Changes are afoot at Facebook (per iMedia Connection). The once red-hot social network has bid farewell to Owen Van Natta, the CRO who helped the company secure a $240 million investment from Microsoft, and now there are reports that it’s looking for a high-level executive to serve as a kind of second in command to founder Mark Zuckerberg.
According to Kara Swisher at BoomTown, sources close to the company say that Zuckerberg himself has been looking for a well-known technology executive to give him more support.
Such a search couldn’t come at a better time for Facebook, which has been beaten up a bit with reports that its opt-out program was beset by technical glitches. But perhaps more alarming for Facebook are reports that fatigue has begun to set in with users in the U.K. According to a BBC story, the social network saw a 5 percent drop in users from December to January. Facebook now has about 8.5 users in the U.K.
How much is the entity that manages the Microsoft IE-killing browser Firefox worth, and when will it go public? Answers: 1) A lot, and 2) Probably this year or next.
Background:
In the past few years, Mozilla’s open-source Firefox browser has done what most people would have considered impossible, which is chip away at Microsoft’s choke-hold on the browser market. Considering Microsoft’s advantages in this market–Internet Explorer comes pre-installed on nearly every PC–this is nothing short of amazing.
Estimates of Firefox’s current penetration vary, but most put the browser’s share at more than 15% (with 100 million+ downloads). On SAI, which obviously has tech-savvy readers, Firefox accounts for a full 42.3% of visits, only half a point less than IE’s 42.7% (Apple’s Safari accounts for most of the rest, with 13%). This shows the extent of Firefox’s encroachment on what was once Microsoft’s turf, as well as the amount of market growth opportunity left.
So how much is Firefox/Mozilla worth?
Any analysis has to start with the fact that, so far, Mozilla hasn’t made much of an effort to build a business. The company’s main revenue stream is simply per-browser carriage revenue for that little Google search box you see in the upper right corner of your browser tool bar–about $1 per download, according to some estimates. Even without slamming the accelerator to the floor, there’s a lot more where that came from (advertising on the default landing page, for example).
Check out full article at Silicon Alley Insider.
So Facebook will finally allow users to group friends and control information flow based on friend type. For guys like Robert Scoble, who have 5,000 friends (the limit), this may be a way to finally sort through the real friends from the fans. It’s a much needed feature that people have been requesting for a long time.
It also shows the steady maturity of Facebook from a college network to a full on world network, where friendships, business contacts, family and other types of relationships need to be more fully described. And this is also as much about privacy as it is about organization – users will be able to limit the information that certain friend groups receive.
To read more, check out TechCrunch.
Google Operating System reports (and confirms) that Google has acquired a mobile service called Zingku, which had been in private beta. Around since 2005, the service uses text messaging and picture messaging to provide a platform for (what appears to be) entertainment and events-related communication but also has commercial potential. Zingku also integrates the desktop with mobile. Below are some excerpts from copy on the company’s website:
Our service is designed from the mobile phone, outward, allowing you to create and exchange things of interest ranging from invitations to “mobile flyers” with friends in a trusted manner. On the mobile phone, Zingku uses standard text messaging and picture messaging features that come with every phone. On the web, our service uses your standard web browser and instant messenger. There is nothing to install.
With Zingku, things you wish to promote or share can easily be created and fetched via mobile, instant messenger, and web browser. Our service integrates your mobile phone with a personalized web site so that you can easily move (zing) things back and forth between the web and and your mobile as well as powerfully connect with friends and optionally their friends.
To read more, check out Search Engine Land.
If you’ve been reading about the anti-competitive implications of Google’s DoubleClick acquisition, you may be privy to the handy work of public relations firm Burson-Marsteller.
According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft has quietly hired the PR firm to wage a campaign against Google in an effort to convince regulators, advertisers and internet companies that the $3.1 billion deal will put too much power in the hands of Google.
None of the written pitches reviewed by the WSJ disclosed the PR firm’s relationship with Microsoft. Josh Gottheimer, an executive vice president at Burson, said the agency was hired by Microsoft to create i-comp.org, a group dedicated to discussing issues of online privacy and competition. Microsoft confirmed that it is a founding member of i-comp.org.
Read the full article on iMedia Connection.
