VentureBeat

July was slowest for IPOs in five years — A measly 56 companies went public last month, raising $5.6 billion. Pretty depressing, compared to last year’s figure of 190 companies and $31.7 billion. This month is expected to be similarly slow, with a pickup coming late in the year or early next.

From free to 3 cents for music in China — Chinese startup Wawawa has a great idea: Actually charging for music in China, where the notion of paying for pleasant sounds hasn’t quite taken root yet. At 3 cents per song, it might even get some takers. As a hook to draw in users, the site will offer music from less well-known artists.Dean: Strong consumer electronics results and demand in emerging markets continued to boost semiconductor sales, with June figures up 8% from a year ago.

New Facebook competition kicks off — The fbFund Developer Competition for Facebook applications has begun, giving 25 top developers and entrepreneurs a chance to win $25,000, with a $250,000 grand prize.

EA’s payout for Rupture half the reported amount — Shawn Fanning, the founder of Napster, finally hit paydirt when Electronic Arts recently acquired ThreeSF, a company he started that was the parent of social gaming network Rupture. But where initial reports suggested that the acquisition price was $30 million, it was actually only $15 million, according to an EA 10-Q dug up by Silicon Alley Insider.

Where Google’s IPO went wrong — Most will have by now forgotten the parade of mistakes that attended Google initial public offering, but Lisa Buyer, who managed the debut, peels off the scabs to show what went wrong in an interview with peHUB. “We came across as exceptionally arrogant,” she says, “and I understand why.”

All the things a VC needs — What kind of return does it take to satisfy a venture fund, and more importantly, its investors? At least three times the initial investment, according to Fred Wilson, but if you want more details you can read the rest here.

Tesla brings on former Ford exec as CFO — California’s Tesla Motors has been filling its ranks with transplants from the traditional automobile industry. Following the recent appointment of Mazda North American concept car developer Franz von Holzhausen as design director at the company, it has now hired Deepak Ahuja, most recently controller for Ford’s fuel-efficient vehicle program, as chief financial officer.

Loopt signs up with MetroPCS — Having already launched on most of the major cell carriers in the United States, location-based social networking app Loopt has added MetroPCS to its roster.

Judge should dismiss MySpace case, says EFF — A case brought against the mother who allegedly drove a teenage girl to suicide in Missouri should not be pursued, says the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which fears that a precedent would be set for prosecution of many more Internet users.

Here’s the latest action:

Sony opens to in-game ads — The company is about to announce support for ads in the PlayStation 3 video game console, and in-game advertising company IGA Worldwide will be the first to announce a deal, according to Forbes and other publications. As video games become both more lucrative and more expensive to make, this seems like an obvious revenue source, albeit one that may not be welcomed by all gamers. No word on which games will be the first to include ads, but I think there’s something weirdly appealing about the idea that billboard space in the Grand Theft Auto games could become the equivalent of a real billboard.

EA confirms acquisition of social gaming service Rupture — Game giant Electronic Arts has confirmed its acquisition of ThreeSF, the company behind Rupture. The service is the brainchild of Napster co-founder Shawn Fanning, and there have been rumors that EA had acquired ThreeSF for $30 million. EA did not release any details on the acquisition.

Music service Pandora now available as a desktop app — The startup, which delivers a personalized music stream to users, has built a desktop application using Adobe’s AIR platform. Pandora could already be streamed to mobile devices or home entertainment systems, but as far as computers go, this move is a big step because it moves Pandora out of the web browser. It’s not exactly a subtle application that runs in the background, but instead looks almost identical to the Pandora homepage. The company says this is necessary “for now” to display ads.

YouTube adds video annotation feature — Video creators can now add informative or snarky commentary in speech bubbles or other formats to the movies they upload. I would have included a sample video, but it looks like the annotation feature doesn’t support embedded videos yet. The feature is still in testing mode, and YouTube says full functionality will eventually include embedded videos and support for multiple languages. There don’t appear to be any plans to let viewers — rather than creators — add their own annotations.

