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Seeing Interactive And Weebly Partner, Offer White-Label Websites To Bolster Small Biz SEO
Dec 29, 6:01AM
YCombinator-backed Seeing Interactive, which helps newspapers build and sell space in online ad directories and YC-backed Weebly, the service that lets you build your own drag and drop websites, have partnered up to give local newspapers even more options when selling local advertising to small and medium sized businesses. Seeing Interactive, which raised $1 million in June, used to direct businesses to Weebly when they needed to build websites to supplement Seeing Interactive's SEO-optimized Marketplace directory pages. Seeing Interactive has now integrated Weebly into its backend and as of January 1st will allow its newspaper clients to offer advertisers the ability to manage their website and directory listings from the same dashboard. Newspapers can now sell the two services as a package, or separately.
Over A Year After Its Acquisition, Is Mint Still Fresh?
Dec 29, 4:11AM
Here at TechCrunch, we've long been fans of personal finance site Mint, which won our first TechCrunch40 conference in 2007 and was acquired two years later by Intuit for an impressive $170 million. But things may not be going gangbusters at the company these days. We've learned that in the next month, three key employees from the original, pre-acquisition team will be leaving, including Director of Marketing Stewart Langille, lead designer Justin Maxwell, and head software engineer Daryl Puryear. One Mint insider estimated that around 40% or more of the pre-acquisition team has left since Intuit bought the company in September 2009, some of whom have left substantial amounts of unvested stock on the table. Most of the executive team remains, but many employees have gone on to work at or launch their own startups.
Q: What Does Quora Mean For The Future Of Blogging? A: Business As Usual
Dec 29, 12:41AM
As many of you have noticed, we (and by "we", I mainly mean "me") have been using Quora a lot as a source of inspiration for story ideas. Some people seem to think this is a great idea. Others seem to think it's the end of TechCrunch, blogging, and the world — perhaps not in that exact order. But here's what it really is: business as usual. One reader, Elias Bizannes, tweeted the following yesterday, "Blogging 3.0 according to @parislemon 1) Follow the founders of Quora 2) Spend all day on Quora 3) Rehash voted-up Quora posts on TechCrunch". My response to this was as follows, "@EliasBiz so was blogging 2.0 doing the same thing on twitter? and blogging 1.0 doing the same thing on blogs?"
Suit Against Apple Alleges Privacy Breaches By Apps
Dec 29, 12:36AM
Here's a bit of a sticky situation: Apple is facing a class-action lawsuit alleging that they are allowing apps and ad partners to identify specific users — a breach of Apple's privacy policy and supposedly of privacy itself. Apple's privacy policy touches on this directly, yet leaves plenty of room for movement on their side, which is really what the suit is all about, though Apple is simply the biggest target at the moment. The lawsuit alleges that the "non-personal information" collected by likes of Pandora and The Weather Channel can easily be collated and used to identify individuals.
Groupon Closing $950 Million Round, Valued At $4.75 Billion
Dec 29, 12:07AM
Lots of excitement today about Groupon's intention to raise a new monster round of financing, with speculation that the valuation of the still-young startup reaching nearly $8 billion. That speculation is only partially right, says a source with knowledge of the financing. The company is raising big money - around $950 million. And the valuation is an impressive $4.75 billion valuation. Just not quite as impressive as the earlier figure being thrown around. A separate source says Allen & Co. is advising Groupon on the deal. The company, which just recently turned down an acquisition offer from Google, has raised $171 million to date, much of it taken off the table by founders and execs. Our expectation is that much of this new round of financing, if not all of it, will also be used to cash out existing investors.
Groupon's Valuation Could Be As High As $7.8 Billion [Update: We Have The Document And The Actual Valuation]
Dec 28, 9:56PM
Note: A source is now telling us that the valuation is $4.75 Billion on a $950 Million Raise. According to a VC Experts report, Groupon gave the State of Delaware a heads up on December 17th with an Amended Certificate to authorize a $980 million round of Series G funding. While this doesn't necessarily mean the company will be raising that amount, it does give it the capacity to do so. The report says to expect a SEC Form D with the exact amount of finacing to be filed next week.
