Netizen

Monday, July 30, 2012

Even Dave Says Hello

Yahoo hiring Marissa Mayer is as big if not a bigger deal than when it acquired Flickr.

Pink is the New Purple! Dear Marissa: Think Different.

its amazing assets in content, communications, and community around the world. The last really bold move Yahoo made was probably acquiring Flickr .... frequent & broad usage all over the world. ..... What if Yahoo began acquiring or partnering with properties specifically relevant to women, like Pinterest, ShoeDazzle, Gilt Groupe, BabyCenter, Oprah, People, Etsy, Ellen Degeneres, Martha Stewart (or BritMorin.com)..... Zynga (which appeals to mostly women)

Think different makes sense. Think pink is an iffy suggestion. Frankly, it is sexist.

If it is about women - it is not, it is about Yahoo's shareholders, employees, users - the best thing Marissa Mayer can do is be the best CEO she can be. When the announcement was made women across the country spent the night reading up everything they could possibly find on her online. That's impact.

Free Food Goes A Long Way

It is not really a budget issue, so I don't see why more companies don't do it. Another good one is the 20% time. A third is child care.

This free food thing was a great early step to take. So simple, so obvious, so visible. It will garner headlines.

In Week Two, Marissa Mayer Googifies Yahoo: Free Food! Friday Afternoon All-Hands! New Work Spaces! Fab Swag!

a weekly Friday afternoon all-hands meeting ...... Mayer is also prepping major changes to the layout of the work spaces and buildings of Yahoo to make it feel more collaborative and cool, as well as upgrading swag in its stores..... Such focus on improving cultural issues is an interesting initial move by the neophyte CEO, since the care and feeding and, most of all, cosseting of employees has been a critical element to Google’s success at creating an always sunny work environment. ..... “It might be just a small thing, but people are thrilled,” said one Yahoo employee, in a common sentiment about the symbolic gesture of free grub...... Mayer has been up to much more serious business.. most especially pushing product innovation as the savior for Yahoo to anyone who will listen. ...... Better email! Better Flickr! Better search! Better ad-serving! ..... “This is the sound of Yahoo becoming a technology company again.... It will be all about platforms and products.” ..... a big splashy tech or product deal in the days ahead, perhaps via an acquisition to signal the new direction. ..... Will Mayer, as Google CEO Larry Page has done forever, approve all hires at Yahoo going forward? ..... Mayer has been studying org charts carefully this past week, and several sources told me that she has asked all her direct reports for strategic plans in the next 45 days.

Jack Dorsey got elbowed out of the CEO position at Twitter by Evan Williams. Months later Dorsey said he should have had weekly team meetings.

Flat workspaces are another thing. No cubicles. Just one big, open space.

You want your people to be happy.

I asked for a free Flickr, (Make Flickr Free Again) but got free food instead.

Of all the Google things, the 20% time I find the most intriguing. That is Google's elixir of youth. That is the reason why when Google becomes bigger it tackles bigger problems instead of going staid and corporate.

Free lunch in week two is a master stroke.

What will be Mayer's first acquisition? I bet many minds are asking that question. Flipboard would make a lot of sense.

Sunday, July 29, 2012

Dancing To Michael Jackson

Via Lina Lawrey

HTML5 Richness

English: W3C HTML5 Badge in SVG. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

For the longest time it has been that the richness on the desktop has far surpassed the richness possible in the browser. That is about to reverse with HTML5.

Ninja power: open-source HTML5 toolset aims to enable richer Web apps

Three new open-source software projects developed at Motorola Mobility .... a new content creation tool called Ninja, a JavaScript development framework called Montage, and a testing automation tool called Screening ..... The Ninja authoring tool .. 3D scenes and vector graphics ... Montage bridges the gap between developing native applications and Web sites. .. Screening completes the toolset, providing an interface for creating, editing, and manipulating application test scripts. Screening is built with Montage for the front end and NodeJS for the server, and it integrates with WebDriver implementations for Chrome, Opera, FireFox, and Internet Explorer to script the browser. .... Ninja creates all the required HTML, CSS, and JavaScript (if necessary) to render the content you create

The article talks at length and into great technical detail. It has been written by the very people who came up with the technologies being talked about.

