TechFold - Bold tech & web commentary

Facebook Acquisition - Round X; I bet Google

I call Google FTW. The internets are all atwitter that facebook is on the block again - the Guardian says Yahoo is at it again; Battelle speculates that GOOG might snipe it like they did with DoubleClick.

Personally, I’ve thought Google is the more likely candidate for a while. Despite their occaisonal dropped balls on acquisitions (dodgeball), Google is about two things: platform and volume, which feed off each other and together are monetizeable. Advertising? Google built the platform. Search? Same. Video? Yup. Any area of online tech that you look into, Google has a major foundational play under way - if not a platform in a traditional sense, then a product option that has so much market power that it is the defacto platform or standard in its space.

Except social networking. Orkut, however you slice it, is an abject failure. Facebook would fill that gap, and the Facebook platform philosophy works nicely with Google. Google and Facebook could exchange hooks, interfaces, and API’s very quickly and create integrated products that deliver real value FAST.

Final note - I remember comments from GOOG’s CEO from a few weeks ago to the effect that Google wants to be able to tell you what you should be doing for the weekend. THAT’S A SOCIAL FEATURE.

So - when all is said and done, I call Google for the buy, Yahoo for the runner up. The only thing to derail this would be the SEC.

billions, dodgeball, facebook, GOOG, google, microsoft, orkut, sec, social, socialnetworking, weekend, yahoo YHOO

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I’m becoming a curmudgeon

…and its because of stories like the acquisition of Last.fm by CBS. There was a time when companies either adapted, or went out of business: it was a good thing, like the process of ecological succession that keeps forests healthy - old businesses made way for new, the rotting remains of their business models providing intellectual nutrients for their replacements.

Now, it seems like old giants are content to buy relevance instead of re-inventing themselves. The game changed under them with the introduction of the internet: no matter, they’ll just spend their way into the new game.

The problem I see is one of memetic infection. Old companies with deep pockets impose old ideas and business models on new industries. Is Last.fm more likely to cave to things like the Copyright Royalty Board as a part of CBS? Yes. Does wrapping new ideas in a layer of old money ultimately stifle innovation? Yes. Sorry, Sam - even if CBS keeps their hands off, that’s not the same as being independent.

Hear2.0 is convinced that the move heralds the future of personalized radio. Jarrett House agress. I’m not sold: As Praized Blog notes, CBS is claiming that Last.fm will maintain its independence, and it was bought for its community not its technology or data. Plus: I don’t have faith in CBS’s ability to execute.

Nick O’Neill at the Webpreneur wonders why a record label didn’t snap up last.fm. IMHO, its because record labels are afraid of promoting music online where P2P downloads are a click away. Plus, would a label pay to buy a service that promotes music from other labels too?

Personally, I wonder why Last.fm wasn’t nabbed by either Google, or Experian.

cbs, experian, google, last.fm, lastfm pandora

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Google Buying Feedburner; Feeds are another media like Radio, Print, or WWW

TC breaks it: GOOG is buying Feedburner for 100M. WatchMojo covers the origins of FB’s 10 million in VC funding, DeepJive says it only makes sense, and SEW sums up some good advantages for Google.

Holistic Analytics and Advertising

From where I’m sitting, it make sense. Feeds have been out in left field for a long time in terms of a consistent means of measuring their audience and impact on site traffic; with this acquisition and their existing analytics portfolio, Google has a means to connect all of the dots and create a truly holistic means of looking at sites.

Of course this also means that Google can expand their ad inventory as well, offering feeds as another media channel to advertisers. Feeds have evolved into another “media,” so to speak, and as Google has tried to expand into print and radio, so they are taking a stab at RSS.

Creepy

One final thought: as is mentioned more and more, Google’s reach is sort of creeping me out. The Internet is increasingly at the mercy of Google’s “Don’t be Evil” motto - here’s hoping they stick to it.

analytics, feedburner, google, news, rss, stats techcrunch

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Microsoft to Acquire or Merge w/ Yahoo: BAD IDEA

Yahoo again making news. The NY Post breaks the story that Yahoo and Microsoft are once again flirting with marriage or purchase. Personally, I don’t put much stock in the NYP’s finance and technology coverage - so I think this may be hyperbolistic coverage on their part - on the other hand, maybe its legit.