More On AOL's Disc Strategy: $1.19 Floppies, 50% Of All CDs Made, And Precision Bombing
Dec 28, 9:02PM
Yesterday, our post about AOL's promotional discs by way of an excellent thread on Quora invoked quite a bit of feedback. That's hardly surprising given that every man, woman, and child (at least in the United States) probably had their hands on one of the discs at some point in the 1990s. In fact, Jan Brandt, AOL's former Chief Marketing Officer, dropped a huge knowledge bomb in the Quora thread after we published our original post: "At one point, 50% of the CD's produced worldwide had an AOL logo on it," she wrote. Wow. And she followed up today in a new thread with even more interesting information about the program. Specifically, someone asked: What was the Conversion Rate of AOL CDs in the 1990's? Given how widespread the discs were, you might think AOL wasn't (or wasn't able to) monitor the rates so closely. But they were, according to Brandt. "The profitability of each and every disk and promotion effort was tracked and analyzed. We conducted approximately 2000 different tests each year and used these results to develop future programs. Despite the label 'carpet bombing,' there was actually a very high level of marketing sophistication and almost all decisions were data and results driven," she writes.
SnapPages Lets You Hook Into LinkedIn For Custom Online Resumes
Dec 28, 8:56PM
Earlier this years Linkedin Labs, which showcases projects created by LinkedIn employees, launched a feature that lets you quickly convert your profile on the professional social networking site into a more traditional resume. It's quite slick, with a handful of templates to choose from and buttons to convert it to PDF for easy printing (or to share it on Twitter and Facebook). Now SnapPages, a website builder that we've covered before, has launched a new feature that does something similar, but with a bit more flexibility.
Will 2011 See App Makers Thinking Android-First? One Developer Thinks It's Possible
Dec 28, 8:09PM
Over the weekend, there was a ton of talk about 2011 being the year in which Android "explodes" onto the market. You could argue that 2010 was already that year, but plenty of numbers indicate that 2011 will be much bigger for the platform. But despite Android as a whole already outselling the iPhone, there's little debate that amongst developers, iOS is still the platform you develop for first. But this could change as well in 2011, at least according to one developer. And it's significant because he's been an iPhone-first guy up until now. Akshay Kothari is the co-founder of Alphonso Labs, the development house behind the popular Pulse news reader app. Pulse started as an iPad app first, then expanded to the iPhone, then came to Android. Kothari credits both the support they've received from Apple and the press surrounding the iPad as the reason why they've been so iOS-centric up until now. But, "our thinking about the Android platform has changed significantly over the last couple weeks," he writes to us.
Keen On… Erick Schonfeld: Will 2011 Be 1999 All Over Again? (TCTV)
Dec 28, 7:01PM
Only four more days of 2010; four more days till we get to 2011. So what to expect in the new year? What do we most hope for and fear about 2011? For TechCrunch co-editor Erick Schonfeld, 2011 might be the year that touch becomes central to the computing experience. It may also be the year when both mobile and social – John Doerr's third wave - grows up to finally become the dominant sector of the tech industry. Could 2011 be 2000 all over again? Could we see a collapse of all the optimism now surrounding mobile and social? Were Fred Wilson's warnings about tech's current irrational exuberance correct? Not according to Schonfeld who, while acknowledging that there are too many me-too companies, believes that the established players driving the current boom – Facebook, Groupon, Zynga and Twitter – are for real. Is Schonfeld right? Should we be partying like it's 1999? Or could 2011, like 2000, be remembered as the year when the music died? Video ahead.
Awesome Quora Chrome Extension Is Awesome
Dec 28, 6:50PM
Addicted to Quora? Wish there were a way to search the Q&A site directly from your browser as well as receive notifications about your notifications while surfing the web? Well, this awesome Google Chrome extension created by Andrew Brown is just what your browser ordered. Now you can be one click away from a Quora fix everywhere you go online (Brown plans on eventually showing you full notifications while you browse). Die hard fans can grab the repo now from Github or download the extension here if you're already in Chrome.
