Category: Tech news

Yahoo will look a little more like AOL and Demand Media with its acquisition today of Associated Content. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but AdAge is reporting that the deal was north of $100 million. Others say it was $90 million. One of our sources puts the deal at the $100 million price, if you include the earnout. Update: Another source confirms it was “closer to $90 million.” We are going with that number.

Associated Content has been on the block for at least two years. Last summer it was trying to fetch $150 million, but found no takers. Even AOL passed and decided to launch its own competing SEED platform instead, and AOL CEO Time Armstrong is an investor in Associated Content. Another interesting connection is Huffington Post CEO Eric Hippeau, who is a Yahoo board member and was connected to Associated Content from his days at Softbank Capital, which is another investor but is now winding down its portfolio.

The move by Yahoo has some industry observers shaking their heads. It clearly is in keeping with Yahoo’s renewed emphasis on the media side of its business. Associated Content taps into 380,000 contributors who write up articles, snap photos, and create videos on-demand for any topic. In that way it is Yahoo’s way to play in the growing world of crowdsourced media, a strategy that AOL’s Armstrong is pursuing aggressively with his launch of Seed (for text articles) and recent $36.5 million acquisition of StudioNow (for video). Demand Media, of course, perfected this low-cost, low quality but search engine-friendly approach to digital media.

And that is the part that has people scratching their heads. Yahoo is clearly out of the search business through its approved deal with Microsoft. What is left are its owned-and-operated Yahoo sites and its ad network. So far, Yahoo has skewed towards the quality end of the spectrum in terms of online content. it is a brand other brands can trust. But Associated Content operated in another realm, that of non-premium content and related display advertising. It is closer to the performance-marketing end of the scale. More content on its site means more ads, but Yahoo does best on its home page and main portal pages where quality content is expected by consumers and advertisers alike.

It remains to be seen where on the quality spectrum Yahoo’s new content farm will sow its seeds. Maybe Yahoo just wants the technology platform and access to all of those crowdsourced contributors. But it didn’t need to pay $100 million for that. At the very least, it gives Yahoo a way to cheaply create content around trending topics as determined by its search data and traffic patterns on its properties. Associated Content can also help with Yahoo’s mobile and local efforts by providing cheap, customizable profiles of local businesses and points of interest against which Yahoo can also sell ads. I am starting to speculate at this point, but there are a lot of things Yahoo can do with this platform. For its sake, I just hope it cuts back on the “Greengasm” articles on eco-friendly sex toys.

Photo Credit/Flickr/makelessnoise

Facebook just got a lot more accessible to international users. The social network has launched 0.facebook.com, a special mobile-only site that can be accessed free of charge on select carriers. The lightweight site omits photos but includes core functionality like News Feed, status updates, profile Walls and messaging.  And most important, Facebook has partnered with over 50 mobile carriers to offer free access to the site, without any data fees.

Not to be confused with the now defunct Facebook Lite, Facebook 0 was originally announced back in February (when it was called ‘Zero’). Facebook has presumably been hammering out deals with carriers since then, and it has quite a few on board with more on the way (you can see a list of countries supported in Facebook’s blog post or the table below).

This mobile site could play a big role in Facebook’s growth going forward, especially given the predictions that browser-equipped mobile phones will be more abundant than PCs in the not-too-distant future. For some people, 0.facebook.com will probably be their only Facebook experience — it may even be the only mobile site they’re accessing from their cell phones.

If you’re in the United States though, don’t bother pulling out your phone to check out the site for yourself — none of the US carriers are on board.

Just as we suspected late last night, Twitter removed Tweetie 2 for the App Store yesterday to make room for the newly rebranded “Twitter for iPhone.” It’s there right now in the App Store, labeled as simply “Twitter” — but you can’t download it just yet, as it’s likely still in the process of being put up.

Without being able to see the app just yet, the thing that immediately jumps out is that it’s labeled as “Version 3.0″ — this suggests there will be some upgrades (beyond just the name) from Tweetie 2 (which, of course, was version 2.0). That said, Twitter for iPhone is actually smaller in file size than Tweetie 2 was (2.4 MB versus 2.8 MB), so I’m not sure what that means. That also doesn’t seem to bode well for the possibility that an iPad version of the app is included.

The reason Tweetie is becoming “Twitter for iPhone” is because Twitter bought the company behind it, Atebits, in April. Tweetie 2 is widely considered to be the best Twitter iPhone app, and Twitter wanted one app to point to for all those people searching the App Store looking for an official way to use Twitter on the iPhone. For Android and BlackBerry, they opted to make their own apps from scratch.

