Rev2.org

I have really enjoyed following the progress of eBay these last few months. Over 5 years ago when I first became seriously interested in the Internet from a business perspective, eBay was the benchmark for me. Well eBay and amazon to be honest.

Where I come from (New Zealand) the big topic early in this century was ‘e-commerce’. This was a relatively new proposition down-under, a beast that kiwi business people new they would have to tackle. At the time there was only one local who had proven to have ability in this field, his name is Sam Morgan and he started trademe, basically a kiwi eBay. In a lot of ways the success of trademe further re-enforced my ongoing interest in the progress of eBay as an e-commerce business as there strategy and business model was the catalyst for the trademe auction site.

So recently I have posted about how eBay, like the rest of us Internet ‘nuts’, has had to adapt to the web 2.0 revolution in order to maintain their impressive growth figures since they launched on labor day in 1995. With roughly 89 million registered users these days, they sure do have a great testing resource!

The latest news from eBay is dominated by their two major acquisitions- Skype and PayPal. The 3rd quarter financial performance of eBay is public and it reveals some nice in-sights into the delta between the performance of these two arms of the eBay business. The fact that eBay overpaid when acquiring skype has been well documented and this fact is the only real blemish in a 3rd quarter that saw continued growth for eBay.

However, the ability for eBay to continue growing is in a large part driven by PayPal, the credit card payment alternative business the eBay acquired in 2003. Paypal accounted for approximately 25% of eBay’s total revenue in the fiscal quarter, an increase of 35% on the previous quarter last year.

In summary, it seems that eBay’s desire to improve it’s core online auction function is timely and required as this part of their business seems to be stabilizing. eBay chief Meg Whitman will now need to work on ensuring that the acquisition of Skype can provide the same benefits of those coming from her new cash cow Paypal.

The discussion about the potential battle between Google and Facebook for domination in the social networking space is heating up. Google dominate all thing’s Internet these days having the biggest finger in all the important pies. Search, mapping, email, blogging and RSS feed technology just to name a few.

Google have built their business on the strength of their foundation search and search advertising technology which has generated enormous value in their business. These guys are big enough to fight almost any kid in the business playground these days, no matter who they are or what industry they come from. If Google wants something, they can almost certainly afford to buy it.

Needless to say, Google should therefore be in a very strong position when it comes to dominating the latest online craze sweeping all corners of the online globe, social networking. You will hear most people in our industry say,”Google will just buy facebook.” Hell I even said it myself.

The thing is that facebook is not for sale. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has been suggesting this for quite a while; however, it seems that most people were not really taking his suggestions seriously. Does he really think he can effectively ‘beat’ Google by growing facebook to a level at which it becomes un-affordable for Google. The short answer at the moment seems to be: YES.

It seems as though some of the most important people at Google tend to believe in Mr Zuckerberg’s strategy as well. In what is turning out to be a high level technology recruiting coup, key members of Google are making the move over to facebook. This is not at all good news for the Search giant who prides itself on recruiting and retaining the best in the business.

So as Google fights to retain key personnel and get their existing social networking solution Orkut growing at a more healthy rate, facebook continues to move ahead in leaps and bounds. To be honest, I am starting to believe Mark Zuckerberg. Maybe he is the man to take on Google….

Even before the Internet as we know existed, predictions of life in the future involved video calling. How many sci-fi movies or futuristic TV shows did you see when you were a kid that depicted one person seeing another person on a screen and talking with them in real time? Thunderbirds are go!

The interesting thing is that even though the technology exists on the Internet today that allows us to chat to each-other on video in real time, this service has still not really taken off. Most of us thought that Skype would be ‘all over’ the growth in the market, however, the uptake of real time video calling seems to be relatively slow compared to other web based communication technology and services such as the text and image based IM and email.

New start-up Tokbox think that this is all about to change. Tokbox is a free service that allows users to talk with their friends via video web-cams in real-time. Unlike Skype, Tokbox users do not need to download client software. This is a key feature of the Tokbox service offering as it simplifies the process of video calling online for the masses.

With Tokbox, the process of setting up a real-time video conference with anyone is as simple as sending a link to the person that you want to speak with. I signed up for the service today and it was super simple. Name, email address and password is all that is required and you are all set to video call for free.From a business perspective the investment and advisory resources that Tokbox have acquired are impressive to say the least. The are, in a lot of ways, a YouTube protege’. The co-founder of YouTube, Jawed Karim, has a financial stake-holding in Tokbox and also sits on the board. Sequoia Capital who made billions by investing in and then selling YouTube also plan to announce a $4 million investment in Tokbox today. Tokbox are also currently using the same office space that YouTube grew out of, that’s gotta be a bit of a good omen right?

