And while everyone has predictably been falling all over themselves to get in a lot of general reporting about the debut, yours truly has been busy curating the less obvious, in order to get to the bottom of the question – to buy or not to buy…

The Form Factor Issue

After testing out the iPad at the Apple Store in Austin for about 20 minutes, and then again the following Monday at BestBuy for nearly 2 hours, I have to concur with the commentators that said it was a bit on the heavy side.

Not so much in the sense of the weight itself, but in the sense of being distributed in slightly too large of a form factor (kind of like overly large furniture making moving of it more awkward even if the item isn’t that heavy).

Not once did I think that that there wasn’t enough shown on the 9.7″ screen. Instead, it was almost too much. And watching various commentators such as Scoble et al. on the review by The Gillmor Gang wield theirs for the camera, they looked a bit too large as well. Wield is the right word for it come to think of it.

I said in January after the announcement that I had wished for the iPad to be “one size smaller”, about paperback size. Slightly smaller screen, less bezel instead, to keep it at about 4 x times iPhone size, rather than 6 x. If it had to be slightly thicker to fit batteries and other entrails, then so be it. No one seems quite as obsessed with (device) thinness as Steve Jobs come to think of it.

We’ll see if one of the other tablets planned for Android/Chrome OS or Windows will take advantage of this smaller form factor. [UPDATE: Looks like Dell is going to, with 5" and 7" screen versions of its Streak tablet. 5" seems a bit too small given that the current largest smartphones are already nearing 4.5 inch screens.]

Think about it like this: A 10″ screen held at 2 feet equates to a 50″ screen at 10 feet! (This is why no one thinks that hard about the little screens in the airplane seat backs being too small to watch many hours of movies on long flights.)

Right now I have my laptop on my lap, with the 15″ screen about 2 feet away. The iPad would have to be held with your arms fully out-stretched to create the same distance. At about 1/2 – 2/3 of that distance, the current iPad screen size will actually be the same (at 2/3) or even bigger than that (at 1/2 distance). I really think a 7-8″ diagonal screen would be completely sufficient.

And make the tablets much easier to wield…

The keyboard issue

There are several aspects to this:

1) There seems to be confirmation of what I suspected in my previous iPad post, that the keyboard dock is not as usable as it may first appear. The reason being that the whole thing is a bit unstable for switching from typing to touch-screen as Engagdet writes: “Our one complaint? It’s not that easy to interact with the touchscreen from this angle” (note that NO Bluetooth mouse is supported), and doesn’t transport well.

[While speaking of docks, an interesting fact that seems to be slipping through the cracks is that the VGA-out dock or adapter enables to output content that is DIFFERENT FROM what you see on your iPad screen for at least some applications that make use of this, e.g. Apple's Keynote presentation app.]

2) Given this reality, it is better to buy the Apple Bluetooth keyboard, IF you need a physical keyboard at times. It will work for other Bluetooth enabled computing devices in your house, etc.

Engadget in the same post shows a good quick video showing (at bottom of post) how fast it it to synch up the Bluetooth keyboard.

The question really is, is it needed at all?

The reports on on-screen virtual keyboard usability vary from good (some claim 50-words per minute, and a pre-launch reviewer from PC Mag wrote his entire detailed, multi-page review on it) to so-so, with the landscape view typing mode appearing to…ahem…win by a landslide.

But even in landscape mode, touch-typists who are used to resting their fingers on a keyboard have a problem, because the virtual keyboard will intermittently think you have begun typing.

The portrait view mode however seems to please next to no-one as far as typing more than a few keystrokes is concerned.

Why? Too far apart for thumb-typing or one-handed “hunt & peck”, too narrow for good two-handed typing. Bummer, if there weren’t an excellent solution that I hinted at in the comments on my last post:

3) Swype. One-handed gesture-based input by “swyping” the letters of a word. The application was unveiled at TechCrunch 50 last year, and is finding its way in private (?) beta onto some Android smart phones.

Why is it not on the iPad? That’s the $64k Question. Swype would appear to be a no-brainer, something that could have really pushed the iPad over the top beyond all doubt.

Fast input, aligned with the ergonomics of the device, seamless transition from touch-based navigation to touch-based Swype “typing”, workable and fast even for those of us who happen to be slowish 2-Finger typists.

