News - KickLabs

Scripps Networks Interactive acquires RealGravity Inc.

PRESS RELEASE

KNOXVILLE, Tenn., Jan 31, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Scripps Networks Interactive Inc. SNI +0.09% , seeking to enhance the digital video capabilities of its growing lifestyle media businesses, has acquired RealGravity Inc., a California-based company that specializes in online video publishing technologies. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Founded in 2009, RealGravity has developed an innovative platform that manages and publishes video content. The company’s cofounders and its 10 employees in Los Angeles and San Francisco will join the Scripps Networks Interactive digital team.

About Scripps Networks Interactive

Scripps Networks Interactive is one of the leading developers of lifestyle-oriented content for television and the Internet, where on-air programming is complemented with online video, social media areas and e-commerce components on companion websites and broadband vertical channels. The company’s media portfolio includes popular lifestyle television and Internet brands HGTV, Food Network, Travel Channel, DIY Network, Cooking Channel and country music network Great American Country.

SOURCE: Scripps Networks Interactive Inc. Read more …

BizSpark Partnership Gives a Boost To Rocket Space

by Claire Lee, Guest blog by Duncan Logan, Rocket Space

Isolation is the silent killer of many startups.

There are currently thousands of people working away at home on great startup ideas hoping to be the next Facebook or DropBox or AirBnB who don’t realize that an enormous amount of the success of these companies was due to the chance meetings and input from the amazing ecosystem that exists in Silicon Valley. We are all influenced by our surroundings and hence the popularity and success of incubators like YCombinator, KickLabs and 500Startups where meetings aren’t left to chance and the environment is carefully controlled.

RocketSpace is a focused technology hub. As an accelerator we focus on post incubator, seed funded technology companies who are approaching the rapid growth phase. The quality of the companies, the quality of the founders and the quality of the ecosystem we manage is critical to us. If we cannot accelerate this growth, but also raise the success rate of the companies within RocketSpace then we have failed.

Twitter: Payment to the People The pay-per-tweet model is moving past celebs to average Joes and Janes

By Erin Griffith

It sounds a bit like a late-night infomercial. “You too can make money on Twitter! Just follow this simple plan . . . ”

And it’s true. As a company, Twitter has yet to turn a profit, but thanks to a proliferation of third-party services offering cash for sponsored tweets, the microblogging platform’s users can. In what is essentially a brokering of “Your Tweet Here” ad space, anyone with a Twitter handle can cash in on his or her followers via services like MyLikes, IZEA, Ad.ly, Twittad, or twtMob, which provide variations on a pay-per-click theme. Word of mouth is officially a tangible currency.

Until recently, shilling for brands on Twitter largely remained in the realm of celebrities. Services like Ad.ly, which connects brands and celebs, offers more than 1,000 celebrities from Snooki to Mariah Carey (and also strangely, Time.com). But regular old Twitter users with small-to-average follower counts are just as eager to try their hand at shilling. And a trusted friend’s recommendation is powerful. Most of Kourtney Kardashian’s followers realize she’s being paid for that 1-800-Flowers shout out. But your co-worker tweeting about a discounted flight on Virgin America? That’s different. “The reach per person is much smaller, but the people you reach and the quality of that recommendation is much higher,” said Leif Abraham, co-founder of creative shop Innovative Thunder. (Disclosure is naturally an issue; most services avoid FTC wrath with sponsorship-identifying links.)

Guinness World Records Hooks Up With Kiip To Let Anyone With An iPhone Have A Shot At A Record

September 28th, 2011, by Alexia Tsotis

In just about one of the weirdest press releases that has come across my radar, mobile gaming rewards network Kiip and the old-school Guinness World Records (seriously) are announcing that they are teaming up today to offer mobile gamers the chance to be official Guinness World Record holders. Yeah.

The partnership will most prominently result in a five-day long contest held from September 28th through October 3rd, where players of the iPhone game ‘Mega Jump’ will compete, through Kiip, for the Guinness World Record for “Highest Score Achieved on Mega Jump.” The highest scoring user on the Mega Jump leaderboard (visible here) will be featured in the “Guinness Book of World Records: 2012 Gamers Edition.”

RealGravity Seeks to Shake Up Video Platforms and Syndication With All-in-One Solution

Thursday, October 13, 2011, by Will Richmond

Newcomer RealGravity is looking to shake up online video platform/publishing and syndication with a no-commitment, risk-free, all-in-one solution.RealGravity hit my radar recently as it is poweringCineSport, which has become one of the top online video sports properties this year (recently with more viewers than Yahoo Sports, ESPN and SI Digital) by focusing exclusively on syndicating its content to larger 3rd-party publishers.

As VideoNuze readers know, online video syndication has been a focus of mine for several years, as I’m a big believer that it’s critical for generating audience and revenues, particularly for smaller content providers that lack well-trafficked destinations. RealGravity is providing important infrastructure for fueling syndication, and recently I caught up with Luke McDonough, co-founder and CEO to learn more about what makes RealGravity different.