Ebay announced Monday that it has agreed to acquire Magento Inc., the company behind the open source ecommerce platform Magento.
In the announcement, eBay said that Magento will join the company’s new X.Commerce initiative. X.Commerce is eBay’s integrated open source platform group that will be revealed to developers in more depth in October.
On the Magento blog, CEO and co-founder Roy Rubin posted about the sale. Rubin writes that “it’s too soon to know all the details” but following the close of the sale, “Magento will continue to operate out of Los Angeles, with Yoav Kutner and me as its leaders.”
Magento also posted a FAQ [PDF] page for its customers, but at least to us, this did little to clarify what will actually happen to Magento moving forward and left us with more questions.
Although Magento will continue to operate out of Los Angeles and its staff there and in Ukraine have been retained, there was no real answer to the question “will Magento continue as a standalone product.” Instead, it looks like what is now Magento will become a big part of eBay’s upcoming X.Commerce platform.
Magento will continue to work with its existing partners and customers of its hosted and supported solutions. As for the open source Magento Community Edition, not much is known what it means for the product at this point.
For eBay, the move is interesting, especially in conjunction with PayPal and the various PayPal X initiatives. Magento is an opportunity for eBay to offer businesses a soup-to-nuts ecommerce solution, from hosting to payment processing to mobile.
The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.
Quick Pitch: Unbound crowdsources funding for books.
Genius Idea: Ending the hunt for the next bestseller and the innovation bottleneck that comes with it.
The book publishing industry, says Unbound co-founder Dan Kieran, is broken.
“Publishers spend huge amounts to secure potential bestsellers, but only a very small number of those work out,” he says.
In the quest for the next big seller, authors who are known for one kind of book are encouraged to continue publishing that kind of book. Covers are designed to be eye-catching rather than beautiful. And innovative ideas that haven’t yet proven themselves as sellers can get left in the dust.
Kieran and his two co-founders, who are all authors and/or publishers, decided to rethink publishing in a way that shifts its focus from what might sell onto what readers have already declared they will read. Unbound, which launched on Sunday, allows authors to pitch their ideas directly to readers instead of editors. If enough readers support it — usually between 1,500 and 5,000 — the book will be published. If not, they get their money back.
Readers can pledge their support in different denominations. At the first level, they’ll receive an ebook edition of the book if it is published. At the most expensive, they’ll receive two invites to the launch party, lunch with the author, two signed first editions of the book and two ebook editions.
All supporters get their names printed in the back of the book and access to the author’s “shed,” where they can read updates about the book’s progress, draft chapters and other extras.
So far the platform only has five book proposals listed on it. Former Monty Python team member Terry Jones has pitched a comic book of “cautionary fables” involving machines and novelist Tibor Fischer has pitched two stories. Less than a week in, none of the proposals are anywhere close to gathering enough support to publish. Jones and Fischer have had the most success, each achieving 2% of their goals.
All of the proposals are from somewhat established authors with fan bases that have provided much of the support. Eventually, however, the platform hopes to be more like Kickstarter, which allows anyone to post a project for potential crowdfunding. But then why don’t authors just take advantage of Kickstarter’s already established user base and put their book pitches there?
Kieran says that Unbound provides all of the editing and distribution services of a publishing house, which the more broadly focused Kickstarter obviously doesn’t. That makes forking over 50% of book profits — much less than Kickstarter project leaders take home (95%), but much more than the typical publishing house pays its writers (about 7% to 15%) — worth signing up for. That, and the creative freedom that advance sales create.
“The difference is that because the books have already been sold, it gives an opportunity to change the way they’re made,” Kieran says.
Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark
The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.
Jim Aberman is founder and CEO of Jim Aberman Marketing Company and the father of Rich Aberman, entrepreneur and founder of WePay.
You can read about young entrepreneurs starting new companies or raising millions of dollars in venture capital on a daily basis. For parents who dream about their kids becoming entrepreneurs, these articles reinforce the stereotype of ambitious dropouts and instant dot-com millionaires. While the promise of fame and fortune is alluring, the question remains, “Can a parent raise a child to be an entrepreneur, and why would they even want to?”
I think the answer is no. By definition, the path to becoming a “professional” is more structured than the path to becoming an “entrepreneur.” If you want to become a doctor, for example, you get into a good college, do well in school, ace your MCAT and write a great application. If you want to become an investment banker, you work hard in college, attain a great internship and ace your interview. Since there are no structured paths to becoming an entrepreneur, it’s hard to set your child on the right path. I believe, however, that there are qualities and characteristics that you can instill in your child over the course of his or her youth that will help prepare him or her for the risky, emotionally draining, economically irrational and statistically doomed decision to become an Internet entrepreneur.
My son, Rich Aberman, was recently listed as one of Businessweek’s Best Young Tech Entrepreneurs Under 30. When he told me three years ago that he was going to drop out of law school to found an online payments business — WePay — I thought he was joking. And, at first, I was very against the decision. However, I believe that I prepared Rich for the challenges he has faced by nurturing and guiding him so he could reach his full potential. I think some children are born with the natural desire to venture off the beaten path and to build things from scratch, but it is up to the parents to nurture and reinforce those tendencies, while simultaneously providing the parental guidance that all children need.
The following are a few guidelines that worked for me.