While Twitter for iPhone doesn’t show up in searches of the App Store yet, you can find it in the App Updates area of iTunes if you have Tweetie 2 on your system (though you still can’t download it yet). When it does go live, the (newly free) app can be found here.

Update: MacStories is saying that some international users have been able to download the app successfully. Feel free to send in pictures if you’re able to!

Quora is a great place to find answers about products from prominent people involved with them. It’s also a great place for those prominent people to disagree, publicly. That’s what’s happening right now in a thread about the future of Firefox.

Someone posted the following question to Quora recently: Will Firefox have double-digit market share in 3 to 5 years? Straightforward enough. Yes, says (outgoing) Mozilla CEO John Lilly. No, says Firefox co-founder Blake Ross. So far, Ross is winning the argument, according to the votes from Quora users.

Here’s what Ross had to say:

I’m pretty skeptical. I think the Mozilla Organization has gradually reverted back to its old ways of being too timid, passive and consensus-driven to release breakthrough products quickly.

Lilly, meanwhile, offered up this:

I’m hardly an unbiased observer, but am confident that it will. Product is getting better all the time, and especially with 4.0 approaching in the fall. We’ve got 400M users and are growing that number. And we have a huge community of committed people around the world working on making it better. It’s more competitive than ever, but I feel pretty good about our chances, not only on the desktop, but also on Android, which is already looking good.

Ross, who is currently a Director of Product at Facebook (coincidentally working on a Quora competitor), has an argument that seems inline with his Facebook colleague (and former Parakey co-founder) Joe Hewitt. That is, governing bodies (in this case, Mozilla — in Hewitt’s case, W3C) are slowing down the development process on the web, and making it harder to innovate. Both Ross and Hewitt have a long history in the space, as both worked on Netscape, before moving on to create Firefox.

Clearly, both are annoyed at what has happened to their former renegade web browser. Firefox came around at a time when Microsoft’s Internet Explorer had complete control of the market, with over 90% share. Over the past 5+ years, IE’s share has dropped to below 60%, thanks largely to Firefox which now stands between 25%-30% of the market. But, by many accounts, Firefox is no longer considered to be the light, open alternative it once was. That includes the person who asked the question on Quora, who put in the description: “Seems like they are going to start to see massive erosion in share as Chrome/Safari and IE9 continue pushing forward.“

Certainly, Google Chrome is now growing at a much faster pace than Firefox is. Apple’s Safari, meanwhile, has seen slower, but steady growth over the past few years. Both of those browsers are based on the WebKit engine, which seems to be the layout engine of choice these days. Firefox doesn’t use WebKit. Instead, it relies on Mozilla’s Gecko engine.

Lilly is right when he implies that the key to this argument may well be in the mobile space. The problem there is that the WebKit browsers are starting to dominate thanks to the popularity of Google’s Android platform, and Apple’s iPhone (and BlackBerry will soon have a WebKit browser as well). An early build of Firefox for Android is out in the wild, but it will take something really impressive for people to use it instead of Android’s built-in WebKit browser. Apple, meanwhile, has started to let on alternative browsers as well — notably, Opera. But again, it will be hard for any browser to beat the tightly integrated built-in browsers (and who knows if Apple would even let a mobile version of Firefox in the App Store).

Some at Google disagree with Hewitt’s assessment of the slow-moving web. But again, that’s at Google, where they do seem to be pushing things faster than Mozilla currently is. Can Hewitt’s and now Ross’ criticism shake them out of the malaise?

The Illinois Institute of Technology announced today that it would be providing all incoming, first-year undergraduate students with iPads as part of an initiative to “integrate new technologies into the classroom and foster educational innovation among faculty and students.”

The university, which has close to 3,000 undergraduate students, says that educational applications for iPad, such as eBooks, Blackboard Mobile Learn, and iTunes University, will enhance students’ educational experience. The initiative will also be used IIT students and faculty will also develop new applications that will increase classroom interactivity and collaboration.

Universities seem to have a love-hate relationship with the iPad. Some see it as a threat to college bookstores, and the device has had some connectivity and security issues at certain colleges.

Start-up Tsavo Media, an online media network started by UserPlane founder and MySpace co-president Mike Jones has been sold to Canadian online advertising and marketing company Cyberplex for $75 million.

