From: Andrea Boone
Date: November 14, 2008 9:07:06 AM PST
To: Subject: Music-mobile partnership serves up industry artists

Hi Paul...MySpace has given millions of users the inside scoop on hot new artists and the next big single. But interest has plummeted, and with the cell overtaking the computer as a user’s ‘first screen’, the mobile industry is the next promotional frontier.

SRC Records found the solution in a unique music-mobile partnership with mobile-only social networking site, [REDACTED]. [REDACTED], the largest mobile social network in the US and third most trafficked site on the web, turns a user’s cell phone into the only source for exclusive unreleased demo tracks and interviews by Def Jam artists. Holed up in a tiny NYC hotel room with a video camera, [REDACTED] asks the artists questions keyed in by members from their cell and streams the interview to chat rooms and the site. Love it? Hate it? Users key in feedback- the power to ultimately determine if or how the song is released.

Today—American Idol David Cook has ‘leaked’ one of his tracks for his album slated for release on the 18th—

Do you have time to do a quick call?

Thanks,
Andrea

——————————————————————-
Andrea Boone| Account Executive| SSPR

(photo by AP/Jason DeCrow)

EMBARGOED NOVEMBER 13, 2008
8AM EASTERN/5AM PACIFIC

Go Porn, Go!
The former owner of Sex.com, Gary Kremen, invests in innovative porn filter, CrowdSifter.com, created by Dolores Labs (doloreslabs.com)

Back in 2006, entrepreneur Gary Kremen sold Sex.com, one of the most expensive pieces of web real estate, for $12 million in cash and stock. So what is he going to do with the money? Among his many projects, the prominent San Francisco investor is backing an innovative content filter, CrowdSifter, that keeps areas of the net safe for kids with the help the net's most important asset: its users. “It is crucial to be audience appropriate on the web, and user content can be especially difficult to wrangle,” says Kremen.

Kremen, founder of Match.com, invested an undisclosed amount to start-up Dolores Labs, he is also part of their advisor team. Dolores Labs released the first phase of its CrowdSifter porn-filter service this month. CrowdSifter uses the wisdom of crowds to filter suggestive, pornographic or obscene images. Adults with internet access can sign up and label images. CrowdSifter combines the input of tens of thousands of people across the web.

Lukas Biewald, CEO of Dolores Labs, came up with the idea to provide ready-to-use tools that let humans contribute tasks that computers are not good at, such as figuring out what constitutes porn. Biewald started as an artificial intelligence specialist, working on automated algorithms to judge search relevance for Yahoo, Inc., and has a first hand understanding of technology's limits in judging bad taste and obscenity.

While Kremen does not object to porn sites, he believes that there are areas of the internet that should be kept appropriate for their respective user-bases.

Because the technology uses real people to judge the images, companies have more flexibility to define what appropriate means to them and their clients. What is appropriate content for Disney is different than what is appropriate for MySpace. "One thing we noticed when we launched our own social network, FaceStat, is if you give someone the ability to upload content, they will eventually upload something inappropriate," says Chris Van Pelt, CTO of Dolores Labs.

As a businessman, Kremen understands the value of nurturing brand identity, retaining an internet user-base and unlocking advertising value on websites. Kremen was the initial investor of Dolores Labs. He says “I was impressed with the smartness of the people. I felt an immediate impulse to see this team grow.”

Kremen has a diverse history of investment and this is not his first by far. “While l get to work with so many cool people, my most enjoyable project is probably creating love at Match.com."

DOLORES LABS INFO:
Located in the heart of San Francisco, Dolores Labs began in December, 2007

Board of Directors:
Lukas Biewald – Founder, CEO (BS Math, MS Computer Science, Stanford)
Chris Van Pelt – Founder, CTO, Board of Directors (BA Art, Computer Science, Hope College)
Gary Kremen – Investor (Founder of Match.com & Clean Power Finance)

You're welcome to contact us for quotes on crowdsifting, AMAZON'S mechanical turk, tech start-ups, porn filtering or whatever else.

WEBSITES:
www.doloreslabs.com
www.crowdsifter.com
www.kremen.com

CONTACT INFO:
info@crowdsifter.com

A couple of months ago Six Apart launched a new initiative that provided custom ad options aimed to offer more engaging ways for brands to interact with content producers and consumers, thanks in part to its acquisition of Apperceptive. Things seemed to have worked well for Six Apart as a result, and the next step for the blogging software creator is a new self-service option for site publishers to add social networking capabilities to their online publications with the upgraded Movable Type Pro (MT Pro).

This combines Movable Type’s blogging platform with social networking features, which is something that many traditional and new media sites have begun to do in the past couple of years for branding purposes and additional engagement with consumers. Many traditional media companies have found this to be a challenging task given the existing crossover audience and lack of integration with publishers’ content for consumers’ purposes.

Now that companies have begun to find more productive ways of interacting with their customers online, Six Apart is capitalizing on this growing necessity with additional social networking tools that can be integrated with the Movable Type blogging platform. This will include things like social media content aggregation capabilities for users, more ways for users to share and contribute items, forums, groups, and more.

I asked Chris Alden, CEO of Six Apart, and a few of his team members how brands are hoping to use any of this user-generated content that’s coming through these newly enhanced blogs and online publications, and he mentioned that things like forums and content aggregation are quite popular, though there may not be a direct way in which brands will be using the content per say. Being part of the conversation, however, is priceless. “Even if it’s sharing content that they find interesting across the Web is contributing content,” said Alden, “aggregating is important for these larger companies. It’s not theoretical anymore. It’s real.”

Along with the new MT Pro launch, Six Apart is also releasing Movable Type 4.2, which is the most recent version of its platform. It comes with a handful of new and improved features, including enhanced performance, simplified default templates for easy “quick start” blogs, and open source TypePad Anti-spam built in.

