Showing posts with label Tech. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tech. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Hedge Fund Startups
Hedge Fund Startups
The excel spreadsheet is available here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/16561645/Hedge-Fund-Startup-Investments
The excel spreadsheet is available here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/16561645/Hedge-Fund-Startup-Investments
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Wolfram Alpha: 6 Things You Need to Know
1 - Frederic Lardinois: "It definitely looks like it can live up to the hype - though, because it is so different from traditional search engines, it will definitely not be a "Google killer" http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/wolframalpha_our_first_impressions.php
2 - Wolfram will be giving a sneak preview of Wolfram Alpha knowledge engine at Harvard Law School on Tuesday, April 28: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/events/2009/04/wolfram
Event is being co-hosted by Jonathan Zittrain
3 - In Wolfram's own words: "Wolfram|Alpha isn't really a search engine, because we compute the answers, and we discover new truths. If anything, you might call it a platonic search engine, unearthing eternal truths that may never have been written down before..."
4 - "Wolfram|Alpha can pop out an answer to pretty much any kind of factual question that you might pose to a scientist, economist, banker, or other kind of expert. The exciting part is that you're not just looking up pages on the web, you're getting new information that's generated by computations working from the known data. Wolfram says the response can be so speedy because, "We've found that, of all the things science can compute, most take a second or less." http://boingboing.net/2009/04/06/stephen-wolfram-talk.html
5 - Stephen Wolfram created the math software Mathematica ; he was educated at Eton, Oxford, and Caltech; he published a physics paper at 16; he wrote a book of philosophy in which he posits the world is based on cellular automata, A New Kind of Science. It is available online: http://www.wolframscience.com/nksonline/toc.html
6 - You can get updates by checking out the Wolfram Alpha website and/or Wolfram Alpha Blog
http://www.wolframalpha.com/
http://blog.wolfram.com/2009/03/05/wolframalpha-is-coming/
2 - Wolfram will be giving a sneak preview of Wolfram Alpha knowledge engine at Harvard Law School on Tuesday, April 28: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/events/2009/04/wolfram
Event is being co-hosted by Jonathan Zittrain
3 - In Wolfram's own words: "Wolfram|Alpha isn't really a search engine, because we compute the answers, and we discover new truths. If anything, you might call it a platonic search engine, unearthing eternal truths that may never have been written down before..."
4 - "Wolfram|Alpha can pop out an answer to pretty much any kind of factual question that you might pose to a scientist, economist, banker, or other kind of expert. The exciting part is that you're not just looking up pages on the web, you're getting new information that's generated by computations working from the known data. Wolfram says the response can be so speedy because, "We've found that, of all the things science can compute, most take a second or less." http://boingboing.net/2009/04/06/stephen-wolfram-talk.html
5 - Stephen Wolfram created the math software Mathematica ; he was educated at Eton, Oxford, and Caltech; he published a physics paper at 16; he wrote a book of philosophy in which he posits the world is based on cellular automata, A New Kind of Science. It is available online: http://www.wolframscience.com/nksonline/toc.html
6 - You can get updates by checking out the Wolfram Alpha website and/or Wolfram Alpha Blog
http://www.wolframalpha.com/
http://blog.wolfram.com/2009/03/05/wolframalpha-is-coming/
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Supercomputer Bankers
Speeding Up Financial Analysis
http://www.technologyreview.com/printer_friendly_article.aspx?id=22463&channel=computing§ion=
"Now IBM has shown that stream computing can be used to analyze market data faster than ever before. The result is a machine that helps automated trading systems determine the price of securities using financial events that have just occurred. To build the system, the computing company partnered with TD Securities, an investment-banking firm, to tweak IBM software called InfoSphere Streams for financial data. The firm ran the software on one of the latest IBM supercomputers, known as Blue Gene/P."
Video on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mri7cha8ziw
http://www.technologyreview.com/printer_friendly_article.aspx?id=22463&channel=computing§ion=
"Now IBM has shown that stream computing can be used to analyze market data faster than ever before. The result is a machine that helps automated trading systems determine the price of securities using financial events that have just occurred. To build the system, the computing company partnered with TD Securities, an investment-banking firm, to tweak IBM software called InfoSphere Streams for financial data. The firm ran the software on one of the latest IBM supercomputers, known as Blue Gene/P."
Video on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mri7cha8ziw
Monday, April 6, 2009
Attributor - Everthing you want to know
Who leads Attributor?
Management Team:
Jim Pitkow, CEO, Co-founder
Prior to Attributor, Jim was CEO and Chairman of Moreover Technologies, where he successfully restructured the company through acquisition by VeriSign in October of 2005. Before Moreover, Jim was the President and Chairman of Outride Inc., a spinout from the Xerox Palo Alto ResearchCenter (PARC), which was acquired by Google. Jim received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1997. Jim graduated Cum Laude in Psychology from the University of Colorado in 1993.