Tsavo operates over 300 media properties, including Twirlit, which includes content showcasing celebrity gossip, fashion, food and beauty; and Manolith, which features posts on gadgets, style and men’s health; and a Twitter-based search engine called Twithority.

Funded by deep-pocketed private equity firm American Capital, Tsavo has made several acquisitions since its birth, including the publishing assets of Canadian digital media network MoxyMedia and the online marketing and search engine optimization firm Better.

Cyberplex plans to match Tsavo’s media properties and search marketing capabilities with its own network of over 10,000 publishing and advertising partners. The acquisition makes Cyberplex one of the largest ad companies in Canada.

Remember the “megapixel myth” that has driven camera specs for the last decade or so? Yeah, it’s still here; it’s called the “HD hoax” now. I just made that up. But seriously. The idea behind the megapixel myth was that simply increasing the size of the output image didn’t usually result in a better picture in any way. In fact, in addition to filling up the memory card faster, this megapixel bloat led to images that were noticeably less sharp and true to life. Similarly, so-called HD cameras and sensors are now being sold strictly on numbers and not on features or performance. But more data for the image is always better, right? Not quite.

What set this post off was that yesterday, Omnivision announced that they were packing 1080p onto a 1/6″ sensor. An admirable feat of miniaturization. But the reality is that this “high definition” is anything but.

Continue reading…

This morning brought news of Zynga and Facebook’s five year commitment to keeping social gaming on the network. As we wrote earlier today, the deal was surprising considering Zynga’s recent frustrations with Facebook. Some of these frustrations stemmed from last year’s limitations on messaging users. But the more significant concern was Facebook’s push of Facebook Credits as the only payment platform that Zynga and others can use. And clearly, the Credits angle of the deal was a definitely part of the negotiations for this partnership.

The issue that Zynga has is that Facebook takes a massive fee – 30% – for Credits (that is standard for all publishers). For Zynga, which is a cash cow for virtual currency and goods, this cut can amount to some serious dough. Last year, Zynga founder Mark Pincus told The New York Times that direct purchases of virtual currency and goods would account for most of its more than $100 million in revenue in 2009. Last week. Cake Financial founder and CEO Stephen Carpenter estimated that Zynga is bringing in $15 million in profit per month, and would stand to take a significant loss from the 30 percent cut. Now, with the new deal, Zynga will expand the use of Facebook Credits, the social network’s virtual currency, to more games in the developers’ family.

Zynga and Facebook most recently sparred over Facebook’s Credits initiative. Zynga was of course trying to negotiate to lower Facebook’s cut and in these earlier negotiations, things got heated. Facebook was even threatening to shut down Zynga games altogether.

Facebook’s director of communications Larry Yu tells us that the 30 percent fee has remained the same for this deal. But according to a source, Zynga was able to win some concessions and the company walked away pleased with the deal. These concessions could have been made in the form of ad money, as Zynga is one of the largest advertisers on the social network.

And if Facebook is willing to make concessions for Zynga, what does this mean for the other game developers and publishers who are using Credits? For instance, it would make sense for Playdom, the second most popular game publisher on Facebook, to try to sort out a deal as well.

The other angle to the virtual currency agreement is whether Facebook credits will be able to be used on Zynga games off the Facebook platform. Zynga’s recent plans to move off the platform, i.e. Zynga Live, is sure to play a hand in this matter. Zynga wouldn’t comment on any specifics of whether Facebook Credits will integrate off platform.

That being said, virtual currency withstanding, Zynga reportedly spends between $5 million and $8 million a month on Facebook advertising. The fact is that Zynga can afford to play hardball.

Amazon’s cloud storage services are going to be getting another major competitor this week: Google. We hear that this week during its I/O conference, Google will be announcing a new service that is a direct competitor with Amazon’s S3 cloud storage. Google’s service will be called Google Storage for Developers, or ‘GS’. We believe it will be available in a private beta initially. We also hear that the service will be positioned to make it very easy for existing S3 customers to make the switch to Google Storage.

Features will include a REST API, the ability to use Google accounts to offer authenticated downloads, and data redundancy. Developers will be able to use a command line tool to manage their data, and there will be a web interface as well.

We’d previously reported that Google was looking to expand its cloud service offerings, but that it would primarily be focused on ‘value-added’ services that took advantage of technology Google has been using internally, like its translation tools and video processing. We’re hearing that such value-added services will not be part of this launch, but it is highly likely that they will be coming in the future. And that’s the key here — competitors will have a hard time matching the array of technologies and infrastructure Google has spent years developing.