1. Let Her Discover Her Passions
Parents often have their child’s day scheduled down to the minute with classes, sports and other activities. It’s important to give kids the opportunity and responsibility to choose what they want to do and explore their passions. When Rich was growing up, he was on the debate team and the math team. When he told me he was quitting the debate team to focus on math, I was upset. I thought he was doing a great job managing both, and I wanted him to stay well-rounded. In retrospect, I realize that passionate focus was a key element in the success of his entrepreneurial endeavors.
2. Challenge Him
As parents, we have the responsibility to challenge our kids to reach their full potential. When Rich first entered high school, I set up meetings with the principal and the head guidance counselor to introduce him to the valedictorians and leading students in each class to help mentor him. It was probably pretty awkward for him, and I’m sure I came off looking like that crazy over-involved parent. But I wanted to make it clear to him that he had a responsibility to be an over-achiever, since we both knew he was capable of it.
3. Lead by Example
I started and ran my own business and thought it was very important that Rich see what it was like firsthand. I took him on business trips with me and introduced him to other successful entrepreneurs who shared their own experiences with him. But I never shielded him from the challenges and anxiety that come along with starting from scratch and building something new. In fact, it’s one of the reasons I originally wanted him to become a “professional” rather than an entrepreneur.
4. Don’t Rule by Fear
I was never punitive. Sure, point out what is wrong but encourage positive achievements. Entrepreneurs need to believe they can do anything, and obviously, they cannot be risk averse — that’s what lawyers and accountants are for.
Great entrepeneurs are not born out of a desire to make money or to be famous. They simply can’t imagine doing anything else. Building something new is the only thing that can make them happy. As parents, it’s up to us to be realistic about the challenges of entrepreneurship, allow our children to follow their passions and adequately prepare them for living up to their full potential.
The Future of Search Series is supported by SES New York Conference & Expo, the search and social marketing conference helping brands, agencies, and professionals connect, share and learn what’s next for the interactive industry.
A “social search” is one that ties a searcher’s social graph to his search queries. With social search, each searcher sees unique results that are shaped by the interests of his social network friends.
Google, not the company to often fudge with the appearance or function of its search results, turned on its version of social search more than a year ago. It has since gone on to more prominently feature social search results and blend them in with regular results.
One should not make light of these changes; they point to the company’s recognition that the average web user, who now spends more time on Facebook, may be not-so-quietly demanding a new form of search.
In fact, Facebook is more than a social network for many these days. It’s the center of our social graph, it’s where we go to find and read the day’s news, it’s how we comment on articles, and its ubiquitous “like” buttons help us refine our interest graphs and are becoming the de facto way for us to voice our approval for nearly anything on the web.
“Likes” have become so significant that they factor into Bing’s algorithm for social search results, and even have a place in Blekko’s human curated search engine. “Likes” also determine popularity: the more “likes” a piece of content or status update gets, the more that item is resurfaced inside and outside of Facebook.
The Changing Definition of (Social) Search
The rise of Facebook and its hold over our attention begs the question, should we still think of search as an explicit query-driven practice? Or, is search in the traditional sense outdated?
Are social networks (or information networks) the new search engine? Or, as Steve Jobs would argue, is the mobile app the new search engine? Or, is the question-and-answer formula of Quora the real search 2.0?
The answer is most likely all of the above, because search is being redefined by all of these factors.
Because search is changing, so too is the still maturing notion of social search, and we should certainly think about it as something much grander than socially-enhanced search results.
The average Facebook user does not say to himself, “I want to search for the most popular stories among my Facebook friends.” No. Facebook does the work for them by crafting a search experience, without search, that highlights content of social relevance.
It’s for this reason that one-off social search engines like Sharetivity are not the future — look at Sentimnt, which has closed down its consumer-facing social search product. A social search engine that requires the user to think about surfacing content from social networks is one that misses the point.
Semantic Analysis, Machine Learning and the Next Generation of Social Search
Let’s embrace the notion that social search should be effortless on the part of the user and exist within a familiar experience — mobile, social or search.
This social search future is already unfolding before our very eyes. Foursquare now taps its massive checkin database to churn out recommendations personalized by relationships and activities. My6sense prioritizes tweets, RSS feeds and Facebook updates, and it’s working to personalize the web through semantic analysis. Even Flipboard offers a fresh form of social search and helps the user find content through their social relationships.
Of course, there’s the obvious implementations of Facebook Instant Personalization: Rotten Tomatoes, Clicker and Yelp offer Facebook-personalized experiences, essentially using your social graph to return better “search” results.
Then, there’s a crop of new startups that dig through the clickstreams of friends, all of which have plans to move into content recommendations.
We’re just now scratching the surface of what’s possible when one’s expanding social graph becomes intertwined with search. But as time goes on, the social search experience will be so fluid — it will seem more like discovering than searching — we won’t even know it’s happening.
Series Supported by SES New York Conference & Expo
The Future of Search Series is supported by SES New York Conference & Expo, the search and social marketing conference helping brands, agencies, and professionals connect, share and learn what’s next for the interactive industry. Learn why more than 5,000 brands and agencies from the enterprise level to brick and motor businesses choose SES for their online marketing education.
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A “social search” is one that ties a searcher’s social graph to his search queries. With social search, each searcher sees unique results that are shaped by the interests of his social network friends.
