Falls in time with the recent re-release of JPG Magazine, where readers (viewers) can submit photos to issues and themes for consideration in the magazine. ($100 per photo used.)

See you Thursday, till then; avoid all shell shock from Web related activity. Though the days are cooler; get out, as time away from the safety net of technology (sit.. stare.. type) make for better productivity in the long term.

Tag: diggrz

11.6.06: Time says YouTube invention of the year

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Somehow you just doubt Time would have picked YouTube as the invention of the year if it hadn't been validated by a $1.65 billion purchase by Google. No matter. A few choice words about the monster in Time's inimitable prose style:

YouTube's creators had stumbled onto the intersection of three revolutions. First, the revolution in video production made possible by cheap camcorders and easy-to-use video software. Second, the social revolution that pundits and analysts have dubbed Web 2.0. It's exemplified by sites like MySpace, Wikipedia, Flickr and DiggÑhybrids that are useful Web tools but also thriving communities where people create and share information together. The more people use them, the better they work, and more people use them all the timeÑa kind of self-stoking mass collaboration that wouldn't have been possible without the Internet.
The third revolution is a cultural one. Consumers are impatient with the mainstream media. The idea of a top-down culture, in which talking heads spoon-feed passive spectators ideas about what's happening in the world, is over. People want unfiltered video from Iraq, Lebanon and DarfurÑnot from journalists who visit there but from soldiers who fight there and people who live and die there.

Most refreshingly, Time's article leaves the copyright scare til the end, noting the schizoid attitude some corporations have to the YouTube opportunity.

"The people marketing content see it as a great new platform, but the legal side of the business doesn't know how to react," Hurley says. "We have instances where someone within the company uploaded something, and the other side's asking you to take it down."

11.6.06: HP's services chief out. Was he pushed?

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Steve Smith, head of HP's $15 billion services business has left the company, the Financial Times reports.

With revenue increasing in the group just 1% last quarter and, as the FT notes, "expanding HP’s services footprint has emerged as a top priority for HP under the leadership of Mark Hurd," it's reasonable to suspect that the resignation was not all Smith's idea.

Rumor has it that HP is getting ready to acquire European IT integrator Atos Origin and last week extended its tender for Mercury Interactive for the fourth time.

An HP spokeswoman said Mr Smith had resigned for personal reasons. She said Ann Livermore, head of the technology solutions group, would take over Mr Smith’s role while the company looked for a replacement.

11.6.06: 'Google killer' Powerset gets $12.5m

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Powerset, a search startup that says it can blow Google away by providing actual answers to natural language queries, rather than hits based on keyword frequency, has raised $12.5 million in venture funding, Matt Marshall reports on VentureBeat. (We blogged on Matt's previous Powerset report.)

The funding comes from Foundation Capital ($7m), The Founders Fund ($3m), and several angel investors ($2.5m combined).

Powerset is notable because it says it can improve on Google’s search engine by understanding the meaning between words. Take, for example, the phrase, “Who did Dick Cheney shoot?” Powerset will give you results with references to Harry Whittington, Cheney’s hunting partner who Cheney accidentally shot. However, if you type in “Who shot Dick Cheney?” it will give you a response “Sorry, no results.” Google, on the other hand, can’t distinguish between these two phrases, and gives very similar results for both.

11.6.06: State of the blogosphere

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Dave Sifry has released Technorati's quarterly state of the blogosphere report and, besides the overall numbers (100K new blogs/daily, blogos doubling in size every 230 days to 57m) and Technorati's improvements at filtering "splogs," the most intriguing findings have to do with the global nature of the blogosphere in 2006.

For instance, while 3% of posts are in Spanish, that language has a much more global reach than the #2 and #3 languages, Japanese and Chinese. That's probably not suprising. Spanish is a colonial language, Asian languages are generally confined to their countries - although with the large numbers of Asians working in the West, you'd expect to see more global activity.

But you can't really tell from the single pie chart exactly what's going on. I'd like to see a comparison of blog posts in different languages outside of their home countries. For instance, removing Japan, in what countries are Japanese blogs being posted. Outside of the English-speaking world, where is English the blog language of choice?

