Startups to Watch in 2012

So, which are the young NYC startups to watch in 2012? Here's my picks among the newborns in the Alley:

Fab.com
OnSwipe
Nestio
YouNow
Mobli
Taboola
EventNow
72lux
Shelby.tv
Pixable
Clothia
SonarMe
CityPockets
Solve Media
Lot18
BridesView
LocalResponse
Zaarly
TaskRabbit
SkillShare
Adkeeper
Conductor
CityMaps
UpNext
Centzy
BuzzTable
Kogeto
Kickstarter
CodeAcademy
GirlApproved
HeTexted

What do I base this on? Trust me, I've seen my share of startup pitches over the past year. About 12 NY Tech meetups (about 80+ pitches) , 10 UltraLight Startup meetup (60 pitches) , the ERA Accelerator program (10 or so young babes incubating) , three NY Video Meetups and a couple Fashion 2.0 meetups (and a slew of other meetups I can't even remember from this past year).

NanoRacks Rides Soyuz Progress

The hottest startups aren't all on Planet Earth. NanoRacks, a hot space research startup, had several payloads on the Soyuz Progress rocket that successfully launched Sunday. Kudos to Near Earth, a NY-based financial adviser firm, that is helping NanoRacks down here on Earth. They know how to "launch" Space startups.

TechStars’ Demo Day Unveils 12 Start Ups — NYConvergence.com

TechStars’ Demo Day Unveils 12 Start Ups — NYConvergence.com

Accelerators are red hot right now in Silicon Alley.

I'm a mentor at ER Accelerator, which is accepting applicants for its next "class" and participated in their DEMO Day recently. It was jammed and even got pickup in the New York Times.

But, I have to admit TechStars is the most famous accelerator around, thanks to the popularity of its Bloomberg TV reality TV show. Hat's off to David Tisch. We're all looking forward to watching this group. The last one raised $24 million.

CityPockets Acquires DealBurner's Daily Deals App - Tricia Duryee - Commerce - AllThingsD

CityPockets Acquires DealBurner's Daily Deals App - Tricia Duryee - Commerce - AllThingsD

Home-Goods Retailer CSN Stores Raises $165 Million - Digits - WSJ

Home-Goods Retailer CSN Stores Raises $165 Million - Digits - WSJ


CSN Stores, a BRUNI PR client, makes E-Commerce Investment history. The "Amazon of the Home" will use the investment to rebrand itself as Wayfair. You'll be hearing more about Wayfair.

CSN Stores Becomes Second-Largest Online Retailer of Home Goods in the U.S. -- BOSTON, May 31, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

CSN Stores Becomes Second-Largest Online Retailer of Home Goods in the U.S. -- BOSTON, May 31, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

Online Giant CSN Stores Achieves Its Best Quarter Ever -- BOSTON, April 22, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

Online Giant CSN Stores Achieves Its Best Quarter Ever -- BOSTON, April 22, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --



BRUNI PR's newest client is CSN Stores, the "Amazon of Home Products", which just had its best quarter and is planning some major announcements in the coming weeks. 250+ websites are under the CSN umbrella. CSN is on track to become a $500m company by year-end. We're proud to be working with CSN.

Who won @ SXSW? (and does it matter?)

Who won the battle of the group messaging apps at SXSW? TechCrunch sez GroupMe, but Fast Society also scored points with a fine new version of its app.

Fast Society, a NYC-based startup, recently released a new group application that is “Built to Party.” Users with an iPhone and Android capable phones can send and receive audio messages, share their locations, text for free within the app, and “go back in time” to remember previous conversations with the group. (NYC Convergence).

"Fast Society is setting itself a part from other group messaging spaces by using its own platform, saving it a lot of money and adding flexibility. They are also avoiding becoming a social network, as they are designed just for single groups."

The startup launched in September 2010 and has raised $275,000 in seed capital. CEO Matt Rosenberg describes the company as “something that is edgy and dangerous. We’re not your mom’s startup. We’re young and aggressive.”

As an aging Boomer, I appreciate FS's demographic targeting. Why waste time on reaching older consumers who don't appreciate group texting? That's why MTV recently chose FS to promote its controversial "Skins" show. Watch this young Alley startup move "Fast" and catch up to GroupMe and other players.

