Just a reminder: today is the most important day of the year. It’s TC DC Mini Meet-up Night! We’re here in DC and we’re looking forward to meeting with you all at RFD (810 7th St NW) at 6pm for some networking, some fun, and some start-up talk.

I’ve been doing these things in the US and Europe for a few years now and my style is very laid back and very organic. This is a very informal event – we won’t be having speeches, panels, or wonkery. We’re here to hear pitches, talk tech, and discuss what you’ve been up to. Come along even if you have nothing to launch. After all, maybe you’ll meet your next start-up partner tonight.

As a special bonus, DC meet-up folks will get to meet our new co-editor, Eric Eldon, who is coming in from San Francisco and who will be in DC with us that evening.

Furthermore, we are in Norfolk on Tuesday, and Richmond on Wednesday. You should have already RSVPed (did you?), you should have already picked out what you’re going to wear (did you?), and you should have your pitch ready (do you?).

Thanks to all those who helped out in organizing this and a huge thank you to our sponsors. We’re really looking forward to this opportunity to meet with you guys in the tech corridor. Feeling left out? Fear not. We’ll be hitting other cities this summer.

Tweet us at @johnbiggs or @jordanrcrook if you have questions or concerns.

Monday, April 9 – DC – RFD – 810 7th St NW – 6pm-10pm (??) – Our first event will be at RFD in NW. These guys have a huge selection of beers on tap and, if we play our cards right, we’ll have a few hours of open bar. If you haven’t RSVPed hop over to Plancast or email me at [email protected] with the subject “RSVP DC.” Try to include a rough headcount.

Sponsors

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Tuesday, April 10 – Norfolk – We Are Titans Offices – 259 Granby St 3rd Floor – 6pm-10pm – We will begin the night at the We Are The Titans offices, kindly provided by a team of titans who work there, and the perhaps we can move to another location later. Please RSVP here or email me at [email protected] with the subject “RSVP NORFOLK.” Try to include a rough headcount. We are also looking for sponsors, so please let me know in a separate, non-RSVP email if you’re interested.

Here’s a little bit about our first Norfolk sponsor:

Also sponsoring Norfolk is Create Digital.

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Wednesday, April 11 – Richmond – SnagAJob HQ – 6pm-10pm – 4851 Lake Brook Dr – Finally, we’ll meet in Glen Allen, outside of Richmond, for our final meet-up. Thanks to SnagAJob for donating a space with a bar and some booze. We’re still looking for Richmond sponsors as well, so please email me directly. RSVP here or email me at [email protected] with the subject “RSVP RICHMOND.” Try to include a rough headcount.

Here’s a bit about our first Richmond sponsor:

Also sponsoring Richmond is Create Digital.

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/mWuq9f-7nnc/

The folks behind a forthcoming fashion catalog for the iPad, Bazaart, have launched an interesting side project in their downtime (what’s that?) from their participation in DreamIt’s new Israel-based startup accelerator program. In need of something similar for themselves, the company launched a Facebook app called “Pinvolve” which converts Facebook Pages into Pinterest pinboards.

To use Pinvolve, you have to first be logged into Facebook as one of the page’s admins before installing the app. Once up-and-running, Pinvolve creates a new section on your Facebook page which presents all your photo posts in a Pinterest-like fashion – that is, in the typical image pinboard style that’s now associated with the popular social networking service.

The app also pulls in the Facebook likes and comments associated with each post, as well as the comments’ text. If a post has a lot of comments, however, only the first few will be listed on the main Pinvolve page, with a link to the rest provided below. When clicked, that link will take you to the photo’s page on Facebook.

However, Pinvolve isn’t just about re-displaying Facebook content with a Pinterest look-and-feel, it also provides tools that let you and the page’s fans re-share those posts over on Pinterest. When you hover over an image on the Pinvolve pinboard, Pinterest’s “Pin it” button appears. Clicking this will then re-post that content to Pinterest itself.

You can see an example of Pinvolve in action now, over on fashion model, blogger and designer Audrey Kitching’s Facebook Page here.

