Technology industry heavyweights are banding together to form a new group called the Allied Security Trust. Members include Google (GOOG), Cisco Systems (CSCO) and Hewlett-Packard (HPQ). This alliance will buy up patents in the marketplace to preempt “patent trolls” from acquiring these patents in order to extract royalties from Allied Security Trust members.
Patents are notoriously difficult to value but it is clear that patents are becoming a viable asset class in themselves. Taking the cue from many other asset classes, could there be a way to “securitize” a portfolio of …

The stock market’s rebound has been so fast and furious that it might make folks forget that we just experienced a nasty credit crisis and market downturn. Have sinking home values not registered with the national psyche? Surf around on Zillow.com and witness the vast amounts of wealth disappearing over the last few months as homeowners see their most significant asset crumbling on a shaky credit foundation. Of course, institutional money managers are the ones buying furiously and fueling this market rebound. It is entirely plausible that, unlike the average …

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 …

The technology sector gets a big surprise with Microsoft (MSFT) announcing that it will cease to pursue the acquisition of Yahoo! (YHOO). Most analysts and market pundits expected Jerry Yang & Company would ultimately accept a deal, albeit at a higher price than Microsoft’s initial offer. Expect Yahoo! stock to take a precipitous plunge at the market open and the announcement of class action lawsuits from its larger shareholders. While this saga of two tech giants unwinds, plenty of news in the rest of the tech sector deserves attention.
The Nasdaq …

A couple weeks ago, I wrote about my pessimism regarding the technology sector. The market had seemed to interpret the surprisingly good results reported by Big Blue (IBM), Google (GOOG), and even Yahoo! (YHOO) as reasons for unleashing optimism and a bargain hunting shopping spree for stocks of publicly traded technology companies. Maybe the recessionary environment and the woes faced by banks and the American consumer would not negatively impact corporate budgets for technology. My skepticism rests on the ability of secondary technology companies to weather the economic slowdown. In …

“@kevinrose how do I get you to follow me back???” – anonymous self-proclaimed “social app guru”
This is Part 2 of a series that explores the science of Social Media Measurement. Let me preface this post by saying that this is a lighthearted post trying to come up with a simple measurement regarding a hugely successful social web service.
Previously, I explored the measurement of popularity, novelty, and attention on the very popular crowdsourcing news aggregation site Digg. My post was based on an arcane academic study involving the half-life of popularly …

I wrote about my short thesis on Netflix (NFLX) just about ten days ago. The company just the other day reported growing earnings but disappointed with a weak outlook. The stock fell a whopping 24% as investors ran for the exits. The market responded negatively to the increase R&D costs for developing streaming technology that would allow the company to deliver long-form digital video content over the Internet. These recent expenses have slowed down profit growth and promise to weigh on foreseeable future earnings.
My short thesis …

Here is a list of things I want to see changed on the Web:

Social Networking
Blogrolls
RSS feeds
email

It helps to think conceptually of the commonalities in these items. Primarily, I’m concerned about how we manage information flow. In the future, sociologists will look at our nascent digital culture as a clumsy initial attempt to acquire and manage useful information and relationships. Our current clumsiness is resulting in information overload. Our feeble attempts at keeping up with information flow is leading to new symptoms of “digital addiction” for which we have few remedies …

Venture capital follows the public equity markets. So it is no coincidence that many VCs think that funding activity will slow down in the foreseeable future. KPMG, the large accounting firm, surveyed venture capitalists and found that 69% of respondents think that we are currently in a recession. A whopping 90% believe we will see a drop in initial public offerings. All in all, this will result in less money raised in venture capital partnerships and thus less money available for startups. Startup funds will find …