Posts Tagged ‘Internet’

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In Facebook Deal, Board Was All But Out of Picture (The Wall Street Journal)
On the morning of Sunday, April 8, Facebook Inc.’s youthful chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, alerted his board of directors that he intended to buy Instagram, the hot photo-sharing service. It was the first the board heard of what, later that day, would become Facebook’s largest acquisition ever, according to several people familiar with the matter. AllFacebook Zuckerberg negotiated with his Instagram counterpart down from an original $2 billion offer, asking Systrom whether he thought Facebook could one day be worth more than $200 billion, roughly the size of Google. Systrom agreed to the one percent or roughly $1 billion in stock. SocialTimes Normally a deal like this takes several days, if not weeks, to complete, and usually involves more lawyers and bankers than were present during the negotiations. Gizmodo It was a bold strategy, and one that smacks of the kind of approach a small start-up might take. It’s not, however, the way most people might expect a multi-million dollar public organization to conduct business. TechCrunch This just in: According to multiple sources close to the company, Facebook is eying an IPO on May 17th — depending on whether the SEC agrees that all the reams of paperwork (including those concerning its recent acquisition of Instagram) are in order. PRNewser The Ad Age Digital Conference continued Wednesday with a presentation from David Fischer, Facebook’s VP of business and marketing partnerships, whose presentation could be boiled down to this: “Your brand needs an always-on strategy.” Read more

Almost 80 percent of American adults are online, but what exactly are they doing? A new infographic from Flowtown and Column Five reveals the percentage of adult Internet users who are doing everything from social networking to shopping, banking, blogging, chatting, gaming and more.

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Most people assume that the Internet, which lives all around us, is weightless. Surprise—it’s not! According to Michael of Vsauce, theoretically the Internet does weigh something, though it doesn’t weight very much at all.

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When asked how important various information sources were for obtaining updates after the earthquake and tsunami, 83 percent of people ranked television as very important, while 72 percent cited Internet access through a personal computer. Radio broadcasts were very important for 66 percent of people, while 49 percent specified the use of mobile phones.

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Startups have seen a double digit increase in VC investments in 2010, which marks the first ever such increase since 2007 – according to MoneyTree Report by Pricewaterhouse Coopers, and National Venture Capital Association. VC’s invested $21.8 billion in 3,227 deals in 2010, which represents an increase of 19% in dollars and 12% in terms of deals done compared to the previous year.

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Check this off as one more milestone down for the Internet era. For the first time ever, the average American spends as much time online as watching TV — about 13 hours a week, according to a new survey.

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The Federal Communications Commission Chairman (and Obama’s Harvard classmate) Julius Genachowski outlined in his speech this morning the proposal to stop Internet providers from favoring or discriminating against Internet traffic over their networks. If it works, the FCC won’t allow, let’s say, Verizon from slowing down Skype to make their own applications seem faster.

Genachowski said the end goal here is to reserve the open Internet as a platform for innovation, investment, job creation, competition, and “free expression.”

And the “network neutruality” rules, if enacted, will mean the following for consumers:

1. Americans will have the right to access lawful content without being discriminated against. No central government can tell you what you can and can’t look at.
2. All consumers have the right to know basic information about their broadband service, so they can make an informed decision about which network to subscribe to.
3. Individuals’ right to say what they want will be protected from censorship by corporations.

The FCC seeks to regulate net neutrality, the principle that “the flow of content should remain open and unrestricted.”

But is the proposal airtight? Some are skeptical: New York calls the proposal “likely to disappoint,” while bloggers on Huffington Post label it “garbage.”

The findings from a new survey released last week tracking how people react to online content delivery are not surprising: consumers have little patience for slow websites and expect their mobile service to be just as fast, or faster, than their home computers.

But don’t discard the survey just yet. The real takeaway, and the reason so much attention was paid, is the impact the survey may have in driving the debate over net-neutrality by presenting the side of a voice not often heard in the debate: consumers.

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A North California District Court Judge dismissed Facebook’s lawsuit against Power Ventures this week, unconvinced by the site’s claim that Power.com’s efforts to integrate Facebook into its platform constituted a criminal violation of the California Penal Code. In short, violating a website’s terms of use is not a crime.
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The National Endowment for the Arts has released a report on technology and the arts with findings indicating that internet users might be more – not less, as some have opined – cultured than others. Audience 2.0: How Technology Influences Arts Participation looks at how new media use affects adults’ interaction with “high culture” like jazz performances and art galleries. Those who use new media like the internet, handheld devices and T.V. to participate in the arts are, according to the report, more likely to attend live arts events, and a greater variety of events at that.
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