According to Bazaart co-founder Dror Yaffe, the idea for Pinvolve came from his team’s own need to market their content on what’s now the third most popular social network.

“We’ve been marketing our applications on Facebook and Twitter, but when Pinterest became a major player we were baffled,” he says. “As a young startup, our resources are very limited and it takes a lot of effort to market on another social network. So, as a side project, we’ve developed Pinvolve.”

Despite the fact that the company has done very little marketing or media outreach, (save for a bit coverage by Israeli sites), the app is already installed on over 1,000 Facebook Pages as of today. Using Pinvolve on its own page, Yaffe says they’ve increased their re-pins by over 150%, and this figure is consistent across the app’s early adopters.

Although the basic version is being made available for free, Facebook page owners are offered an option to upgrade to Pinvolve’s white label plan, which removes the “Get Pinvolve Now” button from the page, and allows you to customize the “like” button, the cover photo, and lets you link from the app directly to your Pinteret profile. For now, this option is available for the (pretty much no-brainer) price of $9.99. It will later bump up to $19.99.

To try out Pinvolve for yourself, head over to the app’s page here: http://apps.facebook.com/pinvolve.

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/QLPgMMvsafo/

Not everyone is happy about Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram this morning, it seems. In an apparent insta-backlash, a bunch of folks are tweeting about their intentions to delete their Instagram accounts now that Facebook has tainted their trendy social network with its massive data-grabbing paws.

It’s a spectacle even worse than when Instagram launched on Android, prompting all those #teamiPhone tweets. Sigh.

Some tech blogs are even posting tips and tools that help you get your data out of the service, too, like Instaport, for example. On Hacker News, a user dug up the Instagram page that lets you delete your account. Hooray. (Note: don’t click that link in haste unless you’re sure. All your photos will be gone, and you can’t re-register under the same username in the future.)

Evident among the tweeters are the typical concerns that when a big company steps in, it means things will never be the same – that Facebook will shut down the service or that they’ll change it somehow – two things Facebook and Instagram have both assured users they aren’t planning on doing. Others are concerned with what an influx of the Facebook mainstream user base will mean for their hip (but not so little) community.

guess i might as well go ahead and delete my instagram now. the Android ppl weren’t that bad. but frequent FB users are treacherous.

— Trill Gates (@McNyce) April 9, 2012

Even more users seem to be concerned about Facebook’s privacy-invading ways, and are posting tweets related to how Facebook is set on collecting all your personal into one big database…so you’d better get your data out now before it’s too late!

Of these, one of the more notable Insta-quitters is Boing Boing’s Xeni Jardin, who at least explained her position with a bit more enthusiasm, not to mention vehemence, than others, saying, “I quit Facebook after the umptymillionth privacy fuckup. I vote with my attention and my data input. I vote no to that shit.”

She also re-tweeted gdgt’s Peter Rojas, who posted:

“Most people disagree, but I think it’s important to not use services you have issues with, even if they are free.”

Over-reaction from the Insta-hipsters? Another example of what all that Facebook fear-mongering can lead to? Or perhaps something indicative of a growing desire among social networking users for smaller, more private networks?

Maybe a little of all of the above.

Yes, Facebook is free, meaning you’re the product that gets sold. But Instagram is free, too, and massively growing. Eventually, it would have figured out how to monetize your eyeballs as well, albeit on a smaller scale than Facebook does now.

But there’s still something to be said about these Insta-quitters, though – it could be that for these users, Instagram, like other, new micro social networks (think Path, Pair, Pinweel, etc.), had provided an alternative to, and even an escape from, Facebook and all its apparently frightening size and scale.

And with that protection gone, so are they.

There is a huge (and growing) market of people who want nothing to do with facebook. Hint hint.

— Sean Bonner Ⓥ (@seanbonner) April 9, 2012

Same here. WHY ZUCK WHYYYYYYY “@Pecora_: @xeni I’m pissed, Instagram is my favorite app. Actually I use it even more than twitter.”

