Livestreaming Rakes in Big VC Bucks

It was a big Money week for Livestreaming companies. Blogger Robert Scoble gushed on his blog yesterday, "it's amazing how much money is flowing in right now..."

Indeed, Kyte TV (a mobile streaming outfit) announced today it has raised $15m. Earlier this wk, UStream announced that it has raised $2m. And, last but not least, Mogulus has finalized its $1.2m in financing. Not bad for a NY based startup that just launched its Mogulus TV (www.mogulus.com) a little over a month ago.

Collaboration in Romance, Video and Meetup

Collaboration was the theme at last night's fine NY Tech Meetup at IAC corporate headquarters in Chelsea.

Kaltura's Shay David pitched this hot new "Wiki meets Video editing" tool that enables multiple users to edit videos and graphics. Kaltura won rave reviews at the recent Tech Crunch conference. It's a really cool group video editing product that deserves more attention from the press.

Pete Kamali pitched the IgNighter site, which enables "group dating". And, Scott, our organizer and leader, pitched a new Meetup feature called the Meetup Alliance that will allow Meetups to organize among themselves (and beyond geographic borders). A Tech Meetup Nation, you bet.

Mogulus Goes Public

MOGULUS LAUNCHED LIVE STREAMING PLATFORM AT NEWTEEVEE LIVE


SAN FRANCISCO, CA. --- Nov. 14 --- Mogulus, a New York-based internet startup, unveiled a groundbreaking live streaming platform today that enables anyone with a computer, a web-cam and a high speed connection to broadcast like a multi-million dollar television station.

"To make compelling live user generated content, you need powerful production tools. With Mogulus, producers can now collaborate in real time and make high quality live television shows on the internet,“ said Max Haot, Founder/CEO of Mogulus.

Om Malik, editor-in-chief of GigaOM and organizer of NewTeeVee Live, said Mogulus "is a great partner for broadcasting live TV on the Web." In addition to being a featured platform at NewTeeVee Live, Mogulus will be streaming the event live at www.live.newteevee.com.

Mogulus, in private beta for the past four months, is one of the most popular live streaming applications in Internet history. More than 17,000 producers with beta access created more than 18,000 live 24/7 channels and streamed more than 12 million unique viewer minutes a month, according to Haot.

MOGULUS LAUNCHED LIVE STREAMING PLATFORM AT NEWTEEVEE LIVE


SAN FRANCISCO, CA. --- Nov. 14 --- Mogulus, a New York-based internet startup, unveiled a groundbreaking live streaming platform today that enables anyone with a computer, a web-cam and a high speed connection to broadcast like a multi-million dollar television station.

"To make compelling live user generated content, you need powerful production tools. With Mogulus, producers can now collaborate in real time and make high quality live television shows on the internet,“ said Max Haot, Founder/CEO of Mogulus.

Om Malik, editor-in-chief of GigaOM and organizer of NewTeeVee Live, said Mogulus "is a great partner for broadcasting live TV on the Web." In addition to being a featured platform at NewTeeVee Live, Mogulus will be streaming the event live at www.live.newteevee.com.

Mogulus, in private beta for the past four months, is one of the most popular live streaming applications in Internet history. More than 17,000 producers with beta access created more than 18,000 live 24/7 channels and streamed more than 12 million unique viewer minutes a month, according to Haot.

Tumblelogging Towards the Future

Google, Facebook and even Microsoft reps were all there conveying the latest news about their companies at the NY Tech Meetup this week, held in the spacious IAC Corp. in Chelsea this week, but the real highlights were the startups Vimeo, Pixelperfect, and Tumblr. Tumblr, in particular, is generating a lot of buzz these days, especially since Union Square Ventures invested. Here's how this leading VC firm describes Tumblr in their blog:

"Tumblr is the easiest way to express yourself online. The form of expression on Tumblr is called a tumblelog, which (as defined by Wikipedia) is "a variation of a blog that favors short-form, mixed-media posts." Tumblelogging exists to express a more ethereal identity."

I have been testdriving (or tumblelogging) on my Tumblr account, and have to admit it's more fun than Twitter and so easy to use. Kudos to Davidville, the developer (aka David Karp).