The Visual History Album/ FotoBridge

When Academy Award - winning producer Jon Landau decided to digitally archive thousands of family photos dating back to the early 20th Century, he chose FotoBridge.

Digitizing your photos to DVD isn't just for Hollywood types and pro fotogs. FotoBridge's newest customers are Baby Boomer consumers who want to preserve their family's visual history.

There are an estimated 1 to 3 trillion Photos available for digitial conversion. That's a lot of old photo albums in closets.

Getting rid of that clutter is a great idea. But, picking a Photoscanning Service is also a chore.

Do a Google Web search on Photo Scanning Services and you'll see dozens of names. But, among the top ranked search results is FotoBridge (www.fotobridge.com). And, with good reason.

FotoBridge is the fastest growing photo scanning service in the US. With over
15 million images delivered so far, FotoBridge is the Number One choice for pros and Consumers. It recently introduced Home Movie/Video/Film to DVD, a hot new area.

FotoBridge uses a variety of the latest, most-advanced, professional imaging technologies and systems available today. Their Kodak scanners are specially modified models supported by Kodak for dedicated print photograph scanning.

Following scanning, FotoBridge enhances each digital image through "Intelligent Digital Finishing" (IDFSM) process. This process combines automated and manual techniques to resolve existing color, exposure, red-eye, highlights and contrast problems present in the original photos. IDF can often salvage poor photos and make good photos look even better.

FotoBridge has a Facebook page, a Twitter following and even a YouTube channel (with examples of their work.

JW Player: Download | LongTail Video | Home of the JW Player

JW Player: Download | LongTail Video | Home of the JW Player


Longtailvideo: Obama's video platform of choice

When President Obama gives his State of the Union Address in a couple weeks, it will be seen on the White House website (www.whitehouse.gov ) utilizing the JW Player, an online video platform from Longtailvideo, a leading NYC-based startup that dominates the open source video business.

Over 1.3 million websites now have the JW Player, which was developed by a famous Dutch entrepreneur nearly six years ago. (nicknamed "JW"). He's in the States and NYC this month. Welcome to the Big Apple JW. To learn more, go to www.longtailvideo.com

Outbrain: a new ad medium is born near Union Square

Can "Content Discovery" help save the newspaper industry?

"Content Discovery" provides online readers high quality, personalized content at the end of each article on publisher websites.

Outbrain (www.outbrain.com), a NY-based content recommendation company and new Bruni PR client, is the leader in this new internet Trend and advertising medium. The three year-old startup's mission is to serve "interesting content" to online readers.

Google finds info that you're looking for; Outbrain's platform finds content/info you didn't know existed.

Media Companies are flocking to this web technology because it enhances reader experience, increases traffic and provides a valuable new revenue stream. By offering "sponsored recommendations", they generate revenue from advertisers/brands promoting their content next to the publisher’s own editorial.

Outbrain data shows that readers don't mind if content is paid. As long as it's interesting, they will click and engage with the content.

Outbrain's client list includes many major Media players: Conde Nast, USA Today, iVillage, Boston.com (Boston Globe), The Daily Beast, TheStreet, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Newsweek, Seattle Times, VentureBeat, and Slate.

What's Outbrain's "secret sauce"?

Outbrain's proprietary technology personalizes content recommendations to the individual, helping each online reader discover new, interesting articles. The recommendations are based on contextual and behavioral algorithm.

Outbrain has raised over $18 million in Series A and B financing.

Outbrain's network reaches 150 million monthly users on the Web

Why Entertainment Will Drive the Next Checkin Craze

Why Entertainment Will Drive the Next Checkin Craze

Philo TV wowed the NY Tech Meetup audience last week here in NYC. I've been testdriving it and love checking in while I'm watching TV. Tonite, Philo TV followers will be chatting about the latest Jersey Housewives show, not high brow cultural stuff, but enough to get some traction for this fascinating coach potato app. Kudos to Founder David Levy and his team.

