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urban anthropology
The Jakob Lodwick Crack-Up Goes Taxi Driver
Vimeo founder Jakob Lodwick is now sporting a haircut straight out of Taxi Driver. Which wouldn't be disturbing, except that the young millionaire seems to be having a breakdown that would make a fitting sequel for the gritty film. More » -
Crack-ups
The Scary Knife Rites of an Apostate Fameball
Hipster millionaire Jakob Lodwick can't stop seeking web attention. Yet even the dim lights of internet semi-fame drive him up the wall. So he's left to stab in frustration, in the dark. More » -
details, details
Correct out-of-touch New York style rag's Internet gossip!
It's complicated. God, is it ever. The same October Details story that follows around New York's "Internet playboys" and their bicoastal hangers-on runs with this chart of who dated, funded, or hated in this overdocumented side of the Web scene. So sweet to know we're not the only ones keeping a scorecard, but one of its subjects, Caroline McCarthy, claims there's inaccuracies! Let's do Details and the kids recently fanning their fameballs from the coverage a favor and fix it up then. Ready? Let loose in the comments with your errata. -
digital music
MySpace Music — like Muxtape, except people who wear deodorant will use it
MySpace Music, a joint venture between the News Corp. social network and music labels Universal, Sony and Warner,finally launches next week, says Fortune, though it still won't have a CEO. MySpace users will be able to listen to and organize playlists full of songs from all three music labels for free. (EMI is the lone holdout, which means no coldplay.) Playlists will include affiliate links to Amazon.com's MP3 store. MySpace CEO Chris DeWolfe says ad revenues and song kickbacks are going to save the music industry, replacing lost CD sales. More » -
rumormonger
Muxtape's spending real cause of music site's shutdown
Muxtape founder Justin Ouellette says he's shut down the mixtape-hosting website because of a problem with the Recording Industry Association of America. A statement from the RIAA itself seems to confirm the story. Bu we hear another reason Muxtape is shutting down is that it got too expensive for Ouellette to keep up. More » -
clips
Classic Jakob Lodwick video further explains post-Lodwick productivity surge
Even when Manhattan's favorite Internet hipster Jakob Lodwick isn't high, he's not that hard-working. Connected Ventures cofounder Zach Klein reminisces about the early days of Connected Ventures, the IAC-backed testosteronefest behind CollegeHumor and Vimeo. Lodwick leads the startup's crew in singing "Semi-Charmed Kind of Life," and trashes cofounder Ricky Van Veen's cardboard cutout of Shaquille O'Neal. Any questions on why Vimeo's performance soared after IAC fired Lodwick? shaq attack from Amir Cohen on Vimeo. -
earnings
IAC down more than half a billion in second quarter
In the second quarter, IAC swung from a $94.6 million profit last year to a $421.6 million loss this year. Don't blame Jakob Lodwick! His former company, Vimeo, is nowhere near the top of IAC/InterActiveCorp's expense report for the past quarter. The real problem at Barry Diller's Internet empire is Cornerstone Brands, a rollup of catalog companies undermined by weak consumer spending in home and apparel retail. Cornerstone's losses led to a $300 million writedown in goodwill in IAC's second quarter. In addition, the soft real estate market cut revenue for home financing site LendingTree nearly in half. More » -
vimeo
Amateur video site overrun by — no, not porn
Victim of their own success: Vimeo, the online video-sharing venture owned by Barry Diller's IAC. The site has been been doing well since IAC fired Vimeo's founder, wacky Web 2.0 poster boy Jakob Lodwick. But Vimeo's ample capacity is now bogged down by a glut of videogame screen-capture movies, sometimes called fraps. Why is that a problem? More » -
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wantrepreneurs
Julia Allison: HTML tutor to the nonstars