Glam Media Launches Glam Wellness Vertical:
Mind-Body-Spirit; Healthy Planet and Empowerment

EatingWell, EarthPledge, EcoFabulous, Natural Solutions Magazine, Lifescript and Others Join Glam Wellness Channel; SOYJOY is Launch Sponsor

SILICON VALLEY, Calif. and NEW YORK—July 28, 2008—Glam Media, Inc., the
pioneer of vertical content networks and number one in reach for women online, today announced the launch of Glam Wellness, a new vertical encompassing mind-body- spirit, empowerment and a healthy planet. Glam Wellness provides brand advertisers, including launch sponsor SOYJOY, with access to women passionate about wellness. More than 20 Web sites and publishers have joined the Wellness vertical, within the Glam Publisher Network of 640 sites, where Glam Media will represent their premium ad inventory. In addition, Natural Solutions Magazine and Earth Pledge, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting sustainable practices, both joined today as content partners on the Glam Wellness channel on Glam.com.

Launching with more than 3 million uniques, Glam Wellness is the fastest-growing premium wellness vertical network. Sites joining the Glam Publisher Network include: BeThree.com; Conscious Living TV; EcoFabulous; EatingWell; Lifescript; Low Impact Living; Spaparazzi and others. Glam Wellness is the most recent channel to launch in the Glam Media vertical content network, which brings together premium media content and 640 publishers to give advertisers a unique and diverse platform for brand engagement with their target audiences.

“Natural Solutions Magazine is excited to partner with Glam Media to inspire and inform readers (both online and in print) who care about well-being and healthy living,” said Rob Lutz, President & Group Publisher, INNOVision HEALTH MEDIA, Inc. “Glam’s Wellness channel brings together a premium community of Wellness publishers and content for consumers.”

“The premium Wellness sites and sought-after publishers in the Glam vertical content network offer brand advertisers both incomparable reach and the right environment,” said Joe Lagani, VP and GM of Glam Wellness and Glam Living. “Glam’s Wellness channel enables brands to reach a premium wellness audience on the Web and to connect with women seeking purpose, balance and healthy living.”

Glam Wellness will be overseen by Joe Lagani, former publisher of Conde Nast’s House & Garden and is run by Glam co-founder and Wellness Director Rebecca Arora. Glam Media’s vertical content network now features six separate channels, including: Style, Living, Entertainment, Wellness, Health & Family. Each channel offers a distinctive blend of original editorial, media partner content and curated content from the Glam Publisher Network. Glam facilitates the building of businesses for its hundreds of publishers by allowing them to focus on creating content and engaging their audiences while Glam Media’s vertical network connects branded display advertisers with the online audiences of the sites in the Glam network. Glam Media interfaces with a handpicked network of publishers and managed vertical networks to provide a host of media services such as display and video advertising, content syndication, advertorials, search and other applications.
# # #

About Glam Media
The founders of Glam had an epiphany about what it would take to bring brand advertising online –to niche and premium Web audiences. Today, Glam Media is the fastest growing Top 20 Media Company in the U.S. With a total reach of nearly 41 million unique monthly visitors in the U.S. (comScore Media Metrix) and 77 million global uniques, Glam Media provides a compelling mix of owned & operated web sites and the carefully curated Glam Publishing Network of more than 640 popular and influential lifestyle Web sites, blogs and magazines. For premium national brand advertisers, Glam Media offers an unprecedented array of reach and targeting that are singularly attractive to both upscale and aspirational consumers. Glam Media is backed by Hubert Burda Media, GLG Partners, Accel Partners, DAG Ventures, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Walden Venture Capital and Information Capital. Glam Media is based in New York City and Brisbane, California.

Peer39 Launches World’s Most Advanced
Semantic Advertising Platform



Former TACODA SVP Matthew S. Goldstein Joins
as Chief Operating Officer



NEW YORK (June 30, 2008) Peer39 today announced the launch of SemanticMatch™, the world’s most advanced semantic advertising platform. Based on natural language processing and machine learning, Peer39’s patented algorithms understand content meaning and sentiment, enabling precision targeting down to the page level so that display ads appear on pages most relevant to their message. SemanticMatch™ gives brands the necessary protection to target any page, including inside social media, and opens entire new targeting capabilities to online brand and performance advertisers.



Matthew S. Goldstein, who has been Senior Vice President, Revenue Operations for TACODA since June 2006, has joined Peer39 as the company’s Chief Operating Officer. He will report to Amiad Solomon, CEO, and be based in New York.



“Matthew was an integral part of the success that TACODA enjoyed as it was purchased by AOL, and with MTV Networks’ online operations,” says Mr. Solomon. “We are pleased to have someone with his depth of experience joining us in establishing Peer39 as the market leader in semantic advertising solutions.”



“Semantic targeting is widely seen to be the next stage of advertising technology, beyond contextual or behavioral. What makes Peer39 different is that ads are targeted to the meaning of pages rather than to pre-selected keywords. The problem with keywords, as is well-known, is that they can be highly irrelevant to the actual page and conversation happening,” says Mr. Solomon. “We eliminate the errors that can plague keyword targeting and unlike other forms of online targeting, Peer39’s SemanticMatch™ does not set cookies or track user behavior.”



“When I studied the next generation of ad targeting technology, it was clear immediately that Peer39 has taken granular targeting to its deepest level by understanding page meaning and sentiment,” says Mr. Goldstein.



For publishers, including portals, news sites, ad networks, social media, blogs, and forums, Peer39's technology effectively monetizes a wide range of online content and increases the value of content pages that grow revenue and ROI. Using SemanticMatch™, advertisers simply decide where they seek to reach users in the marketing sales funnel – anywhere from awareness (“autos”) to consideration (“SUV”) to preference (“hybrid”) to purchase and retention – and the system automatically targets their ads to relevant pages, without the need for keyword targeting or setting cookies.