Facebook and Zynga have just announced a five year partnership and the expansion of use of Facebook Credits in Zynga games.

After months of discord, Zynga and Facebook have made peace– at least for now. Despite Zynga’s earlier frustrations and reports that it was ready to abandon Facebook, the two companies were able to agree to a “five-year strategic relationship.” “Facebook was a pioneer in opening their platform in 2007 and in just three years tens of millions of Facebook users play our games every day, from FarmVille and Café World to Treasure Isle and Mafia Wars,” Zynga CEO Mark Pincus said in the press release. “We are excited about Facebook’s long-term commitment to social gaming and Zynga, and look forward to working with them and other platform providers to bring the best social gaming experience to users worldwide.”

Although Zynga and Facebook are now tied together for at least the next five years, don’t expect Zynga to abandon its Zynga Live project and other avenues that will help it grow more independent of the social networking site. We hear that the game developer is still ramping up for its independent projects.

Another interesting part of the announcement is the expansion of Zynga’s use of Facebook Credits, the social network’s virtual currency. Zynga and Facebook most recently sparred over Facebook’s Credits initiative. As the only payment platform on the site, Facebook would slice 30% off publisher revenues (which is the standard cut for Facebook). Zynga was of course trying to negotiate to lower Facebook’s cut. Negotiations between the two were “intense,” according to our sources, with Facebook threatening to shut down Zynga games altogether. It’s unclear what the breakdown is for the new agreement and if Zynga managed to lower Facebook’s percentage but surely this new partnership should bring in more revenue for Facebook, considering that Zynga is a cash cow for virtual goods. According to a source, Zynga was able to win some concessions, the company walked away pleased with the deal.

See the release below:

Facebook and Zynga announced today that they have entered into a five-year strategic relationship that increases their shared commitment to social gaming on Facebook and expands use of Facebook Credits in Zynga’s games. The agreement provides a solid foundation for both companies to continue to work together to provide millions of people with a compelling user experience for social games.

“Facebook was a pioneer in opening their platform in 2007 and in just three years tens of millions of Facebook users play our games everyday, from FarmVille and Cafe World to Treasure Isle and Mafia Wars,” said Mark Pincus, founder and chief executive officer at Zynga. “We are excited about Facebook’s long-term commitment to social gaming and Zynga, and look forward to working with them and other platform providers to bring the best social gaming experience to users worldwide.”

“We are pleased to enter into a new agreement with Zynga to enhance the experience for Facebook users who play Zynga games,” said Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer at Facebook. “We look forward to continuing our work with Zynga and all of our developers to increase the opportunities on our platform.”

Zynga is currently testing Facebook Credits in select games and will expand to more titles over the coming months. Terms of the agreement between Facebook and Zynga were not disclosed.

There are a number of group messaging applications that are catered towards business users, such as Yammer or Socialtext. Today, Micromobs is launching a web-based group messaging app aimed towards communication within social groups among friends and family.

On the site users can create and join groups or “mobs” and create a stream of messages uniquely relevant to each user. Users are able to post messages, photos and files and respond in stream to threads, keeping their conversations organized in an ongoing discussion. Users can also push their messages to Twitter and Facebook and make groups private.

Micromobs, which was incubated at the Founder Institute, is designed to fill the gap for a simple group application for the masses. that connects family, volunteer organizations, poker groups, sports teams etc. Micromobs also could be ideal for group communication when planning a next trip, or organizing an event. Ajay Kamat, founder of Micromobs, says that he sees his biggest competitor as email, which is the most common threaded communication for among families and friends. Of course, people use Facebook and other social networking applications for group communications, but the application is hoping Facebook Connect will entice users to be able to use the platform and publish to Facebook at the same time. The startup is also planning to launch mobile apps in the near future.

We are now less than a week away from TechCrunch Disrupt in New York City, May 24-26. The speaker lineup is complete, the Disrupt Agenda is now posted (see below), and the Battlefield Startups have been selected and are at this very moment preparing for battle. There are still a few tickets left (get them now because the discount rate expires tomorrow).

Kicking off the program, Charlie Rose will interview John Doerr, the fabled Kleiner Perkins venture capitalist who backed Amazon, Netscape, and Google. Now he thinks the iPad is the next big thing (he’s a big believer in clean tech too, but that’s another story). Doerr has made billions of dollars by spotting disruption early on. It’s what all venture capitalists try to do, and part of the culture of Silicon Valley. But what happens when the dynamics of the technology industry begin to pervade the media industry? Whether it’s print, music, TV, games, or advertising, the media industry is taking on the characteristics of the technology industry with its accelerated rate of creative destruction.