This alone may make me wait for an Android tablet with Swype on board, with a slightly smaller screen as discussed above. Yeah, it’s that important.

.

Other stuff that is actually great

Somewhat under-reported has been the fact that the battery life is truly excellent, anywhere from 8 hours (non-stop, full-blast use with only the most resource-heavy applications), up to 12 hours or more with normal usage. Very few of the reviewers appeared to be able to get below Apple’s claimed 10 hours, which is a remarkable feat. Manufacturer battery life claims used to be notoriously…how do I put this…optimistic..

Also under-reported is another near miracle that instantly should make the iPad a couch computing favorite: It emits next to no heat, and has no fan, hence no fan noise. All while keeping the screen applications and video very snappy.

This may well prove huge, for business meetings as well, where Steve Rubel has already seen a more positive acceptance than either a laptop (creates distance) or a cell phone (makes people think you’re texting/checking your email).

Despite a variety of conspiracy theories for why Apple has it in for Adobe, THAT is the real reason why Flash is not being supported. Flash is a CPU resource hog. It’s why even a pretty powerful dual-core laptop starts to spin-up mightily when viewing most flash-based video. Have the thing on your lap, and the hot “exhaust” from your CPU is warming up your pants for you.

This is a HUGE DEAL. A literally cool and quiet computer. And just as I write that, here comes news that apparently iPad has issues with sitting out/being used in the hot sun, and can shut down pre-emptively to avoid overheating. Makes sense since it’s all glass and aluminum…

Also underreported: By way of a variety of apps such as Citrix Receiver, the iPad can run any remote computer and nearly any of that computer’s applications that might be too complex or large to run on iPad natively. This could be one of the killer apps for the iPad in settings such as hospitals. Steve Rubel’s point about meetings comes to mind again: Where a laptop would be inappropriate by a patient’s bedside, a tablet can be natural form factor.

About the iPad’s Kindle-Killing…

Much attention has been paid to the iPad’s impact on publishing, especially as a new entrant in the eBook reader category vs. Amazon’s Kindle device. So this area warrants some close scrutiny.

First, let’s point out that Apple is playing it pretty safe when it comes to anything that could smack of anti-trust worthy stiff-arming: The iBooks app is NOT installed by default, even though the iTunes Store is making a pretty obvious suggestion to install it. And Apple did not attempt to block the Kindle app, so they’ve learned from the iPhone Goggle Voice app brouhaha.

Apple has a lot of clout and likes to control everything, and yet, it doesn’t want to get into it with Congress if that can be avoided.

So how should Amazon play this?

Don’t try to take a shrill stand in a battle that can’t be won. Instead of carrying on about how the Kindle is still the superior eReader (e.g. in bright sunlight, which is probably true), Amazon should

1) drop the price for the Kindle immediately to below $200,

2) applaud the iPad for running the Kindle app so well, and so beautifully, pointing out that the Kindle really is a for-the-beach/pool type device, and

3) highlight the fact that ALL of your existing Kindle books will play on the iPad AND hopefully still on your Kindle as well.

The last point will make the Kindle a great hand-me-down device for kids who you don’t quite trust with a $500-900 iPad. And likely persuade prior Kindle owners to stick with the Kindle bookstore. Which is what Amazon should care the most about. There never was much use for them to get into a hardware race against Apple.

The Kindle will eventually simply be seen as a transitional device while Apple and others were still figuring out the new form factor. And meanwhile, Amazon has learned tons of valuable things about eBook economics. The business it should be in.

Given the various issues described further up, especially about the outdoor overheating, maybe it is too early to count the Kindle out just yet, and maybe it will fare better for longer than I first thought. Especially if Amazon further lowers the price.

More details on the iBooks app

One of the big issues that appear to be surfacing in regards to the iBook app is the bookmarking. Writes Gizmodo in “Hands On: Apple iBooks”:

Apple’s Bookmarking solution is perfect for highlighting a favorite line, but pretty lousy for just keeping your page. And, yeah, for a casual reader, this is a biggie.

And I would add to that that iBooks bookmarks are missing the capability to add your own commentary, a must for those of us who are used to heavily marking up our non-fiction books.