Jim is the President of the Adolescent Counseling Services and has spent over a decade as a Nordic National Ski Patroller. He can also be found prowling Incan ruins in Bolivia.
Jim Brock, Chairman, Co-founder
Jim most recently served as SVP, Communications & Consumer Services at Yahoo!, where he led the highly successful communication and broadband operating groups. Prior to joining Yahoo!, Brock was a partner with Venture Law Group, a leading Silicon Valley technology law firm, where he led the firm's Internet practice.
Jim holds a B.A. degree in economics with honors from Claremont McKenna College and a J.D. degree from the University of Chicago Law School.
Jim lives with four women, including three teeny boppers. Even his dog is a girl. He carries chocolate wherever he goes and has seen the long version of "Pride and Prejudice" five times. Not back to back, though.
Adrian McDermott, Vice President of Engineering
Adrian McDermott is the Vice President of Engineering at Attributor. Previously he was the VP of Engineering for BEA Systems’ AquaLogic User Interaction family of products and the Web 2.0 based Enterprise Social Computing product line: AquaLogic Pages, Ensemble and Pathways. Adrian joined BEA as part of the Plumtree Software acquisition, he was the first engineer hired by Plumtree in early 1997 and worked on the architecture and development of every Plumtree Portal product version. Prior to Plumtree Adrian worked as an itinerant software consultant in London, Hong Kong,
Sydney and Guam.
British expat Adrian stays true to his roots via the daily consumption of marmite, a gelatinous English breakfast food. His American colleagues believe it looks like axle grease and tastes like toe jam.
Matt Robinson, Vice President of Business Development
Matt leads the company’s business development and strategic partnership initiatives and also serves as the company’s general counsel. Matt has been involved with internet and new media companies for the past decade, focusing on the intersection of content, technology and law. Before joining Attributor, Matt spent 6 years at Yahoo!, most recently as Vice President and Associate General Counsel overseeing legal product counseling. Matt holds a BA degree from the University of California, Los Angeles and a J.D. from the University of San Francisco School of Law.
Outside of work, it’s all about raising twin boys and in those extra minutes, skiing, fly fishing, mountain biking, and getting lost in foreign locales without a guidebook.
Rajat Monga, Chief Architect
Rajat leads the labs and operations at Attributor and has been responsible for many of Attributor's core architectural principles. Prior to Attributor, Rajat played a lead role in Search at eBay. He also has extensive experience designing and building complex scalable systems at Quova, Arzoo and Morgan Stanley. Rajat received his B.Tech. from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi.
Outside of work, Rajat spends time keeping his one-year-old son out of mischief. He also enjoys reading and swimming, though generally not at the same time.
Rich Pearson, Vice President of Marketing
Rich leads the Marketing and PR activities at Attributor. Previously he led the marketing efforts for Yahoo! Mail, Messenger and Photos which followed two years in London where he directed Yahoo!’s European Marketing efforts. Before that he held senior marketing positions at Homestead, Segasoft, and Del Monte Foods.
Rich holds a B.S. from University of California, Berkeley and an M.B.A. from the Haas School of Business.
Outside of work, Rich enjoys running, reading, cooking and performing improvisational comedy for his increasingly unimpressed kids.
http://www.attributor.com/management.php
Where can I hear what Attributor has to say?
Attributor Blog: http://www.attributor.com/blog/fairshare-enables-the-sharing-economy/
Attributor on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Attributor
Who are their customers?
Attributor Customers include: Thomsons, Financial Times, Conde Nast, the New Yorker, PC World, MIT Sloan Management Review, etc.
Who works at Attributor?
From LinkedIn:
Attributor provides a content monitoring and monetization service that tracks how and where your text, image and video content moves across the Web.
Customers such as Thomson Reuters, Associated Press, Conde Net, Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa and others use Attributor to identify new sales leads and revenue-sharing opportunities, monitor licensed and unlicensed uses and derive more links and better search engine placement. see less
Specialties
content monetization, digital content management, licensing
Attributor employees are most connected to:
* Yodlee
* AdMob
* eBay
* Yahoo!
Career path for Attributor employees
before:
* Yahoo!
Top Schools
San Jose St. Univ. 8%
Univ. of California, Berkeley 8%
Median Age 35 years
Gender
Male 79%
Female 21%
Who funded Attributor?
Funders (from Crunchbase)
Funding
Total $22M
Series A, 1/06 $2M
Draper Richards
First Round Capital
Selby Venture Partners
Sigma Partners
Amicus Capital
Series B, 12/06 $8M
Sigma Partners
Selby Venture Partners
Draper Richards
First Round Capital
Amicus Capital
Series C, 4/08 $12M
Jafco Ventures
Sigma Partners
Where can I read articles about Attributor?
