News Byte

American Express Will Pay You to Tweet (Sort Of)

Here’s how you can turn 140 characters into cash, or at least credit: A new American Express promotion will reward Twitter users with discounts on some goods and services if they tweet or retweet certain messages. Card users who connect their Twitter accounts with their Amex accounts will see credits appear directly on their statements. Amex helped Twitter launch its “self-serve” platform last month, and has connected with Foursquare for a similar offer.

A Nation Divided on How to Say the Word “Coupon”

You say toe-may-toe, I say toe-may-tah. Poe-tay-toe, poe-tah-toe. And, now there’s this: Coo-pon or cue-pon?
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How to Open a Beer Bottle With a Magazine. Is That a Web Ad Worth Saving?

Web start-up AdKeeper says if advertisers make compelling ads, surfers will want to save them and look at them again. So here’s one worth looking at, at least. But is that enough?

Google Acquires Zetawire for Mobile Payments Tech

Google has acquired Zetawire, a Toronto-based start-up that has been working on technology that turns a cellphone into a virtual wallet.

Shopkick Checks In With Target–CEO Cyriac Roeding Talks About Social Shopping

The idea of being rewarded for being a consumer is getting a lot of heat of late, as retailers seek to take advantage of the fast-moving social phenom among consumers, especially young ones. Thus, a wide range of efforts to combine location-based mobile apps with purchasing, both online and offline. Today, another company in the space, shopkick, announced it had added another store–Minneapolis-based Target–to its list of retailers deploying its platform and mobile app that gives you points for simply walking in a store.

OpenTable CEO Jeff Jordan Talks About Groupon, Mobile Growth and Why IPOs Aren't That Scary!

It was certainly high time that BoomTown made a reservation–oh, I had to make that pun–to check in with OpenTable CEO Jeff Jordan. The well-liked and voluble Silicon Valley exec–who had worked in a top job at eBay before moving over to the online restaurant reservation service and taking it public last year–has actually been up to a lot recently.

Groupon Grabs $135 Million From DST and Battery–Valuation Above $1 Billion for Social Buying Site

Groupon, the social buying site that has become one of the hotter start-ups of late, has gotten a giant round of funding from the same Russian investors that backed social networking powerhouse Facebook and game phenom Zynga. Digital Sky Technologies is the main funder of the round for the Chicago-based Groupon, but Battery Ventures is also participating. The money, the company said, will be used to grow the business–and to speed far ahead of numerous rivals–as well as cash out employees and early investors.
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A Deal on a Haircut? That’s What Friends Are For

With group-buying Web sites, getting more people to join in on a deal gets you a better deal.
haircut

Groupon's Andrew Mason Speaks!

My 2010 start-up that passes the slightly-less-raised-eyebrow test is Groupon, a group-based social buying service that nabbed another $30 million in funding in December. So earlier this week, I sat down with Groupon’s Midwesternly-nice Andrew Mason, 29, to talk about where the start-up is headed with its pile of dough and growing base of consumers who want to make a deal.
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