— Xeni Jardin (@xeni) April 9, 2012

RT delete urs ! @CBaezzz Delete ur instagram!! The Feds own it now!!

— Anto(@Toniiiiii_) April 9, 2012

Rt @reallybigweek: INSTAGRAM | I want to delete my account – Done. tmblr.co/ZwwhbwJN1oSH for the truly Facebook-phobic

— Martin Warne (@mwarne) April 9, 2012

ooo noo fb bought instagram, better delete my account erm nm didnt have one to start with

— Justin Case (@TeamAndIRC) April 9, 2012

time to delete instagram “@instagram: We’re excited to announce something very big: Instagram + Facebook bit.ly/Hslpv2”

— Hamce M (@Napaceni) April 9, 2012

Bout to delete instagram now that FB is over it.. When too many people catch on, it’s time to move on!

— BrIIght Red (@WhosBennie) April 9, 2012

If you delete your Instagram account, because Facebook bought them, you probably have a basement full of canned foods and flashlights.

— Alex Williams (@alexcwilliams) April 9, 2012

DELETE YOUR INSTAGRAM ACCOUNT! i call it ‘instaExodus’ and it happens friday the 13th.#instaExodus #joinus

— matt klaman (@mattklaman) April 9, 2012

Facebook buys Instagram for $1B. Don’t want Facebook to have even more of your data? Delete your Instagram account: instagram.com/accounts/remov…

— Christopher Soghoian (@csoghoian) April 9, 2012

Facebook is buying Instagram…. Shame I liked Instagram too… Guess I’ll have to delete them simultaneously

— Corey Gensler (@photogC) April 9, 2012

Obligatory tweet about Fb’s acquisition of Instagram causing surges of pseudo-intellectual trendsetters to delete their accounts.

— Chase Eversole (@ChaseEversole) April 9, 2012

RT @adamparish RT @rontec76: Neat. Facebook bought Instagram. Guess that’s one more app I can delete.

— meaganbyrd (@meaganbyrd) April 9, 2012

This is why we can’t have nice things. #instagram #facebook

— Jason Burns (@jasonburns) April 9, 2012

So. Facebook is buying Instagram. Ugh. (delete, delete, delete)

— Angie (@CornBread10) April 9, 2012

Soon as I delete my Facebook they decide to buy instagram #FML

— Erick Florian (@Eazythekid) April 9, 2012

Great I got to delete instagram now Facebook just bought instagram for 1 billion dollars

— Chad Wages (@CDub445) April 9, 2012

So Facebook is buying Instagram… that was a good app, i’ll know doubt have to delete it now #ihatefacebook

— Emma Bates(@_EmmaBates) April 9, 2012

UPDATE:

I can’t believe Facebook bought Instagram for $1 billion! The fun’s over! Time to delete my Instagram account now. Also, what’s Instagram?

— Betty F*ckin’ White (@BettyFckinWhite) April 9, 2012

Image credit: Hilariously, Instagram user QuarryGirl

• INSTAGRAM

Instagram is a free photo sharing application that allows users to take photos, apply a filter, and share it on the service or a variety of other social networking services, including Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Tumblr, Flickr , Foursquare and Posterous.[2] The application is compatible with any iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch running iOS 3.1.2 or above.

Instagram, in an homage to both the Kodak Instamatic and Polaroid cameras, confines photos into a square shape. This is in contrast to the…

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Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/9ac5Pt8hFPw/

The use of social media in the enterprise has been a path well-trod by companies using mass market tools like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to communicate with peers, customers, investors and anyone else who might be interested in what they’re up to. But when it comes to the most senior information executives, they’re actually a little antisocial.

According to data compiled by social software provider harmon.ie, only about 10 percent of CIOs in the top companies — Fortune 250 and and Global 250 — actively use public social networks. Within that group, only four CIOs write blogs, and more than one-third either do not have LinkedIn profiles, or have profiles with fewer than 100 connections.

