Today, All Things Digital debuts a new feature called “Almost Famous” in our Voices section.
No, it is not about Kate Hudson and nascent rock stars.
Well, you might meet geek rock stars to be.
Focused on innovative, interesting or just plain odd start-ups, we thought it was a good way for our readers to get a gander at some up-and-coming ideas and trends. It will be penned by Drake Martinet every Friday.
Microsoft’s MSN is in preliminary talks with MySpace about using the social networking site’s music service, MySpace Music, to power music offerings on the giant portal.
While sources at both companies cautioned that the talks are still early, Microsoft–which has its own music site that it programs with original and partnered content–execs are interested in goosing its offering.
That’s because MSN Music consistently ranks substantially lower than other big online music properties in terms of traffic, while MySpace Music is always near the top.
This morning, BoomTown will be onstage at California First Lady Maria Shriver’s well-known Women’s Conference in Long Beach, Calif., to moderate a panel titled “Changing the World Through the Web.”
The panelists include Hollywood actor/producer, Katalyst co-founder and Twitter demigod Ashton Kutcher; Facebook’s Randi Zuckerberg; Premal Shah of Kiva.org; and Blue State Digital’s Joe Rospars, who was also new media director for Barack Obama’s presidential campaign.
In other words, as a group, they are all either prettier, smarter or better for the planet than anything I have ginned up so far.
Yesterday, BoomTown traveled to the South Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center–and it was not even time for the annual Consumer Electronics Show!
Instead, I was attending BlogWorld Expo, an annual event for bloggers of all kinds–from military bloggers to political bloggers to a roving pack of mommy bloggers–who gather to find out about all kinds of social media software and tools and, most importantly, how to monetize their sites.
Needless to say, it was blogtastic!
Today, BoomTown got the best quote ever from Scott Monty, when I asked him over lunch about his comparison of social media tools to an illicit drug.
“Social media is the cocaine of the communications industry,” said Monty, who has been global digital and multimedia communications manager for Ford Motor Company since mid-2008.
Riding that Twitter train, high on Facebook cocaine?
Yesterday, BoomTown checked in with Docstoc CEO Jason Nazar about the document sharing start-up.
Today, it’s Trip Adler, CEO of its much larger rival, Scribd.
Launched in early 2007, the San Francisco-based online publishing company allows customers to share a wider range of documents, including books and manuscripts. It now claims to have 10 million documents.
Today, BoomTown has traveled to England to see the Queen, but mostly to attend and speak at a conference at the University of Oxford, titled “Oxford Social Media Convention: Assessing the Evolution, Impact and Potential of Social Media.”
In other words: What is up with this Twitter thing, but in a British accent.
When BoomTown went to visit serial entrepreneur Loïc Le Meur early last year at his San Francisco HQ, he was stoked about the prospects of his “video conversation” community start-up.
Fast-forward to today and the entire business plan of Seesmic has been upended, with the video part pretty much junked. Now Le Meur is focused almost entirely on his social media desktop client, as well as Web and mobile versions, which began as a dashboard for Twitter.
If at first you don’t succeed, dump and change again–the motto of Silicon Valley!
Former Bebo CEO Joanna Shields and Shine Group Chairman and CEO Elisabeth Murdoch have formed a content start-up to produce across media platforms, both online and offline, with a focus on social engagement, according to sources.
The new venture, which does not have a name, is being financially backed by both Shine and Shields.
Based in London, it will invest, develop and partner to create a variety of content offerings that also incorporate interactive and social networking elements.
In a move that will surely have Madison Avenue talking, well-known online advertising sales executive Wenda Harris Millard–who is now president of New York- and Los Angeles-based media consultancy Media Link–is poised to take over all advertising sales at MySpace, sources said.
But, in an unusual twist, the former Yahoo and Martha Stewart exec will remain in her job at Media Link, which has also been hired by MySpace to advise on restructuring the social networking company’s salesforce.
Current President of Sales and Marketing Jeff Berman will be leaving the company, MySpace has told employees via an internal memo.
Here is a slick video about social media that looks at its impact and quick influence, all of which is true, although it does manage to leave out the very pertinent question of whether or not it makes any money or not (because most of it does not yet, of course).
It begins by asking: “Is Social Media a Fad?”
More like a financial dud so far–but, in any case, it is a very fun watch. Created by Socialnomics, a blog by Erik Qualman covering social media, it is also a book that is now coming out.
The board of iLike planned a meeting earlier tonight to go over a buyout offer by MySpace, several sources close to the situation said. But it was suddenly canceled because of some thorny tax implications related to the talent-retention part of the deal to purchase the social music start-up.
This does not mean the pending acquisition is in jeopardy, sources said, and it could be on track to be signed as early as today, barring any more complications.
What’s also been unclear is the actual price the social networking giant is paying for iLike, which has been reported as about $20 million. In fact, only $13.5 million will be paid in cash, with $6 million slated for forward payments to retain key talent.
In an unusually robust collaboration using Facebook Connect, the Huffington Post is launching a feature on Monday called “HuffPost Social News,” which lets readers create a personalized social networking-like news page on the Huffington Post itself.
While the Huffington Post had already been using Facebook Connect since January–which allows readers of the site to log in using their Facebook identity to interact, which is mostly used to leave comments–this essentially takes Facebook Connect and puts it on steroids.
While the use of “social news” will be seen by some as simply a clever PR term, it is an interesting development for both the popular online news site and for the social networking giant.
Last night, BoomTown moderated a really interesting panel for an organization called Girls in Tech, titled “Journalism 2.0 RoundTable.”
Girls in Tech describes itself as a “social network enterprise focused on the engagement, education and empowerment of like-minded, professional, intelligent & influential women.”
With those lofty requirements–combined with the fact that I was a girl when we had yet to land on the moon–I have no idea what I was doing there.
Yahoo confirmed the news–first reported by BoomTown and in The Wall Street Journal last night–that it was buying Xoopit, the San Francisco social email company.
And it did so in both a blog post and on Twitter, as you can see here:
@karaswisher @jvascellaro Your scoops confirmed http://bit.ly/gpOT2.
Well, thanks! But we are already onto new scoops, so try to keep up!
The price for the acquisition, which Yahoo did not reveal, was about $20 million, according to sources.
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.
D is unlike any other executive conference. Since its debut in 2003, D has brought to life the energy and excitement of the digital revolution in an unscripted, upfront and unparalleled way. Read more »
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