In addition, the company announced that it had closed $8 million in Series B financing with Canaan Partners as the lead investor and with participation from existing investors, Dawntreader Ventures and JP Morgan. “Advertisers and publishers continue to seek better, more effective ways to reach and market to consumers online,” says Warren Lee, principal at Canaan Partners. “With past investments in innovative online advertising companies such as DoubleClick and Tremor Media, we here at Canaan are excited to be working with the Peer39 team to further develop its unique technologies and to scale its business.”



Finally, Peer39 announced its advisory board consisting of Eytan Elbaz (co-founder of Applied Semantics, inventor of AdSense), Daniel Jaye (former President of TACODA), and Daniel T. Ciporin (former Chairman and CEO of Shopping.com-eBay).



Peer39 (www.peer39.com) is the global leader in semantic advertising solutions. Based on natural language processing and machine learning, Peer39’s patented algorithms understand page meaning and sentiment, and deliver the most relevant and effective brand safe online advertising. Headquartered in New York City, Peer39 maintains a research and development center in Israel. Peer39 Labs conducts primary research in semantic web technologies resulting in a number of patents covering its technology and business practices.

From: Heddi Cundle Sent: 13 February 2008 To: [redacted] Subject: Seesmic Raises $6 million - Embargo Release

I hope you're well. Please find below a press release under embargo until 5am (pst) tomorrow. Please let me know if you'd like to interview Loic Le Meur by phone before or after embargo lifts.

I'll call shortly but any immediate questions, don't hesitate to contact me. My details are at the end of this email.

Kind regards

————

Seesmic Raises $6 Million to Power

the World's Video Conversations

A-List investors are led by Niklas Zennström's Atomico and include Steve Case, Ron Conway, Jeff Clavier, and Reid Hoffman

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - February 14, 2008 - Seesmic (www.seesmic.com), the highly anticipated new start-up from Loic Le Meur, today announced that it has raised $6 million from internationally renowned investors. The investment is lead by Atomico - an investment group founded by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis. The complete list of investors is:

* Michael Arrington - Founder, TechCrunch
* Steve Case - Co-Founder and former CEO and Chairman, AOL
* Jeff Clavier - Managing Partner, SoftTech VC
* Ron Conway - Early investor, Google
* Steve Garfield - Pioneering video blogger
* Dan Gillmor - Director, Knight Center for Digital Media Entrepreneurship
* Reid Hoffman - Founder, LinkedIn
* Michael Parekh - Managing Director, Goldman Sachs
* Mark Pincus - Co-Founder and former Chairman and CEO, SupportSoft
* Ariel Poler - Founder and former CEO, IPRO and Topica
* Jeff Pulver - Chairman and Founder, Pulver.com
* Martin Varsavsky - Founder, FON

Until now, online communication has lacked personality, being limited to text (IM, SMS, email). Seesmic changes that, bringing conversation alive through video, allowing users to be seen and heard and to broadcast themselves. Still in closed alpha, Loic is building Seesmic in the open, with the help and guidance of the Seesmic community. Through his daily video blog loic.tv and the "feature request" function on the Seesmic site, Loic and his team gather suggestions and solicit feedback from the community about the platform and its functionality.

"I'm thrilled to have such an unprecedented group of high-profile business leaders, entrepreneurs, and angel investors validate the potential for Seesmic," said Loic Le Meur, Founder and CEO of Seesmic. "This significant investment will enable us to launch a site built by and for our community, incorporating the products and features they've told us they want through their Seesmic conversations."

"Seesmic has grasped the opportunity to evolve the way people express themselves and converse online. Theirs is an exciting vision and I look forward to supporting the team," said Niklas Zennström, Co-Founder of Skype.

"At last, the Internet is really social: you can see and hear people express their ideas and thoughts, you can join in, and you can make new friends. With Seesmic, everyone can participate in live conversations rich with personality, bought to life through video," commented Ron Conway.

About Seesmic

Seesmic brings online conversation to life through video. Straight from their webcams, Seesmic enables users to easily post videos of their thoughts and ideas and participate in video conversations with the world.

Founded by Loic Le Meur - France's best-known blogger, entrepreneur, founder of the largest European web event LeWeb3, and Internet Advisor to French President Sarkozy - Seesmic is changing the way people converse on the Web.

What Seesmic's community says about Seesmic:

"The difference between YouTube and Seesmic is that YouTube puts video at the center, whereas Seesmic puts people at the center," Stephanie Booth, Lausanne, Switzerland's best known blogger.

Heddi Cundle
Consort Partners Ltd

————————— Introducing BBtv vlogs! Today: Joel from BB Gadgets. It's been a little more than two months since we launched Boing Boing tv, and we've decided that producing a daily internet show just isn't enough. Meet BBtv vlogs!

OK, seriously: starting today, we'll be releasing these additional videoblog segments in addition to the every-weekday Boing Boing tv episodes. The vlogs won't be every single day all the time, but we're going to have fun with them.

What's the difference? The BBtv vlogs will be casual, conversational stuff we mostly tape ourselves, wherever we are. They'll feature Boing Boing editors talking about things, people, ideas, places, technologies we're fascinated by. They're more like video diaries, I guess? Only less emo, no ranting about your YouTube enemies, and ffs no dance contests.

So, imagine Pesco talking with one of those artists he blogs about, or Cory wandering around in Tokyo with a handheld camera pointing out cool stuff he's seeing that day, or Joel Johnson from Boing Boing Gadgets talking about about little infrared controlled helicopters or retro-tech radios — oh hey, wait! That's the vlog episode we're publishing today, our very first.

