Michael Mikikian, Founder of LA-based Gickup, which we have covered before, wants to bring back an oldie but goodie – The Dating Game. Yes, the cheesy, super popular game show that ran from 1965 to 1986. This time, of course, it will be all online – and The Blind Video Dating Game (BVDG) looks really…
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Tell me if you’ve experienced this frustration for yourself. You and a group of friends go to a major event – e.g. college football game, music festival, or technology conference. Throughout the event’s various highlights, you and your friends are snapping pictures as if you worked for TMZ and everyone was Lindsey Lohan (is she…
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Way back at the beginning of the month, Zamp was a showcased startup at our SXSW #StartupLife Celebration. Founder Sam Zebarjadi was gracious enough to sit down for an interview, which became part of our SXSW video series (you can watch the interview here). He talked about his really cool social travel service that connects…
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The Internet has opened up new avenues of fundraising for charities, and you’ll see one in action on June 14: Twive and Receive, a competition by Razoo. Twive and Receive is a friendly battle where nonprofits try to raise the most money in a 24-hour period (Pacific time). The top nonprofits/cities will win $15,000 (first…
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Facebook recently introduced the Timeline format for personal accounts, which organized users’ activity according to the time it took place. A similar format was then rolled out for business pages. The new Timeline can have a big impact on the way businesses manage their Facebook account. On March 30th, 2012, Timeline will be rolled out to all business pages…
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Looking for a new way to communicate with your friends, family, and customers? The just-launched DC-based startup RantRally is a social site that lets you record messages and quickly and easily share those messages with others. Your listeners will immediately know it’s you, providing an emotional connection and human element that text lacks. It’s super…
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In my blog post last week, I used Pinterest as an example of a website whose Terms of Service (TOS) sells out its users by trying to shift all risk onto them. As I pointed out, Pinterest’s indemnity clause (which made a user liable for any copyright infringement based on an image the user pinned)…
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As I discussed in one of my previous posts, social gaming is the current trend in video games. It is very interesting how more games are beginning to incorporate social gaming as part of their main mechanics (successful games such as Zynga’s Farmville or Lolapps’ Ravenwood Fair are the leaders in this space). For example,…
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“What are you doing?” This was the simple question posed by Twitter back in its early days. Now with a roughly $8 billion valuation, turns out that was a very valuable question. There stands reason to believe that there is gold buried in the question of “what are you doing later?” - but as of…
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A note from guest author Matthew Levy: “This post represents my personal opinions. These opinions should not be attributed to Cloudigy Law or anyone else associated with the firm. I am solely responsible for this content.” So you have a great idea for a new social media site. You’ve gotten your platform built, you’ve got…
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Social capital: is it some high falutin, new-age terminology meant to give relevance to the irrelevant or the most undervalued hiring criteria in today’s economy? Nicole Antoinette co-creator, wordsmith and marketing director for the recently released iPhone wallpaper app, Paper’d, is making a strong case for the latter. In the seven days since the app’s release, Paper’d has already…
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I went to my first SXSW when I was 17, using my sister’s badge to catch a glimpse of Janeane Garofolo at Emos in Austin. You can watch that SXSW described by then-musician Fred Armisen here. The conference has come a very long way since then. Originally a ploy by Austin bars to stay full during…
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Managing marketing and social media is not easy, even with the resources of a large company. Jessica Jensen, Senior Marketing Manager at Microsoft, stopped by our SXSW #StartupLife Celebration Saturday to talk about the challenges of marketing in today’s day and age when there’s so much noise to break through. As you’ll see in the…
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Who is going to win social discovery? Last week, we interviewed Paul Davison, founder Highlight – this year’s most buzzed about social discovery app at SXSW. We also had the opportunity to sit down with Damien Patton, founder of Banjo, likely the consensus as second place contestant in this race. After talking with each of…
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Last week at the Launch Festival, NYC-based Couple Street (Couple St.) unveiled the first social network for only two people. Couple Street allows couples to stay connected, organize their common life, and enjoy private and intimate communication. “Facebook is for friends, LinkedIn for business relationships, and Couple St. supports the most important relationship of your…
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Jeff Dachis cofounded digital marketing firm Razorfish in the ’90s, raising an IPO of around $50 million in 1999. Nowadays, he’s working as the CEO of Dachis Group, a social media consultancy that serves 30,000 brands – including AT&T, Disney, HP, Nokia, and Target. They also maintain the Social Business Index to rank the performance…
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Two months after the iPad 2 debuted in March, around 40% of users surveyed said their iPad was their primary computer, up from around 30%... Read More
There are a number of startup accelerator and incubator programs in the United States. We are fans of these programs (not to be confused with... Read More
We are excited to announce the participating startups for Tech Cocktail's South by Southwest (SXSW) event: #Startuplife Celebration presented by .CO. It was one of... Read More
With our Startup Mixology Conference coming up next week followed by our classic Tech Cocktail DC Summer mixer which will showcase a handful of early-stage... Read More