As a startup guy myself and someone who likes to cover startups, I was delighted to find the Innovation Alley at ad:tech San Francisco. It’s no surprise that the exhibit hall and conference sessions are dominated by big brands like Yahoo! (YHOO) and Google (GOOG). They have the resources to buy exposure. But startups struggle for attention everyday. Most don’t deserve any attention but even the ones with innovative new technology and solutions don’t get the buzz they deserve.
So the folks at ad:tech is helping to solve this rather …

A few days ago, I wrote about the commoditization of social networks or rather the social networking feature sets that currently make Myspace and Facebook so unique and neat. Pioneers in social networking like Friendster and Myspace introduced a new data and software architecture that, at the same time clumsily and elegantly, met Internet users’ desire to interact and share content with each other. Finding old friends, connecting with new friends, sharing music and videos, playing collaborative games, and expressing oneself to virtual audiences of thousands all were groundbreaking features …

Chris Anderson, a writer at Wired Magazine and author of the influential The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More, makes some good points about the insanity of Facebook’s $15 billion valuation, the inadequacy of current approaches to social networking, and the implications of an over-reliance on advertising as a business model. His arguments are useful because entrepreneurs can use them to make concrete business or strategic decisions. He doesn’t use namby pamby qualifications to hedge his bets and predictions. I do …