Techcrunch40 conference: All TC40 presenting companies and “what they do” is summarized here in one single page. Effort is made to keep it brief and simple, representing facts in layman’s language minus the marketing fluff and all other heavy mambo jambo. Shouldn’t take you more than 5 minutes to finish the page.

After reading short company reviews here, if you want to know more about a company, you can click on the profile link, which will take you to startup’s profile page at Crunch Base. Also included are the links to the live coverage at Techcrunch in detail towards the end of this post. Enjoy!

List of startups presenting at Techcrunch 40 conference -at a glance:

App2You lets you create do-it-yourself database driven web-based applications using a simple browser based interface. (profile)

8020 Publishing lets online communities actively participate in creating print magazines, crowd sourcing the print magazine creation process, and providing the logistics and editorial oversight. (blog, profile)

Cake Financial (blog, profile)

CastTV is a video search engine which help users finding and cataloging videos from the web. (blog, profile)

Ceedo lets you take your Windows desktop environment with you on mobile devices. Just connect mobile device to a Windows-PC and start working. (blog, profile)

Clickable (blog, profile)

Cognitive Code provides SILVIA, a complete system for the development and deployment of intelligent application that allows humans to interact with computers in completely natural and intuitive ways - uses artificial intelligence. (blog, profile)

Crowd Spirit is all about Electronic Product Crowd sourcing - Define, design, invest, finalize, test, recommend electronic products and share product revenue. (blog, profile)

Cubic Telecom Cubic Telecom is a mobile startup focused on reducing roaming and call charges for overseas calls. (blog, profile)

DocStoc DocStoc is YouTube for documents. Upload, share and rate your documents with the world. (blog, profile)

eXtreme Reality (blog, profile)

Faroo is a Peer-to-Peer distributed search engine with a distributed index providing more democratic user centric ranking while sharing advertising revenue with users. (blog, profile)

Flock is a web browser which makes discovery and sharing of rich media (video, photos, blogs etc) easier while enhancing social networking experience. (blog, profile)

FlowPlay (blog, profile)

GotStatus (blog, profile)

Kerpoof (blog, profile)

LoudTalks is a push to talk free downloadable application, which allows you to talk to your friends or colleagues instantly with a single touch of a button. (blog, profile)

mEgo (blog, profile)

MetaPlace (blog, profile)

Mint (blog, profile)

MusicShake lets your create music without previous knowledge of music or expertise. You can create ringtones and personalized music. (blog, profile)

Orgoo (blog, profile)

Ponoko helps you convert your designs into real products, helps sell these products online or deliver directly to the customers. (blog, profile)

PowerSet (blog, profile)

PubMatic (blog, profile)

Spottt (blog, profile)

Story Blender lets your create video mashups from video clips, images and audio and share with your friends. (blog, profile)

Teach the People Lets you create communities for fun, education & innovation and share knowledge. Allows uploading of audio, video, docs and provides broadcasts, chat discussion boards etc. (blog, profile)

Tripit Tripit is a do-it-yourself online trip planner which lets your share your trip itineraries etc with friends. (blog, profile)

TruTap lets you IM from mobile phone, share pics etc across different Instant Mesaging (IM) networks. Requires app download to your phone. (blog, profile)

Viewdle allows monetization of videos by indexing and making embedded meta data searchable. Its facial-recognition technology enables better cataloging and more relevant search results. (blog, profile)

Wixi is a media sharing desktop which lets you store and share all your video, music and photos in one place. (blog, profile)

WooMe (blog, profile)

Xobni (blog, profile)

Yap lets you use your ordinary mobile phone to access applications by just talking into your phone, by providing voice-to-text translation services. You talk, they type. (blog, profile)

Zivity (blog, profile)

ZocDoc (blog, profile)

Techcrunch 40 Day 1 presentations:

TechCrunch 40 Session 1: Search & Discovery

TechCrunch 40 Session 2: Mobile & Communications

TechCrunch 40 Session 3: Community & Collaboration

TechCrunch 40 Session 4: Crowd Sourcing

Techcrunch40 Day 2 presentations:

TechCrunch40 Session 5: Productivity & Web Apps

TechCrunch40 Session 6: Revenue Models & Analytics

TechCrunch40 Session 7: Rich Media & Mash Ups

TechCrunch40 Session 8: Entertainment for All Ages

Note that some links will become functional on Sept 18 once the demos. Please leave a comment if you find any mistakes or inaccuracies.

