EBay just reported its earnings, and while rest of the data doesn’t intrigue me as much, the Skype data is pretty telling. In the 78 days eBay has owned Skype, the company did sales of $24.8 million. No mention of profits in the press release, but they do point out that nearly 87% of the total sales are from outside of the US. At $24.8 million over seventy eight days, it works out to about $116 million, a shade ahead of $100 million annual run-rate they hoped for when the SkyeBay deal was announced. Continue »
Archive for January, 2006
Google: No Paying The Net Fathers
Alert: Paul Kapustka, the reporter on the story says that this response from Google came as a result of his queries about Verizon CEO’s statements at the CES, and not the recent BellSouth comments. Continue »
Windows Mobile Devices Come to T-Mobile
The T-Mobile SDA and MDA will be available via pre-registration on the T-Mobile website starting this Friday (1/20). The T-Mobile SDA will retail for $299 and the MDA will retail for $399. Add to the mix the brand new Opera for Pocket PC, and you might not have Treo 700 envy. Continue »
Yahoo, Google & Web 2.0 Reality Check
Not such a good day for Yahoo and other search engine stocks. Yahoo’s modest financial performance in the fourth quarter of 2005 prompted a quick sell-off, and already the second largest search engine is down 10% for the day. Suddenly there is growing anxiety about Google and the whole “internet advertising thing.” Some analysts have already started the bear talk on Google. There is belief that Yahoo’s weaker than expected earnings are prompting a sentiment shift on the search stocks - from positive to less than positive. Canary in the mine, as per Joseph Weisenthal stock options and their cost, Continue »
First ADSL2+, Then Fiber
It is an irony of sorts - France, long the bastion of socialist styled capitalism - is behaving like a free market economy. Okay that is a stretch, but when it comes to broadband it really is. In the US, when cities announce plans for munibroadband, the incumbents big and small respond with crocodile tears and a lobbying effort that could put a Republican Presidential Campaign to shame. In France when the populist mayors, and presidents trumpet “the broadband for all” mantra, the private sector responds with more aggressive rollouts, bigger, faster networks. (Okay people I am oversimplifying, but forgive me for my NyQuill-addled brain is in an underperforming mode right now.) Continue »
Skylook, Cupid for Skype & Outlook
Skype 2.0’s default integration with Outlook always reminds of that mismatched romance called Bennifer. Perhaps that is why I appreciate the latest version of Skylook. Though still in beta, v1.5 has an answering machine built into Outlook that places recorded messages in the user’s inbox without requiring a Skype Voice Mail subscription. The ability to convert Skype Voice Mails to MP3 and archive inside Outlook. Best part - you can show up to ten on-line Skype contacts in the Outlook toolbar. Continue »
Dutch Want Their Video Phones
Updated: I had completely botched this post, but thanks to some eagle eyed readers, I have fixed it. The study actually had nothing to do with the CityNet project, and in fact is part of another project that looked at various different broadband applications. I apologize for the incorrect information that came your way. Continue »
When is Alpha A Beta?
PC Pro writes , “An alpha version of Firefox 2.0 should be released as a public beta next month. ” You know what they mean? (via) Continue »
Google Talk Federates
The much awaited Google Talk federation is live. Gary Burd, the software engineer who works on GTalk writes over on the Google Talk Blog: Continue »
BellSouth to Internet: Show Me The Money
Update: Jeff Pulver has advice for Eric Schmidt, Google CEO. Turn Off Bell South and writes, “Welcome to the game of Internet Chicken and the race to mutually assured destruction. Who will flinch first before it is too late?” Pulver is even more disappointed with Mark Cuban’s stance on network neutrality. Continue »
