Pageflakes raised a high profile round of funding in May 2006 from Benchmark Europe (renamed Balderton Capital). Balderton has continued to bridge the company with additional funds, and about $4 million has been invested to date.

Live Universe, which was founded by MySpace founder Brad Greenspan, has made a number of acquisitions to spur growth. Most recently, they acquired video site Revver, in February 2008.

The deal was competitive, according to one source, who says that Colorado-based NewsGator was also bidding. But it’s likely that the acquisition price was not huge - Pageflakes is in a highly competitive market dominated by Yahoo and Google. Even so, reports that the company may be going to the deadpool seem to be inaccurate.

Pageflakes CEO Dan Cohen, who ran the My Yahoo product prior to joining Pageflakes, will report to Greenspan, and the company will remain at their current offices in Germany and San Francisco.

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

Google is in effect becoming Salesforce’s productivity suite. Google documents, spreadsheets, and presentation can be created from within Salesforce’s CRM application. GTalk works as the de facto instant messenger within Salesforce. With one click, sales people who use Gmail can send any email correspondence with potential or existing customers to Salesforce, where it becomes recorded as part of the sales cycle. Sales events and marketing campaigns can be overlayed onto a Google Calendar (see screen shot below), as well as colleague’s schedules for figuring out convenient meeting times.

The Google productivity apps are free unless a company wants to upgrade to the premier edition (which includes added security and management features) for $5/user/month. By summer, Salesforce will be reselling the premier edition itself for twice as much—$10/user/month—and will throw in telephone support and put everything on one bill.

Salesforce founder and CEO Marc Benioff tells me that he is embracing Google as another way to undercut Microsoft:

You’ve seen what we have been doing is slowly integrating all of our services with theirs. Certainly the enemy of my enemy is my friend, which makes Google my best friend. I have spoken with a lot of customers who want to get off of Microsoft Word.

Of course, Microsoft’s desktop cp-Office apps are threatened long-term by Google Apps, and its own CRM software for small businesses is threatened by Salesforce. But why didn’t Salesforce simply build its own Web-based productivity apps as so many others are doing? Says Benioff:

I really didn’t want to compete against Google in an area they consider core.

Better to gang up against Microsoft together. Now he has the leading Web-based productivity suite baked into Salesforce. But that brings up another question. If Google and Salesforce are so well suited for each other, why doesn’t Google just buy Salesforce? It could accelerate the growth of Google’s enterprise business and make it a little bit less reliant on advertising dollars (since Salesforce charges monthly subscriptions). When I put this notion to Benioff, he punted it back to Google:

You should give them a call and ask them about that.

Something tells me I won’t get a straight answer from them either. But it is obvious that Google is thinking along the same lines when it comes to enterprise apps in the cloud. Just last week, Google launched its own marketplace for enterprise apps, which is similar to Salesforce’s AppExchange. Ultimately, though, how many different Web platform companies can co-exist? A Google-Salesforce combo could sew up the Web platform for enterprise apps.

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Original post by Erick Schonfeld and software by Elliott Back

BuddyTV aims to provide a comprehensive resource and community for television fans, serving up daily editorials, interviews, and discussions. Other features include a “Television Jockey” service, which allows users to stream video and audio live to other members as they share their thoughts on the latest TV events.

In June 2007 BuddyTV raised $2.8 million in a round led by Gemstar-TV Guide. Competitors to BuddyTV include MeeVee, which was recently placed on Deadpool watch.

We should note that previous rumors of BuddyTV’s acquisition by Comcast have proven to be false.

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Original post by Jason Kincaid and software by Elliott Back

YouTorrent

TorrentFreak reports that “YouTorrent’s selling points are the great interface, an ad-less design, and its ability to search most of the bigger BitTorrent sites” and since launching in January has grown to a remarkable 10 million uniques per month.

In an odd move, the owners have switched YouTorrent’s meta-search to sites that only list legal torrents, a decision that may well kill YouTorrent’s traffic before the site finds a buyer.

How much the owners are chasing for YouTorrent was not disclosed, however the site has zero income as the owners have never run ads.

For those looking for a YouTorrent alternative now it’s useless, try PizzaTorrent.

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

The company offers a Windows-only download that enhances the instant messaging experience with extravagant emoticons and video features.

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

We’ve noted problems with the service in the past, but never a general outage. The site is down. The service is down. Everything appears to be offline.

If you want to be a phone company, and get your users to rely on you to manage all of your incoming calls, this simply cannot happen. There are undoubtedly going to be a lot of very pissed off homeless people this morning, as well as GrandCentral’s other users.

