Microsoft Offers Works For Free

Microsoft has released the new version of Microsoft Works as a free, ad supported office package that will compete directly with Open Office and Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

The Works package offers word processing, spreadsheet and slide (powerpoint) functionality partially based on code from older versions of Microsoft Office.

The move by Microsoft to offer a free office suite comes as online office packages including Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Thinkfree Office and Zoho continue to grow market share due to increased broadband penetration, online convenience and lower costs.

It was not disclosed whether the new version of Microsoft Works would sync with or support Microsoft’s online services under the Live brand. Whilst the version was said to be released July 27, it was not clear where it could be downloaded from or accessed.

Microsoft Works first launched as a Mac application in 1986.

StreetAdvisor Launches New Services

StreetAdvisor will today launch a range of new upgrades that will give homeowners, renters, and buyers a more complete picture of where they could live.

The new StreetAdvisor provides a real-life “insider” view that provides users the ability to learn and share vital details about where they live, including noise levels, traffic, neighbors, entertainment, and public services in a similar way to travel review sites. Recommendations and negative experiences about local businesses, entertainment and services will also be supported.

StreetAdvisor’s street based reviews have been expanded to include cities, states, and countries.

Upgraded guidebooks now include four broad categories with the ability to create additional topics in a similar fashion to a Wiki.

Other new features include a member recognition system, “local expert program” and StreetAdvisor Billboards, a service that offers the ability to secure exclusive “run-of-street” advertising opportunities on a per city basis.

The site is currently in public beta and offers coverage for the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia.

Facebook Outage

Facebook is down, and has been so since at least 10 am PST. Anyone notice it down earlier than that? We’ve emailed the company for their comment.

Update: Facebook is now back up as at 11:30am PST

Update: Statement from Facebook:

This morning, we temporarily took down the Facebook site to fix a bug we identified earlier today. This was not the result of a security breach. Specifically, the bug caused some third party proxy servers to cache otherwise inaccessible content. The result was that an isolated group of users could see some pages that were not intended for them. The site has now been restored and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have

Tangler’s Embedded Discussions

Australian startup Tangler has created a next generation forum product that allows real-time discussions to occur without page refreshes. Their forum product is both synchronous and asynchronous - meaning it competes as much with Meebo (web based chat) as it does with existing forum applications. Users can also easily embed rich media into the discussion

We first wrote about Tangler in February 2006, when it was deep in a development. They’ve been quietly working with beta partners for the last six months, and recently opened their doors to allow anyone to create a new forum. Last week, the 1,000th forum was created on Tangler.

Tangler forums are also decentralized. Any discussion/forum can easily be embedded in a third party website or websites. The discussion occurs simultaneously on all instances of the forum. See here for an example of an embedded forum.

Examples of startups using Tangler as their forum include Weewar, Particls and Omnidrive.

See our recent coverage of Meebo Rooms as well. It is interesting to see web chat and forums colliding towards the same end product.

IAC Up, Ask Down In Second Quarter

A strong second quarter by IAC saw a 78% increase in profits, mostly driven by assets sales and reduced costs. The positive headline results did not flow through to the struggling 4th ranked search engine Ask.com, which saw adecline in revenues. The second quarter decline comes despite a $100 million Crispin, Porter + Bogusky advertising campaign that should be resulting in increased traffic and revenue to the site.

The exact amount of the decline was not disclosed.

FCC Fails To Mark Its Place In History

The FCC released the auction rules on the 700 MHz spectrum today. Google formally requested (and we supported) that the new bandwidth have four requirements: open applications, open devices, open services and open networks. Together these rules could quickly make the U.S. wireless space competitive with European and Asian markets that we have long trailed.

The auction rules include much of what Google requested, including open devices and open applications. But open services and open networks are out, meaning third parties may not get access to the networks at fair wholesale rates. Will we see a tidal wave of innovation in the space? It’s too early to tell. The FCC hedged its bets to keep AT&T, Verizon and other incumbents happy. New players like Google may or may not participate.

