Le eMini Blog

gCrime?

2008-07-14T19:36:00.001+02:00

When police reports meet with Google Maps, it gives you this daily updated mashup of what's going on near you.
Here's our neighborhood at netvibes office for the last 30 days... [here]

PS: note to readers: thanks for your patience (and emails), I've not blogged much lately. I'm not putting this blog on hold but will simply post now and then.

Very personal keyboard

2008-04-26T08:58:00.002+02:00

Erik De Nijs is definitely a creative designer. We knew the iPod jeans at Levi's, he now creates the first (to my knowledge) keyboard pants. I wonder how it feels? and if he has plans for a version with separated numpad on the back pocket?
Very personal keyboard :-)

Very funny

2008-04-19T04:01:00.001+02:00

Western

2008-04-10T20:42:00.003+02:00

[photo credit SFChronicle]

Took me 1 hour to drive 3 miles on highway 280 southbound last nite. Imagine 6 lanes going into a small city exit. Now I know why. Highway was closed because of a shooting. A guy with 2 kids on the backseat got shot dead by another driver.
I live 2 miles from there. And the article says it's the second time this week! Fortunately not at this very spot but still.
This is not news on TV while having a drink. This is real life, scary shit. After a "free Tibet" day, when are we going to have a "free of guns" day?

Blogging safe

2008-04-08T08:37:00.002+02:00

Ok. now, I'm worried. After reading Michael Arrington's testimonials in VNUNet about the threat of blogging and consequences on your health... man. 30 pounds in 3 years (took me 10 years to get those, but I'm a slow blogger too :-)
Anyway, this post is a safe one. Short, no picture. Cool. We want to manage the author, don't we?

$2.6M for a pizza

2008-04-08T08:27:00.002+02:00

... but any pizza. Pizza.com was just sold for this amount. Story (BBC) doesn't say how slices and if toppings were extras :-)

So, here's a message to a famous car company, bought by BMW few years ago. if you're looking for the electronic version of the Mini... just ask. At this price, I'm ready ;-))

iPhone 3G coming up in May

2008-04-01T06:09:00.003+02:00

Is it still a rumor when analyst at Bank of America predicts it?
10M in manufacturing, 8M if second half forecast, support for MS Exchange, etc... the new iPhone 3G is expected in San Francisco for the Apple Worldwide developer conference on June 9th. SDK should be ready as well. First one to be delivered in May...

Now the question is: at what price? and will there be upgrade programs for the iPhone bought lately?

Ditto.

2008-03-31T08:11:00.003+02:00

Dan Farber is an ex colleague, a mentor and... a friend.
I've been blogging for 3 years now and the debate about journalism and blogging, and no-original content in blogging or even the latest tension over TechMeme's role or even definition have created the need in me to post my profound thoughts about all this.

I wrote 4 versions of this post and, as I still wasn't satisfied with it, just saved it without posting it.

And just read Dan's post on his own blog about this very subject. [you definitely should read it]

And it's perfect. Spot on. Right on. A+.

It makes the point. Not that he has much more talent than I do (no blog needed for that :-)), but makes me feel great to just continue blogging... even pushing it with a post like one: No personal added value but still a sense of a contribution. Thanks Dan, you're definitely a friend. ;-)

Love me, please love me...

2008-03-25T05:14:00.003+01:00

(Yes, it's a song from Michel Polnareff.)

Jason Calacanis is offering a free MacBook Air if you accept to follow him on Twitter and help him get the numero Uno position on Twitter, in front of Robert "too-famous" Scoble.

Well, first, the MacBook is used as I understand it. But anyway, is a MacBook enough to entertain a couple of hundred or thousand followers and more importantly, what will happen the day after the precious MacBook gets won by a soon to become famous as well follower? Will it be one MacBook Air per month? week? Will Jason be official Apple distributor?

Well, that brings two important questions: 1/ is follower a new fee based job on the internet? 2/ can you be famous in following?

Anyway, this is really funny and brings an interesting angle to the micro-celebrity syndrome on the Internet. After all, isn't it a simple step towards buying its own audience? You are the media, they said...

New Wikio has arrived.

2008-03-24T04:03:00.003+01:00

Wikio released a new version this past week. I'm biased on Wikio, I confess. I'm an investor, like the team and the founders are my friends. Enough to be biased, isn't it?
So, when a startup like this release a new product, praising it the very first day ain't credible.
I let few days go by to see how it would develop in me.
Well, result is clear: I like it. I like the new UI, cleaner, more ajax with expand and collapse right on the page, definitely more accurate search and addition of video is really cool.
Congrats Guys. Great job.

Smart way of making money on Google

2008-03-19T07:10:00.003+01:00

You're bored with Google search page's design? want to add your picture, use a wallpaper to make it more personal?
Homepagle is for you. A super smart way to make money on Google. It creates a simple page with your own images or from a bunch of nice pictures and simply replaces the result page with its own AdWords.
Very smart.

Free Ingrid

2008-03-18T18:18:00.001+01:00

A superb initiative from Vinvin at Seesmic.
Free Ingrid. from Freddy, San Francisco.