Obviously, there are a number of similarities in the challenges that Tokbox will face compared to those that Youtube faced as it grew like crazy. There are serious levels of investment required in the area of data storage when an organization builds a business around free online video services. From this perspective the partnership between Sequoia and Tokbox seems like a match made in heaven.

It’s not too long before someone in my extended family will be expecting their first child. Exciting times are ahead with everyone talking about whether it will be a boy or a girl (the parents chose not to know) and if it is a boy or a girl what gifts should friends and family buy. I’m hoping for a boy so I can buy boy toys for the little fella. The parents have requested that if we do buy toys, could we go with the wooden variety. Chinese plastic (and the lead based paint on them) do not have the best rep with new parents these days.

So I’m on the hunt for wooden toys. To be more specific, I’m on the hunt for a rocking horse. I figure a boy or a girl will love one of these. Being a geek, my rocking horse search starts online of course. But before I start, I have my daily ritual of checking the various RSS updates from the vast number of blogs I read. One post in particular catches my eye, its about Ponoko a new start-up who were recently debuted at TechCrunch40. Ponoko is all about facilitating designers and helping them sell their creations- all online.

As it turns out, Ponoko have updated their website so I decide to follow the link and take a closer look at what this new site is really all about. I’m impressed by their service which enables you to use their site to design basic products that will be made out of basic materials such as plastic or wood. The designs are then manufactured using laser cutting technology by Ponoko. You can choose to sell your designs, the products themselves or both.

The designs and products offered on Ponoko are a little limited at the moment, however, it didn’t take me long to find exactly what I was looking for- this wooden rocking horse. And while I’m sorting out the baby gift on Ponoko I may just need a nice little landscape viewing stand for my new iPhone!

I must admit when I first heard about Ponoko I was not really sure what exactly it was that these guys did. Their new website is doing a great job of clearly explaining this and I have to say I’m impressed. These guys are on a fast track to something great in my opinion. The service that they offer is brilliant on so many levels but in particular Ponoko immediately struck me as a very environmentally friendly manufacturing business of the future.

By creating an extremely transparent process right from conceptual design through to manufacturing, these guys are going to make their community think twice before purchasing something that they could potentially design and build themselves on Ponoko. My need for a rocking horse for a new family member is a perfect example. I have a genuine concern as to how this toy has been made and what it is made out of and Ponoko’s designs and products address this concern.

Ponoko rocks baby. Literally.

Who are the people in your neighborhood? In your eBay Neighborhood that is. The world’s most recognized online auction has finally decided to dip it’s toes into the field of social networking. Although this move by eBay may seem a little late to most, the new offering is already receiving mildly positive reviews before the official launch which is scheduled for today.

The new eBay social network is intended to help as part of a rejuvenated strategy as the San Jose-based multi national e-commerce company looks to kick start growth again after recent declines. A quote from eBay:

“a collection of micro-communities built around common interests and passions …, eBay Neighborhoods draws content from existing community features such as eBay listings, eBay Blogs, eBay Guides, and eBay Reviews, while adding new Neighborhood-specific message boards, member-uploaded photos, and social mapping tools to visualize the interconnections between people and their common interests.”

It’s interesting to note the recent criticism that eBay has received. Being recognized as a pioneer in the world of e-commerce has not been enough to stem this negative feedback from customers who are particularly concerned with the depth of content on the auction site. Shoppers are finding the site to hard to navigate as a result and are demonstrating their frustration with their mouses choosing to use other online stores such as Overstock and Amazon.

A sneak peak at eBay’s growing list of plans for improvement indicates that the neighborhoods feature will not be the only tactic that eBay look to leverage as we move closer to the holiday season.

Do you think eBay can resurrect their growth of the past with these new Web 2.0 style tactics?

The latest press around Google Inc. suggests that the world leading search engine has developed their first serious strategy involving the use of the video content that they have been acquiring since purchasing online video community YouTube.

The wider plan by Google involves an increased effort in distribution of content across their massive network of advertising partners (adsense). Obviously this content will be supported by advertisements, no surprises here. The plan does, however, involve a new move by Google to also distribute video content from youtube across the same advertising network. The video content will be surrounded by advertisements.

The revenue that derives from the video content will be shared with the publisher, although it is not clear yet as to what the exact splits/percentages will be. Christian Oestlien, product manager for Google Adsense says, “We are creating incremental distribution for our content providers.”

