Category: Tech news

While we already knew the subject of this news, Yahoo’s CEO Carol Bartz officially announced Project Nike, a distribution partnership with Nokia this morning. Nokia will build Yahoo email, search, and other applications into their devices.

As part of the agreement, Nokia will be the exclusive, global provider of Yahoo’s maps and navigation services, integrating Ovi Maps across Yahoo properties, branded as “powered by Ovi.” Yahoo will become the exclusive, global provider of Nokia’s Ovi Mail and Ovi Chat services branded as “Ovi Mail / Ovi Chat powered by Yahoo!”. Nokia and Yahoo also plan to work on ID federation between their services. Select, co-branded service offerings are expected to become available from the second half of 2010, with global availability expected in 2011.

The announcement was made at the NASDAQ in New York City. Bartz highlighted the importance of Nokia’s mapping technology integrated into Yahoo’s properties. Bartz also said they are looking to make similar partnerships with other mobile phone companies.

As my colleague MG Siegler wrote last week, this play seems to be more of a short-term gain. In terms of the long-term, the future is in smartphones, a sector where Nokia is declining. Nokia is strong, however, in sales of feature phones, which are phones that people still mainly use to do things like make phones calls and send text messages. For now, thanks to the evolving markets in third-world countries, this remains an important segment and it’s certainly a compelling opportunity for Yahoo.

Also, catch Carol Bartz speaking at TechCrunch Disrupt today about the deal and future of Yahoo.

Earlier this year, we covered the launch of Flixtime – an Animoto-like slideshow generation platform developed by Franco-American online stock photo giant Fotolia. When Flixtime first came out, the service naturally seemed basic in comparison to Animoto – which has been in the slideshow space since 2006. However, only a few months into its existence with over 50,000 free videos created on its site, it seems Flixtime is already throwing punches at Animoto with some new features that go live on the site today.

Couldn’t make it to TC Disrupt? You’ll miss all the hallway deals, but you don’t have to miss the show. Watch our full coverage right here livestreamed all day, for the next three days. Starting with Charlie Rose and John Doerr through to all the Startup Battlefield launches, we’ll have live and archived video.

So stick around and watch. And if your boss asks you what you are doing, say that it is market research.

Today’s the opening day our of TechCrunch Disrupt conference, and we’re starting it off with a bang. Famed interviewer/journalist/host Charlie Rose is talking to John Doerr, partner at venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Doerr is known for his massively successful investments in companies such as Google, Amazon, Intuit, and more recently Zynga (among many others).

Rose asked Doerr for his thoughts about what’s coming next. Doerr says that’s we’re on the third great wave of innovation. The first was the microchip/PC in the 80s. The second was the Internet in the 90s. And now we’re entering a wave of social, mobile, and new commerce, Doerr says.

And what’s leading that wave? The iPad.

Doerr (who invested in Apple) clearly loves this device. He had one on stage with him and kept picking it up over and over again throughout the Internet. He says it will change the way we interact with everyday things such as television. And it will charge health care. But maybe most importantly, it will change education, he says.

Rose also asked Doerr about Facebook. He asked if there will be other social networks that rise, or if Facebook will rule them all. Doerr isn’t sure. He thinks there could be a federation, or that Facebook could be the one.

That said, he does consider Facebook to be one of the “four horsemen” of the Internet right now. According to him, those are: Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple — yes, all Kleiner Perkins investments.

Branching off from Facebook, Zynga, another Kleiner Perkins investment, is the fastest growing investment that Kleiner has ever made, Doerr says. He believes they’ve nailed the mixture of social with a business model. It isn’t just about advertising, it’s about virtual goods. And they’ve used it for good too – to raise millions for Haiti.

Rose asked Doerr what worries him the most right now. Doerr is worried about energy. Specifically, he’s worried that he U.S. if falling too far behind in energy technology. We may dominate the web, but other countries dominate the future of energy right now, and we’re going to be buying our future from them unless this changes, he reasons.

