groups

I'm very happy to have heard from Matthew Aslett that he's moving on from Computer Business Review. Not that CBR is a bad publication - quite the opposite. Rather, I'm excited for Matthew and for The 451 Group, as I love the quality of the open-source work that both produce. Matthew is consistently one of the out-performers in the crop of open-source business bloggers.

From Matthew's announcement:

I just wanted to let you all know that today is my last day at CBR/ComputerWire.… Read more

When creating a broad forum or social-networking site like Facebook, deciding what, if any, content should be prohibited is always a difficult decision. Pornography and unauthorized copyrighted material are usually forbidden, but any other restrictions will often spark calls of censorship and accusations that the forum infringes on the freedom of speech guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution. In reality, the constitution doesn't dictate what must be allowed in these circumstances, just as you are permitted to make certain subjects off-limits in your own home. Despite the fact that there is no constitutional issue, there is a perception of one, and the concerns about censorship are very real and do have merit.

Lately, Facebook has been dealing with a growing controversy surrounding one of its groups. F**k Islam has more than 800 members, has generated almost 20,000 wall posts, and sparked a number of similar groups in addition to a host of groups built around their opposition to the group's existence. The debate has recently spilled into The New York Times.… Read more

Maybe it's just me. Maybe I just don't get it. More about that in a moment.

First, I want to extend hearty congratulations to Scott Heiferman and Adam Seifer, on selling Fotolog to France's Hi-Media Group for $90 million. If anybody can pull down that kind of a payday, more power to them. When L' Homme wants to shower you with untold riches, who in their right mind would protest?

I'm not quite sure though what Hi-Media thinks it acquired. I have an idea what I think it thinks it's acquired. With roughly 10 million … Read more

Sourcefire just announced its acquisition of ClamAV. ClamAV is by most estimates the most commonly used open-source antivirus product on this planet, with over 10 million downloads (and a significant percentage). Great, great move by Sourcefire.

There's just no end in sight of this open-source M&A market, friends, and this time it was one open-source project buying another. I like that. Keep it in the family.

Nick Selby over at The 451 Group has a great analysis. He writes:… Read more

Universal Music Group, the largest of the four big music labels, has become the second major to offer DRM-free MP3 downloads.

EMI was first to take the plunge, selling DRM-free files first on Apple's iTunes (in the AAC audio format) and later offering MP3s through a variety of other services via a deal with MediaNet.

Unlike EMI, the Universal deal is only a five-month trial, and the company hasn't announced any such deal with Apple--not surprising, given the two companies' recent history. In fact, nobody should see this as an act of kindness on Universal's part. Rather, … Read more

It's much easier to analyze data when you've already determined what you want to conclude.

The author of the "economic study" produced by the ERS Group on behalf of AMD's antitrust lawyers, O'Melveny & Myers, said that his analysis of Intel's profits over the last 10 years assumed from the start that Intel was guilty of anticompetitive behavior, rather than reaching that conclusion based on the data. Michael Williams, director of the ERS Group, calculated that Intel has pocketed $60 billion in ill-gained profits after a thorough exercise that seems to have been … Read more

Online community Imeem launched in August 2005, and although I wasn't familiar with the service at the time, it sounds like a blend of several popular features: social networking, instant messaging, blogging and photo sharing. At some point, the company added a feature that would let users create playlists from their personal music collections, then stream these playlists to other users. By spring 2007, the service claimed 16 million active users.

The concept was a bit like MySpace.com, and like that site, Imeem eventually drew a copyright infringement lawsuit from a major record label--Warner Music Group, in this … Read more

Although you can't singlehandedly fix the woes of national health care that are spotlighted in the movie Sicko, many free Web sites at least put a bit more power in your hands to manage personal wellness or a medical crisis. Just share your data wisely.

WebMD (a Webware 100 winner) offers videos, virtual support groups, quizzes, blogs, doctor lookups, and a spiffy symptom checker. Look up drugs by a pill's color, imprint or shape. WebMD won't spam you, but as with its competitors, if you subscribe to e-mail updates about some unappetizing ailment, then prepare for related … Read more

If you could spend $6,000 on anything right now, it would certainly be a photomosaic mirror comprised of a 30-inch LCD screen and a Mac Mini, right? If so, you're in luck, because The Barbarian Group is now selling custom-made, limited-edition, real-time photomosaic mirrors. They come as a large box that you need simply hang up and plug in. Its built-in Web cam will take your image and display it as a photo mosaic with about a second of lag while it processes many teeny-tiny pictures to reflect a live image (see video here).

To build up its … Read more