It's been just a little over a year since Julia Allison touched down in Silicon Valley, strutting past the hand-stampers at an arts fundraiser and informing anyone who would listen that she was looking for a boyfriend to help her with her website. It hasn't exactly paid off. The so-soft-it-hurts launch of her new startup, Nonsociety.com, is a technical tour de farce. The rumored-to-death project wraps glamour shots of Allison and friends like comrade Meghan Asha Parikh, TechCrunch editor Michael Arrington's ex-girlfriend, around sideways-scrolling feeds ("lifestreams"!) of their Tumblr blogs. Meghan, a former hedge-fund analyst, shows off her tech creds here. She's the only one who seems to have a functioning "lifestream," even on launch day. Allison's and a handbag-designing ladyfriend's came up 404. We salvaged the launch video, in case the whole thing collapses: More » -
Andrew Pile
New Vimeo boss mocks Jakob Lodwick's pet wantrepreneur
On Monday, we posted Muxtape founder Justin Ouellette's accidentally-emailed-to-the-Internet photo of a napkin on which he'd scribbled details of his investment deal with Jakob Lodwick. Lodwick, best known for getting fired from Vimeo, an online video-sharing site he founded, now owned by IAC. He now spends his days playing the solipsistic teenager in a man's Crocs-shod body. Now Lodwick's replacement at Vimeo, director of development Andrew Pile, joins the fun. More » -
the chart
Vimeo without founder Jakob Lodwick: quite successful
Is IAC's Vimeo, the video-sharing site founded by bizarrely charismatic (and just plain bizarre) New York entrepreneur Jakob Lodwick, missing its founder? In a word, no. Lodwick lost his job due to insubordination last November; his dare-you-to-sue-me funding of an IAC employee's music startup, in an apparent violation of his noncompete agreement, is right in line with the nose-thumbing he did while on the job. We heard IAC finally fired Lodwick because he would blow off meetings with upper management when it wanted to talk to him about things like marketing and growth. So who got it right — IAC chairman Barry Diller's suits, or the wannabe iconoclast? More » -
confirmed
Napkin shows New York ubergeek Jakob Lodwick encouraged IAC employee to two-time Barry Diller
Once an oversharer, always an oversharer — no matter what it costs, personally or financially. When IAC fired Jakob Lodwick — the Internet's own Howard Roark — from Web video site Vimeo, IAC agreed to pay Lodwick $100,000 a year until 2011, just so long as he stayed away from IAC employees in any new ventures. Lodwick, reportedly bipolar and never much one for consistency, has proven unable to resist the temptation. An image posted to former IAC employee Justin Ouellette's personal blog seems to confirm what's already been rumored: Lodwick funded Ouellette's side project, an online-music site called Muxtape, with enough cash — $95,000 in exchange for 1 percent of Muxtape's equity, going by the scribbled napkin — so that Oullette could quit IAC to run Muxtape full time. More » -
exits
Jakob Lodwick too good for the Internet, leaves it to you animals
It's hard out there for an Objectivist. At least, that's according to Normative founder Jakob Lodwick, who cites his mama when deciding that we're all just too negative to appreciate the risk-taking, innovative soul behind Vimeo and (too a much more secretive extent) Muxtape. You animals have scared him away from the Internet with your snide comments and ad hominem insults! Never mind that markets, like emotional states, tend to be volatile — if your will is positive enough, you can conquer all, promise! At least, that's the theory. Lodwick has decided to stop trying to live up to it and will cease to publish anything but positivity online, presumably with comments disabled. More » -
wantrepreneurs
Why are Jakob Lodwick and Charles Forman in Esquire?
We don't own a smoking jacket or get manicures, so were unaware that New York wantrepreneurs Charles Forman of Iminlikewithyou and fired Connected Ventures cofounder Jakob Lodwick appear in the latest issue of Esquire until Forman pointed it out to us this morning. "Good to see you yesterday," Forman managed to say before asking: "Are you going to put my Esquire thing on Valleywag?" Fine. But only because it gives us a chance to examine what, exactly fellow wantrepreneur Julia Allison sees in him. Yes, the pair are dating. (Though we hear she sometimes forgets his name when introducing him at parties.) More » -
breakdowns
Muxtape hacked, causing emo indie types to weep more than usual
Reports came in over the last hour that Muxtape was hacked, and the online-music startup has confirmed the news on its blog.This afternoon, someone gained access to our server and caused some problems. We are investigating and will have more information soon.
