The mobile phone versions of the Opera browser will now come with Google as the default search engine. The new deal applies to Opera Mini and Opera Mobile; the desktop version of Opera already offers Google as the default search engine. Opera’s mobile versions currently have an install base of 35million users. The financial details of the […]

The mobile phone versions of the Opera browser will now come with Google as the default search engine.

The new deal applies to Opera Mini and Opera Mobile; the desktop version of Opera already offers Google as the default search engine. Opera’s mobile versions currently have an install base of 35million users.

The financial details of the deal weren’t disclosed, but it would be fair to guess that Google just paid its way into Opera’s mobile user base at the expense of Yahoo, the previous paying provider.

The deal is effective March 1 and applies everywhere except within the borders of the former Soviet Union.

Note that Google is also a partial owner of the Maxthon browser, via a 2007 investment.

Update:

we’ve received this response from Yahoo

Yahoo! has elected not to continue its mobile search partnership with Opera at this time. Yahoo! oneSearch is an industry leading mobile search service and offers an innovative and compelling search experience for mobile consumers around the globe. With more than 29 carrier partnerships covering over 600 million consumers, we’ve experienced tremendous success and received extraordinary consumer response from oneSearch users. Our capability to partner with leading mobile operators and handset manufacturers enables us to lead and further the global mobile ecosystem. Consumers with Opera browsers will continue to have access to Yahoo! oneSearch, and as long-standing partners, Opera and Yahoo! will continue to work together.

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By Andrew Liszewski I’m not thrilled with the idea of owning a home, mostly because of all the added responsibilities like cutting the lawn, shoveling snow and having to be that mean neighbor who always confiscates baseballs and Frisbees that land in my yard. But on the other hand a home grants you to do things […]

By Andrew Liszewski

I’m not thrilled with the idea of owning a house, mostly because of all the added responsibilities like cutting the lawn, shoveling snow and having to be that mean neighbor who always confiscates baseballs and Frisbees that land in my yard. But on the other hand a house allows you to do things like install a dedicated home theater or even cooler, your own bowling alley.

United Bowling, a Florida based company will install a 2 lane, full regulation length bowling alley in your home complete with genuine AMF and Brunswick equipment like pin stackers and ball returns. You’ll need a minimal area that’s 88 feet long, 12 feet wide with a 10 foot ceiling, but if the kids have moved out there’s no reason not to demolish their bedrooms in order to make room for such an awesome upgrade. Of course at $88,000 it’s not a cheap upgrade, but if it was worth it to Daniel Plainview, then it’s worth it to me.

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Household, Sports

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New York-based Magnify.net has raised $1M in a Series A round involving Next Stage Capital, New York Angels, Rose Tech Ventures, Active Angel Investors, Ogden Capital, Gideon Gartner, and Chris Anderson. The company is also claiming to have attracted 30,000 publishers and over three million visitors per month. Each publisher on Magnify.net sets up a so-called […]

New York-based Magnify.net has raised $1M in a Series A round involving Next Stage Capital, New York Angels, Rose Tech Ventures, Active Angel Investors, Ogden Capital, Gideon Gartner, and Chris Anderson.

The company is also claiming to have attracted 30,000 publishers and over three million visitors per month. Each publisher on Magnify.net sets up a so-called channel where they can aggregate user generated videos found across the internet on places like YouTube. Magnify.net also recently added webcam broadcasting capabilities so presumably this figure includes webcam channels as well.

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Google is continuing to try to disrupt Microsoft’s bid for Yahoo, and, we’ve heard, may even be considering a bid to acquire a significant chunk of Yahoo’s stock (keep reading though, we’re calling this a long shot at best). Google clearly wants to see the status quo continue in the search space, and would rather […]

Google is continuing to try to disrupt Microsoft’s bid for Yahoo, and, we’ve heard, may even be considering a bid to acquire a significant chunk of Yahoo’s stock (keep reading though, we’re calling this a long shot at best).

Google clearly wants to see the status quo continue in the search space, and would rather fight a fragmented market than a single, stronger, Microsoft/Yahoo. That’s why they weighed in shortly after the initial Microsoft bid, saying “Microsoft’s hostile bid for Yahoo! raises troubling questions.”

Sources with knowledge of the deal are saying that Google also hired veteran M&A expert George Boutros as Credit Suisse the day after the Microsoft bid was made, to advise them on how to respond to the deal. That advice, one source says, may be leading Google to place an unsolicited bid to acquire just under 20% of Yahoo’s stock at an inflated price.

The goal isn’t so much to close the deal, which would almost certainly be opposed by U.S. regulatory agencies. But rather to throw another curve ball at the Yahoo Board, which is already dealing with the Microsoft bid and a likely challenge to their board seats this June. If the Yahoo Board, particularly the outside board members, were preparing to fold to Microsoft, a Google bid might give them pause. And any delay buys Google time - during which other factors can come into play to stop the deal.

“It’s a relatively cheap way for Google to confuse the situation further, and, potentially delay or disrupt a Microsoft acquisition” said one advisor to the deal, requesting to remain anonymous.

