Hearty Congratulations go to Mr. Mark Hurst, president of Creative Good. InfoWorld just bestowed upon him its "Netrepreneur of the Year" award. Mark credits his receiving the award in part to the report he co-authored with Robert Seidman, "In Search of E-Commerce." The second edition of this report (http://www.goodreports.com) shows how sites like Amazon and Dell improved their usability since the report was first released. And the kicker? Many of the changes were suggested in the original release of the report last June. Mark said that he is "happy that *customers*, not technology, were the focus of the Netrepreneur award..."
UniversityVentures, Inc. (http://www.uventures.com), the Silicon Alley intellectual property (IP) development firm, announces the hiring of securities industry veteran Thomas F. Kane, Jr. as Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Kane joins co-founders Mr. Heraman and President and General Counsel Craig Zolan as executives of the company.
Marc Perton has just joined Oxygen Media, where he'll be working on personal finance content. Mr. Perton was previously at Citibank.
One of my favoritely-named companies in the Alley has just closed a $3 million first round of financing led by Dawntreader LP. Sybarite (which stands for "a luxurious person") Interactive is now named LivePerson and also received financing from Sterling Payot Capital, LP, Silicon Alley Venture Partners, LLC, FGII, and a group of individual investors.
With great regret a little start-up had to close-up shop. MileNet will be shutting down its service indefinitely due to an overwhelming demand on their server and lack of financing for infrastructure improvements. Since they launched in early November, about 30,000 people downloaded and used their software to earn frequent flier miles by keeping MileNet on their desktops and sending it to friends. Zen and Andy, of MileNet, expressed sincere apologies that they were not able to deliver the service and quality they hoped to. For information on how to redeem miles, please visit: http://www.milenet.com
A chronicle of the people and events in technology, internet and media since 1997, mixed in with snapshots of musings and observations.