Articles:
Attributor Launches Service to Track Copyright Infringement Across the Web
http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/11/04/attributor-launches-service-to-track-copyright-infringement-across-the-web/
InFocus: Attributor Corp.
http://www.econtentmag.com/Articles/Editorial/Feature/InFocus-Attributor-Corp.--51636.htm
Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attributor
Crunchbase:
http://www.crunchbase.com/company/attributor
Management Team:
Jim Pitkow, CEO, Co-founder
Prior to Attributor, Jim was CEO and Chairman of Moreover Technologies, where he successfully restructured the company through acquisition by VeriSign in October of 2005. Before Moreover, Jim was the President and Chairman of Outride Inc., a spinout from the Xerox Palo Alto ResearchCenter (PARC), which was acquired by Google. Jim received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1997. Jim graduated Cum Laude in Psychology from the University of Colorado in 1993.
Jim is the President of the Adolescent Counseling Services and has spent over a decade as a Nordic National Ski Patroller. He can also be found prowling Incan ruins in Bolivia.
Jim Brock, Chairman, Co-founder
Jim most recently served as SVP, Communications & Consumer Services at Yahoo!, where he led the highly successful communication and broadband operating groups. Prior to joining Yahoo!, Brock was a partner with Venture Law Group, a leading Silicon Valley technology law firm, where he led the firm's Internet practice.
Jim holds a B.A. degree in economics with honors from Claremont McKenna College and a J.D. degree from the University of Chicago Law School.
Jim lives with four women, including three teeny boppers. Even his dog is a girl. He carries chocolate wherever he goes and has seen the long version of "Pride and Prejudice" five times. Not back to back, though.
Adrian McDermott, Vice President of Engineering
Adrian McDermott is the Vice President of Engineering at Attributor. Previously he was the VP of Engineering for BEA Systems’ AquaLogic User Interaction family of products and the Web 2.0 based Enterprise Social Computing product line: AquaLogic Pages, Ensemble and Pathways. Adrian joined BEA as part of the Plumtree Software acquisition, he was the first engineer hired by Plumtree in early 1997 and worked on the architecture and development of every Plumtree Portal product version. Prior to Plumtree Adrian worked as an itinerant software consultant in London, Hong Kong,
Sydney and Guam.
British expat Adrian stays true to his roots via the daily consumption of marmite, a gelatinous English breakfast food. His American colleagues believe it looks like axle grease and tastes like toe jam.
Matt Robinson, Vice President of Business Development
Matt leads the company’s business development and strategic partnership initiatives and also serves as the company’s general counsel. Matt has been involved with internet and new media companies for the past decade, focusing on the intersection of content, technology and law. Before joining Attributor, Matt spent 6 years at Yahoo!, most recently as Vice President and Associate General Counsel overseeing legal product counseling. Matt holds a BA degree from the University of California, Los Angeles and a J.D. from the University of San Francisco School of Law.
Outside of work, it’s all about raising twin boys and in those extra minutes, skiing, fly fishing, mountain biking, and getting lost in foreign locales without a guidebook.
Rajat Monga, Chief Architect
Rajat leads the labs and operations at Attributor and has been responsible for many of Attributor's core architectural principles. Prior to Attributor, Rajat played a lead role in Search at eBay. He also has extensive experience designing and building complex scalable systems at Quova, Arzoo and Morgan Stanley. Rajat received his B.Tech. from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi.
Outside of work, Rajat spends time keeping his one-year-old son out of mischief. He also enjoys reading and swimming, though generally not at the same time.
Rich Pearson, Vice President of Marketing
Rich leads the Marketing and PR activities at Attributor. Previously he led the marketing efforts for Yahoo! Mail, Messenger and Photos which followed two years in London where he directed Yahoo!’s European Marketing efforts. Before that he held senior marketing positions at Homestead, Segasoft, and Del Monte Foods.
Rich holds a B.S. from University of California, Berkeley and an M.B.A. from the Haas School of Business.
Outside of work, Rich enjoys running, reading, cooking and performing improvisational comedy for his increasingly unimpressed kids.
http://www.attributor.com/management.php
Where can I hear what Attributor has to say?
Attributor Blog: http://www.attributor.com/blog/fairshare-enables-the-sharing-economy/
Attributor on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Attributor
Who are their customers?
Attributor Customers include: Thomsons, Financial Times, Conde Nast, the New Yorker, PC World, MIT Sloan Management Review, etc.
Who works at Attributor?
From LinkedIn:
Attributor provides a content monitoring and monetization service that tracks how and where your text, image and video content moves across the Web.
Customers such as Thomson Reuters, Associated Press, Conde Net, Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa and others use Attributor to identify new sales leads and revenue-sharing opportunities, monitor licensed and unlicensed uses and derive more links and better search engine placement. see less
Specialties
content monetization, digital content management, licensing
Attributor employees are most connected to:
* Yodlee
* AdMob
* eBay
* Yahoo!
Career path for Attributor employees
before:
* Yahoo!
Top Schools
San Jose St. Univ. 8%
Univ. of California, Berkeley 8%
Median Age 35 years
Gender
Male 79%
Female 21%
Who funded Attributor?