All the various mixes played one song and one song only — noodly downtempo chillout "Good Disease" by Aim. Could a sufficiently emo Connected Ventures engineer ticked at Muxtape backer Jakob Lodwick's poaching of Justin Ouellette have decided to take matters into his own hands? -
journalist math
Founder of music startup Muxtape learns art of obfuscation from his master
Interviewing Muxtape's Justin Ouellette for Listening Post, Eliot Van Buskirk asked "How many users are there at this point? How many muxtapes?" Ouellette's response — "more than the population of Germany, less than the population of Japan" — puts the number between 82 million and 127 million users. Compete.com puts the number around 52,000. Ouellete might have been joking, but Van Buskirk published the numbers without comment. And remember, with Ouellete and his Muxtape partner Jakob Lodwick, whom Barry Diller fired from his post as founder of online-video site Vimeo, you can't judge what's actually going on based on what they say. More » -
jobs
Jakob Lodwick gets it for free — now with interns
Promiscuous hipster investor Jakob Lodwick is once again looking to score for free. "Basically, if you want to work your ass off for me a few days a week," Jakob wants you for his music startup, Normative. Noting Lodwick's post-IAC riches, Tumblr'r Corinne offers this rewrite of his ad: More » -
exits
Barry Diller is paying Jakob Lodwick more than $100,000 a year to stay away from IAC employees
We heard Jakob Lodwick may have broken his severance agreement with IAC's Connected Ventures when he poached Vimeo Web designer Justin Ouellette to help him start Muxtape, an online mix-tapes startup. How much could the gaffe cost the Connected Ventures cofounder? Reportedly, $100,000 a year through 2011. "What a mess," an IAC exec tells us. True, but mostly for Lodwick. IAC can hire more Web designers to replace the one Lodwick's entrepreneurial ventures have cost them so far. Diller's six-figure dole will be harder for Lodwick to replace. -
vimeo
Barry Diller's video site cashing in on searches for "beastiality"
Doing some follow-up research on Vimeo's traffic after our post earlier today, a tipster made an intriguing discovery. Compete.com lists "beastiality" (sic) as the fourth-highest search term driving traffic to the IAC-owned video-sharing site. Which may have something to do with open-minded libertarian founder Jakob Lodwick's choice of "Obeastiality" as the name of his blog (it now redirects to jakoblodwick.com). Sadly, there's no hot monkey sex on the site, but I did find a clip of a woman making out with a cat, so that's something. Interspecies lovin' on Vimeo, after the jump. More » -
exits
Lodwick's Muxtape mess
Jakob Lodwick, the fired founder of Vimeo who's now dabbling in online music, rushed out an announcement of his involvement with Muxtape, an online mix-tapes startup — shortly after we started asking questions. But in his attempt to spoil our scoop, Lodwick may have put the payout he got from Vimeo's parent company, IAC, at risk. We're told that part of Lodwick's severance package included a fairly typical agreement to not poach any of his former Connected Venture colleagues for future projects. But with Muxtape, that's just what Lodwick's done. More » -
mareen fischinger
Lodwick's latest flame pitches Muxtape for him
Meet Mareen Fischinger, a photographer from Düsseldorf, Germany, according to her Tumblr blog. "I don't know anything about her," a source tells us, "Just that Jakob [Lodwick] is [redacted] her." We have a little more to add to the scoop. Besides her obvious eye for photography, Fischinger shares her boyfriend's talent for pitching Muxtape without disclosing his relationship to the company. -
rumormonger
Is Jakob Lodwick the moneyman behind Muxtape?