The SEC Investigation Into Private Stock Sales Is All About The Glaring Lack Of Disclosure
Dec 28, 6:09PM
The Securities and Exchange Commission is asking questions about private stock markets like SecondMarket and SharesPost. The SEC has sent "information requests to several participants in the buying and selling of stock" to a number of companies, reports the New York Times (although private market SecondMarket says they have received no request from the SEC). Over the past year, trading in shares of still-private companies such as Facebook, Zynga, and LinkedIn has skyrocketed, allowing employees and early investors to sell their shares even without an IPO. About $400 million worth of shares will pass hands this year on SecondMarket, which is the largest of the private exchanges, up from about $100 million in 2009. The lack of liquidity because of the general postponement of IPOs among many Internet startups is fueling this growth. Only qualified institutions and high net-worth individual investors are allowed to participate in these markets, but as more and more shares trade hands the SEC's 500-shareholder rule could be triggered which would require the companies to report audited financial results just like a publicly-traded company. Investors are buying shares on these markets with little to no knowledge of the actual financial results of the underlying companies. There are no disclosure requirements because these markets take advantage of employees or early shareholders who want to unload their shares to the highest bidder. Investors see these markets as a chance to get in on hot, pre-IPO, Internet startups. 
TechCrunchTV's Funniest Videos From 2010 (TCTV)
Dec 28, 5:48PM
During the holiday season, there's a newsroom tradition to look back at the year's funny and memorable videos. At TechCrunchTV, we don't want to disappoint. TechCrunchTV launched this June and since then, we've produced around 1,000 videos. We've asked tough questions to CEO's, entrepreneurs, VC's, and angels. We brought you exclusive interviews with new start-ups and top tech companies. We provided live coverage of Disrupt. And, as you can see in this video, we've had our share of funnier moments. Highlights include a backstage moment with our new AOL boss; Jason Kincaid and MG Siegler turn into their favorite smartphones; John Biggs vs Four Loko; Michael Arrington as a robot; and two famous words from Yahoo's CEO Carol Bartz.
Fancy Is A Social Shopping List For The Design-Obsessed
Dec 28, 5:38PM
We recently wrote about thingd, the ambitious startup that wants to build a "database of every thing in the world." The startup, which has raised funding from a group of impressive investors, recently rolled out Fancy, a social shopping/blogging platform to list products. The idea behind Fancy is fairly simple. Via a bookmarklet, you can flag and import pictures of pretty much anything from other websites into your Fancy profile. You can also download pictures and text into your profile as well. Or you can snap a photo of a favorite product from Fancy's iPhone app. You can tag photos (i.e. shoes, furniture) to make them searchable on the site.
Union Square Ventures Is Raising A New $200 Million Opportunity Fund
Dec 28, 4:53PM
Union Square Ventures is raising $200 million for a new fund called the Union Square Ventures Opportunity Fund LP. According to an SEC filing, the VC firm already raised $135 million for the fund from 19 investors. The last time Union Square raised money was for its $156 million Union Square Ventures 2008 LP fund. Union Square Ventures is the leading early stage VC firm in New York City led by Fred Wilson, Brad Burnham, and Albert Wenger. Its portfolio includes Twitter, Foursquare, Zynga, Tumblr, Boxee, Disqus, Etsy, Clickable, and Indeed. 
Ifbyphone Raises $8 Million Cloud-Based Call Management Platform
Dec 28, 4:10PM
Phone management system Ifbyphone has raised $8 million in Series B funding from the company's CEO Irv Shapiro, Apex Venture Partners, Origin Ventures, Spring Mill Ventures, i2A Fund and Second Century Ventures (the National Association of Realtors' investment fund). This brings the Chicago-based company's total funding to $16 million. Ifbyphone's Web-based management applications allow businesses to track, route, and automate phone calls to. Users can use the company's software to manage call flow, set up virtual call centers, measure advertising, and to automate manual clerical tasks.
Sears And Kmart Team Up With Sonic To Launch A Netflix Competitor
Dec 28, 1:51PM
It looks like Sears wants to get in the online movie market. The retail company, which also owns Kmart, has just announced that it is launching a Netflix-like movie download service, called Alphaline Entertainment. Powered by Sonic Solutions' RoxioNow platform (Rovi just bought Sonic Solutions for $720 million), Alphaline allows Sears and Kmart customers to download movies and and TV shows online. The company says that it plans to make the platform available to users on a variety of devices, including mobile. 
