Valleywag: first round capital

Laid-off Wall Street techs offered work at Silicon Alley startups

Jackson West — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 09:00:00 PDT

Buy low, sell high, as they say on Wall Street. And right now, there's a flow tide of technical talent from shuttered financial firms flooding the New York Area available at rock-bottom prices. Fred Wilson at Union Square Ventures says why not take a pay cut and work longer hours at a Web startup? The "quant jocks" Wilson describes could also bank their savings and some unemployment checks and spend six months pitching a business plan — I bet they could convince Wilson to throw some money your way. The entrepreneurial route worked for former finance techie Jeff Bezos, an early adopter who worked at a hedge fund before hedge funds were cool. First Round Capital has a list of jobs in and around New York for those who would rather continue collecting a paycheck. Though the fund did sneak in email startup Xobni, which is on the left coast. "[H]ey, why not consider a move. The weather is better and winter is coming!!!" That said, so is Julia Allison. (Photo by AP/Mary Altaffer)

MyYearbook scores $13 million to cater to more 13 year olds

Alaska Miller — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 10:40:00 PDT

MyYearbook, a social network for teens turned off by the old people thronging Facebook and MySpace, has raised an additional $13 million in venture capital. The social-network startup wooed by Barry Diller's IAC last year, but a deal never happened. The site claims to be the third biggest social network in the U.S.

Some prize: Numbers from Hitwise give MyYearbook 1.5 percent of U.S. traffic to social networks. Compared to MySpace's 71.9 percent and Facebook's 16.9 percent, that's a limp into bronze. Norwest Ventures Partners, US Venture Partners, and First Round Capital participated in this second round of funding. MyYearbook says that it will "use the money to create new services and make more money." One likely way it will do the latter: Dropping Glam Media as its online-advertising network so it can keep more of its advertising revenues.

VC freaks out Yahoos with "shocking" Facebook ad

Nicholas Carlson — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 10:20:08 PST

Yesterday, First Round Capital VC Jeff Kopelman posted to his blog what he thought was clear evidence that Yahoo employees are planning a mass exodus. Through his venture firm, he bought Facebook ads with the message "Leaving Yahoo?" in November and again this week after Microsoft announced its intentions to buy the company. Clickthrough rates on the ads were up 300 percent this time over last, Kopelman said. What Kopelman didn't say was that this time the ads included Facebook profile pictures of current Yahoo employees. The pictures appeared because the Yahoos had joined First Round Capital's Facebook group — not because they'd left the company.

"I think that my experiment was flawed," Kopelman writes on his blog. Here's one Yahoo employee's far-too-gracious reaction:

Earlier today, I read your post on the social ads experiment. I agree that it's an interesting polling mechanism to judge the mood of folks at Y! or Microsoft. But I want to offer an alternate / adjunct explanation to the reason behind the rise you are seeing in CTRs. The ads are shocking.

Social ads were designed as an endorsement. By becoming a fan of a business, I lend my likeness to the business and allow them to promote their products and services to my fans. It most instances, this would have a purely positive connotation. For example, if I were a fan of BMW my likeness might appear alongside a Newsfeed ad which might read "The Ultimate Driving Machine." The ad tagline is generally positive and straight forward. In the case of the ads you designed (attached), my face appears alongside a tagline, "Leaving Yahoo!?". To the casual eye, the ad tagline reads as if it could be reporting a rumor that I am leaving Yahoo!, or that I have already left and that I am recruiting for a start-up.

The negative connotation of the ad design introduces the potential to elicit responses of surprise and shock - not necessarily directly related to employee satisfaction. In fact, if the clicks on the ads are driven by "surprise and shock" it may also provide an explanation as to why the Microsoft CTRs were higher than the Yahoo CTRs. It could be that people at Microsoft were more surprised than Yahoos to see that their colleagues were leaving the mothership.

An interesting experiement in social ads and a good lesson for me about the twists and turms related to Beacon and passive endorsements. I don't want my colleagues to think I'm leaving Yahoo, so while your experiment is ongoing, I've pulled my "Facebook fandom" for First Round Capital, but I very much remain a fan! I know that your experiment was done with the best of intentions. You should keep doing them! Afterall, if we can't be fascinated by this industry (and maintain our sense of humor) it's time to move on. We're all still learning about Beacon and social ads in general. It's a really powerful concept, but I think there we'll discover a line between implicit and explicit endorsements.

The moneymen at The Lobby

Megan McCarthy — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 15:33:15 PDT

The venture capitalists spotted at this week's Lobby conference in Hawaii are not, we've noted, the Sand Hill Road dwellers who inflated bubbles past or present. No sign of anyone from Sequoia or Kleiner Perkins. So who is enjoying the tropical sun? Well, conference host and August Capital partner David Hornik, of course. Also photographed on the scene: Greylock's David Sze, SoftTech's Jeff Clavier, Foundation Capital's Mike Brown, Panorama Capital's Mike Jung, and Bay Partner's Eric Chin. Hats off to First Round Capital's Josh Kopelman, who is using his entrepreneurial skills to cash in during the scavenger hunt. (Photo by: bradley23)

Much love to Web 2.0

Megan McCarthy — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 15:45:27 PDT

The week of Web 2.0 Summit, with the industry converging on San Francisco, seems like as good time as any to throw a shindig. Everyone's in town for the schmoozefest, so you might get to meet quality people who normally avoid the party scene. While my boss hit the Reddit party, I hopped around town to some of the other events. Three, in fact. VC firm True Ventures held a gathering at their offices on Pier 38, a tech industry jam session — for charity, naturally — occurred across town at the Rickshaw Stop, and VCs Eric Chin and Mike Jung held a private party at Fluid for attendees of their intimate Alpha dinners in Woodside. Who needs sleep this week?