Is Yahoo twice its value now?

2008-03-13T07:19:00.002+01:00

Barron's is bringing a very good point. While Google is suffering of concerns on the online advertising market, real concerns or just seasonal panics, Yahoo! is under the shelter of Microsoft offer at $31 a share. If Sir Microsoft was not here, Yahoo!, following the same trend, would be in the $15 range...

So, is Microsoft missing a great discount deal here? can they send some mixed message like a market adjustment, saying they are ready to pay a premium of a couple of percent and thus, at a revised valuation their new offer is now at $20 a share? after all, it's just a $14B adjustment... why not give it a shot?

Job's made of Apple products

2008-03-08T05:52:00.002+01:00

cool.

A $17B report

2008-03-03T03:55:00.002+01:00

In this very nervous market, every piece of information, not read the right way, can have disastrous effect.
Last week, comScore reported a 8% decrease in paid click per search query, in January vs December. Immediate market reaction was a $55 drop per share over two nervous sessions. This means a $17B drop in Google valuation. Reading straight numbers from comScore is a dangerous exercice. So dangerous, even comScore's CEO had to make some explaination [good article from Forbes here]
Google did introduce a "quality factor" that simply translate in raising the bar for paid clicks to be displayed, producing higher paid clicks. All in all, quality vs quantity. So, do people invests in a number of clicks or in a company financial performance?
comScore's CEO statement makes the point, reading numbers requires caution before action and, if you ask me, at $471 Google is a bargain theses days... ;-)

iPhone opens on Thursday?

2008-03-03T03:38:00.002+01:00

Press has been invited this coming Thursday at Cupertino's HQ to get a pitch on Apple's plan for iPhone's software. SDK for sure and maybe more? like support for Corporate email servers, Microsoft and Lotus Notes?
Apple has been beaten down over the past 3 months with some analysts fearing the gold time for iPod to be behind and iPhone's 10M mark to maybe not happen. Worst, the number of cracked iPhone to be higher than expected, meaning the revenue coming from exclusive country telcos to not bring as much as planned.
Apple is a master in Marketing in general and PR in particular. I can't make the link between Cook's reiteration in confidence about the 10M units sold and this week announcement.
Apple has always started with a closed environment and high price strategy when launching a product. Prices have dropped earlier than planned, 2 months after July launch. Time for an open platform, earlier than planned too?
Isn't it the fastest and most secured way to get to the 10M mark?...

Mission: Ginger

2008-02-21T07:43:00.003+01:00

Some is wrong on this poster: Ginger will be release (way) before May 22nd :-)
(thanks to Mo for the link. fun creation with this site (in french))

Have you seen what everybody has already seen?

2008-02-13T06:58:00.002+01:00

This is most viewed video of all time. 74M views and counting. It's really funny but it brings one comment: have you seen that video before? So the most popular site of video sharing has an all time most viewed video and you haven't seen it yet?
Is it because of you being totally has been or simply because popular has a more long tail sense on the Internet?
Anyway... enjoy that video and let's add to this counter :-)

Facebook for life

2008-02-12T07:59:00.000+01:00

Interesting article in the NY Times about how hard, near impossible it is to delete your account on Facebook. Citing a group in Facebook of about 4,800 members just on that very matter. Now it brings two questions:
1. how do Facebook deal with local privacy laws where it is mandatory to be able to delete all footprint of yours with a single email? like in Europe and France in particular?
2. how can you be willing to leave facebook... with a group on facebook? ;-) The egg or the chicken? who's leaving first...

$49B?

2008-02-11T06:18:00.000+01:00

Interesting week coming up.
Tomorrow monday, Yahoo! will most likely reject Microsoft offer at $44.6B considering the price to be too low. (I'm not surprised and believe so as well).
Will Microsoft come back with a $35 a share offer, which means a shy of $49B bid?
Will Microsoft sign with Google an ad pact giving a gigantic inventory to the search giant?
Your thoughts?

eEA

2008-02-11T06:09:00.000+01:00

First, I saw the presentation at TC 40 in Oct.
Then, I register to the beta.
And now I use it each time I travel. It's super cool to have everything about your trip in one place including some neat gadgets.
But now, TripIt comes with TripIt to Me, a service that makes you ask for an information about your trip in a simple language. It's like sending an email to your Executive Assistant, which I don't have...
Send "get schedule tomorrow" to plans@tripit.com and... your schedule for tomorrow including the weather, stuff near by etc... arrives to your blackberry (or anything you use to read your email)
Not only those guys have invented a smart way to understand and get intelligence out of confirmation emails but now they make the service talk to you.
Like an eExecutive Assistant. Free and 7/24.

I'm waiting for the command "get me a double expresso" and the Starbuck guy will ring downstairs 10 mns later :-)

Showing off? maybe. Proud? very.

2008-02-07T23:20:00.000+01:00

Yes, it looks like showing off, and well, yes, it is if being proud of the job done is showing off. Naturally, it's a team work and all congrats go to all of them. Say, it's team show off made by a proud individual.
But, for a few sec, it feels good to see, a year after netvibes, inc. has opened, some concrete results. And ginger is not launched yet...