Among the top-25 most social CIOs are a number of tech names such as SAP (whose CIO Oliver Bussmann topped the list), Google, Microsoft and IBM. The CIOs of media giant Omnicom, Royal Bank of Scotland and Office Depot also made the list.

Harmon.ie says that its analysis is based on a combination of the strength of the CIOs’ LinkedIn network, CIO’s retweet frequency, socialmention scores, blog reach, citations by other influential bloggers, Google+ Circle inclusion and other “related factors.”

What to make of these conclusions? Although you can argue that major businesses will have specialists employed to watch over how a company uses social media, on another level this is kind of surprising. It indicates that people tasked with helming the leading companies in their information technology, and deciding on how to invest in social media specifically, may not know all that much about it, specifically in a first-hand way but possibly more generally, too.

“These 250 CIOs are charged with transforming the world’s largest enterprises, yet our analysis shows that most have relatively little experience using the kinds of tools that are needed to drive that change,” says Mark Fidelman, harmon.ie’s chief social strategist and lead author of the analysis.

But on the other hand, conclusions like this also seem to imply that even if social media has become huge among consumers, most enterprises are not actually putting it front and center in their own IT road maps.

Even with the most social of CIOs, you get a sense that this is all still about laying groundwork for the future rather than staking something out for today. Bussmann at SAP says that his company has found that SAP’s investments in blogs, Twitter and the rest have resulted in only a 3 percent-5 percent positive impact on the SAP brand.

And that’s saying nothing for the times when social media gets used and the result is a big fail.

So how does the world’s “most social CIO” use social media?

SAP’s CIO Oliver Bussmann tells me he got started with his social media use in 2006, with an internal blog covering corporate IT issues such as enterprise mobility — the first foray that many made at that time into user-generated content and getting more social. That blog eventually was made public and Bussmann says it is now one of the most-visited blogs in SAP’s blog network.

Today, he says he uses Twitter (4,218 followers) most of all in his social communication, with Facebook and LinkedIn having secondary roles. He gets the most traffic, he says, from people on Twitter, while LinkedIn is more for people reaching out to him to work at SAP. And on Facebook, “People comment but not so much on business topics.”

One site that seems just as overtly consumer as Facebook but has caught Bussmann’s attention is Pinterest, for its different approach to sharing and organizing information.

“Pinterest is something that is out there working from a visual point of view,” he says. “I can see a great opportunity there, especially when you think of how you can quickly scan 200 or 300 headlines and get a sense of the bigger market environment. I think Pinterest might be the place for sharing in the future.”

[photo: timbu, Flickr]

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/ZuVbJulaze8/

Editor’s Note: A guest post by Uzi Shmilovici, CEO and founder of Future Simple, the company behind Base CRM.

Strategy. Unfortunately, it suffers from a bad reputation among startups. It is associated with consultants who are paid millions of dollars only to come back with a two-by-two matrix of animals. Not that there is anything wrong with it. Some of my best friends are consultants.

However, strategy is crucial for startup success. Startups usually operate in an environment of constrained resources while competing with strong incumbents. Hence, the right strategy can be a matter of life and death. This post is the first in a series of posts that will explore concepts in strategy and how they apply to startups.

The first concept we’ll look at is the “Innovator’s dilemma”, a term coined by Clayton Christensen from the Harvard Business School. The innovator’s dilemma discusses a situation in which there are established incumbents in a specific market who are investing in sustainable innovations — these are incremental improvements to an existing product. Usually, they are doing that to support the incremental needs of their customers.

They are then faced with a new entrant to the market that introduces a disruptive innovation. The new entrant attacks only a small part of the incumbents’ business, usually the one in which the margins are very low. At this point, the incumbent decides not to compete in this business anymore because they don’t want to invest in defending their least profitable business and/or are afraid of cannibalizing their main business. As a result, the new entrant is then able to capture a significant market share in that specific segment.

What happens next is funny. After it captures the low end of the market, the entrant moves upstream to the next part of the business. Again, the incumbent is reluctant to compete in that segment which is now its newest least profitable segment. The entrant then captures a significant market share in this second segment.