This is clearly a compromise decision. History will decide if the FCC commissioners made the right choices. Perhaps their feeble attempts to stand up to AT&T, Verizon and their army of lobbyists will have been enough to get the U.S. back in the race with the rest of the mobile world. Or perhaps not. Just for record keeping purposes, Kevin Martin (Chairman) and commissioners Jonathan Adelstein and Michael Copps are willing to fight for openness. Commissioners Deborah Taylor Tate and Robert McDowell, who are parroting much of the nonsense that AT&T spewed last week, are clearly lining up with the incumbents.

Google Licenses Gmail In Japan

Google has licensed Gmail to Japanese mobile operator KDDI Corp.

The email service will be branded by KDDI and work on the “auone.jp” domain. Google will provide the backend for the service and account holders will have the same functionality as provided by Gmail itself, including 2GB of storage.

The announcement continues a recent string of deals in Asia for Google as it attempts to build market share and presence in countries it does not dominate. More recently, Google has licensed search to a number of Chinese search portals.

KDDI is currently Japan’s second largest mobile operator behind NTT DoCoMo. Third ranked mobile operator Softbank owns Yahoo Japan, which according to Smart Money is not as strong in search, but leads Google in other services including email.

Action Engine Raises $20 Million

Mobile applications developer Action Engine has raised $20 million in new round led by Baker Capital.

Previous investors Northwest Venture Associates and The Spangler Group also participated in the round.

The company develops mobile device software that allows media companies and mobile operators to provide music, video and other content on mobiles. Action Engine’s ODP platform incorporates intelligent mobile advertising, support for mass market handsets and broad management capabilities that are claimed to “increase profitability, lower cost of ownership and drive brand-awareness.” Existing clients include MSNBC, TiVo, Sprint and Verizon.

Action Engine’s total funding to date is now $65 million. The company plans to use the funds to accelerate its sales, marketing and distribution efforts.

50 Cent Gets Down With YouTube

YouTube has announced a new music competition that will be judged by leading artists 50 Cent, Common and Polow da Don.

YouTube OntheRise Rap Edition is a follow up to last year’s YouTube Underground contest and seeks to discover the best rap and hip-hop artists in the United States.

Unsigned talent who aspire to be professional artists have until August 17 to submit their videos. The final winner will be announced September 7.

The winner will be awarded a trip to New York City to professionally record a single for G-Unit/Interscope Records, a $10,000 gift card from Guitar Center, and their video will be featured on the homepage of YouTube.

Further contest information is available here.

Are Terrorists Using Second Life To Plan Attacks?

OK, so sensationalistic headlines targeted at Second Life are so last week; from FBI related gambling bans to animal sex, we’ve seen a lot. Now there are allegations being printed by News Corp in Australia that suggest that the next major terrorist attack on a Western country could be being planned in Second Life, and yes, as can be seen in the picture to the right, 9/11 is being used as a reference point as well.

The report describes in detail various griefer operations as being terrorist attacks and goes on to say that:

On the darker side, there are also weapons armouries in SL where people can get access to guns, including automatic weapons and AK47s. Searches of the SL website show there are three jihadi terrorists registered and two elite jihadist terrorist groups.

The fear factor is so thick, it can’t be easily paraphrased

With the game taking such a sinister turn, terrorism experts are warning that SL attacks have ramifications for the real world. Just as September 11 terrorists practised flying planes on simulators in preparation for their deadly assault on US buildings, law enforcement agencies believe some of those behind the Second Life attacks are home-grown Australian jihadists who are rehearsing for strikes against real targets. Terrorist organisations al-Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiah traditionally sent potential jihadists to train in military camps in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Southeast Asia. But due to increased surveillance and intelligence-gathering, they are swapping some military training to online camps to evade detection and avoid prosecution.

The terrorists must get broadband in their caves now.

Rohan Gunaratna, author of Inside al-Qaeda, says it is a new phenomena that, until now, has not been openly discussed outside the intelligence community….”They are rehearsing their operations in Second Life because they don’t have the opportunity to rehearse in the real world”

Be alert, but not alarmed

“Community representatives are relied on to report suspicious or inappropriate behaviour to the owners or the SL authorities, just as in the real world.”