Where there is disruption, there is also opportunity, and we’ve organized Disrupt to explore where the puck is going. On Monday, Funny Or Die CEO Dick Glover will tell us how the Web is changing his approach to TV production and distribution. Boxee CEO Avner Ronen and Comcast Interactive executive VP Sam Schwartz will debate what TV Everywhere actually means. Bloomberg’s editorial chief Norm Pearlstine, Huffington Post CEO Eric Hippeau, and New York Times media writer David Carr will discuss whether the iPad will really change the game for print media or whether the bigger ongoing disruption is the Web itself.

On Tuesday, we’ve got Google engineering VP Vic Gundotra, Facebook product VP Chris Cox, and Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley talking about how the mobile Web is a new beast and how to tame it. (Facebook alone has 100 million mobile users, Google is pushing hard to get Android adopted everywhere, and Foursquare has figured out how to get people to voluntarily broadcast their location, which may be the key to local geo advertising). Tim Armstrong will tell us how his transformation of AOL is coming along, and later we will ask AOL founder Steve Case what he thinks of Armstrong’s strategy. Then we are going to put 4Chan founder Christopher Poole, Chatroulette’s Andrey Ternovskiy and Dailybooth CEO Brian Pokorny together on a panel with GE’s global executive director of advertising and branding Judy Hu so that they can try to explain why she should ever entrust her brand to them. Finally, VCs Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures and Ben Horowitz of Andreessen Horowitz will have an actual debate about whether and under what circumstances itr’s better for startups to go lean versus fat.

On Wednesday, Twitter and Square founder Jack Dorsey will give us a special demo. We’ll have panels on social commerce (with Gilt Groupe CEO Susan Lynne and Etsy founder Rob Kalin) and advertising technology. Chris Hughes and Scott Heiferman will talk about social change. John Borthwick and Chris Dixon will tackle the challenges and rewards of seed funding in New York City.

All of this agenda is just in the mornings. The afternoons will be jam packed with new startup launches in our Startup Battlefield competition. This is our new format since we are no longer doing TechCrunch 50. It will be about half as many companies, with more feedback from our expert panelists, and elimination rounds until we get a winner, who will receive a $50,000 prize. I’ve seen these companies in rehearsals and all I can say at this point is that they will not disappoint. And if you are an engineer/hacker, join our awesome and free Hack Day the weekend before the event—the best projects get stage time in front of the full conference audience. Watch this video interview I did with Beet.TV for more info.

We also plan to add an audience member to each panel, so you can be a part of the discussion, too.

If you want to attend Disrupt, now is the time to buy your ticket.

Disrupt Agenda

Monday, May 24: “What’s Going On?”
A high-level look at societal changes in how we consume and share information, and why. The following days will focus on how these changes are influencing platform development and business strategy in media, advertising and technology.

