Brightkite, one of the half-dozen or so companies vying for market share in the location-based social-networking space, has merged with another mobile start-up called Limbo. The official branding of the company will be Brightkite now, but its home base will now be at Limbo's headquarters in Burlingame, Calif.
Limbo's focus is on mobile games, as well as text-message alerts: sports scores, celebrity gossip, weather, horoscopes, and the like.
It's not totally clear how the two will merge their technologies, but a little bit of background was provided on the Brightkite blog. Brightkite will have access to Limbo's engineering team and back-end system, as well as relationships with cell phone carriers.
"We plan to move all Limbo accounts and key features to the Brightkite platform. Limbo users gain an enriched product, enhanced user interface, and new Brightkite friends," the post by co-founder Brady Becker read. "We expect this transition to happen within the next few weeks."
TechCrunch's Erick Schonfeld reports that the deal was "nearly all stock" and that the company will have access to a $9 million funding round that Limbo raised in January.
Representatives from Piczo, a social network geared toward teens, have confirmed that the site will be rolling up into Stardoll, another social site that focuses on virtual doll accessorizing.
They'll be combining with a third site called Paperdoll Heaven to form what's called the "Stardoll Network." Then, presumably, they will have access to a stronger lineup of common advertisers.
Financial terms have not been disclosed. But to put things into perspective, Piczo says it has 30 million registered members and 10 million monthly unique visitors. Stardoll is slightly smaller. But with the biggest social sites now numbering well over 100 million members, there's no surprise that smaller players are consolidating in this difficult (to say the least) financial climate.
What's interesting is that Piczo used to be one to watch: before it was overtaken by MySpace, it was the No. 1 social site for teens in the U.K. But about a year ago, it began to hit visible trouble stemming from tepid traffic and rumored layoffs.
Social network Reunion.com has made a new friend: people search service Wink. The two have merged in a new deal that promises to make it dramatically easier to find people on the Web.
Early next year, the merger will produce "an entirely new brand," the companies said. The two have not said what its name will be, nor have financial details been disclosed. With the dual technologies of Reunion and Wink, the companies say that they will be able to search more than 700 million social-networking profiles. They'll be able to search profiles on MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn, Friendster, AOL's Bebo, Microsoft's Windows Live Spaces, Yahoo, Xanga, and Twitter--among others.
Numbers from Nielsen last month indicated that Reunion.com, which says it receives 12 million unique visitors each month, is one of the fastest-growing social networks in the U.S. despite the fact that it's hardly on the radar of Twittering blog pundits. Its biggest demographic, according to Nielsen, is those between 55 and 64 who are looking to re-connect with friends and classmates.
"Through this merger, we're redefining the people search space by bridging existing social networks and providing consumers with the tools they need to find, be found, and stay connected," Wink CEO Michael Tanne said in a release. "We're aiming to create an entirely new online experience that simplifies people's lives by making it easy to find and keep up with everyone they know. There will be exciting developments in the coming months as we integrate our strengths and push our business forward."
It's been a tumultuous few days for Yahoo--you know, with that takeover bid from Microsoft--but the company continues to shake things up internally, too.
On Monday, the company announced that it will discontinue its Yahoo Music Unlimited subscription service and will transfer its customers to RealNetworks' Rhapsody service.
In mid-2008, Yahoo Music Unlimited subscribers will be guided through an in-browser process to convert their music libraries to Rhapsody's service. For a limited time (length unknown), they'll be able to keep paying Yahoo's subscription fees, which cap out at $8.99 per month, before being required to start paying Rhapsody's $12.99 monthly fee.
Additionally, Yahoo announced in conjunction that it has acquired FoxyTunes, a browser plug-in that is compatible with multiple desktop and Web-based music players.
RealNetworks, which acquired Rhapsody when it purchased parent Listen.com for $36 million in 2003, has been partnering with both hardware manufacturers like TiVo and media companies like Viacom's MTV Networks. It's the company's best strategy for staying afloat in a digital music landscape that's not only dominated by Apple's iTunes but also seems to be gravitating toward "free," not subscription-based models.
But the announcement with Yahoo is shrouded in uncertainty, for obvious reasons. Just about anything could happen to Yahoo if Microsoft's proposed $44.6 billion acquisition goes through.
RealNetworks, ironically, has a hostile history with Microsoft, too, dating back to an antitrust scuffle several years ago that led to a partnership in which RealNetworks ultimately claimed it was shortchanged.
Social networking is one of the biggest and fastest-evolving phenomena on the Web, and Microsoft's proposed takeover of Yahoo will undoubtedly send it in new directions. More than anything, a MSFT-YHOO acquisition will shake up the debate over just how you can make money off a Facebook or MySpace.com--because they're running out of time to figure that out.
Should the Microsoft-Yahoo acquisition go through, expect them to try to corner the social-network advertising market.
The common wisdom is that neither Microsoft nor Yahoo is a real force in social networking. Both companies own multiple social media properties, and the only resounding success among them is Yahoo's Flickr. (Sorry, Microsoft, I'm not counting the Zune's "song-squirting.") "They're very interested in the space," Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li said in an interview with CNET News.com. "They haven't been able to get traction in it. They look at it very longingly."
Social networking, in addition, will be a tasty slice of the Web for a hypothetical Microsoft-Yahoo because it's also one of the few niches of the Web on which Google doesn't already have a stranglehold. Its OpenSocial developer initiative isn't ready yet, its Orkut social network has only gained traction in a few regions of the globe, and the company admitted in its recent quarterly earnings call that social advertising (specifically on News Corp.'s MySpace) isn't bringing home the bacon.
Taking the reins on the advertising market is probably the best way for Microsoft-Yahoo to make waves in social networking without actually launching a big social-media initiative--and I certainly hope they don't try to, because there are way too many networks out there already. Microsoft already has a foot in the door with its $240 million stake in Facebook. (Yahoo tried to acquire it outright in 2006 and was promptly spurned.) And Facebook's own Social Ads were met with high-profile opposition and plenty of bad press.
With Microsoft's and Yahoo's resources pooled, the two companies could devise a more effective social advertising strategy (if such a thing is even possible). Even if it's dubious in its effectiveness, expect it to be very high profile. Think about it: Microsoft-Yahoo could claim they're doing what Google couldn't do. How's that for instilling confidence?
"A potential acquisition, if it actually goes through, could be a much, much more interesting player for Facebook to want to do business with," Li said, noting that Facebook's current deal with Microsoft only covers display advertisements, not search ads. "If Microsoft and Yahoo can actually make a play in search, that makes Facebook a lot more comfortable going with an all-Microsoft deal and maybe even be acquired by it. Who knows?"
But beyond advertising, a combined Microsoft-Yahoo has a massive social-networking tool at its fingertips, Li continued. "Yahoo and Microsoft both have this wonderful asset called e-mail address books and instant-messaging buddy lists, which are essentially a social graph," she said. "A lot of people are using those services, much more so than Gmail, for example, and so that's an instant social graph."
- prev
- 1
- next
