Fit For Commerce: Experts in eCommerce Consulting

Overview
Company offers consulting services for ecommerce vendors/sites. Experts in starting ebusinesses and revamping existing ones. The team of former multichannel retailers and experts has hands-on experience from many years in eCommerce in over a hundred large and small online businesses.

CEO is Bernardine Wu, former president and COO of Venda, where she was instrumental in Venda's launch and growth in North America. Clients included: Lands' End, Neiman Marcus, Crabtree & Evelyn, UnderArmour, Pokemon and DoItYourself.com.

Offerings
• Figure out what you need and where to find it
• Define your detailed functional and technical requirements
• Assess your eCommerce needs and strategies
• Strong Ecommerce consultant team
• Design wireframes and site navigation
• Benchmark against industry best practices
• Write an effective RFP and analyze responses
• Sort through the clutter of technology offerings to find the best fit
• Ask and answer the right questions and stretch your thinking

Manticore Technology - Next Gen sales lead generation, 100+ customers

Interesting company and solution set. Customers include Jaspersoft, Riverbed Technology, Intellitactics, Red Seal Systems, Renewdata.com and Liquid Machines. Company does not appear to be venture funded and is led by Jeff Erramouspe (ex Vignette/Compaq).

Overview
Manticore demand generation platforms for B2B marketers for any size company with any level of sophistication. Company works with startup looking to make your mark or a multi-national.

- Deliver powerful SAAS demand generation solutions which enables B2B marketers to generate more leads.
- Identify which leads are ready to buy
- Nurture less-qualified leads through the pipeline
- NO implementation costs, NO consulting costs, NO setup costs

Why Demand generation is a growing trend and Manticore is the best solution:
- Faster and more efficient way to market ebusinesses
- Increased revenue and improved marketing effectiveness
- Implemented with complete CRM integration in one-hour.
- Unique, multi-tenant architecture creates a highly configurable environment that can save valuable resources, reduce time-to-impact and accelerate ROI

Bberg: VC Funds lost 21% 2008

"Venture-capital funds lost 21 percent of their value last year as a closed market for initial public offerings kept young companies from delivering returns for early investors.

Almost the entire decline came in the fourth quarter, after the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. roiled financial markets, the National Venture Capital Association said yesterday. The association's performance index fell 19 percent from Oct. 1 to Dec. 31.

Falling stock prices made it more difficult for start-ups to sell shares or merge with larger competitors. Last year, the number of IPOs by start-ups fell to the lowest level since 1977, as the Standard & Poor's 500 index lost 38 percent."

iPhone versus Palm Pre comparison chart.

From precentral- an interesting iPhone versus Palm Pre comparison chart , showing side-by-side feature, function differences

Apple's App Store Downloads Top One Billion in Just Nine Months

"Apple® today announced that customers have downloaded one billion applications from its revolutionary App Store, the largest applications store in the world. The one billionth app, Bump created by Bump Technologies, was downloaded by Connor Mulcahey, age 13, of Weston, CT. As the grand prize winner of Apple's one billion app countdown contest, Connor will receive a $10,000 iTunes® gift card, an iPod® touch, a Time Capsule® and a MacBook® Pro."

""The revolutionary App Store has been a phenomenal hit with iPhone and iPod touch users around the world, and we'd like to thank our customers and developers for helping us achieve the astonishing milestone of one billion apps downloaded," said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. "In nine months, the App Store has completely revolutionized the mobile industry and this is only the beginning."

Today, the groundbreaking App Store has more than 35,000 applications available to consumers in 77 countries, allowing developers to reach tens of millions of iPhone(TM) and iPod touch users around the world. This summer the iPhone OS 3.0 software update will provide developers with over 1,000 new developer APIs enabling In-App Purchases, Peer-to-Peer connections, App control of accessories, and Push Notifications. The iPhone OS 3.0 release will also add over 100 customer features including cut, copy and paste; Spotlight(TM) search; landscape keyboard and view for all key iPhone apps; MMS* support; and expanded parental controls for apps, TV shows, and movies from the App Store.

*MMS messaging is available only on iPhone 3G; fees may apply. MMS may not be available in all areas.

Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and has entered the mobile phone market with its revolutionary iPhone."

NYT: With Private Trades, Venture Capital Seeks a New Way Out

"Founders of start-ups and the venture capitalists who finance them have two ways to get their money out of the company: sell it to another company or sell shares to the public.

The market for initial public offerings has dried up and companies are not being very acquisitive these days. In the first three months of 2009, only 56 companies were sold, half the number of a year ago, and none went public.

What if they had another option? SecondMarket, which operates markets for trading illiquid assets online, is creating a marketplace for trading shares of private companies. It puts investors together with shareholders and collects a fee, which will be 2 percent from each side for the private company market."

