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Posts Tagged “

Bono

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digital music

Bono agrees with U2 manager's attack on Internet service providers

U2 frontman Bono disagreed with manager Paul McGuinness's judgment on the failure of Radiohead's Web busking for In Rainbows, but like McGuinness, he lays the blame for the death of the music industry's business model at the feet of those greedy Internet service providers in his open letter to New Music Express:
More »

4:40 PM on Mon Jun 30 2008
By Jackson West
805 views, 6 comments

crash this bash

Google's fight for the right to party like sagging, middle-aged rockers

Google has asked San Francisco for permission to host a "picnic-style dinner" for 1,400 sales employees on June 11. What's really pathetic: Google wants its salespeople to boogie down after hours to the sounds of U2 and Journey. Not the actual U2 and Journey, mind you, but cover bands. Neighbors aren't charmed, and not just by having their backyards used at the set for lightly inebriated lip dubs of "Don't Stop Believing." But the people who bring in Google's billions should ask why, if Larry Page is such pals with Bono, he wasn't able to deliver the real thing for their park-wide party.

12:20 PM on Thu May 1 2008
By Melissa Gira Grant
914 views, 8 comments

Latest by n/a: Oh, I almost forgot to mention: as a Google shareholder, I prefer that they save a few bucks by getting the cover band. The party attendees won't know the difference. They will be too busy Twittering or talking shop to care. more »

the sum of all human knowledge

Jimmy Wales's $1,300 dinner with the VC

Everyone's beating up on Wkipedia founder Jimmy Wales for his shady dealings. But evidence has now arisen that if he's a money-grubber, he's not a particularly skilled one. When Wales turned in receipts for $30,000 in expenses charged to the Wikimedia Foundation, Wikipedia's nonprofit parent, among them was a $1,300 dinner at a steakhouse in Tampa. In attendance: Marc Bodnick, another Elevation Partners cofounder. Bodnick later introduced Wales to Bono. (His sister-in-law Sheryl Sandberg, then a Google exec, now Facebook's COO, helped connect Bodnick and Bono, a contact from her Washington days.) The foundation's board ultimately turned down Wales's request to get paid back for the dinner. More »

4:40 PM on Thu Mar 20 2008
By Owen Thomas
873 views, 5 comments

Latest by marcsiry: I expected that gentlemen with suitcases of cash would have picked up the bill. Seems odd that Jimmy got stuck with the tab. more »

sheryl sandberg

Harvard Business School, White House alumna says connections don't matter

In an interview with BoomTown's Kara Swisher, Facebook's new second-in-command Sheryl Sandberg says "Silicon Valley is a very good place for women."
For a couple reasons. It's a meritocracy. People really care about ideas here. None of the old school where'd-you-come-from stuff applies in Silicon Valley and I think that helps women.
Where Sandberg comes from: More »

5:00 PM on Wed Mar 5 2008
By Nicholas Carlson
4,469 views, 18 comments

music

Bono gives away iPods to save Africa

Bono gave a red iPod to the Japanese Prime Minister hoping to encourage more support from Japan to combat African poverty. Yasuo Fukuda asked Bono if his music was preloaded on the device. "No, but you can download it."

Handily for the PM, U2's music is available on the Japanese iTunes store. In November 2006, Bono gave then Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe a pair of his Armani Red campaign sunglasses for the same cause. (Photo by AP/Peter Dejong)

5:00 AM on Tue Jan 29 2008
By Jordan Golson
257 views, 1 comment

nerdspotting

Robert Scoble gets within inches of Real Bono


Robert Scoble almost managed an interview with some guy wearing sunglasses inside at Davos. But no, that's not our very special correspondent recording a message to fans on YouTube. It's the real Bono. Really, you think our guy would say, "Don't change your lightbulb. Change your leaders" ? He's a bit more cynical than all that. More »

11:20 AM on Thu Jan 24 2008
By Nicholas Carlson
370 views, 9 comments

celebritards

Fake Bono draws real pitches

I finally got the story behind Bono's alleged appearance at the Demo tradeshow last year. MindTouch cofounder Aaron Fulkerson recruited the singer from a U2 tribute band — Pavel Sfera from San Diego-area Desire — to walk around the show floor and do his shtick for laughs. Sfera, shown here with telejourno Natali Del Conte, turned out even better than the real thing: He ad-libbed monologues about Mother Teresa, Desmond Tutu and Jesus all over the place. Because of the real Bono's role at Elevation Partners, and oh just maybe an oversized sense of their own importance, Demo attendees believed what they wanted to believe: Saint Paul of Clontarf had come by their show to check out their startup! Fulkerson had to hustle Sfera out of the show after founders began excitedly pitching him. "I've got a cure for hunger," one gushed. It involved Web page markup technology. (Photo by Brian Solis, I think)

9:59 AM on Thu Dec 20 2007
By Paul Boutin
732 views, Comment

satire

Bill Gates visits his therapist


Thank you for seeing me, doctor. Right here on the couch, turned away from you? I read that doctors do that to eliminate the burden of eye contact. Ha, or in case they don't like your face, good one. Actually I don't like my face much either. That's what I'm here about. More »

Feature

3:56 PM on Fri Dec 14 2007
By Nick Douglas
1,101 views, 1 comment

exclusive

Gavin Newsom makes Larry and Lucy's short list

We hear that Larry Page's wedding to Lucy Southworth on Necker Island Sunday was a smaller affair than widely reported — only 170 people, not 600. Confirmed in attendance: Richard Branson, who officiated, and Bono, who read a poem he wrote for the couple and performed a song. Oh, and also San Francisco's hunky god-mayor, Gavin Newsom, shown here with Page and Google cofounder Brin. How do we know Newsom was there? More »

7:00 PM on Wed Dec 12 2007
By Owen Thomas
4,560 views, 6 comments

exclusive

Fake Bono revealed!

Since I first noticed that Fake Bono had taken over Fake Steve Jobs's blog, I've been wondering who Fake Bono really is. We had a number of guesses: Dan Lyons was taking on a second alter ego; Bono himself was writing; Marc Bodnick, cofounder of Elevation Partners, where Bono is a partner, was taking a turn; and Bono-wannabe Valleywag contributor Paul Boutin. After carefully reviewing the Bono posts, we're ready to reveal the identity of Fake Bono. More »

5:33 PM on Tue Nov 27 2007
By Jordan Golson
1,503 views, 3 comments

Latest by mjlambie: I saw him in LA and swore it was him. he even did the accent. when he sang, we knew it wasn't. i felt like a fool. more »

lazy valleywag

Who is Fake Bono?

Over the long Thanksgiving weekend, Forbes editor Dan Lyons's Fake Steve Jobs blog was taken over by Fake Bono. As the story goes, Bono was spending Thanksgiving at Jobs's house and found El Jobso had left himself logged into Blogger. He got drunk with Googlers, flew on Marissa Mayer's jet to meet the Pope in Uganda, introduced the U2 Edition iPhone, and wouldn't shut up about his RED campaign. Really, who is this guy? Send guesses my way. After the jump, an apology of sorts from Fake Bono to Fake Steve. More »

12:20 PM on Mon Nov 26 2007
By Jordan Golson
928 views, 9 comments

Latest by Rick: I only signed in to second the nomination for Paul "Shades" Boutin more »

elevation partners

How iLike got U2's new song



A previously unreleased song from U2's upcoming rerelease of Joshua Tree is already available on the Internet. But we're not just talking about unlicensed BitTorrents here. "Wave of Sorrow" and the video embedded above explaining the song, is available on iLike, and not, as far as we can tell, on the band's MySpace or official site. So why did U2 favor iLike, the music widget best known as a Facebook success story? More »

2:53 PM on Thu Nov 15 2007
By Megan McCarthy
1,809 views, 6 comments

rumormonger

Wikiprofits on Wales's mind?

A tipster is telling us we got it right on why founder Jimmy Wales is moving Wikipedia to San Francisco: dollar bills. Tall stacks of them. Specifically, Wales is looking to tap the deep pockets of Wikipedia benefactor Roger McNamee of Elevation Partners, our source believes. You know, the firm U2 frontman Bono shills for. Our tipster writes that McNamee and Wales have plans to profit from Wikipedia. Curious, since Wikipedia's run by a nonprofit. The tip, after the jump. More »

11:07 AM on Thu Oct 18 2007
By Nicholas Carlson
616 views, Comment

Private-equity firm Elevation Partners — which counts U2 frontman Bono among its partners — sold gaming companies BioWare and Pandemic Studios to Electronic Arts for $860 million. Elevation Partners, which is named after the U2 song, was a natural for EA to do a deal with. One of the founding partners, John Riccitiello, is the CEO of Electronic Arts. Elevation purchased the two game companies in late 2005 for $300 million. Not bad for less than two years' work. [WSJ]

Comment

comics

Steve Jobs and Bono explained


From cartoonist Hugh MacLeod, a concise explanation of why Apple CEO Steve Jobs keeps pushing his company deeper into the music business, and why rock star Bono has joined tech private-equity firm Elevation Partners.

9:39 AM on Tue Aug 28 2007
By Owen Thomas
339 views, 1 comment

Latest by ThatKid: It's like how basketball players all want to be rappers and rappers all want to be basketball players. more »