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Anne Walls and John Singleton are co-founders of WordHustler (www.wordhustler.com), a local Hollywood startup looking to help writers connect with publishers. WordHustler launched in May of 2008 in a beta. We caught up with both Anne and John to learn more about the company. What's the whole idea behind WordHustler? John Singleton: WordHustler is a service that empowers writers to get connected with people who publish or produce their work. we do that by eliminating the hassles of the traditiona
I've never been able to walk into a large group of people and feel like I can "work the room." Sure, I've read various articles on this stuff, but honestly, I still struggle with meeting interesting people. I seem to be very adept at meeting financial planners, attorneys, accountants, etc. - and after 10 seconds of conversation, I'm at a loss. I can make small talk with them, but unless I'm going to see this person a few times or unless they have a tech specialization, ummm, not the best use of
Is there a difference between tech startups in Silicon Valley vs. Los Angeles? Most emphatically, Yes ! I’ve spent the last year running a tech company based in Santa Monica , CA and I’ve spent countless weeks in the Bay meeting with hundreds of tech founders. As unreliable as stereotypes may be, these are my generalizations. Bay area founders are amazing technologists.
Thursday, December 18, 2008 -- Mindshare. Mindshare is a monthly event that was created to serve as a platform for networking and the sharing of ideas across a wide range of fields. See [link] (more).
Office leases are one of companies’ largest expenses, and if your whole team is working from home with no clear end in sight, you may be wondering what to do about your lease.
Google now shows me an option to push things in my search results to the top. It's an interesting choice. Doesn't it seem like it's inviting problems. Basically the only people who will spend time on this is people trying to improve their search rankings. The rest of us signal with lots of other things like links, bookmarking, etc. Not sure I buy this approach from Google.
I went to a meetup yesterday that was on the topic of Internet Marketing / SEO / SEM. The meeting had a decent case study and some pretty good discussion around the room of different tools that you might consider using. Then the organizer went into a 20 minute sales pitch around his new training/coaching offering. It felt like a bad time share presentation.
As a follow-up to my last post on Meetups SEO / SEM , I was just booted from the group and any of my comments about issues I had with the way the group was handled along with my negative vote about the event were deleted from the group. It makes me wonder if Meetup is actually encouraging this kind of thing.
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As a follow-up to my last post on Meetups SEO / SEM , I was just booted from the group and any of my comments about issues I had with the way the group was handled along with my negative vote about the event were deleted from the group. It makes me wonder if Meetup is actually encouraging this kind of thing.
Found this via Ben Kuo - The math behind Internet advertising businesses The advertising equivalence principle? So if we assume that a $1 CPM is about right and figure out what audience is required to build a $100MM annual revenue business, we find out that we need 8.33 billion monthly page views and over 300 million monthly unique visitors creating 25 page views per user.
Fantastic post by Dion Hinchcliffe - Ten Aspects of Web 2.0 Strategy That Every CTO and CIO Should Know. Raises some interesting points, but the general theme is: just figure out ways to get it to happen.
Fascinating article by Andrew McAfee - Technology Beats a Full House - discusses how variation in performance spread decreases over time as systems become optimized. He shows that the spreads in IT heavy industries has greater variation over the past decade. winners were increasingly separated from losers.
I'm blogging from the CalTech Enterprise Forum. The topic is: Betting Your Company On An Internet Platform? A very interesting topic, especially for those of us involved in developing for start-ups. At the CTO Group that I organize in Santa Monica, we've had lots of discussions around this. The basic conclusion was that it was a bit premature if you were talking about a serious, funded start-up.
It's funny how things intersect in life. I just ran into Chris Gammil's post New Era of Social Innovation where he describes it as: The model takes the best of the OPEN model and pushes right out into the open, further distributing idea sourcing, team forming, development, commercialization and economic distribution. What are some of the drivers? The social web is making it easier find people with similar passions for creation/innovation The social web is making it easier to find people with com
A while ago I posted about Secret for Networking at Events - Prenetworking where I recommended that people should look at who's attending the event prior to going to the event in order to make their networking more effective. I've received a lot of positive feedback on the post. Since I posted on this and since I've been using this approach for quite a while, it has become pretty obvious that part of the reason that old school organizations / event producers are not getting the value of providin
Chris Gammil and I just spent some quality time together with a new, private group that is advising start-ups here in Los Angeles. The goal is to have start-ups learn from each other and from others who have been through the experience. So, far it's turning out great. The primary question we ask is: What's Keeping You Up at Night Chris provided a list of common issues: How much is enough?
