According to sources close to the situation, Index Ventures and Michelangelo Volpi are out of the deal to buy Skype–and their lawsuit-loving nemeses, the founders of the Internet telephony service, are in.
More details to come, but it’s sure proof that the legal system, such as it was used, works.
It’s not likely the announcement of Yahoo’s third-quarter earnings later today will be quite as exciting as its Open Hack Day in Taiwan this past weekend, but BoomTown will try to make those numbers and the conference call afterward with CEO Carol Bartz as entertaining as possible.
Bartz is certain to be so, especially if she lobs some good quotes, as she did in a recent interview about her management style: “I have the puppy theory. When the puppy pees on the carpet, you say something right then because you don’t say six months later, ‘Remember that day, January 12th, when you peed on the carpet?’ That doesn’t make any sense.”
How much does BoomTown pray for more zingers like that? Muchly!
Last Friday, National Public Radio top execs came to San Francisco for a “Digital Think In” to pick the brains of some Silicon Valley types about where the public radio icon should go, digitally speaking.
While NPR actually has been pretty fast-forward with podcasts and a robust Web site, it still has to think about what social networking means to it and whether a day is coming when broadcasting online will be bigger than offline.
Also, what’s up with Twitter?
Like a lot of fans of the “Archie” comic book series–yes, BoomTown is that old–I was irked when Riverdale’s endless teen goofball picked spoiled Veronica over sweet Betty in a recent issue in August.
Not because I like Betty more, but because it ended the long-running love triangle that has been going for almost 70 years.
But apparently, the story is not over, because the whole thing is part of a six-story arc, which includes Archie marrying both Veronica and Betty and having twins with each.
And, you can see it all on your iPhone.
BoomTown could not resist posting this photo for posterity’s sake, taken by All Things Digital Webmaster and master photog Adam Tow.
It pictures a quartet of the tech media’s heavy hitters, all attending at the Apple event in San Francisco today.
Eve Ensler, playwright, activist and creator of V-Day, appeared at the the seventh D: All Things Digital conference in late May to talk about the links between what goes into making mobile phones and human rights violations.
There, she shed much needed light on the dire situation in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, where some of the worst atrocities are now being committed on the population in a terrible civil war.
She predicted it would get worse without massive international intervention.
Tragically, she was right.
This morning, BoomTown was on the very terrific National Public Radio talk show, “On Point,” along with Harvard law professor Jonathan Zittrain.
The program, moderated by Tom Ashbrook on Boston’s WBUR station, was titled “From Desktop to the Digital Cloud” and dealt with the increasing move of data of all kinds online and into the so-called “cloud.”
In other words, eventually, a completely virtual life for music, photos, records and more, and the end of packaged software.
For all the noisy hubbub over should-we-or-shouldn’t-we-publish confidential documents hacked from password-protected accounts of Twitter employees, as well as a Twitter spouse, it is actually pretty simple.
Stolen equals stolen.
But, because this is a “hot” issue and it concerns an even hotter Web 2.0 company–Holy traffic-gooser, Batman!–the debate will surely go on and on, even as the stolen information inevitably leaks its way out.
Still, let’s not pretend what it is and is not.
BoomTown is at the lovely Santa Clara Marriott in Silicon Valley at the 2009 Yahoo annual meeting, liveblogging the event, which should be spectacularly dull.
Here is a rundown of what went on.
10:05 am: The meeting kicks off with a little video presentation with various and sundry television talking heads saying “Yahoo” in quick succession.
Actually, this was the year during which all of those hype-magnets repeated “Twitter” so many times that it has began to make my ears bleed.
But I like the spirit of trying to make Yahoo seem relevant and innovative again.
In what is quite possibly the most spot-on comment about Twitter that BoomTown has heard thus far, Harvard University Professor Jonathan Zittrain said about its use by Iranians protesting the election results there:
“It is easy for Twitter feeds to be echoed everywhere else in the world. The qualities that make Twitter seem inane and half-baked are what make it so powerful.”
In other words, Twitter is so simplistic and silly that it is a perfect digital tool to overthrow a government–which kind of makes the trendy microblogging service the Forrest Gump of international relations.
Does the tech march ever slow down?
Not this week it doesn’t! And Digital Daily’s live-blogger de tutti live-bloggers John Paczkowski will be there to cover every move.
Today, in case you haven’t heard, is the big annual Apple event: The Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco. And, tomorrow brings a Google App confab.
Nutritional journalism information: We’ll be bringing it to you un-processed, but promise it will account of 100 percent of your daily accuracy value.
John Battelle, the founder, chairman and CEO of Federated Media Publishing, told his staff this morning that he will begin a search for a new top exec to take the company into its next stage of growth.
In a post on the FM Web site, Battelle said that he was not leaving the San Francisco-based company and wrote that the new exec–whose title could be CEO–would report to him.
While the current meme is that traditional journalism is getting the stuffing knocked out of it by the digital onslaught, it neglects to notice that a lot of really sharp news reporters are actually getting some real traction by finally starting to be serious about creating online sites that are designed to compete.
As case in point, BoomTown recently visited the offices of TheWrap.com, a Web blog aimed at dominating breaking news about the business of Hollywood and the entertainment industry.
The content-discovery service, StumbleUpon, has gotten itself back to start-up status, after being bought by eBay two years ago.
It announced today that it was returning to being an “investor-backed startup” by a roster of well-known Silicon Valley investors, including Ram Shriram of Sherpalo Ventures, Accel Partners and August Capital.
Its founders, Garrett Camp and Geoff Smith, are also back, with Camp now in place as CEO.
“We are grateful to eBay for its guidance. However, we realized there were few long-term synergies between the two businesses. It is best for us to part ways and focus on our respective strengths,” said Camp, stating the very obvious.
That’s quite a boomerang since it was acquired by the auction giant in 2007 for $75 million.
Don’t miss this weekend’s New York Times piece about the online love match made by a well-known law professor blogger, Ann Althouse, and a longtime commenter on her blog, Laurence Meade, who was smitten by her bon mots
After reading the rest of the story about how they met in digital comments and their relationship slowly moved to analog, it’s hard to imagine that people are going to hook up any other way but online in the future.
Kara Swisher started covering digital issues for The Wall Street Journal's San Francisco bureau in 1997 and also wrote the BoomTown column about the sector. With Walt Mossberg, she co-produces and co-hosts D: All Things Digital, a major high-tech and media conference.
Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.
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