And Joel, if you have never *seen* him speak before, is quite a funny guy. His video diary stylee is sort of like HSN meets America's Funniest Home Videos meets Slackers. — Xeni Jardin (thx, JGB!)

Several applications will be available the day LinkedIn's platform launches. The social network also introduce several new apps of its own on that will "enable them to draw on the wisdom, knowledge, experience, resources, and inspiration of their networks."

It's not good news for Google's OpenSocial initiative, in which LinkedIn is a theoretical partner. Why would LinkedIn need its own platform — if, that is, OpenSocial were anything more than a PR scam?

Read/WriteWeb's Marshall Kirkpatrick Twitters:

Update: Amazon contacted us this morning to let us know that though they sent us a draft press release, they are not in fact making any such announcement, they are not supporting OpenSocial and if they were it would still be under embargo anyway despite the date on said release.

Apparently, though, Jeff Bezos & Co. aren't prepared to diss Facebook quite yet. Amazon's PR team messed up and hopes we'll just ignore their own press releases, or honor some after-the-fact embargo. Sorry. Even when done right, the day of the embargo is over.

Please find the below background information based on tonight’s keynote dinner conversation between Rupert Murdoch, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, News Corporation and Chris DeWolfe, Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder, MySpace.

This information is not for on-the-record use, it’s simply a background overview for your reference if you‘re planning to cover tonight’s discussion.

Should you have any questions—please feel free to email Dani Dudeck (xxx@xxx.com) and Tracy Akselrud (xxx@xxx.com) and please cc myself, Casi Kneebone (xxx@xxx.com.

Thanks!
Casi

WEB 2.0 DINNER CONVERSATION KEYNOTE—MYSPACE’S BACKGROUND OVERVIEW
Rupert Murdoch: Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, News Corporation
Chris DeWolfe: Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder, MySpace

1. MYSPACE CONFIRMS CONTRACTS

• Chris (co-founder and CEO of MySpace) confirm that he and Tom Anderson (co-founder and President) have renewed their contracts and will continue their respective roles within MySpace/ News Corp for two years.

2. MYSPACE CONFIRMS NEAR TERM DEVELOPER PLATFORM

• Original openness and personalization of the MySpace community was integral to the company’s success, MySpace helped develop the widget eco-system and it made the site a more fun, customizable experience.

• We believe the industry’s embracing the idea of openness is largely a good thing for users.
o We will formalize our relationships with the developer community and roll out a new platform in the coming months

o We believe the current state of openness is just the tip of the iceberg—users should be more involved in the process

• Our developer integration strategy centers on complimenting and enriching the user experience.

• Steps to the strategy as we roll it out include:

1.) In the coming weeks we’re launching a catalogue of all widgets & tools available on MySpace

2.) In several months we will make industry standard APIs available through a new platform where developers can try new things in a sandbox environment

3.) Users will participate in an opt-in beta test program to determine usability

4.) Users will vote and ultimately determine which of these widgets get tightly developed into MySpace

5.) MySpace will formally introduce the best ones into the community with highly developed integration

3. SKYPE PARTNERSHIP

• This week, MySpace announced a partnership with Skype to empower its 110 million active global users with voice capabilities.

• The announcement unveils MySpaceIM with Skype, a new product that integrates MySpace’s popular IM client—currently the world’s fastest- growing IM platform with more than 25 million installed users—with Skype’s voice-calling capability. (Product available in November)

• Skype is a great example of how we look forward to working with partners to extend the MySpace community into other useful applications on the Internet. Through this partnership, the Skype community can now access their MySpace network, and content through the Skype client, and visa versa.

4. EVOLUTION OF MYSPACE MUSIC—SONY BMG

• This week we announced a licensing pact—our first with a music label—with SONY BMG ENTERTAINMENT—a key step in the evolution of the MySpace Music platform.

• The deal calls for MySpace and SONY BMG to share in sponsorship and advertising revenues, underscores both organizations’ commitment to building new business models that benefit artists and consumers alike.

• Under the terms of the deal, SONY BMG will license music videos, select audio material, and other content from its extensive artist roster and will make the content available on its artists’ MySpace profile pages. MySpace and Sony BMG will share in sponsorship and advertising revenues generated from the music videos and profile pages. Additionally, MySpace will work with SONY BMG to promote the music company's artists throughout the site.

5. SF OFFICE OPENING

• SF office soft launching this week.

• SOMA district, on 2nd street, cross street Brannan, next to the ballpark.

• All heads for the first year will largely MySpace dedicated (developers, engineers, MySpace-sales).

• Half of our current employees are engineers—we need to immediately fill our SF office with 50 new engineers and expect within 1 ½ years we’ll have 200 heads in that office.

• The Bay Area is pulsating with innovation and disruptive ideas—we want to be closer to that action. We are doubling our workforce in the next year, hiring new developers, engineers, and programmers to help bring our full product pipeline to life.

• We recently opened a satellite office in Seattle to fill our need for .net developers. Building on the template of the Seattle office, we’re going to continue finding the best ways to grow our back-end team. The Bay Area is a natural next step to extend the talented team working behind the scenes to keep MySpace the most trafficked site online and industry leading global social network.

6. GROWTH

• MySpace is currently operational and completely localized in more than 20 international markets—we have another 10 on the way including Russia, India and Poland.

• Our head of international, Travis Katz, relocated this week to London—international HQ will now be out of that office where we currently have approximately 100 people.

• MySpace is the #1 social network in Europe.

• MySpace currently adds 300,000 new users each day and it’s the most trafficked site in the United States.

• We currently have approximately 700 global MySpace employees—we plan to hire another 700 this year.

7. NEWS CORP/ MYSPACE ACQUISITION ANNIVERSARY

• Tonight is the two year anniversary of the News Corp acquisition of MySpace.