Looks like Motorola is not strong only in hardware. It seems to have a deep bench when it comes to software as well. This work might as well have been done at Google. It is so at the edge.

Apple And Twitter

Image representing Apple as depicted in CrunchBase

Image via CrunchBase

Steve Jobs tried to cut a deal with Facebook. It did not quite pan out. So he threw in his lot with Twitter. That gave Twitter a tremendous boost in the Apple ecosystem. And now looks like the relationship is about to get deeper.

Apple may invest "hundreds of millions" in Twitter

Apple investing hundreds of millions in Twitter would be like when Microsoft invested hundreds of millions in Facebook. That was a smart move. That money grew. This money will also grow.

And I am glad Apple is also coming around to Facebook integration.

Jackson Heights

eBay, Come Back

Image representing eBay as depicted in CrunchBase

Image via CrunchBase

I have not used eBay in years. I had no idea it needed a comeback. I just read about it in my hometown newspaper.

Behind eBay’s Comeback

EBay, Yahoo and AOL, the dominant Internet triumvirate circa 2004 ..... eBay’s success has big implications for struggling companies like Yahoo and AOL, not to mention more recent sensations that have already lost some luster, like Zynga, Groupon and even Facebook ...... “One of the unique things about the Internet is a company can be a white-hot success and become a global brand and reach global scale in just a few years — that’s the good news,” he told me this week. “But then somebody can turn around and do it to you. There’s constant disruption. One of the first things I had to do here was face reality. EBay was getting disrupted.” ...... So thoroughly has eBay been transformed that he didn’t even mention its traditional auction business ..... Excitement about eBay’s prospects has little to do with its traditional auction business, or even its core e-commerce operations ...... Most of its growth came from mobile retailing and its PayPal online payments division, a business it acquired in 2002 for what now looks like a bargain $1.5 billion. ...... “Mobile is revolutionizing how people shop and pay.” ..... EBay is offering a one-click payment solution. .... Mr. Spitz said he was recently stopped at a traffic light and the sun was bothering his eyes. By the time the light turned green, he had used his phone to order and pay for sunglasses. ...... “We saw the mobile revolution early and we made a big bet across the entire company. We saw that mobile was an important factor for our customers. It was becoming the central control device in their lives. We didn’t worry if it cannibalized our existing business, because we knew it was what our customers wanted.” ..... The smartphone “has blurred the line between e-commerce and off-line retail,” Mr. Donahoe continued. “Four years ago, you had to be in front of a laptop or desktop to shop online. Now you can do it seven days, 24 hours. We’re going to have to drop the ‘e’ from e-commerce.” ...... Amazon continues to invest in its delivery systems and it, too, has an effective mobile app and one-click payment system. ..... EBay and PayPal apps already rank among the top 10 mobile apps .... EBay stresses, without mentioning Amazon by name, that it doesn’t compete with its retail customers. ...... “We spent three years fixing the fundamentals and tried not to worry about what everyone else was saying.” ..... “We’re more technology- and innovation-driven than we’ve ever been. Mobile gave us the opportunity to start with a clean slate from a technology perspective.” Less than two years ago, eBay acquired Critical Path Software, which was helping to develop eBay’s mobile apps. “We thought they were the best, so we bought them and got a couple hundred of the best software developers in the world working exclusively for us,” Mr. Donahoe said. ...... PayPal Here, a new payment system, would allow customers to “check in” in advance at a shop, be greeted by name when they arrive, complete transactions without a mobile device or credit card and get a text message as a receipt. ..... Mr. Donahoe has been chief for just over four years, and has replaced most of eBay’s top management.