All Things Digital

I am now at the DLD conference in Munich, which is put on by Hubert Burda Media, a gathering that has become one of Europe’s most interesting in recent years.

The three-day DLD–which stands for Digital, Life, Design–focuses on digital innovation, science and culture and has the most cosmopolitan audience of any conference out there.

It is chaired by publisher Hubert Burda and serial Israeli investor Joseph Vardi and hosted by Stephanie Czerny and Marcel Reichart.

It is interesting to be here to garner a lot of different viewpoints from outside the U.S., and I will be visiting a lot of German Web start-ups over the next week.

There is also a lot of Olympic-level schmoozing, of course, since there are precious few such events in Europe compared to the conference-crazy U.S.

There are also, of course, a lot of the usual suspects from the States and especially Silicon Valley.

So far this morning, I have run into folks like former Microsoftie Linda Stone, Yahoo’s Bradley Horowitz, writer and entrepreneur Esther Dyson, Facebook’s Matt Cohler and, yes, Martha Stewart (who needs no introduction).

I am also here to interview onstage for DLD today Kenneth Roth (pictured here), longtime executive director of Human Rights Watch, which investigates, reports on and seeks to curb human-rights abuses in some 70 countries.

To say I am out of my league in interviewing such a serious and substantive figure is an understatement, especially given that I spend all my time contemplating the monetization of widgets (to be more specific, the non-monetization), the fate of content on the Web and the exact date the hype of social networking will end.

Still, I will give it my best effort and perhaps focus on the use of digital tools to get information and stories of heinous injustices out worldwide. After all, the Web has to be more than SuperPoking and dumb online videos on cats skateboarding.

Our session is aptly named: “Inconvenient Stories.”

My favorite kind.

Video, of course, to follow.

The money continues to dribble into Facebook, it seems.

The Samwer brothers of Germany have agreed to invest $10 million to $15 million in the hot social-networking site, a development which was first reported by Reuters and TechCrunch.

It feels like an awfully small amount to garner a key Facebook relationship in the important European market, so I would expect more to come.

A lot of people have doubted Facebook’s ability to raise more money after getting a lofty $15 billion valuation following a $240 million investment from Microsoft in October of 2007, which made the stakes very high.

And, indeed, the personal investment by the well-known European entrepreneurs comes after some time has passed since the last investment in Facebook in late November by Chinese investor Li Ka-shing of $60 million and possibly $60 million more, which was first reported here.

By coincidence, after meeting him at a dinner hosted by Accel Partners–a Facebook investor, in fact–in London in December, I am planning to visit with Marc Samwer next week in Berlin. Marc, with his brothers Alexander and Oliver, founded a German online auction site that was later sold to eBay and now run the European Founders Fund.

So, as they say over there: Ausgezeichnet!

While BoomTown was abroad recently, we did video interviews with lots of folks, like Facebook’s Owen Van Natta. We also talked with MySpace’s SVP and GM of international, Travis Katz, but did not get around to posting it.

So here’s the video, where we talk about key trends abroad, the markets that will really matter going forward in terms of growth for dominant players like MySpace and Facebook.

Both face a plethora of competitors, especially homegrown ones, as well as the challenge of creating meaningful social-networking experiences in a variety of languages.

For example, according to stats released in October by comScore, the European social-networking scene had 127.3 million unique visitors in August, 56% of the population. More than three-quarters of the U.K. were online with almost 25 million unique visitors in the same time period.

Bebo was slightly ahead of MySpace in the U.K., followed by a fast-growing Facebook and also Hi5.com.

That kind of competition abroad should be one of the more interesting stories for social networks going forward.

Here’s the video:

For your Thanksgiving entertainment, don’t be so American! Go abroad! See the world! BoomTown did!

Here are links to the posts I have done from BoomTown’s trip to Europe–with glamorous stops in England, France and Monaco (and all the videos are below too!)–in chronological order going backward:

Kara Visits the Royal Society in London

Kara Visits Cambridge University

Kara Visits a Feast!