While multiple sources have confirmed that Google is being advised by Boutros, only one is saying that Google might be preparing to place a bid in the next couple of weeks. Credit Suisse analyst Heath Terry said last November “Over time, Google will continue to gain share until they have effectively reached 100 percent.”

Arbitrageurs, who today hold as much as 20% of Yahoo’s stock during this risky period, have not heard this rumor, either, according to another source. These are the guys that hire private investigators to track executives and known advisors, monitor private jet traffic and otherwise gather information about possible M&A deals through any legal (and sometimes not so legal) means at their disposal. Generally they hear rumors first, and trade on the information before the press gets their hands on it. For example, some arbitrageurs say they had already factored in News Corp.’s possible Yahoo bid days before we broke the news. The fact that the arbitrageurs holding yahoo stock haven’t heard anything about this makes the rumor significantly less likely to be accurate.

Assuming Microsoft does not back away from its bid, look for them to nominate their own slate of directors for the Yahoo board a few days in advance of the March 13 deadline. Google, or anyone else who might try to disrupt this deal, will likely make their move before then.

Thanks to Nathan Lipson at TheMarker (he’s currently shaking down sources in New York) for comparing notes with us on the rumor mongering.

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Site-specific search provider Eurekster is today releasing a new version of its Swicki product that features a set community features on its results and home pages. The free Swicki search widget, used here on TechCrunch in the right-hand column, provides a cloud of popular search terms and leads to a page with results voted on by […]

Site-specific search provider Eurekster is today releasing a new version of its Swicki product that features a set community features on its results and home pages.

The free Swicki search widget, used here on TechCrunch in the right-hand column, provides a cloud of popular search terms and leads to a page with results voted on by users and optionally collected from related sites.

The new version attempts to bring even more attention to the site-specific Swicki community built around search. The following components will now show up on the results page: a summary of the most recent comments (users can comment on search results) and a list of the top Swicki comment contributors. On the Swicki homepage for a site (each site that adds the search functionality also gets a community overview homepage), you will now be able to see the top voted search results, a list of the most recent posts, and related RSS feeds.

I’ve never been a huge fan of the Swicki search we have here on TechCrunch, since I prefer to see just a reverse chronological list of the posts related to my search term, not a list weighted by user votes. If you search “facebook”, for example, the first result comes from March 2006 and not terribly relevant anymore.

However, I can understand why community-based search is useful for less newsy sites, such as the home repair example that Eurekster has provided us to the left. For standing resources such as this one, the feedback of the community can be particularly helpful for refining search results, pushing the best to the top. Today’s improvements should help to strengthen that community and encourage participation.

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By Evan Ackerman The Optimus keyboard is pretty and all, but it’s awfully flat and keyboardy. The Zen Sandbox PC may be monochrome, but it uses some kind of conceptual “z-axis” electronic surface to create dynamically tactile 3D features that the user can manipulate. The Zen is designed for the visually impaired, since it would be able […]

By Evan Ackerman

The Optimus keyboard is pretty and all, but it’s awfully flat and keyboardy. The Zen Sandbox PC may be monochrome, but it uses some kind of conceptual “z-axis” electronic surface to create dynamically tactile 3D features that the user can manipulate.

The Zen is designed for the visually impaired, since it would be able to display braille, or a textured simulation of your computer desktop. You can also turn it into a piano, or a xylophone, or just about anything else you can imagine. At the moment, though, you’ll have to imagine the Zen too, because it and the technology that powers it are still just a concept.

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Concepts

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Yesterday San Diego based DivX announced the shutdown of popular video site Stage6, to the surprise and dismay of the site’s 17.4 million happy monthly visitors (the post on the shutdown has over 5,000 comments). There’s lots of speculation around why DivX is shutting the site down, ranging from piracy issues to the spiraling CDN […]

Yesterday San Diego based DivX announced the shutdown of popular video site Stage6, to the surprise and dismay of the site’s 17.4 million happy monthly visitors (the post on the shutdown has over 5,000 comments).

There’s lots of speculation around why DivX is shutting the site down, ranging from piracy issues to the spiraling CDN costs of streaming all that HD content. But what really happened, according to multiple sources, is that a ridiculous battle of egos at the DivX board level caused most of the team to simply quit. DivX, essentially, snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

First a bit of history - just before DivX went public in late 2006 it launched Stage6 as a way to show off the capabilities of the DivX codec. Without any promotion at all the site quickly gathered users. By mid 2007, when the site went into beta, it had millions of users and tens of millions of page views. The high quality video was key - users simply flocked to it.

DivX cofounder and CEO Jordan Greenhall knew he had a potential hit on his hands. He decided to explore a sale of Stage6, and hired investment bank Montgomery & Co. to see who might buy it. He also started pitching VCs on the idea of funding it as a spinoff. Given the conflict of interest, he resigned as CEO of DivX - president Kevin Hell took over the company. Darrius Thompson, (DivX co-founder), Mark How (DivX VP Business Development), Mark Chweh, Chester Ng and about 20 other DivX employees joined him. All shared the title of “cofounder” at Stage6.