9:00am	Opening Remarks Mike Arrington, Editor, TechCrunch
9:15am	The Big Picture: Tectonic Shifts in Technology, Special Series with Charlie Rose Charlie Rose, Host, Charlie Rose Show John Doerr, Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
9:40am	Charlie Rose, Host, Charlie Rose Show Yuri Milner, CEO & Founding Partner, Digital Sky Technologies
10:05am	Real-Time Demo: TweetUp The real-time stream from Twitter, Facebook, and other sharing platforms is influencing communications, advertising and content. Advertisers see real-time data as key to sending the right message to the right people –and avoiding disaster. What’s now in real-time technology? Bill Gross, CEO idealab, debuts TweetUp
10:15am	Hollywood-Flavored Fireside: Funny or Die Gets Disruptive Made-for-web content doesn’t always stay online. And TV obviously isn’t all about the static squawk box. Professional producers and comedians from the hit Funny or Die discussion how content creation is evolving — and how it’s affecting the talent industry, Hollywood and Beyond. Dick Glover, CEO, Funny Or Die Chris Henchy, Comedian & Actor, Co-Head Gary Sanchez Productions Mark Kvamme, Partner, Sequoia Capital Andrew Steele, Executive Producer, Funny or Die
10:55am	Coffee break
11:10am	TV Everywhere: Who Profits from Entertainment On Every Screen, All the Time? As content like SNL or the NBA becomes available on any screen, any time, the “windowing” techniques on which TV networks and other content owners used to rely for advertising and other business models no longer pertain. What’s the future of multi-channel entertainment? Who’s going to profit? Moderator: Michael Wolf, Founder & Managing Director, Activate Avner Ronen, CEO, Boxee Samuel Schwartz, EVP, Comcast Interactive Quincy Smith, Founding Partner, CODE Advisors
11:40am	Entertainment Content Demo: Tunerfish Comcast is about to launch a new service, developed as a secret, skunk-works project by some of the Silicon Valley team they obtained in 2008 (via the acquisition of Plaxo). What does the cable, entertainment, and communications giant have up its sleeve? John McCrea, Founder, Tunerfish & VP Marketing, Plaxo
11:50am	Products into Services: Music, Gaming, and Publishing Entertainment content is evolving from discrete 3D products into streaming digital services with ancillary revenue streams. A book is now more than bound paper; it’s also a digital download with add-ons such as author interviews or footage. Music is no longer a static CD; it’s a chance to interact with a musician a social network or meet others fans online. How will these trends continue to impact the content industries and business models? Sarah Chubb, President, CondeNet Fred Davis, Founding Partner, CODE Advisors John Hagel, Co-Chairman, Center for the Edge, Deloitte Neil Young, CEO, ngmoco
12:40pm	LUNCH
1:55pm	Fireside: Social Networks & Online Content: Where’s it Going? Mike Arrington, Editor, TechCrunch Jason Hirschhorn, Co-President, MySpace Mike Jones, Co-President, MySpace
2:15pm	Startup Battlefield Begins–Session 1: Disruptive Ideas & Marketplaces Companies TBA May 24, on special URL Disrupt.co Selected from hundreds of applicants worldwide, these fresh products will show new ways of thinking for mobile, iPad, Hollywood, e-commerce, finance and more.
3:45pm	Coffee Break
4:00pm	Startup Battlefield Resumes–Session 2: Disruptive Apps & Services
5:30pm	Does The IPad Change Everything For News, Or Is It Still All About The Web? David Carr, Writer, New York Times Ron Conway, Angel Investor, SV Angel Eric Hippeau, CEO, Huffington Post Norm Pearlstine, Chief Content Officer, Bloomberg

Tuesday, May 25: “How are Platforms and Content Evolving?”

9:30am	The Mobile Disruption–What’s Next? Moderator: Mike Arrington, Editor, TechCrunch Chris Cox, VP, Facebook Dennis Crowley, CEO, FourSquare Vic Gundotra, VP, Google
10:00am	Social & Local Demo Howard Lerman, CEO, Yext launches a brand-new product for small biz everywhere
10:10am	Fireside: Local Content, Local Ads, and Everything in Between. How is AOL Changing? Mike Arrington, Editor, TechCrunch Tim Armstrong, CEO, AOL
10:30am	Coffee Break
10:50am	The Lean vs Fat Startup Debate The funders behind Twitter, Skype and other digital greats debate strategy for growing strong companies Ben Horowitz, Co-founder, Andreessen Horowitz Fred Wilson, Partner, Union Square Ventures
11:30am	Fireside Chat Mike Arrington, Editor, TechCrunch Steve Case, CEO, Revolution
11:50am	Digital Crowds into Dollars Traditional print media is experiencing fragmentation while online media are experiencing the opposite; coalescing of audience around addictive digital platforms. How can brands effectively meet audiences where they? And how can technologists amassing these audiences work best with brands? Judy Hu, Global Executive Director – Advertising & Branding, GE Brian Pokorny, CEO, dailybooth Christopher Poole, founder, 4chan Andrey Ternovskiy, CEO, Chatroulette
12:30pm	LUNCH Optional lunchtime meet & greet with Knight Foundation: News and media startups are invited to lunch and learn about participating in the “Knight News Challenge,” which offers $25M in grant money for news innovation.
2:00pm	Exits: The 2010 Outlook TechCrunch talks with legendary investor and tech banker Frank Quattrone on the liquidity outlook as the recession recedes. Co-presented by SecondMarket. Mike Arrington, Editor, TechCrunch Frank Quattrone, Founder, Qatalyst
2:30pm	Startup Battlefield–Session Three: Disruptive Streams Inspired entrepreneurs serve up a third round of amazing product launches
4:00pm	Coffee Break
4:15pm	Startup Battlefield–Session Four: Disruptive Entertainment
6:15pm	VC / Startup Speed Meeting & Reception Presented by Zoosk in the Networking Lounge and in Startup Alley. Cocktail reception is open to all attendees; speed meeting for pre-registered startups.
	After-party Hosted by MailChimp at Tribeca Rooftop

Wednesday, May 26: “How do You Find Your Audience –and Make Money?”
Content creation and distribution change, so must business models. How can artists, brands, advertisers and other merchants reach the right audience, with the right message, at the right time?

