Google’s Android Party Gets Bigger

Today Google’s Android party got a lot bigger. Fourteen of the world’s largest mobile phone and chip makers, including Sony Ericsson, Vodafone Group, and ARM Holdings joined the Open Handset Alliance and pledged support for Google’s Android platform. Almost all of these members had existing Linux platforms they supported. Its not surprising that they are interested in using a common Linux platform that is more standardized and easier to support. Not to mention the big G is backing it.

Netflix and Tivo Team Up

Netflix has been on a rampage of sorts doing deals to get distribution of their online service. Engadget broke the story tonight that Netflix and Tivo teamed up to offer Netflix’s on demand service. Now people can access thousands of movies both standard definition and HD movies from their Tivo.

Similar to the Xbox 360 Netflix service that recently came out, the functionalty is at no additional cost, you just need a Netflix account to use it. Engadget also got an early hand on experience. They said it is not as flashy as the Xbox 360 experience but the performance was noticably better. Netflix is certainly making a major bet on online distribution and they are moving fast to lock up key distribution channels from Blockbuster.  The recent deal that Microsoft and Blockbuster made to create a Live Mesh application is going to make this a game of chess and not checkers. 

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Interview with Mark Zuckerberg

TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington, recently interviewed Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. They talked about a variety of topics, but there were a couple things that were interesting. Facebook has but a lot of investment behind its platform and it recently launched its Facebook Connect service which we wrote about. Zuckerberg talks about the ways he views first party applications verses third party applications.

Zuckerberg says, “There’s this big question about whether we’ll compete with applications. The approach that we take isn’t that there’s some rule that we won’t compete with applications, but we just think that in general it’s not good for us to.”

What he is really saying is I will build first party applications when it’s in Facebook’s best interest. Anything that is really, really important to the community will be strategic to Facebook. Like music, Zuckerberg goes on to confirm that Facebook is working on a music application. Read more

Flip Video MinoHD Takes HD Video Mainstream

First it was cheap HD TVs, then it was more and more HD channels on TV. Now the YouTube generation gets a device that will take HD video into the mainstream, the Flip Video MinoHD camcorder. This little device claims to be the smallest HD video recorder. The Flip Video MinoHD comes equipted with 4GB, capable of storing 60 minutes of 1,280×720 resolution (720p) video. Thats pretty compelling for a device that only weights 3.3 ounces and is ultraslim. The battery is an integrated lithium ion rechargeable battery which gives you about 2 hours of recording time. One of the obvious things it lacks is a HD output connection. It only includes a standard definition AV output jack.

The Flip Video MinoHD is definitely geared towards the social netowrking crazed genreation. With just one click I can upload my videos to YouTube, MySpace, and AOL. It includes FlipShare software that runs on the MAC and PC. HD recoridng is getting cheaper and cheaper. The Flip Video MinoHD, can be bought for around $200 and is a red hot gift for the holidays.

Apple to Sell $99 iPhone at Walmart

According to BGR Apple(AAPL) is planning on selling a $99 iPhone at Walmart(WMT). If this is true, everyone in the mobile business should get a little scared. This means that Apple has hit a very important price point. Most of the 1.2 billion phones sold every year are below $100 price point. This will make sales of iPhone sky rocket at levels not seen since iPod. Now it seems Apple has the largest retailer on the planet behind them and Walmart and Apple are primed to sell 10′s of millions of units. Engadget even has pictures of at&t manuals with Walmart logo on them. Looks real to me.

Nokia who owns over 40% of the phone market should start getting a little worried. They sold over 430M units last year and their bread and butter segment was at price point below $100 for low end feature phones. This move by Apple can be a real game changer if it proves to be true.

Qi Lu is Microsoft’s Chosen One

Microsoft announced today that Qi Lu will join the company as the President of Online Services Group. Steve Ballmer tapped Lu to oversee all efforts in search, advertising, and online information and communcations.  Qi comes to Microsoft after 10 years at Yahoo, where he most recently served as executive vice president of engineering for all Yahoo’s search and advertising development efforts. He has a dotorate in computer science from Carnegie Mellon and holds over 20 U.S. patents.

