Kara Swisher

Recent Posts by Kara Swisher

Sweet? Biz Stone Is Poised to Launch New Mobile Startup Called Jelly.

According to sources, Twitter co-founder Biz Stone is close to launching a new startup called Jelly, which one person called a “native mobile” effort.

While it’s not clear exactly what that means, sources said the well-known entrepreneur has already hired four or five employees to form a team on the mystery product that will likely be aimed at smartphones and tablets.

It’s an interesting move, since Stone is also running a small incubator called Obvious with one of his Twitter co-founders, Ev Williams. They left their daily roles at the high-profile microblogging service to create Obvious, which has startups such as Lift, Branch and Medium in its portfolio.

There has been low-level chatter in Silicon Valley about Stone’s startup, which some have taken to mean he is no longer working as much with Williams at Obvious. But sources said that is not the case and both are involved in helping their small group of startups.

That said, Williams has been focusing more on Medium, an effort to rejigger blogging and content platforms. Meanwhile, another Obvious principal, Jason Goldman, has been focused on Branch, an online conversation-focused site.

Presumably, Obvious will invest in Jelly, but that’s not clear.

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Just as the atom bomb was the weapon that was supposed to render war obsolete, the Internet seems like capitalism’s ultimate feat of self-destructive genius, an economic doomsday device rendering it impossible for anyone to ever make a profit off anything again. It’s especially hopeless for those whose work is easily digitized and accessed free of charge.

— Author Tim Kreider on not getting paid for one’s work