And guys, a post, not on MS-Yahoo!, has to be refreshing, somehow, hasn't it? ;-)

$44.6B. A bargain.

2008-02-04T03:50:00.000+01:00

So it was not rumors. For the past year; Microsoft tried to convince Yahoo! of a friendly merger. As I heard from trusted internal sources, Yahoo!'s founders refused. Thursday, as my previous post highlighted, Yahoo!'s stock reached a bargain price. Friday, Steve Balmer sent a letter to Yahoo!s board to propose a 62 percent premium to that day stock price, making this hostile offer a $44.6B takeover.

Let's spend few minutes on the price of the transaction.

1. $44.6B is cheap
Yahoo! has 500 Millions Unique Users a month. A short while ago, Microsoft paid $300 per UU his stake in Facebook. I even believe it's more than that when considering the guaranteed regular revenue. Especially in the light of last week Lookery's announcement to guarantee $0.125 CPM... At Facebook's UU valuation, Yahoo! is worth $150B. 3 times more.
It's also cheap when you consider the end result: $31 per stock. Over the past year, Yahoo! was traded around this price and was $34 on Oct 29th 07. Considering that all major stocks, besides MSFT, have been hammered with Q4 results and also in the light of all analysts maintaining their target prices over the next 12 months... Balmer is making an offer at fair or regular market price!
I personally believe the price will go higher...

2. But it's a lot of cash. Even for Microsoft
Paid 50 percent in cash, Microsoft will have to cut a check of $22.3B
Even for Microsoft, that's a lot of money and I'm eager to get info on how this will be finance, if you know more, please let me know. Either directly via email (my first name at emini.com) or with a comment to this post?
Which makes me believe the price will go higher but in stock exchange mostly.

Interesting week ahead...

Meanwhile, here's Google's first reaction. Here too, more to come... This is just the beginning.

Yahooouch!

2008-01-30T02:28:00.000+01:00

UPDATE Friday, Feb 1st: Microsoft has made an hostile offer to buy Yahoo! for 44.6B

Tough time for Yahoo! Earning call today, after the bell, disappointed with a profit lower than expect but also with forecast in the low range of analyst expectations for next year.
Rumor had it as Jerry would announce layoffs as a last chance to make up for Wall Street but the 1,000 layoffs (9% of its workforce) were not enough to avoid the stock to free fall after market by more than 10%. Valued at about $18.50 at the time I'm writing this post.

Jerry Yang miraculous effect, the classic founder comeback, the hope of another Steve Jobs magic move didn't happen. On June 18th 2007, Jerry took back the driver seat at Yahoo!. Stock was $28.12 that day. about 7 months later, the stock has lost $10 a share or 35% of its value. That's about $8B in valuation. Gone.

Jerry asked for 100 days to come up with the re-newing strategy. BlueLithium and Zimbra were acquired, as planned before Jerry joined and Terry was aked to leave. 100 days later, Yahoo! issued an earning guidance below analysts estimates. Time for good news?
Not really. Then came the apologies for the jailed Chinese dissident. End 2007.
CES, in January in Las Vegas, Yahoo! finally announced its mobile focus and the whole company motto of the "best start on the Internet".
And then my friend, Vince Broady left Yahoo! Vince, to me, is a star to me. He co-founded GameSpot, revived mp3.com, created tv.com and more... Over the past 6 months, almost everybody I knew at Yahoo!, here and in Europe, has left Yahoo!

Yahoo! is not alone. CNET and others are in a similar situation. After paper content companies, internet content companies are struggling. Producing content and sticking ads ain't enough for growth anymore. Still a good business to be in, but like every other businesses, maturity brings the need to trim production cost and in a fast aging industry, companies needs to reinvent themselves faster than it takes big ones to re-organize themselves.

Why is Yahoo! not playing in the Social networking arena?
Why is Yahoo! not grabbing a seat at the Video sharing game?
Why is Yahoo! not inventing the new TV that Hulu, Joost and others are shaping up?

Yahoo!, while I never worked for them, is a company I like. Naive and unexplainable, but still, I wish something happen there. It's about time. A Microsoft take over, which at current valuation, is near bargain price, can't be the only way forward, can it?

Losing less. But still, about 1 a year.

2008-01-28T03:23:00.001+01:00

Interesting article in the Wall Street Journal this week end showing some weird math: the number of unaccounted soldiers for at conflict's end vs recognized deaths per conflicts over the (recent) past.
I then took the liberty to feed Excel with those figures in the table below.

	1945	1953	1975	1991	1991	?
	WW II	Korea	Vietnam	Cold war	Gulf	Iraq
accounted	405000	37000	58000	28	382	3931
unaccounted	78000	8192	2646	138	1	4
ratio	19.26%	22.14%	4.56%	492.86%	0.26%	0.10%
duration	4	3	11	45	1	5
unacc./y	19500	2730.7	240.5	3.1	1.0	0.8

Years on first line are the conflict's ending year. The two last lines are duration per conflict and unaccounted per year of conflict. Clearly, the US Army is making progress in localization and identification.