Web2NewYork: Going Mobile

"Going Mobile" was the theme at last night's well attended Web2NewYork Meetup at the Gallery Bar in the Lower East Side. The hottest pitch came from Thumbplay, which offers a "platform of mobile entertainment content" that aggregates, promotes and delivers mobile content directly to your cell phone. Thumbplay started with ringtones and now offers videos, movies and ads, all formatted for the "small screen". Won't be long before advertisers follow the lead of movie studios and music companies in moving toward mobile entertainment companies like Thumbplay.

RENAMITY PR & Bruni PR

Silicon Alley is spreading south into the Delaware Valley. Philly's economy isn't just about healthcare/pharma, banks and law firms anymore. Internet companies are sprouting up in Philly and surrounding areas, especially King Of Prussia, faster than timeshares in the Poconos. At the recent TechCrunch 40 and Demo conferences out West, there were numerous Philly based startups rubbing elbows with Silicon Valley venture capitalists and young Net moguls.

To service these new Delaware Valley startups, Bruni PR has entered into a strategic partnership with RENAMITY PR, one of the city's fastest growing PR firms, with clients in a wide range of businesses, including entertainment, food, beverages, consumer goods, and financial services. RENAMITY PR CEO Anthony DiMeo III has a strong track record in marketing to the city's "young affluent", the same demographic group spearheading the economic move into the Net industry. I'd call them the "young affluentials". Can the next Google or YouTube come out of Philly? If it does, Bruni PR and RENAMITY will be there to seize the opportunity.

wixi

wixi, an exciting new media centric social media site, is inviting TechCrunch readers to its beta version. I'm glad I followed up on Arrington's advice today and took wixi for a testdrive. It's amazing. Wixi users get 3GB of free storage that they can use to share photos, videos, and music with their friends and family. While the service is browser-based, Wixi designed the interface to feel like a desktop environment with drag-n-drop functionality. wixi, launched at TechCrunch 40, and I apologize for not including them in my last post about the NYers who generated buzzz there.

TechCrunch 40/ New Yorkers Create Buzz

New York-based startups generated a lot of buzz at the TechCrunch 40 gathering on the West Coast today and yesterday. Clickable, Viewdle, and most of all, Kaltura, got raves views for their demos. Kaltura, a Brooklyn based startup with a unique tech that marries the wiki with video editing collaboration tools, won the coveted "40th company" spot after wooing everyone in the DemoPit. Viewdle has pioneered facial recognition tech that is used in its video search product. Reuters is a big customer. Clickable, a Union Square Venture Fund company, also won rave reviews for its online ad product.
Kudos to Arrington, Calacanis and the other organizers.

Animoto/ NY Tech Meetup

Animoto stole the show last night at the NY Tech Meetup with its amazing, new "do it yourself" music video product. Brad Jefferson, co-founder and CEO, blew away the audience with a music video about the Tech Meetup created in just a few minutes. RobinGood and other prominent bloggers have been raving about Animoto for several wks, and now I can see what the fuss is about. As Robin predicted, this product will replace slideshows in the near future.

CrossCast WiTV demo

CrossCast: the Joost Killer?

Made in Italy 2.0 tech got a big boost last week with the talk about CrossCast, a new video on demand product that some bloggers say is the real "Joost killer". WebTV and Mashable have seen previews and are raving about this new Italian startup from the Lake Como region. I had a chance to ask some of the Joost execs partying at the CrunchGear birthday party here in NYC last week, and they confirmed that Joost is watching CrossCast closely. The new service debuts later this month at a Media Event in Milan. Kudos to the LSVMultimedia group that developed CrossCast. This has to be the most anticipated Italian tech I can remember, and I've been watching the Italian tech/Net scene for some time.

Fotolog Founders Cash In

Congrats to Scott Heiferman and the other Fotolog founders. It's not official yet, but Silicon Alley Insider reports today that Fotolog has been sold to a "major Latin American media company" for $100m or so. Makes sense since Fotolog has huge traffic in Latin America. Alexa ranks it as one of the most popular websites in several nations down there. Now, Scott can ramp up Meetup.com, his other successful startup.

uPlayMe

Silicon Alley's music related startups are garnering major funding these days. A couple wks back it was Amie Street that made the news. Today, another key player that won rave reviews at the NY Tech Meetup several months back is getting a second round of financing, and well-deserved.
uPlayMe (www.uPlayMe.com), developer of a desktop application which automatically connects people through their shared tastes in music, movies, TV shows and other digital content, announced today it has closed a multi-million dollar funding round including investments from Warner Music Group (NYSE: WMG), Village Ventures, and other investors.