Andrew Warner from Mixergy posted - Before Looking for Funding, Get an Advisor. He recommends that early stage companies get input from people who know the funding process, know the vertical, etc. That's great advice. Of course, it's sometimes hard to find advisors. On the flip side, as a person who regularly advises early stage start-ups, I often have a hard time finding interesting start-ups.
Last Saturday, I was a panelist at the CalTech - Social Networks event. It was a really good event with lots of interesting folks in attendance. I would guess that there was about 100 people - on a Saturday in Pasadena. That shows some interest in the topic. The presenters had some interesting things to say on a wide variety of topics. A post by Elrend Wilhelmsen discusses some of what was discussed.
Jan Zands is the founders of Los Angeles-based phonesheet.com (www.phonesheet.com), a startup which is developing web-based software for tracking phone messages and action items. We ran into Jan and thought it would be interesting to talk to him about the story behind the firm and its software. What is Phonesheet.com? Jan Zands: It's a web based phone message manager.
The X Prize Foundation, the Santa Monica nonprofit focused on encouraging innovation through prize-based competitions, has signed on a sponsor for a new prize focused on improving the nation's health care system. The group--which was behind the Ansari X Prize, which resulted in the first commercial space launch vehicle--said that it is in a collaboration with Wellpoint, Inc., and the WellPoint Foundation to develop a $10M or more competition to to generate new ways to address the nation's seriou
Irvine-based Fisker Automotive has announced that the plug-in hybrid vehicle maker will show a production vehicle from the firm in January, at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, the first time the company will have showed a production vehicle. Fisker, which is venture backed by the Qatar Investment Authority, Palo Alto Investors and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, showed a prototype of its KARMA vehicle in January, and is scheduled to begin delivery of its vehicles in Novem
We're always interested in how technology is influencing the business of Hollywood, and recently ran across Los Angeles-based Scripped. Scripped (www.scripped.com) is applying the world of Web 2.0 to the business of script writing, and is looking to combine a free online tool for writing scripts with matching those scripts with content producers. We spoke with Sunil Rajaraman, CEO and co-founder of the firm, about the company.
Los Angeles-based MySpace and PayPal announced this morning that the two companies are teaming to help people collection donations for non-profit organizations. According to the firms, they have create a fundraising software--which they are calling the MySpace IMPACT / PayPal fundraising widget--which can be placed on any MySpace page. The widget can be used to donate money to the non-profit of a user's choice.
San Diego-based RoyaltyShare said this morning it will be developing a new system for tracking limited downloads and interactive streaming. According to RoyaltyShare, it will be rolling out a platform which tracks and automates the tracking of music subscriptions and streaming, based on the recent agreement by the music industry on revenue sharing for streamed music.
This morning, Los Angeles-based Mogreet (www.mogreet.com) announced it had raised a Series B funding round for the firm's mobile greeting services. We caught up with James to hear more about the company, how he managed to get funding even in this economy, and his view on the mobile market. For those who haven't tried your service, tell us the story behind the site and how you started it?
Our interview this morning is with David Sacks, CEO of Geni.com, an online family tree and social networking site, as well as Yammer, the instant messaging startup spun out of Geni.com at TechCrunch50. David has a unique perspective on the Southern California technology environment, having been the COO of PayPal before its acquisition by EBay, and having had the full Silicon Valley experience.
Santa Monica-based Zag, the online car buying software firm headed by former CarsDirect CEO Scott Painter, has spun out a new company called TrueCar, the firm said late Wednesday. According to TrueCar, it will provide information about new car pricing, using the actual price people have paid for cars. The firm said it has scored Series A funding from Zag, Anthem Venture Partners, Global Retail Partners, Capricorn, Capital One Auto Finance, ARcturus Capital, Scott Painter, and co-founder Tom Tair
Irvine-based Skweezer, which provides services for translating web sites to mobile phone formats, along with an advertising network, said Monday that it has partnered with JumpTap. According to the firms, Skweezer's mobile content optimization technology is available on JumpTap's mobile search applications. Skweezer's technology converts any web site into a mobile-optimized format.