LightSquared

Press Releases - LightSquared


I met Phil Falcone a few years back when I worked on a couple assignments for Harbinger Capital, which had become majority shareholder in Parmalat and was getting the message out to reporters covering Europe. The Italian press called him "Il Falcone", "the Falcon". Phil's lastest venture, a hugely ambitious wireless network called LightSquared, launched earlier today. Burson Marsteller is handling PR and has its hands full. Phil has to raise billions in debt to finance the project, and I believe, will likely prevail.

The Revenge of "Flogs"/ Four year Anniversary

AT&T Wireless PR (ATT_Wireless_PR) on Twitter


What's a Corporate PR Department's worst nightmare? A Twitter account that "fakes" your communications to the outside world. And, gets more attention than the "real" releases.

Ask AT&T's PR people. They are contending with a "fake" Twitter account that is making a laughing stock out of AT&T's PR Department and PR agency (probably Burson or H&K). Just today, NYT tech editor Damon Darlin lists the fake PR Twitter acct. as one of the "things he's following" right now, on a daily basis. Amazing endorsement from my favorite tech editor on the planet.

Edelman PR, the nation's largest Independent PR firm, started this mess a few years back with their infamous "flog" , fake blog for the Walmart account, a early desperate attempt by the PR industry to get its hands around Social Media. Ironically, four years later (almost to the day), we have the new order of "fake" communications, this time from the "other side" of the PR equation.

Papa John’s Recruits Facebook Fans to Create Next Pizza

Papa John’s Recruits Facebook Fans to Create Next Pizza

Can you crowdsource your next pizza recipe? My dad, Americo Bruni, owner-founder of Bruni's Pizzeria, the "king" of South Jersey pizza, would be appalled at the idea of leaving these decisions up to the customer, but times change even in the pizza business. Can't wait to show him the poll results. Pineapple with tofu and kimchi on pizza? Mama mia.

My Foursquare Day (and Night)

Foursquare made history yesterday and I was proud to be part of it. I was one of the several hundred thousand or so Foursquare users around the globe who gathered to celebrate this amazing mobile LBS service/social network/game, which is morphing into a media platform, the CNN of young techies here in New York City. Foursquare hit the 1 million member mark as well as yesterday, according to Mashable and Techcrunch. I experienced the power of Foursquare Nation at the Foursquare Party in Hotel on Rivington Penthouse and partied with co-founders Dennis Crowley and Naveen, both rock stars of the reborn Silicon Alley in NYC.

The 15 Biggest PR Disasters Of The Decade

The 15 Biggest PR Disasters Of The Decade

U.S. Wealthy Lack Loopholes to Offset Obama’s Taxes (Update1) - BusinessWeek

U.S. Wealthy Lack Loopholes to Offset Obama’s Taxes (Update1) - BusinessWeek

Tax Time is just around the corner. Deferred Comp is making a big comeback as a tax saving solution.
BRUNI PR placement for NIP-Retirement Capital Group, a leader in this space.

USA TODAY analysis: Many CEOs took a pay cut in 2009 - USATODAY.com

USA TODAY analysis: Many CEOs took a pay cut in 2009 - USATODAY.com

BRUNI PR placement in USA Today Report on CEO Pay

Nestle vs. Greenpeace: How Not to Handle a Social Media PR crisis

Have a break? from Greenpeace UK on Vimeo.

The Nestle vs. Greenpeace PR battle that erupted this week shows PR pros what not to do in Social Media PR crisis: censor. When this Greenpeace video criticizing Nestle gained traction this week, Nestle's PR folks decided to try to muscle YouTube into censoring the vid. and deleting comments about it. Not a smart PR strategy. The resulting furor has increased coverage of the battle.

2010 Microsoft BizSpark Accelerator at SXSW Finalists | SXSW.com

2010 Microsoft BizSpark Accelerator at SXSW Finalists | SXSW.com

NY startups featured at this year's SXSW BizSpark Competition :
AnyClip, Topguest , Knowem? , ChallengePost, Udorse

Toyota Turns To Twitter To Repair Its Image

Toyota Turns To Twitter To Repair Its Image

NYConvergence - A digest of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut digital media technology news: NY Tech Meetup Debuts New Monthly Feature

NYConvergence - A digest of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut digital media technology news: NY Tech Meetup Debuts New Monthly Feature

Suspended jail sentences for Google | Video | Reuters.com

A major PR headache in Europe for Google : Suspended jail sentences for Google | Video | Reuters.com

A $3.5 Billion Effort Aims to Help Tech Start-Ups - NYTimes.com

A $3.5 Billion Effort Aims to Help Tech Start-Ups - NYTimes.com Will Silicon Alley get Silicon Valley money?