SelectMinds

Large corporations want to use social networking tools. No big surprise. Many leading "social network in a box" services like Ning, KickApps and others are eyeing the corporate market. A new NY-based player has also jumped in -- SelectMinds.
Flatiron-based SelectMinds has raised $5.5 million in Series A funding from Bessemer Venture Partners, the company said today. SelectMinds sells on-demand corporate social-networking software and networking services to companies like Dow Chemical, Ernst & Young, and JPMorgan Chase. KickApps, also based here in NYC, raised subtantial funding last week.

Web2NewYork

Food, wine, card games and 3-d metro guides were the theme at Tuesday nite's fine Web2NewYork meeting at the Gallery Bar in the Lower East Side here in NYC.
Great presentations by Snooth, a wine rating website, UpNext, a 3-d NYC metro guide, and HeyCosmo, a card game multiplayer site. Danny Moom of UpNext and the Snooth team got rave reviews (even though it was clearly a beerdrinking crowd). A lot of food-related website owners were in the house, including charming Blanca Valbuena of FriendsEAT.com, a hot new Hoboken-based site, and Jenn Beisser of chefsline.com. Compliments to our Meetup organizer Peter Verkooijen.

Gnomedex: Meeting of A-List Minds

Kudos to Chris Pirillo (and his family) for organizing one of the best tech conferences (or unconferences) I've seen in a while. This year's Gnomedex 7 conference featured Bob Steele, Scoble, Calacanis, Kawasaki and others. I watched on the Gnomedex website, which featured a live eventstreaming, (and saved myself a ton of $). Steele, a former CIA agent, spooked the audience with a rant about the NSA and policing of social media in the US. It was a bit chilling, but on target. Meanwhile, Kawasaki, as usual, spoke like a preacher who really energized the audience with his tales of Silicon Valley. My buddy Jason Calancanis fielded some tough questions about Mahalo, his human powered search engine service, but made some fascinating points about the future of search. Also made news by announcing that Mahalo will now feature comparable search results from Google, Yahoo and other "non-human" search engines. Way to go Jason.

NowPublic stays Independent

Hat's off to Len Brody and Mike Tippett, founders of NowPublic.com for raising over $10m in new financing from Rho Ventures, a NY based VC outfit, and, more important, fending off potential "media company" suitors.
NowPublic, the largest "participatory journalism" organization on the planet, has an agreement with AP and other newsgathering orgs to provide "crowdsourced" content and news. My hope is that many of the Media beat reporters in the business media (NYT, WSJ, BW, etc.) that have heard my pitch about this Canadian-based pioneer will now start to pay attention.

Money Still Flows Into Silicon Alley

New York area companies received $446.1 million in venture capital funding in the second quarter, down 19% from the same quarter a year ago, according to a survey released Tuesday.

While the amount of money declined, the 65 venture capital deals was the same number as in the year-ago quarter, according to the MoneyTree Report by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association.

Amie Street: Supply Meets Demand

What if you could sell something and price it based on its popularity? The ultimate matching of demand and supply. Economists should study Amie Street.
Kudos to the folks at Amazon for investing in one of the hottest music websites.
The key to Amie Street isn't just the indy music available on the site, but the so-called REC system.
"The REC system drives the site's music discovery process. The price of a song is determined by how many times it is purchased, and Amie Street pays customers for discovering and recommending great music. For example, if a user "RECs" a song when it costs 0 cents, and the song grows to 98 cents, the user receives 98 cents for RECing that song." Will Amazon start selling books by indy publishers and writers based on the REC system. Time will tell.

Trusted Opinion & Netflix

In the world of Trusted Opinion, we are all movie critics. Check this site out before going to the movies or buying a DVD. I've been playing movie critic for several months on this site and find it invaluable.
From today's Mashable:

"Trusted Opinion, the free online community that lets you create a personal recommendation circle of friends, has integrated Netflix queuing into its system.

