Organizational leadership theories too often manifest into tedious memoirs peppered with Sun Tzu and Machiavelli quotes. The frequent outcome is subjecting teams to rewriting job priorities as MBOs, IDEO founder David Kelley is featured, I was willing to give it a read. After all, these two leaders have clearly made strides in defining positive…
Reputation Management Services Should Practice What They Preach
Online reputation has been measured by in-bound links through Google Ranking, RSS and feed subscribers and now, the number of social media shares on services like Klout and Echo apps. As new reputation systems have emerged, an army of deceptive users have risen up to game them via link farms and exchanges, fake profile generators and most recently…
Risk-takers and Strategists: Jeremiah Owyang on Long-Term Social Media Planning
Two years ago, 93% of Americans believed companies should have a social media presence. Today, brands are hiring social media specialists for customer support, crowdsourced product development, promotions and even leads generation. At this point, with Twitter and Facebook having hit critical mass and millions opting into location-based…
There’s Money to be Made in “Premium Privacy” Says VC Fred Wilson
When veteran blogger and venture capitalist Fred Wilson addresses an audience on the business opportunities in geolocational services, you can’t help but listen. While we have our own opinions as to why users have gone geoloco this year, Wilson explained his perspective from an investment standpoint at today’s Geoloco conference.
Google Image Search Gets a Redesign and New Search Ads
With more than 10 billion images indexed, Google Image Search has become the visual reference source to beat. Google’s VP Marissa Mayer took the stage at a press conference today to announce the company’s latest image search redesign. In November 2009, ReadWriteWeb covered the introduction of Image Swirl but since then little news has come from…
Using the Startup Process to Change Disaster Relief
In early December a Supernova session entitled, How Startup Companies Can Change the World had presenters brainstorm ways to connect the technology industry with policy makers. Coupled with many of the discussions already taking place in the Gov. 2.0 movement, the session looked at how technologists can contribute to projects they might not…
Inside Twitter’s Developer Fears with OneForty’s Laura Fitton
After a busy couple of days, oneforty app store founder Laura Fitton is in the unique position as the unofficial spokesperson for a developer community turned upside down in the wake of the Tweetie acquisition and Promoted Tweets launch. As the company hosts its first Chirp developer conference, thousands of coders are questioning their role and…
How to Burn Bridges with Bootup Labs and Other Investors
When Phoenix-based designer Jamie Martin’s blog post hit the front page of Hacker News earlier today, he realized what it’s like to burn bridges in a connected world. After his company Status.ly and three other startups were dropped from the Bootup Labs program roster due to financial difficulty, Martin blogged about the unfortunate incident and…
Seed Incubator Panel: YCombinator, VentureHacks, Capital Factory, TechStars
A decade ago, entrepreneurs saw seed funds as a means to an end. There was little effort to brand the separate groups, there were few celebrity angels and the entire VC community seemed shrouded in mystery. Enter the seed incubator model.
Between Paul Graham of YCombinator, David Cohen of TechStars, Naval Ravikant of Venture Hacks and Josh Baer…
Is Innovation Fair? Andrew Keen Says No
Andrew Keen is no stranger to controversy. He has irritated bloggers by equating Web 2.0 with communism and enraged citizen journalists with his best selling book, Cult of the Amateur: How Today’s Internet is Killing Our Culture. Naturally when I saw Keen’s core conversation “Is Innovation Fair?” on the SXSW program, I knew it would incite lively…
Small Business Web Directory Launches at SXSW
Upon first glance we were skeptical. Generally when someone says they’re launching a business directory it’s an SEO play with little value to users. Nevertheless, the small business web directory is a pleasant surprise. The group is providing a variety of useful resources to help startups integrate services and scale up their internal operations.
Beyond Ads: Monetizing Location-Based Services
This week geo-crazy mavens were pleased to hear of location-based updates to Facebook, the launch of Foursquare analytics and of course yesterday’s news of Gowalla’s comment and picture functionality.
So far the most common way to monetize these types of services is through sponsored leader boards and tips on nearby promotions. But the question…
There is No Perfect VP of Sales and Marketing
Sales and marketing are not the same thing. It’s true they both deal with relationship management and it’s true that neither of these job descriptions require hardcore engineering, but just because they’re both in the realm of words over code does not mean that they are the same. At the risk of muddling your mind with HR jargon, the core…
DeadHeads and Retweeters: Crowdsourcing Influence
Last week the New York Historical Society opened the first large-scale exhibit of material from the Grateful Dead Archive. The archive will be managed by the University of Santa Cruz with special access to four decades worth of videotapes, recordings, fan letters and even a note from President Obama. What is surprising about the archives and the…
Follow the Hippie: Leadership Lessons Through Dance
When Sigma Partners’ Richard Dale posted a video of a random dancing guy to his Venture Cyclist blog I was skeptical. I’d seen the original video sans narration and dismissed it as a strange sociological phenomenon condensed into a quick three minute clip. Nevertheless, when the same video is narrated by MuckWork and CDBaby founder Derek Sivers, it…
How to Prepare for Conversion and Optimization
The best way to reduce bounce rates and design a path of least resistance for members and customers is to offer something they want. While others prioritize member acquisition in order to build an early product test case, Sean Ellis has a slightly different philosophy. Ellis has worked with companies like
Series Seed Documents: Legal Templates for Early Investments
Because today’s startup generally requires significantly less seed capital to function, the legal contracts once required for large-scale deals are no longer appropriate. Rather than forcing startups to draft lengthy legal documents, one attorney is offering an invaluable resource to entrepreneurs. Best known as the Fenwick and West attorney…
Escape from New York: Is the Valley Necessary?
In an effort to highlight some of the emerging tech centers across the world we’ve written on a number of cities for our Never Mind the Valley series. We’ve featured the funding and opportunities available in places like Washington DC, Bangalore and Beijing. Our intent has never been to create regional rivalries, but rather to highlight the diverse…
Open Thread: PRManna – Copy Cat or Inspiration?
Earlier this month we noticed PRManna climbing up the Hacker News front page and reached out to the creator for an interview. Ryan Waggoner started PRManna in his spare time and was open in saying that the project was inspired by Peter Shankman’s Help a Reporter Out. The difference between PRManna and HARO is that Waggoner’s product was…
In Hindsight: When VC Associates Misread the Landscape
When a startup entrepreneur tells the story of his/her mistakes and how they’ve corrected them, it’s endearing. When an investment associate for one of the more prestigious VC firms does it, it’s surprising.
Union Square Ventures’ Andrew Parker recently started a Got It Wrong Series on his Gong Show blog where he identifies his own mistakes and…