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MySpace to Acquire iLike?

posted on August 17, 2009

ilikemyspaceTechCrunch reports that multiple credible sources have confirmed that MySpace, the first social network to garner the hype (then hatred) of the media mind, is fighting its way out of stagnation with a possible acquisition of music-social site iLike. TC lists the price tag as $20 million for the first acquisition since Owen Van Natta (former COO of Facebook) took the helm in April.

iLike is a social music recommendation system. You may have seen the iLike app on friends’ Facebook profiles (or use it yourself), since the app has nearly 10 million users. TechCrunch reports that it’s the top music app on Facebook—and Bebo and Hi5 and most social networks (other than MySpace, which has MySpace Music). With such a wide user base, it seems like iLike was ripe for the picking.

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Breaking: Facebook Acquires FriendFeed

posted on August 10, 2009

This is one of those posts that we’d rather bring to you quickly and fill in the blanks later–Facebook has just announced that it has agreed to acquire social network aggregator FriendFeed.

Facebook today announced that it has agreed to acquire FriendFeed, the innovative service for sharing online. As part of the agreement, all FriendFeed employees will join Facebook and FriendFeed’s four founders will hold senior roles on Facebook’s engineering and product teams.

The full release is here.

It’s interesting that Facebook has intentions to become an aggregator of the social web. It’s already testing the integration of Twitter feeds, and this acquisition confirms its intentions. The big question for me is how will FriendFeed’s loyal users react? Many of them–Robert Scoble included–flocked to FriendFeed’s apparent bipartisan approach to social networking. Will that disappear now that it’s part of Facebook?

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Publicis Goes Fishing for New Ad Revenue, Catches a Razorfish

posted on August 10, 2009

In a Razorfish sale, yet to be officially confirmed, both Microsoft and French ad firm Publicis look set to walk away winners.

Microsoft looks set to recoup $530 million of the $6 billion it paid to acquire aQuantive and, along with it, Razorfish.

Publicis beefs-up its online advertising offering, picks up Microsoft, McDonalds, Google, and Yahoo as clients, and celebrates its 1-year anniversary of acquiring Performics with another big acquisition.

This should be Publicis’ last big-fish acquisition for a while, according to CEO Maurice Levy, "Don’t expect any acquisitions of this magnitude in the short or medium term." Now Publicis has to figure out how to integrate Razorfish, without losing any of the marquee client accounts, and hope that it can turn around a decline in revenue during the first half of 2009.

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Emerging Details: Yahoo May Kill Microsoft Deal if it Fails to Match Google

posted on August 5, 2009

Did you know that if the revenue per search, under a Microsoft/Yahoo partnership, fails to match Google’s estimated revenue, Yahoo can kill the deal?

Did you know that Microsoft must hire 550 Yahoo employees, whether they need them or not?

Did you know that the entire deal is in jeopardy if not completed by July 29 of 2010?

Did you know… OK, enough already!

While these fun facts might not make it into the next edition of Trivial Pursuit, they do make it into the latest 8-K filing from Yahoo. eWeek has a great recap of the fine print not previously announced, and it makes for interesting reading.

For example:

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Google Jumps On2 Video Compression; Sends Google Radio into a WideOrbit

posted on August 5, 2009

I wouldn’t hold your breath, but there’s a chance we’ll soon see the end of pixelated videos on YouTube. Google has today announced the acquisition of On2 Technologies and its portfolio of video compression technology. The $106.5 million deal could signal that we’ll soon see better compression technology used at YouTube– which means those videos that look great on your desktop, will still look great when they get to YouTube.

“Today video is an essential part of the web experience, and we believe high-quality video compression technology should be a part of the web platform,” said Sundar Pichai, Vice President, Product Management, Google in a statement. “We are committed to innovation in video quality on the web, and we believe that On2′s team and technology will help us further that goal.”

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Dear Microsoft, Thank You! Love, Barry Diller

posted on July 30, 2009

Barry Diller: Microsoft, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

1. Your deal with Yahoo shadowed our poor Q2 financial results.

While the whole world focused on the minutiae of the search deal between Microsoft and Yahoo, Diller’s IAC released its quarterly numbers. They weren’t up to analyst estimates, so I’m sure Diller was glad to have the insulation offered by the Microhoo hype.

IAC said revenue from its media and advertising unit, which includes search engine Ask.com, fell by 10% to $168.6 million. The company’s overall revenue declined 4% to $340 million.

2. When our deal with Google expires in 2012, we now have options.

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For Fun: Microsoft/Yahoo Caption Contest

posted on July 29, 2009

Let’s face it, the news is going to be swamped with the MSFT/YHOO deal today. So, for some light-hearted relief, let’s have a caption contest. Here’s an official photo provided courtesy of Yahoo!/Microsoft:

Leave your caption in the comments below and the best one–as chosen by me tomorrow at 9am ET–will win a $25 Amazon gift card. Please keep them clean.

Here’s mine: “We’ll take care of search from here on out, you can keep the “goofy, over-sized pen” business.” ;-)

We have a winner!

I have to give kudos to all the Pilgrims that left a caption–you guys are funny! In the end, this one made me laugh the hardest: