News and Analysis
Through This Ourglass, Watching TV in Public Is More Fun
“Making TV smarter” has been the mantra for many a failed startup over the years. I won’t tell the sad tale of AOL TV, which I helped build content for. That said, Ourglass is approaching things a little differently: targeting TV out-of-home and looking to make public experiences with the tube more fun and useful.
Street Fight Daily: Uber Fires Self-Driving Car Architect, Google Tests Personalized Search
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Uber Fires Former Google Engineer at Heart of Self-Driving Dispute… Google Tests Personalized Search, Likely a Future Ad Targeting Weapon… How to Differentiate Among the Many Marketing Automation Companies…
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2011 Local Commerce M&A Saw Most Activity in Daily Deals
2011 was an intensely active year for the local marketing and commerce M&A market, with 186 transactions logged — up 40% from 2010. Many major companies that have local components to their business (led by Groupon, Google, LivingSocial and eBay) are making important strategic moves in the space to solidify their products…
Street Fight Daily: Glassmap and Privacy, Judging Highlight
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Why Highlight Wasn’t A Breakout Success At SXSW (TechCrunch)…
Glassmap’s Founders Get Clear About Online Privacy (GigaOm)…
Retailers Strike Back in Mobile Wars With … People (Ad Age)…
Placed Snags $3.4M in Funding To Bring Location Analytics to Developers
The location analytics startup emerged from a 13-month stealth period yesterday, announcing Series A funding as well the release of a new product for mobile app developers. Placed for Developers is a free SDK that enables developers of location-aware apps to analyze the real-world context in which their products are being used…
Loopt and Green Dot: A Storified View
What’s the future of location-based services? One path may be mobile commerce, where LBS platforms bring a key loyalty tool. That seems to be one explanation for the $43 million acquisition of LBS Loopt last week by banking company Green Dot, which is known mainly for its prepaid cards for retailers.
So how did it shake out in the Twitterverse, in blogs and general media? Here’s our Storified roundup:
PODCAST: This Week in Location-Based Marketing — INTRO, Wallit, Momentfeed
In this week’s video podcast from the Location Based Marketing Association, hosts Rob Woodbridge and Asif Khan look at location-based dating with Eskimi; INTRO’s bid to be a mobile business connector; Wallit’s virtual augmented walls and Instagram. Plus, special guest Rob Reed from Momentfeed.
Street Fight Daily: PayPal Here’s Squeeze on Square; Truth in Online Ad Numbers; Groupon Fines
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups: How PayPal Here Could Lay the Hurt on Square and Others (GigaOm)… What’s ‘Reality’ When Calculating Online Ad Numbers for Local TV & Radio? (BIA/Kelsey)… Groupon UK Told to Clean Up After Record Complaints (GigaOm)… AOL Snaps Up Hyperlocal Photosharing App Hipster (TechCrunch)… and more:
Do Datasphere’s 50M UVs Make It a Model for Hyperlocal Scale?
What Datasphere excels at is scaling, with superb technology — and, of course, finding that sweet spot between the aggregators and high-cost editorial operations. Is this the future of hyperlocal? The 50 million unique visitors to their TV stations’ community sites have provided a kind of answer…
Streets Ahead: Google Chat, and Instagram Reels