The trip log that I liked best is MileBug from Izatt International. This is a nice little app that does a good job of making the process relatively painless. The biggest obstacle to using any app like this is the time required to enter the details for your trip. The simplest measure would be, “Does it take more or less time than it would to write it down on paper?” I think MileBug passes this critical litmus test.

You can track odometer readings for the start and end of each trip, and you can do so for multiple vehicles. MileBug lets you track trips by Business, Destination, and Purpose and set presets for each of those items for quick entry. You can setup reimbursement rates for each business if you need to track rates for the standard federal tax deduction for some trips and a corporate reimbursement that may have another rate for other trips. MileBug will automatically start the next trip from the last known odometer reading to save a little time. I appreciate how the odometer dials roll over, instead of just running from 0 to 9 like in some other apps. It makes it a little simpler to update your mileage when you roll past 9 on one or more of the digits.

To get the data out of MileBug, you can email reports. This sends a table of text with a summary and detailed entries. The email feature integrates with the built-in Mail app on the iPhone which makes it easy to use your address book to make that process easy too.

There are a couple of things that I think could stand improving. Adding a new destination always adds that new entry to your preset list which could become quite long. I chose to use generic entries like “client”, “HQ” and “home” for destinations and used purpose to denote if it was billable or not. Because I wasn’t entering the individual destinations, I just put the details in the “notes” field. There’s also no way to import data back into MileBug if you were to lose it, in say an app update gone bad, or after restoring your iPhone without a backup. I can live without the import, but I have to remember to email the reports regularly.

If you need more detailed records, you might look into Trip Cubby which offers some additional options, but at a much higher price. I particularly like that you can use a keypad to enter odometer readings in Trip Cubby instead of spinning little dials. Still, I prefer MileBug for its simplicity and it works perfectly for my needs.

MileBug is available in the iTunes App Store. The app is priced at $2.99 for a limited time.

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Yesterday Chris and I visited Justine Bateman and her three partners at FM78.tv, a new production company focused exclusively on making content for the web. Armed with revolutionary fever and Bateman’s idea for a show about a family candy company, FM78.tv is currently working to make a top-notch, union-compliant, big-budget television show that’s TV quality but doesn’t live on TV.

The actress, Bateman, most recently of Desperate Housewives but most memorably of Family Ties, is the ringleader of a group that also includes writer and producer Jill Kushner (The Ellen DeGeneres Show), Peter Murrieta (Wizards of Waverly Place) and Alan Sereboff (Snowblind). The four met on the picket line during the recent writers’ strike and developed the Speechless pro-writer online video campaign.

FM78 wants to make one show and do it well. In contrast, Strike.TV, which originated from the same writers’ strike, is aggregating some 45 shows — in many cases only a pilot — with the thought that, because of the established talent creating the shows an audience will find them on the Internet and they will somehow succeed, either in niche or mainstream fashion (see our interview with Strike.TV, also from yesterday). The four founders of FM78, however, explicitly reject the notion that the web is a farm team for TV, and hope to very soon have FM78 be their only job.

From FM78′s manifesto:

At FM78.tv we also recognize that ALL TV and Film distribution will be through the Internet exclusively in short order. We therefore see no sense in wasting time before getting high-quality, professional content online. We have seen user content and we have seen professionals doing user content, but we are focused on bringing the high level of professional entertainment we have been doing our entire careers straight to the Net.

What the two writer-led companies have in common is the overwhelming desire to rid themselves of “notes” from the network executives who traditionally get a say in the creative process. It’s a common theme here in L.A. and pretty much all anyone can talk about.

We met FM78 at Murrieta’s office in Hollywood yesterday and shot the above video of Bateman, Kushner, Murrieta and Sereboff explaining their project and their upcoming show, Candy Inc, which will feature Bateman, Jeff Garlin, Doug Stanhope and more and will be directed by Steve Pink. They’re also working with the folks behind You Suck at Photoshop for viral promotion. Provided FM78 can finance the series through sponsorship, it is to be released in 18 parts early next year.

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New Research Looks at Online Video “Super Sharers;” Sharpe Partners reports that 75 percent of super sharers find ways to skip ads, and video isn’t about creative expression as much as it’s about sharing real life experiences. (MarketWatch)

CNET Gets a Redesign; videos are now embeddable!

MyToons Partners with Vuze; animation community to provide vintage animation channel for the BitTorrent video network. (release)

I-Rights to Distribute Do You Believe Me?; new online series from producers of Sofia’s Diary is about a 17-year old girl with recurring nightmares. (C21Media)

Nielsen: 114.5 Million TV Households for 2008 – 2009 Season; increase of 1.5 percent over last year. (release)

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Verizon Wireless added 1.9 million net customers in the third quarter 2006, up 15.1% from the third quarter 2005, and now the company has a total of 56.7 million customers of which 54.6 million retail (non-wholesale) customers. The revenues for the wireless business were up 18.2% from third quarter 2005.