I Pissed Off A PR Spammer Today/ a Tale of Caution From TechCrunch

I Pissed Off A PR Spammer Today

Tiger Woods Apology Boosts His Standing Online | Andrew LaVallee | Voices | AllThingsD

Tiger Woods Apology Boosts His Standing Online | Andrew LaVallee | Voices | AllThingsD

Milabra

The 1 trillion images on the Web are Advertising's Next Frontier.

Pairing images with targeted ads is the Holy Grail for Advertisers. The reason: consumers rely heavily on images in search engine result pages.

The age of Visual Ad Targeting is just around the corner.

Google recently announced plans to begin matching images from its fast-growing Google Image Search with display ads. Presently, Google photos are indexed by text and other metadata.

But, a NYC startup called Milabra beat Google to the punch last year by launching the world's first contextual ad network with targeting based upon visual content. And, it's getting a lot of attention from major ad networks and digital chiefs at big ad agencies.

Milabra (www.milabra.com) uses cutting edge visual recognition software to see what's important in an image, and targets advertising based on that data. Visual media publishers simply add the Milabra tag to their site, and Milabra automatically segments and moderate their content into advertiser friendly "buckets", increasing their inventory value and improving their performance.

Why is visual recognition ad targeting so effective?
It actually connects with the hard wired patterns of the human mind to create a more effective advertising experience. It's the language of pictures. By connecting to our primary sense, sight, it connects with consumers on a more fundamental level than other forms of targeting.

Milabra has signed up a slew of Ad networks since it launched over a year ago.

Most of the leading digital chiefs on Madison Avenue have met with Milabra and are looking under the hood of its technology, developed by a Columbia University neuroscientist.

TechCrunch wrote a glowing post back in February after the startup raised $1.2m in angel investments. No ad trade or mainstream media coverage to date. Milabra was the talk of AdTech last week and recently premiered to rave reviews at the NY Video Meetup and AlwaysOnMedia.

Outbrain's OutLoud: Earned Media Maximizer

One of the biggest problems in the PR field called Media Relations is that media placements, these days called "earned media", have a limited shelf life. Sure, a media placement such as an article in the New York Times can live on forever in Google News Search, but how do you maximize the longevity of a "PR hit" in the New York Times or Wall Street Journal.

Outbrain, an NYC startup that provides content recommendation technology to over 25,000 websites, has come up with an answer: "OutLoud". “OutLoud”, lets customers submit articles, blog posts or videos for only $10 a month and have them distributed in a scaled and targeted way. "Amplify your earned media and positive press, build an audience for your corporate blog, or bring new audiences to your own crafted content" says Outbrain, which will be featuring OutLoud at this week's AdTech event. BTW: Bruni PR is using OutLoud to blast a recent Financial Times placements on behalf of Beyond Media, a New Brunswick NJ based client.

What if retailers had a Digg-like social media game that predicts what they should sell for the Spring 2010 season?

Believe it or not, Limited Brands is spending substantial money right now on just that. It has hired a new NYC-based startup called StyleHop to conduct "predictive" research on what young female consumers will be buying next Spring.

StyleHop has been gathering results from a panel of 10,000 monthly "StyleHoppers"/ users and feeding the findings to Limited. StyleHop (www.stylehop.com) CEO David Reinke thinks that Limited and other clients, including Calvin Klein, are spearheading a "revolution" in the use of predictive behavior research.

E.Factor: the largest Entrepreneur Group on the Globe

E.Factor (www.efactor.com) is fast becoming the largest entrepreneur group on the planet, approaching 1 million members, according to VP-Marketing Stephanie Frasco. E.Factor branches are sprouting up around the world, especially in Europe and Southeast Asia.

