Net

Mission: Total Freeze in Grand Central

Although I really didn't have time to go Jeff Pulver's Facebook party given my new job, new child and relocation errands, I'm glad that I stepped by. Letting your Facebook friends connect with each other over free drinks is definitely a great idea. Everyone was wearing stickers with their name, company and tagline. Anyway, I made some new acquaintances and had a chance to catch up with some old friends. Kudos to Jeff for inviting me and for the great idea.  I wonder if there are any other Facebook networking events like this around the world? (In the picture Jeff, me and Ouriel).

Yesterday Loic and I took our RunCast (or should I call it a FogCast?) to a new level: The Golden Gate RunCast featuring guests: Bill Tai, General Partner with Charles River Ventures (and on the Maxthon board) and Konstantin Othmer,CEO and founder of Coremobility. It was a great run on a bridge over troubled water and can bee seen as bridging the gab between Europe and the US ;)

Technorati Tags: billtai, goldengate, loiclemeur, coremobility, crv, storyboards

Since the feedback on my idea of using storyboards to develop business plans have been very positive, I decided to create a Facebook group dedicated to the topic. Enter Storyboarders. Drop your word-based business plans & burn those power points. Enter the storyboards! We are the storyboarders, creating conversations - not just presentations!  Feel free to join in & let's crowdsource it to the next level. Who knows, perhaps this group will give birth to a new business plan format better suited for humans including VCs?

Technorati Tags: businessplans, creativeprocess, crowdsourcing, Facebook, storyboards, tools

I had a really good time yesterday hanging out with fellow israeli entrepreneurs and VC's at Herzeliya beach yesterday evening. To my surprise was Om Malik and Andrew Barton (Rocketboom) who I recently spend a few days with at the CRV summit in Phoenix there too. Great vibes, beers and cigars. Networking Israeli style. This is how I really would arrange a conference - By the beach, informal, no stage, no power point,drinks, cigars and cool music. Kudos to my buddy Ouriel and Sagi, Orly and Eyal for arranging it all.

Technorati Tags: idrink, idrink06, Israel

I just love Skitch. I have 5 invites if you want one. Just one thing: it's Mac only.

Technorati Tags: Skitch

This is just awesome! Frets on Fire is a game about musical skill and fast fingers. The aim of the game is to play guitar with the keyboard as accurately as possible. It's an open-source project with hundreds of songs composed by the community and supports multi platform. In short it is open source guitar hero! How cool is that!

Features: 

• Unique inverted keyboard gameplay style
• Song editor  form making your own tunes
• Compete iwth others on the World Charts
• Supports importing Guitar Hero I-II songs
• Multiplatform
• Open source

Technorati Tags: fretsonfire, games, opensource, guitar hero, music

Last week I attended the First Virtual Goods Summit at Stanford University, organized by CRV's Susan Wu and Charles Hudson
and reported about it here. On the panel "Are virtual goods the next big business model?" I realized that I this really might be the case. 

Accel's, Kevin Efrussy who invested in Facebook, got a lot of question about Facebook's introduction of virtual gifts. Kevin said that if he who is a pretty boring non-cool person with pictures of his kids on his profile got gifts that people have paid $ for - then imagine what people (read attractive girls) who are cool & in receives! 

Susan Wu also reported that prior to the panel she got a virtual pizza thrown in here face by somebody she didn't even knew. And this person paid for that. How weird is that? Although virtual goods is extremely popular in Asia and a huge revenue generator the uptake in the US and Europe has been very slow. Enter Facbook. Min Kim from Nexon, added that Facebooks introduction of virtual goods is paving the way for a general acceptance of virtual goods outside of China, and in particular in the US. Judging from the popularity of virtual goods on Facebook - he just might be right.

But why on earth are people buying bikini's to their girlfriends avatar or virtual flowers that dies after two weeks?

According to Doppelganger's Tim Steven, its a real expression of affection, identity and emotion. People really feel just as proud wearing a pair of branded jeans in a virtual world as in real life walking across the school yard. It's the expression of the same thing. Moderating the panel Susan Wu, clearly stated that she would invest in a company selling virtual goods on Facebook! We have just got used to all the applications being launched on Facebook by companies hoping to gain distribution like a Trojan horse, now be prepared for the same companies getting ready to sell virtual bikinis, pizzas and why on iPhones to make some money too.

So are virtual goods the next big business model? Probably. If Habbo hotel make 90% of their revenues on virtual goods, they sell more furniture than IKEA and girls in Korea spends more money on their virtual haircut than on their real - there must be something in it...

Technorati Tags: Facebook, Nexon, vgsummit, virtual goods, virtual worlds

Here's a new episode of outsourcing my life. New experiment: To outsource the building of a new business. Comments welcome!

Technorati Tags: outsourcing timferris 4hourworkweek

I have been following the guys from Cooliris for a bit more than a year now and today they came to see me and demonstrated their new product: Piclens. Piclens delivers an immersive and full-screen experience for viewing photos on the Web. By downloading a browser plugin, you can search and browser images from Google, Flickr, Yahoo, Friendster and more in full-screen theater like mode. I think it really rocks and totally changes the way images can be experienced on the Web. Download Piclens here!

Technorati Tags: piclens

Here are some additional thoughts I have for the next Le Web 3.

1. Lifehacker competition
2. Virtual goods, world & economy panel/speakers
3. Bootstrapping - building the most effective and cheapest bootstrapping budget

Technorati Tags: bootstrapping, leweb3, lifehacking, Lifehacks, vgsummit2007, virtualworld

I am at the first Virtual Goods Summit taking place on Stanford Campus. Virtual worlds and good are really getting hot and here are some amazing facts:

• Tencent with the QQ IM brand in China has more than 254 unique million users & 28MM simultaneous users
• Neopets: 40 MM registered users and 750, 000 daily transactions
• Nexon: 3.5 MM registered users, virtual goods cost between $0.60-$1.00. People by functional & decorative items like a rainbow colored balloon to use in a game rather than that standard balloon because people don't want to be like all the others.
• Nexon users spend more money on virtual haircuts than on normal haircuts!
• Habbo Hotel sells more furniture than IKEA!

I am really happy that I decided to go here and skip the second day at Supernova. Virtual goods and worlds are going to be so huge - the fun has only got started.

Technorati Tags: Habbo Hotel, Neopets, Nexon, Virtual economy, Virtual worlds, puppy, puppy, QQ, Tencent, Vgsummit2007

I'm off to San Francisco (again) for a bunch of meetings and SuperNova 2007. I have a lot of interesting meetings lined up, amongst others: meetings with my two favorite platform providers: Facebook and the Twitter. I know most of my readers have lots of request for new features and improvements - dump them here and I'll make sure they reach the right people.

I will spend all Wednesday to Friday in San Francisco and will be in Palo Alto the rest of time (until 27th). I you wanna meet up please leave me a comment or just get in touch directly.

I will also try to post a daily video on Facebook so feel free to tune in from time to time. Also, don't forget to join The Maxthon Lovers group on Facebook. It's growing and would love to see you there as well. Oh, and don't forget to join the Le Web 3 group as well.

Maxthon also have a skin competition coming up soon for the 2.0 version with cool prices. If you want to create a cool skin and spread it to millions of users around the world and even have the chance to win the default position - please let me know. Start- ups and companies are also welcome!

Technorati Tags: Jaiku, Maxthon, leweb3, leweb3.1, Supernova2007, Twitter

I going to be at Super Nova 2007 and in the Bay area starting next week June 19-26. If you want to meet up please let me a comment alternative find my contact info on this blog.

Technorati Tags: Supernova, Supernova2007, Maxthon

Rodrigo Bressane, Maxthon fan, web developer and fantastic photographer from Brazil send me this little clip. Rodrigo tells me while he is driving back from work why he loves Maxthon. Rodrigo even shot the new Miss Brazil the other day (second place at the miss universe).

Some pictures of her on his Flickr: here, here and there.

Check out his site.

Technorati Tags: Maxthon, Miss Brazil, Rodrigo Bressane

In case you missed it yesterday. Here are the slides from Steve Jobs keynote on WWDC2007 courtesy of Guy Kawasaki.

Technorati Tags: Apple, WWDC2007

Here's the 3rd episode of Outsourcing my life. This time in RunCast formate. Very shaky but not stirred. Unfortunately the battery died halfway through in parallel with me reaching 90% of my heart capacity. Now I'm off to Rhodes and the greek island called Symi to focus and get things done. I'll be back with a new episode (GreekCast ?) later this week and some more thoughts about global entrepreneurship & ideas for Loic's Le Web 3.1.

Technorati Tags: Outsourcing, loiclemeur, netaneljacobsson, runcast, leweb3

This is becoming funnier and funnier. Loic just posted his RunCast with comments and and a new challenge to me as a follow-up from my previous Outsourcing My Life 2. Now I have been challenged to comment on Le Web 3 in RunCast format too! Don't worry. A RunCast with Outsourcing My Life 3 will come too now with comments on Le Web 3. And Loic, what about turning peoples VideoCast on Le Web 3 into an actual Advisory Cast Board? Stay tuned to the RunCast, SwimCast and PoolCast too.. Technorati Tags: loiclemeur , leweb3 , netanel , outsourcing, entrepreneurs, video

After my blog post followed by my video post on outsourcing my life. Loic responded in a brilliant way. He created a video comment on my video and challenged me to continue the conversation with him and our viewers via video. What a great idea!

As you can see from Loic's comment, he too  decided to join the outsourcing my life idea and I connected him with Brickwork as well. We're now both on the way on this experiment and I will update you all tomorrow via video on how it goes.

BTW, check out the great video/TV site vpod.tv - Loic's & my video is now on their front page. Stay tuned - another coming tomorrow.

Technorati Tags: Loic Le Meur, BrickworkIndia, vpodtv, outsourcing, India

I just checked my personal search history on Google and it's quite fascinating. I learned the following about my search habits that I didn't have any clue of:

1. I search mostly during January and November
2. I search mostly on Thursday followed by Wednesday
3. My search activity is at peak at 2pm

What are your search habits? A quick analysis of this seems to imply that I am search mostly during the winter months, my search activities are mostly intensive towards the end of the week (in Israel Thursday IS Friday) when I have got the most important stuff done and I have more free time. Finally, I my search activities reaches its peak a 2pm - that is after lunch when I am more relaxed and I am in a discovery mood.

Technorati Tags: Google, Search, puppy

With the advent of citizen journalism, blogging, twitters, youtubers and the overall fragmentation of news, traditional media is trying hard to find new ways or not being irrelevant. Here are 10 new uses for newspaper:

1. Deodorize food containers. Stuff a balled-up piece of newspaper into a lunch box or thermos, seal it, and let sit overnight.
2. Ripen tomatoes. Wrap them individually and leave them out at room temperature.
3. Pack delicate items. Wrap frames and figurines with several pieces of newspaper, then crumple the remaining sections to fill extra space in the box.
4. Wipe away tough streaks on glass. Use newspaper with cleaning fluid to clean mirrors and windows.
5. Preserve antique glass. Some older frames have finishes on the glass that can be damaged by cleaning solutions. Remove smudges by rubbing with newspaper dipped in a solution of one part white vinegar and one part warm water. Let air-dry.
6. Dry shoes. Place crumpled paper in them overnight.
7. Wrap gifts. Use the comics to wrap a child’s birthday gift, or try the wedding announcements for an engagement gift.
8. Create a home for slushy snow boots. During the winter, keep a pile of newspaper near the entryway. When your little snowmen and -women come home, they can toss their winter wear onto the newspaper instead of creating puddles on the floor.
9. Prepare a garden. In the fall, mow a patch of lawn to make room for a dedicated bed. Cover it with four layers of newspaper, then a four-inch layer of shredded leaves or bark mulch. Hose it down. Come spring, the compost blanket will have smothered the grass roots, and the bed will be primed for planting.
10. Keep the refrigerator vegetable drawer dry and free of smells. Line the bottom with newspaper.

Who said that newspapers are dead? The above proves that they can be really useful in daily life. Soon coming : 10 New users for TV and Radio.

The above 10 points were found here but in a totally different context...

Technorati Tags: Lifehacks, Media, New Media, Newspaper, 10 new uses, puppy, TV

Must say that I Iove this campaign for SanDisk’s Sansa. Very creative and funny and using Apple’s marketing trics against themselves to promote their own alternative.

Check out the mini-site called lilmonsta . Love the creative and copy. Came across this while searching for Maxthon users on MySpace.

In a world of streamlined smooth advertising, this  kind really sticks out and at least graps my attention.

Sansa - Me? I have 3 iPods and a MacBookPro, so I guess I am guilty of being an iPuppet too..

The guys at Plymedia just launched SubPLY. SubPLY allows anyone to create and add subtitles to any video from any site enabled by PLYmedia and post it anywhere they wish.  Disclaimer: I site on Plymedia's Advisory Board.

Technorati Tags: Plymedia, Subply, Video, Subtitles, YouTube, Metacafe,

There is nothing more stimulating than when you see passionate users creating their own stuff to promote their favorite products & services. This is true love. The Maxthon community is a perfect example for this. I digged through the Chinese Maxthon Forum and found a couple of cool banners with a unique twist.

I have no idea what they say yet (Chinese readers - help me out on these two ;) but I like them. And there are tons of them. I will digg some more and see if I can find some more interesting stuff.

Technorati Tags: Maxthon, user generated, marketing

After two full weeks on the road it's finally time to head home to Israel again. It has been two great weeks starting out in San Francisco and the Web 2.0 Expo, followed by five days in Palo Alto and finally the CRV Leadership summit at Royal Palms Resort & Spa in Phoenix.

I think I summed up my views on Web 2.0 Expo before so I won't comment on that here. It is always so great to be in California, I get so much stuff done and have time to meet and hang-out with interesting entrepreneurs, venture capitalist and other great people. Although I try to spend a week a month in California, I must say that this time has been the best so far.

One of the highlights was hanging out with the Plymedia gang on Shabbath (for whom I am an Advisor) and especially hiking at Tiburun with Ben Enosh. It was a great day and I felt that I really made a new great friend. I also had time to meet new interesting entrepreneurs like Nik from Omnidrive, Yahya from Freewebs and others.

The best event was however the Charles River Ventures Leadership Summit at the Royal Palms Spa & Resorts in Phoenix, Arizona. What a great place! I wish I had brought my wife..This was the first time in five years that CRV had invited all their CEO's and founders from their portfolio companies and top speakers from various industries.

Against the backdrop of the Camelback mountains the event was very well planned and with a great lineup. I am really glad I decided to stay another week just to participate here. Besides all the portfolio companies people like Chris Sacca (Google), Evan Williams (Twitter), Andrew Baron (Rocketboom), Scoble, Michael Arrington, Om Malik, Ted Leonsis, Nathan Myhrvold (Intellectual Ventures & frmr Microsoft CTO), Prof. Yared Diamond (Pulitzer winner and author of "Collapse"), Larry Summers (frmr US Treasury Secretary), Matt Jacobson (Facebook), David Eckoff (VP Turner) and many more.

I particularly enjoyed chatting with Evan Williams (Twitter rocks!), Chris Sacca, Om Malik, Matt Jacobson, David Eckoff, Andrew Baron and David Sachs (Geni). Man! Geni is so good. Its going to become so big. David is a fantastic entrepreneur.

The event was really top quality in terms of speakers and participants but best of all - intimate enough for having quality time with each other. There was also time for desert hiking (see photo above with me & Bill Tai making the "m" Maxthon sign) lots of cactuses and a feeling of being beamed to Indian and cowboy land. Will post a separate CactusCast that I shot on the hike later.

I definitely learned a lot, met new friends and was inspired. Lot's of stuff on my mind now, new potential partnerships and new business ideas. Time to head home to wife and kids - I really miss them!

Technorati Tags: CRV, Freewebs, Geni, Larry Summers, Maxthon, Nathan Myhrvold, Plymedia, Rockeboom, Royal Palms Spa & Resort, Ted Leonsis, Twitter, Web2expo, Yared Diamond

Technorati Tags: Sopranos, Marketing, Guerialla Marketing, Sopranos, Sopranos

I am going to be at the Web 2.0 Expo in SF all next week and I am going to bring with me two developers from Maxthon as well to the show. My schedule is jammed packed but if you would like to meet up April 15-22 at the show or on Thursday/Friday in Palo Alto - please let me know.

Technorati Tags: Web2.0expo, Maxthon

Talking about passionate users! Just got this in from Tony Gang, one of the new guys at Maxthon who posted this on the Maxthon Blog. This music video is made by LinQi and GuangChen ,students of Northwest Polytechnical University of China.

It's in Chinese but Tony have promised to supply one with English subtitles over the next couple of days. Since I know that I have many Chinese readers, why don't we run a competition? The one who sends me an English translation first, will get a U3 key with Maxthon :)

Love it! Keep sending me more.

Have you ever wanted to learn the 10 principles of Economics but been too stupid to ask? Or rather you have an MBA and still doesn't get it? The Standup Economist Yoram Bauman explains Mankiw's ten Principles of Economics as they are really are. Very funny! Ran into this clip on Michael Eisenbergs blog.

Faster than a Twitt, Maxthon super plugin developer Neo101, created this cool Twitter toolbar for Maxthon 2.0 The toolbar enables you to post to Twitter straight from Maxthon. Add me as your friend.


Technorati Tags: Twitter, Maxthon, Maxthon 2.0

Passover is getting closer and it's once more time to get ready for that Matzah. Here is a great and funny video on Matzah: What's Up With It? Or what about this one? Rapping the sea where Jono and G-fish sing a song of praise, using the timeless Jewish folk tradition of Rap Music (about the Exodus), or this one: The school of Gefilte fish?