Here is another weakness Kindle could exploit for the time being, as relayed by PC World in “iPad as E-Reader: Glaring Problems, Promising Apps”:

By and large, in my reading, iBooks offered the slickest e-book navigation experience I’ve had on any device. Regrettably, however, iBooks makes a poor choice for anyone who wants to read e-book purchases on more than one device. Unless you plan to take the iPad with you everywhere, you’ll be without an e-reader much of the time. To make its bookstore more compelling, Apple needs to make desktop and phone versions of its reader. Until that happens, I won’t be buying any more books from Apple.

That’s pretty definitive, and may be a great life-line for the Kindle.

In summary, has the game just been changed?

I think we can safely assume that the ecosystem of iPad apps, accessories, and other add-ons will be a healthy one, see this example of people’s ad-hoc ingenuity… as the iPad as a design/art object is already spurring on a lot of further, often artistic ideas.

However during my tests one thing I realized is that there clearly is a learning curve for non-iPhone users as far as the basics of the interface are concerned. While that should help to rustle up Apple’s existing customers, it may prove to be a hurdle for very broad adoption. Then again, some commentators have already pointed out that very young users between say 3 and 13, are taking to the iPad like fish to water.

But plenty of adults are also ecstatic. Writes Michael Arrington in his “Unauthorized TechCrunch iPad Review”:

…the iPad beats even my most optimistic expectations. This is a new category of device. But it also will replace laptops for many people. It does basic computer stuff, like email and web surfing, very well. Applications load quickly and are very responsive – think iPhone 3GS with a 50% speed boost.

That’s what surprised me the most. The iPad isn’t just for couch computing…It’s a perfectly usable business device. And the form factor just happens to work far better for cramped places like airplanes than a normal laptop. I doubt I’ll ever open a laptop on a plane again after tomorrow…

The iPad will put significant pressure on laptop sales, particularly second device laptops.

Of course, here is the guy that was so desperate for the tablet form factor that last year he had his own tech blog delve into the device manufacturing business for a bit, and created his own Linux-based tablet prototype, dubbed “The CrunchPad”. (That project ended rather abruptly due to his overseas partners running away with the device under rather dubious circumstances.)

So, do we have a winner?

Someone on Gillmor Gang (see link above) intoned: “April 3 2010, the day the laptop died – or at least became the walking dead.”

I would concur that sub-12-13″ laptops and netbooks have just been dealt a considerable blow.

And Windows 7 based tablet PCs are just not really very far beyond a basic Windows PC with some touch features enabled, it’s as of yet not an end-to-end offering. Microsoft appears to indirectly be acknowledging this by basically ditching Windows Mobile 6.5, and going back to the drawing board:

The (still) unfortunately named (and just “renamed”) Windows 7 Series Phone is pointing in the right direction, but Microsoft won’t have it ready until the fall/X-mas, which means a tablet offering based on it is unlikely to be forthcoming until some time next year at the earliest.

That leaves many as of yet un-announced Android/Chrome OS based tablets, we will have to see if any of those materialize before the X-mas shopping season. Either way, that leaves a lot of room for Apple to run away with the entire category.

If everyone who can afford one and wants this class of device is buying an iPad now, then category leadership kicks in, and could well keep Apple in cruise-control and above 50% market-share from here. Until an entirely new category of device makes the iPad obsolete. Maybe it will be something like this Sixth Sense Technology TED Talk, for example.

Despite my overall positive views of the iPad and relative excitement about the tablet form factor, I for one decided to hold off for a bit longer due to the detail issues described above, which as you can tell are quite different from the ubiquitous and nearly reflexive complaints of “no multitasking, no Adobe Flash, no camera”.

None of those weighed very heavily for me. We will see if maybe Dell’s Streak in a 7″ version running Android and allowing the use of Swype for text input will end up being everything I ever wanted in a tablet. That such an Android device very likely would also support multitasking, Flash, and a camera (the “Big 3 Complaints” about the iPad) would only fall under the rubric “bonus” for me.

Please add your own iPad usage experiences and research in the comments below. Did you get one? Will you? How about an Android based tablet?

But this time even usually stalwart Micro-hoo cheerleader Michael Arrington of TechCrunch is saying that Microsoft may be going too far in its Machiavellian machinations to want to feast on Yahoo’s carcass.

Meanwhile David Kirkpatrick, senior editor of Fortune Magazine, argues that Microsoft will inevitably buy Yahoo, making the case that it has gotten personal for Redmond ever since Google wrested the crown of perceived "greatest and most powerful tech company" away from them.