Google has been the clear winner from the rise and rise of online media to date. Their AdWords advertising product has pretty much revolutionized online marketing. The thing is, adwords is text based and we all know that ‘rich’ media has a huge future online. So when Google acquired youtube in late 2006 they made their intentions clear. Google wanted to leverage the growth in online videos and other similar media that fall into that ‘rich’ category.

Up until yesterday it was not entirely clear as to how Google intended to monetize the ridiculous amount of video content that has been uploaded onto youtube. It will be interesting to see how this new rich media strategy from Google evolves. How do you think Google can best utilise the content on youtube, will targeted video ads be as effective as text based ads?

Being stuck down the bottom end of the world in New Zealand means that I, like most of my fellow countrymen, love to get out and about and travel the globe. The only problem is choosing where one should travel to. Traditionally, New Zealanders will start their big OE (overseas experience) by basing themselves in London and plan adventures from there.

The impact that the Internet has had on travel has been massive and I for one am all for it. Until recently, however, the Internet was really only an excellent tool to help you build the very basics of your travel itinerary. Flights, accommodation and car rental have been well catered for over the last few years. But what about when you actually arrive at your destination and you want to do something that doesn’t involve transport or sleeping?

This is where a new breed of services such as Tripcart come into play. Tripcart is a service that helps you plan your road trip within the USA. If you have ever been to the states for an extended period of time you will know its a big place and there are a whole bunch of choices when it comes to things to do, places to see, activities and the like. There are not many other places in the world where you can stay in one country whilst experiencing a true ‘road trip’. Tripcart have obviously identified this and aim to help those of us who are keen to plan our USA road trip online.

Tripcart is definitely a site that I would categorise in the ‘online travel 2.0′ column. These guys are using classic 2.0 tactics such as Google Maps mashups, category clouds, reviews, ratings and other mandatory 2.0 style consumer generated content. This combination of site features and tactics are well executed on Tripcart making for a nice interface and therefore user experience.

As mentioned, the Tripcart site is part of a new breed of travel booking sites. So the service that these guys are offering is not that unique in a way. I recently reviewed Tech Crunch 40 participant Tripit who are also tapping into this new offering. With this in mind it’s great to see that Tripcart are focusing on one travel market (USA domestic) in the first instance.

As they say, “even the simple plans are hard to execute,” and it must be easy for web 2.0 start-ups in the travel industry to fall into the trap of going global too quickly. The domestic travel market in the USA is huge so Tripcart will have more than enough work on their hands getting a great selection of local US inventory and content up on the site in the coming months and years. So yep, a smart move to stay local in my opinion.

I’m off to the States again (geek conferences!!!) early 08′ and I happen to feel like a bit of a road trip through the beautiful south this time. My options for building an online itinerary are growing by the week with these great new travel start-ups…….you gotta love it!

Employment advertising and job search are industry categories that have by and large been revolutionised by the world wide web. Brand names such as Monster and Seek are now top of mind for those of us around the world who are in the market to either recruit or be recruited. Websites such as these took over from the employment sections of traditional daily newspapers.

Interestingly, in recent times there seems to be a shift in employment advertising and recruiting services on the web. The 2.0 revolution is starting to impact on how we find jobs on the Internet, particularly given the fact that there is a global shortage of human resources. All of a sudden the employee is a whole lot more powerful. There are a whole lot of vacancies and they are all available for anyone to see 24/7 online. Whats-more, professional social networks such as 2007 webby winner linkedin allow us all to promote ourselves as potential & desirable employees, also 24/7.

New startup Revyr is looking to take advantage of the 2.0 online job search market. Based in Sydney, Australia, Revyr is (like other job sites) all about facilitating job hunters in their search. The key point of difference with the site is that Revyr are more interested in your content as an employee than that of the advertisements from the would be employers.

The analogy that these guys use is very relevant, “Before you purchased your cell, car or plasma you probably went online to read reviews and see ratings but when you where looking for a new job did you do this sort of research? You probably didn’t but you should have - this is why we developed Revyr”.

The site is currently in beta and requires a testing authority to enter. I was fortunate to get an invite and have a play around. The interface is simple, clean and easy to navigate. Obviously there is not a hell of a lot of content up on the site. Given the fact that the primary function of the site is to facilitate and provide reviews of employers, there will need to be a little bit more content up for one to provide a more detailed review of the site and it’s performance.