Silicon Valley Loses to the Brits!

Kara Visits Dailymotion in Paris

Kara Visits Netvibes in Paris

Kara Visits the Monaco Media Forum: More Interviews on the French Riviera!

Kara Visits the Monaco Media Forum: Opening Dinner

Kara Visits Monte-Carlo

So the hapless team from Silicon Valley got smoked last night, losing the debate at Cambridge University over where the most billion-dollar companies of the future would be created. Europe or Silicon Valley?

Even loudly declaring “Facebook, $15 billion valuation!!!” with a stiff upper lip didn’t work one bit.

Neither did: “Steve Jobs lives in Atherton”; “At least Yahoo isn’t as bad as Skype”; “You have no Dunkin Donuts and Fry’s”; or “Google could buy your country and have enough left over to pick up Ireland too.”

Here’s a video for you to see the carnage as it unfolded:

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I know new Yahoo Eurohead Toby Coppel thinks I am too mean to his overlords in Sunnyvale and even emails me about it (I can take it!).

But I am going to surprise him by telling him that I think he is so very clever today.

Why? He signed the obvious deal with social network Bebo to sell its display ads in the United Kingdom and Ireland, renew its search deal and add its excellent Answers product and market a branded toolbar.

Could this be a first kiss in a possible bigger deal, such as a Yahoo acquisition of Bebo, which has been rumored? The fact of the matter is that this pair, despite reports, have never held such talks.

That said, such a purchase would be a good one for Yahoo. Provided, of course, that its CEO Jerry Yang got it into his mind to do something bold and initiate a possible game-changer. (Sorry, Toby, I know you think I am being mean again, but the truth hurts!)

While Yahoo cannot hope to buy either MySpace or Facebook (too pricey), what it could do with a smaller, less expensive and internationally oriented site like Bebo, especially when integrated with some of Yahoo’s better properties, could be interesting and even invigorating for the company.

Bebo, which runs behind powerhouses MySpace and Facebook in the U.S., is a little engine that could in Britain and Ireland, where it dominates the market with 11.6 million members.

The ad deal is exclusive and, while the parties did not say so in their joint statement, is likely to be along the lines of those handing-out-the-candy-to-social-networks guaranteed ad arrangements both Facebook and MySpace have signed (with Microsoft and Google, respectively). This is Yahoo’s first plunge into this game.

Under terms of the deal, Yahoo will sell Bebo’s display ads in the U.K. and Ireland, leaving Bebo to concentrate more on ad sales for its innovative original entertainment offerings, like its “KateModern” and the more recently announced “Sofia’s Diary.”

Yahoo’s own most innovative property, Answers, a community-based knowledge service, will be integrated into Bebo. And the pair will develop and distribute the Bebo toolbar, which will let its users get info about their Bebo accounts when not on the site. Yahoo also renewed its deal to provide search on Bebo.

Neither Coppel, who is managing director of Yahoo Europe, nor Joanna Shield, Bebo’s president of international, were available for an interview, so I politely refuse to quote from their meaningless press release statements.

Still, here’s a post I did about Coppel (pictured here, as he refused to be the subject of my withering video camera lens) after a visit on a recent trip to London, as well as a post I did of Shields and her sharp team at Bebo there too (as well as a video posted below).

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

One of the most hot and hyped areas on the Web is in the social-networking arena. And while Facebook and MySpace suck up all the oxygen in this heady room, there are others, including the No. 3 company in the space, Bebo.

While its technical and Web creation offices are in San Francisco, a lot of the commercial action takes place in London, since the United Kingdom and Europe are a big growth area for the company and, most important, where it is running neck and neck with the leaders.

Besides the more worldly focus, Bebo–co-founded by CEO Michael Birch in mid-2005 and funded by Benchmark Capital’s London partners–is trying some different approaches to the space.

Bebo, for example, has interesting new initiatives like its “KateModern” fictional series on the site, a deal with cool gaming site AWOMO (A World of My Own) and a hip look that straddles the chaos of MySpace and the spareness (I would say grimness, but Mark Zuckerberg would call me mean again) of Facebook.