Another first for E.Factor: the first even Health Insurance plan for entrepreneurs. E.Factor and Access Health are offering the three-tier plans (individual/couple/family) to members.

Livestream Launches Twitcam

Livestreaming finally comes to Twitter as Livestream, a NYC startup, launches Twitcam.

Cairo: the new Call Center Mecca | The News is NowPublic.com

Cairo: the new Call Center Mecca | The News is NowPublic.com

UpNext iPhone app

You can fly like Superman around buildings on the amazing new UpNext NYC iPhone app. Google might offer a great Streetview of Manhattan, but this young NYC startup has come up with something that's on, well, a higher level. As you zoom thru Manhattan you can tap a building to see what's inside or search for bars, restuarants, hotels, etc. In the Top 20 in the Travel section of the iPhone app store. It's worth more than the $2.99 fee.

Plagium

Plagiarism is a huge problem today. During the past several months, Science and Medical journals have been reporting an upsurge in academia and the research community. Even high schools are now using software to check term papers.

How do you check to see if your content, words, quotes or ideas are being ripped off? Septet Systems, a NY-based computer/software consulting firm, has come up with a solution: www.plagium.com. This cool little Google-like interface allows you to type in content and check across the Web to see if anyone is stealing your stuff.

Bruni PR will be pitching this to Publishers Weekly and other key trades in the publishing world as well as the mainstream media outlets.

Startups To Watch in 2009

Which Silicon Alley startups should we be watching in 2009?

Here's the official BRUNI PR list:

Mogulus
Boxee
AdaptiveBlue
SkyGrid
BuddyMedia
Esty
StyleHop
E.Factor
Innovid
Aviary
Urbis.com
Adarky
10Gen
Beyond Media
Blip.tv
Kaltura
AdMob

Boxee Raises $4 Million

quick intro to boxee from boxee on Vimeo.

One of the most talked about startups in NYC has proven that VC money is available even in a tough economy. Featured in Forbes.com several weeks ago (thanks to the efforts of Bruni PR), Boxee is an amazing media sharing platform that allows viewers to share and rate videos, music and photos. Fred Wilson, Union Square Ventures, one of the investors, calls it the "Firefox" of media browsing. This young startup first presented at NY Video Meetup and NY Tech Meetup just a few months back, and are now poised to partner with the media giants. Congrats to Avner Ronen and his team of young Israeli geeks.

Motrin Moms Campaign Implodes

Here's a great textbook example of how companies can misuse Social Media: the Motrin Moms campaign, which has raised a furor today on major blogs, including TechCrunch, Mashable and others. The "viral" ad pokes fun at mom who carry their babies, implying that they will need Motrin for the pain endured. The number of hateful parodies of this ad are cropping up faster than Obama friends on Facebook. The ad agency involved will likely kill the ad later today. Moreover, it's the number one topic on Twitter today, but not the kind of Twitter coverage any company would want.

Will Wall Street Crash burn Silicon Alley?

How will Silicon Alley (and Silicon Valley) fare in this new era of Fear and Loathing on Wall Street? Today, TechCrunch chimes in with a positive report:
So far the downward spiral of credit and financial markets seems to have left venture capital firms and startups relatively unharmed. Even though the IPO market closed completely in the second quarter (and opened again only slightly in the third), venture capital firms continue to raise money and invest in startups at a healthy pace. During the first half of the year, venture capital firms raised about $16 billion in 141 funds and invested about $15 billion in nearly 2,000 deals.

But, there are different views on the subject. Case in point: The Calacanis Nation enewsletter, put out by my old friend Jason, a real expert on crash and burn. (When his Silicon Alley Reporter featured the Alley Meltdown some years ago, he put a photo of the Hindenburg on the cover of his magazine, something I'll never forget as I watched my roster of Alley PR clients disappear virtually overnight).

Jason predicts that 80% of all startups (East and West Coast) will be out of business within the next year or so, as VC $ dries up. He cites three factors that kill startups: 1) bad idea, 2) bad execution 3) other outside reasons. Well, clearly, No. 3 is the big one to watch right now. A great startup can have the right idea, the right execution and still get ****** in today's business environment. Let's hope Arrington is right, and Jason is wrong. But, my bet is on my old Alley buddy, who saw boom and bust and boom again over the past years.

