Webby News

One of the things I like most about working at Facebook is the ability to launch products that are (almost) immediately used by millions of people. Unlike a three-guys-in-a-garage startup, we don’t have the luxury of scaling out infrastructure to keep pace with user growth; when your feature’s userbase will go from 0 to 70 million practically overnight, scalability has to be baked in from the start. The project I’m currently working on, Facebook Chat, offered a nice set of software engineering challenges.

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ActivIdentity announced that Jacques Kerrest has accepted the position of Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer. In this capacity, Mr. Kerrest will oversee all of ActivIdentity’s financial and operational functions, including finance and accounting, financial planning and analysis, regulatory and risk management.

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Zvents announced that it will be collaborating with Microsoft to enhance the events experience on MSN City Guides. Through the collaboration, Zvents’ platform will bring new capabilities to MSN users looking for interesting things to do in their immediate vicinity, enabling local merchants to promote themselves to interested consumers.

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The latest director of engineering at Facebook, one of four, is Mike Schroepfer - from Mozilla. In his blog on the move, he wrote to his Mozilla colleagues: “This is the first time I’ve decided to leave something I really truly love - I will dearly miss getting a chance to work with all of you every day. Everyone that I’ve met from the community has, and will continue to be, a huge inspiration to me.”

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Which of the following are RIAs: Google Earth, Gmail, Picnik, iTunes? “RIA” is too broad term and trying to stuff all this types of application into that bucket. I think discussing the terms will deliver much more value. What do you think an RIA is? Do we need another term?

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In its relatively short lifetime, the World Wide Web has had a dramatic impact on the way information is presented and shared. Before the Internet and the Web were available, “big media” companies invested heavily in expensive research, writing, editorial, printing, post-production, and broadcasting infrastructure to create compelling and thoughtful media assets for consumers.

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The SEC has finally acknowledged that the nature of online information is increasingly interactive, and not static. Henceforth, according to a recommendation by its own Special Counsel in the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance, information appearing on company web sites “does not need to satisfy a printer-friendly standard or be in a format comparable to paper-based information, unless the Commission’s rules explicitly require it.”

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