Below find my live notes of the conversation (paraphrased):

Charlie Rose: I come to this area as a laymen. But I’ve talked to a lot of people in the space. Recently Mark Pincus of Zynga. Steve Jobs did a program with me a while ago, even before he was Steve Jobs. John Doerr and I got to know each other in the 90s. Now we’re friends.

Where are we in the revolution? What comes next?

John Doerr: Great question. I think we’re on the verge of a third great wave of innovation. The first was the microchip and the PC in the early 80s. The second wave was 1995: the Internet. Marc Andresseen brought Netscape Navigator to the world. Then Amazon came. Then in 1999 we saw the 15th search engine called “Google.”

This third wave is social, mobile, new commerce. We don’t have a name for it yet. We could be on the verge of reinventing the web. It’s people, it’s places, it’s relationships. It’s exciting.

CR: What will influence its velocity.

JD: One key thing is apps. Steve Jobs has transformed everything. It’s turning this world upside down.

CR: In the first hour with the iPhone and app, you were in right? You knew.

JD: I did. These smartphones change everything. They’re always connected, always on. It’s a powerful new platform. 85 million iPhones and iPod touches – we’re there. And now we have the iPad. It took just 28 days to sell a million of them. It’s not a big iPod. It’s a new paradigm. Imagine 10 years forward.

CR: Go ahead take 10 years forward. Steve Jobs told you “this is the best work of my life.” Why does he think that?

CR: Go ahead take 10 years forward. Steve Jobs told you “this is the best work of my life.” Why does he think that?
JD: It’s not a computer. You don’t need files. You don’t need mice. It’s magic, what you see is what you touch. I don’t want to call it a computer. It’s a magical surface.

JD: I found I can take it to concerts. And church. (laughs)

CR: You own Apple stock.

JD: Regrettably (laughing). We raise $100 million iFund 14 companies from 5,000 that applied. This year those ventures will do $100 million in revenues. 80 million minutes a day in those applications. In 14 months we ran out of money. So we went back to the piggy bank to get another $100 million.

CR: What’s with Steve an Adobe?

JD: He has a note on his site about it? Flash is buggy and power problems. The iPad runs for 10 hours.

CR: Is battery improvement coming?

JD: No, it’s coming really slowly. There are some disruptive things, but it’s coming slow.

CR: What else does the iPad need to make it better?

JD: There’s the obvious things like a camera. It will be 5 times as fast, a terabyte of storage. And that’s just a few years from now. It won’t have a phone in it.

CR: What does Mark Pincus and others like Zuckerberg have in common with some of the greats?

JD: They were nerds. They had no social life whatsoever. They have a love affair with their companies. They were missionaries not mercenaries.

CR: Bill Gates was more Rockafeller then Edison.

JD: They’re passionate about product. It’s the most important thing.

CR: Talk about Kleiner Perkins. Some investments are successful, some are not. Talk about Zynga.

JD: We invested in Zynga 20 months ago, and it’s the fastest growing venture we’ve ever had. The people there are extraordinary. They can monetize these new social networks. Advertising is one part, but it’s more than that. 2% will pay for virtual goods. They also raised $3.6 million for Haiti in just a few days. It’s powerful stuff.

In any day there are 30 million people playing Farmville — that’s more than watch 60 minutes.

CR: So what can you do with that?

JD: A lot. There’s not branded place on the Internet right now to have fun. It’s about life. They become a habit that connects you.

CR: Is the core of the third wave the convergence of social and mobile?

JD: That’s at the core, but it’s changes in consumer behavior. New commerce is included. Mark Pincus’ wife Ally has a company called One King’s Land, there they find limited sale — you better get it now. It’s an idea.

CR: Social networking is an old idea, that Facebook brought into the future. Will there be one?

JD: That’s an interesting question. I don’t know. There may be one, or there may be a federation.

CR: What does your history tell you?

JD: It tells us that one of the key to all of this is network effects. When you have 500 million people and you square that — it’s a huge number.

CR: Will there be more?

JD: I don’t know. Let’s see.