Tags: Matzah Tags: Passover Tags: Pesach Tags: Jewish Tags: Chabad Tags: Gefilte Fish Tags: Torah Tags: Judaism Tags: Video Tags: Media

Here's a great video with Guy Kawasaki talking about The Art of the Start at TiECon, May 13, 2006. I read his book and I can warmly recommend it for any entrepreneur or entrepreneurs to be. Filled with a lot of truths, killing many illusions (probably based on learning a lot from his mistakes) about how to run a start-up. I met with Guy 1 1/2 year ago when he recently got into blogging. I remember how he told me that he really invests a lot of time and thinking behind every blogpost that he writes. You can definately see that. He loves the "10" points format which is reflected in many of his posts. This video is a nice summary of the book.

I stumbled upon Scribd the other day. And I am really impressed. Such a simple way to store and share documents and yet so powerful. Scribd is a free online library where anybody can upload .pdf, .doc, .ppt, .xis, .txt etc. It also has an embeddable PDF player that let's you view documents right away in your web browser.

What I also like is the Digg-like rating system and the detailed traffic analytics for each document. Other very useful information like: recently uploaded documents, most viewed and similar documents makes this service leaves other document-sharing services I have seen way behind.  You can also subscribe to other peoples documents via RSS which is very cool. If done right, Scribd could become the default destination for uploading and sharing everything from dissertations, papers, research reports, PR and marketing materials. The question is just how they will deal with all the garbage that people will start uploading..

If I would be Google, I would immediately incorporate the main ideas from Scribd into Google Documents.. it's really a no-brainer.

Technorati Tags: Pdf, Scribd, Sharing, doc, txt, pdf, Tools, Upload

The Funded , the recently launched resource for entrepreneurs (or gossip about VC's as some would call it), just posted a number of profiles on Israeli VC's. The judgments are quite hard with a few exceptions:

• Giza Venture Capital: Arrogant and untrustworthy
• Genesis Partners: They thing you work for them
• Walden Israel: This VC is asleep please do not disturb
• Apax Partners: If they invite you, it's to learn...not to invest
• Benchmark Israel Capital: Michael Eisenberg - One of the most sophisticated/manipulative/dangerous people in the industry
• Pitango Venture Capital: Large tanker VC - too large for Israel
• Evergreen Venture Partners: They were very impressed, and we are still waiting
• Jerusalem Global Ventures: Shlomo Kalish is/was the alpha male of this VC
• Fortissimo Capital: One of the few serious guys in the industry
• Carmel Ventures: An investment company that thinks it's a VC
• Zone Ventures: If you got extra time on your hands to burn
• Gemeni Israel Funds:Double face

It is not clear to me what parameters they use for passing judgement on the VC's, however I think initiatives like thefunded have an important role to play. If nothing more, at least for forcing some kind of transparency on the VC's. I have seen & heard too many bad stories from entrepreneurs raising capital so it's good that a rating site like this exist.

It is not very difficult to find venture capital now a days. What is difficult though, is to find a suitable VC. A friend of mine once compared partnering with a VC like a software bundle, you have to be careful of what comes with the bundle.. I would say its more like a Catholic marriage. It's is nearly impossible to get out once you are married...

I therefore recommend any entrepreneur to really examine carefully every potential investor beyond the money and the term-sheet, and question themselves if this really is a partner I can imagine to "live with"? Besides the cash, can they really add value? Scrutinize any potential VC like you would a bride to be and don't exchange rings before you are absolutely sure that this is going to be the "mother" you want for your baby ;).

It will be interesting to see once the list of Israeli VC's is complete who will take the lead.

I know some of the VC's above better than others. The only thing I can say is that I have heard the same about Giza from many different people. The other thing is that if your market is in the US - be very careful of who you are partnering with. I would go directly to a US VC rather than an Israeli.  The network and in-depth knowledge about the market is key to success (unless you already have the network and only need their money).

Technorati Tags: VC, Venture capital, The Funded, Giza Venture, Genesis Partners, Walden Israel, Apax Partners, Benchmark Capital, Pitango , Evergreen Venture Partners, Jerusalem Global Ventures, Fortissimo Capital, Carmer Ventures, Zone Ventures, Israel, Entrepreneurs

This is quite cool. By using the swarm plugin for Google Earth you can look up the BitTorrent client that is used by each peer, what percentage of the file they downloaded so far, and their exact location. The only thing is that now it only shows seeds for torrents that contain the word "Borat"... I guess that more useful words are on the way.

If this could track all p2p traffic in China - you wouldn't see any thing on the map except pins.. Via TorrentFreak.

Technorati Tags: BitTorrent, Borat, Google Earth, p2p, peer-to-peer, mp3, mashups, Swarm, Torrents, tracking

I told you and showed you about HiPiHi - China's Second Life. Hold the fort! Here comes Frenzoo - Second Life for teenage girls in Hong Kong..According to Brand Republic "Frenzoo, an Asia-centric 3D virtual world aimed at teenage girls, will soon come out of stealth mode to connect consumers in a Second Life-like experience.".Via Angus.

Technorati Tags: Frenzoo, HiPiHi, Virtual Worlds, Hong Kong, Second Life, SL

Pulver's Israeli Facebook Party

Although I really didn't have time to go Jeff Pulver's Facebook party given my new job, new child and relocation errands, I'm glad that I stepped by. Letting your Facebook friends connect with each other over free drinks is definitely a great idea. Everyone was wearing stickers with their name, company and tagline. Anyway, I made some new acquaintances and had a chance to catch up with some old friends. Kudos to Jeff for inviting me and for the great idea.  I wonder if there are any other Facebook networking events like this around the world? (In the picture Jeff, me and Ouriel).