Montgomery spent the second half of 2007 pitching Stage6 to buyers, although there wasn’t much interest. But VCs were eager to buy in to the idea of a spinoff. By November they had commitments from Crosslink Capital, Sofinnova France and Mission Ventures to invest $20 million at a $90 million post money valuation. Another $5 million was committed from a strategic investor, plus $2 million more from “friends and family.” All in all, Stage6 was preparing to close a $27 million round. DivX was to retain 20% ownership in the new funded entity.

Not only was DivX to receive a substantial chunk of equity in the new company, they’d be able to get the operating costs, estimated to be around $1 million/month in CDN costs alone, off their books. And Stage6 was to give most of their 2008 revenues back to Divx as well.

Those revenues were not immaterial. Everyone who views a video on Stage6 must first download the DivX player. Packaged with the download was an option to download the Yahoo Toolbar. The revenue from Yahoo to DivX is around $16 million per year. Our sources estimate that half that, or around $8 million/year, was due to Stage6 downloads. And that share was growing - 2008 toolbar revenues may have been as high as $10 million, making Stage6 almost breakeven.

At a meeting in late November the DivX board was asked to approve the spinoff and venture financing. But at the last minute the board decided to cancel the spinoff and retain control of Stage6. It’s not clear why they did this - perhaps they were surprised at the valuation and wanted to keep control of the assets. Or perhaps the revenue from Stage6 was too material for them to let it go over the long run. From what we hear a massive battle of ego’s ultimately killed the deal. But when the decision was made, the key Stage6 founders resigned. DivX made a brief announcement about Greenhall’s departure, and added that it “expects to take additional time to consider the alternatives available to the Company related to the future of the Stage6 service.”

From that point everyone expected DivX to just continue to run the site. But over December and January they may have become concerned again about the costs of streaming the video and running the site without most of the key team there to look after things. Three weeks ago, we hear, DivX re-approached Greenhall and asked if they’d like to do the original deal. Greenhall declined.

So then DivX announced the closure of Stage6. When it shuts down all those millions of DivX downloads and associated Yahoo revenue goes away with it. At the end of the day DivX threw out the baby, the bathwater, millions of dollars in revenue and tens of millions of users. Their board and executive team, in short, look like fools. Investors seem to agree - the stock hit an all time low today.

DivX declined to comment on this post.

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By Andrew Liszewski While Robot Coupe is actually an entire brand of catering equipment, I don’t think the word ‘robot’ is the best way to describe this automatic bread slicer. Just feed a baguette or similar sized loaf of bread into the vertical feeder and a stainless steel blade will cut anywhere from 180 to 360 […]

By Andrew Liszewski

While Robot Coupe is actually an entire brand of catering equipment, I don’t think the word ‘robot’ is the ideal way to describe this automatic bread slicer. Just feed a baguette or similar sized loaf of bread into the vertical feeder and a stainless steel blade will cut anywhere from 180 to 360 slices a minute. You can also vary the thickness of the slices from 8mm up to 80mm for some serious ‘Texas toast’ action.

But the lack of arms and the fact that you’ve to manually feed this thing baguettes just keeps it out of the robot category for me. However if you own a catering business or sandwich shop this could still be a great replacement for a slow assistant, but all that time you save better be used to sell more sandwiches since the Robot Coupe Bread Slicer has a price tag of about $2,700.

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Food, Kitchen, Robots

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By David Ponce So hey, I was thinking. I bought this here car stereo a couple weeks back, the JVC KD-NX5000. It’s pretty nice. So, below is my two minutes’ worth of impressions on it. Out here, the three-word verdict: awesome, slightly quirky. car stereo, mobile posts

By David Ponce

So hey, I was thinking. I bought this here car stereo a couple weeks back, the JVC KD-NX5000. It’s pretty nice. So, below is my two minutes’ worth of impressions on it.

Out here, the three-word verdict: awesome, slightly quirky.

car stereo, mobile posts

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Jay Gould, the former owner of a social network and video site called Bolt.com that was started in the nineties but shut down this past fall following bankruptcy at the hands of a Universal Music Group lawsuit, has launched a new advertising network for casual gaming sites called Gamers Media. The new network, which as GigaOm […]

Jay Gould, the former owner of a social network and video site called Bolt.com that was started in the nineties but shut down this past fall following bankruptcy at the hands of a Universal Music Group lawsuit, has launched a new advertising network for casual gaming sites called Gamers Media.

The new network, which as GigaOm points out joins the likes of NeoEdge, Mochi Media and even Google itself, already claims to reach nearly 20 milion unique visitors across 40 sites. The company insists that these unique visitors are particularly attractive targets for advertisers since they earn high salaries and spend substantial amounts of time per visit on casual gaming sites.

Gamers Media has chosen Adify to power its ad network. Adify, which we wrote about in fall of 2006, provides software for the creation of virtual ad networks.

Gould is also the founder and CEO of WikiYou.

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