Broadband is where the company showed better than expected results. Analysts expected Verizon to add about 130,000 FiOS customers, the company added about 147,000 in the third quarter. Some analysts expected 55,000 video customers, VZ added 63,000.

The total broadband net additions however were softwareer than what analysts had expected: 448,000 versus 500,000+ forecast. Another proof that the DSL market is seriously slowing down. All these gains were not enough to offset the problems in traditional voice and other businesses. Wireline revenues were down 4.7% for the quarter.

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The company has been in business since 2004, and is finally getting ready to announce its first beta, perhaps as early as the first week of November. On Monday, October 30th, the company is going to announce that it has received a $5.5 million in Series A financing from Menlo Ventures.

We met with Jeff Black, the chief executive and the founder of the company over the weekend, and he gave us a demo of the service, which is essentially a “virtual number” on your mobile phone. The service needs a tiny application that is downloaded onto your phone and becomes your virtual mobile number, which can make and receive phone calls.

Here is how it works: the service gives you a TalkPlus number that you can pass around freely. The service connects to a TalkPlus server over the data network, and allows you to authenticate your number. All out bound calls from your phone can be made via any of the two phone numbers you have – your cell phone, or this virtual number.

Outbound and inbound calls use the voice channel, and connect to the PSTN network. There is no voice quality degradation, typically a problem with mobile VoIP offerings. Those who are receiving your call can only see your virtual phone ID.

When they want to return your phone call, they can hit call and the call is returned to the virtual number. When they hit send, the call is then routed to the TalkPlus softswitch and then onto your mobile phone. The original cell phone number can stay anonymous, if you so desire, a feature that can come in handy if you are looking for love online or in the bars.

No surprise, TalkPlus is about to hook-up with one of the top five dating sites on the Internet. The service will be free while in beta, but will cost about $10 a month and will come with a slew of features. TalkPlus will share the revenues with its partners, Black told us.

The new service has shades of Jangl, Grand Central, iotum, and several other Voice 2.0 companies. We find the concept intriguing, and once we get our hands on the beta software (which currently runs on most regular phones, but not smart phones,) we will bring you a review. We will look at their business model at that point as well.

What we do love about the service – ability to add a second phone number to your mobile phone. A few European carriers tried to do that with dual SIMs, but to have a work and personal number on the same handset – that alone is a reason to check out TalkPlus.

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While in France, Neuf Cegetel, the third largest broadband provider in France behind France Telecom and Free went public last week, with stock showing continued strength. The company is valued at around five billion euros. The company has also acquired AOL’s access business in France.

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The news announcement also brought to the forefront issues Skype has had with its mobile clients, or lack there of. Despite promising a Symbian client for a while, the company is yet to deliver on its promises. We know that there are issues that need to be resolved before mobile Skype clients become common place.

Of course, Nitzan Shaer who won’t be losing sleep over it. Skype’s Director of Mobile Devices has left the company for parts unknown. He is the latest pre-eBay Skyper to get out of dodge. Stephanie Bouchet, who used to handle marketing at Skype is gone as well. About a dozen original Skypers have left the company. Looks like eBay-ification of Skype is happening much faster than we originally thought. It would be interesting to see how this shakes out.

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1. Zillow is falsely representing to the public that its on-line valuations are within ten percent of the home
   selling price.
2. Zillow has a less than 30 % accuracy rate when offering the valuations for public consumption.
3. Zillow.com’s over and under valuations are causing substantial injury to consumers nationwide when they consider selling their home, using their home equity or buying or refinancing property.

I think the crux of the problem is this point from the complaint.

NCRC further contends that the general public is unaware that AVMs are exempt from Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP), and that the “average” consumer who relies upon information on the www.Zillow.com internet site mistakenly believes that he or she is receiving a valuation equivalent to one conducted by a valuation professional.

In other words, a lot of appraisal professionals can get dis intermediated by Zillow and their ilk, and that’s cause many a lot of sleepless nights. The classic old vs. new debate. On the other side of the debate, we are pretty sure the VCs who have pumped in $57 million into the company must be having an unpleasant weekend.

Frink makes a good point when he writes:

We say in many places on the site (and next to the Zestimate on every home details page) that Zillow is not an appraisal, but a free research tool for consumers. We’ve also tried to be really transparent since we launched about Zestimate accuracy.

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Joanna Rees Gallanter, the company’s new executive in charge of U.S. operations (we previously covered the departure of former US chief Juergen Urbanski) was there handing out the goods with the rest of the crew.