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

The application allows users to see the data stream from people they follow on FriendFeed, and post new messages directly to the service. Users can also comment on posted items, and bookmark them. And possibly the best feature: it includes FriendFeed search.

Alert Thingy is now the second Adobe AIR application that is running full time on my desktop (the other is Twhirl, for Twitter). I expect it will be very popular with the Centralized Me crowd.

The application was created by Howard/Baines.

See Sobees for another desktop FriendFeed application, although it runs only on Windows machines. AIR applications are cross platform.

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

The application allows users to see the data stream from people they follow on FriendFeed, and post new messages directly to the service. Users can also comment on posted items, and bookmark them.

Alert Thingy is now the second Adobe AIR application that is running full time on my desktop (the other is Twhirl, for Twitter). I expect it will be very popular with the Centralized Me crowd.

The application was created by Howard/Baines.

See Sobees for another desktop FriendFeed application, although it runs only on Windows machines. AIR applications are cross platform.

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

How much is a Twitter account with nearly 1,500 followers worth? Rocketboom founder Andrew Baron wants to find out, and launches a publicity stunt that will spark a debate about trust and privacy: He’s selling his Twitter account, including the followers. His explanation for the sale:

I really love my Twitter account but I feel like I haven’t been using it the way I want to. Quite honestly, I feel sorry for all of my followers because they wind up with my tweets in their timelines and I haven’t been able to utilize the medium the way I want to. I also participate in another Twitter account over on Rocketboom so I’m thinking I’ll post more over there and start up a new account to do what I want to do next.

It would be silly to just delete this account I have here, especially if there is someone out there that had like interests and had something to say or wanted to get involved in some relevant conversations. In terms of monetary value, I have no expectations or needs at all so I decided not to put a minimum bid on this. Whatever will be, will be.

At the time of writing the current bid for the account, complete with 1400 followers is $26. You can follow the auction here.

Twitter, of course, will almost certainly delete the account if a sale occurs (I’d suspend it immediately if I were them). But they may not have considered this possibility when drafting the terms of service or privacy policy - a sale or transfer of an account isn’t specifically prohibited.

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

Rocketboom producer Andrew Baron has created possibly a first by putting his Twitter account up for sale on eBay.

Barons explanation for the sale:

I really love my Twitter account but I feel like I haven’t been using it the way I want to. Quite honestly, I feel sorry for all of my followers because they wind up with my tweets in their timelines and I haven’t been able to utilize the medium the way I want to. I also participate in another Twitter account over on Rocketboom so I’m thinking I’ll post more over there and start up a new account to do what I want to do next.

It would be silly to just delete this account I have here, especially if there is someone out there that had like interests and had something to say or wanted to get involved in some relevant conversations. In terms of monetary value, I have no expectations or needs at all so I decided not to put a minimum bid on this. Whatever will be, will be.

At the time of writing the current bid for the account, complete with 1400 followers is $26. You can follow the auction here.

(via ChristineLu on Twitter)

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

I call BS on the whole post.

His central questions are “How do you value art?” and “How do you ensure that the value of art can translate into the notion of making a living on art?”

So far, so good. A discussion about music industry troubles, framed from the point of view of the artist. But then, a red flag: “What role does a government body play in the propagation of the meme of art creation? Support? Education? Distribution?”

I tried to keep an open mind throughout the rest of the post. Even though he’s the VP Technology at Warner Bros. Records. And even though the parent company to Warner Bros. Records is currently pitching the horrendous idea of a music tax to replace lost music label revenues.

But all Kaplan has done is take the arguments that his boss made a couple of weeks ago and repackaged them in touchy-feely “what about the children artist?” language. He’s proposing the removal of market forces in the music industry, since those forces no longer work in favor of the company he works for.

“The concept of art is fundamental to our identity as humans,” he says, and “the worst to the best music is art without any regard to its inherent quality.” This is a setup for a big group hug among musicians; a sort of revolutionary cry for brotherhood against…well, against everyone else. He adds that we must find a way to “remove the fear-politics and the pro-ignorance in the US society” which, presumably, is the direct cause of a decline in revenue at Warner Bros. Records. I mean, the decline of valuing the artist as a human being.

Lets not frame the debate around “monetary models around digital music” he suggests. Instead, let’s “step back to the root and evaluate as a society the place of Art within it.”

How do we do that? Government support of musicians.

