Berry, who had been Huffpo’s chief technical officer, stepped back from day-to-day duties in November; at the time, the company said he’d be “working closely” with Arianna Huffington “on strategy and expansion priorities.”

Now Berry says he will be leaving in February — which happens to be a year after the AOL/Huffpo deal was announced. Berry will be working on Rebel Mouse, which he described to the New York Observer as a “social platform,” and will also work on a start-up incubator.

As the Observer notes, the move will reunite Berry with a good chunk of Huffpo’s senior team — co-founders Ken Lerer and Jonah Peretti, former CEO Eric Hippeau and former ad chief Greg Coleman. Most of that group left Huffpo as soon as the AOL deal closed.

Peretti, who now runs Buzzfeed, a son-of-Huffpo aggregator/news site with a flair for social media, credited Berry with much of Huffpo’s success, via a Twitter blessing:

When Paul Berry joined HuffPost had 3M UVs, today the site has 120M million & he deserves LOTS of credit for that growth

— Jonah Peretti (@peretti) January 10, 2012

[Shutterstock/Kutlayev Dmitry]

Last week, I posted on the so-so overall performance of tech stocks in 2011.

Most were in the negative numbers going into last week, and they stayed that way for the full-year comparison.

Bottom line: Tech was a bad investment if you started buying stocks on the first day of trading in January of 2011. And you got really socked if you bought into most of the IPOs of a spate of new Internet companies.

No pressure for 2012, Facebook! (I’m talking to you, Sheryl Sandberg!)

As we open trading this morning after the holidays, here’s where we stand with share prices since one year ago from a sample group I wrote about the most in 2011:

UP

Google: Rose 8.7 percent.

eBay: Rose 8.98 percent.

Apple: Rose 25.6 percent.

Jive Software: Rose 6.7 percent (went public December 15, 2011).

DOWN

Amazon: Declined 4.3 percent.

Yahoo: Declined 3.01 percent.

Microsoft: Declined 6.99 percent.

Cisco: Declined 10.6 percent.

ROUT-ROH DOWN

AOL: Declined 36.3 percent.

Hewlett-Packard: Declined 38.8 percent.

Juniper: Declined 44.7 percent.

FRESHMAN SLUMP (AND INVESTOR DUMP)

Zynga: Declined 0.95 percent (went public December 19, 2011).

Groupon: Declined 20.99 percent (went public November 7, 2011).

LinkedIn: Declined 33.2 percent (went public May 20, 2011).

Pandora: Declined 42.5 percent (went public June 16, 2011).

Yandex: Declined 49.3 percent (went public May 25, 2011).

First off: I can reassure all my readers that I will not be coming out with an opus on Yahoo’s turmoil in 2012. Nor rounding out a trilogy of books on AOL in 2013, for that matter, full of lessons learned and bridges burned.

But that’s not true for other players in Silicon Valley, including three sure-to-be prominent books coming out in the next three months.

First off, on Jan. 25, will be the work of Fortune magazine writer Adam Lashinsky, who turned his cover story on the inside workings of Apple into a book called … “Inside Apple.”

The subtitle, “How America’s Most Admired — and Secretive — Company Really Works,” promises the “secret systems, tactics and leadership strategies that allowed Steve Jobs and his company to churn out hit after hit and inspire a cult-like following for its products.”

Apparently, we’re all about to find out about concepts like the “DRI” — or assigning a Directly Responsible Individual to every task (which I call DYS, or Do Your Story, here at AllThingsD); and the Top 100, “an annual ritual in which 100 up-and-coming executives are tapped a la Skull & Bones for a secret retreat with company founder Steve Jobs.”

Sadly, not anymore on that retreat, but I am still looking forward to reading more about the management techniques of the late tech visionary.

On Valentines Day, well-known VC, entrepreneur and Start-Up Whisperer Reid Hoffman’s book with co-author Ben Casnocha also comes out, touting lessons from Silicon Valley.

Titled “The Start-up of You: Adapt to the Future, Invest in Yourself, and Transform Your Career,” it is described as a “blueprint for thriving in your job and career in today’s challenging world of work by applying the lessons of Silicon Valley’s most innovative entrepreneurs.”

Let’s hope it’s not the dudes from Color handing out the advice!

According to the authors, “the key is to manage your career as if it were a start-up business: a living, breathing, growing start-up of you.”

If I were a start-up, I would sell virtual doughnuts. Hey Reid, gimme a badillion dollars!