Jakob Lodwick now admits he's involved with Justin Ouellette's Muxtape. What the Connected Ventures cofounder, ousted from his job at the IAC-backed venture by Barry Diller, doesn't disclose: a financial stake in Ouellette's online mix-tapes project. We hear it's more than plausible Lodwick is an early investor in the startup. Lodwick has already shown a willingness to invest in projects he admires, such as David Karp's Tumblr. Before publicly disclosing his employ with Muxtape, we asked Lodwick to explain his connection to Muxtape. In an email, Lodwick changed the subject to fantasies of his personal life. More » -
jakob lodwick
Jakob Lodwick now even more unemployed-looking
A tipster sends us this photo of departed Connected Ventures cofounder Jakob Lodwick and his mustache. He's named it "moustache." Perhaps he'll win over Scarlett Johansson by offering her a ride? -
geek love
It's no use, Kevin — Julia knows you have to come down eventually
A tipster sends us this shot of Digg founder Kevin Rose clambering up a palm tree during the Future of Web Apps conference. You know, the one in Miami, where quasi-professional geek paramour Julia Allison drank his milkshake. Allison is beautiful, and if bright lights are your thing, plausibly charming. So why would Kevin flee? Maybe like Allison's last beau, he doesn't want to shell out for a MacBook Air, either. Leaked emails on that whole mess, below. More » -
sex trade
Jakob Lodwick gets it for free
My escort friend is actually going on a date tonight with Libertarian libertine Jakob Lodwick — for free. (Lodwick is in town from New York working on his music startup Normative.) The only way my gal pal's dubious value proposition with Lodwick makes sense is the geek cred she'll gain from being paired with him. Lady, why not just pay Jakob to say he went out with you? That seems easier. -
webtards
Jakob Lodwick Officially Goes Insane
Jakob Lodwick's back from blogging! The recently fired founder of Vimeo and ex-boyfriend of Star editor-at-large Julia Allison says he'll no longer hand loaded guns to thugs, which apparently means fewer topless self-portraits and embarrassing self-revelations, and more news about his startup. It's called Normative and, since starting really pretty web sites is Jakob's talent (which is the only reason I pay attention to him), it will probably be interesting if utterly unprofitable. Also, he's going to end all government involvement in the private sector! And he's starting a third blog just to list the things that he, Jakob, likes. So here's a quick guide to Jakob's three blogs: More » -
nerdspotting
Jakob Lodwick invades Bay Area; hide your women, venture capitalists
Jakob Lodwick is back in the Bay Area, kicking it at his cousin's San Francisco-based startup. The only thing slightly more terrifying than the prospect of one of our local girls becoming his new softcore pinup is the notion that Lodwick might end his blogging strike. Oh wait, he has — three times over. Lodwick, unemployed after getting fired from Connected Venture by Barry Diller, lasted 20 days without blogging. Alongside our daily dose of Jakob Lodwick, he'll expose us to stuff he likes, and apparently work on a political manifesto dubbed The Invisible Fist in which he'll attempt to destroy capitalism as we know it. Good luck on Sand Hill Road, Jakob. -
blogging for dollars
50,000 people actually sad to see Lodwick go
Proving that he is little more than the East Coast's answer to Robert Scoble, Jakob Lodwick quit blogging yesterday. The fired Connected Ventures cofounder blogged his departure from blogging on his blog. "With over 1,700 posts," he writes, "I've seen my identity shift into a weird sort of public figure, which is rewarding. But I admitted to myself tonight that it's become stressful, and I need to take a break and reevaluate my relationship with the Web." According to Compete.com, Lodwick leaves 50,000 loyal readers behind. They'll miss him. So will we. Until he inevitably unquits, that is. -
jakob lodwick
All Objectivists should be forced to keep blogs
You've probably seen that Bill Gates wants the world to embrace a kinder form of capitalism. But have you seen fired Connected Ventures cofounder and "burgeoning music entrepreneur" Jakob Lodwick's rebuttal? It's Objectivism in all its glory! Lodwick tells Gates to stop justifying capitalism by saying it serves to better others. More » -
bloggers
Jakob Lodwick claims he'll behave like a normal human being. Right.