Within Europe, it is actually pretty easy (relatively) to make a living as an artist, depending on the country. I have friends in certain countries who are Artists by trade, supported through government programs. Canada supports art through liberal granting. In those areas, the value of the artifact of art is less of a concern than the value of the process of creating. And the same does and should apply to music as a form of art…It’s my opinion that before we start down the path of “how do you value digital artifacts” and “how do you value music,” we also need to evaluate how we as a society value art. How do we as a government, a democratic society support artists to the point where the value of experience is enough to support the act of creation?

Strip away all the flowery language and what you have is a music industry executive calling for the “pro-ignorance” US society to value music as art no matter whether it’s the “worst” or the “best.” He talks about how great European artists have it with government subsidies. And he’s doing it weeks after his boss called for a music tax.

Like I said, I call BS.

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

The site allows people to file (or search for) grievances, join with others looking for a payout, and eventually get the attention of a first class ambulance chaser to take your case.

An email from the comoany described the reasons for the delay in launch:

It took us a while to come up with a complete Class Action case repository where affected people can search for a case, read about it, register their complaints if affected, and be in touch with Class Action lawyers in real time. People can suggest new potential Class Actions and others affected can read the initial complaint and join up with their own complaints against that product or service. All this is in addition to our efficient case filing system where users can file a lawsuit in any one of 9 categories and get in touch with the best in legal help. A complete internal messaging system etc has been designed. Tons of other good features inside. We hope to make this a harmonious and efficient system for people to register any grievance and be sure to receive good legal help in the least possible time.

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

Madrid, Spain based startup Erepublik is aiming to make its mark in the online gaming community with a model that combines MMOG and social network.

At its core, Erepublik is a massive online multiplayer social strategy that aims to be intricate and accelerated enough “to attract a spectrum of both fanatical and casual gamers.” Players can be politicians, soldiers, entrepreneurs or journalists in different countries, and much of the environment is user generated. The game is still in invite only beta testing, but has 10,000 beta testers from 43 countries currently playing the game. A key pitch of Erupblik is the time required to play the game: 14 minutes a day.

Erepublik’s business model is based on a mixture of the sale of virtual goods, and advertising.

Erepublik has taken €200,000 in angel funding to date and is in the process of closing a further €550,000 round. Management includes CEO Alexis Bonte from lastminute.com and CTO George Lemnaru from Tevin Solutions.

It wont appeal to hard core gamers but that’s not the target market; a time poor MySpace/ Facebook generation who prefers their gaming less full on seems to be the target. It will be interesting to see how it grows in the coming year once it fully opens to the public.

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

According to Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC, Australia’s SEC) documents, Tucker maintains six different versions of himself, complete with varying birthdate, for his various corporate investments:

According to data filed with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, six different Mark Tuckers live at the Mona Vale address. All were born in the Sydney beachside suburb of Manly - but on slightly different dates.

According to ASIC records one Mr Tucker was born on January 21, 1953, one was born on January 13, 1953, another born on January 25, 1953.

Another Mr Tucker - who is both the director and secretary of a company called Bahama Acres Holding Company - is registered as living at the same address but was born on January 12, 1953.

A Mark Tucker living at the Mona Vale address - who is currently the director of the Tucker Family Superannuation Co - was born on January 12, 1963, while another Mr Tucker at the same address was born on March 12, 1953.

Tucker claimed that the varying dates were “typographical errors,” but 6 typographical errors? A company involved in the Bahama’s would automatically raise eyebrows, but six different records is more interesting considering that data matching for tax purposes in Australia usually relies on matching details of directors with a heavy emphasis on a directors date of birth.

There may be nothing untowards here, and we wouldn’t suggest that there is, but someone in Mountain View will be calling Australia shortly, if they haven’t already. There may also be an ASIC or ATO (Australian Tax Office) investigation into Tucker’s business affairs and that’s not going to be a good look for a Google Director.

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

According to Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC, Australia’s SEC) documents, Tucker maintains six different versions of himself, complete with varying birthdate, for his various corporate investments:

According to data filed with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, six different Mark Tuckers live at the Mona Vale address. All were born in the Sydney beachside suburb of Manly - but on slightly different dates.

According to ASIC records one Mr Tucker was born on January 21, 1953, one was born on January 13, 1953, another born on January 25, 1953.

Another Mr Tucker - who is both the director and secretary of a company called Bahama Acres Holding Company - is registered as living at the same address but was born on January 12, 1953.