You can now get Netflix queuing directly from DVD review pages within the Netflix recommendation network. This essentially combines the TrustedIOpinion system with your existing Netflix account. Access the top rated movie and DVD releases based on your circle of friends, figure out which movie you’d like to see next, and add it to your Netflix queue." Kudos to this Palo Alto CA-based startup.

PR: The Exodus of the Young

Crain's New York Business says it is a good time to be in PR in NYC, "where demand for tech-savvy PR professionals is reaching levels not seen since the dot-com frenzy of the late '90s.

Companies are devoting more money to PR rather than advertising to deal with blogs and social networks, wrote Amanda Fung in the July 23 issue.

One key problem: the dearth of talent with five-to-10 years of experience. Don Middleberg, who now has a dozen staffers at Middleberg Communications, says its "tough" to find good people.

Well, Don, the reason it's "tough" is that most young PR pros today would rather work for exciting, new Net startups as in-house PR execs than work in large PR agency sweatshops, like Edelman and Burson-Marsteller.

Rudy & Obama Boys Battle on the Web

"Obama Girl" might beat "Giuliani Girl" in that funny YouTube video everybody is watching right now, but the real Rudy & Obama Boys are head -to- head on the K-Sync Web Noise Tracker this week.

Except for the Gilmore blip over the weekend, the Noise Tracker shows Rudy & Obama both garnering strong coverage on the Web. Yet, Hillary stills bests Obama among the Dems, a continuing trend over the past month.

Check it out at www.politics08.us. K-Sync Web Noise Tracker was developed by Septet Systems, a Bruni PR client and New York based Net outfit founded by Ben Epstein and Alexandre Brown.

Miro

Miro, formerly known as Democracy, relaunched this week and got rave reviews, including this one from Next 100, a prominent video topics blog:

"Miro is an open-source Internet TV application that combines a media player and library, content guide, video search engine, as well as podcast and BitTorrent clients. Developed by the Participatory Culture Foundation, Miro aims to make online video “as easy as watching TV”, while at the same time ensuring that the new medium remains accessible to everyone, through its support for open standards. Described by some as the “Firefox of media apps”, the resulting effort is a slick looking and easy-to-use application — not a mean feat when dealing in open-source methodology — that gives Apple’s iTunes (the default media player and video podcast client for many) a genuine run for its money."

Live on FOX TV - Max Haot - Mogulus CEO -Iphone interview

iPhone Launch TV

iPhone mania had its own live television station last Friday when Mogulus set up a live stream from its studio and the Apple downtown and midtown stores. Call it "disposable TV", live stations set up on the Web for covering major news events on the fly. Many reporters from the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Business Week and others called me, grateful to see the action at the Apple stores without leaving their desks. Brett Larson, tech reporter for FoxTV5 in NYC, invited Mogulus founder Max Haot to talk about his iPhone experience this am on the FoxTV morning news show.

Mogulus: The Revolution Will Be Televised

Imagine having your own live 24/7 television station on the Web. It's a dream that was impossible for most Web developers/producers. Not anymore. NY based startup Mogulus just did a beta launch in late May, and has already spawned 700 new "stations". Rapper Gil Scott Heron used to say "the revolution will not be televised..." Gil didn't envision Mogulus. Founder Max Haot is defying conventional (Joost) wisdom that everyone wants "video on demand stations" and not the "linear model" of live TV.

With Mogulus, you can blend your webcam, video clips from YouTube, and your own original content into your own unique TV program - and you call all the shots. When you’re not broadcasting live, turn on the auto-pilot and let it drive your playlist.

Haot wowed everyone at the NY Tech Meetup two wks ago with his demo. I spent two hours with him yesterday at their headquarters and can say "I have seen the future...."

Bruni PR will be pitching this exciting new startup to key reporters in the coming wks.

MeetMoi

Dating will never be the same after MeetMoi seizes the public's imagination. MeetMoi has already captured the imagination of the VCs. Acadia Woods just invested $1.5m and other major VCs are likely courting this exciting new NY based startup.


Available on Cingular, Nextel, Boost, Sprint, T-Mobile, ALLTEL and CellularOne, the MeetMoi service allows registered members to meet and date other users simply by sending a text message from their phone with a specified location. MeetMoi then registers the user as "available" and sends the user's profile and photo via text message to other users who meet specified criteria and are within a proximity preference. Members have the option of preserving their anonymity while chatting through the gateway of MeetMoi.