Also interesting, for sure, is the appearance of Farsi - but not Arabic - on Techno's top 10 languages list.

Finally, note that Techno's comparison of authority for blogs maps pretty much perfectly with age and frequency. Very high authority blogs have been at it on average a year and a half and post twice a day, while low-authority blogs have been around less than a year and post a dozen times a month.

Yahoo and Google and China - it's time to Do Some Good

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

Tank Man Tiananmen Square June 5, 1989
One of the most powerful images of the 20th Century is "Tank Man" the man that walked out in front of a column of tanks -- a day after the bloody suppression of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989.

He walked into the middle of a pedestrian crossing, with two shopping bags in his hands, and stood down a tank column--stopped them dead in their tracks.

The tanks tried to move around him but he blocked them again and again. He clambered on top of the lead tank and spoke with the crew.

PBS Frontline produced an excellent feature on Tank man earlier this year, I urge you to watch it. Nobody knows what happened to him, some say he was whisked away into the crowd.

But maybe Yahoo can help the Chinese government find him, he might be using Yahoo mail - you never know: TankMan1301@yahoo.china.com

Yahoo's executive management doesn't need to step out in front of a column of tanks to protest injustice in China, or anywhere else in the world, their rights are protected here. So why help the Chinese government track down and jail Chinese blogger Shi Tao for trying to exercise very mild political dissent? A ten year jail sentence.

Yahoo can do the right thing, right now. It can launder the personal data it collects - especially if it is being collected in countries where there is a high likelihood that the personal data could cause serious harm to a Yahoo user if government agencies or their proxies, were to have access to that data.

Yahoo: Launder your data of all personal details through third parties if you have to-- it's as simple as that. And that goes for Google too. Forget about "Do no Evil" how about "Do some good."

There's not much cachet in working for a "police informant" as Reporters without Borders dubbed Yahoo's actions in China.

More Vloggies Vids . . .

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

Everybody and I mean everybody was packing a video camera at the Vloggies on Saturday night. Irina Slutsky, co-host and the prime organizer of the event, started off by telling people that "No videoing was allowed." It brought the house down.

Irina did a great job on stage and kept things lively and fun. Mind you, the crowd were ready to have a good time, they'd been drinking their way through a chunk of PodTech's VC money for a good couple of hours . . . :-)

I managed to grab a quick interview with Andy Plesser, the man behind the fast rising vidblogging sensation Beet.TV. Andy flew in from New York. Here's a rare on-camera interview with Beet.TV's Andy Plesser:

Jerry Zucker, Hollywood movie director of classics such as Airplane, gave a great, short speech in which he sums up why video blogging is such a big deal. You should definitely check this out, introduced by his friend, John Furrier, CEO of PodTech.

And I'd like to give a big thanks to Steve Wyshywaniuk and the crew from AliveinBaghdad.org for finding my camera bag. Check them out!

Alive in Baghdad was formed to counter the sound-bite driven, “Live From” news model. Through the work of a team of Americans and Iraqi correspondents on the ground, Alive in Baghdad shows the occupation through the voices of Iraqis.

Also, check out PodTech.net for John Furrier interviewing myself and a whole bunch of others, at the after-party at Cafe du Nord.

Vloggies: Awards Show Party Video

Make sure you see our very own Lucaso's Diggrz take on the Vloggies....

Foremski's First Law of New Media

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

My good buddy Tom Abate at the San Francisco Chronicle keeps reminding me that I should share my "Foremski's Law." It is something I've been talking about with small numbers of select individuals over the past 18 months or so....

Here is is. Foremski's Law: Content is infinitely scalable.

I"ll explain, some time soon, or if you ask me in person. This points to the keys to the kingdom, if you dig, and I know that you do... :-)

November 5, 2006

The Vloggies Vidcast!

by lucaso for Silicon Valley Watcher.

Here's the diggrz vidcast from the vloggies!

The Vloggies was the Rite-Spot Saturday

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

The place to be Saturday evening was the Vloggies Awards in San Francisco- the best of the best video bloggers.