A Mark Tucker living at the Mona Vale address - who is currently the director of the Tucker Family Superannuation Co - was born on January 12, 1963, while another Mr Tucker at the same address was born on March 12, 1953.

Tucker claimed that the varying dates were “typographical errors,” but 6 typographical errors? A company involved in the Bahama’s would automatically raise eyebrows, but six different records is more interesting considering that data matching for tax purposes in Australia usually relies on matching details of directors with a heavy emphasis on a directors date of birth.

There may be nothing untowards here, and we wouldn’t suggest that there is, but someone in Mountain View will be calling Australia shortly, if they haven’t already. There may also be an ASIC or ATO (Australian Tax Office) investigation into Tucker’s business affairs and that’s not going to be a good look for a Google Director.

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

Hulu has started offering the above box to international users visiting the site from outside of the United States, the first sign that the service may soon be available in more countries than one.

First spotted by Watch TV Online, the region drop down box preferences Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia above all other countries, suggesting that they might be the first outside of the United States with Hulu access.

I spoke with Eric Feng, the CTO of Hulu briefly when Mark interviewed him back in January and I asked him about international distribution then. Mark wrote the response up as:

Hulu is working on providing its videos internationally but content rights issues will take time to work through. Eric couldn’t provide any time table for when we might see Hulu available internationally

I do recall Eric saying that Hulu was keen on rolling out international rights, and the only thing holding them back was the rights holders, but given a chance they’d press the button tomorrow.

In the mean time, read this post on how to access Hulu now from outside of the United States.

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

Upon opening a Jiffle calendar, users are presented with a schedule of their associate’s availability. With a few clicks, a new appointment can be created in a manner that will come naturally to anyone who’s used a standard calendar application.

Jiffle believes that its application could be a boon to participants in Google’s Adwords program. After clicking on an appealing ad, consumers will no longer have to call customer support or sales representatives to schedule appointments - they can simply add themselves into an available time slot. Jiffle also thinks that Cisco’s WebEx could be used in conjunction with the service to further expedite meetings.

There are some strong competitors to Jiffle, including TimeBridge, which already supports Google Calendar. TimeBridge also helps facilitate group meetings through use of a point system, which allows users to vote on their preferred times. We expect to see other major developments in this space very soon.

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Original post by Jason Kincaid and software by Elliott Back

According to co-founder Fabrice Grinda, “OLX is probably the largest classified site no one has ever heard of.” And now it’s also the most funded classified site no one has ever heard of, having secured an additional $13.5M in Series B funding today from General Catalyst, Bessemer Venture Partners, Founders Fund, and DN Capital.

The round brings OLX’s total funding up to $23.5M after raising a previously undisclosed Series A round of $10M in September 2007 with the same VCs and various angels.

Americans are not likely to have heard of OLX because its popularity lies mainly outside of the United States in places like Spain, India, Portugal, Mexico, South America, China, and the Philippines. It has established a presence in a total of 40 countries while supporting 15 languages. Much of its success in the Philippines can be attributed to its white label partnership with Friendster. Its offices are also spread over the globe with 92 employees working out of New York, Buenos Aires, Beijing, and Moscow.

The idea behind OLX, in addition to becoming Craigslist for the rest of the world, is to improve on the technology of first generation classified sites. Grinda prides OLX in its Web 2.0 features which include social network widgets, better search, Ajax-based editors, interactive maps, and mobile versions.

OLX was launched in June 2006 by Grinda with co-founder Alec Oxenford. In addition to taking on Craigslist, OLX faces off against eBay’s Kijiji, which poses the biggest international threat because it has also taken an aggressive global campaign.

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Original post by Mark Hendrickson and software by Elliott Back

Y Combinator founder Paul Graham wrote “Several users have suggested we ban Valleywag, not for anything in particular that they write about, but because their articles are always such deliberate linkbait. I personally agree. In 99% of Valleywag articles, the most interesting thing is the title. But I don’t want to be accused of censorship, so I thought I’d ask for opinions first.”

After 20 hours of voting, 60% of the 400+ people who voted said yes to the ban. One commenter writes “Don’t rely on the tyranny of the democracy. Use this as an opportunity to build a framework based on principle and apply it across the board. When you build constitutions, you have to do it in private, with great minds and based on timeless principles… and weight in fact the true nature of man.”

Based on the voting, Hacker News then banned them from the site.

Hacker News is still in the honeymoon period - it hasn’t yet attracted such a large readership that the trolls have taken up permanent residence. After mentioning them a couple of times and seeing comments asking me to please stop writing about them, I asked the community if they’d prefer I didn’t mention them. The responses were mixed.