• When News Corp acquired MySpace, the company had 10 million unique users—MySpace currently has 110 active global monthly user

—END—

MYSPACE AND SKYPE ANNOUNCE PARTNERSHIP BRINGING FREE INTERNET VOICE COMMUNICATIONS TO MYSPACE GLOBAL COMMUNITY

Partnership Creates World's Largest Online Voice-Connected Community

Beta Version of 'MySpaceIM with Skype' Announced Today

LOS ANGELES/LUXEMBOURG, October 17, 2007 — MySpace, the world's most popular social network, and Skype, the leading Internet communications company, today announced a partnership to empower the MySpace community with voice communications. With more than 110 million monthly active MySpace users and 220 million Skype(tm) registered users around the world, this partnership connects two of the most popular communications platforms on the Internet to create the world's largest online, voice-connected community. The announcement unveils MySpaceIM with Skype, a new product that integrates MySpace's popular IM client—currently the world's fastest-growing IM platform with more than 25 million installed users—with Skype's free, high-quality voice-calling capability. The partnership will also enable users to link their MySpace profiles and photos or avatars to their accounts on Skype. Both products will be available to users starting in November. Launching in 20 countries where MySpace has localized communities, MySpaceIM with Skype will enable millions of users to place free Skype Internet calls to other MySpace or Skype users. The addition of Skype voice-calling to MySpace's instant messaging feature gives users more ways to easily connect with friends and family around the world, and does not require MySpace users to download any additional Skype software.
"MySpaceIM with Skype is a truly groundbreaking product integration and partnership," said Chris DeWolfe, co-founder and CEO of MySpace. "Skype has the leading technology in Internet voice communications and an enormous international user base that we're thrilled to connect with our existing community. Our network has no geographical boundaries — Internet calling is the natural next step for how our members communicate with each other."
Skype is available in 28 languages and is used in almost every country around the world. The ability for Skype users to link their Skype accounts to their MySpace profiles will be available globally, except in Japan, China and Taiwan. In addition to free, high-quality Skype calling, MySpaceIM with Skype will also allow the users of the MySpace network to optionally select Skype's premium fee-based products, including:
* SkypeOut(tm) - To make calls to landlines and cell phones domestically or internationally;
* SkypeIn(tm) - A local phone number to receive calls wherever you are in the world from other people on landlines or cell phones;
* Voicemail - To take voice messages when you're busy or offline; and
* Call forwarding - To redirect incoming Skype calls to a landline or cell phone.
"Both MySpace and Skype have become a part of people's lives by bringing people closer together, no matter where they live in the world. This partnership reiterates that Skype is the platform of choice for Internet communications because we make it simpler and easier for people to place free calls to one another whether they are on Skype or within the MySpace network," said Michael Van Swaaij, interim CEO of Skype.
MySpaceIM with Skype takes advantage of the many personal privacy settings available to users throughout the MySpace network. Users who have a MySpace profile set to "private" can not receive a Skype call from someone who is not on their friends list. Users can also choose to allow only those individuals they have affirmatively added to their Skype personal contact list to call them. Users are empowered to block any MySpaceIM with Skype user at any time, and with the "incoming call window" users can pre-screen incoming callers in order to accept, ignore, or block the call.
Financial terms of the MySpace and Skype deal were not disclosed.

Why, some attendees were treated to one-on-one meetings with Microsoft chairman Bill Gates. We can only imagine what second prize was. Do readers care, though, if the reporters got face time with a billionaire — or that they had to wait a day to read this not very momentous news? "Usually they have embargoes for news people care about," said one reporter in attendance. Heard more news on the new Zune? Break the embargo and send it in.