Finally, on March 12, the grumpy investor Peter Thiel teams with entrepreneur Max Levchin and chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov for “The Blueprint: Reviving Innovation, Rediscovering Risk, and Rescuing the Free Market.”

It’s funny that they, and also Hoffman, are using the hopelessly analog term “blueprint,” but I like the retro feel.

No surprise, Thiel’s posse is unhappy with the pace of innovation, presumably underwhelmed by “Plants vs. Zombies” compared to the internal combustion engine.

“Challenging the notion that we are living in an age of technological progress, three of the world’s most original thinkers demonstrate that we have become a risk-averse society, hobbled by tort laws and government regulations, short-term financial thinking, and mind-numbing complacency,” the book’s description reads. “Eager to end ‘paper entrepreneurialism’ and avoid another financial meltdown, they propose that we expand research and development in breakthrough ‘disruptive technologies,’ create millions of jobs through science-based engineering and genuine innovation, shore up our crumbling infrastructure, stop squandering money on misspent ‘horizontal education,’ and restore financial discipline.”

Phew! And here I was very pleased that I can Instagram filtered pictures of my dinner last night around the world.

In any case, before the zombies arrive to steal them, get your brains ready to think big thoughts.

The stock market is closed today, as part of the Christmas holiday. But it is doubtful — barring any major announcements — that the vastly different performances seen by a range of tech companies will change much.

Which is to say, some companies — such as eBay and Google — did well, although only Apple shares rose significantly enough to cause festive feelings.

As of Friday, Google rose almost 7 percent for the year to date, eBay rose 10.8 percent and Apple was up almost 26 percent.

As for all the others in tech? Lumps of coal for investors of varying size.

Let’s start with the better negative performances: Amazon was down 1.95 percent, Yahoo was down 2.7 percent and Microsoft was down 6.7 percent.

Not exactly anything to wassail about. And Yahoo shares were only down a little, since the recent swirl around its possible sale gave its stock a recent bump, or the performance would have been worse, based on its financial results.

And the oft-troubled AOL? Down 35.3 percent.

The crop of new Internet companies was also not doing so great. The latest, Zynga was down only 1.2 percent, Groupon down 12.5 percent and LinkedIn down 32.3 percent. Pandora truly tanked, with a 42.5 decline in share price. Only Russia’s Yandex bested that, with a 48.6 percent drop.

Enterprise-focused companies also had a lackluster year. While recently public Jive Software was up 9.2 percent, Cisco was down 8.7 percent and Hewlett-Packard was down 38.5 percent. Juniper got truly socked, with a 43.6 percent decline.

The music you are looking for right about now is “(Hey, Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song” by B.J.Thomas, which you can enjoy here in this timely video:

In a written statement Wednesday, the company said its board and management team “remain firmly committed” to creating value for its shareholders. “We will continue to aggressively execute on our strategy in 2012 as we continue the turnaround of AOL,” the company said. AOL added that it had cut costs, sold noncore assets and made “significant investments for our future” during the past two years.

Read the rest of this post on the original site »

In a deal that was struck some time ago and is close to fruition, BermanBraun is prepping three major Web properties for AOL that will focus on pets, men and, interestingly, the weather.

After I inquired, AOL confirmed that the Hollywood production company — headed by former Yahoo and ABC exec Lloyd Braun and former Paramount exec Gail Berman — will debut the trio of sites around March. The new sites will use rich features and a slick design to attract premium advertisers.

The pair will jointly sell the advertising, but the sites themselves will be operated by BermanBraun in cooperation with AOL’s media unit, the Huffington Post Media Group. The deal was struck in late 2010, before AOL bought the Huffington Post for $300 million in January of this year.

While AOL has partnered with many outside sites, this will be the most prominent one since that acquisition.

Since then, much of the new content development on AOL has been aimed at drastically increasing the number of sites with that brand. There have been more than two dozen of those since March.

In this case, the Huffington Post Media Group, run by Arianna Huffington, has typically either created new topic sites or relaunched old AOL ones.

This week, for example, the company rejiggered AOL TV as HuffPost TV, as well as announcing El Huffington Post, an international Spanish-language version of the Huffington Post that will debut in early 2012, in partnership with El País.

The BermanBraun effort, though, is more independent and large-scale. It will feature extensive video and heavy use of imagery. Huffington Post will be involved in editorial selection, and has been working closely with the firm on incorporating social elements.

“It’s been a very dynamic and collaborative partnership — we’ve worked together on everything from design to picking the editors,” said Roy Sekoff, founding editor of the Huffington Post Media Group, about the arrangement. “BermanBraun brings a distinctive approach to their sites, and we’ve helped infuse that with our focus on real-time, social, and building community.”

