Or why did Comcast acquire Plaxo?

In the last couple of days I found myself wondering about this acquisition and the idea behind it… Is it a brilliant move? Did Plaxo make a once in a life time deal with someone who’s so desperate to make an impact on the web and not doing that great so fat? I guess me will tell.

Till then, here are my thoughts which might shed some light on this acquisition… and might not…

Let’s start with the facts:

1.       The terms of the deals were not disclosed but the assumptions are that Comcast paid for Plaxo around 150-170 million dollar!

2.       Plaxo manages an online address book, and lately as part of the Web 2.0 buzz, they added other activity-notifications which were done by the user, such as new added photos on the FlickR account… which was in my own opinion a pale clone of the facebook application

3.       Plaxo has 1.5 million active users

4.       Comcsast has over 24 Million subscribers to its cable services however, despite the announcements of  a successful figures with Fancast, the truth is that the website is way behind youtube (see figure below… yeah, I was using an understatement)

Now let’s think about it for a second,

If you were the biggest VOD library in the television market, however you have not maintained a significant grasp in the online market… what would you do?

1.       You would build a website which can provide an appealing VOD experience (they did that, fancast is a great website)

2.       You would let anyone know about the website

Comcast tried (according to their GM) to grow organically, just like youtube did, but it wasn’t very successful… so now they need a new and very fast way to spread, and for that what’s better than using the address book? The Plaxo application (just like the Linked-In application) knows how to scan the address book and send invitations to everyone.

Imagine now that we’re adding recommendations to that:

 “Danny watched last night the last episode of Entourage. He gave it 5 Stars! (btw, that’s what I’ve realistically give to this brilliant series). Do you want to watch it too?”

Will it work? It looks like there is a reasonable reason to believe it will… But in order to become a huge success they must turn around Plaxo in a way it will fit their needs without harassing their users, and that’s always the most difficult task…

Danny

Elbert Hubbard was considered to be a real genius.

Not just because he was a highly regarded American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher, but mostly due to his business wisdom.

He is the inventor of what we know today as “premium with purchase” – meaning, you buy cereals and you get a toy-gift. Imagine that… there is a person who invented that!

I studied about him after reading a quotation he wrote: “One machine can do the work of 50 ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.”

This is totally my philosophy. Since we just recruited five new team members, I thought it would be nice to introduce them to the readers and show how ordinary persons they are – each and every one of them! I asked them either to tell three bizarre facts about themselves or answer even more bizarre questions I’ve asked…

I’ll start with Eli. Eli is a brilliant Java ME (J2ME) developer and here are 3 facts you didn’t know about him:

1.       He never travelled abroad (what?!?) well, except for trips to Lebanon… you know…

2.       The first Java book he ever bought, a decade ago, was published by…  Microsoft.

3.       As he lives in Ra’ananna, he is saving the planet as he is going to work by foot (what a dream…)

Next one is Demi , a gifted graphic designer!Here’s the questionnaire:

1.       If I weren’t a graphic designer I’d probably became a DJ on the radio. Why? Cuz music is my life.

2.       What kind of Humor makes you laugh? Anything spontaneous and not too well planned…

3.       Is there anything you will refuse to eat? Avocado!  And if someone will offer you a million dollars for eating it? I’ll ask them to show me the money first J  And the last one for this session – please welcome Max!  Max is client-side developer and one of our biggest promises when it comes both to humor and development…Here’s what he answered:

1.       If I weren’t a software developer I’d probably became a Porn Movie Director (huh???) . Why? Why not? (hmm…).

2.       What kind of Humor makes you laugh? American Humor! Just love it!

3.       Your biggest fear?  All my life I was afraid that one day my car keys will fall into one of those drainage grills… Until the day they actually fell there J So now you know better why I used Hubbard’s quotation. And to all the new guys – Good Luck!