Organized by PodTech, co-founded by John Furrier, the event brought together an eclectic, and very much a San Francisco crowd. PodTech's Valerie Cunningham did an excellent job in getting people to come out...and dress for the occasion.

Silicon Valley generally likes to dress as if they just crawled out of their parent's spare bedroom - T-shirts and jeans - even though they have been dressing themselves for many years. That's why it was fun to see lots of people dressed to the nines for the event.

This was not your typical Silicon Valley event, that typically starts at 6 and ends at 8. Yes, it's true, this event did officially start at 6 but everybody was fashionably late and it was almost 8 before things got going.

Andy Plesser from Beet TV was there (how come Beet didn't win anything?!) plus Nick Douglas from ValleyWag was looking very dapper; of course Scott Beale, Laughing Squid with his camera; Renee Blodgett turned up ready to have fun; my pals Chris and Kristie Heuer were freshly deplaned from Boston which did not slowdown Chris; the indefatigable Dan Farber was there; Steve Gillmore my fellow ZDNet blogger, Nick Aster representing Tree Hugger was there (congrats on winning a Vloggie!)and lots and lots of familiar faces - it was a very good evening.

Here is a smattering of gossip: Gabe Rivera, the TechMeme maestro, has finally escaped the dungeon of Mike Arrington's Atherton house, he's currently in the Peninsula. (I told him he should keep moving north and get a place in SF.)

I will post pictures and video as soon as I can locate my camera . . . I hope somebody did(!)

Scott Beale has a good Vloggies wrap here...

November 3, 2006

Vidcast: "Burnt" fundraiser for Africaburns(a South African burningman) at Nimby

by ladyQi and lucaso for Silicon Valley Watcher.

Two weeks ago the diggrz headed to the Nimby Warehouse in Oakland, CA to check out "Burnt," a fundraiser for Africaburns (South Africa's incarnation of Burningman) The event was massive, featuring large scale fire installations, aerial performances, and a ton of stellar musicians. Enjoy!

Kultur Shock: November flow

[diggrz: an SVW tag for arts, culture, trends, and events in and around Silicon Valley- new from SVW] -

By Maria Mouk for Silicon Valley Watcher

With the time change this weekend came the weather tide, pulling out the heat of Indian summer and making way to seemingly winter rain. It's always bittersweet to feel the flux of the seasons, but in all change lies evolution... and I look forward to days of pensive skies.

Crazy Castro shooting Halloween! If this year came close to cancellation, I see no reason for having an event that contributes to 9 people being shot next year. What is wrong citizens? Stray fire at a Halloween Party? Blows my mind... Very disturbing.

Put your thoughts into a positive process: move, make, and involve yourself. Maybe you found inspiration at the Brazilian Girls show Thursday night at the Warfield. Or braved the rain in the Mission march for Day of the Dead. This week has more options for burning off your Halloween candy.

If you really feel like doing a body good- head to the Apple on the East. The New York City Marathon starts Sunday morning Nov 5th, and if you havent qualified to run- you can still cheer on the thousands who attend.

For the rest on the home Bay, weekend is jam packed with suggested events such as Clandestine; a Cold War themed costume party set in Berlin, 1962 to benefit Workspace Limited, who provide affordable studio space for artists. Saturday afternoon: Of interest may be the Plants & Magic: Exploring Our Spiritual Connection to Plants show at the Conservatory of Flowers and the San Francisco Botanical Garden where renouned ethnobotonists will speak about the sacred role of plants and the plant-based rituals of Earth's diverse cultures. Learn about shamanic uses of plants, and join in on the Kava Lounge for inspired conversation while moving to the sounds of Brazilian drummers.

Saturday also rolls on with the VLOGGIES at the Swedish American Music Hall. Yes, the first award ceremony for online video documentation presented by Irina Slutsky (the name just slides off the tongue doesnt it? ;) ) of GeekTV. After party at Café du Nord. Also this weekend, geek out at the Vintage Computer Festival 9.0, at the Computer History Museum, in Mountain View.