I think that Revyr have definitely nailed a potential niche in the online job market with their new service. As they have quite rightly pointed out, as a prospective employee it makes total sense to research the performance of an employer should one have the ability to do this.

I suppose that the threat of sites such as linkedin or even facebook providing a similar type of service is more than likely, especially in the case of linkedin. A little bit of google research also revealed an existing player by the name of jobvent who offer a similar approach to the employment market.

I have read and seen a lot of press about recruiters, particularly in the USA, who use facebook as a means of discovering deeper levels of information about potential candidates. There is no reason why someone could not flip this process on it’s ear and develop a service similar to revyr on the facebook platform (note to revyr: get your facebook app live!)

Having just been through a corporate employment process and landing a job that did not work out, I certainly wish I had the ability to communicate with previous employees of the company that I chose to go with. Instead I spent 6 months of my career only to find that I was in the wrong place and I needed to start looking for the right role again.

Skilled employees now have a lot more control over their destiny in the workforce. Hopefully employer review services will become as popular online as the review services and/or site features for other major online industries such as retail.

Do you really want to know what your friends are doing online right now? Do you fancy a bit of online friend espionage? What article they are reading in the New York Times online or what iTunes track they are listening to in real-time? If so, Slifeshare is the new social network for you.

It’s not very often that I read an About page on a website that I am reviewing that does not need to be edited a little bit in my opinion. I love about page’s that are straight to the point, we all know how short people’s attention spans are when it comes to reading text online. The ability to describe your service and the benefits that it offers to new users in one sentence is a real strength. So I was very impressed with Slifeshare’s about page which states:

“Slifeshare is a live network where you and your friends stay in touch by following each other’s computer activities, in real-time. Share notes, web pages, videos, feeds, music, applications and more with your friends, family or the world. It’s about social awareness and being connected, all the time, to those you care about.”

Its often the most simple services and applications that become so addictive and Slifeshare has that sort of potential. All that is required is a simple download of a small application called ‘Slife’. This will enable your machine to start sharing your activities with other members in your community.

From a privacy perspective, the call to ‘download this little app’ as part of the Slifeshare sign-up process was the point at which I became slightly suspicious. I am not a huge one for conspiracy theories, however, I don’t like spyware either. A quick trip to the help section on the site revealed some re-assuring answers to the doubts that I started to have.

In terms of cost, you can get a basic membership for free or alternatively splash out and spend a huge $2 per month for ‘premium’ membership. The upgraded membership will enable additional profile features such as a premium icon for your profile, an advertising free interface and most importantly a widget that gives you the low down on who exactly has been visiting your Slifeshare profile page.

One aspect of Slifeshare that I find very cool and progressive is the developer center. In true Facebook-style, Slifeshare are taking a very ‘open access’ approach to their service offering an API in XML format. Developers can go nuts and create mash-ups from the long list available profile content. Very cool indeed.

I suppose the success of this web 2.0 start-up will ultimately hinge on how transparent individuals really want to be about their online life. Slifeshare suggest that their service is a great way to avoid the hassle of having to use IM or the ‘poke’ feature on facebook to keep in touch with your large group of friends.

Whilst I have never really found using IM or facebook to be slow or much of a hassle, I am always keen to try things that give me what I want faster and Slifeshare could potentially be good from that perspective. As the very simple corporate policy of arguably the most successful online business suggests ‘Fast is better than slow’.

Chief Executive Steve Ballmer has put a dark cloud of uncertainty over the rumors of Microsoft’s proposed purchase of a 5% stake-holding in social network facebook with recent comments. Ballmer was yesterday quoted as saying “I think these things [social networks] are going to have some legs, and yet there’s a faddishness, a faddish nature about anything that basically appeals to younger people.”

Mmmmm, $500 million for 5% of a fad? Has the likelihood that Microsoft will make this investment just taken a turn down negative street?

One thing that I do find interesting about Mr Ballmer’s comments is his reference to ‘younger people’ and the theory that anything that appeals to them has a ‘faddish’ nature. Quite a big call, don’t you think?

For starters, the demographic make-up of Facebook’s community is actually a lot older than most would think according to some research I found. As much as I would like to think that 35 year olds fit in the ‘young people’ category, common sense would suggest that this demographic is a little more mature, affluent and less ‘faddish’.

So maybe there is a little bit of a bluff behind the Microsoft CEO’s comments about the Facebook fad. A recent article from the New York Times certainly suggests that although Microsoft may believe that Facebook is a fad, it’s a fad that they want to be a big part of in their new move into a more ad-generated revenue strategy.