David Lidsky's Blog, page 3139
October 24, 2014
Ebola.com Sells For $50,000 To A Marijuana Startup
Ebola.com just got a big Las Vegas payout.
It's the kind of story that could only happen in Las Vegas: Ebola.com, a web domain purchased by speculators in 2008 for $13,500, just sold for $50,000 and a large number of shares in a marijuana startup owned by the former governor of New Mexico. Chris Hood and Jon Schultz, who own a total of 5,000 domain names in their portfolio including Birdflu.com, sold the domain to a company named the Weed Growth Fund.
Survey: Venture Capitalists A Little Less Confident
A new survey indicates Silicon Valley VCs are losing confidence in the economy.
Are Silicon Valley investors worried about the economy? A new survey says… maybe. University of San Francisco professor Mark Cannice polled over 30 tech industry venture capitalists and found the first decline in economic confidence by VCs in two years. According to Cannice's survey, respondents' average ranking of the economy dropped from 4.02 to 3.89 on a five-point scale.
Ikea's New Desk Goes From Sitting To Standing With The Push Of A Button
Sit. Swoosh. Stand.
Anyone who's priced a convertible desk that they can both sit and stand at knows it's an expensive proposition that can quickly reach into four digits. If only Ikea made one in birchwood veneer, or something.
Why There Is No Available Ebola Vaccine
A vaccine was found to be 100% effective at protecting monkeys against Ebola, but pharma's business model kept it on the shelf.
New York City officials have been working hard to prevent the public from panicking after a doctor living in Harlem was diagnosed with Ebola. "He did not have a stage of disease that creates a risk of contagiousness on the subway," Dr. Mary Bassett, the city health commissioner, said. "We consider it extremely unlikely, the probability being close to nil, that there will be any problem related to his taking the subway system."
Paul Budnitz's Bohemian Rhapsody, Ello
If SoHo were turned into a social network, it might look something like Ello.
Paul Budnitz's buzzy invite-only social network Ello is a hot ticket in Silicon Valley right now. But Budnitz is not your typical tech entrepreneur, having last run a bicycle shop in Burlington, Vermont, far from the shadow of the California tech scene. Ello, a still-in-beta experiment that has attracted $5.5 million in venture backing, is his side project. And it's unlikely to have a measurable impact on existing social networks anytime soon.
Inside America's First Cat Café
It's in Oakland, California and it was hell to open.
The race to open the first cat café in the U.S. is over. As of Catur-- er, Saturday, October 25, Oakland's Cat Town Café will welcome cat and coffee lovers to its friendly space in the city's Uptown neighborhood for lattes and lap cuddles alike.
The Internet Is Full Of People Pretending To Be Animals
Specifically, cats and dogs. And some wolves.
The below Twitter exchange is in two languages. One is obvious: It's in Thai. The second is harder to understand because it's also written in . . . dog.
October 23, 2014
#FastPet: Do You Have A Cover Star?
Special, limited time offer: we'll put your pet on the cover of Fast Company! (Sorta)
This has been quite a week for Pet Week and to cap it off, we are going to be doing something silly for a few hours on Oct. 24th:
Paul Allen Donates $100 Million To Fight Ebola
The Microsoft cofounder's gift will buy medical equipment, pay salaries, and launch partnerships with med schools.
Paul Allen, Microsoft's cofounder, just donated $100 million to the fight against Ebola. The donation, announced today at a Seattle press conference, will go toward supplies for humanitarian aid workers, training, lab equipment, and employees for Liberian health care providers (in collaboration with the University of Massachusetts Medical School), and creation of a new crowdfunding website called TackleEbola. Allen's announcement follows a previous earmarking of $26 million to the Centers for Disease Control and several other medical group.
Can Target Reclaim Its Design Moxie?
CEO Brian Cornell wants to compete on product, and not just price
As Target gears up for its first holiday season since an epic breach of its data systems last year, new CEO Brian Cornell is shifting away from discounts and toward design, with a renewed focus on dressing both its customers and their homes. Whether that strategy will pay off remains to be seen.
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