9:00am	Success Strategies for Musicians in the Digital Era Troy Carter, Founder & CEO, Coalition Media Group, worldwide Manager to Lady Gaga
9:20am	Mobile & Commerce Demo Jack Dorsey, Founder & CEO, Square
9:40am	The Future of the Market is Social. How Do You Find Your People? Finding customers in 2010 is not as simple as mailing out the Sears Catalog was in 1910. A fragmented consumer base with varied tastes combined with unlimited Web competition make e-commerce easy to initiate but challenging to excel within. These executives have successfully identified their marketplaces and created services with social functions that adapt to different mini-niches therein. What’s their strategy? How can other companies learn to “monetize” the old-fashioned way — by selling products that people want, to the people who want them? John Caplan, CEO, OpenSky Rob Kalin, CEO, Etsy Susan Lyne, CEO, Gilt Groupe Dan Porter, CEO, OMGPOP
10:25am	Social Advertising Demo David Kidder, CEO, Clickable
10:35am	Fireside Chat: Online Advertising Mike Arrington, Editor, TechCrunch Nikesh Arora, President, Global Sales Operations and Business Development, Google
10:55am	Coffee Break
11:10am	Social Networking & Social Change How can online connections create offline change? As digital tools create communities, how will they meet society and the larger world? Scott Heiferman, CEO, Meetup Chris Hughes, Executive Director, Jumo Reshma Saujani, Congressional Candidate, New York
11:40am	The Big Brand Story How to Make Experiences that Matter for Online & Social Audiences Frank Cooper, SVP and Chief Consumer Engagement Officer, Pepsi
12:00pm	How Will AdTech Deliver the Audience? In an era of media fragmentation, how can ad-tech experts help brands reach fans on new platforms, such as mobile devices and the iPad? especially now that brand budgets are moving more money to online, what’s now in real-time and social-graph strategy? This line-up of top brains discusses where it’s all going—and who stands to make $$. Samir Arora, Founder, Glam Media Zaw Thet, CEO, 4INFO Eric Wheeler, CEO, 33Across
12:30pm	LUNCH
2:00pm	Getting it Built John Biggs, Editor, CrunchGear Adam Hocherman, Founder & President, American Innovative Bre Pettis, Founder, Makerbot Liam Casey, CEO, PCH International
2:30pm	Getting Funded A How-To Workshop
3:00pm	The Facebook Effect David Kirkpatrick, Senior Editor, Technology & Internet, Fortune Sean Parker>, Managing Partner, Founders Fund
3:20pm	Measurement Demo Eric Bosco, Chief Product Officer, ComScore
3:30pm	What’s Behind the NYC Seed-Funding Hotspot? The city has the population density –and proudly local, niche communities — that drive growth of social, mobile and e-commerce startups. The instant laboratory creates a network effect that then helps services grow in value. How will these startups scale beyond the five boroughs and how can upcoming teams take advantage of NY’s unique environment? John Borthwick, CEO, betaworks Chris Dixon, CEO, Hunch & Angel Investor
4:00pm	Hack Day Finalists Present
4:15pm	Startup Battlefield Finale Four Amazing Finalists Face Off in a Final Round
5:30pm	Disrupt Cocktail Reception Hosted by Zecco
7:00pm	Winners Announced with contributions from: David Sacks, CEO, Yammer, former honoree Custom Award from Yahoo and Lowenstein Sandler
9:00pm	After-party Hosted by Media Temple (mt) at element

The web measurement firm Quantcast has appointed ex-Yahoo! MD Philip Macauley to lead the company’s operations and expansion into the UK market.

Macauley spent ten years at Yahoo!, where he was most recently Director of Business Development and Commercial Relations.

His tenor at the Internet giant saw him take on various “senior roles” including “driving media agency relationships as Agency Sales Director and leading the company’s publisher efforts as Head of Publisher Partnerships.” All of which would appear to make Macauley a very good fit for Quantcast.

SoundCloud has just announced they have hit a million users. It followers their deal earlier this year with The Hype Machine, but it’s clear this is a startup that is scaling globally now from its base in Berlin.

