Robert Scoble wonders if Facebook is worth as much as YouTube
Yesterday Rober Scoble questioned and debated the worth of Facebook. Lots of good comments on his post. While I don’t doubt social media’s value, I wonder if Facebook will be a flash in the pan. They have moved away from their core audience to gather more eyes. I question if the fickle 17-24 year old market will stick around long term or jump on the next thing…
Technorati Tags: Facebook, Social Media, Robert Scoble
Thanks for the Deficit GW … I’m sure my kids will love it
Wall Street Journal reports today that the U.S. trade deficit widened to a record $69.86 billion in August, inflated by high oil prices and American demand for imports. The deficit with China rose to a record. Exports rebounded from July’s fall, rising 2.3% on strong sales of aircraft, foods and consumer goods.
Sorry that the democratic president Bill Clinton’s efforts have been washed away in fewer than eight (8) short years!
George W. Bust!
Ray Noorda podcast posted to the homepage of PodTech.net
What fun and what a challenge. After lots of work, Kip Meacham, Cyd Tetro, and I worked into the night to weave together 6 interviews into a 16 minute Ray Noorda Tribute Podcast.
The podcast was posted to the homepage of PodTech.net. What a great surprise to wake up and see this today.
Check out the article here on PodTech’s web site.
Special thanks to Ty Mattingly, Ron Heinz, Darl McBride, David Bradford, Drew Major, and Ransom Love for taking the time to share their personal experience working with a legend.
Technorati Tags: Podcasting, Podtech, Social Media
Facebook’s gotta get the “$B” now
So Google decided to get smart and stop building an inferior product and just buy the brand in YouTube. Hard to imagine that YouTube could be worth a thousand and a half million dollars ($1.65B), but it’s clear that there’s still future dollars in eyeballs.
With that said, I can’t image that Facebook can hold out much longer. Just sell to Yahoo for a $1B and start spending your money.
Technorati Tags: Facebook, Social Media
Meet-Up / Podcasting for PodTech and Rocky Mountain Voices
Lots going on. Hard to blog.
First, I’m working with Cydni Tetro, Kip Meacham, and Tim Kapp on a podcasting gig, Rocky Mountain Voices. Not a job, but an adventure! We have been out recording people — I’ve recorded Andrew Hartsfield from WiLife, Lee Gibbons from Podango, John Furrier from PodTech.net. Our goal is to foster the community with more visibility using the power of social media like Podcasting, blogging, and video blogs.
We hosted a Meet-Up Party to launch our affiliate relationship with John Furrier’s PodTech Network. We held the Meet-Up in the lobby of the building where vSpring Capital / Wasatch Partners / and CenterShift are located. It was cool. We ended up with about 115 people attending. Sponsors included Yahoo, NextPage, vSpring, Wasatch Venture Fund, Printsmart, MediaRain, Omniture, Card Access. Food and drink by Loco Lizard. Music by Mike Masse. Lots of pictures of the event are on my Flickr account.
Finally, I worked out and announced a transition plan from Agilix by the end of the year. I’m looking forward to using more of my marketing, business development, partnering, and creative skills in a new gig.
L to R: Paul Sherer, John Furrier, Cydni Tetro,
Kip Meacham, Brad Baldwin (me), Tim Kapp
Technorati Tags: Agilix, Podcasting, Podtech, Utah
18 great years…wow that was fast
Amy and I just celebrated our 18th anniversary. We decided to do it in style this year and leave the kids behind. We went to San Francisco for the weekend and had a great time.
What did we do? Play. Shop. Walk. Explore. Experience. Eat. Some of my favorite adventures included:
- Walking across the Golden Gate Bridge
- Shopping in Union Square — we had a fun time in the Tiffany’s and Levi store
- Visiting the SFMOMA for 4 1/2 hours
- Eating San Fran sour dough bread from Boudin
- Visiting the just opened Bloomingdale’s
- Making the pilgrimage to the Apple Store — they were having and iMovie contest showing
- Dragging Amy around without a car, including the BART ride from Oakland, the walk from Powell and Market to Chinatown to Fisherman’s Warf.
- Visit to Haight / Ashbury–ate a yukky Philly sandwich at Burgermeister
I also enjoyed the buzz and life in the city. Oh how I miss it. While out walking, we came across videographers taking footage, photographers shooting action shots of bike messengers, and street performers playing alternative music. I was draw-in from a distance by the sound of Radiohead’s “Where I Begin and You End” from Hail to the Thief.
Fisherman’s Warf was filled with lots of life and of course seafood. Amy prefer’s beef, but I jump at the chance for seafood. While I didn’t make it to Scoma’s, I took Amy to the end of Pier 39 to Neptune’s Palace with it’s great view of Alcatraz. After, we hung out on the street watching people and listening to a guy play Jimi Hendrix with uncanny impersonation, complete with playing the guitar behind his head.
See more of our fun on my Flickr account.
Technorati Tags: Apple
Apple iPhone…if the rumor is true, it’s GSM
May retract this tomorrow, but latest rumor is Cingular is the carrier for an Apple iPhone. Nice since I’m currently with Cingular. However, Cingular’s lack of cutting edge data networking clearly suggests that the first-gen phone would be media centric (surprise, surprise) and less data centric.
Love my music, but my phone is a tool. The mini-me of my computer. I’m wanting data — and lots of it. Smartphone. Apple OS. MiniSD storage. Contacts, calendar, tasks, email, web browsing. Etc., etc..
Dallen and friends become radio talk hosts
I wanted to play around with my new mixer and mics for a bit today. I was able to recruit Dallen, Davis, and Parker into playing the radio host role.
Here the Boys of Rock discuss Wolfmother, The Beatles, and finally Led Zeppelin. Enjoy.
Top market for Tablet PCs — Education
Well, we guessed right in the fall of 2003 on which market would embrace the Tablet PC: Education.
From eWEEK.com:
Indeed, education “is our biggest [tablet] segment,” said Chad McDonald, director of notebook product marketing. “We expect that to continue to expand. We expect big things from this product both in education and in consumer retail.”
Education is a nice fit since students use highlighters and add notes. Just need to get those books in digital format.
The total market size for Tablet PCs is still a tiny niche with an expected 4 or 5 million total unit shipments by 2009, down from a far more aggressive 14 million units expected (and this has been ratcheted down each year since the launch in the fall 2002). YE2003 Tablet sales were estimated at 1 million.
Dell’s considering Tablets in 2007. Now that Tablet features are being positioned as “included” in the Vista OS, it might be possible to get demand and volume to a level to support Dell.
Cool MP3 player comparison in WSJ
With the big rebranded-reskinned Toshiba Gigabeat Microsoft Zune announcement today, Wall Street Journal posted a cool page that compares the big name devices today.
You can’t count Microsoft out. Just look at what they’ve done with the Xbox. And if the analyst’s are correct, the Zune may just turn out be Bill Gates latest charity:
From WSJ:
Analysts expect Microsoft will have to sell Zune at a loss to hit those price levels. “If you look at the typical high-end video players — iPods — they are $349 and up,” said David Smith, an analyst at Gartner Inc. “To be competitive, [Zune] would definitely need to be in that range.”
Check out the comparison at
http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/info-musicply0609.html.