Funders (from Crunchbase)
Funding
Total $22M
Series A, 1/06 $2M
Draper Richards
First Round Capital
Selby Venture Partners
Sigma Partners
Amicus Capital
Series B, 12/06 $8M
Sigma Partners
Selby Venture Partners
Draper Richards
First Round Capital
Amicus Capital
Series C, 4/08 $12M
Jafco Ventures
Sigma Partners
Where can I read articles about Attributor?
Articles:
Attributor Launches Service to Track Copyright Infringement Across the Web
http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/11/04/attributor-launches-service-to-track-copyright-infringement-across-the-web/
InFocus: Attributor Corp.
http://www.econtentmag.com/Articles/Editorial/Feature/InFocus-Attributor-Corp.--51636.htm
Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attributor
Crunchbase:
http://www.crunchbase.com/company/attributor
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Siri Assistant , Origins in CALO : Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Organizes
Siri based on CALO Project
CALO Project Website: http://caloproject.sri.com/
SRI CALO Website: http://www.ai.sri.com/project/CALO
Summary: "SRI International is leading the development of new software that could revolutionize how computers support decision-makers.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), under its Personalized Assistant that Learns (PAL - download brochure) program, has awarded SRI three phases of a five-year contract to develop an enduring personalized cognitive assistant. DARPA expects the PAL program to generate innovative ideas that result in new science, new approaches to current problems, new algorithms and tools, as well as new technology of significant value to the military.
The team dubbed its new project CALO, for Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Organizes. The name was inspired by the Latin word "calonis," which means "soldier’s servant." The goal of the project is to create cognitive software systems, that is, systems that can reason, learn from experience, be told what to do, explain what they are doing, reflect on their experience, and respond robustly to surprise.
The software, which learns by interacting with and being advised by its users, will handle a broad range of interrelated decision-making tasks that have in the past been resistant to automation. A CALO will have the capability to engage in and lead routine tasks, and to assist when the unexpected happens. To focus the research on real problems and ensure the software meets requirements such as privacy, security, and trust, the CALO project researchers themselves are using the technology during its development.
SRI is leading the multi-disciplinary CALO project team and, beyond participating in the research program, is also responsible for overall project direction, management, and development of prototypes. The project is bringing together leading computer scientists and researchers in artificial intelligence, machine learning, natural language processing, knowledge representation, human-computer interaction, flexible planning, and behavioral studies."
See video at Video.Google: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6477589906894112212
Other Spin offs:
http://www.adapx.com/
http://farecast.live.com/
and Radar Networks, makers of Twine: http://www.twine.com/
CALO presentation at DARPA Tech: http://caloproject.sri.com/DARPATech.pdf
DARPA brochure: http://caloproject.sri.com/PALbrochure.pdf
CALO publications: http://caloproject.sri.com/publications/
Related research efforts include:
"RADAR, the Reflective Agent with Distributed Adaptive Reasoning, is a $7 million dollar, five-year research project in Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science. The overall goal is to develop a software-based "cognitive personal assistant" that will help busy military commanders and managers to work more effectively, with less time wasted on routine tasks. This new technology should be equally valuable to managers in industry, academia, and government. RADAR is funded by the Information Processing Technology Office (IPTO) of DARPA and managed by SRI International." At Carnegie Mellon's Computer Science Department: http://www.radar.cs.cmu.edu/
and
"IRIS is a semantic desktop application framework that enables users to create a “personal map” across their office-related information objects. IRIS includes a machine-learning platform to help automate this process. It provides “dashboard” views, contextual navigation, and relationship-based structure across an extensible suite of office applications, including a calendar, Web and file browser, e-mail client, and instant messaging client." http://www.openiris.org/
Participants include the usual suspects, such as MIT and Harvard, as well as:
CollaborX Inc.
Fetch Technologies, Inc.
iAnyWhere Solutions
International Computer Science Institute (ICSI)
ISX Corporation
Laszlo Systems
Natural Interaction Systems, LLC
See other posts here:
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-founder-on-linkedin.html
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/search/label/Siri
CALO Project Website: http://caloproject.sri.com/
SRI CALO Website: http://www.ai.sri.com/project/CALO
Summary: "SRI International is leading the development of new software that could revolutionize how computers support decision-makers.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), under its Personalized Assistant that Learns (PAL - download brochure) program, has awarded SRI three phases of a five-year contract to develop an enduring personalized cognitive assistant. DARPA expects the PAL program to generate innovative ideas that result in new science, new approaches to current problems, new algorithms and tools, as well as new technology of significant value to the military.
The team dubbed its new project CALO, for Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Organizes. The name was inspired by the Latin word "calonis," which means "soldier’s servant." The goal of the project is to create cognitive software systems, that is, systems that can reason, learn from experience, be told what to do, explain what they are doing, reflect on their experience, and respond robustly to surprise.
The software, which learns by interacting with and being advised by its users, will handle a broad range of interrelated decision-making tasks that have in the past been resistant to automation. A CALO will have the capability to engage in and lead routine tasks, and to assist when the unexpected happens. To focus the research on real problems and ensure the software meets requirements such as privacy, security, and trust, the CALO project researchers themselves are using the technology during its development.