Golden Gate RunCast with Guest's

Yesterday Loic and I took our RunCast (or should I call it a FogCast?) to a new level: The Golden Gate RunCast featuring guests: Bill Tai, General Partner with Charles River Ventures (and on the Maxthon board) and Konstantin Othmer,CEO and founder of Coremobility. It was a great run on a bridge over troubled water and can bee seen as bridging the gab between Europe and the US ;)

Technorati Tags: billtai, goldengate, loiclemeur, coremobility, crv, storyboards

Storyboarders - Now On Facebook

Since the feedback on my idea of using storyboards to develop business plans have been very positive, I decided to create a Facebook group dedicated to the topic. Enter Storyboarders. Drop your word-based business plans & burn those power points. Enter the storyboards! We are the storyboarders, creating conversations - not just presentations!  Feel free to join in & let's crowdsource it to the next level. Who knows, perhaps this group will give birth to a new business plan format better suited for humans including VCs?

Technorati Tags: businessplans, creativeprocess, crowdsourcing, Facebook, storyboards, tools

iDrink06 - The Comic

I had a really good time yesterday hanging out with fellow israeli entrepreneurs and VC's at Herzeliya beach yesterday evening. To my surprise was Om Malik and Andrew Barton (Rocketboom) who I recently spend a few days with at the CRV summit in Phoenix there too. Great vibes, beers and cigars. Networking Israeli style. This is how I really would arrange a conference - By the beach, informal, no stage, no power point,drinks, cigars and cool music. Kudos to my buddy Ouriel and Sagi, Orly and Eyal for arranging it all.

Technorati Tags: idrink, idrink06, Israel

Skitch - My New Favorite Snap-Draw & Share Application

I just love Skitch. I have 5 invites if you want one. Just one thing: it's Mac only.

Technorati Tags: Skitch

Frets On Fire - Open Source Guitar Hero

This is just awesome! Frets on Fire is a game about musical skill and fast fingers. The aim of the game is to play guitar with the keyboard as accurately as possible. It's an open-source project with hundreds of songs composed by the community and supports multi platform. In short it is open source guitar hero! How cool is that!

Features: 

• Unique inverted keyboard gameplay style
• Song editor  form making your own tunes
• Compete iwth others on the World Charts
• Supports importing Guitar Hero I-II songs
• Multiplatform
• Open source

Technorati Tags: fretsonfire, games, opensource, guitar hero, music

Are Virtual Goods the Next Big Business Model?

Last week I attended the First Virtual Goods Summit at Stanford University, organized by CRV's Susan Wu and Charles Hudson
and reported about it here. On the panel "Are virtual goods the next big business model?" I realized that I this really might be the case. 

Accel's, Kevin Efrussy who invested in Facebook, got a lot of question about Facebook's introduction of virtual gifts. Kevin said that if he who is a pretty boring non-cool person with pictures of his kids on his profile got gifts that people have paid $ for - then imagine what people (read attractive girls) who are cool & in receives! 

Susan Wu also reported that prior to the panel she got a virtual pizza thrown in here face by somebody she didn't even knew. And this person paid for that. How weird is that? Although virtual goods is extremely popular in Asia and a huge revenue generator the uptake in the US and Europe has been very slow. Enter Facbook. Min Kim from Nexon, added that Facebooks introduction of virtual goods is paving the way for a general acceptance of virtual goods outside of China, and in particular in the US. Judging from the popularity of virtual goods on Facebook - he just might be right.

But why on earth are people buying bikini's to their girlfriends avatar or virtual flowers that dies after two weeks?

According to Doppelganger's Tim Steven, its a real expression of affection, identity and emotion. People really feel just as proud wearing a pair of branded jeans in a virtual world as in real life walking across the school yard. It's the expression of the same thing. Moderating the panel Susan Wu, clearly stated that she would invest in a company selling virtual goods on Facebook! We have just got used to all the applications being launched on Facebook by companies hoping to gain distribution like a Trojan horse, now be prepared for the same companies getting ready to sell virtual bikinis, pizzas and why on iPhones to make some money too.

So are virtual goods the next big business model? Probably. If Habbo hotel make 90% of their revenues on virtual goods, they sell more furniture than IKEA and girls in Korea spends more money on their virtual haircut than on their real - there must be something in it...

Technorati Tags: Facebook, Nexon, vgsummit, virtual goods, virtual worlds

Outsourcing My Life # 5

Here's a new episode of outsourcing my life. New experiment: To outsource the building of a new business. Comments welcome!

Technorati Tags: outsourcing timferris 4hourworkweek

Piclens A Really Cool Way of Browsing Pictures

I have been following the guys from Cooliris for a bit more than a year now and today they came to see me and demonstrated their new product: Piclens. Piclens delivers an immersive and full-screen experience for viewing photos on the Web. By downloading a browser plugin, you can search and browser images from Google, Flickr, Yahoo, Friendster and more in full-screen theater like mode. I think it really rocks and totally changes the way images can be experienced on the Web. Download Piclens here!

Technorati Tags: piclens

Ideas for the Next Le Web 3

Here are some additional thoughts I have for the next Le Web 3.

1. Lifehacker competition
2. Virtual goods, world & economy panel/speakers
3. Bootstrapping - building the most effective and cheapest bootstrapping budget

Technorati Tags: bootstrapping, leweb3, lifehacking, Lifehacks, vgsummit2007, virtualworld

At the Virtual Goods Summit 2007

I am at the first Virtual Goods Summit taking place on Stanford Campus. Virtual worlds and good are really getting hot and here are some amazing facts:

• Tencent with the QQ IM brand in China has more than 254 unique million users & 28MM simultaneous users
• Neopets: 40 MM registered users and 750, 000 daily transactions
• Nexon: 3.5 MM registered users, virtual goods cost between $0.60-$1.00. People by functional & decorative items like a rainbow colored balloon to use in a game rather than that standard balloon because people don't want to be like all the others.
• Nexon users spend more money on virtual haircuts than on normal haircuts!
• Habbo Hotel sells more furniture than IKEA!

I am really happy that I decided to go here and skip the second day at Supernova. Virtual goods and worlds are going to be so huge - the fun has only got started.

