Yahoo! CEO to step down, and leave a big mess behind
Yahoo, under huge financial pressure and mounting losses, has begun a search to replace company co-founder Jerry Yang as chief executive, the company said Monday. The sad thing is, it may already be too late to really help much. Yang was mostly blamed for the lack of initiative with the sale of Yahoo! to MS a few months back, and admitted it was due to “emotional attachment”, almost always a bad mixture with billion dollar deals.
“Jerry and the board have had an ongoing dialogue about succession timing, and we all agree that now is the right time to make the transition to a new CEO who can take the company to the next level,” Chairman Roy Bostock said in a statement. “We are deeply grateful to Jerry for his many contributions as CEO over the past 18 months, and we are pleased that he plans to stay actively involved at Yahoo as a key executive and member of the Board.”
Yang will resume his position as chief Yahoo, the company said, the role he had before taking over in 2007 after former CEO Terry Semel departed.
More of the ugly, sorted details here about their financial issues, losses and layoffs: Link
Antitrust worries destroy the proposed Yahoo!-Google “partnership”, and Yahoo isn’t happy
Well, it was an interesting thought, anyway. But it won’t happen, thanks to the paranoia that is the Justice Department. The deal was scrapped due to worries about legal entanglements that would follow such a formal partnership.
Yahoo! and Google were going to partner up, it was announced in June, to offer search results to one another and share some revenue. Yahoo was due to make about $800 million off the deal, for a company that really needed the cash after rebuffing Microsoft’s buyout offer and declining ad revenue.
What was wrong with this deal, you ask? According to the DoJ, a lot, I guess. Mainly they stated it would negatively affect prices and competition. Valid to a degree.
Here’s more detail about the proceedings: Link
Yahoo: A little bad news
Yahoo today reported a 64 percent drop in net income for the third quarter (that’s a LOT, boys and girls, almost 3/4 of their net income), issued cautions about a slowly diminishing advertising market, and confirmed that layoffs are definitely on the way.
The company anticipates reducing headcount “by at least 10 percent” by the end of the year, which could mean a lot of jobs lost.
With 14,300 employed at the end of last quarter, that means at least 1,430 are losing their jobs in 2008. And Yang indicated there could be further cuts in 2009 if the market doesn’t get better. Pushing away that Microsoft/Yahoo deal could be something they end up regretting.
More details about this eye-opening development here: Link
Google, Android and The Not-So-Secret Plan
Android may be an open-source operating system (and has been widely celebrated as such), but Google isn’t shy about the idea that it hopes to profit by underwriting its development. And with Google’s first Android phone, the T-Mobile G1, just about here it’s becoming clearer exactly how they want to benefit.
T-Mobile’s G1, otherwise known as the HTC Dream, is the first phone to go on sale with Google’s Android operating system built in.
Google executives have spoken about Android’s general benefits: the company wants to use it to accelerate the use and sophistication of mobile Internet browsing, and open the “hood” so to speak, for tinkering by outside parties. But judging from my testing of a G1 phone, it appears Google wants a more direct benefit for their own bottom line, too: more users of Google’s various online services.
Although there’s nothing stopping a G1 owner from using search engines and other services from Google rivals such as Microsoft and Yahoo (though most web users on PC/Mac desktop systems predominently use Google as their SE of choice), Google technology is built deeply into the G1 by design, and that trend will continue.
The hooks get a little more obvious when things get more personal. The Android phone asks you for your Google account information when you first start it up, and if you have a Google account, it immediately grabs your contacts, calendar appointments, and Gmail messages and loads them up for you. Convenient you might say, but very deliberate as well. This function does NOT exist for their rivals, such as Yahoo.
The tie-in to these personal services is telling. Google has dominated its competition when it comes to the search engine market, but it hasn’t been as successful when it comes to more more personal uses of its services such as e-mail and social networking. With Android, Google apparently hopes to establish more of this direct contact with Internet users and use the OS to leverage its position in the market.
And it’s still the very early days for Android. At the same time Google or others could write applications that dovetail with various services. And by the same thought process, given Android’s free software development kit and open Android Market for offering new applications, I’d expect mobile applications from Google rivals like Yahoo and MS as well. Whether they’ll be able to take center stage in Android is another matter.
True Internet/TV convergence - It’s almost here
As an avid TV viewer and internet junkie, I’ve always had that dream, the dream of a television-viewing experience where the Internet was not only always accessible but integrated right into the experience. There was no switching back and forth between environments. I viewed what I wanted when I wanted online or via broadcast and tapped into information about what I was viewing through a small bar or window that could either sit on the screen or be safely minimized. If I saw something that I wanted to buy, I didn’t have to grab my laptop or switch out to Windows. I simply accessed the information about the product right on the TV screen, and bought it right then and there.
