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Mark Zuckerberg on "vision quest" in India
"According to sources, Zuckerberg is in India and, in fact, all over the world, on a trip that is mostly for pleasure and contemplation, but also mixing in with some business." — Kara Swisher on Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's travels [BoomTown] (Photoillustration by Webyantra)
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nerdspotting
Indian website puts five-digit bounty on Mark Zuckerberg's head
Mark Zuckerberg's in India, we hear. Is he there on holiday, or working to launch Facebook India? The answer's unclear, but Indian gossip website Techgoss.com wants to know the answer pretty badly. So badly that they're offering a 10,000-rupee reward for anyone who turns up photos of Zuckerberg and a detailed story on what he's up to. That translates to $250 — or a week's wages for an Indian computer programmer. (Photoillustration by Jackson West)
nerdspotting
Could Owen Van Natta toast a reunion with another ex-Facebooker?
When I ran into former Facebook COO Owen Van Natta at last night's Fast Company party, he was in high spirits, claiming to enjoy life as an unemployed dad. But he's made no secret of his desire to get back into the startup game at some point — this time as CEO, not a dispensable No. 2. Which is why this photo, sent by a tipster, of Van Natta doing shots of Jägermeister with ex-Facebooker Darian Shirazi, got us thinking. Shirazi has a startup, Redux, which raised $3.5 million in funding last month. Redux is working on automated ways of finding friends online, but it's better known for its FlickIM instant-messaging client for the iPhone. It may not be the next Facebook, but one has to think Van Natta could do worse than running Redux, and Shirazi could do worse than landing Van Natta.
caption contest
You know how to whistle, don't you?
At 21, Darian Shirazi, is just old enough to order a drink at the bar of Junoon, the Palo Alto Indian restaurant where this shot was snapped. But he's already logged two years at Facebook, the sale of one company, and a round of funding from Draper Fisher Jurvetson for Redux, his current startup. That was enough to draw the interest of John Hawksley, an MIT-trained engineer who interned last summer at Google and who, in 8th grade, starred on Dick Clark's Battle of the Child Geniuses. (Hawksley doesn't turn 21 until May 22.) Our tipster spotted the two in mid-job interview, or so he claims. Can you suggest a better caption? Do so in the comments. Yesterday's winner: "How could we all be picked last?" by longtailwagsthevalley.
nerdspotting
Jimmy Wales bores crowd with stump speech in Norway
"Yesterday we went to see Jimmy Wales speak at the Nobel Peace Prize Center during the seminar 'How Free is the Internet.' Jimbo was less controversial than his wikipedia page and his jokes were not funny." — Aeron Bergman and Alejandra Salinas, on a visit by Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales to Norway
nerdspotting
Marissa Mayer hits the town with hunky boytoy and Orkut
Google VP Marissa Mayer attended the San Francisco Ballet's New Work's Festival on Friday and she brought along all her favorite friends. These included Mayer's manfriend, real-estate fund manager Zach Bogue, who, for reasons unknowable hasn't starred in a season of ABC's the Bachelor yet. Mayer's outfit is "a softer, [more] feminine look than we usually see from her" reports SFLuxe — but check out Googler Orkut Buyukkokten's suit, below. It's a Roberto Cavalli, darlings. More »
Ballmer, sighted in Palo Alto, was there for Yahoo meeting
A Valleywag tipster spotted Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and fellow executive Kevin Johnson in Palo Alto on Wednesday. Kara Swisher now confirms they were in California for a meeting with Yahoo. [BoomTown]
A Valleywag tipster spotted Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and fellow executive Kevin Johnson in Palo Alto on Wednesday. Kara Swisher now confirms they were in California for a meeting with Yahoo. [BoomTown]
nerdspotting
Steve Ballmer seen in Palo Alto today, near Facebook's offices
A tipster writes:Was parked on University Ave right east of University Cafe near Waverly, on a conference call dealing with business for my own startup company. And lo and behold, Steve Ballmer, Kevin Johnson and some other woman walked out of the building on the corner (right @ 3pm). They walked along University Ave toward El Camino Real. I worked at MSFT for 3 years before leaving to do my start up so I know it was certainly then. Lots of silence on the Yahoo deal, and perhaps they were on Facebook business unrelated... but who knows.Ballmer, Microsoft's CEO, was rumored to be meeting with Yahoo executives in Oregon. No need to go so far! He was just a few stops down 101 from Yahoo's Sunnyvale headquarters. But our tipster may be right about Ballmer being here on Facebook business. Kevin Johnson, one of Ballmer's companions, was president of Microsoft's Windows division and an architect of its Facebook investment. Facebook investor Accel Partners is located on University near Waverly; from there, the Microsoft team walked in the direction of Facebook's offices. Anyone know what they were up to? Drop us a line.