But in arguing that Microsoft desperately needs Yahoo’s scale, Kirkpatrick falls into the same "scale will solve things" thought trap that is deluding Microsoft, and plenty of commentators throughout the blogosphere in both posts and comments as well.

Currently Google’s monetization advantage vs. Yahoo (confirmed, and likely similar vs. MSN/Live Search), that comes from their focused execution is somewhere around 50-100%. And it has NOTHING to do with "scale".

It has everything to do with the advertisers being able to afford higher average bids due to higher average conversions. Period.

Conversion is the only thing that ultimately matters to an advertiser. Scale is a straw-man. If YHOO or MSFT had equal or better conversion numbers for the same keywords, then advertisers would jump on that. The individual advertiser could care less about the total query share numbers, or total number of clicks, they only care about their ads converting when they are being shown and clicked on.

If you mail a direct response ad, do you care what total percentage of the region or nation that mailing list reaches? No way. You care about the conversion numbers, because if an ad doesn’t convert you can’t long afford to mail/run it. In search ads, if you fail to convert the clicks you get, as a small business you can be bankrupt before you know it. It’s that simple.

The total volume of searches or even clicks for a keyword on Google, Yahoo, or MSN/Live has little or nothing to do with it. It’s simply that at lower conversion rates on Yahoo or MSN/Live, advertisers have a harder time making the economics work for them.

Steve Ballmer should change his tune at the next Microsoft company meeting:

Conversion, conversion, conversion…

Few people in "big business" understand direct response models, but that is what search advertising ultimately is. It is NOT image advertising, because Google text ads, whether served with search results or on websites and blogs as "Adsense" ads, do not lend themselves to branding exercises like display (image) ads or TV commercials.

The old adage of marketers – "I know half of my advertising is wasted, the problem is, I dont know which half" – does not hold true for the direct response model that pay-per-click ads served with searches or with content are based on.

Any advertiser with a basic understanding of the Adwords campaign management backend can tell EXACTLY which half is not working, then tweak the keywords, ad copy, asf. and turn off non-performing ads/keywords in short order.

Myth #2: "Affluence Gap"

A similar oft-repeated myth is the following statement taken from an Alley Insider comment:

Google has [...] the most affluent search users. Therefore, ad buyers want their ad to be shown on Google, and the price is bid up.

It isn’t about the supposed greater affluence of the Google users at all, otherwise Yahoo could not outsource THE AD SERVES (NOT the searches) to Google and instantly get 60-80% higher returns. Note that we’re talking about the very same (Yahoo) search users as before.

It’s about Google’s superior monetization that is due to their fanatical refinements of ad serves and the search results themselves, AND the higher conversion rates that the advertisers are experiencing.

Now there is one other side to this that is in fact branding/positioning related: The context in which an ad is served. With Google, since Google = search, users are in a "searching for a solution" mindset much more so (on average) than on Yahoo (or MSN), where people may be for any number of reasons (social, email, IM, news, etc.).

This is the real draw-back of the portal strategy that Yahoo and MSN embraced, which by definition leads to brand dilution: You have no idea about the exact user mindset, and many if not most of the pages you serve create contexts that are counter to anyone clicking on ads.

How many ads have you personally ever clicked on that got served with your free online email? Your chat? Your Yahoo groups, etc.? Chances are, none. After a brief period of mental adjustments, you likely started to completely ignore those ads.

Even Google had to learn this lesson, when they found last year that the social networking inventories for Adsense ads (e.g. on MySpace) were monetizing far lower (because converting less) than expected: People just weren’t looking to buy when networking on-line. It’s two different things.

From the point of view of the advertisers, all that matters to them is per-click cost and conversion. That alone determines whether their PPC campaign is viable past a few days. If Yahoo could allow them to get workable numbers, they’d be more than happy to bid higher on Yahoo’s search inventories.

So it is this mindset context differential rather than any affluence disparity, or the vaunted "search share" scale myth, which gets even usually smart and tech savvy people like Alley Insider’s Henry Blodget to drink Microsoft’s Kool-Aid on why they need Yahoo’s search division.

As long as this myth persists, there will likely be no peace for Yahoo.

Today, some not so minor controversy erupted in the blogosphere in reaction to the news that Facebook had just shut down Google’s FriendConnect on its platform. There were a lot of details being discussed re: data privacy vs. data portability between still largely "walled garden" social networks, all of which are quite relevant to a larger discussion on the future of the Web.