Reuters: It's Official, We are in a Bear Market

A News Alert just in from Reuters: The Bear Market is officially here.
What does it mean for Net startups? Time will tell.

New York City rules in Tech Jobs

According to a report released today from a tech industry trade group, New York and its surrounding metropolitan area leads the nation when it comes to the number of high-tech jobs. Rounding out the top five in order were Washington, D.C.; San Jose/Silicon Valley, Boston, and Dallas-Fort Worth.

New York had 316,500 high-tech jobs, while Silicon Valley had 225,300.

Trendrr: Obama beats McCain in Media Coverage

Who is winning the battle for media coverage?

Obama, without question. Check out this cool new graph from Trendrr, a service of hot NY startup Wiredset. This graph says it all. The media loves Obama.

TechSet Party NYC

The TechSet Party NYC at the Gansevoort Hotel was, without question, the highlight of Internet Week. Brian Solis, CEO of Future-Works, and Stephanie Agresta organized a fine party that was well attended by NY digerati, including Sarah Austin (Pop17), David Karp (Tumblr), the Mashable team (Pete Cashmore, Alana Taylor, Brett Petersel), Esther Dyson (angel investor), Caroline McCarthy (CNET), and others. Looking forward to more TechSet events here in NYC. These guys throw parties that remind me of the Josh Harris/Pseudo parties and Courtney Pulitizer get togethers in the Nineties Silicon Alley.

Internet Week: A Non-Event?

Ok, I guess it's obligatory to salute Internet Week. Kudos to Mayor Bloomberg for launching a "seed fund" for NY Internet companies this morning. Tomorrow nite, we're at the NY Tech Meetup, which showcases "the Top Internet Companies", and later, at the Web2NewYork/Center Networks "drinks4charity" (a good cause) party at Gallery Bar. On Friday,it's the Mashable Exhibit Hall party. I get to rub elbows with Cashmore and other luminaries. In between, there are a slew of events, ranging from the I Media panel, Net film shows, music performances and everything you can think of, some totally unrelated to the Internet or Silicon Alley. Go figure.

MashBash NYC Party

The MashBash NYC party at Webster Hall last Friday nite was one of the best Silicon Alley parties I've been to since the '90s. GrandMaster Flash performed for a VIP audience of several hundred. I hadn't seen Flash since '81 in the same venue, when it was called "The Ritz". Everybody was at this party, including Tumblr, Magnify, Kluster (which sponsored an open bar), DrawnbyPain (jeskid), Silicon Alley Reporter, Center Networks, Alley Insider, Diggnation, etc. (and Bruni PR, that's me in the Roma soccer cap).
Kudos to Adam Hirsch and his Mashable team.

Livestreaming the Italian Soccer Championship

The Italian soccer championship will be decided next Sunday. Inter and Roma are neck in neck for the "scudetto", with Inter having only a one point advantage in the Serie A ranking. What is certain is how livestreaming has changed the way Italians view and experience these games. There are approximately 20+ livestreaming tv channels on Mogulus that feature Italian soccer. If you miss the game or don't have a TV nearby, you can watch on your computer. Forza Roma!

Drawn By Pain/Webby Award

Drawn By Pain is one of the hottest web TV series to come out of Silicon Alley. We're all praying that Jesse Cowell and his jeskid production team wins the Webby Award for animation on Tuesday. Go for it Jes.

Crunchgear Party: Empressr Impressed

Empressr wowed the Crunchgear party in NYC on May 1st at Red Sky bar with the "first visual story and presentation Internet application". (I'm the guy in the beige cap) Here's how the folks at Empressr describe it --

"Empressr was developed by Fusebox, an award winning creative and technology firm that creates rich Internet applications (RIAs), and advertising and marketing programs for global 1000 companies. Empressr was developed in response to what we saw as the limitations of existing presentation applications. If streaming video and Flash are more dynamic ways to present important information, then why shouldn't everyone have access to this medium? So our creative and technology experts teamed up to develop a way for anyone to create rich media presentations, easily. The result is the first-of-its-kind visual story telling and presentation application that is revolutionizing the industry"

$ Pour into NY startups/PWC study

Good news from Price Waterhouse. The US economy might be in the toilet, but the bucks keep rolling into NY.