Sekoff declined to give more details, such as the names of the sites. (They won’t be HuffPost Pets, HuffPost Weather and HuffPost Dudes, though!)

Pets could be a strong category if done in a new way, especially if designed with new tablet devices in mind. And weather, to my mind, is a sleeper category if reimagined freshly.

BermanBraun — which also develops television shows and movies — has a lot of experience in the online content arena. It has previously created Web sites for Microsoft’s MSN unit, including the high-profile celebrity site Wonderwall.

It will be interesting to see how the collaboration turns out. In the meantime, here’s my favorite weather song — Lena Horne rules! — to enjoy until the three sites launch:

South Korean consumer electronics giant Samsung Electronics has hired former AOL and Google exec David Eun to lead a new push to create more media offerings, the company said.

In a press release, the maker of a wide range of devices — from televisions to tablets to smartphones and more — said Eun would serve as executive vice president of its media-related units.

About Eun’s role, Samsung said: “He will play a key role in developing a global media strategy and driving new business opportunities to take advantage of Samsung’s growing number of digital televisions and displays, mobile phones, tablets and other connected devices.”

It’s not clear what that means, but presumably it could spell more investments and acquisitions in digital media, and even in the social space.

The move is part of a larger reorganization at Samsung Electronics, which it also announced has divided into two parts, digital media and communications and device solutions.

Samsung’s deepening of its media efforts — it has previously launched various smaller content initiatives — is an interesting one, especially in light of the fast-changing market it now competes in, in which partners like Apple and Google have also become intense rivals.

Google bought Motorola recently and has been increasing its media offerings, as has Apple. Samsung and Apple are also engaged in a series of global legal battles over devices.

In turn, companies like Amazon — which recently released the Kindle Fire tablet — have upped their efforts in the consumer electronics area.

In addition, Japan’s Sony — which already owns a major Hollywood studio — now owns all its handset business and has recently added tablets to its lineup.

Eun is an interesting choice, having been part of Google’s earliest efforts to move beyond its core search business into media, such as its acquisition of YouTube.

He left his most recent job at AOL, where he had headed its content unit, earlier this year. Eun has also previously worked at both Time Warner and NBC.

Here’s the official press release about his hiring:

Samsung Electronics Appoints David Eun as Executive Vice President

Eun to Enhance Samsung’s Global Media and Content Efforts

SEOUL, Korea — December 14, 2011 –Samsung Electronics Co., the technology leader and innovator in consumer electronics and telecommunications, proudly announces the appointment of David Eun as Executive Vice President.

Eun joins Samsung after an accomplished career in media and content. He was most recently President of AOL Media and Studios, where he oversaw AOL’s efforts to become a leading provider of premium content, spanning over 100 different websites and production studios in NY and LA. Before that, he formed a global Content Partnerships group at Google with oversight for media strategy, partnerships and strategic alliances spanning over 30 different Google products including Google Books, Maps and YouTube. He also has a deep knowledge of traditional media businesses from working at Time Warner and NBC.

He will play a key role in developing a global media strategy and driving new business opportunities to take advantage of Samsung’s growing number of digital televisions and displays, mobile phones, tablets and other connected devices.

“Samsung Electronics has an unparalleled footprint across multiple devices and platforms that provides a unique experience to consumers around the world. The competition for prominence in the living room has already begun, and Samsung Electronics is ideally situated to extend beyond that to connect the entire home and the lives of consumers,” stated Eun. “I’m looking forward to joining the impressive leadership already in place and to building a new presence in media for Samsung Electronics.”

Eun received a J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he was a Teaching Fellow for the Harvard Negotiation Project, and an A.B., magna cum laude in Government, from Harvard College. He was selected “Digital Power Player of the Year” by the Hollywood Reporter in 2010, is an Advisory Board Member for the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, and sits on the Board of the Television Academy of the Arts and Sciences Foundation.

At least it should be, based on the $35 million that investors just plowed into Outbrain, the content recommendation engine that works with AllThingsD and lots of other publishers. Index Ventures led the round, joining existing investors Carmel and Lightspeed; the New York-based company has raised $64 million to date.

Outbrain makes money helping funnel traffic from one publisher’s site to another. It gets paid whenever someone clicks on its sponsored listings (those are the ones labeled “From the Web” at the end of this story), and gives the originating publisher 60 percent of the revenue. Publishers (again, like AllThingsD) also benefit, because Outbrain provides recommendations for other stories that will keep readers on the original site.