SRI is leading the multi-disciplinary CALO project team and, beyond participating in the research program, is also responsible for overall project direction, management, and development of prototypes. The project is bringing together leading computer scientists and researchers in artificial intelligence, machine learning, natural language processing, knowledge representation, human-computer interaction, flexible planning, and behavioral studies."
See video at Video.Google: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6477589906894112212
Other Spin offs:
http://www.adapx.com/
http://farecast.live.com/
and Radar Networks, makers of Twine: http://www.twine.com/
CALO presentation at DARPA Tech: http://caloproject.sri.com/DARPATech.pdf
DARPA brochure: http://caloproject.sri.com/PALbrochure.pdf
CALO publications: http://caloproject.sri.com/publications/
Related research efforts include:
"RADAR, the Reflective Agent with Distributed Adaptive Reasoning, is a $7 million dollar, five-year research project in Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science. The overall goal is to develop a software-based "cognitive personal assistant" that will help busy military commanders and managers to work more effectively, with less time wasted on routine tasks. This new technology should be equally valuable to managers in industry, academia, and government. RADAR is funded by the Information Processing Technology Office (IPTO) of DARPA and managed by SRI International." At Carnegie Mellon's Computer Science Department: http://www.radar.cs.cmu.edu/
and
"IRIS is a semantic desktop application framework that enables users to create a “personal map” across their office-related information objects. IRIS includes a machine-learning platform to help automate this process. It provides “dashboard” views, contextual navigation, and relationship-based structure across an extensible suite of office applications, including a calendar, Web and file browser, e-mail client, and instant messaging client." http://www.openiris.org/
Participants include the usual suspects, such as MIT and Harvard, as well as:
CollaborX Inc.
Fetch Technologies, Inc.
iAnyWhere Solutions
International Computer Science Institute (ICSI)
ISX Corporation
Laszlo Systems
Natural Interaction Systems, LLC
See other posts here:
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-founder-on-linkedin.html
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/search/label/Siri
Siri Assistant Founder on LinkedIn
http://www.linkedin.com/ppl/webprofile?action=vmi&id=2358359&pvs=pp&authToken=GNqe&authType=name&trk=ppro_viewmore&lnk=vw_pprofile
Summary
Commercializing innovation
Experience
Founder & CEO
Siri
Information Technology and Services industry
January 2008 – Present (1 year 4 months)
Recently launched a venture funded company focused on a truly big innovation for consumer internet.
Coming soon...simplifying life for everyday humans.
Entrepreneur-in-Residence
Stanford Research Institute
Telecommunications industry
June 2007 – December 2007 ( 7 months)
Preparing internet venture for Fall 2007 launch.
General Manager
Motorola
Public Company; Telecommunications industry
August 2002 – May 2007 (4 years 10 months)
Vice President
Telenor Mobile
Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; Telecommunications industry
April 2000 – August 2002 (2 years 5 months)
Education
Handelshøyskolen BI
MBA, Strategy and Marketing
1993 – 1994
From Crunchbase:
http://www.crunchbase.com/person/dag-kittlaus
Siri’s CEO is Dag Kittlaus, who founded the company as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at SRI.
A serial innovator and consumer wireless internet veteran of 10 years in Scandinavia and the US, Dag is working on creating his third consecutive mobile internet product with over a million users.
Dag has held leadership roles as VP of Consumer Internet Services at Scandinavian telecom giant Telenor Mobile, and several consumer product groups at Motorola including GM of xProducts and founder and GM of Motorola’s Interactive Media Group. He conceived and launched Screen3, a breakthrough consumer mobile application currently used by millions of users and adopted by Cingular, China Mobile, and Telefonica.
See also posts here:
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-origins-in-calo.html
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/03/siri-ai-assistant-startup.html
Summary
Commercializing innovation
Experience
Founder & CEO
Siri
Information Technology and Services industry
January 2008 – Present (1 year 4 months)
Recently launched a venture funded company focused on a truly big innovation for consumer internet.
Coming soon...simplifying life for everyday humans.
Entrepreneur-in-Residence
Stanford Research Institute
Telecommunications industry
June 2007 – December 2007 ( 7 months)
Preparing internet venture for Fall 2007 launch.
General Manager
Motorola
Public Company; Telecommunications industry
August 2002 – May 2007 (4 years 10 months)
Vice President
Telenor Mobile
Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; Telecommunications industry
April 2000 – August 2002 (2 years 5 months)
Education
Handelshøyskolen BI
MBA, Strategy and Marketing
1993 – 1994
From Crunchbase:
http://www.crunchbase.com/person/dag-kittlaus
Siri’s CEO is Dag Kittlaus, who founded the company as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at SRI.
A serial innovator and consumer wireless internet veteran of 10 years in Scandinavia and the US, Dag is working on creating his third consecutive mobile internet product with over a million users.