Technorati Tags: Habbo Hotel, Neopets, Nexon, Virtual economy, Virtual worlds, puppy, puppy, QQ, Tencent, Vgsummit2007

Off to San Francisco & SuperNova 2007

I'm off to San Francisco (again) for a bunch of meetings and SuperNova 2007. I have a lot of interesting meetings lined up, amongst others: meetings with my two favorite platform providers: Facebook and the Twitter. I know most of my readers have lots of request for new features and improvements - dump them here and I'll make sure they reach the right people.

I will spend all Wednesday to Friday in San Francisco and will be in Palo Alto the rest of time (until 27th). I you wanna meet up please leave me a comment or just get in touch directly.

I will also try to post a daily video on Facebook so feel free to tune in from time to time. Also, don't forget to join The Maxthon Lovers group on Facebook. It's growing and would love to see you there as well. Oh, and don't forget to join the Le Web 3 group as well.

Maxthon also have a skin competition coming up soon for the 2.0 version with cool prices. If you want to create a cool skin and spread it to millions of users around the world and even have the chance to win the default position - please let me know. Start- ups and companies are also welcome!

Technorati Tags: Jaiku, Maxthon, leweb3, leweb3.1, Supernova2007, Twitter

Super Nova & San Francisco Next Week

I going to be at Super Nova 2007 and in the Bay area starting next week June 19-26. If you want to meet up please let me a comment alternative find my contact info on this blog.

Technorati Tags: Supernova, Supernova2007, Maxthon

Maxthon Fans: Rodrigo Bressane - Brazil

Rodrigo Bressane, Maxthon fan, web developer and fantastic photographer from Brazil send me this little clip. Rodrigo tells me while he is driving back from work why he loves Maxthon. Rodrigo even shot the new Miss Brazil the other day (second place at the miss universe).

Some pictures of her on his Flickr: here, here and there.

Check out his site.

Technorati Tags: Maxthon, Miss Brazil, Rodrigo Bressane

WWDC2007 Slides

In case you missed it yesterday. Here are the slides from Steve Jobs keynote on WWDC2007 courtesy of Guy Kawasaki.

Technorati Tags: Apple, WWDC2007

Outsourcing My Life Part 3 - The RunCast

Here's the 3rd episode of Outsourcing my life. This time in RunCast formate. Very shaky but not stirred. Unfortunately the battery died halfway through in parallel with me reaching 90% of my heart capacity. Now I'm off to Rhodes and the greek island called Symi to focus and get things done. I'll be back with a new episode (GreekCast ?) later this week and some more thoughts about global entrepreneurship & ideas for Loic's Le Web 3.1.

Technorati Tags: Outsourcing, loiclemeur, netaneljacobsson, runcast, leweb3

Outsourcing My Life 2 - Loic's RunCast Comments

This is becoming funnier and funnier. Loic just posted his RunCast with comments and and a new challenge to me as a follow-up from my previous Outsourcing My Life 2. Now I have been challenged to comment on Le Web 3 in RunCast format too! Don't worry. A RunCast with Outsourcing My Life 3 will come too now with comments on Le Web 3. And Loic, what about turning peoples VideoCast on Le Web 3 into an actual Advisory Cast Board? Stay tuned to the RunCast, SwimCast and PoolCast too.. Technorati Tags: loiclemeur , leweb3 , netanel , outsourcing, entrepreneurs, video

Outsourcing My life: Comments via Video By Loic Le Meur

After my blog post followed by my video post on outsourcing my life. Loic responded in a brilliant way. He created a video comment on my video and challenged me to continue the conversation with him and our viewers via video. What a great idea!

As you can see from Loic's comment, he too  decided to join the outsourcing my life idea and I connected him with Brickwork as well. We're now both on the way on this experiment and I will update you all tomorrow via video on how it goes.

BTW, check out the great video/TV site vpod.tv - Loic's & my video is now on their front page. Stay tuned - another coming tomorrow.

Technorati Tags: Loic Le Meur, BrickworkIndia, vpodtv, outsourcing, India

My Personal Google Search History

I just checked my personal search history on Google and it's quite fascinating. I learned the following about my search habits that I didn't have any clue of:

1. I search mostly during January and November
2. I search mostly on Thursday followed by Wednesday
3. My search activity is at peak at 2pm

What are your search habits? A quick analysis of this seems to imply that I am search mostly during the winter months, my search activities are mostly intensive towards the end of the week (in Israel Thursday IS Friday) when I have got the most important stuff done and I have more free time. Finally, I my search activities reaches its peak a 2pm - that is after lunch when I am more relaxed and I am in a discovery mood.

Technorati Tags: Google, Search, puppy

Traditional Media Dead? Not Yet - 10 New Uses For Newspaper

With the advent of citizen journalism, blogging, twitters, youtubers and the overall fragmentation of news, traditional media is trying hard to find new ways or not being irrelevant. Here are 10 new uses for newspaper:

1. Deodorize food containers. Stuff a balled-up piece of newspaper into a lunch box or thermos, seal it, and let sit overnight.
2. Ripen tomatoes. Wrap them individually and leave them out at room temperature.
3. Pack delicate items. Wrap frames and figurines with several pieces of newspaper, then crumple the remaining sections to fill extra space in the box.
4. Wipe away tough streaks on glass. Use newspaper with cleaning fluid to clean mirrors and windows.
5. Preserve antique glass. Some older frames have finishes on the glass that can be damaged by cleaning solutions. Remove smudges by rubbing with newspaper dipped in a solution of one part white vinegar and one part warm water. Let air-dry.
6. Dry shoes. Place crumpled paper in them overnight.
7. Wrap gifts. Use the comics to wrap a child’s birthday gift, or try the wedding announcements for an engagement gift.
8. Create a home for slushy snow boots. During the winter, keep a pile of newspaper near the entryway. When your little snowmen and -women come home, they can toss their winter wear onto the newspaper instead of creating puddles on the floor.
9. Prepare a garden. In the fall, mow a patch of lawn to make room for a dedicated bed. Cover it with four layers of newspaper, then a four-inch layer of shredded leaves or bark mulch. Hose it down. Come spring, the compost blanket will have smothered the grass roots, and the bed will be primed for planting.
10. Keep the refrigerator vegetable drawer dry and free of smells. Line the bottom with newspaper.