Like most of the Web, this is a business that’s supposed to work at scale, and Outbrain says it has that now, generating 200 million clicks a month. Earlier this year, Outbrain bought former rival Sphere from AOL.

(Image courtesy of Shutterstock/The Bezz)

And though the immediate question over whether or not HP would ultimately keep the platform or sell it to someone else is now answered, it was clear from talking with Whitman and Andreessen that there are still a lot of issues to sort out. There are questions about business models, how to work with outside developers, hardware manufacturers, and even over how many people will keep their jobs.

It’s also notable that Andreessen was on hand because of his history with open source projects. As the creator of the Netscape Web browser, Andreessen was there for that company’s much-remembered IPO, its acquisition by AOL, and the transformation of the Netscape browser into an open source project now called Mozilla, which produces the popular browser Firefox.

My first question was about what kind of contribution — both financial and otherwise — HP is prepared to make to this new open source project.

AllThingsD: Meg, do you have any thoughts on how much you’re going to contribute to this webOS effort in terms of money and people at this point?

Whitman: I won’t give you a dollar number but I will tell you that it will be a substantial software investment but it will not break the bank at HP. This is a wonderful asset, actually, but what I was telling employees this morning is you’re a start-up now. You’re a start-up with a number of people, 750,000 installed devices out there, and with your first venture capitalist, and that’s HP. And let’s go figure out how to change the world out there.

The thought that it’s now a start-up makes me want to turn to you, Marc, and ask, what do you think of that?

Andreessen: I’ve been lucky enough to have been involved in a number of what I think have turned out to be very successful open sourcing projects that are a lot like this. And of course the big one that I was in the middle of was the transition from Netscape to Mozilla, which is not a perfect analogy but there are a lot of similarities and that just turned out marvelously well. And then obviously Linux has been a huge transformative force in the industry in the last 10 years, and both Linux as an open source project and Red Hat as a business have been spectacular. So we live in a world now where open source now, unlike 10 or 15 years ago, is mainstream, it’s widely accepted, it’s widely adopted, it’s trusted, enterprises are willing to bet on it, hardware companies are willing to bet on it, and chip companies build it into their plants from day one. So I think we have a real opportunity to have something really special happen.

Meg, in looking back to before your time as CEO when there was a plan to have webOS on printers and all the consumer PCs. Will there be any changes to those plans?

Whitman: I think we’ve got to walk before we run here. And let’s see what form webOS takes. In 2012 as you know we’re bringing two Windows 8 tablets to the market, we’re excited about that, we’re going to be working with them [Microsoft] constructively, but there may be an opportunity in 2013 to think of a different device, maybe come back to tablets. Let’s just see how it goes, but obviously HP would be one of the likely suspect hardware manufacturers for webOS.

So you’re not closing the door entirely to hardware down the road, just not right away?

Whitman: In all likelihood, not in 2012. The 2012 road map is already done.

One thing that comes to mind is that, based on our reporting, there may be headcount reductions in webOS at some point. Can you give us any clarity on that?

Whitman: I can’t. We have released no numbers on that and the reason is we don’t know. I’d tell you if I knew, but we don’t know. We’ve got to get a business plan, a product road map, a business model that we think will work, and decide how we’re going to engage with other hardware manufacturers, how we’re going to engage the open source community and that will determine ultimately the types and numbers of people.

AOL, which has had some turmoil in its executive ranks of late, has promoted Jim Norton to be its new head of sales.

The New York Internet company said Norton would be “responsible for sales on all of AOL’s owned & operated properties, including sites like The Huffington Post, Engadget, Stylelist and MapQuest,” as well as a range of other areas.

AOL has rejiggered its advertising execs and strategies several times in recent years, and Norton is not precisely replacing its former advertising head Jeff Levick (who left for Spotify) and is more akin to another top former AOL ad exec Mark Ellis (who left for Yahoo).

That job has now been folded into the portfolio of Chief Revenue Officer Ned Brody, to whom Norton will report.

“We need to become faster in our operations,” said Brody in an interview this morning about the shift. “We brought in Jim to bring in singular focus on selling.”

Brody said that AOL is working on how to increase the “value proposition” of its variety of advertising and marketing offerings and to quicken the process.

Norton came to AOL from Google in 2009 and before that worked in a wide range of ad jobs.