SoCal Edison agrees to buy power from eSolar, a solar thermal company — The companies say the deal should result in the construction of 245 megawatts worth of concentrating solar towers in Southern California’s Antelope Valley by 2011.

The truth is revealed about Twitter’s constant downtime — The startup has been doing a lot of talking about the reasons behind its scaling problems, but Valleywag has an alternate explanation.

It was Hammer Time tonight at the Intel Capital dinner.

With some 600 start-up chief executives in the audience, entertainer MC Hammer offered ministerial advice (embrace technology, don’t forget community) for tech entrepreneurs from a “content guy’s” perspective. With references to “tweets” and rubbing shoulders with the tech elite at the D6 conference, the middle-aged rap artist showed he knew his technology.

He started by showcasing musicians from his own music label (including his talented daughter) and moved on to a demo of his latest start-up, DanceJam.com, where he is chief strategy officer. He closed with a rendition of his ’90s hit, “Too Legit to Quit;” joining him onstage were a couple of dozen audience members as backup dancers — including Intel CEO Paul Otellini. (We have the pictures to prove it).

Hammer (Stanley Kirk Burrell) started on the road to fame as a bat boy for the Oakland A’s baseball team. Slugger Reggie Jackson gave him the nickname “Hammer” because he thought the youngster resembled “Hammerin’ Hank Aaron.” Hammer said he was an entrepreneur from the start, selling tickets that the A’s players were allotted but didn’t use. Charley Finley, the legendary coach of the A’s, kept Hammer aboard as a child “executive vice president.” By the time Hammer was 14, Finley was asking Hammer to fire people.  He had the crowd laughing at that.

But he got serious for a moment, noting how Finley as a CEO managed to pull together the fractured community of Oakland — during a time of urban chaos and protests of the Vietnam War — with five championship wins.

“I would be less than I really am, if I stood before four or five hundred CEOs, and didn’t emphasize the point that each and every one of you, in our current, turbulent times, each one of you can change the environment,” he said. “We as CEOs are not irreplaceable. Why don’t we take our time to create not only great businesses, but make an impact on the lives of the people in our companies and bring some light into dark moments?”

He noted how Napster disrupted his own industry and mentioned how he met a despairing Shawn Fanning as Napster was going down the tubes. While riding around in Hammer’s Hummer, Hammer told the bright Napster founder that he probably had four or five companies in him. Fanning just sold another company, ThreeSF, to Electronic Arts for $30 million. (EA confirmed that today, but didn’t disclose the price).

“Don’t let them discourage you,” Hammer told him. “Hang in there. Even when I saw disruption coming, I embraced the man and the technology. Today, the music industry still doesn’t embrace technology. Just to use a song, you still need a seven-month licensing process.”

Hammer was looking a bit older than I remembered him while watching his smash “U Can’t Touch This” video in my youth. But his deep preacher’s voice was unmistakable. He left most of the dancing and singing to his own daughter and other rapping kids being groomed for the big time.

He noted how he considered every “artist as a start-up” at his Full Blast House music incubator, where he sees his job as applying filters to find talent. Those young artists are immediately matched with business development people who could start thinking about the brand at the beginning and move beyond CD sales.

“There are so many ways to monetize content,” he said.

One of those is to showcase the dancers and artists on his new site, DanceJam.com, founded a few months ago and funded by Softbank and Rustic Canyon Ventures. His site demo didn’t work. “Oh well, Hammer, welcome to the tech world,” he said, not skipping a beat.

But its point is to highlight young dancing talents, index their videos, allow viewers to rate them, and show dance competitions “dubbed battles.” Maybe it will catch on. Hammer reminded everyone that music is what made MySpace take off. He promised big partner announcements soon. At the same time, Hammer is starting an effort to get music and technology into the hands of troubled youth in Philadelphia to “keep them from killing each other.”

He closed with an encore performance, encouraged by Intel Capital President Arvind Sodhani, who did his own Hammer dance imitation. Hammer was inspiring and he brought the crowd to its feet. Don’t be surprised if a few of those 600 CEOs start busting some moves in the future.