Facebook is now open to anyone with an email address. Of note is how they are focusing on privacy controls and communicating this change properly to their users.
It will be interesting to observe how this change plays out.
OpenBC Becoming Xing
Joe reports that openBC is changing its name to Xing. It will be interesting to see how that plays out. At SelectMinds, we were working with Accenture when they went through their name change from Andersen Consulting. That change provided an opportunity to speculate on the value of a name, since Accenture had paid Arthur Andersen (I think) about $1b to continue using the name Andersen Consulting for a year.
There will be implicit costs for openBC through this name change. Obviously they think that it’s worth it.
Start-up Pitch Tips
Online Advertising Concentration
The IAB came out with 2006 First Six Months numbers on online advertising. One interesting phenomenon that endures is the concentration of advertising revenue at the top. The Pareto Principle does not apply to this case (in that it is even more concentrated than the 80/20 cliche. The top 25 advertisers (NB: NOT the top 25%, but the top 25) pull in a whopping 84% of all online ad revenues. Reminds one of the Turkish TV advertising figures…
The Anti-Brand
Auren posted about a crazy business idea:
Let’s create a new cigarette brand.
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We’ll call our brand of cigarettes "Death".The slogan will be "smoking WILL kill you."We’d be very up front with our customers — we will probably kill you and we don’t think you should buy our product.
"Death" might encourage people not to take up smoking or to quit.
Truth in advertising might actually work.
It’s interesting to think about However, I think the current economics of cigarette advertising would not allow this to happen. Even if you called your cigarettes "Death", you are tightly restricted on how you can advertise them. The one bad effect of cigarette advertising regulation is that it enforces the oligapolistic structure of the industry today. It would be extremely difficult to create awareness of a new cigarette brand.
Facebook in Play Again
This is a bit late but it looks like while I have been away, WSJ reported on rumors of an M&A conversation between Yahoo! and Facebook, with a price tag around $1b. There is much conversation on the topic in blogland, so I’ll let you read the various viewpoints yourself (if you have not, already) here, here, here and here.
I think, just like $580m a year ago, the $1b number is blowing people away. One needs to look at the deal from the acquirer’s perspective. I think it would be a mistake for Yahoo! to pay $1b for Facebook. As many have pointed out, their problem is not reach. However, the same deal, in my mind, makes more sense for someone like Viacom, who’s got the content and is starving for attention.
Music Search
David Byrne is predicting a need for music search in a recent journal entry:
Soon enough a site will open that is like a Google search for music
downloads — downloads that are not copy-protected but you still pay for.
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Consumers don’t care who they buy them from if the interface is easy
and intuitive. Soon enough iTunes consumers will find they have reached
the 5th authorized player on their tracks and the frustration will set
in when they can’t listen to the music they paid for. They’ll start to
look elsewhere.
Approaching Attention Markets
I have been watching ROOT for some time now. I think it is founded on a very basic, sound concept and I am convinced it will be successful.
However, it has been a slow development. I am surprised by this because, at this point:
- Internet traffic is liquid
- There’s broad acceptance of keyword buying
- There are existing players arbing out keyword price differences
- So, the next natural step is the creation of a marketplace/exchange to further remove remaining frictions in this area.
Seth Goldstein has just announced that the Chicago Board of Trade has invested in ROOT. That’s great news and it is one more step in the completion of the above process.
TR35: Utkan Demirci
MIT’s Technology Review compiles an annual list of young innovators in science, whose work is changing our lives, all under the age of 35. This year the list includes a Turk, Utkan Demirci, 28, whose development of disposable AIDS diagnostic tool earned him the spot.
No More Velvet Rope – Facebook Opening Up
NYTimes and Forbes are reporting that Facebook is lowering its admission requirements.
The move is meant to help the site expand, but it risks undercutting one of its attractions: it has been more exclusive and somewhat more protected than MySpace, its larger and more freewheeling rival.
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Under its new system, Facebook will create new networks for 500 geographic regions, and it will allow anyone to join them. In the default setting, people in the region — like the New York City area — will be able to see the full profile of other members in the same region. Facebook has long offered a series of options that allow users to expand or contract the information shown to various sorts of people.
I tend to think of openness not in terms of who can join, but what hurdles does one need to jump to access content. In those terms, Facebook is still a closed community and I think that tends to create an advantage for MySpace.
Cem Sertoglu 