Dag has held leadership roles as VP of Consumer Internet Services at Scandinavian telecom giant Telenor Mobile, and several consumer product groups at Motorola including GM of xProducts and founder and GM of Motorola’s Interactive Media Group. He conceived and launched Screen3, a breakthrough consumer mobile application currently used by millions of users and adopted by Cingular, China Mobile, and Telefonica.
See also posts here:
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-origins-in-calo.html
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/03/siri-ai-assistant-startup.html
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
RPX and Intellectual Ventures - Patent buyers
"Like most venture-backed firms, RPX Corporation, a new company devoted solely to buying patents, hopes to make a lot of money and eventually go public.
But the strategy of the start-up, backed by the blue-chip venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Charles River Ventures, is exactly the opposite of the other patent funds. It buys patents with the expressed intention of not using them and not suing anyone else who does."
http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/31/trolling-for-patents-to-fight-patent-trolls/
Main article: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/30/trolling-for-patents-to-fight-patent-trolls/
The term "Patent Trolling" is derogatory - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_troll#cite_note-39 and WSJ article, Inventors have rights too by Nathan Myrhvold
About RPX http://www.rpxcorp.com/company.html
RPX News http://www.rpxcorp.com/releases/index.html
RPX Blog http://rpxcorp.com/blog/
See also Nathan Myhrvold (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Myhrvold) former Microsoft CTO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Myhrvold
Head of similar firm, Intellectual Ventures: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_Ventures
Intellectual Ventures: http://www.intellectualventures.com/
Intellectual Ventures News: http://www.intellectualventures.com/news.aspx
Article on Intellectual Ventures: http://74.125.113.132/search?q=cache:http://www.intven.com/docs/IAM_Issue_19_Cover_Story.pdf
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/
But the strategy of the start-up, backed by the blue-chip venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Charles River Ventures, is exactly the opposite of the other patent funds. It buys patents with the expressed intention of not using them and not suing anyone else who does."
http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/31/trolling-for-patents-to-fight-patent-trolls/
Main article: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/30/trolling-for-patents-to-fight-patent-trolls/
The term "Patent Trolling" is derogatory - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_troll#cite_note-39 and WSJ article, Inventors have rights too by Nathan Myrhvold
About RPX http://www.rpxcorp.com/company.html
RPX News http://www.rpxcorp.com/releases/index.html
RPX Blog http://rpxcorp.com/blog/
See also Nathan Myhrvold (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Myhrvold) former Microsoft CTO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Myhrvold
Head of similar firm, Intellectual Ventures: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_Ventures
Intellectual Ventures: http://www.intellectualventures.com/
Intellectual Ventures News: http://www.intellectualventures.com/news.aspx
Article on Intellectual Ventures: http://74.125.113.132/search?q=cache:http://www.intven.com/docs/IAM_Issue_19_Cover_Story.pdf
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/
Friday, March 27, 2009
How to make money from online content, even after it gets loose on third-party websites.
Embracing Piracy by Erica Nanone
"addressing the problem in two ways. First, the company is working with online ad networks to share revenue with the owner of any content that appears on an ad-supported site. Attributor is also testing code that attaches ads to articles, no matter where the article appears. A site can grab an article with permission, as long as the code that handles the ads is in place. Robinson noted that there's still a lot to work out, such as figuring out the minimum amount of compensation that the content creator should accept."
http://www.technologyreview.com/web/22350/
Attributor website:
http://www.attributor.com/
Attributor White Paper: Set your content free and monetize it
http://www.attributor.com/docs/Setyourcontentfree.pdf
SEE ALSO http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/attributor-everthing-you-want-to-know.html
"addressing the problem in two ways. First, the company is working with online ad networks to share revenue with the owner of any content that appears on an ad-supported site. Attributor is also testing code that attaches ads to articles, no matter where the article appears. A site can grab an article with permission, as long as the code that handles the ads is in place. Robinson noted that there's still a lot to work out, such as figuring out the minimum amount of compensation that the content creator should accept."
http://www.technologyreview.com/web/22350/
Attributor website:
http://www.attributor.com/
Attributor White Paper: Set your content free and monetize it
http://www.attributor.com/docs/Setyourcontentfree.pdf
SEE ALSO http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/attributor-everthing-you-want-to-know.html
Monday, March 23, 2009
The coming censorship wars
"it's well known that countries such as China, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam and South Korea all use a number of techniques to prevent their citizens gaining access to certain types of traffic. These techniques include blocking certain IP addresses, filtering traffic with certain URLs in the data packets and prefix hijacking, any of which could affect international traffic.
But according to Karlin and co, very little international traffic is routed through these countries so they pose a relatively small threat.
Less well known, they say, is that countries like Great Britain and Australia also censor traffic, albeit ona less pervasive scale. And that huge amounts of international traffic is routed through Britain.