Sixty-six area companies received $526 million in venture funding during the quarter, according to a report released by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association. Funding was up 12% from the previous quarter and 35% from the same quarter a year ago.

Nationwide, venture capitalists invested $7.1 billion in 922 companies. Funding was down 8.5% from the fourth quarter and 5% from the same period a year ago.

Trendrr

Trendrr was the highlight of last week's NY Tech Meetup. It's Graphing meets Social Media. Read/Write/Web has a fine post/endorsement this week:

"Trendrr currently offers up data from 17 different data sets -- and the site is always adding more. These are things like: stock charts, YouTube video plays, MySpace friends, comments, or profile views, Amazon sales rank, Google News mentions, etc. Users can also input custom data via the site's RESTful API or by hand. Users are allowed to track up to 20 data sets at a time.

Once Trendrr is tracking your data, it can then be mashed up into comparison graph. Data can be left absolute or scaled relatively, and the site supports line, area, bar, and scatter graphs. These charts can then be embedded, linked to, or exported via excel, xml, or json. Trendrr can also export data via its new simple graph syndication API."

Does the PR industry have a future/Vizu poll

Opinion Polls & Market Research

Slikstr

Can you start a "fake" startup, raise VC money, hire employees and fool the business world. You bet. Matt Feldman, founder/CEO of neovids, wowed the NY Video 2.0 meetup last week with his Slikstr prank/gag. neovids has successfully produced a webisode series on Slikstr, a fake startup. Feldman "founded" the startup a few wks back with a blog, a business plan and an intro video on YouTube and Mogulus. Believe it or not, he has received requests from VCs offering investments, resumes from interested job applicants and even, real press coverage from blogs that were all hoodwinked by this young Net video company. I first saw the Slikstr gag at a recent Web2NY meetup and didn't realize it was fake until half way through his pitch. Even Edelman PR, the inventors of the infamous Walmart "flog" would blush at Slikstr's success.

Mashable NYC event

The Mashable NYC event on Friday at the Anchor Bar in Tribeca was jammed pack with Net moguls and for a change, lots of female geeks. You can count on Pete Cashmore and Adam Hirsch for bringing in the web gals, and they did. They also showcased some sexxy new startups: Kluster, Utterz, and Oovoo. Kluster, the star of the recent TED conference, unveiled their new crowdsourcing "idea generation" site where Kluster members can win "watts" and money for submitting great business advice and solutions. Utterz, a new mobile microblogging service enables you to post video, photos and chat from your mobile device. It was impressive. Check out the "utterz" they set up for the event, and you will see me. Oovoo, a videoconferencing site, also impressed.

Vizu: Beyond Clicks

How do you test online ads and go beyond just counting "clicks"?

A huge question that the ad industry and ad research biz are grappling with right now.

In just the past month, Nielsen, comScore (Mediametrix) and Compete have launched new online ad testing services that are supposed to solve the problem. Perhaps, they are reacting to a hot (and well financed) new entry into this market called Vizu.

Vizu, (www.vizu.com) a San Francisco-based online polling company, recently introduced
Ad Catalyst, an online ad testing service that goes beyond their competitors' static approach.
Ad Catalyst measures your online ads in real-time and breaks down your campaign's effectiveness by frequency of exposure, time period, creative unit, etc. and puts the info at your fingertips 24/7 (on a real "dashboard").

UpNext

Imagine a Virtual 3-D New York City where you can fly through like SuperMan and drop into any building and view its contents.

UpNext is a tiny 4-person NY startup developing extremely detailed 3D maps for the internet browser. UpNext (www.upnext.com) only maps Manhattan right now (they aim to map Boston and San Francisco by mid 2008), but it is "a powerful demonstration of how 3-D experiences could soon become more mainstream". (from TechCrunch). BRUNI PR is currently pitching UpNext.