Who said that newspapers are dead? The above proves that they can be really useful in daily life. Soon coming : 10 New users for TV and Radio.

The above 10 points were found here but in a totally different context...

Technorati Tags: Lifehacks, Media, New Media, Newspaper, 10 new uses, puppy, TV

Have You Become an iPuppet?

Must say that I Iove this campaign for SanDisk’s Sansa. Very creative and funny and using Apple’s marketing trics against themselves to promote their own alternative.

Check out the mini-site called lilmonsta . Love the creative and copy. Came across this while searching for Maxthon users on MySpace.

In a world of streamlined smooth advertising, this  kind really sticks out and at least graps my attention.

Sansa - Me? I have 3 iPods and a MacBookPro, so I guess I am guilty of being an iPuppet too..

Create Your Own Subtitles To Any Video with SubPly

The guys at Plymedia just launched SubPLY. SubPLY allows anyone to create and add subtitles to any video from any site enabled by PLYmedia and post it anywhere they wish.  Disclaimer: I site on Plymedia's Advisory Board.

Technorati Tags: Plymedia, Subply, Video, Subtitles, YouTube, Metacafe,

User Generated Maxthon Promotions From China

There is nothing more stimulating than when you see passionate users creating their own stuff to promote their favorite products & services. This is true love. The Maxthon community is a perfect example for this. I digged through the Chinese Maxthon Forum and found a couple of cool banners with a unique twist.

I have no idea what they say yet (Chinese readers - help me out on these two ;) but I like them. And there are tons of them. I will digg some more and see if I can find some more interesting stuff.

Technorati Tags: Maxthon, user generated, marketing

Two great weeks in California & Phoenix

After two full weeks on the road it's finally time to head home to Israel again. It has been two great weeks starting out in San Francisco and the Web 2.0 Expo, followed by five days in Palo Alto and finally the CRV Leadership summit at Royal Palms Resort & Spa in Phoenix.

I think I summed up my views on Web 2.0 Expo before so I won't comment on that here. It is always so great to be in California, I get so much stuff done and have time to meet and hang-out with interesting entrepreneurs, venture capitalist and other great people. Although I try to spend a week a month in California, I must say that this time has been the best so far.

One of the highlights was hanging out with the Plymedia gang on Shabbath (for whom I am an Advisor) and especially hiking at Tiburun with Ben Enosh. It was a great day and I felt that I really made a new great friend. I also had time to meet new interesting entrepreneurs like Nik from Omnidrive, Yahya from Freewebs and others.

The best event was however the Charles River Ventures Leadership Summit at the Royal Palms Spa & Resorts in Phoenix, Arizona. What a great place! I wish I had brought my wife..This was the first time in five years that CRV had invited all their CEO's and founders from their portfolio companies and top speakers from various industries.

Against the backdrop of the Camelback mountains the event was very well planned and with a great lineup. I am really glad I decided to stay another week just to participate here. Besides all the portfolio companies people like Chris Sacca (Google), Evan Williams (Twitter), Andrew Baron (Rocketboom), Scoble, Michael Arrington, Om Malik, Ted Leonsis, Nathan Myhrvold (Intellectual Ventures & frmr Microsoft CTO), Prof. Yared Diamond (Pulitzer winner and author of "Collapse"), Larry Summers (frmr US Treasury Secretary), Matt Jacobson (Facebook), David Eckoff (VP Turner) and many more.

I particularly enjoyed chatting with Evan Williams (Twitter rocks!), Chris Sacca, Om Malik, Matt Jacobson, David Eckoff, Andrew Baron and David Sachs (Geni). Man! Geni is so good. Its going to become so big. David is a fantastic entrepreneur.

The event was really top quality in terms of speakers and participants but best of all - intimate enough for having quality time with each other. There was also time for desert hiking (see photo above with me & Bill Tai making the "m" Maxthon sign) lots of cactuses and a feeling of being beamed to Indian and cowboy land. Will post a separate CactusCast that I shot on the hike later.

I definitely learned a lot, met new friends and was inspired. Lot's of stuff on my mind now, new potential partnerships and new business ideas. Time to head home to wife and kids - I really miss them!

Technorati Tags: CRV, Freewebs, Geni, Larry Summers, Maxthon, Nathan Myhrvold, Plymedia, Rockeboom, Royal Palms Spa & Resort, Ted Leonsis, Twitter, Web2expo, Yared Diamond

Great Ideas For Guerilla Marketing

Technorati Tags: Sopranos, Marketing, Guerialla Marketing, Sopranos, Sopranos

Web 2.0 Expo Next Week

I am going to be at the Web 2.0 Expo in SF all next week and I am going to bring with me two developers from Maxthon as well to the show. My schedule is jammed packed but if you would like to meet up April 15-22 at the show or on Thursday/Friday in Palo Alto - please let me know.

Technorati Tags: Web2.0expo, Maxthon

Maxthon Music Video By Chinese Fans

Talking about passionate users! Just got this in from Tony Gang, one of the new guys at Maxthon who posted this on the Maxthon Blog. This music video is made by LinQi and GuangChen ,students of Northwest Polytechnical University of China.

It's in Chinese but Tony have promised to supply one with English subtitles over the next couple of days. Since I know that I have many Chinese readers, why don't we run a competition? The one who sends me an English translation first, will get a U3 key with Maxthon :)

Love it! Keep sending me more.

Standup Economist - The 10 Principles of Economics As they Really Are

Have you ever wanted to learn the 10 principles of Economics but been too stupid to ask? Or rather you have an MBA and still doesn't get it? The Standup Economist Yoram Bauman explains Mankiw's ten Principles of Economics as they are really are. Very funny! Ran into this clip on Michael Eisenbergs blog.

Twitter For Maxthon!

