5 posts and columns on scene

Voices

Three Reasons Why Venture Capitalists Are Investing in New York Startups

in News on November 1, 2010 at 11:21 am PT

One criticism leveled at New York City’s fledgling tech scene is that it’s hard for entrepreneurs to find investors in their backyard. But increasingly that argument doesn’t hold water.

Apparently Yahoo's Bartz Didn't Get the Memo About Avoiding Land Wars in Asia

in News on September 16, 2010 at 9:02 am PT

How can BoomTown put this as delicately as Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz would? How about this: Her actions in regard to the Internet giant’s Asian relationships are about as bad as it gets these days. After losing Yahoo Japan’s search and online advertising business to Google last month, followed by the loss of a major South Korean site’s search business, Yahoo is poised for a third strike with its partner in China, the Alibaba Group. Sources close to the company said it is likely Alibaba will either partner with another search technology for sites that are now powered by Yahoo or build it internally.

What eBay-Rich Meg Whitman Really Wants to Do Is Direct!

in News on July 12, 2010 at 2:53 pm PT

It’s worth checking out an article in the New York Times today that points to a very questionable, but–as it turned out–politically savvy angel investment made by former eBay CEO and now Republican candidate for California governor Meg Whitman. The piece alleges that Whitman’s $1 million investment in late 2008 in a Hollywood entertainment company called Tools Down! Productions was done to ease a prominent Republican strategist away from working for her rival for the GOP nod. This kind of thing has happened before, of course. But what’s interesting is to see Silicon Valley’s digitally enabled moneybags step up to the very stained political table and jump right into the game.

Giving Your Pictures Some Va Va ‘Zoom’

in The Digital Solution on January 6, 2010 at 3:24 pm PT

When basic point-and-shoot cameras aren’t enough any more, go to the next level: megazooms.
canon

A Search Engine With a Real Eye for Videos

in The Mossberg Solution on November 18, 2008 at 5:52 pm PT

Web video has transformed the way the Internet is used, but finding the exact clip you want can be incredibly hard. And it’s no wonder, considering that sites like YouTube conduct their hunts by looking at a clip’s “contextual metadata” — tags, video title and description — and thus can often be misled by false information.
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