Irvine-based Kofax, which develops document capture tools, has hired on Jim Vickers as its Senior Vice President of OEM and Partner Strategy, the firm said today. Vickers joins the firm from Taylor Corporation, and has also served at EMC/Captiva Softare and Electronics for Imaging. Kofax said that Vickers will oversee all OEM, point-of-sale, channel management, and business development.
Computer game maker Activision Blizzard is apparently cutting jobs in El Segundo and Los Angeles, according to a filing with the California Employment Development Department. According to layoff filings, required in California of certain companies, Activision Blizzard is looking to lay off 4 employees in El Segudno, and 23 employees in Los Angeles on December 19th.
San Clemente-based Sambazon, which markets food and beverages using the Brazilian fruit acai, said Thursday that it has raised a round of private equity funding. The funding came from Verlinvest, a Belgian private equity group. Sambazon said the funding will go towards distribution and marketing of its products. Bradmer Foods and RSF Social Finance also participated in the funding, and Sambazon was advised by Partnership Capital Growth in the funding.
Los Angeles-based DailyStrength, an online health-related social networking site, has been acquired by HSW International, Inc., a developer of Internet businesses. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. According to HSW, DailyStrength has 700,000 unique visitors a month, generating 20 million monthly page views. Doug Hirsch, CEO of the firm, joins HSW International as Senior Vice President.
San Diego-based Nirvanix, a provider of storage-as-a-service, said Tuesday that the firm's technology is being used by video delivery firm Ooyala. According to Nirvanix, Ooyala is using Nirvanix to help its customers store and manage HD-quality video. Financial impact of the partnership was not disclosed. Nirvanix provides online storage for Internet-based businesses, which can be access via a programmatic API.
Thousand Oaks-based Xirrus, a provider of Wi-Fi networking hardware, has installed its products at a university in Topeka, Kansas, the firm disclosed today. Xirrus said that it has rolled out its 802.11n Wi-Fi arrays at Washburn University, to provide wireless connections throughout the University's campus. Financial impact of the win was not disclosed.
Los Angeles-based iolo technologies, publisher of the PC tune-up software System Mechanic, said this week that the firm has added support for Dutch and German. According to iolo, the product is now available in markets in Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. System Mechanic is a software utility for fixing and optimizing PCs. The firm said the added support is part of a "aggressive" localization initiative for the firm.
Aliso Viejo-based High Tower Software, a venture-backed developer of security, compliance, and log management software, has shut down. A spokesperson at the firm told socalTECH that the shutdown occurred yesterday, and that the firm is now in the process of looking for buyers of its technology. High Tower was backed by Falcon Fund, Hallador Venture Fund, INROADS Capital Partners, J.F.
Torrance-based Knowledge Adventure, which develops software for the educational games market, said today that it has inked a deal with Unity Technologies to develop a "3D virtual world" geared at kids. According to the firm, it will create a new virtual world aimed at kids 3-10, which will allow children to access the firm's JumpStart and Math Blaster branded software online, via the iPhone and iPod Touch, Mac, and Wii.
Woodland Hills-based United Online said Friday that it has promoted Robert J. Taragan to President of the firm's Communications segment, and named Matthew J. Wisk as President of the firm's online loyalty business, MyPoints.com. Taragan has been at United Online since 2000, and was EVP Operations. Wisk has been at United Online since 2005, and was EVP and Chief Marketing Officer.
Irvine-based WebVisible announced today that it has acquired Pasadena-based Adapt Technologies, a developer of search engine marketing tools. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. WebVisible is a provider of local online advertising services, which helps small and midsize businesses place search engine marketing. Adapt Technologies was venture backed by Concept2company, Emergence Capital Partners, and Mohr, Davidow Ventures; the firm had raised $9.8M in 2005.
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