DEMOfall 07 Demonstrators

360desktop, Pty Ltd.; Victoria, Australia; www.360desktop.com
Advanta; Spring House, PA; www.ideablob.com
AgendiZe; Grapevine, TX; www.agendize.com
Apprema, Inc.; Sunnyvale, CA;www.apprema.com
Attendi, Inc.; New York, NY; www.attendi.com
BatchBlue Software, LLC; Barrington, RI; www.batchblue.com
CashView, Inc.; Palo Alto, CA; www.CashView.com
Check Point Software Technologies, Ltd.; Redwood City, CA; www.checkpoint.com
ClipBlast!; Agoura Hills, CA; www.clipblast.com
coComment; Geneva, Switzerland; www.cocomment.com
CodaSystem France S.A.; Paris, France; www.shootandproof.com
CornerWorld; Dallas, TX; www.cornerworld.com
Digital Fountain; Fremont, CA; www.digitalfountain.com
Diigo, Inc.; Reno, NV; www.diigo.com
DimDim, Inc.; Burlington, MA; www.dimdim.com
earthmine, Inc.; Berkeley, CA; www.earthmine.com
EncryptaKey; Cypress, CA; www.encryptakey.com
Exalead, Inc.; New York, NY; www.exalead.com
FastCall411, Inc.; Hollywood, CA; www.fastcall411.com
Fluid Innovation, Inc.; Austin, TX; www.fluidinnovation.com
Fusion-io; Salt Lake City, UT; www.fusionio.com
Generate, Inc., Maynard, MA; www.generateinc.com
Glam Media; Brisbane, CA; www.glammedia.com
Global Communications, Inc.; Houston, TX; www.globalcasttv.net
Global Mobile Technologies, LLP; San Francisco, CA; www.push-it.com
Graspr, Inc.; Sunnyvale, CA; www.graspr.com
iForem, Inc.; Redwood Shores, CA; www.iforem.com
InstaColl; Bangalore, India; www.live-documents.com
Jasper Wireless; Sunnyvale, CA; www.jasperwireless.com
kannuu, Inc.; Dallas, TX; www.kannuu.com
LiveMocha, Inc.; Bellevue, WA; www.livemocha.com
LogMeIn, Inc.; Woburn, MA; www.logmein.com
LongJump; Sunnyvale, CA; www.longjump.com
matchmine, LLC; Needham, MA; www.matchmine.com
MetaRADAR, Inc.; San Bruno, CA; www.metaradar.com
mig33; Burlingame, CA; www.mig33.com
MotionDSP, Inc.; San Mateo, CA; www.motiondsp.com
mSpoke, Inc.; Pittsburgh, PA; www.mspoke.com
MuseStorm, Ltd.; Yahud, Israel; www.musestorm.com
Myndnet; East Palo Alto, CA; www.myndnet.com
Myxer; Deerfield Beach, FL; www.myxer.com
Ncursion; Carlsbad, CA; www.ncursion.com
PeopleJam, Inc.; Los Angeles, CA; www.peoplejam.com
Phreesia, Inc.; New York, NY; www.phreesia.com
PlanHQ; Wellington, New Zealand; www.planhq.com
Prolify, Inc.; Waltham, MA; www.prolify.com
Propel Software Corporation; San Jose, CA; www.propel.com
Proxure; San Luis Obispo, CA; www.proxure.com
Pudding Media, Inc.; San Jose, CA; www.thepudding.com
Quire, Inc.; Mountain View, CA; www.myquire.com
Qumranet; Santa Clara, CA; www.qumranet.com
Real Time Content, Ltd.; Ipswich, England; www.realtimecontent.com
RedSquare Ventures, Ltd.; Moscow, Russia; www.redsquareventures.com
RelevantMind, Corp.; Berkeley, CA; www.RelevantMind.com
SceneCaster; Richmond Hill, Canada; www.scenecaster.com
SpaceTime; New York, NY; www.spacetime.com
spigit; Pleasanton, CA; www.spigit.com
Sway, Inc.; Middleton; WI; www.shoutlet.com
Talari Networks, Inc.; Cupertino, CA; www.talarinetworks.com
Trovix; Mountain View, CA; www.trovix.com
Truphone; London, England; www.truphone.com
Tubes Networks, Inc.; Boston, MA; www.TubesNow.com
Tungle Corporation; Montreal, Canada; www.tungle.com
Vello; Mountain View, CA; www.myvello.com
Vitarati, Inc.; San Luis Obispo, CA; www.seenr.com
Vyro Games, Ltd.; Dublin, Ireland; www.vyro-games.com
WMS Gaming; Waukegan, IL; www.wms.com
Your Truman Show, Inc.; San Francisco, CA; www.YourTrumanShow.com
Yuuguu, Ltd.; Manchester, England; www.yuuguu.com

The most ludicrous, self-defeating requirement — the one that prompted Boutin to detach himself from his keyboard and head downtown — was that journalists not publish the list until 9 a.m. Monday morning — a full two hours after TechCrunch itself said it would publish the list. Boutin, of course, did Calacanis a huge favor by doing so.

In reporting the publicly available list before TechCrunch40's unilaterally imposed embargo — an embargo, one should note, that Boutin never agreed to observe — Boutin actually gave TechCrunch40 a shot at gathering attention. Instead of being buried in the noontime news mix, the TechCrunch40 list hit the top of Techmeme first thing Monday morning.

So Boutin has inspired me. Shipley deserves the same kind of buzzmaking attention for her upcoming startup showcase. I know that the Demo lineup has been circulating. Why? Robert Scoble, for one, has been filming videoblog episodes with Demo participants all this week.

I can't make it down to San Diego, but if anyone gets their hands on the list, please drop me a line. Fair's fair. Help a girl out, won't you?

I'm told that the deal on these embargoed releases is usually that the publicist gave some prestigious outlet an exclusive in return for the embargo. For example, your first Embargo Breaker, Congresspedia, had cut a deal with the WaPo (verified!) in exchange for embargoing the story until after the WaPo broke it. I'm fine with people making those deals, but doesn't that make it really stupid to turn around and send out the news as junk mail to strangers?

After the jump, the offending release.