CR: Let’s talk about media. What about Google TV?

JD: It’s the best version of what it is that I’ve seen. For the last time we’ve watched the Super Bowl with out the Internet in your lap or on the screen. The Internet are finally coming together.

CR: Let’s talk about China.

JD: They now have more Internet users than we do. They’ve been ahead in user pay. But Google is leaving the mainland, the state is soverign. The leading players are Chinese companies. It’s a tough market for Western Companies.

CR: What does that mean for Google?

JD: (pauses) Google takes a very principled point of view. You can’t buy position in their network, for example. For a state to not let things be ranked automatically didn’t work. They stepped away from the largest market.

Google, Apple, Amazon and Facebook are the Four Horsemen of the Internet. Each of those have huge market and can innovate.

CR: What’s disruptive looking down the pipe?

JD: I haven’t talked about new immersive relationship between you and the medium. Again, I’m not talking about computers. It’s like the iPad. This is a fluid experience. New ways of interacting, things from Apple, Cooliris, there are others. These will improve. We’ll look back at these devices today as if it’s the stone age.

I’m excited about what the iPad can do with healthcare. The government is spending $20 billion on this. We need this information in the cloud. Every doctor and nurse needs an iPad.

CR: But someone has to teach the doctors how to do this, right? They’re too busy.

JD: Sure. Another thing is education. This tablet will transform education.

CR: But the potential in schools hasn’t taken place yet, right? But this will do it?

JD: That’s correct.

CR: Russia wants to create a Silicon Valley — so does China.

JD: I talked to one of the Russian guys behind this. He said it’s not going to work — because it’s hard.

CR: What excites you about the future — where are we missing something? What worries you?

JD: My worry isn’t about innovation in tech — the iPad is transforming things. But I worry about energy. We continue to spend too much money overseas, and we’re hurting the environment. The U.S. was the leader in the Internet.

But in new energy tech, 4 of the top 30 in new green tech re in the U.S. It’s like if Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook were all outside the U.S. Only Amazon would be American. We have to get in this game. Or we’ll be buying our energy from the world. That worries me.

That’s a wrap.

This morning in a letter published in the Washington Post, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has responded to the barrage of criticism that has been directed toward the site since its set of announcements at f8. The key message: Zuckerberg says that with respect to its privacy controls “[Facebook] just missed the mark.”

The letter isn’t particularly apologetic — you won’t find words like “sorry”, “fault”, or “mistake”. Instead, it’s more of an acknowledgment that Facebook has heard the criticism and will be responding to it. Soon, Facebook will be rolling out a new set of simplified privacy controls and an easy way to “turn off all third-party services”. Here are some key quotes from Zuckerberg’s letter:

We have heard the feedback. There needs to be a simpler way to control your information. In the coming weeks, we will add privacy controls that are much simpler to use. We will also give you an easy way to turn off all third-party services. We are working hard to make these changes available as soon as possible.

The biggest message we have heard recently is that people want easier control over their information. Simply put, many of you thought our controls were too complex. Our intention was to give you lots of granular controls; but that may not have been what many of you wanted. We just missed the mark.

We have also heard that some people don’t understand how their personal information is used and worry that it is shared in ways they don’t want. I’d like to clear that up now. Many people choose to make some of their information visible to everyone so people they know can find them on Facebook. We already offer controls to limit the visibility of that information and we intend to make them even stronger.

None of this should have come as a surprise to anyone at Facebook. I’ve been writing about the looming backlash for months. Not because I’m especially prescient, but because it was really obvious to anyone paying attention. Facebook made a gamble, and it hasn’t worked out very well. At least for now — expect them to try to push the envelope again in, oh, about six months. Hopefully users will be better educated about their privacy and how to control it when that time comes.

Top photo by Steve Maller Photography

Brian at PocketNow posted a browser comparison video showing the iPhone, the Nexus One, and the HTC HD2 all viewing the same websites. He installed Froyo on the Nexus One and downloaded the Flash beta which allows him to run almost all Flash content. It’s really long.While I do enjoy a long video of a man playing with Android phones, 11 minutes worth of a man playing with phones (found after the jump) might be a bit tiring. However, the money shot comes at about 1:40 where you see some Flash games playing in the wild.

