Pulse2 Technology and Social Media News » Slide

Google Shuts Down Slide So Max Levchin Leaves

Amit Chowdhry — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 18:43:53 +0000

Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) acquired Slide about a year ago for $182 million. Now Slide is being shut down so Slide founder Max Levchin is leaving Google.

“Max has decided to leave Slide and Google to pursue other opportunities, and we wish him the best,” said a Google spokesperson. “Most of the team from Slide will remain at Google to work on other opportunities.” When Slide was acquired, it operated independently out of Google’s San Francisco office. They continued to maintain existing applications such as SuperPoke Pets. They also experimented with new applications such as Disco and Photovine.

Some of the team at Slide will be brought into YouTube. Slide has about 100 employees. Before getting acquired by Google, Slide raised $78 million in venture capital funding. Slide’s head of product Jared Fliesler is also planning on leaving Google. It is rumored that Fliesler will be joining Square as encouraged by former Slide colleague Keith Rabois.

[AllThingsD]

Google Source Codes Indicates a Google Games Service Coming Soon

Riley Kennysmith — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 19:28:32 +0000

TechCrunch reports that Yvo Schaap has found, buried in the Google+ source code, a link for a Google Games logo and API endpoints that indicate that Google Games will be a social gaming service. Schaap found references to “game friends” and an ability within Games to “post to stream.” Google is known to have invested more than $100 million in gaming giant Zynga in 2010, and also acquired gaming company Slide last year as well.

For many, one appeal of Google+ is that it isn’t overrun with games the way Facebook is. It remains to be seen how Google Games will be integrated with Google+, or when we’ll see the Google-branded gaming service. However, given Google’s insistence that Google+ is a social extension of all other Google services, the games will probably find their way to the currently-uncluttered social network.

Google’s Slide Team Releases Pool Party Photo Sharing App

Riley Kennysmith — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 18:08:37 +0000

Google, possibly preparing to take over the entire internet/world, is also working on a photo sharing app called Pool Party. The app is available in the Android Market and in Apple’s App Store, but is currently in beta as an invite-only service. You can request an invite at the website and download the app without an invite, but you won’t be able to use it until you secure an invite. The app is focused on realtime photo sharing in group aggregate albums called “pools.” It looks like a great way to look at photos of an event without having to click through separate photographers’ albums.

Pool Party was built by Google’s Slide team, who are also responsible for the Disco messaging app. [TechCrunch]

Max Levchin Becomes VP Engineering At Google After Slide Acquisition

Amit Chowdhry — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 03:42:16 +0000

Max Levchin was a co-founder of PayPal and was most recently the CEO of Slide.com. After Google bought Slide.com for $182 million plus $42 million in retention bonuses, Max Levchin became the VP of engineering at the search engine company.

Both Levchin and Google Android head Vic Gundotra now report to Google SVP of operations Urs Hölzle. On the same day that Google acquired Slide.com, the company gave a demo of its upcoming Facebook competitor called Google Me to internal upper management. Levchin will most likely oversee Google Me as well.

[InsideFacebook]

Google Acquires Slide

Amit Chowdhry — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 21:56:48 +0000

Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) has acquired social application company Slide. This further indicates Google’s plan to create a social networking ecosystem to challenge Facebook. No word on the acquisition price, but there is speculation that the deal was worth $228 million plus $46 million in retention bonuses. Google’s future social initiative has the codename Google Me. Slide is known for the SuperPoke and Top Friends applications on Facebook. [eWeek]

Controvesy Around Slide’s SuperPoke Facebook App For “Shank”

Amit Chowdhry — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 02:47:31 +0000

Slide, Inc., the company created by PayPal co-founder Max Levchin, is taking some heat from The Sun U.K. The Sun U.K. is blaming Slide for a violent epidemic happening in London because in the SuperPoke application, users can virtually “shank” friends.