Wacky entrepreneur-turned-egoblogger Jakob Lodwick has vowed that from here onward, he'll reveal "less, not more" about his life online. A wise move that would prevent him from, say, deleting entire blog entries as soon as they're reported on. Buried deep within his Normative nonexplainer is his new philosophy of revealing "a morsel" rather than his whole "lunch" because he's learned some sort of lesson. The real reason? Without Julia Allison, he's just not that interesting. -
normative
Jakob Lodwick reveals his musical ambitions
Jakob Lodwick's brief, one-sided spat with fellow Web-music entrepreneur Peter Rojas was just a warm-up act. Lodwick has announced his new project, Normative. We'll make this short, since Lodwick squanders endless words on a heart-wrenching tale of the music industry's slide and his efforts to purchase normative.com from a cybersquatter. More » -
nerdfight
Jakob Lodwick disses Peter Rojas, just so we'll talk about him
Ousted Vimeo founder/CEO Jakob Lodwick has fallen into Tumblr-blogged obscurity. Without a scantily clad photo of Jakob and Julia every morning, why should we continue to care about his budding musical exploits? Lodwick must have gotten the memo, for he's taken on fellow nerd-hottie hipster entrepreneur Peter Rojas in an attempt to stay relevant. Lodwick (and everyone else) can't figure out what's so great about Rojas's Web-music thing, RCRD LBL. "They combined the worst way to discover music (genres) with the worst way to organize Web content (tag clouds)." Them's fighting words! At least he has one good point: the only people who think any of this crazy music 2.0 nonsense is a good idea are founders of music websites and their friends. (Photo of Jakob Lodwick by Jesse Winter) Update: Lodwick deleted the post. Luckily, we have a copy. More » -
jakob and julia
Guy without a job seeks to humiliate his ex
Fired Connected Ventures founder Jakob Lodwick thought it would take a whole 300 or so words to humiliate his ex-girlfriend, Star editor-at-large and Mossberg-esque technology evangelist Julia Allison. All this because Lodwick and Allison's relationship — friends prefer to characterize it as a postmodern art project — went awry. But Jake, there was no need to go over a 100 words. More » -
tumblr
Who made Tumblr's David Karp so famous?
"My bf is like, so famous," David Karp's girlfriend Amy notes on her blog. And it's increasingly true. Yesterday found Karp featured in the New York Post's gossip rag, Page Six magazine. Just a few days before that, the New York Observer asked, "Would You Take a Tumblr With This Man?" You'll never guess who's taking credit for all the attention. Here's a hint: She's Julia Allison. Oops, ruined that game. More » -
jakob lodwick
Where'd you go over the holidays?
Cabo, it's supposed to be the West Coast's Mexico. But here's photographic evidence that Silicon Alley entrepreneurs (and B.J. Novak from "The Office," back left) like to play in the Pacific, too. More » -
haven
New Lodwick project for nerds only
"The Internet used to be nerds-only, by virtue of how obscure and complex it was," Jakob Lodwick writes. Toward that end, Lodwick's new service Haven, which he describes as a combination of Tumblr and a Web forum "is, and will remain, a private community." A rehash of The Well, in other words, but with fewer Deadheads and more shirtless pics. -
normatism
Jakob Lodwick's new website launches
Normatism. No, we don't know what the recently fired founder of Vimeo is up to, either. The most entertaining interpretation is that this is the first in a series of softcore geek-porn photo spreads. Unboxing, indeed. -
followup
Lodwick doesn't mock homeless, but may in the future
Jakob Lodwick has burst our balloon: the fameballer has taken time from his vacation in Mexico to deny any involvement with norbum.org and its tasteless homeless fashion contest (although he does reserve the right to make fun of the homeless in the future). Lodwick did create the "norbum" name and has purchased several domain names related to his new startup. It's no surprise that the site was attributed to the Web exhibitionist. But Lodwick says his new startup — a music-production venture, we hear — will not be ready for publicity for another couple months. But when it is, will whatever stunt he engineers surpass the attention he could have garnered by mocking the poor? (Photo by Zach Klein) -
jakob lodwick
Former girlfriend says Vimeo founder fired for insubordination
Julia Allison, the ex-girlfriend of Jakob Lodwick, agreed to chat with her sadmirers on sister site Gawker. In the comments, she revealed the real reason why the attention-seeker was fired from his own company Vimeo:He was fired for "insubordination" — meaning, he didn't agree with the strategy IAC had for Vimeo, and he just ignored them when they told him to do things. He thinks of himself as Howard Roark and IAC's middle management as one huge Peter Keating, so getting fired fit into that storyline quite nicely. I think he saw it as almost heroic.
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followup
Tumblr creator doesn't find the homeless funny
David Karp, the creator of Tumblr, may be working on a new project with the attention-seeking Jakob Lodwick, but he doesn't want anything to do with Lodwick's attention-seeking means. Karp called Silicon Alley Insider while on vacation in Puerto Rico to deny any involvement with the Norbum project:I'm not involved with Norbum, I don't know what it is, and I would never make fun of homeless people.
The blogging-tool creator may be willing to take Lodwick's money and share some office space with him, but the duo's involvement has yet turned the young developer into a fameballing clone of Lodwick. (Photo by Marco Arment)

