What happens next is funny. OK, you got the point…

Before we continue, it is important to understand the types of disruptive innovation that exist. There are four: a new product, a new technology to produce a product, a new way to distribute a product and a new way to provide services. The entrant can introduce a disruptive innovation along one or more of these dimensions.

Why would anyone buy books on the internet?

1995. The commercial internet is in its early days. Jeff Bezos decides to start selling books online. At that time, the biggest booksellers in the United States are Barnes and Noble and Borders.

Bezos understands that he can disrupt the book industry by taking advantage of the internet as a new distribution channel. Amazon launches and grows exponentially. It takes BN two years to open its own website. What took them so long? Well, not too many people buy on the internet and they are far better investing their resources in their major business — the retail stores.

It takes Borders three years to launch their website. At this point, Amazon is far down the road. In 2001, Borders decides let Amazon run their website for them. After all, the internet is just a small percentage of their sales anyway.

On February 16th, 2011 Borders files for bankruptcy.

If you’ll look around, you’ll find many industries that experienced or are experiencing a similar type of disruption. A small sample from internet startups — Zynga : Gaming Companies, AirBnB : Hotel Chains, Box : Sharepoint.

The Innovator’s dilemma and your startup

There’s a reason why so many internet startups were able to use the concepts from the innovator’s dilemma. The internet provides an amazing platform to build disruptive products, and more importantly, create and leverage new distribution channels.

So, how should you think about the innovator’s dilemma? Here are four key takeaways:

1. Understand what is the source of your disruption. Is it a new product or a new way to distribute an existing product? This will help you understand whether you are really disrupting the market or just building an incremental product.
2. Pay attention to opportunities in new distribution channels. Zynga’s biggest innovation was taking advantage of Facebook as its distribution channel before the traditional gaming companies could say “Mark Zuckerberg”.
3. Start by marketing to the group of customers for which the incumbent in your industry has the lowest margin or the lowest interest to defend. Don’t go head to head on their most important customers. They will crush you.
4. Remember these lessons when you are at the top.

Figuring out how to compete in your market will take a lot of time and effort. Remember that these frameworks are just tools to help you think through the problem and will not provide you with a magic answer. You’ll have to discover it yourself.

Image credit: isdky — Brian Barnett, Flickr

• UZI SHMILOVICI

Uzi Shmilovici is an internet entrepreneur. He co-founded Netcraft – an Israeli web agency in 2003. Over the years, Netcraft set the tone and became an industry leader in Israel, setting standards in user experience, design and development for the web. Those achievements were recognized when he was named one of the Top-40 Israeli Internet Startup Professionals by TheMarker Magazine in 2008 (the most prominent business magazine in Israel). Netcraft was later acquired by Tapuz, a leading Israeli internet…

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Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/uhHiQeeRoxM/

Editor’s Note: Ian Lurie is CEO of Portent Inc, an internet marketing agency that he founded in 1995. He co-published Web Marketing All-In-One for Dummies, where he wrote the sections on SEO, blogging, social media and web analytics. He also wrote Conversation Marketing: Internet Marketing Strategies.

I’m a Google-phile. Or at least, I was. Lately, my gut’s felt a bit wobbly every time someone mentions the big G. Page, Brin and company have lost their focus. Once, they helped us all find the stuff we needed. Now, they spend their time in slap fights with Facebook. It’s almost like the Googlers are no longer in charge at Google.

That’s because they’re not. The Google IPO put the company’s fate in the hands of investors. And it’s ruined the company. IPO-bashing is popular right now. But I’m not just jumping on the bandwagon here. The evidence is pretty damning: Pre-IPO, Google was laser-focused on being the best tool on earth for search-and-discovery, and they appeared unstoppable. Post-IPO, the company has lurched from one social media debacle to another.

Google’s total victory

Google owns search. According to Search Engine Land, Bing still only holds 15% market share. Google? 66%. That’s a mind-boggling lead when you consider the money Microsoft has poured into promoting their search engine. Put an average apartment complex next to the Empire State Building. That’s the difference between Bing and Google.

