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Nasdaq-listed online advertising and performance solutions provider LookSmart (LOOK) has appointed Mark Sanders as Chair of the Board.
Mark has served on the former Australian company’s board since 2003. He replaces Edward West, who is CEO and President, in a move aimed at beefing up the company’s corporate governance regime.
The San Francisco-based company’s shares were down 1.28%.
Tags: LookSmart
In this session of Metarand Unplugged, we talk with the CEO of Geneva based coComment, Matthew Colebourne.
As an aggregator of millions of comments across the web, Matt has a good understanding of how brands are beginning to grok that markets are conversations and that there is a huge opportunity to build deeper brand engagement through conversations.
Stream the mp3:
Stream the Session in Quicktime:
Tags: coComment, Matthew Colebourne
Playboy has dived head first into the social media arena, setting up partnerships with Break, Howcast, Metacafe, Veoh and YouTube.
The entertainment-lifestyle brand sees this move as a great way to leverage off of the success of “The Girls Next Door” and create the Playboy Audience Network.
Mixercast will also be developing ad-supported content and contest widgets for use on the network, which will move to short-form content franchises. This suite of marketing and interactive content widgets will be used to extend Playboy-branded experiences to social networks and also to blogs and start pages.
A talent search is currently underway on YouTube to find the 55th Anniversary Playmate.
Playboy is aiming to create more of the interactive engagement in their digital business that they’ve achieved through the high-touch world of parties, events, location-based entertainment venues, and retail stores.
Tags: Break Media, Howcast, Metacafe, Mixercast, Playboy, Social Media, social network, Veoh, Widgets, YouTube
Twitter has doubled in size over the past nine months. From one million total users to two million.
What’s really interesting, though, is that it has kept a steady number of active users over this time: 20%.
This is a really high DAU rate and points to a depth of engagement not found, for example on Facebook apps. Most apps on Facebook have a DAU in the 1-2% range [there are exceptions, of course, like the massively mulitplayer game Imperial Galaxy - DAUs have reached as high as 30%].
I’m sure both the rate of growth and the level of engagement are factoring heavily in the current financing round Twitter is going through.
My current favorite Twitter apps:
* Twhirl, an Adobe Air-based Twitter interface, recently acquired by Seesmic;
* Twinkle, an iPhone app that taps into other Twinkle users in a specified radius - great for swarming.
[via Techcrunch, disclosure: I am Chairman of Creative Enclave, the makers of Imperial Galaxy]
Tags: Twhirl, Twinkle, Twitter
Cox Enterprises has confirmed that it has acquired vertical online advertising network company, Adify Corp.
Adify provides Build Your Own Network technology, which empowers media companies to increase their reach and boost revenue. Backed by Venrock and US Venture Partners, this Silicon Valley company will become part of Cox TMI in a transaction expected to complete in May.
Cox is a leading player in the automotive media vertical, but has pledged to remain committed to serving the broader media industry through Adify.
Some sources are reporting that the deal is valued at $300 million.
Tags: Adify, Advertising Platform, Cox Enterprises, US Venture Partners, Venrock