ORCL down (-49.77%) from Yahoo Finance (must be an error)

Oracle Corporation

(NasdaqGS: ORCL)

After Hours: 9.72  -9.63 (-49.77%) 8:01pm EThelp

Last Trade:	19.35
Trade Time:	Apr 22
Change:	0.18 (0.92%)
Prev Close:	19.53
Open:	19.50
Bid:	19.20 x 200
Ask:	19.40 x 100
1y Target Est:	20.49

MoJoVox

MoJoVox

MoJoVox provides a simple interface to discover the latest news and live discussions on topics of your interest in real time

Youtube making a celebrity of Susan Boyle...stunning

Ring one up for Google/Youtube - a week ago, she was just another 47-year-old Scottish virgin. Now, more than 29 million YouTube views later, Hollywood agents and talk-show bookers are jostling for a few minutes with Susan Boyle, a stocky, beetle-browed woman who would not ordinarily rate a second glance on the street. She's amazing!

Youtube link with 29 million hits

A look at Apple Products from 1976 to 2009

A cool visual of most Apple products since 1976. Apple Newton anyone? I cannot live without my lime-green iPods and iPhone 3G. How many do you own?

CNET: Single girls match bachelors on tech toys

Forrester Research survey released yesterday found that single women rival single men as tech device owners survey released Thursday.
A few interesting statistics:
* Single women prefer laptops while single men prefer desktops.
* Among the adult singles surveyed, 47 percent of women said their next computer would be a laptop, and 29 percent said it would be a desktop, while 47 percent of men said their next computer would be a desktop and 38 percent said it would be a laptop.
* As for hand-held devices, 27 percent of single women surveyed count themselves as owners while 29 percent of single men said they have one, according to the study. Single women, meanwhile, surpassed single men slightly on digital-camera ownership, 78 percent to 76 percent.
* Fewer than 20 percent of single women said they followed technology news, compared to less than 40 percent of single men.

Is Twitter Secure? 17-year old claims responsibility for Twitter Worm: Stalk Daily

17-year old, Mikkey Mooney, has claimed responsibility and has stated he is the person behind the twitter worm the past few days:
“I am the person who coded the XSS which then acted as a worm when it auto updated a users profile and status, which then infected other users who viewed their profile. I did this out of boredom, to be honest. I usually like to find vulnerabilities within websites and try not to cause too much damage, but start a worm or something to give the developers an insight on the problem and while doing so, promoting myself or my website.
I decided if I had a site that followed the same functionality and simplicity as one of the most known sites on the web at the time then it would receive a lot of hits. While playing around and getting the site developed I started adding more features and tried to part myself from Twitter, while still giving it’s still compact nature and simple use.
Only the sessions were encrypted and passwords were not played with, so it was not that harmful, but was still a matter of concern and the Twitter team was able to resolve that pretty fast."
Techstartups advice to all users: If your Twitter ID is compromise immediately change your password!

Protect your information or he'll take it away.

SFMerc: Dwindling public companies means big changes in the valley

"The number of public companies in Silicon Valley fell for the eighth consecutive year in 2008, to 261. Forget the inflated dot-com peak of 417 in 2000. It's also below the 315 the valley had in 1994, when the Mercury News started keeping track."

"From 2001 to 2008, there have been 90 IPOs in the valley, an average of 11 annually — and the last one was more than a year ago. Compare that with 331 IPOs in the years from 1990 to 1998, an average of 41 annually. The two years in between were so insane — producing 163 IPOs — that it's no use considering them for sake of comparisons."

Vijay Singh - Amazing Golf Shot at the Masters 09

Great video! Vijay makes it look easy at the Masters during Tuesday's session with this hole in one - after skipping the ball over water. This was played at Augusta on hole 16 - 170 yard Par 3 Redbud, practice round. Hopefully he can repeat his amazing 2000 performance for 2009. Link Here.

What's in his bag:
Driver: Cleveland HiBORE XL 9.5°
3 wood: Cleveland Launcher Steel 13°
5 wood: Cleveland Launcher Steel 17°
Irons: Cleveland Black Pearl (3-9) Irons
PW: Cleveland Black Pearl
SW: Cleveland 900 56°
LW: Cleveland 900 60°
Putter: Never Compromise Milled Series
Ball: Titleist Pro V1x prototype

New Gmail for iPhone and Android out Today (through Safari)

Google today announced an updated version of their gmail web application.
Features including:
Updated user interface
Faster to open messages
Batch actions - archiving multiple messages at once
Basic offline support

Net net it's a great alternative to IMAP for searching through older emails.

Gmail for mobile requires iPhone OS 2.2.1 or above.

Forbes: Common Attributes Among Billionaires

As Forbes has concluded there are interestingly several common themes among today's billionaires. Forbes made the following deductions based on loose interpretation of today's over 600 self-made billionaires.

"Several billionaires suffered a bitter professional setback early in their careers that heightened their fear of failure."

Parents Had Math-Related Careers - Accountants, Small-Biz owners

Fall Birthdays - 42 born in September

College Dropouts - Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison, Micheal Dell

Skull and Bones (Yale Secret society) - Eddie Lampert, Steven Schwarzman, Frederick Smith

Goldman Sachs - Eddie Lampert, Daniel Och

Pcmag: Top 10 Hottest Windows 7 features

"You have nothing, nothing to threaten me with. Nothing to do with all your strength." - Joker
All this hype for what? Microsoft's Windows 7 is expected to be released sometime this year. So far the hoopla on the latest MSFT Operating System has been well justified.
Below are PC Magazine's top 10 hottest features after testing the beta version of Microsoft's latest and greatest masterpiece. Let's hope it's not anywhere near the mess Vista has been.