If you're looking for a little more action, check out the ICER AIR Festival at ATT Park, on Saturday, with performances by Ladytron and Jurassic 5, beyond the skate & BMX vert demo, wakeboarding exhibition, and the big air/ ski and snowboard competition. Lombardi Sports will be having a blowout 50 percent ski and snowboard sale to accompany the event. Attending will be most accomplished world-class skiers and snowboarders of Olympic and X-Games fame.

Sunday evening (8pm), stop into the Little Baobab (3388 19th St @ Capp St.), for the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Calabash Music Mixer. EFF is the leading civil liberties organization defending rights online. Calabash Music is a top online distributor of music from
around the world, providing its entire catalog in MP3 format and splitting sales revenue 50-50 with artists. Mingle, chat, and dance with EFF staff members.

Power weekend! Invest your time.efforts and Enjoy.

[diggrz refers to the nomadic lifestyle offered by mobile digital technologies and gadgets - creating a "nomadig" culture. The diggrz name is also a tip-of-the-hat to some of the ideas of the Diggers, a democratic group that arose in 1649, out of the English revolution.

Tag: diggrz

Friday Newswatch: CA's Kumar gets 12 years, Hurd faces more questions

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Former CA CEO gets 12 years for fraud, obstruction

Faced with life in prison for securities fraud and obstruction of justice, Sanjay Kumar got off easy. The former CEO of Computer Associates was sentenced to 12 years in federal prison and an $8 million fine, the Times reports.

Kumar engaged in a $2.2 billion accounting fraud, inflating the company's profits in 1999 and 2000, lying to investigators and even trying to bribe a potential witness to the tune of $3.7 million.

“This shocked the conscience of this court, and I dare believe it shocked the conscience of any reasonable person,” Federal Judge I. Leo Glasser said.

What did CA and Kumar do? Little things like the "35-day month," where sales made in one quarter were booked to the previous quarter, thus driving up the stock price as it looked to Wall Street that CA was making money hand over fist.

It was really the obstructionist behavior like offering a whopping bribe and lying to the FBI that earned Kumar his stiff sentence.

House has more questions for Hurd

The House subcommittee that held hearing on HP spying in September sent a set of questions to CEO Mark Hurd that focus on his under, the Times says. HP released one set of questions and Hurd's answers (PDF). Another set of responses has not been released.

At issue is Hurd's recollection that at a July 2005 someone talked about getting personal phone information from the Web. In reponse to a question about that meeting, Hurd wrote:

“I recall only the remark being made by someone at some time and thinking there must be some Web site with the information."

Chinese Internet Rep Flees From UK Reporter

A lot of people have personally expressed to me their disgust at Yahoo's involvement in acting as what Reporters Without Borders has called a "police informant" in the case of blogger Shi Tao.

David Smith, a reporter for The Guardian in the UK, writes about China:

The communist state stands accused of censoring search engines and persecuting bloggers such as Shi Tao, who was jailed for 10 years after using his Yahoo! account to email a US-based website about the government's attempt to control media coverage of the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown.
I tried to give China the right to reply by approaching Hu Qiheng, chairwoman of the Internet Society of China, for a full and frank interview in this Sunday's Observer.
Can we discuss openness? 'I don't want to talk about that,' she said. 'It's outside our remit.'
And with that she turned heel and fled into the crowd.
Later, I'm told, she said in a workshop discussion that all governments need ethical starting points from which to regulate the net. Asked why the UN's declaration of human rights, including the right to freedom of speech, would not do, she simply smiled and nodded and said she'd prefer to hear everybody else's views.

Link to Great Wall of Silence from Guardian Unlimited: Technology

I'm not going to let this issue drop. SVW is going to be watching Silicon Valley and other US companies, and their involvement in China very closely. Watch this space.

Day of protest against net censorship

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Reporters Sans Frontieres (Reporters Without Borders) is organizing the blogosphere into a mass protest action next Friday, Nov. 8. The group is calling on all bloggers to demonstrate against Internet censorship and repression against bloggers in 13 countries.

In order to combat this kind of censorship and to make as many people as possible aware of the situation, Reporters Without Borders is for the first time launching a major protest: 24 hours against online censorship. The general public, Internet users, bloggers, journalists, students - everyone is invited to register their opposition to censorship with a simple click.