I think the most interesting part of that part of the video is how close Flash games running on a good processer are to standard, natively written games.

So fine, you say, things look great. Why not run Flash?

Email marketing company Constant Contact has acquired NutshellMail, a FbFund-backed startup that provides an innovative web-based service that lets users send and receive your messages from social networks, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace and Twitter, in your email inbox. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Founded in 2007, NutshellMail was one of twenty startups incubated within the 2009 class of fbFund REV, Facebook’s joint program with Accel Partners and Founders Fund aimed to help foster quality applications on Facebook Platform.

Constant Contact will use Nutshell to compliment its email marketing, event marketing, and online survey tools for small businesses and nonprofit Constant Contact also announced it will open a Bay Area office.

A number of fbFund startups have seen exits over the past year or so. Groupcard was just acquired by InComm, Weardrobe was acquired by Like.com last fall and WedSnap, the developer of Facebook app WeddingBook was bought up by the Knot.com.

So mr. Jobs is saying we won’t be disappointed by the announcements that will be made at Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference.

And now the company has been gracious enough to also let us know when exactly he’ll be delivering.

Mark the date: the man’s keynote address kicks off on Monday 7 June at 10 AM PST.

We know a new iPhone is coming – but what else?

Check back here for extensive coverage of the whole event from before it starts until way after. Yes, we’re a little magical too.

Press release below:

Apple will kick off its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) with a keynote address by CEO Steve Jobs on Monday, June 7 at 10:00 a.m. This year’s WWDC sold out in a record eight days to over 5,000 developers.

The five-day event running from June 7 to June 11, is focused on providing advanced content for skilled developers across five key technology tracks: Application Frameworks; Internet & Web; Graphics & Media; Developer Tools; and Core OS. Apple engineers will deliver over 100 solutions-oriented technical sessions and labs.

WWDC 2010 gives an incredibly diverse community the opportunity to connect with thousands of fellow iPhone®, iPad™ and Mac® developers from around the world.

SCVNGR, the location- and mobile-based social gaming platform, has an offer for those of you lucky enough to be here at TechCrunch Disrupt. They’ve created a trek (a set of challenges, to the uninitiated) based on locations in and around Disrupt, and if you’re game, you stand a chance of winning a shiny new iPad.

I’m guessing there will be a number of check-in missions in addition to more involved ones like making a tower of Red Bull cans. I’d throw my hat into the ring, except I’ve already got more iPads than I know what to do with. I’m considering building a sort of shrine. But if you could use an iPad, and you have an iPhone or Android device, go download the SCVNGR app and start trekking.

If you’re really into this kind of thing, you’ll probably be happy to hear that you’ll get a badge (pictured in all its glory right over there –>) for completing enough challenges. The winner will be the one with the most points at the end of the conference. Get to it!

IBM is acquiring Sterling Commerce from AT&T for approximately $1.4 billion in cash. Sterling Commerce applications streamline the commerce lifecycle from selling to fulfillment to payments. The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2010.

IBM says the acquisition of Sterling will expand its ability to help organizations connect and communicate with customers, partners and suppliers both on-premise or through cloud computing delivery models.More than 18,000 customers use Sterling Commerce offerings.

This year, IBM bought up cloud computing company Cast Iron, health care data management firm Initiate and Intelliden. Last year, IBM acquired six companies, including Guardium, RedPill Solutions, SPSS, Ounce Labs, Exeros and Outblaze.

We are only a few hours away from kicking off the first ever TechCrunch Disrupt conference and we are thrilled to announce the 20 startups that were chosen out of hundreds to present their applications over the next few days. We will also hear pitches from the two StartupAlley companies that receive the most votes over the next two days.

These startups will battle it out over three intense days, with one of these startups eventually taking home $50,000.