In his post, the always interesting Paul Golding asked the question “Is personalization that important?” especially in the mobile sector.

In my opinion, Personalization is a vital part of this equation.

Personalization of mobile devices allows the creation of a unique user experience and a user-statement. Padmashree Warrior (Motorola) stated this as:

… user expectations in the mobile world revolve around Personalization, Mobilization and Socialization. Personalization is about reducing digital clutter, and making a world of exploding digital content increasingly relevant to you. Tomorrow’s personalization engines need to learn your preference and work with location and presence to deliver an experience tailored to you.

I think Personalization goes beyond that. It transcends the device, to include user-interaction, content, context and services. Device makers, service providers and the customers need to realize that they are part of a learning, adapting and evolving ecosystem. In such a system, the user should not only be able to customize, choose, create, distribute and control content, but this entire process, should in itself create additional value. When done correctly, everybody in the food chain gets a slice of this additional revenue.

Ringtones are one of the simplest examples that come to mind. They are a rage in Asia and Europe and catching up here. Third-party moblogging, location and presence based services focus on the ‘context’ aspect. This is the ‘Who Effect’ that Tony Fish referred to in his illuminating post.

To do this correctly, an open standards based approach has to be agreed upon and followed by all the stakeholders. Organizations such as W3C, Open Mobile Alliance and 3GPP have still a long way to go before Personalization standards are in place.

Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia’s chief executive has said, “Devices alone are not enough anymore. Consumers want a complete experience.”

Steve jobs just announced the availability of new iPod Touch. In fact the whole iPod product line is refreshed. The new introductions are iPod Nano (fatty!) -Video for everybody on a small 2” QVGA screen with new UI. A slightly thicker iPod with 160GB capacity is now available for $349 allowing you to carry 40,000 songs in your pocket.

For the iPhone lovers, the new iPod Touch is only 8 mm thick, with the same touch screen functionality of iPhone. Think of it as iPhone - phone, and a lot thinner. Wi-Fi has been missing in the iPod line-up for a long time, iPod Touch brings this much wanted feature to the iPod fans along with the very familiar Safari Browser, but no built-in speakers. Now you can watch your favorite YouTube videos while on the move.

With the built in browser in iPod Touch, now you don’t need to be at a computer to buy music. Now you can directly browse the iTunes store customized for Wi-Fi access using iPod Touch and preview or buy music to your hearts content. This new iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store will also be available via iPhone.

Apple is offering some interesting Wi-Fi and music mash-ups. One of the official mash-up feature is Starbucks Music integration through Wi-Fi. So next time you are getting your cup of Latte and like the music which is playing at Starbucks, with a dedicated button on your iPod Touch you can now buy that track instantly from iTunes store. In case you want to buy this track latter, your iPod Touch remembers the track which was playing when you visited Starbucks. We expect lot of open source hacks and applications in coming days from the creative folks.

This is great as Apple is making music more discoverable and tapping into the long tail of the market. What better place to sell music when customer is ready to buy it. True Web 2.0 customer experience and integration - When you want it - how you want it. Starbucks has 5800 WiFi enable stores nationwide, all of which allow free Wi-Fi access to iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store by 2009 in a phased roll-out plan.

My guess is that iPod Touch is going to become new status symbol however storage capacity offered is tiny as compared to normal iPod line-up. Probably apple is betting that the folks would use iPod Touch mostly for consuming online content through Wi-Fi. iPod Touch’s pricing is way too high for it to become a mass market product - you have to shell out $299 for 8GB version and $399 for 16GB version. This may be due to the expensive touch screen parts, but we may expect price drop or more capacity from Apple in next 4 to 6 months.

For more detailed live coverage of todays iPod Touch Launch, head over to Engadget.

Crunchgear is also covering the event live.

Update 1:

Zoli makes an interesting point, “iPhone without AT&T baggage”

And Dave Winer is not impressed

Micro- or Nano-blogging, Presence Messengers and ways to share or send stuff are part of the same ecosystem: services that operate with a slightly different or overlapping focus. Tumblr, Dodgeball, Jaiku, Plaxo, Twitter, Pownce, … are the relevant examples, of which I touched upon Twitter, Jaiku and Pownce. Let us now analyze these services with some simple questions.

Are they useful?

I think such services are partly useful to a segment of the market but only for a short period of time. They can be addictive but that does not increase their usefulness. Of course, there is potential in such services. In many parts of the world, the mobile phone will be the first computer people will be using and so the reach is tremendous only if the mobile component is part of the picture.

Services should fulfill a genuine need and also make the customer perceive that they are useful. Companies use Technology to meet the first requirement and Marketing for the second. Getting a text message that your salary has been credited to your bank account is an example for this. Companies have to work hard to bridge the need and the perception: Say, you ‘Twitter’ that you want to brush your teeth but are out of toothpaste, and P&G pipes in with a discount coupon to help you save on any of their toothpaste brands; you use it when you shop the next time. Such a transaction could be beneficial to all parties (Twitter pockets a tiny commission).

Is there a Business Model?

This is the weakest spot. Companies like Pownce or Twitter have temporary ‘eyeballs’. Revenue models are questionable. On paper, Pownce has advertising and the premium subscription. Twitter does not even have that. In my opinion, even without competition, they will not last because of technology-shifts. What they offer are not break-throughs in technology, but utilities. So, it is easy for competition to catch up or buy them out for low valuation. As we can see, there are already lots of players on the same turf.

Can they get customers? It may seem easy to get customers since the thresholds are lower in such simple utilities. It is much easier to text out your micro-blog than labor out a regular blog. The UI is much better and Personalization is in. Multiple mobile devices are supported so you don’t need a computer to micro-blog; your cell phone will do. But, all this is just not enough for the customers to switch. Om Malik’s reaction is typical of most customers. Grabbing their attention is the challenge. Unless you generate enough ‘buzz’ at that time, making it seem like a prize to join the latest community, it will be impossible to differentiate. Focusing on a niche segment is one way to go.

Can they keep customers? Here, keeping their attention is the challenge. George Colony, the CEO of Forrester Research puts it beautifully: you have to re-earn your customer’s loyalty every day. Consumers are fickle because a new toy will grab their next fifteen seconds of attention. Factors like ‘blog fatigue’, ‘connected fatigue‘ also play a role. The advantage of such services is that the customer can define his/her audience and share opinions and stuff without worrying about acceptance among friends. Facebook and Myspace have so far been successful in retaining majority of users, but how long they can continue to do that remains to be seen. Most of the people stay because their friends and contacts are there. Sooner or later there are bound to be tools which will allow you export out your contacts and content from one social network to another. Plaxo Pulse is one such initiative, and if Pulse delivers what it promises, it will break the lock-in of social networking sites on the users. Such sites could offer a better value proposition for users to stay on.

“People will bring this into work eventually and so businesses will use such services” - Jyri (of Jaiku) said in interview with Scoble. Enterprises are taking a cautious approach to social-networking in the office space. Even CIA is launching a social networking site for its spies. On one hand is the need to keep the professional separate from personal and on the other hand, to encourage the social and interaction aspects to harness the full-potential. However, there are already many reports of businesses blocking access to Facebook and schools blocking access to MySpace. Have to keep an eye on the emerging trends.

Is it all Fluff and No Substance?