Retrevo’s “Snapshot” Graphs Products By Price And Features

Retrevo, one of a number of automated, aggregate review sites we previously covered, is releasing an alpha version of a new product comparison feature called “Product Snapshot”. The feature helps find the greatest “bang for your buck” by visually displaying how a product’s price and features stack up against others in its category. CEO Vipin Jain will demo the feature at tomorrow’s Stanford Summit. The feature will go public at the end of September.

“Product Snapshot” maps a product’s place on a price/feature graph relative to other products in the category. The mapping of the product is based on a statistical analysis of a number of major features and prices drawn from across the web. Products with fewer features for their price fall at the bottom left of the chart, while products with high prices and many features are placed toward the upper right. For example, this search for a Samsung LN-S4696D shows where the LCD TV places relative to other mid-range TVs.

The snapshot also includes links to products with better features, similar products, and cheaper products. These features will be released at the end of September when the full feature is pushed live.

Retrevo distinguishes itself by focusing on consumer electronics and finding a great deal of auxiliary material on products. Searches return PDF product manuals, aggregate user ratings, product previews, written reviews, forums & blogs, and shopping links. The data is pulled from thousands of sites including those of manufacturers and retailers. Retrevo’s depth of information makes it best suited for initial product research instead of quick price comparisons.

While Rome Burned, Amp’d Used Venture Capital On Porn

You just know that this is going to end in a Hollywood movie.

Matt Marshall at Venture Beat has the scoop on what the Amp’d team were spending part of their $360 million in venture capital on: porn.

According to the asset list from the Apm’d fire sale, the company acquired at least 100 porn DVDs; least that’s the number listed for the auction (we’d presume additional DVD’s were probably taken home).

As Matt put it so well “We’re still wondering how venture investors such as Redpoint (which lost $25 million in this) and Highland (which lost $50 million) could have let this happen.”

Amp’d declared bankruptcy June 2 owing $100 million.

Full coverage of the Amp’d meltdown on TechCrunch here.

UPDATE: A correction printed at Venture Beat notes that these might not have been DVD’s, but some sort of X rated content Amp’d produced, they look like DVD’s and certainly we are unwilling to repeat the names of them here to prove the point. Aside from the still very valid questions about how Amp’d blew $360million in funding and ran up $100million in debt, there are now some interesting questions as to why a company primarily marketing to teens was producing X-Rated content.

More Information On That Secretive Twitter Financing

When Twitter announced a round of financing last week they mentioned most of the investors - an A list crowd that includes Union Square Ventures, Charles River Ventures, Marc Andreessen, Dick Costolo, Ron Conway, and Naval Ravikant. But they didn’t disclose the amount raised, even though it is customary to do so. We sniffed around and heard that the the company held a special meeting with their new investors and specifically asked them not to disclose the amount raised. We heard that it was a small round, between $1 - $5 million, but frankly I suspected it would be on the low end of that range.

Other startups, notably Technorati, have also tried to keep venture rounds quiet. But inevitably they leak because so many of the limited partners who invest in these funds must disclose information to the SEC. That hasn’t happened yet with Twitter, but the numbers are leaking. As best as we can tell, the company raised a $5 million round, on a $20 million pre-money valuation.

NowPublic Gets $10.6 Million For Crowd Sourced News

“Crowd sourced” news network NowPublic.com has closed a $10.6 milion series A round of financing led by Rho Ventures with seed investors Brightspark and the Working Opportunity Fund participating.

Crowd sourcing is part of the widely expanding “citizen journalism” category, which encompasses all the new ways non-professionals can participate in the news reporting process. Examples range from commenting, voting on stories, to full out blogging. News commentator Jeff Jarvis has written extensively on the subject. NowPublic is a website that provides these tools to the public so they can report on what is going on around them. Many other news startups also incorporate these tools in different ways, such as NewsVine, OutsideIn, Digg, CitizenBay, recently Topix, and the now defunct Backfence.