Audioo: The Audioo platform allows users to auto-stream, publicly share, and store voicemails from handsets and services including Google Voice.

Appbistro: Appbistro is an application marketplace for Facebook pages.

Art.sy: Art.sy is the destination to discover and share original fine art online.

Betterment: Betterment is intended to be a replacement for your savings account, allowing you to invest in two portfolios.

ChompOn: ChompOn allows any business to run its own social flash sales.

Compass Labs: Compass Labs is a social e-commerce ad network for Twitter.

Fluidinfo: FluidInfo is a Wikipedia of databases – a shared online always-writable cloud database.

Geotoko: Geotoko is a promotional campaign management platform for geo location based services.

Keenkong: Keenkong is a social media monitoring engine that extracts why people are talking, what are they talking about, who they are and then segments messages accordingly.

Live Matrix: Live Matrix is a guide to video events and streams taking place on the web.

Movieclips.com: Movieclips.com is an online database of movie clips.

NoiseToys: NoiseToys is a software company uses games and competition to encourage users to share and discover music.

Off & Away: Off & Away is an online travel site that offers exceptional travel experiences in fun and unique ways.

Publish2: Publish2 allows newspapers to create a comprehensive, customized newswire for print.

Soluto: Soluto’s software aims to detect PC users’ frustrations, reveal their cause, learn which actions really eliminate them and improve user experience.

Textingly: Textingly provides a texting address, a web management console and apis for businesses to create immediate, two-way dialog with their customers.

Tickreel: Tickreel is a web filter that makes the web less of a black box and significantly improves how users consume the web.

UJAM: UJAM is a cloud-based platform that allows users to create new music or enhance their existing musical talent and share it with friends.

VideoGenie: VideoGenie allows companies to customer-source video testimonials.

WeReward: WeReward is a mobile incentive platform that rewards consumers for check-ins or performing tasks.

Back in the early cretaceous period – ok, make that 2006 – users of Facebook thought they were using a private social network. As a result they did all sorts of things which they probably wouldn’t have made public. Of course, now we know that Mark Zuckerberg believes that “if people share more, the world will become more open and connected”. In plain English that means Facebook wants to open up much of your data to the outside world, assuming you haven’t gone through your privacy settings with a fine-toothed comb. And as we all now know “Public” on Facebook effectively means “On Google”. Now, London-based developer Tom Scott has created a Web app called, simply, Evil which randomly displays the private phone numbers of unsuspecting Facebook users.

The waiting – as they say – is almost over.

In a few short hours the starting gun will be fired for the very first TechCrunch Disrupt conference. Over 1500 attendees have registered to join us in New York for a three day program of keynotes and panels featuring some of the most disruptive names in technology, plus the startup battlefield where 22 would-be disruptive companies will compete head to head for the Disrupt Cup (and $50k in cash). The buzz on Twitter speaks for itself – #tcdisrupt is the conference that everyone is talking about.

But if you can’t make it to NYC, we have some great news: we’ll be live streaming the entire event right here, beginning at 8:30am Eastern (5:30am Pacific).

But at Disrupt, ‘live streaming’ doesn’t mean we’re just pointing a camera at the stage. Oh no. For a start, there will be three cameras broadcasting all the action from the main stage. But also, during the gaps between sessions, and over the lunch and coffee breaks, our own Evelyn Rusli will be hosting a series of exclusive backstage interviews with judges, speakers, panelists and contest participants. We’ll also be covering all the action from start-up alley and the conference hallways, plus highlights of the after-parties and a few extra surprises that are too awesome to spoil here in advance. Joining Evelyn, expect to see a star-studded line-up of TC writers and editors on screen throughout the day(s).

All in all, that’s nine hours of live and uninterrupted Disruption each day, for three days.

In fact we’re expecting the live stream to be so great that even those lucky enough to be at the conference will still want to watch the coverage back when they get home. Which luckily they will be able to do as every single panel, keynote, start-up battlefield session, backstage interview and awesome surprise will be available to watch again on demand, minutes after each one ends. AND for those of you who aren’t on Eastern Time, we’ll be re-running the best of the conference overnight too.

