Google Health and MySpace

Google Health and MySpace

One of the more underappreciated aspect of the Silicon Valley ecosystem is that it is equally good at winnowing ideas that are no longer viable as it is at creating exciting new things. Therefore, I was reminded of the fanfare surrounding the prior glories of these two endeavors.

MySpace is sold off for $35mn to an advertising firm. And, Google Health + Google PowerMeter are retiring.

It would be interesting to see what these alum networks will spawn next.

* MySpace's $35mn deal: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/myspace-sold-to-advertising-firm-for-35-million/51623
* Google Health+PowerMeter: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/update-on-google-health-and-google.html

WDP Free Download (until June 28th)

The Leader's Checklist

Wharton Digital Press (WDP) first book is out. It is a collection of principles to help leaders do the right things by Wharton management professor Michael Useem. This book will be available as a free download until June 28, 2011, see the link below. (I don't think there is a POD, Print on Demand, option for this eBook)

Mission Critical: 15 Principles to Help Leaders Meet Their Toughest Challenges: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2799

Digital Insight

It is good to see that WDP is able to leverage assets like Knowledge@Wharton, which I am a faithful reader since inception, as a way to promote the book. On the other hand, it would be nicer for WDP to offer an "one-click" download process to make things simple. But, these are details.

What I really love to know more about is how has this digital publishing process impacted the data collection and analysis given the new level of interactivity. WDP could potentially be a new value-add data broker.

Talent War 2011

The Siren Sound

As I have noted on the ever shifting employee networks of Silicon Valley given its "at-will" employment contract. The first public salvo came from Google who offered an across the board salary increase in 2011. There are a analyses on the latest winners and losers of the latest "Talent Wars."

Not surprisingly, Apple, Facebook, and Google are all doing well, relatively speaking. The major casualty of the current phase is Yahoo who is losing a bit of its luster lately. The interesting winner is Twitter who, despite the persistent criticism of its lack of business model, is getting a lot of people to join.


* List of winners and losers of the talent war vintage 2011: http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=1501275766337378089&postID=7523281652592663360
* A graphical analysis the current talent war: http://www.focus.com/images/view/42092/