The only country that is more influential than Britain by a measure invented by Karlin and co called the Country Centrality, is the US. The US, along with Sweden, allows wiretapping of international traffic without a warrant, not everybody's cup of tea. But routing your internet traffic to avoid the US, or Britain for that matter, would be a tricky business."
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/23184/
Josh Karlin website: http://www.cs.unm.edu/~karlinjf/#[[About%20Me]]
Josh Karln on "Mysteries of the Unregulated Internet" https://www.research.gov/rgov/gov/research/core/cms/news/printNewsDetail.jsp;jsessionid=R2hqJdvLG5PL915GQzMJb60hhvCJSrzQrLSnvG54F1G8TX08M7tQ!-34539227?nodePath=/BEA%20Repository/news/items/1223069797045
Scientific papers by Josh Karlin: http://en.scientificcommons.org/josh_karlin
But according to Karlin and co, very little international traffic is routed through these countries so they pose a relatively small threat.
Less well known, they say, is that countries like Great Britain and Australia also censor traffic, albeit ona less pervasive scale. And that huge amounts of international traffic is routed through Britain.
The only country that is more influential than Britain by a measure invented by Karlin and co called the Country Centrality, is the US. The US, along with Sweden, allows wiretapping of international traffic without a warrant, not everybody's cup of tea. But routing your internet traffic to avoid the US, or Britain for that matter, would be a tricky business."
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/23184/
Josh Karlin website: http://www.cs.unm.edu/~karlinjf/#[[About%20Me]]
Josh Karln on "Mysteries of the Unregulated Internet" https://www.research.gov/rgov/gov/research/core/cms/news/printNewsDetail.jsp;jsessionid=R2hqJdvLG5PL915GQzMJb60hhvCJSrzQrLSnvG54F1G8TX08M7tQ!-34539227?nodePath=/BEA%20Repository/news/items/1223069797045
Scientific papers by Josh Karlin: http://en.scientificcommons.org/josh_karlin
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Sense Networks Strikes Again
Sense Networks is the most popular girl at the popular tech mag ball.
See articles in Wired:
http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/16-08/st_thompson Clive Thompson on Real-World Social Networks vs. Facebook 'Friends'
and MIT Technology Review:
http://www.technologyreview.com/communications/20247/ TR10: Reality Mining: Sandy Pentland is using data gathered by cell phones to learn about human behavior.
http://www.technologyreview.com/communications/19968/ What Your Phone Knows About You; MIT's Sandy Pentland finds surprising implications in patterns of cell-phone use
See also Sense Networks news:
http://www.sensenetworks.com/media_center.php
"Over the course of any day, people congregate around different parts of a city. In the morning hours, workers commute downtown, while at lunchtime and in the evening, people disperse to eateries and bars.
While this sort of behavior is common knowledge, it hasn't been visible to the average person. Sense Networks, a startup based in New York, is now trying to bring this side of a city to life. Using cell-phone and taxi GPS data, the startup's software produces a heat map that shows activity at hot spots across a city. Currently, the service, called Citysense, only works in San Francisco, but it will launch in New York in the next few months."
http://www.technologyreview.com/communications/22286/?a=f
Science brought to you by Alex "Sandy" Pentland out of MIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Pentland
2004 Technology Review article by the man himself: http://www.technologyreview.com/web/13517/
They are funded by "hedge fund community and by founders of other leading finance and technology companies." I.e., Drobny Global Advisors and The Challenger Funds. Sounds like they made a great investment.
See articles in Wired:
http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/16-08/st_thompson Clive Thompson on Real-World Social Networks vs. Facebook 'Friends'
and MIT Technology Review:
http://www.technologyreview.com/communications/20247/ TR10: Reality Mining: Sandy Pentland is using data gathered by cell phones to learn about human behavior.
http://www.technologyreview.com/communications/19968/ What Your Phone Knows About You; MIT's Sandy Pentland finds surprising implications in patterns of cell-phone use
See also Sense Networks news:
http://www.sensenetworks.com/media_center.php
"Over the course of any day, people congregate around different parts of a city. In the morning hours, workers commute downtown, while at lunchtime and in the evening, people disperse to eateries and bars.
While this sort of behavior is common knowledge, it hasn't been visible to the average person. Sense Networks, a startup based in New York, is now trying to bring this side of a city to life. Using cell-phone and taxi GPS data, the startup's software produces a heat map that shows activity at hot spots across a city. Currently, the service, called Citysense, only works in San Francisco, but it will launch in New York in the next few months."
http://www.technologyreview.com/communications/22286/?a=f
Science brought to you by Alex "Sandy" Pentland out of MIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Pentland
2004 Technology Review article by the man himself: http://www.technologyreview.com/web/13517/
They are funded by "hedge fund community and by founders of other leading finance and technology companies." I.e., Drobny Global Advisors and The Challenger Funds. Sounds like they made a great investment.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Siri - AI Assistant Startup
We have met our share of secretive startups over the years, but few have been as secretive about their plans as Siri, which was founded in December 2007 and did not even have an official name until today. Siri was spun out of SRI International and its core technology is based on the highly ambitious CALO artificial intelligence project. Today, Siri announced that it has raised an $8.5 million Series A financing round, led by Menlo Ventures and Morgenthaler Ventures.