Of course, all of this impressive programming requires some equally impressive technology. And for that we’re eternally grateful for the support of our broadcast partner, Livestream. Livestream has sent a full crew – plus a ton of technology – to Disrupt to ensure that you don’t miss a moment of the action. We couldn’t have done any of this without them, particularly CEO Max Haot and Head of Production, Otto Cedeno.

Speaking of people we couldn’t have done this without – this seems like a perfect time to give credit to producer Sophia Kittler who will be coordinating over 27 hours of video over the next three days, and also to Evelyn Rusli who will be in the studio for most of that time. Sophia and Evelyn have been working their assess off these past days and weeks, in addition to their day jobs preparing for the imminent launch of TechCrunch TV. I’m nominally the ‘creative director’ – whatever that means – of the on-screen programming, but really it’s Sophia and Evelyn who have done all of the hard work – both creatively and logistically. Kudos to them both.

One final thing: you too can be part of the Disrupt TV action simply by ensuring that you use the hashtage #tcdisrupt when you tweet about the event. We’ll be picking our favourite tweets and scrolling them across the bottom of the screen throughout the conference. We’ll do our best to read some of them out on air too.

Ok – that’s all until 8:30am. Stay tuned!

Now, for under $1,000 you can print your own objects in 3D. Just take a look at how it’s done in this video, which I took over the weekend before Disrupt got started. We had a Hackathon with about 300 engineers who came to cobble together software and hardware products in 24 hours. Among them was Zach Hoeken of MakerBot Industries. His MakerBot is making an open-source toilet holder (which may not be something the world really needs, but it sure does look cool).

The MakerBot can print almost any small object from a design file on your computer: open-source toilet holders, open-source bottle openers, human figurines. It prints it out in layers of plastic. The designs are open-source, allowing anybody to manufacture them without paying a royalty. People share their 3D designs on Thingiverse. Come on, you know you want one.

The countdown to the official launch of TechCrunch Disrupt in New York is down to the last several hours. Things kick off Monday morning at 9 am EST with Charlie Rose and John Doerr, and we run from there for three days.

Half of the event is a startup launch battlefield where 22 new companies and products will show their stuff to the world for the first time on stage. Startups are eliminated over three rounds until we have a “final four” for best of show. Eventually an overall winner will be chosen.

The winner receives a cash prize of $50,000, although that has paled in importance to the massive press and user awareness that the companies will get from their time at Disrupt.

But we’ve also decided to add another award into the mix – The TechCrunch Disrupt Cup. This is a 16 inch tall sterling silver cup trophy weighing in at nearly six pounds – more than five pounds of pure silver. It holds 15 pints of your favorite beverage.

Like the Stanley Cup in hockey, this is an award that the winner will only be able to keep until someone else wins it. In our case, for 3-4 months until the next TechCrunch Disrupt (which will be in September 2010 in San Francisco). Winner’s names will be engraved onto the trophy and it will be handed down from winner to winner over the coming years and, hopefully, decades. We will have replicas of the trophy made for the winners to keep forever as well.

There’s a fascinating history behind this trophy as well. It was created by the Gorham Manufacturing Company in 1920 and awarded in 1934 for a bowling championship.

After a very long search for the perfect Trophy Cup, we found it and bought it.

We’ve had the initial engraving removed by Jeffrey Herman, the founder and executive director of the Society of American Silversmiths. The Disrupt Cup will be re-engraved with the TechCrunch Disrupt master logo next week. Until then, we’ve slapped a TechCrunch Disrupt sticker on it.

If you’ve been to our annual Crunchies event you know we like to give crazy awards away. We’re hoping the Disrupt Cup will be an exciting award for Disrupt startups to aim for. And for those winners, we hope that it serves as a good luck charm extraordinaire.

You’ll see lots of pictures of the Disrupt Cup over the next few days. Now you know the story behind the award.