Google has the closest thing to total victory they’re likely to get. The also-rans don’t compete with them—they compete with each other. And everyone’s an also-ran.

How Google makes money

Google makes its money with their pay-per-click network, Google Adwords. Advertisers purchase clicks, one click at a time, in a modified, keyword-based auction. The Adwords model is brilliant. Correctly implemented, it’s a money-generating machine for everyone involved, including Google.

In 2011, Adwords accounted for at least 95% of the company’s income. But it has its limits: In an Adwords model, clicks are your inventory. When you run out of inventory, your revenue stops growing. That’s OK. You can make incremental gains by getting more clicks, and you can get more clicks with better, more ubiquitous search tools.

The IPO trap

But post-IPO, incremental revenue growth isn’t enough. Stock prices are emotional, and incremental isn’t exciting. If you want shareholders to love you, you have to make them a lot of money. That means dramatically outperforming last quarter’s numbers.

In 2011, Google earned $103 million per day. That’s a staggering amount, particularly if you’ve got shareholders clamoring for you to crush your past numbers. To do so, Google will have to find an entire new line of business: A new source of advertising revenue to match Adwords. Or, they’ll have to find a massive new venue in which to place Adwords.

Ironically, Google’s penalized by their success: They’re so dominant in search that they must go far, far outside their expertise to maintain their share price.

IPOs force a company to forever outperform past results, no matter how miraculous. That’s where Google is, right now: Pushed to surpass total victory in their space, they have to move on to an entirely different one.

Suspicious timing

Google didn’t attempt to create their own social network until Orkut. That was early 2004, just before they filed for their IPO. At that point, the pressure was already building to find a new way to generate shareholder value.

How’d Orkut do? Do you remember it? Didn’t think so. Sidewiki? Failed. Friend Connect? Gone. Google Wave didn’t even get past testing. Now we’ve got Google Plus, which is showing some of the worst engagement numbers of any major social media site.

Success is beside the point

I think Google Plus has a lot of strengths. It could succeed. But even if it does, the social media red herring so distracts Google from search that the giant will become vulnerable, for the first time. And understand: Search generates Google’s dramatic revenue numbers. Not social media.

And make no mistake: Google’s work in social is compromising their search supremacy: They’ve ended their ‘firehose’ agreement with Twitter. That agreement allowed them to deliver near-real-time results from one of the internet’s biggest social networks. Now, they don’t get instant access to Twitter posts.

In addition, Google’s started showing Plus posts in search results. That works if Google Plus reaches critical mass, where most Google users are also Plus users. But that’s not currently the case.

By stuffing Google Plus posts into search results and excluding Twitter/Facebook results, they’re cutting off two huge content sets, and replacing them with a smaller, less relevant one. That is not good for the relevance of their results.

So, even if Google Plus survives and grows, it’s unlikely the benefits to Google will outweigh the costs. And Google wouldn’t be doing this, I think, if not for their shareholders.

What’s next?

Google is now beholden to shareholders. They can’t change that. What they can do is stop pandering, and start leveraging their greatest strengths:

• They own two of the largest search engines in the world: Google and YouTube.
• They know more about information discovery than any of their competitors.
• They have a dominant e-mail toolset in GMail.
• They have the biggest information corpus in the world.
• They have a mountain of cash.

It’ll be hard to do. Shareholders get excited about social media, not about a better search tool. But for shareholders and Googlers alike, real success will come from strong, sustainable growth. And that depends more on growing their strengths than struggling against their weaknesses.