It’s clear that the site is aiming for intelligent and thoughtful discussion, so it’s no surprise that they are thinking of banning the toxic wasteland known as Valleywag. The question is, will larger sites, hoping to avoid the Valleywag trolls, begin to ban them, too?

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Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back

In 2004 Tivo successfully sued EchoStar for its Dish Network DVR, which provided very similar functionality to Tivo’s product. EchoStar was ordered to pay Tivo $73.9M in damages. The company has subsequently appealed the ruling a number of times, but has not been successful in getting it overturned.

The Dish Network has advised customers that the latest rulings will have no effect on their DVR service, stating that they have deployed “next-generation DVR software” that will not infringe on Tivo’s patent. The company has also declared that it intends to appeal the latest ruling all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Dish has a lot more lawyer money than TiVo, and it is going to drag this thing out as long as it can.

Thomas Hawk’s Digital Connection was the first site to report the news.

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Original post by Jason Kincaid and software by Elliott Back

Following Michael’s post the other day about the future of social networking, we have heard of several more ways the mobile, location-aware nut is being cracked already.

One of these is an “experiment” by MyBlogLog started at eTech and SXSW that leverages Bluetooth technology to discover the people around you. The Java-based service, previously named “Meetspace” but now known as MBL Mobile, works on both Bluetooth-enabled laptops and Blackberrys.

Once you’ve installed the Java applet and bound your Bluetooth ID to your MyBlogLog ID, you will be able to see other MyBlogLog members within a range of about 30 feet who have also opted into the special service. Their avatars show up on a page that breaks people down into “People Around You” and “People Encountered Most”, the former being those currently detected near you and the latter being those you’ve found yourself near the most. You can click on users to see their activity streams and commonly shared groups.

This service obviously works best when you have a group of geeks huddling around the same areas, such as conference halls. As Marshall Kirkpatrick pointed out on RRW, it also has privacy implications that should give MyBlogLog users pause before they sign up.

For other companies working on location-aware social networking technologies, check out Imity, Mobiluck, Aka Aki, and Loopt. The first three, like MyBlogLog, use Bluetooth-based detection whereas Loopt depends on GPS. LimeJuice and MeetMoi are two similarly intended startups that only require SMS. In the long run, GPS is probably the best technology for this sort of thing (provides much greater range and detail than Bluetooth), but unfortunately lots of phones don’t have GPS capabilities yet.

Also see our posts on an iPhone-only social network and the holy grail for mobile social networks.

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Original post by Mark Hendrickson and software by Elliott Back

Google’s data infrastructure is massive and spread across the world. All that Web crawling, indexing, and searching takes enormous amounts of computing power, not to mention everyone pounding away at Gmail, Google Apps, Blogger, Google Reader, and every other project dreamed up at the Googleplex. But where are all of these data centers and how many are there? Google doesn’t really say. But that doesn’t keep peopel from trying to figure it out. Royal Pingdom has out together this map of all known Google data centers, including spaces it leases and that are under construction. The maps are based on this list compiled by Data Center Knowledge. (And, no, Royal Pingdom didn’t put these on Google Maps).

There are 36 data centers in all—19 in the U.S., 12 in Europe, 3 in Asia, and one each in Russia and South America. Future data center sites may include Taiwan, Malaysia, Lithuania, and Blythewood, South Carolina, where Google has reportedly bought 466 acres of land.

Anyone know how many data centers Microsoft keeps, or Yahoo, or IBM, for that matter?

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Original post by Erick Schonfeld and software by Elliott Back

The AP wire service was originally created to help distribute costs across all members of media networks, including those associated with television, radio, and newspapers. The online video syndication feature is a logical step in this regard. This feature will be especially useful in situations where video is only coming from local sources (such as during a natural disaster). A network will be able to share its content with any number of networks nationally while excluding close competitors, allowing it to retain exclusivity in its own regional market.

According to Robert Aitken, product manager for the AP’s online video, there are over 1,800 affiliates participating.

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Original post by Jason Kincaid and software by Elliott Back

But there was one feature that really caught my eye. You can now import KML files into Live Maps. KML stands for Keyhole Markup Language, and it was invented by Keyhole, the acquired startup behind Google Earth that is now part of Google. KML has become a standard for describing maps hosted on the Web.

What this means, though, is that Live Maps can now drink Google’s milkshake. Because all the customized maps that people have made and share on Google Maps can be grabbed as a KML file. So now Microsoft can benefit from all that work done by Google Map users by simply slurping all of those maps into Live Maps.