nerdspotting
Jimmy Wales takes his Wikipedia magic show to New York City
For a province of California, Silicon Valley can be strangely puritan at times. That made it an uncomfortable locale for libertine Libertarian Jimmy Wales, the less-than-saintly founder of Wikipedia. Wales told ex-lover Rachel Marsden, the Canadian controversialist, that he wanted to move to New York to be closer to her. Their affair is over — ended, fittingly, via a posting on Wikipedia — but Wales has relocated to New York all the same. The likely reason has to do with work, or the appearance of work. Although Wikipedia's nonprofit parent, the Wikimedia Foundation, is located in San Francisco, and his ostensible employer, for-profit wiki venture Wikia, has itsheadquarters in a suburb to the south of the city, Wales is charged with running a search-engine project for Wikia which is based in New York. More »
11:40 AM on Tue Apr 29 2008
By Owen Thomas
1,136 views,
42 comments
Latest by Rachel Marsden: @gitahne-o: Damn straight. more »
nerdspotting
Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and YouTubers party with Pussycat Dolls in Vegas
YouTube cofounders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen partied in Las Vegas over weekend, taking to the VIP sections at Caesar's Palace and the Luxor, a nerdspotter tells us. At Caesar's Hurley, Chen and a crew of about 25 YouTubers — early employees, we hear — lounged around Club Pure, taking in a Pussycat Dolls show (an example in the clip below). Our tipster tells us the group partied not like rock stars, but "cool nerds." Anyone have a visual explanation of what that looks like? Send in your cameraphone spy clips of Chen & Co., or better yet, post them to YouTube. More »
nerdspotting
Sweatily peripatetic Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has been on the run lately. He's been launching salvos in his takeover battle with Yahoo from the unlikeliest of locations: First Morocco; then Milan, Italy; now Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgium. There for a Microsoft developers' conference, captured in a video clip, Ballmer told reporters what Valleywag readers have long known: Yes, he has a Facebook profile. Unlike Bill Gates, he tries to keep up with it.
Steve Ballmer's world tour: If it's Thursday, this must be Belgium
Sweatily peripatetic Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has been on the run lately. He's been launching salvos in his takeover battle with Yahoo from the unlikeliest of locations: First Morocco; then Milan, Italy; now Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgium. There for a Microsoft developers' conference, captured in a video clip, Ballmer told reporters what Valleywag readers have long known: Yes, he has a Facebook profile. Unlike Bill Gates, he tries to keep up with it.
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Steve Jurvetson makes chess nerd supermodel Carmen Kass smile
Draper Fisher Jurvetson general manager Steve Jurvetson was wallowing in Estonian pride on Friday at a party held by the Swedish ambassador. Sidling up to chess-playing überhottie Carmen Kass, he even managed to elicit a smile from the thin minx, who is most often pictured with the professionally dour expression demanded on the runway. But just in case the intimate moment might be misinterpreted, Jurvetson seems to be holding up his hand to make sure the photographer catches the glint from his wedding ring. (Photo from Steve Jurvetson)
lazy valleywag
What's Sergey Brin doing with Arianna Huffington in Tahiti?
Google cofounder Sergey Brin is, two days away from his company's first-quarter earnings call, sunning himself in Tahiti. As is Greco-American blog tycoon Arianna Huffington and Wendi Deng, wife of News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch. Huffington is reportedly there on vacation, but it's a stretch to think Brin and Deng are also there by sheer coincidence. Anyone have a bead on what prompted the South Pacific power summit? Do let us know your theories.
nerdspotting
A tipster writes in:
Larry Ellison drives an Audi R8 to the gym
A tipster writes in: Larry Ellison spotted driving out of 2882 Sand Hill Road in Audi R8, probably coming out of the gym where he is rumored to work out.We haven't got a picture of Ellison in workout shorts, but what about the Oracle CEO's car, the Audi R8? Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson described it as "like smearing honey onto Keira Knightley." Try not to think about Ellison smearing honey onto Knightley while watching Clarkson's review: More »
nerdspotting
Leah Culver, Cal Henderson take in "21" on movie date
I remain utterly obsessed with ubiquinnoying Pownce cofounder Leah Culver and heterofabulous Flickr engineer Cal Henderson, not least because he tweaked my nipples the last time I saw the pair in Austin. A tipster reports spotting the besotted twosome at the Westfield mall in downtown San Francisco, going into a screening of 21, a tale of geeks who used higher math to take the house in Vegas. Could a desert debauch be in their future? (Photo by magerleagues)
lucy southworth
Mark Zuckerberg reveals Larry Page's wife in another man's embrace
Before Lucy Southworth met Larry, there was another man in the future Ms. Page's life: Tom Kretchmar. From a photo album on Facebook, leaked thanks to the site's privacy holes, we can see Southworth and Kretchmar were close. In one photo, she's sitting on his lap. Old college flame, or just a friendly school chum? Never mind: Southworth is too radiantly adorkable for me to pay much attention to Kretchmar. More »
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