McAfee's 2011 Cyber Attack Targets: URL Shorteners, iPhones, Geolocation Services
Dec 28, 1:25PM
Intel acquired McAfee has just released its forecast for the top targets for cyber criminals in 2011, and a number of popular platforms have made the list. The antivirus and security software company's labs group, McAfee Labs, says that Google's Android, Apple's iPhone, Foursquare, Google TV and the Mac OS X platform, are all expected to be targets in the New Year. McAfee Labs says that URL-shortening services, which create more than 3,000 URLs per minute, will be a significant target for cyber criminals in 2011. Because social media sites are already riddles with cyber criminals, these links are going to be used for spam, scamming and other malicious purposes, says the company. Interestingly, McAfee recently launched its own URL shortener, McAf.ee 
Zumigo Raises $420,000 To Help Jumpstart More Location-Based Applications
Dec 28, 12:46PM
There's no doubt in my mind that 2011 will be a big year for location and context-aware applications, and thus also for the companies that enable developers and publishers to build or enhance software that takes advantages of information on users' whereabouts, such as SimpleGeo and Twitter (which acquired GeoAPI maker Mixer Labs about a year ago). Enter Zumigo, a company that offers a suite of fully hosted applications and services that feature advanced mobile messaging and location-based services. The startup hasn't made any noise to date, but an SEC filing reveals that they've just raised $420,000 in funding.
Dashwire Raises Another $1 Million For Mobile Services Platform
Dec 28, 11:27AM
Dashwire, which offers a mobile services platform for carriers, handset manufacturers and retailers, has raised $1 million in debt financing, according to this SEC filing. Dashwire's Dashworks platform (PDF) is a "mobile-plus-web app" solution that helps people setup their phones, migrate from one device to another, backup everything on the phone, keep it in sync online and share photos and videos with others through social networking services.
Zynga's CityVille Now More Than 25 Percent Bigger Than FarmVille
Dec 28, 11:00AM
We knew Zynga's Facebook game CityVille was a hit if the company ever had one (and it's had several already) but the growth that it is displaying is simply mind-blowing. Last week, the Sim City-esque game logged about 61.7 million monthly active users, effectively eclipsing its other hit game, FarmVille. Today, CityVille is at close to 72.5 million monthly active users, which means that it has already outgrown FarmVille (which boasts roughly 57,4 million monthly active users) by more than 25 percent.
Flicksquare Sends Your Foursquare Check-In Photos To Flickr
Dec 28, 3:16AM
Inspired by a tweet from First Round Capital VC Charlie O'Donnell ("Can someone hack a Foursquare app that cc's my checkin photos to Flickr?"), developer Benny Wong has created Flicksquare, an app that takes advantage of Foursquare's recent enabling of photo check-in features, allowing you to also send your Foursquare photos to Flickr. While Foursquare gave lip service to working on the Flickr and Facebook export capability a couple of weeks ago, Wong has beat it to the punch. 
Footage Of Android's Revamped Music Player Leaks
Dec 28, 2:55AM
Earlier this week, some folks over on the XDA developers forum got their hands on a leaked test build of a revamped Android music player. This evening the footage was spotted by Engadget, and now the word is spreading like wildfire: Android is going to get a default music player that isn't totally mediocre. Alright, maybe I'm being a little harsh — the music player that ships with the stock build of Android can play music just fine. But it's also underwhelming, especially when compared to the iPhone's much slicker music application. It's drab and there's nothing like Apple's Cover Flow — but all that's changing.
Firefox On The iPhone? No (Though It Is Being Worked On). Another Mozilla Browser? Maybe.
Dec 28, 1:41AM
Continuing today's theme of scouring Quora for interesting nuggets of information, a Q&A about Mozilla's Firefox Mobile browser is of some interest. In response to the question: Will Firefox Mobile ever be released for iOS devices?, Mobile Firefox developer, Matt Brubeck, this morning gave his answer. First, he gave the obvious and fairly well-known official answer, "We have no plans to release the full Firefox browser for Apple iOS devices," Brubeck wrote. Why? Because the current iOS SDK agreement forbids apps like Firefox from including their own compilers and interpreters, Brubeck explains.
Search Etsy Listings By Color With Glancely
Dec 28, 12:59AM
Let's say you want to find that perfect quirky little black dress for New Year's? Like a mashup of Etsy, Flickr color search, and Google Instant, Glancely lets you search Etsy visually, sorting instant results by color and by price so you can scan through multiple green knit caps or purple socks or whatever handmade items your heart desires. Hold your mouse over an item to get a closer look and click on an item to go straight to its Etsy profile.
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