Here’s the official press release on the move:

JIM NORTON NAMED HEAD OF AOL SALES

New York, NY — December 9, 2011 — AOL Inc. (NYSE: AOL) and Ned Brody, Chief Revenue Officer, today announced the promotion of Jim Norton to head of AOL Sales. Effective today, Jim will be responsible for sales on all of AOL’s owned & operated properties, including sites like The Huffington Post, Engadget, Stylelist and MapQuest. Additionally, he will also lead the sales of all cross platform marketing solutions, including display/Project Devil initiative, video and mobile. This announcement is reflective of AOL’s commitment to putting the strongest leaders in place to service clients in the most efficient and effective manner. Jim will continue to report to Brody.

“Jim has proven himself within AOL to be a fantastic leader,” said Brody. “He not only has deep knowledge and incredible expertise in the marketplace, but a real ability to effect change.” Brody added, “Customers want the best products and packaged solutions all in a fast and efficient manner. Consolidation of leadership under Jim will place even more focus on putting our clients front and center and deliver on their goals and needs.”

“It’s a tremendous honor and opportunity to take on this new leadership role,” said Norton. “It allows me to continue to work with some of the best sales professionals in the business. It’s also a privilege to work with some of the world’s biggest brands.” He added, “We want to continue to be the preferred media partner for marketers and agencies.”

Jim joined AOL in 2009 and was SVP, AOL Advertising’s Advance Sales team, which focuses on national and regional advertisers across all categories, as well as new business. He was also VP of Product Sales working with AOL product teams on maximizing their offerings to advertisers, including MapQuest, Patch, AOL Mail, AOL Video and Mobile. He also managed AOL’s Search and Sponsored Listings business, and helped launch and manage AOL’s self service advertising platform, Ad Desk.

Jim has over 20 years of experience in the media business. Prior to joining AOL, he spent 3 years at Google most recently as National Sales Manager for Google’s Agency Activation team. Prior to that role, he was a Senior Account Executive on the National Tech B2B team servicing many of the leading global tech marketers. He’s also held a number of traditional sales and marketing roles, including four years as Sales Manager at Tribune Broadcasting’s WLVI-TV (Boston’s WB), radio ad sales at Kiss 108FM and a variety of brand marketing roles at Miller Brewing Company and GMR Marketing. He’s a life long Bostonian and graduated from Boston College with a BA in Communications and BC’s Carroll Graduate School of Business with an MBA in Marketing and Technology. He’s married with three children and splits his time between Boston and New York City.

As I reported this morning it was close to launching, Google has debuted its news reader product, which is called Google Currents. In a blog post, the search giant said that the new product, which will compete with many others, including as Flipboard, Yahoo’s Livestand and AOL’s Editions, will be available on Google’s own Android mobile operating system devices, as well as Apple’s iPhone and iPad.

Google Currents will debut with 150 partners — including AllThingsD.com (my developers can sure keep a secret).

Here’s the blog post with all the deets:

Google Currents is hot off the press

Thursday, December 8, 2011 | 11:42 AM

We strive to give you beautiful and simple ways to experience all the content the web has to offer, such as sharing photos on Google+, watching YouTube videos and discovering books, movies and music from Android Market. Today we’re expanding our content offering with the introduction of Google Currents, a new application for Android devices, iPads and iPhones that lets you explore online magazines and other content with the swipe of a finger.

Ready for consumers

We’ve worked with more than 150 publishing partners to offer full-length articles from more than 180 editions including CNET, AllThingsD, Forbes, Saveur, PBS, Huffington Post, Fast Company and more. Content is optimized for smartphones and tablets, allowing you to intuitively navigate between words, pictures and video on large and small screens alike, even if you’re offline.

To get started, simply download the app and choose the publications you want to subscribe to for free. You can also add RSS, video and photo feeds, public Google+ streams and Google Reader subscriptions you’re already following. In addition to consuming your favorite media, you can also use the trending tab to discover related content that matches your tastes.

Ready for publishers

Alongside Google Currents, we’re also launching a self-service platform that gives publishers the flexibility to design, brand and customize their web content. For example, if you’re a small regional news outlet, a non-profit organization without access to a mobile development team, or a national TV network with web content, you can effortlessly create hands-on digital publications for Google Currents.

Great content needs a great audience, which is why Google Currents is integrated with Google+ so users can share articles or videos they’ve enjoyed with their circles. Publishers can also associate their account with Google Analytics in order to increase their awareness of consumers’ content preferences, device use and geographic distribution.

Google Currents is now available for download in Android Market and the Apple App Store for US users. Whether you’re a reader or a publisher, we hope that Google Currents helps you easily experience the best content on the web. Try it here now and stay tuned for more to come.

Posted by Mussie Shore, Product Manager, and Sami Shalabi, Technical Lead