Now, a group of events appear poised to make this dream a (partial) reality. Last week, Intel and Yahoo! announced a somewhat unlikely partnership that would result in Internet-enabled HDTVs that play and use on-screen Yahoo! widgets to give viewers direct access to Web-based content, applications, and contextual advertising. It could be the germ of what might become my idea, brought to life. In fact, execs at Intel and Yahoo! did note that viewers might be able to, say, buy the shoes Lauren is wearing on an episode of The Hills, or anything similar to that sort of thing.
The digital TV part is pretty much going to be taken care of soon. The FCC’s decision to strong-arm the nation and broadcasters into the digital spectrum is probably the best thing to happen to television since color, IMHO. Sorry, all you people still fiddling around with your rabbit ears, but it’s an idea that really needed to happen at one time or another, for a lot of reasons. Those complaining about next year’s switchover on February 17, 2009 might end up feeling quite differently once they see everything the programmers and partners can do with a digital screen.
The Intel/Yahoo! tool and the Sidebar feature look like a really good start. I love that these toolbars can slide on and off the HDTV screen, providing you with instant access to content you’ve stored online. What’s missing, of course, is the deeper integration that would offer direct interaction between your live TV show and the Internet as I mentioned earlier, but I know that’s coming. So, for example, on Deal or No Deal, you could play along with the contestant, select your cases, and even see what’s in them (via an overlay). You could also select a winning case and, perhaps, be entered into a live drawing—maybe you’d compete directly against the on-air opponent for a million dollars! This is the type of digital world I always envisioned.
So do these exciting developments represent true integration and convergence? Not quite yet. In fact, significant hurdles remain. Few of the glowing reports about the Internet TV revolution and the surprise Intel-Yahoo! partnership mention that not enough people have broadband access anywhere near where their TV is located (or have broadband period in some areas of the country). So consumers either need to wire their homes (not gonna happen) or add access points near their TVs. An obvious alternative would be for these Internet-ready TVs to come wireless-ready, too. But these hurdles will be overcome. Eventually.
Twitter-licious?
What Is Twitter?
Twitter is the newest craze to hit the blogging and social networking world. It is a social networking site that allows users to send messages 140 characters long to friends who are on their Twitter friends list. Twitter resembles messaging applications like Yahoo! messenger because it allows users to communicate using short texts, called ‘tweets’.
Users can create a profile on the twitter website, invite friends to their friends list, and start sending their messages to the website via SMS and sending it to 40404. These messages will then be relayed to the people on their friends list. It is entirely up to you if you want to send a message to a hundred other people, or to ten.
If you are on somebody else’s friends list here’s the low-down on what you’ll be seeing (and often!). Every time your friend decides to send an update, these updates are instantly displayed on his site, and is sent to you, if your phone, email, browser, or IM service if you are one of the people who have signed up to receive his updates.
If you want to stop receiving updates on your phone, you can do this by keying in OFF and sending the message to 40404. You can turn Twitter ‘off’ if you are in habit of doing some messaging at specific hours of the day. Some people like to send messages at night, as a way to relax and unwind.
Twitter is the brainchild of Jack Dorsey. It was originally a research and development project of his start-up company Obvious LL in 2006. The service rose to popularity when it received the South by SouthWest Web Award in the blog category. By 2007, Twitter Inc., a separate entity from Obvious LLC, was born, with Jack Dorsey as its CEO.
What made Twitter so popular in so short a time is that it is a very simple and easy way to broadcast anything to your friends (and stalkers). It has often been referred to as micro blogging since you can only so much with 140 characters. Despite this, more and more users are seeing Twitter’s potential not only as a way to inform others about what you are up to, but also as a great marketing tool.
Twitter has been greeted by many with mixed reactions. Those who have been using social networking and messaging services see Twitter as one of the many start-up services that work exactly like the others before it. As of May 2007 there were 111 other sites that looked and worked like Twitter online.
Others say that Twitter is but another addition to the ties that are pulling us all closer together, which may be a good thing for some. Some people, however, think that services like this are already too much of a good thing, and that they can easily make us feel ‘too connected’ for our own good.
But despite this Twitter has a host of fans. Many blogs and social sites now have twitter plugins.
One could say it’s twitter-ific!
An Overview of Social Platforms and the OpenSocial Initiative
It seems that everyone today webpage that ends up being their own persona to the world. Be it a superstar athlete, a musician, an actress, or just some guy down the block, everyone seems to be connected and blogging on-line.
And anyone who is anyone has a Myspace or Facebook page these days to connect with their fans, their friends, or even nobody in particular. (60 Million active facebook users vs. 110 Million for myspace)
For the purposes of this article we’ll keep it simple and leave the discussion with the two giants in the industry.
Facebook made waves last year by opening their API to allow for user created 
facebook apps. This created a surge in popularity for Facebook, as well as a mini virtual market for small casual applications that run the gamut from trivia games to trivial time-wasters.
Myspace is rumored to announce their own custom application system in the very near future.
These changes have transitioned both myspace an facebook into more of a platform then just websites. The user base already existed in large (large) numbers, but now the content is much more engaging, customizable and dynamic. The social platform tempts advertisers as the holy grail of marketing, and users were hooked before they even knew it.