MyBlueZebra: "Made In Italy" 2.0

You think of Italy, and you think fashion, food, wine and cars. Think again. Italy is also a hotbed of new technologies. The land of DaVinci and Marconi is moving fast into the Net arena with new products/services that are barely on the horizon here in the US. Case in point: click to call technology. A new Italian-Australian startup that has set up headquarters here in NYC is capitalizing on advanced "Made in Italy" CtoC tech. It's called MyBlueZebra. MyBlueZebra has a deal with PagineGialle (Italy's version of the Yellow Pages) that's amazing. 140,000 businesses listed on the PagineGialle website now have a small icon called Chiamagratis (Call Free) next to their listing. You click on it and call for free from anywhere in the world. Bruni PR is pitching this story to reporters in Italy over the next few weeks. MyBlueZebra plans to invade the US market in the coming months. Why the crazy name? Founder Andrea Tessitore says it's the most "friendly animal" around. Credit Lapo Elkann for the name. The former Fiat marketing director is a key player in the new company. Forza MyBlueZebra!

Mahalo

ValleyWag, the Silicon Valley gossip blog, has a breaking news story about Mahalo, a new venture founded by Jason Calacanis. Mahalo is described as a search engine that will actually have humans working to guide search results, a concept that goes back to the Mining Company of the '90s, a predecessor of About.com. ValleyWag claims that Mahalo will have Wikipedia like features and will debut at a Wall Street Journal conference later this month. I've known Jason since his early days with Silicon Alley Reporter. Bruni PR was an advertiser. I am sure that this will be successful. Good luck, Jason.

Houseparty.com

Last week, the "boys" on HBO's Entourage threw a b-day party for Vinnie and, amazingly, got sponsorships from Victoria's Secret, Grey Goose and others. Models with skimpy Secret garments showed up along with cases of Grey Goose. A great idea, I thought. A few nights later, at the NY Tech Meetup, Silicon Alley mover/shaker Gene DeRose presented Houseparty.com, a website where companies seeking to promote products/services can "sponsor" house parties. Sure, Gene is pushing chocolate, soda and other things right now, but the idea is clearly scalable to the Entourage level.
Gene, a founder of Jupiter Research, impressed the audience with his pitch, one of the best we've seen at Tech Meetup.

DoubleClick deal

Seems like only yesterday. I can remember meeting DoubleClick (all four employees) back in 1995 at a New York New Media Association sponsored event at 55 Broad Street, at that time promoted as NYC's first "wired building" (w/ a T1 line). There were ten companies presenting. Organa, Tumble Interactive, K2 Design, MCNY and others startups which have long ceased to exist. (Organa and Tumble were Bruni PR clients). DoubleClick not only survived the '90s bust, but went on to revolutionize the online ad industry. The DoubleClick deal will surely usher in a wave of acquisitons of NY based online ad and marketing companies. That's a good thing. Hat's off to Kevin O'Connor, a founder and one of those four original employees. He's probably playing golf somewhere in California or Florida, and relishing the success.

Virginia Tech & Citizen Journalism

The coverage of the Virginia Tech shootings surely indicate the importance of citizen journalism and the Web. Tonight's network newcasts (especially ABC World News) featured eyewitness accounts culled from student cell phones videos, Facebook blog reports and even a college citizen journalism site (the Blacksburg Report). The questions raised by citizen/ student journalists themselves are shaping the coverage. NowPublic.com, Newsvine, Topix and other citizen journalism sites are seeing a huge number of views on info related to the shootings. Hopefully, this combination of citizen (or student) journalism and professional newsgatherers will shed light on this tragedy.

Empowering The Phone: 2Recall.com

What if you could record phone calls and store them using the web?
Consumers could empower their phone calls when shopping or doing business over the phone.
2Recall, a new startup, has launched a new service that allows you to record calls and store them for future use in your own personal web folder at 2Recall.com. A sort of verbal contract that can be put to use later -- if that contractor, broker or salesperson renegs or decides to charge you a higher price than was quoted over the phone.

TechCrunch's Michael Arrington endorsed 2Recall this week in his post.
Bruni PR will be pitching 2Recall to the mainstream press during the next few days/weeks, and anticipate substantial news coverage.

