Mark 'Rizzn' Hopkins
Latest from Mark 'Rizzn' Hopkins
Twitter and Google: What Can Be Said that Hasn’t Been Said Already?
Late last night, Mike Arrington posted an anonymously double-sourced rumor that Google was in late stage talks to buy Twitter. The purchase price was said to be well north of the current quarter billion dollar valuation, and was updated twice with semi-confirmations and non-denials. More interestingly, Kara Swisher posted at Boomtown this morning a pretty ...
Could Microsoft Be the First to Conquer the Living Room?
Ars Technica has the eagle eye this evening. They noticed that “Microsoft recently published two job postings that hint at two separate and possible developments for the Zune platform,” including the notion that Zune will soon by released internationally and more interestingly, to me anyway, that Microsoft using using the portable media player as the ...
What Was the Point of Google Friend Connect Again?
Today, one of the most discussed items over at FriendFeed revolves around a question asked by FriendFeed founder and former Googler, Paul Buchheit. He asks something I’m beginning to wonder myself: “What does it mean to "join" a website with Google Friend Connect? After joining, the main difference seems to be the lack of a ...
Reckitt-Benckiser is Supporting the Indie Video Producers. Sort Of.
AdAge has an interesting piece today for online video producers, talking about the shift of advertising dollars from analog to digital video, primarily in the context of one ad firm’s pitch on their shift. The ad firm is Reckitt-Benckiser, and they say that 20% of their $475 million measured media budget has now shifted to ...
MySpace and Citysearch: Yelp Competitor or Yet Another Stab at Local?
MySpace and Citysearch, according to the screaming headlines over at Mashable and Techcrunch today, are teaming up to challenge Yelp with the creation of “MySpace Local.” This is one of those trademark MySpace moves that has a real potential to revive the usability of the site, but is simply just not a sexy move, one ...
Confirmed: Skype Changes the Game and Releases the iPhone App
Tonight, we receive confirmation from Skype that the story we reported on earlier last week is true. Skype has released an official app for the iPhone, available at the iPhone app store. The app will allow for calling and instant messaging, compatible with the iPhone 2.0’s as well as any Touch units that have a ...
Are Ad Agencies on Course to Become PR Agencies?
Technology has brought about a great deal of convergence in not just formerly disparate areas of technology, but also formerly disparate disciplines of art, science and business. The many interesting conversations I got a chance to be a party to at SxSWi this year showed me nothing else if not that. One of the first ...
Skype Coming to the iPhone?
Word is today that the iPhone will be playing host to a Skype app in the very near future. Om Malik ran a story this morning that indicates Skype could be announcing an iPhone app as soon as next Wednesday: A tipster — a very reliable one — tells me that Skype is almost ready ...
Twitter Affirms Paid Accounts Coming
According to a posting at Business Insider and the Wall Street Journal, paid “pro” accounts on Twitter are coming. “In exchange for a fee, companies will get "more features" on Twitter, the WSJ reports. Twitter cofounder Biz Stone tells the WSJ that the company recently hired a product manager to help develop those accounts, but ...
Is Facebook Really on the Rise?
I was perusing my feeds today, and settled on an article from Nick O’Neill from AllFacebook, wherein he painted a picture of Facebook as returning to vogue as a result of coverage it’s received lately from folks like Robert Scoble and Jesse Stay. Perhaps it’s just my inability to really get Facebook, or perhaps I’m ...