On the spectrum of citizen journalism, NowPublic is considered a “crowd sourced” news network since stories rely on many bits of contributed content instead of a small group of users.

On NowPublic, anyone can sign up for the site and start contributing to stories in the usual categories (politics, culture, entertainment, …) or even local news. Users can write their own stories and upload their own photos (mobile), or simply submit a story from somewhere else on the web. Each of the submissions ranked in the category based on the number of votes they get. Editors can also come in and adjust the rankings based on breaking news and spamming.

Traction is one of the hardest things to build in community based startups. Citizen journalism startup Bayosphere was shut down after it couldn’t attract enough contributors. However, NowPublic reports to have over 118,000 members from over 140 countries and 3,800 cities. The site does over 1 million uniques per month. They have a hardcore audience of about 15 - 20,000 exceptionally active contributors that put up anywhere from 2 to 5 stories each month.

NowPublic seems to work best in times of crisis where it can serve as a hub for reports from people on the ground. During Hurricane Katrina, the site received over 2,000 people writing and posting about what was going on. NowPublic also reportedly broke news in the Virginia Tech shooting, the grounding of an Alaskan ferry, a bombing drill gone wrong in New Jersey and a murder in Vancouver.

The ability to be places where news media aren’t always present has led to a partnership with the Associated Press. AP has started purchasing stories and photos from the site based on the submitters asking price. NowPublic can cover areas AP’s 4,000 staff members aren’t and will be particularly focused on hurricane prone parts of the country as hurricane season approaches. While they are currently not taking any portion of the proceeds, in the future NowPublic plans on taking 25% cut. They have 7 to 10 other major partnerships lined up as well.

The Vancouver-based company was originally started in 2005.

Cisco and Click.tv?

I picked up a juicy rumor this weekend that Cisco may have acquired Click.tv, a video annotation and deep tagging service that launched in 2006 and then shut down last month. When Click.tv closed down last month they said in an email to users “While I regret this shutdown, I am very excited by the reason behind it. You’ll be seeing Click.TV technology very soon doing *much* bigger and better things.” Thiscertainly suggested a complete relaunch or an acquisition.

Was it Cisco? Maybe. They’ve been making some interesting plays in the web space, with acquisitions of Five Across, Tribe and WebEx. Five Across and Tribe are both in the social networking space. I’m not sure how Click.tv would fit into those plans. So for now I’m going to label this as possible but not more. I’m digging for additional sources.

BuddyTV Takes $2.8 million Series A

Seattle based BuddyTV (Advanced Media Research Group Inc.) has taken $2.8 million in Series A funding in a round led by Gemstar-TV Guide International.

BuddyTV is a television focused content network with a team of dedicated entertainment writers producing content that is complemented by users. The service also provides broadcasting tools. See our previous coverage here on the space.

NASDAQ listed Gemstar- TV Guide is best known in the United States for its TV Guide publication. Their involvement in the round is significant due to Gemstar - TV Guide’s background; this is a serious long term player in the television industry investing in a new media TV related startup. The expertise and depth of knowledge BuddyTV will now have access to should bide them well in an increasingly competitive vertical.

Meebo Hits The Live Music Promotion Road

Web based instant messaging platform meebo has announced a new partnership with Live Nation and The Firm to promote “Family Values,” a series of live music events billed as “this summer’s biggest tour.”

The partnership includes concert promotion and concert presence. Music fans visiting meebo.com, the Family Values Tour website and featured band websites have a chance to win 2 free concert tickets and backstage access to every day of the tour.

At the live concerts, fans can share videos and pictures in the official Family Values “Circle Pit” meebo room and win prizes based on their submissions.

Meebo follows in the footsteps of Buzznet, who is promoting their service on the Vans Warped Tour. It would seem that live music events are becoming fertile ground for promoting startups and networking related sites.

The 2007 Family Values Tour is co-headlined by Korn and Evanescence.