> From: "Jamie Newton"
> Date: May 10, 2006 10:17:26 AM PDT
> To: (redacted)
> Subject: Embargo time correction (for Sunday)
>
> The embargo date for the release below should be 1 PM ET on Sunday,
> not 2 PM ET as originally listed (due to a miscommunication with
> the journal). Sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused. —
> Jamie
>
> ***
> A study to appear Sunday, May 11 in Nature Neuroscience (online
> edition) describes a naturally occurring, previously unrecognized
> growth factor that stimulates regeneration in injured optic nerves
> - raising the possibility of treating blindness due to optic-nerve
> damage and the hope of achieving similar regeneration in the spinal
> cord and brain. A press release is below; for links to additional
> resources, visit: http://www.childrenshospital.org/newsroom/
> Site1339/mainpageS1339P1sublevel206.html.
> A high-resolution image of the regenerating optic nerve is
> available.
> If I can be of help, just let me know.
> Sincerely,
> Jamie Newton
> Public Affairs
> Children's Hospital Boston
> (phone and e-mail redacted)
>
>
> EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE:
> Sunday, May 14, 2006, 1 pm ET
>
> CONTACT: Jamie Newton, Children's Hospital Boston
> (phone and e-mail redacted)
>
> FACTOR ISOLATED THAT REGENERATES NERVE FIBERS
> Previously unknown molecule spurs regeneration in the optic nerve
>
> Researchers at Children's Hospital Boston have discovered a
> naturally occurring growth factor that stimulates regeneration of
> injured nerve fibers (axons) in the central nervous system. Under
> normal conditions, most axons in the mature central nervous system
> (which consists of the brain, spinal cord and eye) cannot regrow
> after injury. The previously unrecognized growth factor, called
> oncomodulin, is described in the May 14 online edition of Nature
> Neuroscience.
>
> Neuroscientists Yuqin Yin, MD, PhD, and Larry Benowitz, PhD, who
> are also on the faculty of Harvard Medical School, did their
> studies in the optic nerve, which connects nerve cells in the eye's
> retina to the brain's visual centers, and is often used as a model
> in studying axon regeneration.
>
> When oncomodulin was added to retinal nerve cells in a Petri dish,
> with known growth-promoting factors already present, axon growth
> nearly doubled. No other growth factor was as potent. In live rats
> with optic-nerve injury, oncomodulin released from tiny sustained-
> release capsules increased nerve regeneration 5- to 7-fold when
> given along with a drug that helps cells respond to oncomodulin.
> Yin, Benowitz and colleagues also showed that oncomodulin switches
> on a variety of genes associated with axon growth.
>
> Benowitz, the study's senior investigator, believes oncomodulin
> could someday prove useful in reversing optic-nerve damage caused
> by glaucoma, tumors or traumatic injury. In addition, the lab has
> shown that oncomodulin works on at least one other type of nerve
> cell, and now plans to test whether it also works on the types of
> brain cells that would be relevant to treating conditions like
> stroke and spinal cord injury.
>
> The current study builds on work Benowitz, Yin and colleagues
> published a few years ago. Studying the optic nerve, they found -
> quite by accident - that an injury to the eye activated axon
> growth: it caused an inflammatory reaction that stimulated immune
> cells known as macrophages to move into the eye.
>
> "To make this finding clinically useful, we wanted to understand
> what was triggering the growth, so we could achieve nerve
> regeneration without causing an injury," Benowitz says.
>
> Working in Benowitz's lab, Yin took a closer look and found that
> the macrophages secreted an essential but as-yet unidentified
> protein. Further studies revealed it to be oncomodulin, a little-
> known molecule first observed in association with cancer cells.
>
> "Out of the blue, we found a molecule that causes more nerve
> regeneration than anything else ever studied," Benowitz says. "We
> expect this to spur further research into what else oncomodulin is
> doing in the nervous system and elsewhere."
>
> For oncomodulin to work, it must be given along with an agent that
> raises cell levels of cyclic AMP, a "messenger" that initiates
> various cellular reactions. Increased cyclic AMP levels are needed
> to make the oncomodulin receptor available on the cell surface.
>
> A two-pronged approach
> Benowitz also notes that there is another side to the nerve-
> regeneration problem: overcoming agents that act as natural
> inhibitors of axon growth. These inhibitors are the subject of
> intense study by several labs, including that of Zhigang He, PhD,
> at Children's Hospital Boston.
>
> In a study published in 2004, Benowitz and postdoctoral fellow
> Dietmar Fischer, PhD, collaborated with He to combine both
> approaches - overcoming inhibition and activating the growth state
> (by injuring the lens of the eye) - and achieved dramatic optic-
> nerve regeneration. Now that Benowitz has isolated oncomodulin, he
> believes even greater regeneration is possible by combining it with
> agents that counteract growth inhibitors.
>
> "We're in the midst of an exciting era of research in nerve
> regeneration," Benowitz says. "There are a lot of promising leads
> in the area of blocking molecules that inhibit regeneration. But to
> get really strong regeneration, you also have to activate nerve
> cells' intrinsic growth state."
>
> The study was funded by the National Eye Institute (part of the
> National Institutes of Health), the Patterson Family Trust, the
> European Commission, and Boston Life Sciences, Inc. The
> oncomodulin technology has been licensed by Boston Life Sciences,
> Inc. (BLSI; Hopkinton, Mass.), which is testing recombinant
> oncomodulin for ocular indications in pre-clinical studies. BLSI
> has also licensed other axon regeneration technologies developed at
> Children's. For more information on BLSI's activities, contact
> Sharon Correia at (redacted).
>
> Children's Hospital Boston is home to the world's largest research
> enterprise based at a pediatric medical center, where its
> discoveries have benefited both children and adults since 1869.
> More than 500 scientists, including eight members of the National
> Academy of Sciences, nine members of the Institute of Medicine and
> 11 members of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute comprise
> Children's research community. Founded as a 20-bed hospital for
> children, Children's Hospital Boston today is a 347-bed
> comprehensive center for pediatric and adolescent health care
> grounded in the values of excellence in patient care and
> sensitivity to the complex needs and diversity of children and
> families. Children's also is the primary pediatric teaching
> affiliate of Harvard Medical School. For more information about the
> hospital and its research visit: http://www.childrenshospital.org/
> research/.
>
> - ### -
>

Well thank the gods for Tabblo, the "groundbreaking free online photo-sharing site" launching May 15! With no competitors to immediately gank its features, Tabblo is headed straight to the top of Bubble 2.0. After the jump, dig their press release (embargoed 'til May 15! Shhhh).

Hi [redacted] -

We wanted to let you know that on May 15th a groundbreaking free online photo-sharing site called www.tabblo.com will be launched. This new site provides professional quality templates and powerful editing tools to create online albums from photos taken by consumers, their friends and families to share online, turn into print products, or contribute into blogs and websites.

Tabblo surpasses other photo-sharing sites through its emphasis on creative control and collaboration, not just sharing of photos. By providing easy-to-use, browser-based layout and photo editing tools, and secure collaboration on photo-based projects, Tabblo creates more distinctive and elegant online photo albums (tabblos), and print products than anywhere else on the Internet.

With Tabblo people can easily and securely pool pictures with family and friends to make great-looking group tabblos or group memories for all. It offers secure access and the ability to download full-resolution images free for local printing.

Antonio Rodriguez, founder of Tabblo (and former VP of MyPublisher) would like to give you a sneak peak of Tabblo's new product - this news is under embargo until May 15.

Please let me know if you'd be interested in speaking with Antonio and taking an early look at the product. I can be reached at [redacted] or [redacted]. I've also inserted below sample images of print posters, the first print product launching with this new service.

