Archive for November, 2007|Monthly archive page
Future of Local = Trackable Calls (Part III)
Comments (1)More indicators that web-based local advertising lies in trackable calls (my past writing on the subject here):
1. Yodle raises $12m from DFJ and Bessemer for a trackable call local advertising network.
2. Ingenio is bought by AT&T for trackable call local advertising.
Career Advice from Warren Buffett
Many business schools have a “Warren Buffett Club” that makes an annual trip to visit the Oracle of Omaha. Buffett is extremely outgoing to such groups and usually does a lot of candid Q&A. I recently saw an unofficial transcript from a Tuck Q&A session in ’05. This response of Buffett’s was particularly amusing:
Q: What is your career advice?
A: If you want to make a lot of money go to Wall Street. More importantly though, do what you would do for free, having passion for what you do is the most important thing. I love what I do; I’m not even that busy . . . A few months ago I was talking to another MBA student, a very talented man, about 30 years old from a great school with a great resume. I asked him what he wanted to do for his career, and he replied that he wanted to go into a particular field, but thought he should work for McKinsey for a few years first to add to his resume. To me that’s like saving sex for your old age. It makes no sense.
I’m not going to touch the sex comment, but I think his advice about finding something about which you are passionate is great.
KnowledgeBid public profiles, private contracts, and blog bling
We’ve had a couple of busy weeks at KnowledgeBid and have launched a bunch of new features. Folks that have identified valuable information providers can now send them private listings directly. Private listings allow information seekers to securely and anonymously reach out to people who hold information. Also, providers can create public profiles and link to them with buttons from their personal website, blog, or social networking page. I have one of our new buttons here on my blog (upper right). Click on it and you can see my public profile and a link to initiate a private contract with me. You can read more about the new features over at the KnowledgeBid blog, where we post regular updates about what we’re up to. We’re excited about them and hope you will find them useful!
Tiffany v. eBay set to begin today
The Tiffany v. eBay litigation is set to begin today (my past coverage) and traditional news sources are starting to pay attention again:
CNN Money, WSJ, Washinton Post, PC Magazine, Reuters, WSJ Law Blog (with a shout out – thanks Peter)
Imperia: VoIP app backbone
Much of the recent buzz (two more) about VoIP app innovation seems to be brewing around Iperia. Iperia’s website is pretty tough to decipher, but it looks like they provide infrastructure for trackable calling and other VoIP stuff. They gave a demo of a potential use of their product at the VON 2007 fall conference which was for realtors to track calls to the homes they had on the market. Much of the criticism about the Iperia is focusing on the app for realtors, not the actual products Iperia provides. I’ve written about the benefits of trackable calls for local advertising. It seems Iperia is positioning themselves to be a service provider that can step in and help application builders integrate VoIP features. I think that VoIP features will continue to be grow, but Iperia will be fighting against the tide as the technology behind them becoming easier and easier to implement.
GigaOM on Voice Apps + VoIP lag test 2
Great GigaOm post today on web applications and VoIP innovations. We recently moved our VoIP platform out of Joe’s living room and into a high end hosting facility and were pleased to see our already low latency times cut in half (orginial VoIP test).
Hosted latency (~.43 seconds)
Joe’s living room latency (~.55 seconds)
Normal cell phone latency (~.34 seconds – dinner is being chopped in the background).
Om linked to Andy Ambramson’s VoIP Watch and Ike Elliot’s Telecosm – two blogs I will definitely be following from now on.
KnowledgeBid = officially launched
After months of hard work, I’m proud to announce the public launch of KnowledgeBid. KnowledgeBid is a web-based information market platform that allows users to access offline information and earn money sharing what they know with others. People looking for information or expertise can create listings on KnowledgeBid that describe what they want to know and how much they are willing to pay to learn. Information providers can then apply or create alerts to be notified when their expertise is in demand. Everyone has unique exposure to markets and industries through life experiences, so anyone legally and ethically able to do so can be a valuable information provider.
Much of what I have been blogging about here over the last several months has been directly related to KnowledgeBid. Some of the connections:
- KnowledgeBid is a market for information
- KnowledgeBid is a platform
- KnowledgeBid allows users to engage in the Delphi Technique
- KnowledgeBid target customers are hedge funds and private equity funds, along with day traders and market researchers
- KnowledgeBid uses VoIP technology to dynamically and securely schedule and track conference calls
- KnowledegBid can has robust transaction processing capabilities
So check out the site, subscribe to our company blog for updates, and check out our press release for full details of the launch. We love feedback and criticism, so please don’t hold back!
Wallstrip on Daaa Merc (CME)
Funny stuff today over at Wallstrip. After 5 years in Chicago, I realize that the SNL guys didn’t have to make too much up for Bill Swerski’s Superfans.