We asked her how giving away routers combined with free WiFi access would make a good business model. She said the low cost subscription fees for non-community member day passes will bring in revenue, plus once the company gets to a sizable amount of users there are other ways to bring in revenue from a large community.

FON is a noble idea, but still it might take a lot of investment for them to get a great user base. Then again Google and Skype are investors, so maybe they know something we don’t.

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Recently the company has been working on getting its chip for cell phones ready to market, which Quellan CEO Tony Stelliga says will dramatically reduce dropped calls. At the IBF Conference Stelliga showed off a live demo of the mobile technology, and says the chips will be in phones on the market early next year and that OEMs are currently qualifying devices. Stelliga wouldn’t say what device makers the company is working with — “people don’t want to admit their products are noisy,” he says — but hey, Samsung is an investor, so that might be a logical deal.

A few years ago the company restructured and refinanced, and will also look to raise more funding next summer. Though, if Quellan is able to win over a lot of device makers with its mobile chips, the pay back could be big — Stelliga says a healthy analog chip company can make margins in the high 70% range. Quellan is also part of a recent resurgence of analogue chip companies that are finding analogue techniques can work better for some purposes like signal processing.

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I’m reminded of this little bit of historical trivia every time I watch social media evolve…

…. reading all the articles, hearing from the hundreds of new social media entrepreneurs who write me every day, etc. As social media advances into a powerful new medium for self-expression and communications, the true utility and purpose of social networking sites like MySpace and social video-sharing sites like YouTube seem to be in constant flux. Many go as far as to predict that social media will be a passing fad. Yet in all this confusion about what social media will, or will not, ultimately become when it grows up, two distinct paradigms seem to be dominating the majority of views (and strategic plans) today.

The first is social media as the new Hollywood. Actually, it’s probably more accurate to say a “farm league” to Hollywood. There’s plenty of evidence to support this scenario:
(a) MySpace is owned by Rupert Murdoch, a media mogul;
(b) YouTube (and soon-to-be-parent Google) are doing all they can to partner with the established media players;
(c) Hollywood talent agencies are dedicating resources to social media to scout for new talent and deals;
(d) established Internet players like Yahoo Media Group and new startups like Bix are launching new platforms and contests aimed at becoming the web version of “American Idol”… the list goes on.

The bottom line here is that there are a group of people who view social media platforms as a new opportunity and path to Hollywood fame.

The second model has less to do with the bright lights of Hollywood and more to do with everyday life, and using social media as a digital appendage of oneself. Here, social media fills the basic human desire to express ones’ creativity and individuality, and to use self-expression in order to enhance and extend their relationships and communications with others.

Of all the large social media platforms out there today, Facebook is probably the purest in this sense… peruse the profiles in Facebook and one of the first things you’ll notice is the low “narcissism” ratio vs. other more fame-driven social networks. Consequently, for whole new generation of Internet natives, checking your Facebook profile several times a day is more important than any other form of communications.

Now, let’s go back to Bell for a minute. While his initial vision for the telephone-as-radio turned out be the wrong one, it’s critical to realize that the invention of the radio could not have occurred without the prior invention of the telephone. Put simply, the telephone and radio run along the same continuum of physics. It’s also equally important to understand that the same fundamental science can spawn two completely separate industries. But the most important lesson of all is that Bell didn’t try to create the “radiophone”.

The reason I’m bringing all this up is because I’m starting to see a potentially dangerous trend emerging… one that’s quite reminiscent of “everybody wants to be a portal” wave of the late ‘90s. As I get pitched by hundreds of new social media ventures, there seems to be an increasing disconnect between what they say is their vision vs. the platforms that are actually being built.

It rings especially true when I hear from people deep within the entertainment community about how they intend to embrace and leverage social media to their benefit. To boil it down, nearly every platform demo and spec that I see now are nearly identical in terms of functionality and feature set. Most alarming though is that too many ventures seem to have an overwhelming desire to do it all by building a “radiophone”, as opposed to focusing on one or the other. After all, even Bell quickly realized his success would be found by focusing on building the telephone, and letting others build the radio.

At the risk of mixing metaphors, there are also a lot of parallels that can be drawn, when building an online community, to building towns, cities, or even a nation. While the difference between, say Hollywood and Pittsburgh, from the perspective of urban planning, political organization, economic policy development, law enforcement, etc. might seem similar at a zoomed-out level, the distinguishing characteristics and services of each city get amplified as one zooms in to the culture of the population and the various neighborhoods that make up each city.

Hollywood is very different from Pittsburgh, and the factors that drive the health and prosperity are highly specific to each. This is an obvious statement… yet such obviousness does not seem to be translating to many of the social media ventures that I’m seeing. Put another way, the biggest danger for any social media venture today, whether they be at the startup stage or even for those that already have a lot of traction, is to try to be all things to all people.