• GOOGLE

Google provides search and advertising services, which together aim to organize and monetize the world’s information. In addition to its dominant search engine, it offers a plethora of online tools and platforms including: Gmail, Maps, YouTube, and Google+, the company’s extension into the social space. Most of its Web-based products are free, funded by Google’s highly integrated online advertising platforms AdWords and AdSense. Google promotes the idea that advertising should be highly targeted and relevant to users thus providing…

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Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/aYvuIXlt4ls/

I think the folk tale of employers asking to see a candidate’s Facebook account was apocryphal at best, but it seems like it’s even being debunked in HR circles. Andy Lester a blogger on high-tech career-hunting, has noted that the tale, which surfaced in an AP story a few weeks ago, has been picked up as an example of the horrible state of hiring in this country. Pundits have opined, ink has been spilled, and now interviewees are ready to go into future places of work full of righteous indignation, just waiting for the mention of Facebook. But for the most part it’s an urban legend.

First, most social media accounts are an open book in the first place. I suspect potential recruiters pop over to Google to look up potential hires and I expect the reverse is true. The idea that a recruiter is interested in seeing you drunk at a party is far-fetched (unless you’re working at a place that you probably wouldn’t want to work at anyway) and a healthy social media presence isn’t much of a hindrance anymore.

Lester writes:

Generally it feels like employers are in the cat-bird seat and can basically make us do anything they ask. I don’t think that’s true. Hiring is up and good folks in the tech sector are as sought-after as they were before the crash. Management candidates may have to pee into a cup in order to control cash at a company, but I doubt Facebook usage is a very good metric for hiring in any case.

Besides, shouldn’t you have two social media presences, one professional and one private? And why are you posting drunk pics of yourself in the first place? In many cases it’s a buyers market out there and job seekers, alongside the usual concerns with buying a new suit and printing out a resume, have to be well aware of the reach and impact of their online presence.

via News.Ycombinator.

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/kholmw1_1hw/

SoMe is a film about the rise (and fall?) of social media. Produced by web rabble-rouser and satirist, Loren Feldman, the film will feature Feldman’s signature puppet act (it will be cool, I promise) and interviews with and segments about web luminaries like:

Julia Allison, Michael Arrington, Steve Ballmer, Henry Blodget, Chris Brogan, Robert Bruce, Paul Carr, Pete Cashmore, Brian Clark, Ron Conway, Henry Copland, Jay Cuthrell, Mike Daisey, Barry Diller, Jack Dorsey, Dan Farber, Steve Gillmor, Paul Graham, MC Hammer, Shel Israel, Andrew Jecklin, Steve Jobs, Kim Kardashian, Ashton Kutcher, Loic LeMeur, Jakob Lodwick

Feldman is an experienced film producer and comedian and he knows where all the bodies are buried so it may be a good time when it all comes together. He’s asking for $50,000 to fund the project and he’s already hit $5,000 or so with six days left. Here’s hoping he resurrects the Hendrickson puppet.

Project Page

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/social/~3/2NxgNxKRqc4/

Socialize, the new platform that allows mobile developers to instantly add social features to their apps, has come a long way since its November launch of its Social Action Bar. Apparently, developers are giving this one a shot…in droves. 5,500 developers have downloaded the mobile toolkit to date, with 562 apps in testing and 150 apps which have gone live with integrations. (Here are a few).

The startup is also now reaching over 10 million end users, up from 3.7 million in November. And its user base is doubling monthly, the company says.

According to CEO Daniel Odio, via new downloads, the SDK now reaches 2 million end users (that is, users who download Socialize-infused apps). However, the majority of that 10 million figure comes via the company’s AppMakr channel.

For background, Socialize actually grew out of the app-making service AppMakr, which had previously built apps for brands like Disney, The Washington Post, Newsweek and Politico. It later rebranded as Socialize with a focus on the social app SDK. Since then, AppMakr has served as sort of a testing ground for the new offerings, and was already reaching 3.7 million end users via the Socialize beta at the time of the Socialize Action Bar SDK public launch.

Since then, the startup has been focused on boosting installs and impressions in apps running Socialize, and is helping developers bring in new users to their apps through the social actions of app users. As users comment, like, and share from within the app, they’re essentially serving as the app’s marketers.

The company recently showcased a few success stories on its blog, where app makers were reporting increases in impressions and revenue. One, a finance app for the Spanish stock market, saw impressions go up 316%, and revenue up 257%. A couple of others, one a couponing app, another a fitness app, saw impressions increase by 120% and 103%, respectively.