Faster than a Twitt, Maxthon super plugin developer Neo101, created this cool Twitter toolbar for Maxthon 2.0 The toolbar enables you to post to Twitter straight from Maxthon. Add me as your friend.


Technorati Tags: Twitter, Maxthon, Maxthon 2.0

Matzah: What's Up With It?

Passover is getting closer and it's once more time to get ready for that Matzah. Here is a great and funny video on Matzah: What's Up With It? Or what about this one? Rapping the sea where Jono and G-fish sing a song of praise, using the timeless Jewish folk tradition of Rap Music (about the Exodus), or this one: The school of Gefilte fish?

Tags: Matzah Tags: Passover Tags: Pesach Tags: Jewish Tags: Chabad Tags: Gefilte Fish Tags: Torah Tags: Judaism Tags: Video Tags: Media

Guy Kawasaki "The Art of the Start"

Here's a great video with Guy Kawasaki talking about The Art of the Start at TiECon, May 13, 2006. I read his book and I can warmly recommend it for any entrepreneur or entrepreneurs to be. Filled with a lot of truths, killing many illusions (probably based on learning a lot from his mistakes) about how to run a start-up. I met with Guy 1 1/2 year ago when he recently got into blogging. I remember how he told me that he really invests a lot of time and thinking behind every blogpost that he writes. You can definately see that. He loves the "10" points format which is reflected in many of his posts. This video is a nice summary of the book.

Scribd is Great

I stumbled upon Scribd the other day. And I am really impressed. Such a simple way to store and share documents and yet so powerful. Scribd is a free online library where anybody can upload .pdf, .doc, .ppt, .xis, .txt etc. It also has an embeddable PDF player that let's you view documents right away in your web browser.

What I also like is the Digg-like rating system and the detailed traffic analytics for each document. Other very useful information like: recently uploaded documents, most viewed and similar documents makes this service leaves other document-sharing services I have seen way behind.  You can also subscribe to other peoples documents via RSS which is very cool. If done right, Scribd could become the default destination for uploading and sharing everything from dissertations, papers, research reports, PR and marketing materials. The question is just how they will deal with all the garbage that people will start uploading..

If I would be Google, I would immediately incorporate the main ideas from Scribd into Google Documents.. it's really a no-brainer.

Technorati Tags: Pdf, Scribd, Sharing, doc, txt, pdf, Tools, Upload

The Truth About Israeli VC's?

The Funded , the recently launched resource for entrepreneurs (or gossip about VC's as some would call it), just posted a number of profiles on Israeli VC's. The judgments are quite hard with a few exceptions:

• Giza Venture Capital: Arrogant and untrustworthy
• Genesis Partners: They thing you work for them
• Walden Israel: This VC is asleep please do not disturb
• Apax Partners: If they invite you, it's to learn...not to invest
• Benchmark Israel Capital: Michael Eisenberg - One of the most sophisticated/manipulative/dangerous people in the industry
• Pitango Venture Capital: Large tanker VC - too large for Israel
• Evergreen Venture Partners: They were very impressed, and we are still waiting
• Jerusalem Global Ventures: Shlomo Kalish is/was the alpha male of this VC
• Fortissimo Capital: One of the few serious guys in the industry
• Carmel Ventures: An investment company that thinks it's a VC
• Zone Ventures: If you got extra time on your hands to burn
• Gemeni Israel Funds:Double face

It is not clear to me what parameters they use for passing judgement on the VC's, however I think initiatives like thefunded have an important role to play. If nothing more, at least for forcing some kind of transparency on the VC's. I have seen & heard too many bad stories from entrepreneurs raising capital so it's good that a rating site like this exist.

It is not very difficult to find venture capital now a days. What is difficult though, is to find a suitable VC. A friend of mine once compared partnering with a VC like a software bundle, you have to be careful of what comes with the bundle.. I would say its more like a Catholic marriage. It's is nearly impossible to get out once you are married...

I therefore recommend any entrepreneur to really examine carefully every potential investor beyond the money and the term-sheet, and question themselves if this really is a partner I can imagine to "live with"? Besides the cash, can they really add value? Scrutinize any potential VC like you would a bride to be and don't exchange rings before you are absolutely sure that this is going to be the "mother" you want for your baby ;).

It will be interesting to see once the list of Israeli VC's is complete who will take the lead.

I know some of the VC's above better than others. The only thing I can say is that I have heard the same about Giza from many different people. The other thing is that if your market is in the US - be very careful of who you are partnering with. I would go directly to a US VC rather than an Israeli.  The network and in-depth knowledge about the market is key to success (unless you already have the network and only need their money).

Technorati Tags: VC, Venture capital, The Funded, Giza Venture, Genesis Partners, Walden Israel, Apax Partners, Benchmark Capital, Pitango , Evergreen Venture Partners, Jerusalem Global Ventures, Fortissimo Capital, Carmer Ventures, Zone Ventures, Israel, Entrepreneurs

Track BitTorrent Swarm in Google Earth

This is quite cool. By using the swarm plugin for Google Earth you can look up the BitTorrent client that is used by each peer, what percentage of the file they downloaded so far, and their exact location. The only thing is that now it only shows seeds for torrents that contain the word "Borat"... I guess that more useful words are on the way.

If this could track all p2p traffic in China - you wouldn't see any thing on the map except pins.. Via TorrentFreak.

Technorati Tags: BitTorrent, Borat, Google Earth, p2p, peer-to-peer, mp3, mashups, Swarm, Torrents, tracking

Frenzoo- Second Life in Hong Kong

I told you and showed you about HiPiHi - China's Second Life. Hold the fort! Here comes Frenzoo - Second Life for teenage girls in Hong Kong..According to Brand Republic "Frenzoo, an Asia-centric 3D virtual world aimed at teenage girls, will soon come out of stealth mode to connect consumers in a Second Life-like experience.".Via Angus.

Technorati Tags: Frenzoo, HiPiHi, Virtual Worlds, Hong Kong, Second Life, SL

Jerusalem - The Open Source City?