And Robert Scoble of Fast Company and Mike Arrington of TechCrunch got into a bit of shouting match on Twitter, a "GillmorGang" teleconference call, and their respective blogs.

I am not going to get into the finer points of the data issues here (but you should by all means read the above posts and commentary if you are into this sort of thing). But once again it appears that some larger strategic issues are being lost in the shuffle.

Check out what I wrote in a comment on a Silicon Valley Insider Micro-hoo post about a week or so ago:

While nothing is certain, this [Microsoft-Facebook deal idea would be] already a much better idea than the Yahoo deal. Given what’s going on right now with MySpace adopting Google’s OpenSocial, and making deals with Twitter, Yahoo, et al. to use MySpace data/resources in their systems, MSFT could actually try to preempt Google from running away with social networking:

Buy Facebook and VERY QUICKLY throw weight behind Facebook’s API as a competing standard to OpenSocial in opening up the "walled garden" of Facebook in strategic ways. Facebook apps are starting to lose developers from what I hear, many of which may be moving to OpenSocial API app development. Such a move could stop the slow-down/bleeding, if developers had a sense that big MSFT dollars were now gearing to put the pedal to the metal…

The longer term question is not IF social data will become complete openly exchangeable on the Web, but when. There is no need to have the same things stored/replicated in 1/2 dozen or more places/systems.

Alternatively, MSFT/Facebook could just adopt OpenSocial, and then look to gain more influence on the standard, trying to out-flank/out-innovate MySpace/Google. No good if MSFT let’s Google run away with it in yet another area.

(I took the liberty of adding a few links and minor grammar improvements into the quote.)

And this, in a nutshell, has been exactly the underlying dynamic of what has been playing itself out since yesterday. Leave out MSFT for a moment (though they are certainly lurking in the background), and the Facebook vs. Google/OpenSocial/MySpace battle lines were clearly being drawn…

This shut-down of Google’s FriendConnect application on Facebook, for which both sides have already offered various rationales, justifications, and rebuttals as to the true facts, is just the first salvo in what is sure to be a prolonged war, with Microsoft’s next actions being the potential wild card.

Not that their entry into the fray would guarantee anything one way or the other, but $45 Billion in mostly loose cash can have interesting effects to say the least, especially if Microsoft could get over themselves on this one and make a true attempt at unbridled innovation for once.

The social network issue in itself is very telling by the way how far Yahoo has been falling behind, and how Micro-hoo would have been far from a sure bet to getting any traction in this area: Go check out Yahoo’s two in-house social developments, Yahoo 360, which is hanging in limbo (view their more or less orphaned developer blog here), and Mash (their dev blog also apparently abandoned).

And as I mentioned before, I have it from inside sources that Yahoo also killed another very innovative social-cum-wiki type project (presumably different from Mash) in its early alpha mock-up stages just before the MSFT bid occurred, apparently that was too forward-thinking as well.

Facebook has certainly built up a lot of sophistication in their platform, there is a lot more there technically for those with the eyes to see it. I am not arguing that anyone should therefore like/love Facebook, but they deserve at least a little credit for things they have innovated.

Also, in regards to the Micro-hoo visions of better competing with Goolge in the ad serving realm, Facebook social ads do have quite a bit of potential as there are so many more demographic targeting angles available. In throwing up ads with social properties or (YouTube) videos, context is everything.

Get the context just right, and someone might actually click on an ad. And the key to the context outside of search (which in itself gives you an idea of what the querent wants), is to have the demographic and other semantic context. And that’s where social networks in principle have the chance to shine.

If Microsoft wants to be in ad serves at all, which they clearly still do, it would be better to figure out how to do it right on Facebook instead of a smaller stage. So, all in all, a Microsoft-Facebook play could be a decent idea, though it would all be in the execution… and MSFT not trying to rename things "Windows Live Facebook".  :)

This is from an interview by TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington with Citi Bank analyst Mark Mahaney in regard to the proposed Microsoft-Yahoo deal:

MA: [...] I heard that they commissioned an outside study sometime last year [that] suggested that they would have 85% plus increases in cash flow from outsourcing search to Google. [...] I think you said that they would go from 4 cents to potentially up to 9 cents per search — is that right? Sort of, 40-90 dollar RPMs on searches?

[...]