There was a lot of speculation on who Microsoft would hire for this top position. Lu is an interesting choice because he has fundmentally been an R&D guy. About coming to Microsoft, Lu says “I am genuinely excited about the opportunities ahead for Microsoft to make an enormous impact on the online industry.”  Here is the email Ballmer sent to employees following the announcement. Read more

Netflix Xbox 360 Service Rocks But Needs Some Work

I finally got a chance to play around with the new Xbox Live experience and specifically the new Netflix app. Ever since Microsoft announced the Netflix partnership I was eager to see it in action. I have to say I was really impressed with this new service. But there were a few parts that seemed disconnected. 

The best part of the product is just watching movies. Netflix (NFLX) has standard definition movies and a limited selection of HD movies. I went on a 30 Rock marathon watching the HD version of season 1 and 2. The video quality was very good on a 1080p Samsung LCD. The speed of using the service was also impressive. Movies loaded fast and the navigation was pretty intuitive. But there were some areas that need improvement.   Read more

Google Three Hours From Antitrust Case

Sanford Litvack, the hired gun for DOJ, was just three hours from filing the formal antitrust compliant against Google (GOOG) and Yahoo (YHOO). In an interview with The AM Law Daily, Litvack says, “We were going to file the complaint at a certain time during the day. We told them and three hours before, they told us they were abandoning the agreement.”

The never-filed government complaint would have charged that the agreement violated Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act. Litvack went on to say, “It would have ended up also alleging that Google had a monopoly and that [the advertising pact] would have furthered their monopoly.” Litvack clearly wanted this to happen, “Of course I was looking forward to it,” he says. “We felt pretty good about it, we felt pretty confident.” 

Google certainly avoided a near disaster but it was foolish from the very beginning to even pursue the deal. When you have over 70% market share in the search business, you already have monopolistic network effects that will make it nearly impossible for anyone to compete with you. Why bother locking up an extra 20% and awaking the sleeping giant, the DOJ.

Google Dances Around Cutting Back

Google (GOOG) has been dancing around cutting back on spending and projects with no future revenue opportunity for a long time. But it seems like the are finally changing their tune. With all the economic carnage happening on Wall Street it seems prudent that some things would change at Google. WSJ quoted Google CEO Eric Schmidt, saying “Projects that haven’t really caught on” and “aren’t really that exciting.”  are not going to get prioritized for resources. He went on to explain that Google wants to “prioritize our resources and focus more on our core search, ads and apps business.”

This is coupled with a string of news that Google is cutting back in other ways from reducing the 10K contractors working for Google to curtailing lavish perks like abundant food for employees. I also heard from people inside Google that they are being asked to create budgets for the first time. It looks like the world is coming to a end and Google has to stop partying like its 1999.

Twitter Dead or Bought in 2009

Evan Williams, the god father of blogging, has really lost touch with reality. Tonight at the Churchhill Club in San Francisco he scoffed at criticisms that his company Twitter doesn’t have a business model. Rafe Needleman was there to quote Evan saying, “We will make money, and I can’t say exactly how because… we can’t predict how the businesses we’re in will work.” As he has before, he hinted at generating fees from sales-related Twitter content and from corporate users.

Does he realize its not 1999 or even 2003 when he sold Blogger to Google? Has he turned on CNBC to look at the economic carnage that is happening? Companies that have no business model like Twitter will soon be joining the deadpool or they will be begging Google or Microsoft to buy them. According to Techcrunch, Twitter has around 1 million vistors per month to their Web site and only 200K active users. That is about the size of the whole technorati population in San Francisco. Peanuts, compared to a service that is really mainstream. Twitter is really just a feature in a broader product offering. If Microsoft, Google, or Facebook come out with a similar offering Twitter is a dead man walking.

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