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/semantic_stealth_startup_siric.php
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/22117/
See also other Major Talmadge posts:
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-origins-in-calo.html
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-founder-on-linkedin.html
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/semantic_stealth_startup_siric.php
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/22117/
See also other Major Talmadge posts:
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-origins-in-calo.html
http://majorbenjamintalmadge.blogspot.com/2009/04/siri-assistant-founder-on-linkedin.html
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Two Conclusions on Amazon Mechanical Turk
Amazon Mechanical Turk: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Mechanical_Turk
I) The Amazon Mechanical Turk is related to traditional work and part-time jobs, just like micro finance is related to private equity and venture capital. The time commitment, value of the projects, and returns on the project are lower, however on the whole, it will make things more efficient. In the past, there was no market for these sort of internet odd jobs (e.g., a website needs content, so it offers $0.40 for someone to write a Top 10 list); now there is.
II) This site is of little (no) value in a liberal western country (i.e., a country where there is minimum wage, amply opportunities for part time jobs). Most of the jobs are under a dollar in value. The highest paying job (as of now) is $5 (but I have seen as high as ~$7). However, the US minimum wage is $6.55.
An American would have to be very efficient in order to make more than $6.55 in an hour using the Amazon Mechanical Turk (and most likely, the most efficient Americans have proper jobs).
However, the opportunities for the Third World to do this work is very promising; although it is limited by their access to the internet and their use for Amazon.com's currency.
I) The Amazon Mechanical Turk is related to traditional work and part-time jobs, just like micro finance is related to private equity and venture capital. The time commitment, value of the projects, and returns on the project are lower, however on the whole, it will make things more efficient. In the past, there was no market for these sort of internet odd jobs (e.g., a website needs content, so it offers $0.40 for someone to write a Top 10 list); now there is.
II) This site is of little (no) value in a liberal western country (i.e., a country where there is minimum wage, amply opportunities for part time jobs). Most of the jobs are under a dollar in value. The highest paying job (as of now) is $5 (but I have seen as high as ~$7). However, the US minimum wage is $6.55.
An American would have to be very efficient in order to make more than $6.55 in an hour using the Amazon Mechanical Turk (and most likely, the most efficient Americans have proper jobs).
However, the opportunities for the Third World to do this work is very promising; although it is limited by their access to the internet and their use for Amazon.com's currency.
Friday, April 11, 2008
Cut the Cute Crap
So many of these web 2.0 start ups are too cutesy.
For example, as I am setting up my Digg account, I keep getting little messages from Digg "Your email address looks valid - that's a good thing." "This is your password. Remember to Remember it." The Kluster people have their own mini language-Watts, telling me I can give members of my community "props", etc.
Yea, I get that you guys a young. But do you even talk like that in real life? It sounds like a middle aged person trying to sound young.
Even if you are marketing towards 18-35 year olds, the sort of people who would use these apps are sophisticated enough not to be wooed by the slang and MTV graphics. Or are they?
For example, as I am setting up my Digg account, I keep getting little messages from Digg "Your email address looks valid - that's a good thing." "This is your password. Remember to Remember it." The Kluster people have their own mini language-Watts, telling me I can give members of my community "props", etc.
Yea, I get that you guys a young. But do you even talk like that in real life? It sounds like a middle aged person trying to sound young.
Even if you are marketing towards 18-35 year olds, the sort of people who would use these apps are sophisticated enough not to be wooed by the slang and MTV graphics. Or are they?
Thursday, March 20, 2008
"Technology" as a sector of the economy
Magazines, newspapers, business entities, etc. typically classify "technology" as a sector of the economy.
Is this appropriate?
By technology, they typically mean companies/firms involved in computing, electronics, genetics, etc. However, this is not the true definition of technology:
So why not include the newest tractors or cranes next to the newest operating system?
Instead of saying "technology" is a sector of the economy, would it not be more appropriate to rather say that technology is the cutting edge of *every* industry? Or better yet, to replace the word "technology" with "cutting edge"?
Is this appropriate?
By technology, they typically mean companies/firms involved in computing, electronics, genetics, etc. However, this is not the true definition of technology:
| 1. | the branch of knowledge that deals with the creation and use of technical means and their interrelation with life, society, and the environment, drawing upon such subjects as industrial arts, engineering, applied science, and pure science. |
| 2. | the terminology of an art, science, etc.; technical nomenclature. |
| 3. | a technological process, invention, method, or the like. |
| 4. | the sum of the ways in which social groups provide themselves with the material objects of their civilization. |
So why not include the newest tractors or cranes next to the newest operating system?
Instead of saying "technology" is a sector of the economy, would it not be more appropriate to rather say that technology is the cutting edge of *every* industry? Or better yet, to replace the word "technology" with "cutting edge"?
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