If it, the combined entity would on paper be more of a Google competitor with search and advertising inventory.

Mashable is bullish, asking “Why wouldn’t Microsoft buy Yahoo?” Personally, I think this is a simplisitic assessment - as demonstrated already today, Yahoo is stumbling managing its own products (as is Microsoft - ahem, Vista) - would these two battle damaged, beleaguered companies be able to successfully execute on an acquisition or a merger? I tend to think not: even if the execution was successful, the act would consume so much organizational resources from each for so long that their market positions would erode badly in the meantime as their business languishes while integrating.

Nicholas Carr points out (from the WSJ) that highlevel executive conflict and culture clash would have a derailing effect as well.

Considering that both Yahoo and Microsoft need to get their own houses in order badly, and that throwing an integration on top will just cause further disarray, I hope this discussion remains conceptual or results in tighter business relationships without a purchase or merger. I don’t see why, for instance, Yahoo and MS couldn’t pool their technologies and engineering resources to create a best-of-breed search engine without merging. Spin off the the search units from both MS and Y! into an independent entity 50% owned by each parent.

Henry Blodget proposes something similar, suggesting that the Yahoo/MSN, in the event of a merger, should be spun out as a separate company. Otherwise, he contends, they’ll fall victim to organizational politics and wither on the the vine.

TechCrunch declines to offer an opinion, agnostically reporting the news.

EDIT: Mathew Ingram summarizes the idea as Two Icebergs Roped Together:

They are like icebergs: not only is nine-tenths of them unseen, but they are slow-moving and difficult to steer. Impressive? Yes. Powerful? No doubt about it. But fast, or nimble or imaginative? No. Roping them together would do nothing but compound their problems.

merger, microsoft yahoo

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BlinkX, Video Search, and the Corporate Shell Game

The Financial Times broke the news, but Mashable summed it up more succinctly: $20 and a free pony if you can figure this one out.

The demerger of the consumer business is a complex transaction, in which Autonomy will first take ownership of Blinkx, a separate company founded by Autonomy’s former US chief technology officer, Suranga Chandratillake, which already uses Autonomy’s consumer search technology. In exchange Blinkx will be given exclusive rights to the technology, everywhere outside China. Then the Blinkx business will be demerged again and floated. [From the FT article]

Sounds like an complicated way for Suranga Chandratillake to take a pay day while keeping shareholders happy. Or something.

Meanwhile, try using Blinkx. Personally, I found the search results from YouTube alone a lot better: less clutter in the results, more relevance.

BlinkX for “Nissan Skyline.”
YouTube for “Nissan Skyline.”

BlinkX results are full of a bunch of remote-controlled car stuff - not what I was looking for. Plus, the BlinkX interface, with preview videos playing unsolicited, video thumbnails, and so on, is distracting to the point of making the site painful to use - however technically impressive it may be. Say what you will about the aesthetics/usability of YouTube, but its better than BlinkX.

Finally, BlinkX doesn’t seem to be indexing YouTube properly either. The result sets from each don’t match, and I have no idea how BlinkX ranks video results from one site over another anyway. When it comes right down to it, BlinkX seems counter-intuitive, dis-organized, and a confusing way to find video. This is the fate I fear for CastTV.

blinkx, casttv, mashable, mergers, video youtube

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Hitwise Acquired by Experian, $240 million in cash

Hitwise has been bought by general analytical service provider Experian (12k ee’s, 3.1bn revenue). News from Marketing Pilgrim, via TechMeme. Incidentally, Hitwise has an interesting approach to collecting stats, gathering metrics directly from ISP’s:

Hitwise has developed proprietary software that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) use to analyze website usage logs created on their network. The anonymous data sent to Hitwise from the ISPs include a range of industry standard metrics relating to the viewing of websites including page requests, visits and average visit length.

Hitwise also combines this rich ISP data with a worldwide opt-in panel to overlay demographic, lifestyle and transactional behavior across the thousands of websites that are reported on every day.

A great service (though I haven’t used it myself) built on top of a solid technology base and business model = big sale. Congrats to Hitwise!

experian, hitwise stats

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