For Andreessen and Horowitz, it's gotta be Qik

Netscape wunderkind Marc Andreessen and longtime business partner Ben Horowitz are teaming up again, this time to invest in Qik, which lets users stream live video from their mobile phone.

Andreessen, co-founder and chairman of social networking site Ning, and Horowitz, vice president and general manager of Hewlett-Packard's business technology organization unit, have made a "significant investment" in the Foster City, Calif., company and will join its board of advisors, which already includes Salesforce.com Chairman and Chief Executive Marc Benioff. The company would not say how much the pair of angel investors ponied up.

The service, which is championed by celebrity technology blogger Robert Scoble, has gained in popularity particularly as it adds new features such as integration with Twitter, YouTube, Mogulus, MySpace, Orkut and Justin.tv. Qik is used by a wide array of users, called Qikkers, including both professional and citizen journalists.

There is even a Twittering Texas congressman (and other members of congress) who broadcasts live images from Capitol Hill using Qik. (He describes himself as a "real-time representative.") Other events captured on Qik include the lighting of the Olympic torch, the Mars landing from the Jet Propulsion Lab control room in Pasadena, sessions from the World Economic Forum in Davos and the pope's travels abroad. C-SPAN is now using Qik as one means of covering the Democratic convention in Denver.

Qik takes a feed from a camera phone and streams the images live and unfiltered over the Internet. The service seems destined for the mainstream even though the quality of the video is still what you would expect from a mobile phone (no high-definition here, folks). Analysts say Qik and its competitors, including Comvu, Flixwagon and Kyte, may be on the verge of turning everyone into mobile broadcasters, transforming yet again how news is disseminated and by whom.

So far Qik seems to have the bigger brand. And now it has some name-brand technology backers to go with it.

-- Jessica Guynn

Photo credit: Qik

Comments

[wayne Sutton]

This is great news, as I use qik on both my jailbroken iPhone and nokia n95, I like how qik has grown to be the mobile live stream service of choice.

[sissy]

Hard to believe. this guy has posted his personal ad to a celebrities dating site called (LoveWealthy) for several months. i just visited his profile page yesterday. it seems he has not logged in recently.omg, is he looking for new relationships?

[WebDesignMiami]

Is Salesforce.com the new ADP ... or the next Datapoint?
What will happen if blue sky clears the cloud?

***

This headline recently appeared in several places across the Web:

"Salesforce.com Passes $1 Billion Annual Revenue Mark"

THIS IS NOT TRUE. I don't know whether this material misstatement arose from media manipulation or an honest mistake, but it's genesis is most likely this 20 August 2008 press release...

"Salesforce.com Announces Record Fiscal Second Quarter Results"
http://tinyurl.com/5m5mea

...the subheading of which claims:

"First Ever Software as a Service Company to Exceed $1 Billion Annual Revenue Run Rate"

THIS IS NOT TRUE, EITHER. "Software as a Service" is marketing technospin for "service bureau". And payroll processing giant ADP--another service bureau--exceeded not only a "run rate" but actual annual revenues of $1 billion in 1985:

"The original outsourcer, Automatic Data Processing..."
http://tinyurl.com/56y5tx

Yes, SalesForce.com did report revenues of $263 million for their most recent quarter. And yes, they have raised "FY09 Revenue Guidance to $1.070 - $1.075 Billion". But NO, Salesforce.com has NOT passed the "$1 Billion Annual Revenue Mark". And despite Cheerleader/CEO Marc Benioff's effusive exuberance, some like Tiernan Ray do not share his enthusiasm:

"Salesforce's Deferred Revenue Debacle"
http://tinyurl.com/6oagtp

Perhaps in an effort to meet ever-inflating investor expectations--a fire they themselves have fueled--Mr. Ray notes that Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Nemeroff "...thinks Salesforce may be pushing customers to sign more multi-year subscription contracts by lower prices, which could be hitting deferred revenue." And reading that, for me, brought on a disturbing case of Datapoint deja vu:

http://tinyurl.com/gk77r

"By the early 1980s, Datapoint was a Fortune 500 company. Under immense pressure to increase sales figures, its sales representatives encouraged customers to place large orders at the end of the fiscal year, permitting the company to count the orders as revenue even though the money had not been received and, in some instances, the sold equipment had not yet even been produced.... When some of the customers went broke before paying their bills, Datapoint had to reverse sales or record substantial bad debts, which caused the company to lose $800 million of its market capitalization in a matter of a few months in early 1982. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ordered Datapoint to stop this practice."

Is Salesforce.com the new ADP ... or the next Datapoint? Some say their business model is to take your watch and then bill you for the time. If so, what will happen to all those watches if blue sky clears the cloud?

Bruce Arnold, Web Design Miami Florida
http://www.PervasivePersuasion.com

[Randy Ksar]

Congrats on the investment. Been an qikker since the beginning and love the ease-of-use of the mobile phone software on my Motorola phone. Look forward to future innovations with the new funding.

[John Piercy]

congrats to all the QIK users and team

we here in canada ... dont have unlimited data ....
So Im very jealous ... looks like the future of media is here ... just not in canada

jp