Written on August 5, 2008 – 11:11 am Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
The press loves entrepreneurial kids. Every time a young kid pulls something special off, a newspaper is eager enough to give the lad an wide-spread page. The new press, bloggers et al, seem to have the same habit. Teenage entrepreneurs like Jessica Mah (who was a speaker at The Next Web Conference) and Zooomr founder Kristopher Tate have been receiving a fair amount of attention, partly thanks to their age. And now there’s a new kid on the block. His name? Daniel Brusilovsky. His age? 15 years.
Daniel has just launched Teens in Tech, a publication platform for kids who fancy new media, in private alpha mode. Basically, it’s a Wordpress multi-user installation with a fancy layer - really cool logo - and a forum.
Daniel Brusilovsky at Supernova
As TechCrunch’s Jason Kincaid notes, Daniel seems to know everybody. His board of advisers includes web influentials like Loic Le Meur, Robert Scoble (old enough to be Brusilovsky’s father) and some folks at TechCrunch and Apple. When we - meaning The Next Web team - visited the Valley in June, we met Daniel at Seemics’ HQ and Supernova.
Loic Le Meur told us he expects the young entrepreneur to create value by creating a community of young folks engaged in new media and tech and that is a great platform for companies (like Seesmic) to plug their service. The old marketing formula still works: teenagers have plenty of money to spend and they’re the future. A 1000 teenagers armed with webcams would be a welcome crowd to the Seesmic community.
Le Meur and others also know that young lads like Brusilovsky still attract enough media attention to create a hype. A young entrepreneur is just plain charming - so the group of web influentials happily welcome him in their circle of Internet fame and fortune.
I can’t respect this kid, or his company. As Luke said, its a complete joke. I have no intentions at even visiting Teens in Tech. Also, watch your acronym, people may think its a naughty site.
This post has also lowered the journalistic quality on TechCrunch.
Daniel Brusilwhatever has only been featured because of his connections. Shame on TC.
We experienced the same when we posted the announcement about Jessica Mah coming to Amsterdam:
She is 17, ok, and made high school with 15 years. 600 people read her blog, and dices will be thrown to see if someone will be talking about her in 2 years time. She is not a great speaker! (Drivingsouth)
Although some people support Mah and Brusilovsky - “I wish I was that productive back then”, the general opinion seems to be that the young entrepreneur must really have something special to offer. They get the attention, but then they have to prove they’re worth it. I’m sorry Brusilovsky, but the teenage charm factor isn’t here to stay.
I hope you like that post!
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Written on June 23, 2008 – 4:02 pm Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
TechCrunch broke the news today: Nokia has acquired Berlin-based Plazes for an undisclosed amount. The service - founded by Felix Petersen - allows its users to track the places, activities and people in their lives. Sounds like Twitter and Jaiku right? But it isn’t completely the same, as the location is Plazes core feature. You don’t have to mention you’re in Berlin, it shows up in a Google map. Updates can be send by SMS or a mobile app (soon also on the iPhone).
Felix Petersen
There’s one other important difference though, while Twitter is U.S.-based and Finnish Jaiku was sucked up by Google, Plazes however, will remain European. Their first financial backing came from European private equity firm Doughty Hanson, which invested €2.7 million. The second round of funding DOES have an American touch to it, as Plazes received €1 million in total from Marc Andreessen (US), Esther Dyson (US), and Martin Varsavsky (Argentina). But that’s all there is. Plazes will stay in Berlin and remain member of the European tech family. And that is good for Europe. Just so you know, Loic Le Meur feels the same about it.
So what will happen next? Most likely, Plazes will become a standard Nokia app - installed on all its phones. Here’s what Felix himself (or his ghost blogger) writes:
The team is very excited to be able to further develop the Plazes service that is online today together with Nokia. If all goes well, in the near future plazes will be made available to millions of Nokia customers both online and on millions of mobile devices.
I hope geo localization is ready for its big break-through.
Wanna know how the Plazes office and Felix’ home looks like? Check the MTV Cribs-like video we shot in January.
Written on June 18, 2008 – 8:57 pm Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
One of the last sessions at Supernova 2008 was about “liquid conversations” - the discussions flow away from their original source to services like Friendfeed and Facebook. Dave McClure (500 Hats) moderated the panel of David Sifry (Technorati), Bret Taylor (FriendFeed), Matt Colebourne (CoComment), and Loic Le Meur (Seesmic). I’m not sure McClure knew in advance that this would be not easy as he thought it would be. Here’s what happened.
Each panelist introduced himself and the service he was representing. After some regular introductions by Sifry, Taylor, Colebourne, it was up to Le Meur. He decided to pitch Seesmic by showing a video about the… infamous g-spot. The video was compiled of video replies by Seesmic users from ten different countries and a sex expert - the hilarious type. Here’s the video.
The video was welcomed with several rounds of laughing, although I did noticed some people were a bit shocked. Yes, that’s what happens when the French arrive. Some prejudices are actually based on something.
Valleywag reporter Melissa Gira - “Reporter, Bad Girl, Sex Nerd For Hire” - asked a good question about the video - after answering a question about g-spots. She wondered why Seesmic invites an expert to the video, when the service is all about the conversations of their users. Loic didn’t really give an answer, so I will: It’s a great marketing tool to turn the comments into a show and spice it up with a typical weird sex expert.
Now over to the liquid conversations
Enough for the sex part now, as McClure raised an interesting question about online conversations. They’re flowing away from their original source to places like Facebook, Friendfeed, and Twitter. Friendfeed users aren’t commenting on a New York Times article on the site itself, but express their opinion in Friendfeed. They find like-minded friends there, instead of the railing crowd at the New York Times page. The same thing happens with discussions on blogs - to the discontent of some bloggers. (more…)
Seesmic, the video conversation start-up by Loic Le Meur has just raised a cool 6 million dollars from an impressive list of investors. There are a lot of things I don’t understand about Seesmic but I am afraid to write about them because obviously I must be stupid. I mean, if Michael Arrington, Steve Case and Ron Conway all DO seem to get it, there can’t be any other explanation.
Can you imagine we will be chatting to each other in pre-recorded video messages? Do YOU use iChat video on a regular basis? Can you imagine using it in a Walkie Talkie kinda way where you talk first, then upload your message, then wait for someone to record their message which you then have to watch after which you can record a new message? Or maybe this whole video chatting this is just a cover for another business that we haven’t heard from yet?
No, it must be me. Or maybe these people just REALLY liked Loic and that is the reason why they invested 6 million. Either way, here is the press release:
Seesmic Raises $6 Million to Power the World’s Video Conversations
A-List investors are led by Niklas Zennström’s Atomico and include Steve Case, Ron Conway, Jeff Clavier, and Reid Hoffman
SAN FRANCISCO, CA - February 14, 2008 - Seesmic (www.seesmic.com), the highly anticipated new start-up from Loic Le Meur, today announced that it has raised $6 million from internationally renowned investors. The investment is lead by Atomico - an investment group founded by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis. The complete list of investors is:
Written on August 5, 2008 – 11:11 am
Written on February 13, 2008 – 11:08 pm
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