Foreclosure Mania

Got a call this morning from Meredith Menz, producer of the Today in New York show at WNBC. Seems TINY is doing a segment on "Buying Foreclosures" in the Real Estate market. A sign of the times, indeed. A projected 1.1 million Americans are expected to face foreclosures. While my client, StreetEasy.com, doesn't list foreclosures, a new site,
Foreclosure.com, does and will surely be a quick hit with the press and the Blogosphere.

The Valley vs. The Alley

From today's Information Week online edition:

"Move over, Silicon Valley, there's a greater call for IT professionals in the New York and New Jersey area than there is in Northern California, according to a new report.

Dice, an online career site for technology professionals, reports that there are 12,377 jobs posted for IT positions available in an area that encompasses New York City, Long Island, and northern New Jersey. By comparison, there are 9,393 jobs advertised for the Silicon Valley area, including San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland."

Ning: Instant Social Networks

I just did a testdrive of Ning, the new "instant social network" app, and have to say it's amazing. Kudos to Gina Bianchini, founder/CEO of Ning. In just three minutes, I set up my social network, called Bruni, with a tag "PR buzz". Check out brunipr.ning.com. Yet another forum for my views on PR trends & Net startups (and my rants on the ethical sins of our nation's biggest PR firms).

Burson Marsteller's Hat Trick

PR Watch, a respected industry watchdog org., takes on Burson Marsteller this week with a report on Mark Penn, the worldwide CEO of BM, my former employer, and points out that he wears "many hats", maybe too many hats. Penn is also chief stategist to the Hillary Clinton campaign and head of a polling firm working for the Senator. BM's head Howard Paster brushes off this huge conflict of interest by stating that WPP, owner of BM, has many units that work "independently". I knew Penn back in the Eighties when I was a political pollster working with Dick Morris, and think he's a smart guy, but doubt he can handle the scrutiny of the mainstream press when this issue becomes a problem for BM. My bet is that he picks Clinton over BM.

The Rise of Niche Job Boards

A newly released study by Borrell Associates indicates a sharp rise in the use of "niche" online job boards. Looks like trouble for generalist online job boards like Monster. This bodes well for New York-based JobThread, a fast growing startup that markets a full service job board product for publishers, recruiters and small/mid size businesses.

NowPublic.com + AP Agreement

NowPublic.com, a Bruni PR client, and Associated Press are hooking up. NowPublic, the largest citizen journalism network on the planet, and AP, the largest news organization, will share news leads, photos, video and other info supplied (or crowdsourced) by NowPublic's 35,000 contributors.

Silicon Alley 2.0

Price Waterhouse Cooper just released a new report indicating that $2 billion in venture capital was invested in approximately 250 New York based startups. It represents a two fold increase over last year's funding. The message in the report is clear : Silicon Alley is back. Kudos to PWC for making the news official. Anyone who attends the New York Tech Meetups has known this for some time, but it's great to see the larger business world acknowledge the rebirth of Silicon Alley.

Urbis.com

Whither the slushpile? The Publishing industry is ripe for revolution. Until now, any aspiring writer had to submit manuscripts to the infamous "slushpile" at major publishers. Now, many publishers are looking to the Internet as a way to discover new writers. Therein lies the potential of Urbis.com, the web's leading literary social media site. A new Bruni PR client, Urbis allows aspiring writers to submit their latest work to a customized group of critics. HarperCollins and other key publishers are looking closely at Urbis.com. Founder Steve Spurgat has created a valuable new platform that will soon disintermediate the slushpile and revamp the way publishers find new talent.

New York City's Price Choppers

StreetEasy.com, a Bruni PR client, is working closely with New York magazine on tracking the latest "Price Choppers" in the NY Real Estate market. Here's an excerpt from the latest issue of New York.


The Year of the Price Cut
Overreaching is so 2006.

* By S.Jhoanna Robledo

So is it a soft market, or isn't it? The consensus is forming: Sellers just can't overreach and expect a huge payout the way they did a couple of years ago. New York asked Streeteasy.com, an online database that gathers information on most listings in the city, to run the numbers and find the largest price drops of the year (leaving out mixed-use and multiple-unit buildings and new developments). Bargain-hunters and bonus-toters, this may be your moment.

read further at nymag.com/realestate/realestatecolumn/25993/index.html/