The audio sharing site that’s geared towards those who work in the music industry is an online audio platform which lets musicians collaborate, promote and distribute their music via widgets and apps. It’s been variously described as a “Flickr for audio” or a “Vimeo for audio”, but whatever it is, it’s clearly got the kinds of tools and distribution platform which is winning both the hearts and business of artists.

We’re all for startups trying to make money, but we also recognize a good old ‘bait and switch’ tactic when we see one. Case in point: on-demand help desk software maker Zendesk, which has just emailed its customers to let them know they’re raising their prices – resulting in a 300+ percent increase in monthly fees for some.

The announcement, which was also posted on the company’s forums, comes in the form of an introduction of new product features, with the new pricing scheme mentioned underneath (never a good sign).

The startup claims the new pricing plans are being offered in response to “customer requests for different packaging and features”. But judging from the commentary on the forum entry and on Twitter, we’re not so sure that’s really the case.

Coincidentally, we just reported on Zendesk crossing the 5,000 business customer mark.

Here’s what’s changing for them:

Before:

Solo package: $9/month per agent, 1 agent only
Regular package: $19/month per agent, minimum of 3 agents
Plus+ package: $39/month per agent, minimum of 5 agents

Now:

Starter plan: $9/month per agent, 1 to 3 agents
Regular plan: $29 per month, 3 to 20 agents
Plus+ plan: $59/month, 5 to 100 agents

For what it’s worth, Zendesk is trying to appease outraged customers with ‘grandfathering terms’, but that forces many to switch to annual billing rather than monthly or quarterly, which a lot of them appear unwilling to do. Besides, it’s not a long-term solution.

Some of the reactions on the forum post speak volumes about how Zendesk customers feel about the changes:

So, with 19 agents, our monthly bill goes from 645 USD to 1121 USD? An increase of 74% ? Seriously??!!!

We pay $99 for 5 users, now its 5 x 59 = $295 per month.. This cannot be for real, we have been supporting zendesk since the early days, how can this be justified…If I pulled a stunt like this on my clients I am sure we would lose..Especially as the option to stay on your current price range involved stumping up a years fees.. come on guys, give us a fair go, this is outrageous!!!!

I’m with David, our account is going from $153 per month (9 agents) to $261 per month, a 58% increase. Using a huge price increase to force people into an annual billing plan is going to leave a bitter taste in a lot of mouths.

We currently have 41 agents and would have been up to 50 by mid-June. Not anymore. Our monthly bill is going to increase from $1503 to $2419. That is an annual increase of approx $11,000. A roughly %62 increase.

This seems extortionate, we are facing a 100%+ increase ,what are you playing at Zen Desk?

I’ve also managed to find someone who was actually happy with the transparency Zendesk displayed in its email to customers, so maybe we’re just hearing the voices of the angry here.

Again, it’s fine for startups to make money, even if it means they need to change their pricing plans and hike fees at some point. But in this case, perhaps Zendesk would have been better off checking exactly how profoundly these changes would affect the bills of their early customers.

How can you explain a price increase of more than 300% for a service that you’re far from the only one to provide? Zendesk doesn’t even really do that, they’ve just communicated the new fees and keep pointing customer who complain to the grandfathering terms, which do not explain the rationale behind the price hikes either.

We’ve contacted Zendesk CEO Mikkel Svane for more insight and hope to hear back soon.

UPDATE: Svane responded to us with this statement:

Yes, we are raising our prices on two of our plans. We now have three plans at three different price points (starting at $9). This is the first time EVER that we have increased pricing. But we have added new functionality to the service for every week for the last two and a half years.

And today we’re launching a lot more functionality for knowledge base and community support. Zendesk has gone from a traditional ticket management system to a complete customer engagement platform, supporting 1-to-1, 1-to-many and many-to-many customer conversations and support interactions. Zendesk is investing heavily in new features and our customers will continue to experience great things with Zendesk.

We will deliver on our promise. Are we the cheapest show in town? No. But we do think that we have an excellent offering for almost every budget starting at $9 per agent seat. And we do offer to grandfather our existing customers for one additional year at their current price point with all of their current functionality grandfathered indefinitely.

The price per agent has gone up with $10 and $20 on the Regular and Plus+ plans respectively. That’s a 50% increase. Some customers may experience disproportional price hikes due to earlier introductory discounts, and we will look into these accounts on a case-by-case basis.

Let me finally point out, that we have been completely open and transparent about the price changes. We don’t try to sneak it in.