The RSF site will include features to send a voicemail to Yahoo to protest the company's collaboration with China's repressive measures against bloggers.

Why Yahoo? Because this was the first company to censor its own search engine to curry favour with the Chinese authorities. And because it has been collaborating for years with the Chinese police, which arrests and convicts dissident and freelance journalists. Shi Tao, for example, was sentenced to 10 years in prison on the basis of information supplied by Yahoo!, which hosted his e-mail account.

RSF is urging every website and blog to participate in the demonstration day. Saatchi and Saatchi have created an ad campaign for the day. The group is asking for blogs to post promotional animations on their sites to promote the day.

Web creator warns of blogging perils

From the UK newspaper The Guardian: (Hat tip to Phil Manchester)

Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the Briton who founded the Web in the early 1990s, says that if the internet is left to develop unchecked, "bad phenomena" will erode its usefulness.
His creation has transformed the way millions of people work, do business, and entertain themselves.
But he warns that "there is a great danger that it becomes a place where untruths start to spread more than truths or it becomes a place which becomes increasingly unfair in some way." He singles out the rise of blogging as one of the most difficult areas for the continuing development of the web, because of the risks associated with inaccurate, defamatory and uncheckable information.
Sir Tim believes devotees of blogging sites take too much information on trust: "The blogging world works by people reading blogs and linking to them. You're taking suggestions of what you read from people you trust. That, if you like, is a very simple system, but in fact the technology must help us express much more complicated feelings about who we'll trust with what." The next generation of the Internet needs to be able to reassure users that they can establish the original source of the information they digest.

Creator of web warns of fraudsters and cheats The Guardian Guardian Unlimited

Sir Tim is right, but it is a problem that is not confined to blogging; it is a problem that affects the entire Web. This is why we need a "trust trackback" or a TrustBack.

In the same way that a trackback lists who has linked to a specific online article, a TrustBack would verify the original source of online information, such as a press release or news story, and show that it is not from a "phishing" site.

On September 17, 2006, I published this post on the lessons from the LonelyGirl15 saga.

We badly need a way to verify sources of online content - we need a "trust trackback"

To save you a click or two, here is an excerpt:

What happens in a future world where phishing is applied to news sources rather than spoofing banking sites? And where there aren't enough watchdogs to spot the fakes?
A little while ago, Google News was carrying a hacked headline that was anti-US and anti-Israel. That was easy to spot; but what if Google News, or some other large news aggregator, were carrying a Reuters story that might have been more subtlety altered? . . .

. . .This ability to know that a news source - an individual, a company, an organization, a community, or a government - really said what it is said to have said in a news story, an online post, email, or any other distribution channel, is incredibly important. Otherwise there will be others who will sow misinformation in very sophisticated ways, for commercial gain.
There will be many opportunities for such misinformation in the online world. With so many sources of information, and more coming our way, there won't be enough online sleuths to flag the fakesters as there were with LonelyGirl15.
This means we need to have a way to verify the source of specific chunks of content as originating from an individual, a company, an organization, a community, a government.
A reader should be able to click a "trust" button and have the content verified. . .
. . . For this next phase of the Internet, we badly need a mechanism to verify the source of information that we read online.
This is about creating a type of "trust trackback" that is part of the secure core infrastructure of the internet. Who is up to this task?

Sir Tim? Can you fix the Internet for us?!

November 2, 2006

Thursday Newswatch: MSFT, Novell in Linux pact, see you in Bengalooru ...

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

Microsoft to support Novell's SuSE Linux

Hot on the heels of a deal with Zend, a commercial vendor of PHP products for Windows, Microsoft announced an even bigger deal: Redmond will include maintenance and support for Novell SuSE Linux as part of corporate sales of Windows, AP reports.

"They said it couldn't be done. This is a new model and a true evolution of our relationship that we think customers will immediately find compelling because it delivers practical value by bringing two of their most important platform investments closer together," Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said in a statement.

In addition, Microsoft has pledged not to assert its patent rights over any of its technology that may be blended with Suse Linux. This addresses corporate concerns about using Linux because of the threat Microsoft would retaliate with patent actions.