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Ultra-portable PCs- I was hoping to see some handheld computers other than the OQO and the cPC. It’s exciting that OQO has finally put the Tablet Edition on their device and it was cool to play with. The DualCor cPC grabbed a lot of attention and rightly so and it didn’t disappoint me at all. But I have to admit I was hoping this year would find some other entries into this space. Sony was completely absent, even though they have led the way in the UPC space for some time. They apparently have abandoned it completely. It would have been great if some other vendors had introduced something, even if in concept. I think there is a big market in the handheld segment if enough OEMs bring out machines to generate sales numbers big enough to keep costs down for everyone.

PDAs/ phones- Other than the Verizon Treo 700w running Windows Mobile 5.0 none of the PDAs I saw from all the major players had any features that jumped out. I didn’t see anything cool from HP, Palm nor Dell, who jointly have the PDA market pretty wrapped up at least in the US. There were tons of “me-too” mobile phones but nothing that grabbed my attention for very long. Maybe I’m just too picky. The services side seemed to dominate the show from my perspective. Streaming and slinging and shooting video to PDAs and phones is definitely the big thing, especially trying to mix HD into the picture. But from a device standpoint I didn’t see anything innovative at all.

Notebook computers- Intel’s Duo (dual-core) notebook computers running XP and Media Center were everywhere. I’m certain I saw at least two dozen different notebooks with dual-core technology but other than the CPU nothing much stood out. No new connectivity options, accessories, nothing. I was hoping to see some really small ultra-portable notebooks but maybe I missed them.

Tablet PCs- Toshiba stole the show with the M400, sporting the dual-core processor and integrated optical drive. They also demonstrated the concept Tablet PC with the detachable screen, but they’ve been showing this for about a year now. It’s time to have a first generation model in production, if they intend to pursue this commercially. I hope they do, it’s a very nice hybrid. Fujitsu was there showing the P1510D which is very nice but there was nothing new from them. HP was abysmal without even bringing the one Tablet PC model they still sell to the show. No Tablets at all from them. Motion Computing did not have a booth again, something I frankly don’t understand. I was asked countless times for directions to the Motion booth and I had to tell them to take a flight to Austin and visit them personally because they were not at CES. I think that is a major mistake on their part. The coolest thing I saw in the Tablet PC space was in the Microsoft booth. They were displaying the Motion LS800 and Fujitsu P1510D running Vista, and running it pretty well. That was pretty cool.

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• Kevin White- Agilix
• Fritz Switzer- Ablet Factory
• Betsy Weber- TechSmith (SnagIt)
• Trevor Claiborne- Student Tablet PC
• Chris Pirillo- hey, everybody knows who Chris is
• Jake Ludington- Media Labs
• Gail Gudmundsen- Etymotic Research
• Robert Scoble- now a published author
• Jeremy Hague- Skylook
• Richard Kuo- SnapStream Media
• Jeff Clavier- SoftTech Vc
• Evan Feldman- Microsoft
• Adam Gould- OQO
• Ken Collura
• All of the Heinys (Lora, Loren, Layne (his daughters), Bob and his wife
• Dennis Rice- Tablet PC Buzz
• Arjay
• Steve Beller- Advanced Neuromodulation Systems
• James Kendrick- me
• Chris DeHerra- Tablet PC Talk
• Linda Epstein- Tablet PC2
• Buzz Bruggerman- gives free copies of ActiveWords to everyone
• Renee Roberts
• Rick Segal
• Sierra

I had a good conversation with Jake Ludington who is really jonesing for a Fujitsu P1510D. Seems his wife took his Stylistic and will not give it back. Chris Pirillo was feeling good about the next Gnomedex in the June timeframe. He said something they have planned will blow everybody away and he almost, almost spilled the beans. Betsy Weber was giving away copies of SnagIt! the best screen capture program on the planet. A new OQO with the Tablet Edition was being passed around for everybody to play with- I love the hinged hard cover case!

Thanks to all attendees for making this event so much fun. Thanks to those who picked up the tab for the meal. Thanks to the First Family of the Tablet PC for arranging such a wonderful event. It was great fun to meet a lot of people I know but haven’t met. I can’t wait until next year! Until then, enjoy these few photos I snapped with my camera phone:

Betsy Weber of TechSmith

Lora Heiny- What Is New and member of the First Family

Robert who?

Dennis Rice- looked at my new Treo and tried to switch with his old one

Loren Heiny- standing with the badge visible; Adam Gould of OQO sitting in foreground with beard

Robert Scoble- standing

Fritz Switzer

Chris Pirillo- the original Lockergnomie

Buzz Bruggeman- it took longer than I thought to get him standing on a table

F-B: Jeff Clavier; Betsy Weber; Robert Scoble

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