Such offerings are accused of having only fluff and no substance. I see nothing wrong about it. Twitter or Jaiku do not claim their services will change the course of human history. They just enable you to Lifecast or share stuff with others. Yes, this is about Attention Economy and people have just a few seconds to dash off a text message to share or broadcast. Likewise as a receiver, you have just a few seconds to be confirm that your wife picked up the kids or that this is the right time to call Tom because he is having a coffee-break. Lee Gomes provides this relevant tidbit in his well-written post:

Some folks may lament the vaunted Information Superhighway being used to transport banalities such as what someone is eating. If it’s any consolation, the same thing happened with the telephone, says Claude S. Fischer, the UC Berkeley sociologist whose book, “America Calling,” is a social history of telephones in the U.S. “The telephone was initially conceived of for very serious purposes,” Prof. Fischer says. “But sometime during the 1920s, AT&T decided that ‘idle chatter’ would be a good way to make money. It started to encourage people to pick up the phone for any purpose they want.”
Prof. Fischer says he is as astounded as anyone, certainly as any older person, by the humdrum nature of many Internet communications. “If you look at the content, you’d have to say, ‘What is the point of them?’ But a psychologist might say that the point isn’t the content, it’s the connection.”

What about Privacy?

Usually a lot of fuss is made about Privacy issues. It is important to understand that what exactly constitutes private information can vary depending on the context. There ought to be proper tools and mechanisms to handle privacy issues appropriately. This is where most of the debate should focus. The products and services put out should be flexible enough for the consumer to define and control what he/she is willing to share. In the end, it is an act of negotiation where the consumer is willing to share a part of his private information in return for some benefit.

Unlike Twitter or Jaiku, Pownce is not a messaging service or a presence-announcer. Pownce focuses on your sharing stuff with your friends. That stuff could be photos, music, messages, links, events, etc. to your friends from your PC/laptop to your friends who are connected to you on Pownce.

Kevin Rose (of Digg fame) started Pownce with three other friends as an offering from their company - Megatechtronium.

I have been checking out Pownce. I am not impressed by the browser interface but the desktop application is much cooler since it is based on Adobe’s AIR. While we are still waiting for the Pownce API to be opened up, why are the feeds missing in a social-networking Web 2.0 application such as this? The ability to import the events into your calendar application is useful. If you shell out US$20/year, you are allowed file-sizes upto 100MB and no advertisements to bother you. Now, I don’t think that has enough pull to get paid subscribers.

Pownce is taking the lessons from Twitter seriously by adding members through invitations only. This will allow them to scale in a measured way. By the way, some folks you may want to befriend on Pownce are here. A nice feature about Pownce is that you can define sets of friends so that you can have your ‘islands’ of ‘friends at office’, ‘neighborhood pals’, ‘college buddies’, etc. No SMS or ‘moblogging’ feature is available, unless you actually access your web on your mobile phone to share stuff.

So, as you can see, Pownce operates in a slightly different space as compared to Twitter or Jaiku. We will examine these related spaces a little more closely in my forthcoming post.

Jaiku is the leader of the Micro-blogging pack: ‘The Presence Messenger’. Jaiku says that its “main goal is to bring people closer together by enabling them to share their presence. Jaiku is a phone book that lets you share your real-time rich presence from the phone”. The shared short messages are called Jaikus.

Though Jaiku was the first to allow threaded comments, there are still some rough edges. As of now, you cannot comment on somebody’s Jaiku through the mobile phone. Jaiku only allows short text messages, limiting the message length to 140 characters; so the funny part is that the comments can be longer than the post.

Of the two Jaiku founders, Jyri Engestrom and Petteri Koponen, Jyri worked at Nokia as a Senior Product Manager and brings Sociology background to the team while Petteri focuses on Bizdev and core technology. High profile Jaiku converts from Twitter include celebrities like Leo Laporte.

Jaiku believes in a federated model. For example, I can import my Twitter on Jaiku. Like Facebook - Jaiku and Twitter have both opened up the API, while Pownce is working on announcing their official API.