Bangalore changes its name to appease locals

Just as Bombay has become Mumbai, Indian tech center Bangalore is switching its name to its vernacular original, Bengalooru. Reuters reports:

Although it has traditionally been among India's more cosmopolitan centers, the increased migration over the last decade has alienated some locals and led to the resurgence of regional chauvinistic groups, analysts say.
Their campaign seeking primacy for the local Kannada language -- which they say is threatened by the influx -- has seen shops and businesses in Bangalore removing English signboards and instead prominently displaying Kannada signs.

That Giant Sucking Sound - JotSpot Fears of Being Sucked in Come True

By Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

I just got back from India and I noticed that JotSpot has been acquired by Google. In July of last year, I had lunch with JotSpot founder Joe Kraus, also the co-founder of Excite, the "Google" of its era.

Mr Kraus complained about the "giant sucking sound" coming out of Silicon Valley's Google and Yahoo. Will these companies end up buying all the cool companies around? What will this do for innovation?

Mr Kraus's fears were well placed. However, for JotSpot, I think they got out in time. Clearly, Mr Kraus did not believe that he could go on much further.

Google Docs and Spreadsheets already had a lot of JotSpot functionality. JotSpot brings a heck of a lot more, of course, but it would only have been a matter of time before it filled in the gaps.

In addition, Google is not interested in monetizing these services, at least not for now. If you are going up against Microsoft, Redmond wants revenues and so there is somewhat more of a level playing field--even though Microsoft can out market competitors and it has enormous scale.

But if you go up against Google, you also go up against a competitor that doesn't care about revenues for most of its services. That's a

"bad competitor."

This does not bode well for SocialText or Coghead, although I'm sure that these companies are saying that it "validates" their businesses. There is still some hope for them in that they can go after the corporate market which is full of server-huggers and who will not use Google or Yahoo for business services.

To save you a click or two, here's a reprint of my post from July 25, 2005:

"That giant sucking sound...will massive tech companies vacuum up all the cool/hot tech companies?"

Will just a few big tech companies end up owning all the cool/hot tech companies? That's the way it's looking right now, and it's going to be a big problem.

That's because the big boys are controlling the valuations of startup companies. With fewer buyers around, it becomes a buyers market. Which means fewer reasons to build more startups.

Within each tech sector there are now just one or two companies of a size that can compete against each other, and the other companies in their markets are generally much smaller.

That means it's less likely a bidding war will develop over a hot company, and since there is not much of an IPO market, it's a take it or leave it type of deal.

When I met recently with Joe Kraus, co-founder of search giant Excite (pre-Google) he said he was worried that there was a giant sucking sound coming from Google as it acquires more and more companies.

Yahoo has done its fair share of sucking too, Flickr, one of the coolest/hottest startups of 2004 became part of Yahoo earlier this year.

In other sectors, tech giants such as Oracle, Intel, Cisco, IBM, Microsoft, and Broadcom behave in much the same way. They buy the most promising private companies and they do it nearly every month.

The upside to fewer companies chasing hot companies is that there is less mania and less pressure to buy. When I visited with Dan Scheinman, Cisco's head of M&A, earlier this year, he said he had more time to identify and evaluate a potential acquisition. Valuations were now more reasonable than during the dotcom boom years, he said.

Ten baggers quicken the heart

Reasonable valuations however, don't stir the blood of venture capital investors. There is no opportunity for a ten-fold return on a VC investment when valuations are "reasonable." Yet a potential ten-bagger is the minimum requirement for a VC firm to be interested, generally.

So is innovation in trouble? Will we have less of it in the future?

It is difficult to argue with the economics of scale. I'm not talking about scale in terms of being able to negotiate lower costs on resistors or disk drives. Companies such as Google, IBM, Oracle, SAP can monetize a product or service far better than the startup venture can because they have scale in infrastructure: the global distribution channels, customer base, and support.

Is there a way around this? Let me know.

I'm back from India. . . join me for First Friday at the de Young

I'm back from a very interesting trip to India, I'll have at least one more post on my trip. I just wanted to let people know that I will be at the de Young from 6.30pm to 8.30pm for "First Friday with Foremski." Come on by and enjoy the museum. There is a no-host bar and music with Conjunto Romero celebrating Día de los Muertos. This is not a networking event, it's about connecting :-)

Fridays at the de Young.