Socialize bootstrapped itself by selling a mobile consulting company called PointAbout to fund some of its growth, and currently has $1.5 million in angel funding to help it along.

Now, with Apple’s phasing out of the UDID (the unique device identifier used for user tracking), the company hopes more developers will become interested in its service, which provides insight into user activity surrounding social actions – likes, comments, and shares.

Developers can download the SDK for iOS or Android here.

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If you’re wondering what Philip Kaplan, a.k.a. Pud, has been up to, wonder no longer: He’s working on a social network for musicians called Fandalism. The site went live at the end of January, and without any publicity or advertising, it has grown to more than 350,000 registered users.

You may remember Kaplan as the founder of the blog FuckedCompany and the ad network AdBrite. More recently, he co-founded social shopping startup Blippy, and when the product failed to take off (the other founders are working something new), he focused on smaller projects like newsletter-maker TinyLetter, which was acquired by MailChimp in August.

One thing you might notice: None of these projects seems particularly related to any others. And Fandalism continues that non-pattern. Kaplan says he has actually owned the URL for several years, at one point experimenting with using it as a “YouTube for songs.” He returned to the domain last year as a way to meet one of his own needs: He’s a musician (primarily a heavy metal drummer), and he wanted to connect with other musicians.

Right now, Kaplan says the main way for musicians to find other musicians online is through Craigslist. There’s also Indaba Music, which similarly promises to help musicians find each other, but it’s more focused on collaborating on specific projects. (The site describes itself as a “the music creation marketplace.”) Kaplan wanted to make something that was more social, and also fairly straightforward and simple.

When you create a profile on Fandalism, you enter basic information like where you’re located, the genres of music you play, and your influences. You can also answer questions about your musical history, such as “What was the first concert you went to?”, and share your work through photos, lyrics, and embedded YouTube videos and SoundCloud songs. Then, once your profile is set up, you can start following other members, posting comments on their profiles, giving “props” to their performances, and sending them private messages.

As an example, you can see Kaplan’s profile here.

Judging from the rapid, word-of-mouth user growth, it seems that other musicians also thought there was a need here. And it’s an international userbase — at one point during our demo, Kaplan started searching for musicians in random countries, and the only one that came up empty was Luxembourg. We even found someone in Kazakhstan.

The site was completely invite-only until earlier this week, when Kaplan opened it up a bit, allowing anyone to browse and search. However, you still need an invite from another member to create a profile and post — Kaplan says it’s a basic way to ensure that someone else is vouching for your talent as a musician, so he plans to keep membership invite-only for now. (You can also join as a non-musician, but you’ll need an invite for that, too.)

As for making money, Kaplan says he has some ideas, such as allowing instrument manufacturers to advertise on the site. However, he doesn’t sound committed to any particular model right now. Nor does he seem particularly interested in raising funding, though he doesn’t reject the idea outright, or in hiring any employees. Yep, Kaplan has reached hundreds of thousands of members with a solo project, and while that isn’t quite an Instagram-level user-to-employee ratio, he wouldn’t mind getting there someday.

“Being able to be one guy and have a site with potentially millions of users — you can only do that now,” Kaplan says. “I would like to have 10 million users and still be one person.”

• PHILIP KAPLAN

Companies:
adBrite, Kaplan Index, Tweetname, Flirt140, fast140, FuckedCompany, SuperFan, Blippy, i/o Ventures, BranchOut, Mobog, Punch Your Friends, Faqme

Philip Kaplan (@pud) is a programmer and entrepreneur in San Francisco, CA. He is the founder of TinyLetter (email service provider, acquired by MailChimp), Blippy (venture-backed social commerce company), and AdBrite (a large Internet ad network). He also developed several iPhone apps, including the best selling “Punch Your Friends.”

In 2010, Philip was entrepreneur-in-residence at Charles River Ventures. Philip founded and sold several other businesses including F-ckedcompany.com and PK Interactive, a software company that developed…

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