1. Send Programmers a Shock Button
2. Instant Plug-and-Play Driver Installation
3. Wake Up!
4. Clippy Returns - helps you with networking-management issues, security issues, and driver updates
5. On-PC Play Support of Video Games - support full on-PC play of Xbox 360 games, even Halo 3, and the emulation of PS3 games
6. Add-On Drives for Burning VHS Tapes
7. Flying Toasters
8. Improved File Management
9. Windows 7 Viper Widescreen Wipers
10. UberDriver Features

NY News: Demi Moore Twitter Helps Save Life

Add Life Saving Tool to the growing number of uses for Twitter.

Demi Moore and her score of Twitter followers Friday helped thwart a possible suicide attempt by a distraught California woman.

"Getting a knife, a big one that is sharp. Going to cut my arm down the whole arm so it doesn't waste time," said the message sent to Moore by a user of the social networking site.

"Hope you are joking," wrote back Moore.

"Gbye...gonna kill myself now," the woman responded.

A San Jose police spokesman said the department had received a number of calls from Twitter users about the suicide threat and sent officers to the 48-year-old woman's home.

Moore's husband, Ashton Kutcher, Twitted his congratulations.

"Wifey reported a suicide attempt based on a...tweet she got and saved someones life. The woman is in the hospital now."
About 383,500 people follow Moore's Tweets.

This is so true - Non value web 2.0 companies (most of them) via tech trader daily post

"Lindsay thinks social networking companies, in fact, are largely un-monetizable. In the case of Twitter, he says the obvious way to make money would be for users to pay a subscription fee, or to accept unsolicited tweets from advertisers. “If that happened,” he contends, “the user base would evaporate about as quickly as radiator coolant in Death Valley.” It’s not that he doesn’t like Twitter as a user; Lindsay just thinks it will never have a viable business model.
Indeed, Lindsay comes close to calling the entire Web 2.0 company-creation mechanism something of a Ponzi scheme. (Though he doesn’t actually use the term.) “Typically after a few years of growing users, a social network start-up’s venture funding runs short,” he writes. “Because there are no revenues [there] is no way the owners can persuade the financial markets to fun an IPO. So now there is the problem of how the original venture capitals are to be paid.”
The usual answer, he says, is to start calling around to Valley execs to sell them on “the latest and greatest thing on the Web,” complete with hints that the potential acquirer’s business is “looking a little tired.” And before you know it, he says, you have a deal."

Blodget: 5 Reasons Google Should Buy Twitter for $1 Billion

From Henry Blodget - If Google were to acquire Twitter, Google should buy the company for $1 Billion
1. Google needs a huge new growth engine and Twitter might just fit the bill.
2. Twitter is a hell of a lot more relevant to Google's business than other big Google ideas, such as YouTube...
3. $1 billion is couch change for Google.
4. Twitter could conceivably threaten Google's cash cow--search.
5. Like Google, Twitter is already a verb.
We hope Google has a better strategic rationale for acquiring Twitter beyond buying into the hype.

Twitter has raised ~$55 million in funding from venture capitalists including Institutional Venture Partners, Benchmark Capital, Union Square Ventures, Spark Capital and angels Ron Conway, Mike Maples Jr., Chris Sacca and Betaworks.

Wash Post/Tech Crunch: Google to buy Twitter (Rumour) / 2 sources +$250MM

From TechCrunch..."from two separate people close to the negotiations: Google is in late stage negotiations to acquire Twitter. We don't know the price but can assume its well, well north of the $250 million valuation that they saw in their recent funding."

"If this is accurate, it’s a brilliant deal for Google - the value of Twitter is only going to go up over time."

Also, this would be a great deal for the 20 or so Twitter employees as well as Twitter venture investors Spark Capital and Union Square Ventures. Google sure loves to overpay for companies especially when that Company was only recently trying to raise a funding round. It will be quite sad to see Twitter become one of the many subsidiaries lost inside of the Google Machine.

PC World - Top 10 Tech Job Skills in this Market

According to PCWorld, here are the top 10 valuable skills for techies out there. If you're an IT person looking to sharpen your resume pay attention to the top 10 must-have skills below.
"IT remains a real safe and interesting and high-paying place to be," says David Foote, CEO of Foote Partners, which conducts quarterly assessments of IT pay trends in the United States. "The world has embraced IT…because it enables companies to deliver cheaper and better products. I'm pretty bullish on IT."
"IT is counter-trending a lot of what's happening in the general economy," Foote says.
1. Business Process Modeling
2. Database
3. Messaging/Communications
4. IT architecture
5. IT security
6. Project management
7. Data mining
8. Web development
9. IT optimization
10. Networking