Of course Google couldn’t stand on the sidelines very long. Google’s OpenSocial is just the latest attempt to join in the fray of the white-hot social platform development trend. Launched in November 2007, Google released a collection of API’s built to work together and to standard the core and method which websites and services work and speak together.
You can think of Open Social as a similar initiative for social platforms as Open ID is for User IDS. While Facebook and MySpace got an initial headstart in launching the Social Networking revolution, Google has actually made large strides into the medium in just a few short months.
Since the launch, OpenSocial has gathered support from the likes of LinkedIn, hi5, XING, Friendster, Plaxo and Ning, among others to create a huge conglomerate of social networking sites and applications that are all now linking together to form one community that uses one standard for all the software applications used across it.
Facebook, with a reported 60 million users, doesn’t seem to be that worried yet since they believe their users are satisfied with the service and the applications and netware that run over it. Sooner or later, however, as OpenSocial and the network it is creating across the internet continues to build and gain size, the two will almost inevitably be forced to join together or clash over user bases that will be huge.
Google has already extended an olive branch according to some reports, and Microsoft, which owns Facebook, rebuffed their offer at a partnership.
As the recent Open ID initiative demonstrated last year, there is strong movement in the internet community to bring barriers down and let users bring a distinct digital identity with them wherever they go electronically. It remains to be seen if while users are beginning to enjoy seamlessly moving about the internet with one sole digital identity, if they will have any enthusiasm for a protracted trade war between two conglomerates determined to rule the internet social networking community.
Open ID: the basics explained
Yahoo Moves To Support The Open ID Initiative - What Does It Mean For Internet Users?
With more people accessing the internet now while away from home and their PC’s via laptops, cell phones, and other emerging technologies, someone has figured out a way to streamline and speed up the sharing of information even further.
With the new ‘Open ID Initiative’, consumers can now log onto all their favorite websites without having to use a bunch of different user names and a bunch of different passwords.
This speeds up the transfer of information even for those users who use the same screen name and password for all their websites and still have to pause to type in the information and wait for it to be acknowledged.
What Is Open ID?
Open ID is the creation of a single digital identity for a user on line that is used across all websites and across all platforms. Be it a tabletop PC, a laptop, a phone or wireless device, anything it can access it can access without having to officially log in with the user having to type out a name and a password. All the websites and services will recognize the Open ID user instantly without requiring any more information.
You simply type in a single universal user name and password through an Open ID Initiative Provider such as Yahoo, and the feature will automatically log you into any website that you have visited in the past that required a screen name, a password, or both. You don’t have to pause and type in different or the same information over and over again.
Still in the process of being adopted across the internet, the Open ID Initiative got a huge boost when Yahoo announced it is adding Open ID to it’s service.
The best thing about Open ID is that it never goes out of date and it never expires. Many websites and services will allow you to be logged in automatically for a week or more, but then the term expires and you have to enter the information again.
Not with Open ID. The moment the website comes up it recognizes you instantly and you’ll never be confronted with another ‘Please Log In’ page.
Who Needs Open ID?
Someone who hardly ever goes on-line or only visits a handful of websites probably doesn’t. But anybody who is frequently on-line and visits many different sites and shares or retrieves information often could certainly use it.
Without Open ID, if you wanted to send an e-mail of a picture to a friend’s cell phone from your own cell phone, you would have to:
Log on to your phone service’s internet access feature
Log on to the photo-sharing site where you stored the picture;
Log on to your e-mail service’s website
Send the picture.
That’s 3 times you had to pause and type in a user name and a password.
With the Open ID feature, you open up your phone service’s internet access feature and it instantly recognizes your identity, so there’s no pause to enter any information. You click to go to the photo-sharing site and it also instantly allows you access. Finally you click onto your e-mail service and it too instantly allows you in. You didn’t have to pause and type anything, and the entire process is speeded up dramatically.
Who Owns Or Profits From Open ID?
Nobody and no one. To quote the founder of the Open ID Initiative, Brad Fitzpatrick:
“Nobody should own this. Nobody’s planning on making any money from this. The goal is to release every part of this under the most liberal licenses possible, so there’s no money or licensing or registering required to play. It benefits the community as a whole if something like this exists, and we’re all a part of the community.”
Open ID was created to meet a need that was seen in the internet community, and as such it’s creators want that community to have full access to it. To allow any particular service to charge for the feature or for one entity to claim ownership of it would by nature raise restrictions, which is what the founders of the Open ID Initiative are working diligently to avoid.
Who Supports Open ID?
At present there are over 10,000 websites that respond to this feature.
You can quickly see which internet sites are presently Open ID enabled by checking out the directories found here:
https://www.myopenid.com/directory
The list of websites that are Open ID enabled is growing by the day, so check the directories often.
How Can I Get An Open ID?
Getting an Open ID is fast and easy. Simply log on at the following link to find a list of Open ID providers:
Get an Open ID today and enjoy the benefits of never having to stop and type another password to get into your favorite sites!
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