AO Take: Simple Star’s PhotoShow lets people edit and share their photos and video clips. The PC-based retail product can create slideshows and mini-movies by including music, text, and transitions, making it easy for people to share their photos and video clips. While other photo-service sites battle for brand and online presence, Simple Star has quietly been accumulating customers by bundling its PhotoShow product with OEM devices as well as partnering with services like Shutterfly and Snapfish. Its partnership with Comcast lets users “broadcast” their memories to loved ones. It’s an excellent distribution strategy for a company that already boasts a highly respectable installed base and customer reach.

Headquarters: San Francisco, CA
Founded: 2001
...More

AO Take: Slide is a free downloadable desktop program that indexes photos on the user’s hard drive, automatically groups them into channels, and plays them back through a ticker-style interface. This scrolling playback lets users enjoy images that would normally remain buried on their hard drives. Users can also share photos and invite friends and family to view their photo channels. Founded by PayPal’s Max Levchin, Slide has done a great job integrating with social networking sites. While it appears to have fended off rival Filmloop, Slide is still fi ghting an uphill battle. But it’s a feisty startup with clever services and ideas.

Headquarters: San Francisco, CA
Founded: 2004
CEO: Max Levchin
Employees: 45
...More

AO Take: Social music network Mercora lets people search for, find, and listen to legal, CD-quality music from their PCs and wireless mobile devices. The combination of music discovery and community is exciting—by developing dynamic music communities, Mercora is defining segments of like-minded people and creating compelling advertising opportunities. For "new marketers," Mercora could be an attractive alternative to radio and other forms of audio promotion, and its online delivery platform offers interesting technological advantages. When advertising on certain radio stations to reach a chosen demographic is considered "targeted," it sure makes advertising on Mercora sound like a guided missile.

Headquarters: Santa Clara, CA
Founded: 2003
...More

AO Take: Muvee lets users make music-video type movies out of files they shoot with their camcorders or digital cameras with a single click. The program fi nds the key highlights in the video segments and edits them, putting them together with users’ music of choice, and creating the “muvee.” With the surge of video sites and services, videographers are in need of editing software that lets them stand out in a sea of subpar offerings. With a solid retail product and back-end partnerships with Orb, Revver, eVideo Share, and Mydeo, Muvee has a chance to achieve not only success but a broader, more commercial appeal.

Headquarters: Singapore
Founded: 2001
CEO: Terence Swee
Employees: ca. 80
Investors: Vertex, Walden International
OnHollywood 2007 Category: Consumer Services

AO Take: Major League Gaming is a professional video gaming league that connects players, developers, publishers, media partners, and advertisers. MLG operates a sponsor-supported pro tour that makes several stops in major cities across the U.S. The company is building a network of professional gamers and its accompanying fan base. MLG has a very clever marketing approach and is becoming a recognized brand in the gaming community. The company scored a large round of capital in late 2006, as well as hooking up with USA Network, AOL, Comcast, and Boost Mobile to distribute tournament programming.

Headquarters: New York, NY
Founded: 2003
CEO: Mike Sepso
Employees: ca. 25
Investors include: Oak Investment Partners, Ritchie Capital
OnHollywood 2007 Category: Consumer Services

These ventures aren’t just redefining the way marketers reach audiences; they’re also changing the very nature of the relationship between brands and their consumers.

Below is part 2 of our analysis of the AO Media 100 winners, which appears in full in the AO Magazine. Check out part one and the complete list of winners here.

To be effective, the new marketer must understand how to leverage and build communities. Social networking sites such as Facebook and Friendster, along with newcomers Tagged and “social reviews” site Yelp, offer rapid access to like-minded constituencies. When companies want to build their own topical and product-centric communities, companies like Leverage Software offer the tools.

New marketers also need big ears, to track what’s being said about their products, and even bigger nets to catch the right audience....More

    
According to the scientifically-hardened “Perkins Curve,” there is almost no better time than now to start an Internet business. While successful young entrepreneurs like Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, Mark Zuckerberg, and Kevin Rose steal the headlines, the next wave of young disrupters are preparing to enter the start-up spotlight. AlwaysOn's Noah Gellman recently talked with five up-and-coming entrepreneurs who are changing user behavior and turning innovative ideas into successful companies. The two CEO profiles below are excerpted from an article that will appear in the winter issue of the AO Magazine.

Seth Sternberg
CEO, Meebo
Instant messaging lets you connect to friends anywhere, anytime... unless, of course, you use a different IM service....More