Lawsuit says search companies abuse consumers

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

When it comes to Google, Microsoft and Yahoo collecting, datamining and exploiting user personal communications and identifying data, enough is enough, two consumer groups said in a lawsuit filed yesterday, The Washington Post reports.

The Center for Digital Democracy and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group asked the FTC to investigate the companies' online advertising practices, which they called "deceptive and unfair to millions of users."

"Our online travels are increasingly becoming part of vast databases that comprise the source material for sophisticated analytical engines designed solely to make us more susceptible to online marketing," the complaint said.

The complaint (PDF) singles out a Microsoft service that targets advertising by combining user trails on MSN with such individual details as geographic location, sex, age group, lifestyle and time of day. The suit urges the FTC to halt advertising practices that "abuse consumers."

Soothing words from Microsoft:

"Consumer trust is essential to the success of online business and helping protect consumers' privacy is a top priority for Microsoft in our development and implementation of online services."

And Google:

Google recognizes "that privacy is important" and that as it develops its advertising programs, it comes back "every time to the idea that the trust of the user is paramount."

Somewhat more measured words from Yahoo:

Yahoo has "a longstanding commitment to providing users with clear notice and choice" on the way their data is used.

Part III A Passage to India - the teeming mashup of Mumbai

By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher

[This is an account of my first trip to India, traveling as a guest of Tibco Software, an SVW sponsor. Part 1 is here. Part 2 is here.]

We leave for Delhi airport to travel by small chartered jet to Mumbai, formerly known by its Portuguese name Bombay, India's largest city with 19m residents. The security at the Delhi airport is multi-stage and every few yards police or military personnel are rechecking our papers and screening our baggage.

India has suffered far more terrorist attacks than the US and it seems they can't be too careful. Even though we have moved through multiple checkpoints--all in view of each other--our documents and baggage get checked again and again.

Vivek Ranadive, Tibco's CEO, notes that in the US, private jet travelers go through no security or screening at all. I'm amazed.

We drive out to the other side of the airport and board the aircraft. We're soon up in the air for the 90-minute flight to Mumbai.

I've become a big fan of the newspapers and business magazines in India and pass the time by reading. It's interesting to see things from within India (more on this in a later post.)

As we glide into the approach for the landing I can already see that this is a much different place than stately Delhi, with its broad boulevards and grand government buildings. Right next to the airport is a large brown-grey area of boxes and rectangles all jumbled up. I can't make out what it is but as we get lower I can see it is a sprawling shanty shack city.

As we drive from the airport we're embedded within a mass of humanity and traffic. Tiny two-stroke cars and taxis mix with Bentleys and Mercedes. Some are cutting at right angles across the traffic lanes and people are crossing against the traffic. And everywhere is a cacophony of car horns. Every time we stop, young children tap on the car windows selling roses or newspapers, or begging for one rupee (about two cents) for food.

Bombay is crowded because it is spread across seven islands, so everything along the road is packed in tight: the kiosk-like shops, the people, the shanty shacks, the lone cows. It's all a mashup of colorful clothes and smells. I'm completely fascinated whichever direction I look.

Mumbai seems to be decaying with rundown Portuguese colonial-era buildings and bad housing projects, yet simultaneously rising young and new with striking office buildings and apartment buildings. All mashed up together, next to each other.

We head for the evening reception and dinner at a large hotel in the western part of Bombay. Vivek Ranadive and CIO magazine are hosting an event to launch his book, "The Predictive Enterprise," and about 50 CIOs of India's largest companies will be there.

Sanjay Gupta, vice president for global alliances at Tibco, is already decked out in a sharp suit and sun glasses. Vivek jokes that he looks like a Bollywood movie star. I get changed into a suit in the hotel and then head off to the reception on the lower level.

The restaurant in the hotel is sharp and very urban - it could be a trendy night spot in New York or London. I chat with some of the CIOs, many have spent time in San Francisco and the Bay Area in years past, some have worked at startups.

