Memestreamer Cyan got $7 million in funding for Zivity!

The site allows both amateur and professional models and photographers to show their stuff. Users vote on those that they like, which channel real dollars to the talent. The more votes, the more money. The basic site is free, but users must pay to vote. About 40% of gross revenue is given directly to the talent. With a recent redesign, the site is focused much more on social networking - users and talent have profile pages and can add each other as friends. They’ve even added a news feed feature that shows who is adding who as friends, and which models users have voted for.

Go Cyan!

Zivity Takes $7 Million In Venture Financing

Amazing. This is a short slideshow about Shenzhen, which includes photos of the biggest electronics components market in the world.

Made in China

It began as a covert guerrilla action that spread virally and eventually became a revolution.

What is it?

At most companies, going AWOL during daylight hours would be grounds for a pink slip. Not at Best Buy. The nation's leading electronics retailer has embarked on a radical -- if risky -- experiment to transform a culture once known for killer hours and herd-riding bosses. The endeavor, called ROWE, for "results-only work environment," seeks to demolish decades-old business dogma that equates physical presence with productivity. The goal at Best Buy is to judge performance on output instead of hours.

They are going to do this not only at corporate, but also at the retail outlets.

Every so often I see articles on changing work environments like this come up. I am very happy to see experiments like this happening in the corporate workplace.

Reading this made me think of the place where Decius and I worked "before all hell broke lose"... We both managed trans-continental teams. Our direct reports were in the states, but all the people we had to coordinate projects with were sprinkled across several Asian countries. Every country's management handled it's own staff, but we drove most project goals. It was all stress, frequent flier miles, and a clock that never stopped.

In the states, the engineering staff showed up around 10am-11am. We'd show up at the office, address any immediate concerns for a few hours, and do lunch. Lunch was a strategy session with food. Most of my average day in the states was working with the product development group. The phone conferences with the Asian offices started around 6:30pm. Getting out of the office was always hard, and we always aimed to get out around 9pm, because food became hard to come by in SF after 10pm. At that point, work quasi-resumed at home in the form of phone calls and poking at laptops. Decius had this worse than I did. His phone rang off the hook with technical problems overseas that couldn't wait. I tended to just sit on the couch poking out lists and responding to emails. The workday didn't really end, it just phased itself out slowly.

Overseas, my average day started at 8am. I'd roll out of bed, as my prearranged breakfast arrived, and start parsing in and hammering out emails. Almost all my collaboration with the US would happen before I left the hotel. Sometime around 10pm, I'd shower and head off to the office with the day's objectives lined out. The overseas offices shut off like a switch around 6pm. Completely different work culture. After 6pm, most of our time was spent with sales and professional services folks. Half social, half work. I'd get back to the hotel, late, and start on the morning email barrage for about an hour or two before passing out. I liked my wake-up period to be spent proof reading, eating, and hitting numerous send buttons.

In short, the vast... [ Read More (0.4k in body) ]

Smashing The Clock

Tabjab is a powerful way to keep track of the interpersonal debts that often arise between friends, roommates, and coworkers. You can use Tabjab to send out bills for dinner debts, bar tabs, rent, utilities, entertainment, or any other expense that people share. These bills are delivered via email, and they are easy to consolidate when it comes time to pay.

My roommate and I have been working on this website since late last year. We've been keeping it under wraps but we decided this weekend to formally make it available. When your friends or roommates owe you money you can input it into Tabjab. Tabjab will keep track of it, send emails out, and calculate reciprical debts. Check it out and let us know what you think!

Socially aware accounting tools. Miniature ventures. Group finance. Et cetera...

There are many ways of looking at a project like this, beyond the obvious. All of them have been given significant thought. All of them require far more action than we can current finance...

In any trade or craft, one reaches situations where they must ask: "Where do we go from here?"

In the age where commerce has met the network, the answer is very 2.0.

Ladies and gentlemen, we give you TabJab, and we request your comments...

My new project: TabJab

Contracts are being canceled, deals are drying up, prices are starting to drop. The psychology is shifting even as thousands of new homes and condos join the for-sale listings each day - so the downward pressure will only get worse.

Speculators who bought overpriced condos in hope of a quick killing are going to get hosed.

No one is going to be able to say they didn't see this coming.

Welcome to the dead zone

1) Profits are up, but the wages and the incomes of average Americans are down.
2) More and more people are deeper and deeper in debt.
3) Job creation has not kept up with population growth, and the employment rate has fallen sharply.
4) Poverty is on the rise.
5) Rising health care costs are eroding families' already declining income.

Short and to the point.

via the Economic Policy Institute.

What's wrong with the economy?

BEIJING (AP) -- China dropped its politically volatile policy of linking its currency to the U.S. dollar but retained controls on its exchange rate, switching the link to a basket of foreign currencies in a move that could push up the price of Chinese exports to the United States and Europe.

China dumps dollar in favor of basket of currencies

The News Corporation, making one of its largest bets on the Internet, announced today that it is paying $580 million in cash to acquire Intermix Media Inc., a Los Angeles-based company whose chief asset is MySpace.com, a Web site that is enjoying surging popularity with young audiences.

News Corporation to Acquire Intermix for $580 Million - New York Times

I am not worried about the rise of the cultural conservatives. I am worried about the disappearance of an internationalist, pro-American business elite.

C.E.O.'s, M.I.A.

] The Federal Communications Commission announced Friday
] that states cannot require regional phone companies to
] sell high-speed Internet service as a stand-alone
] product.

Voip development has been held back for a few years. This makes the market dull, which makes you poorer.

FCC: Phone companies don't have to sell DSL as a stand-alone product - 03/27/05