MashLogic pulls in $2.5M for page view-lengthening browser add-on
MashLogic, maker of a contextual browser add-on that pulls in text and images related to the web site you’re visiting and displays them in pop-up windows, has raised $2.5 million in a first round of funding — touting itself to publishers as a way to keep visitors on their pages for longer, upping ad revenue.
None of the Menlo Park, Calif. company’s investors were listed on the regulatory filing, but it took in $500,000 from Bessemer… Continue Reading
SourceForge acquires Ohloh to target ads at open source coders
SourceForge, the public company whose properties include code repository SourceForge.net and tech news site Slashdot, announced today that it’s acquiring Ohloh, a community and database for open source programmers. This is SourceForge’s first acquisition since 2000.
Bellevue, Wash.-based Ohloh says it has compiled the world’s largest directory of open source projects and coders (more than 300,000 each, gathered from 3,500 websites). Ohloh also ranks those coders based on the importance of their contributions to major open… Continue Reading
Bit.ly nabs cash, gives TinyURL a run for its money
At first glance, Bit.ly looks like every other URL shortening service — turning lengthy web addresses into something compact and easily-tweeted like http://bit.ly/11BCd2 — indistinguishable from the Short.tos and Doiops of the world. Of course, TinyURL, the first of its kind, remains the heavyweight, seemingly immune from its drop-in-the-bucket challengers. But with $2 million from several renowned investors, Bit.ly is now in a position to become a force on its own.
This first round of financing… Continue Reading
Tapulous wants to be leading application ecosystem for the iPhone
Tapulous, a new Silicon Valley startup, embodies the craze that’s going on right now around the iPhone.
Tucked inside a ground-floor office on Hamilton Ave. in Palo Alto, Calif., a stone’s throw from social network comany Facebook, the company’s eight employees are feverishly building applications solely to work on the iPhone.
Never mind that the Apple has sold a mere six million iPhones to date, compared to Nokia’s 400 million handsets. Tapulous’ chief executive Bart Decrem believes… Continue Reading
SocialMedia raises $3.5M to sell ads across social networks
SocialMedia, a company that lets small Facebook applications get exposure by bidding on ad links within Facebook popular applications, has just raised $3.5 million in financing.
Using the marketplace offered by SocialMedia, a Mill Valley, Calif., company, less popular Facebook applications bid to get ads placed on the pages of more popular Facebook application — thus, increasing their traffic. Advertising one application within another is an increasingly important way of getting Facebook users to try out… Continue Reading
Satisfaction, the Web 2.0 customer service site, raises $1.3M
[Disclosure: Satisfaction is led by Thor Muller, who is an advisor to VentureBeat. ]
Satisfaction, a San Francisco company that aims to improve online customer service by letting the customers effectively take over the process, has raised $1.3 million seed funding.
VentureBeat reviewed the company two months ago. Satisfaction creates customer support pages for companies and their products. But it goes beyond the standard customer support pages. It gives companies a way to provide answers — but… Continue Reading
Ariva launches a new style of VC firm: A federation of investors
Ajit Shah, former general partner at Worldview Technology Partners, has put together a different kind of firm to make seed-stage investments in start-ups.
Called Ariva, its model is like a federation of investors — that is, more formal than an angel alliance but less structured than a typical VC firm. The goal is to allow partners to spend more time working with entrepreneurs.
Word has been out since last year that Shah was raising the fund, but… Continue Reading
Y Combinator continued
Some readers took issue with VentureBeat’s recent assessment that Y Combinator had successfully “nailed” the start-up incubator model. There’s one particular critique we should address.
In return for its advice and money, Y Combinator does take its pound of flesh, in the form of six percent of a company’s stock, on average, which some people think is excessive. In our earlier, favorable assessment of Y Combinator, we were referring mainly to the vibrancy of the start-ups… Continue Reading
Kongregrate, the online social game hub
Updated
Kongregate, of San Francisco, launches tomorrow with a host of Web games targeted at young males with social networking components pushing new bounds.
Kongregate is signifiacant because it targets a group that until now hasn’t been served by online social games. Social gaming has been the domain of women, especially older women (served by companies like Club Pogo, owned by Electronics Arts). Young males searching social action games have had to download large software programs to… Continue Reading
Invasion of the mommy sites — Maya’s Mom launches with angel funding
updated
Maya’s Mom, a start-up based in a Palo Alto garage, has launched the latest site for parents to trade tips about how to care for their kids.
There are numerous other sites doing very similar things. Minti.com launched last year, and got $1.19M in venture capital earlier this year. It appears to have stolen an early lead, and has found all kinds of ways to integrate with other popular Internet sites. There’s Mommybuzz, which is… Continue Reading