Kerry Metzdorf
Red Javelin Communications, Inc.

Beginning below, ending after the jump.

New Blog Search Engine Sphere Launches [TechCrunch]
Sphere [Official site]

Hi - we want you to know that sphere is going live early tomorrow morning. Prior to doing so, we'd like to give you an early look at the product.

We've been able to integrate a lot of the great feedback we've received from a number of beta users. Thank you. As many of you know, we were hardware constrained during the beta and weren't able to give everyone access to the site - to those of you who didn't receive a password, thank you for your patience.

We'd appreciate you helping us get the word out if you like what we've built. Please feel free to blog about the site any time after 7:00 am Tuesday (May 2nd).

Here is the url: www.sphere.com. New in this V1.5 release:

* custom range histogram;
* sphere it bookmarklet that makes it easy to find blog posts that relate to what you're reading on the Web;
* top queries this hour/ this week;
* RSS for search results;
* community feedback buttons throughout the site;
* expanded related media verticals including podcasts (Yahoo! API), books (Amazon API), and photos (CNET Webshots API);
* expanded related news articles coverage (over 50 mainstream news sites such as CNN, NYT, ESPN, Fox, USA Today to name a few);
* expanded profiles;
* featured blogs for 12,000+ keyword search terms covering over 500 broad topics including baseball, anime, food, web 2.0, tech news, knitting, culture, etc.; and
* a brand new back end that scales.

The best two featues are the custom range feature (a search on 'mohammed cartoons' really illustrates its utility) and the sphere it bookmarklet (take a chance, download and it'll change your life). Also, check out the featured blogs for a number of topics like baseball, food, knitting, motherhood, web 2.0, google, etc - you'll find featured blogs for about 12,000 keyword search terms. And check out the related media for almost any search - you'll now find podcasts, books and photo's in addition to our news articles.

As always, we would appreciate your thoughts, and we hope you like it.

Best,
Sphere Founders

FOR PLANNING PURPOSES ONLY
EMBARGOED UNTIL WEDS. APRIL 26TH AT 10 AM EDT

SUNLIGHT FOUNDATION LAUNCHES INTERNET INITIATIVES DESIGNED TO BRING TRANSPARENCY TO CONGRESS

New foundation launches Congresspedia website and unveils technology-based approach to enhancing Congressional transparency and accountability.

Full release (remember! secret until Wednesday!) after the jump. By the way, the journalist who passed me this thanks the Sunlight Foundation for spamming it up informing the world.

Another day, another embargo — it's an annoyingly common practice in politics, tech, and business. Got an embargoed release in your inbox (or, of course, your spam filter)? Set it free — forward to tips@valleywag.com before the expiration publication date.

>
>
> FOR PLANNING PURPOSES ONLY
> EMBARGOED UNTIL WEDS. APRIL 26TH AT 10 AM EDT
>
> SUNLIGHT FOUNDATION LAUNCHES INTERNET INITIATIVES DESIGNED TO BRING
> TRANSPARENCY TO CONGRESS
>
> New foundation launches Congresspedia website and unveils
> technology-based approach to enhancing Congressional transparency
> and accountability.
>
> WHAT: Taking the famous words of Supreme Court Justice Louis
> Brandeis "Sunlight is the best of disinfectants" as its guiding
> principle, the Sunlight Foundation will harness the power of the
> Internet to bring an unparalleled degree of transparency and
> accountability to Congress. It will launch its effort in a press
> conference call on April 26th at 10 AM EDT. Dial-in information
> listed below.
>
> Sunlight's formation and approach come at a time when the public's
> discontent with Congress and lawmakers nears a high water mark.
> Citizens believe that Democrats and Republicans are equally
> responsible for corruption in Congress and do not think that
> current ethics reforms proposals go far enough, according to a new
> Sunlight poll that will be released.. The recently conducted poll
> results also demonstrate that the public favors, by sweeping
> margins, regardless of party affiliation, greater transparency for
> elected officials.
>
> On April 26th, the Sunlight Foundation, which seeks to empower
> citizens to shine a brighter light on corruption in Congress, will:
> · Discuss its goals and objectives as an organization
> dedicated to using the Internet and information technology to
> promote openness in Congress.
> · Announce its first series of grants to promote transparency
> in Congress.
> · Launch its Congresspedia website, in partnership with the
> Center for Media and Democracy.
> · Announce the results from a new bipartisan poll conducted
> by Celinda Lake and Ed Goeas on public perceptions of current
> congressional "ethics" reform efforts and their support for greater
> Congressional transparency.
>
> WHO: On hand and available for interviews will be:
> · Ellen Miller, Executive Director, Sunlight Foundation
> · Michael Klein, Chairman, Sunlight Foundation
> · Celinda Lake, Lake Research Partners and Ed Goeas, The
> Tarrance Group
> · Sheldon Rampton, Research Director, Center for Media and
> Democracy
> · Bill Allison, Investigative journalist and editor, Sunlight
> blogger
> · Larry Makinson, Veteran money and politics researcher,
> Sunlight blogger
> · Micah Sifry/Andrew Rasiej, Personal Democracy Consultants,
> Tech advisors to Sunlight
>
> WHEN: 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM EDT, Wednesday, April 26, 2006
>
> WHERE: BY TELECONFERENCE CALL OR AT
> The Sunlight Foundation, 901 15th Street NW, Suite 350, Washington,
> DC 20005
>
> DIAL IN: Reporters able to dial-in, listen and participate.
> Teleconference Access Number: 866-239-0753 Confirmation Code: 4110008
>
> LOG IN: There will be an online demonstration of Congresspedia,
> which can be accessed by logging into
> http://url.netspoke.com/go/?k=fc3c446760ca4dc48550c13f01d5fecc