True Ventures, the firm which counts WordPress maker Automattic and tech-blog network GigaOm among its holdings, hosted people at its offices on Pier 38 right by the Bay Bridge. Spotted at the party: GigaOm reporters Katie Fehrenbacher and Liz Gannes in conversation with Richard MacManus of ReadWriteWeb. The effortlessly charming Jared Kopf of AdRoll tried to duck having a specific launch date for his ad software company. (Before December 31, he promised.) On my way out the door, I spied First Round Capital VC Josh Kopelman chatting with angel investor Ron Conway, VC Stewart Alsop, and TeeBeeDee's Robin Wolaner. (I recognized Wolaner because she recently blogged about having eye surgery complete with mid-surgery pictures. Ew! In a Discovery Channel can't-stop-looking sort of way.)

I spoke with Kopelman for a moment as he explained the reason why he tried indoor skydiving — the activity which broke his shoulder. His wife thought it seemed safer than the zero-gravity flights currently in vogue with the Sand Hill set. Oops.

Onto the Rickshaw Stop across town, to a music session for hacks and flacks. The open mike jam session starred jounalist rock star Don Clark of the Wall Street Journal and Kevin Maney of Portfolio. Here's a secret for you — whenever Don Clark plays, a gaggle of PR fans mob the audience. Last night? No different. Spotted in the crowd, flacks from big firms, like Voce Communications, and PR consultants aplenty. Ali Partovi, founder of music application service iLike, came out to support the scene. PR goddess Brooke Hammerling appeared and greeted Le Web 3 conference producer Cathy Brooks effusively.

To SoMa and Fluid for the the last stop of the night, where Mike Jung of Panorama Capital and Eric Chin of Bay Partners brought together alums from their Alpha dinners in Woodside for a drink special. Spotted: First Round Capital director Howard Morgan, who spoke briefly about his investment into the Zero-G airlines. (He's been on three of those flights already!) The crowd was full of founders. Among the crowd were Mint's Aaron Patzer, HotorNot founder James Hong, former Greylock VC turned Chirpscreen founder Eve Phillips and the guy blowing kisses above, PBWiki founder David Weekly. Eric and Mike told me that they aim to have their Alpha dinners bring together founders and VCs with a common thread, with the hopes of making connections that pay off. And it's happened. Oren Michels of Mashery reports that his widget-software startup received a check in the midst of one of the Alpha dinners. The Alpha luck might have struck again. At the end of the night, Mike Jung snuck away for a phone call. Rumor was that a deal was in the works. Heard anything about it? Let us know.

Email startup takes on filmmaking

Megan McCarthy — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 15:38:45 PDT

A note to venture capitalist Rob Hayes of First Round Capital. Remember the cash you plunked down on Xobni, the party-throwing email startup? This is where your money's going.

Email startup Xobni ("inbox" spelled backwards) has released a short film aimed at recruiting new engineers to join their team. Filmed with a clear nod towards Reservoir Dogs and Office Space, the clip includes an efficient German manager, gratuitous toilet humor (the bathroom stall is labeled "Outbox"), an Indian-accented sock puppet, and an appearance by Y Combinator guru Paul Graham, who bought the cameo, in a sense, by providing Xobni's seed round.

Josh Kopelman's bad break

Megan McCarthy — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 15:36:02 PDT

If you were wondering why First Round Capital VC Josh Kopelman has been walking around in a sling, here's your explanation. Embedded, above, is the video Kopelman posted of him breaking his shoulder trying to indoor skydive in Las Vegas. Beware: The mishap occurs around :90 seconds in, and it's totally not for the squeamish. But if you can stand it, it's as good a demonstration of the downside of the Valley's macho, testosterone-driven, thrill-seeking culture as you'll ever need.

Bow down and worship Xobni's party-throwing skills

Megan McCarthy — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 16:11:11 PDT

On the left, beatific investor Rob Hayes of First Round Capital. On the right, worshipful Xobni cofounder Adam Smith, genuflecting before the man who graced his startup with the tall dollars, and helped fund a night of excess last Friday.

Xobni, an email-organization startup launched by Paul Graham’s Y Combinator incubator, has not yet come out with an actual product. But no matter! They threw a party last Friday to celebrate their new office in San Francisco’s Financial District. I, alas, skipped the affair, which, in retrospect, was a bad decision (no kidding -Ed.), because judging from the pictures, they had a hell of a time. So, what is Xobni, exactly? From the tipster who alerted us to the photos:

They’ve been around forever, have raised tons of money, rented a ginormous office in a historic building in the financial district, but have yet to release a product.

Sounds like the perfect reason to throw a bash.