MM: [...] they actually said that they thought they — they didn’t name Google but it was obviously Google — that the difference in the monetization gap was 60 to 70%. That’s the first time we’d heard or seen Yahoo sign off on this specific gap.

No wonder that Yahoo has been flirting with outsourcing at least some of their paid search ads to Google: It’s instant money in the bank, to the tune of potentially 25-50% higher TOTAL cash flow! (TechCrunch rightly pointed this last one out, but omitted the underlying cause in their write-up.)

I came to a similar conclusion re:"the monetization gap" a week or so ago, just by looking at the respective search shares reported by ComScore, as well as the Q1 earnings numbers by Google and Yahoo.

Obviously, the numbers reported by Mahaney from an in depth study (that was apparently commissioned by Yahoo itself!) are much more authoritative. And to me, they therefore are the true bombshell out of this interview, though Google Q1 earnings were obviously enough of a bombshell to send their stock up over $100 in a few days.

Now beyond this very key admission, the further question obviously is how this portends for the proposed buyout of Yahoo by Microsoft. And here again Mahaney is pulling no punches,  and comes to a conclusion very similar to what I wrote here. Even though the TechCrunch summary of the interview again inexplicably omits his dire predictions.

I realize that it’s easy to get caught up in the complicated and "titillating" mechanics of the negotiations (or lack thereof), but at the very end of the day the only questions that should matter are:

Does any of this make sense from a business perspective?

Will this make a difference in terms of Microsoft-Yahoo being able to compete with Google in earnest?

Will they together be able to change these dynamics that have led to what amounts to an admission by both companies that they haven’t been able to compete? (By Microsoft in that they are seeking out this deal, by Yahoo that they likely cannot avoid it, and have even been considering outsourcing to their main rival in a weak attempt to try and avoid it.)

Here is what Mahaney had to say:

MM: [...] The open question and really the last area where they could have an impact on Google is just by creating a larger second place, or second tier, search engine. [...] That would be an intriguing possibility here on how Microsoft/Yahoo! could have a negative market share impact on Google and search. We’re not going to know that for a year and a half or two years from today, assuming everything goes to plan. In the mean time, [...] Google is starting to attack more and more aggressively [...] on the display advertising market. I think it’s a reasonable bet that Google’s share of the total US advertising and the world Internet advertising is the same or maybe even a little bit greater over the next two years.

Sounds pretty open and shut to me, especially if you’ve been paying any attention to how methodically Google has been honing their search monetization.

• The 50 Who Matter Now

I linked to the page with the, unsurprisingly, #1 ranked Google team of Page, Brin, and Schmidt. You can navigate either backwards (from the top down) or forwards "count-down-style" from there (50th place is next). I found counting down and keeping the guessing game going more fun.

Notably absent (or only indirectly present): Microsoft. I’ve said for a long time that MS has no innovation mojo left (some would argue they never had any to begin with), despite having the largest R&D department and budget of anyone.

They grew into such a giant (organizational size and inefficiency due to complexity correlate directly), all they can do anymore is buy innovation… which they did, by buying aQuantive and their Riax ad-tracking system for rich-media sites to the tune of $6 Billion.

Riax is prorietary sofware (proprietary sofware at Microsoft? No way…), developed by CEO Brian McAndrews, and is – supposedly – "something Google can’t yet match." Well see how long MS takes to screw it up or make it as much of a yawner as everything else they touch: MSN, Zune, Vista, what’s next?

Why would you care? If you are in business you better know not only that Web2.0 and related phenomena and innovations are here to stay, but how they will affect your business, creating either disruption or upside potential for you.

It’s good to be in the know…

Extra benefit… you get to SEE what those people look like that invented the stuff you use everyday… without having to do dozens of Google or other searches… connections, bloodlines and blood feuds, juicy tidbits and major business nuggets… all there for you presented on a silver platter…

Key mentions for Bloggers:

• Barry Diller is putting together niche sites such as a joint venture with Blog Queen Adriana Huffington (Huffington Post) for a Daily-Show style humor site (#16).
• Philip Rosedale and his Second Life are the likely vanguard of all future shopping/consumption experiences (#25). And IMO that will include consumption of information such as Blogs
• Technology-blogger Michael Arrington, Founder of TechCrunch, is influencing the flow of the VC money river (#22). How’s that for the power of the written word and information?