And, of course, because of the landscape now related to social-networking sites, there are the usual takeover rumors for the site, although there is likely a lot more smoke than fire at this point.

Here is a longish video of my visit to Bebo’s London offices and a talk with Joanna Shields, its sharp president of international, a Silicon Valley exec with extensive European experience at companies like RealNetworks and Google. Her insights are well worth the length here, as they provide a window into where the whole sector is headed in content and advertising:

While on my visit to London, I wanted to drop into an up-and-coming start-up here, and so I went to see WeeWorld, an avatar-based social network aimed at teen girls mostly.

Funded by Benchmark Capital’s London colleagues and also Accel Partners, it is typical of a European Web company in its worldwide focus (instead of just the basic U.S. obsession of most in Silicon Valley), even though its CEO Celia Francis (whose online avatar is pictured here) has longtime Silicon Valley experience and is an American.

The site allows a user to create a “WeeMee” character to interact with others on the site or anywhere really, blog, email and even play games. It is gaining traction nicely, it seems.

So here’s a video about my visit to WeeWord, chatting with Francis about the European market and WeeWorld’s not-so-wee world, opening with another tiny tech tour of London:

While in London, I paid a visit to the offices of Yahoo, which are now located near Covent Garden (less upscale than its tonier digs in years past), and which is the new home of its new managing director, Toby Coppel.

Coppel, pictured here and whom I have known for many years, comes from ground zero–literally these days–at Yahoo’s HQ in Sunnyvale, Calif. There, he most recently was the company’s chief strategy officer, reporting directly to recently departed CEO Terry Semel, in a job that included much of the portal giant’s deal-making worldwide.

In Europe, the United Kingdom-born-and-educated Coppel replaced Dominique Vidal, in what will be Coppel’s first foray into serious hands-on operations.

He will have his work cut out for him.

To start, here is a short video of my visit to Yahoo Europe’s HQ, as well as a tiny tour of London on my way there:

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I have known Simon Levene for a long time–he’s been working in the European operations at a handful of Web companies, such as @Home, Time Warner and Yahoo, over the years and is now working as a venture partner at the European branch of Accel Partners, the Palo Alto, Calif., backer of Facebook and other Web 2.0 companies. The London office has about $500 million under management.

Levene always has a sharp view of the scene and is often sharp-tongued–exactly how I prefer my VCs. In our talk, he liked mobile–one must in cellphone-heavy Europe–but not so much widgets, which earned him my undying gratitude for saying so.

Here is my video of him talking about the venture landscape in Europe:

I have arrived in Dublin and am so tired, I am still trying to figure out the time difference and money–yes, I am a completely ignorant American!

Nonetheless, we press on and serve up some interesting items from around the Web–this time with a Euro-focus.

First observation: If you want to make a friend abroad, carry an iPhone. They are not for sale here yet, as deals between Apple and major European telecoms are still pending.

But Apple is likely to sell the iPhone here later in the year, with one of the major carriers, which include Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom’s T-Mobile, France Telecom’s Orange or ultra-hip Telefónica’s 02.

Until then, with it visible in my hand, I made about 53 new friends at Heathrow Airport where I was changing planes. I also scored free first-class champagne from the stewards on board British Airways for giving them a test run of the device.

Most people treated the phone as if it were Paris Hilton suddenly appearing in their midst, with a lot of pointing and gaping at it, as I watched the first season of NBC’s “Heroes” I had downloaded. (Save the cheerleader, indeed! From her creepy adopted Dad is more like it!)

And I could elicit visible oohs when I kept shifting the screen vertically and horizontally, as if I were performing some sort of “Harry Potter” magic.

Since I am in Ireland, here is a link to an Irish blogging site talking about the iPhone.

And check out the video Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert did especially for Philippe Dauman’s appearance at D5 this year–his impression of using an iPhone midway through skewers the ridiculous fascination with the iPhone perfectly.

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