Aviary strips Hillary Clinton

Aviary was the highlight of this week's New York Tech Meetup. This Flash-based artist tool is amazing and won rave reviews from a tough technologist audience. We'll be hearing more about Aviary in the future, no doubt

Business Week: CEOs lose Billions

The top five CEOs lost over $1 billion during the past several wks, thx to the stock market drop, according to a major Business Week story released today. David Leach, of Strategic Apex Group, a Bruni PR client, is quoted. Who pitched BW on the idea? The answer is Bruni PR. Reporter Ben Steverman does an outstanding job in analyzing the damage done.

Check out :
businessweek.com

Yes.com: Radio 2.0 and RSS

Yes.com, a radio playlist social media site, is racking up some nice traffic numbers these days. You can find the playlists of over 3,000 radio stations and chat about the songs as they are playing in realtime with other fans of that particular station. I've been testdriving Yes.com and find it impressive. Founder Daniel Goldscheider has big plans for Yes.com, and has been quietly adding RSS feeds to the site. You can chat about breaking news stories coming out of TechCrunch, GigaOM and other sites in real time.

NYers at the Crunchies

No one was surprised that Facebook, Digg, the iPhone, zoho, meebo and others won top awards at the Crunchies last nite. What surprised me was the presence of NY startups that competed for the awards. Tumblr, the multimedia micro-blog, and UpNext, the 3d search/social media site, Etsy, Viewdle and others were in the house and won praise/ attention. Kudos also to Mogulus, which powered the Crunchies TV livestreaming show.

Acid Jazz from Soundclick

Soundclick clicks w/ Web2NewYork Meetup

They've been around for over ten years, but don't get the attention that AmieStreet and other NY-based indy music downloads sites get these days. Soundclick was the highlight of a lively Web2NewYork Meetup last Tuesday nite at the Gallery Bar in the LES of NYC.
From their site:
"You will find well-known artists such as Janet Jackson, Sarah McLachlan, Moby, Gravediggaz, PM Dawn, Phil Collins, Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, Letters To Cleo. But the driving force are hundreds of thousands of great unsigned bands looking for their big break."
Soundclick has
more than 50,000 new songs approved each month. They are seeking more advertisers, and will surely find them. VCs and investors need not apply. Soundclick is fully funded and has been around long enough not to worry about burn rates.

Macworld draws record livestreaming audience

Macworld was a historic livestreaming milestone.

Sure, it wasn't "Super Bowl" network TV ratings, but about 6,000 people watched the Jobs speech live on five separate Mogulus TV channels.

The coverage of The Digital Lifestyle channel (http://www.mogulus.com/tdl), which had experts reporting live from a studio and getting real-time information from reporters on the ground, was a great success and received very positive feedback from viewers.
Mogulus is a Bruni PR client.

NY Startups To Watch in 2008

Which NY startups are worth watching in 2008?

Here's the Bruni PR list:




Kaltura -- innovative collaborative video editing

AmieStreet -- indy music site with unique pricing formula

GroundReport --- hot new citizen journalism TV website

Urbis.com -- literary/social media site eyed by major publishing houses

Blip.TV -- the hottest video on demand site around

Mogulus -- livestreaming on the Web (a Bruni PR client)

Clickable -- run your online ad campaign in a box

StreetEasy.com -- still the hottest Real Estate site in town (former client)

Wixi --- personal/social media search engine

Tumblr -- like Twitter but with video/music/media diaries

The Ladders -- leading job search startup

Animoto --- do it yourself music video creation

Etsy --- your place to buy/sell "all things handmade"

Future Scanners --- Digg with a predictions on the future

Snooth -- wine lovers' social media site

Unype --- 3d Virtual World

Electric Sheep --- the guys who build stuff for Second Life

Yuxt -- online video bookmarking

Motionbox -- online video bookmarking

KickApps --- user generated video

IMEEM --- what's on your playlist

BlockSavvy --- urban culture social media site funded by Damon Dash

AdItAll -- do it yourself tv ads

Magnify --- video community

Raketu --- VoIP service cheaper than Skype

MyBlueZebra --- click to call

Yes.com --- radio lovers' social media /rating site

RecordMyCall --- phone call recording Web service

LinkExperts -- organic search links consultants

JobThread --- job classifieds in a box

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.