You can find my previous post on Twitter here. More on micro blogging in my next post.

Further Reading:

Marko Ahtisaari does a great job to convince you why he uses Jaiku
Duncan Riley makes a case for switching from Twitter to Jaiku
Kristen Nicole announces the iPhone version of Jaiku on Mashable
Robert Scoble interviews the Jaiku team in this interesting video
Emily Turrettini’s announces the start of Jaiku service on her blog

Update 1:

Here is another good post comparing mini blogging solutions

I read this morning on Read/writeweb that Yahoo has released its Ajax version of the Yahoo Mail, and it is no more beta.

One of the coolest feature is the ability to send and receive SMS messages to any phone number directly from email interface. You enjoy unlimited storage and integrated Instant Messaging in Yahoo Mail, but you still have to shell out money if you want to enjoy email forwarding and pop access. I

Om Malik points out that globally 3 trillion SMS messages are sent by mobile users, and unlike email for which you need a computer or a terminal to access your account, any mobile user can send and receive SMS messages, bringing social equilibrium and breaking class barrier.

The popularity of SMS parallels that of email: It is simple, easy and doesn’t need any expensive gear to send or receive. Like email, it is socialist in its usage — a cheap $50 phone can send and receive SMS messages from a luxury model, Nokia N95 and even more snobbish iPhone.

Gmail however still remains Techcrunch’s favorite, even though Yahoo is offering unlimited storage for email and Gmail charges beyond a certain point. Read Mike’s thorough writeup here.

Disclaimer: This is a real blog. Not a 140-character SMS that broadcasts your reply to the ultimate question that the rest of humanity is begging you to answer: “What are you doing at this moment?”In other words, I’m not twittering or powncing.

Twitter has received a lot of publicity, which helps me tread a little lightly on the details. The idea was hatched on March 13, 2006. Who’s behind it? Biz Stone, Jack Dorsey and Evan Williams (of Blogger fame). It was born in Oct 2006, quoting from Twitter blog:
Twitter was in part created because we thought the increasing amount of folks using the status message field in their IM client to indirectly communicate with friends indicated a potential need or market for a service built around that sort of use case.

Essentially, Twitter users send short messages of upto 140 characters that can be viewed either on a website or on mobile phones. You can either make it public (seen by all others who have a Twitter account) or to a select group of contacts that you choose. By April 2007, they had around 94k users, their popularity growing faster than the twiddling thumbs, leading naturally to some scaling hiccups. You can put the Twitter widget on your website so that your blog readers could know what you are upto each time you update it. You can integrate with your other IM identities from AIM, Gtalk, LiveJournal, Jabber, SMS Mobile Texting, and the Web Interface. Naturally, with a name like this, it has given rise to its own lexicon -Twettering, Twitterer, Twitterific, Twitterrhea, Twitterphobia and so on ….

Liz Lawley’s interesting post summarizes as: What Twitter does, in a simple and brilliant way, is to merge a number of interesting trends in social software usage personal blogging, lightweight presence indicators, and IM status messages into a fascinating blend of ephemerality and permanence, public and private.

The service is free and its business plan, as per current trend, does not exist. Serious believers think that “you build it; they will come and a business model will emerge” works for Twitter. Its star is in ascendency, among its users are personalities such Robert Scoble and even John Edwards. This area of ‘mini-blogging’ has too many wannabes - Dodgeball (acquired by Google), Jaiku, the Status line of Facebook, and Pownce (Kevin Rose’s new startup).

In the coming post, I will be digging deeper and will analyze the social impact of ‘mini personal status broadcasting systems’.

Further Reading:

Jeff Barr is quite enthusiastic about Twitter
Fred Wilson shares a VC perspective, calling Twitter “the Status Broadcasting System of the Internet”
Alex Iskold expounds forth on the Read/WriteWeb blog
A counterpoint from Scott of Jangro
SF Chronicle coverage