Deal Radar 2008: Turbine

Turbine is the largest privately held gaming studio in North America. They have created several popular and massively multiplayer game worlds on the Internet such as The Lord of the Rings: Shadows of Angmar, Asheron’s Call, and Dungeons and Dragons: Stormreach. The company has a top-of-the-line technology platform and innovative graphics and has created an active niche in the online worlds segment for social gaming experiences. >>>

Bringing On WebEx 2.0: DimDim CEO DD Ganguly (Part 6)

SM: What is your strategy going forward? I understand your open source go-to-market strategy, which is a viral spread. What is your hypothesis on where DimDim Pro and Enterprise are going to gain traction?

DD: All sales that have happened to date have been inbound inside sales. >>>

Being Gay: Another Media Hook

By Richard Laermer,  Guest Author

According to Clay (“Don’t Touch Me!”) Aiken, it is a big gay world out there. And that’s what the press wants you to believe. From my viewpoint, as a fuchsia card-carrying gay alpha male, every few years there’s a boondoggle in gay stories in America: the Supreme Court said OK to sodomy in Texas; Iowa in the heartland says OK to gay weddings; Richard Chamberlain (Richard! Chamberlain!) claims he’s a homo; while finally (my favorite) MTV said OK to the airing of a band (t.A.t.U.) that portrays itself as being “all lesbian, all the time.” The mega-ratings grabber Tia Tequila featured a bisexual lady of indiscriminate taste, but I’m not sure if she’s into sex as much as she is into showing off her inanity. >>>

Trusting Untrusted Computers (Part 3)

By Taher Elgamal, Guest Author

I continue my discussion of how to trust essentially untrustworthy networks, software, and hardware by addressing what works and what sells in the information security industry. In last week’s post, I outlined strategies we can implement to build customer trust in networked systems. Here I begin to look at the problem from an entrepreneur’s perspective: how does one build and grow a business, and how does that relate to solving real security issues and problems? >>>

Bringing On WebEx 2.0: DimDim CEO DD Ganguly (Part 5)

SM: Because your are so open, all of your customers and potential customers can know about not only the benefits but also potential drawbacks to your software. What has been the impact of your open policies?

DD: If you look at a traditional software company, the customers are at the top of the funnel and all of that information gets channeled to one product manager. >>>

Rules for Bootstrappers (Part 5)

By Greg Gianforte, Guest Author

With so much of the world becoming standardized and interchangeable, there is little to differentiate your business from a legion of other companies. Except, that is, the special effort of backup support you provide to all your customers. >>>

Bringing On WebEx 2.0: DimDim CEO DD Ganguly (Part 4)

SM: Your major competitive advantage is being a free platform as well as an open source platform?

DD: Yes. As you can imagine, Microsoft or WebEx Cisco are not going to become open source or free hosted solution companies anytime soon. >>>

Forbes Column 08: ‘SaaS-ing’ Back At The Economy

My Zero-In column on Forbes this morning is ‘SaaS-ing’ Back At The Economy. In it, you will see Jim Heeger’s description of the ‘thumbtack’ economy. >>>