For instance, here is a Google map created by a user named Matthew B. titled PA & NJ Winter Camping that shows camping sites in those states:

Now, here is the same map sucked into Windows Live Maps. It is the exact same information with the same pushpins and descriptions layered into Live Maps:.

Of course, this is a two-way street, since any customized map on Live Maps or in Microsoft’s Virtual Earth can now also be exported as a KML file. Google can take out its straw and slurp right back from the Live Maps glass. The difference is that Google’s glass is a lot more full and is more yummy because so many more people have created customized Google Maps than customized Live Maps.

So right about now, Microsoft is wielding an old wooden bowling pin, wiping its chin, and ranting, “I drink it up!”

(Milkshake photo by Dion Gillard).

And here is a picture of an enhanced 3D Las Vegas:

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Original post by Erick Schonfeld and software by Elliott Back

With the excitement brewing about our Meet-Up on May 1 in New York, we’ve decided to slowly open up RSVPs to about 200 more people in the expectation that we’ll have a bigger venue picked by the middle of next week. Sponsorships are lining up quite nicely and we look forward to some amazing giveaways and a bunch of cool demos at the show. That said, pop over to Eventbrite to RSVP.

Gold Sponsor

Palladium Sponsors

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Original post by John Biggs and software by Elliott Back

We all know by now that if you could vote on the Internet, Barack Obama would already be president. His Website has always attracted more traffic than those of other candidates. Unaffiliated video-endorsement site YouBama popped up spontaneously to collect video endorsements from supporters. MoveOn.org is getting its constituents across the Web to rally behind him. Even Silicon Valley digerati like Marc Andreessen love him.

Today, Compete shares some more numbers (in table above) that show Obama beating Hillary Clinton 2 to 1 in Web traffic, 4 to 1 in Wikipedia article readers, and 10 to 1 in time viewers spend watching their videos on YouTube. Compete also measures something it calls “FaceTime,” which is teh amount of time spent with each candidate across several leading social networks and media sites (Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, MeetUp, YouTube). Obama trounces Clinton there as well, with 78 percent share versus 21 percent. And among Web surfers in Pennsylvania, which is holding a big primary next Tuesday, twice as many people are visiting Obama’s official Website than Clinton’s.

This doesn’t necessarily mean Obama is going to win Pennsylvania. The Web population still skews younger than the general electorate, but his strength on the Web is definitely one of Obama’s competitive advantages.

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Original post by Erick Schonfeld and software by Elliott Back

San Diego based V-Enable, a free 411 service provider we first wrote about in December is celebrating April 11 (4/11) with a new product that adds real humans to the mix.

FreeMobile411 (available at both freemobile411.com and fm411.mobi) expands on V-Enables previous handset only offering by providing any mobile free 411 service complete with the regular features, such as residential and business search.

Where the product differs from others, such as 1-800-Free-411 and Google’s Goog411 is the option of operator assistance, allowing consumers to speak with a live operator when they need one. V-Enable claims they are the first free 411 service to offer operator assistance.

Using real people to assist with free 411 calls seems like a step back into the past, but it’s a point of differentiation that may appeal to some people, like baby boomers.

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Original post by Duncan Riley and software by Elliott Back

TechCrunch reader Nicolas Hoizey noticed a blog post on the official Google Docs Blog today written by Andrew Cheng, a Google Marketing Manager. Hoizey sent us the NetNewsWire screen shot above (click for large view).

The post, based on the screen shot, appears to be a simple to do list. But the post was removed from the blog and the feed, and that means it’s time for conspiracy theories to blossom.

It is certainly reasonable to assume Google would consider launching a simple to-do list product to complement its office suite, and would post about the new product on the official blog. One reason to remove the post - they may have simply posted too early and pulled it down because the product wasn’t ready to launch.

But the post itself is literally nothing more than a list of things to do over the weekend. No additional features or functionality, or any description of the product, is mentioned in the post.

So maybe Google is doing it, maybe they aren’t. Or maybe Hoizey just had a little fun with photoshop this evening and sent over the results of his work. Can anyone out there confirm that this post was published?

We wrote a post comparing various to do list applications back in 2006, and added to it in 2007. But really, how much can really be done to create an even better way of creating a list, organizing it, and removing finished items? Perhaps this is yet another niche market that Google intends to dominate, and I’m not sure anyone will really care.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Original post by Michael Arrington and software by Elliott Back