I ask about the startup culture in India. There doesn't seem to be much going on. I can't get much of an answer from the people I'm speaking with.

One of them says, "We've skipped that step." I smile but say that you can't skip the startup stage, innovation happens much faster when you are not encumbered by a large organization.

Vivek Ranadive, Tibco CEO - in black shirt, signs copies of his book

After a while the room is hushed and Mr Ranadive gives an introductory welcome. He says he grew up in Mumbai, his mother and sister still live there, but he left when he was 17. He introduces his concept about the predictive enterprise and then the CIOs line up to have him autograph copies of his book.

Before dinner begins, I head back to the hotel room to get some stomach medicine. I feel like I am coming down with a local malady, despite only drinking bottled water.

I lay down on the bed for one moment and then am startled to wake up four hours later, having completely missed the dinner. And everybody has left for another hotel on the other side of Mumbai. Holly Burkhart, Tibco's very able and super-efficient corporate communications director and events organizer calls. I apologize for missing the dinner, she tells me not to worry and says I should stay there and make my way over to the other hotel the next morning.

My stomach is still churning so I'm thankful to rest and nurse my stomach cramps. I notice that the vitreous porcelain bathroom receptacle is marked "HindWare." How apt I think, but then again it could it also refer to "Hindi.

- - -

Part 1 is here

Part 2 is here.

November 1, 2006

MS may reconsider China policy

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

"Things are getting bad... and perhaps we have to look again at our presence there." That's Microsoft policy counsel Fred Tipson at the Internet Governance Forum in Athens, the BBC reports.

We have to decide if the persecuting of bloggers reaches a point that it's unacceptable to do business there. We try to define those levels and the trends are not good there at the moment. It's a moving target.

Earlier, Tipson had joined Cisco's Art Reilly in defending corporate engagement in China, saying that companies have to abide by local rules. He also offered the usual platitudes about providing access being the path to economic growth and thus individual freedoms.

"The economic value in the internet is driving growth and development in educational opportunities [in China]. Openness is often too segmented too narrowly into a discussion around freedom of speech."
Mr Tipson said it was "critical not to portray the internet as a threat to governments. The internet is transforming the political culture of China. There is no question about it."

Wednesday Newswatch: Wiki Intelligence Agency? Stock option madness

By Richard Koman for SiliconValleyWatcher

CIA + Wikipedia = Intellipedia

In the buildup to war, US intelligence agencies failed to deliver an independent, accurate view of the situation in Iraq. Cowtowing to pressure from above, spy bosses silenced or downplayed analysts' assessments that didn't support the march to war. Now the intelligence community is taking software from Wikipedia to create an intelligence structure that supports capturing a diversity of ideas, the LA Times reports. "We're trying to transform the way we do business," Michele Weslander, who oversees the initiative for John Negroponte, says.

The system allows analysts from all 16 U.S. intelligence agencies to weigh in on debates on North Korea's nuclear program and other sensitive topics, creating internal websites that are constantly updated with new information and analysis, officials said.

While it's hardly taken over as the primary method for developing National Intelligence Estimates, it is being used "to develop preliminary judgments" for the NIE on Nigeria.

"I think in the future you'll press a button and this will be the NIE," said Michael Wertheimer, assistant deputy director of national intelligence for analysis.

Stock option watch

Andrew McKelvey, former CEO of Monster Worldwide, refused to answer questions from an internal investigating committee and resigned from his holdover position as chairman emeritus, the company said. "Mr. McKelvey had declined to be interviewed" and "would not provide assurance that he would appear at a later date." Monster will restate earnings from 1997 to 2005 and hopes to start 2007 on a "clean slate."

Microprocessor maker Atmel said it would restate its earnings for 2003 through the first quarter of '06. An internal investigation is continuing ... The SEC is investigating chipmaker Silicon Image's stock options practices from Jan. 1, 2004 through yesterday. ... The SEC has ended its investigation of Intuit without recommending enforcement action ... Look for more action from the agency in the very near future, Chairman Cox told a conference this week: "I expect that we'll be seeing more, as a result of that process, in days ahead." ...