Slide immediately removed the “Shank” feature from the application. “Slide does not condone violence whatsoever, and our SuperPoke! application is meant to foster fun, virtual communications between friends. We have removed this particular action as it misrepresents the SuperPoke! brand” stated a Slide spokesperson.

I agree that “Shanking” friends on the virtual application is distasteful, but I disagree with the way that The Sun reported the whole thing. The Sun U.K. interviewed the uncle of Rob Knox, an actor who played Marcus Belby in the Harry Potter movies. Rob Knox was killed by former classmate , Karl Bishop with a knife in front of a bar when trying to protect his little brother. Knox’s uncle was quoted by The Sun:

“Wait until one of their family members is a victim of knife crime and then see what they say. The stupidity of having this on their site is unbelievable. And they deliberately use the street term ‘shanked’, which is even worse. They are targeting the kids who are on street corners carrying knives.”

The first sentence of that quote was very distasteful. Violence happens everywhere. When something bad happens, media sensationalists have a tendency to try and find scapegoats. I believe that Slide is being wrongfully accused here. Some of the SuperPoke features can easily be offensive, but at the end of the day we are all human and a majority of us have control of our own actions.

Related Links:
1. AllFacebook
2. The Sun UK article
3. Slide.com

Slide Over That $50 Million, I’ve Got Photo Widgets!

Amit Chowdhry — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 08:26:10 +0000

As you give a goofy look at the camera pointing at you in a photo kiosk at an entertainment venue, you begin to wonder what captions and background you’ll use.Â Now take this concept, slap it on the Internet in the form of a widget that can be Facebooked or MySpaced, and you’re ready to raise $50 million.

Business-savvy Internet entrepreneur and PayPal co-founder, Max Levchin did exactly that, as mentioned in BusinessWeek.Â Slide raised $50 million and increased their valuation to $500 million.Â This fourth round of investment was provided by Fidelity Investments and T. Rowe Price.

Photo widget companies is a proven model for acquisition targets, but is also a proven model for its vulnerability ofÂ mooching on other social networks’ user base.Â For example, Photobucket wasÂ acquired by News Corp. in May 2007 at a price of $250 million in cash.Â But before the acquisition, MySpace completely blocked Photobucket from accessing their users because of an advertising violation before making a truce.Â

Altogether, Slide has raised over $75 million including investments from other PayPal co-founder, Peter Thiel and venture capitalist, Vinod Khosla.Â Thiel is an early investor of Facebook.Â The other founders of Slide include Jared Kopf and Scott Banister, both also former PayPal employees.

Previous Slide coverage is available at: http://pulse2.com/category/slide/.

RockYou! Receives Series B Funding

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 16 May 2007 22:10:00 +0000

RockYou! is a company that designs widgets known for appearing all over MySpace.Â The company was previously placed in the shadow ofÂ Photobucket because of the controversies that were happening between Photobucket and MySpace.Â

But now RockYou! is boasting 150 million widgets served by 10 million registered users and now receiving Series B funding.Â AfterÂ Photobucket was acquired by MySpace, there are now talks of other widget company acquisitions which makes the funding of RockYou! seem a lot more promising.Â

TheÂ competition between RockYou! and Slide is heating up and what happens in the near future will definetely be interesting.

Photobucket isn’t the only on the block to be acquired by MySpace.Â According to TechCrunch, there are talks of Flektor getting acquired as well.Â Flektor allows users to create slideshows that include effects, transitions, photos, text, and video.Â The amount rumored for Flektor is $10-$20 million.

Slide Receives Third Round of Funding From Khosla Ventures & Mayfield Fund

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 07:51:50 +0000

Slide.com, the photo slideshow website has raised a third round of funding from Khosla Ventures and Mayfield Fund. According to VentureBeat, the amount of funding for the third round is undisclosed, but there are rumors circulating that it is over the second round of $8 million. Based on third round funding estimations, Slide is currently worth near or over $20 million.

Creating a slideshow with Slide is done in 3 simple steps from the arrange page. The three steps are: 1.) Create a Slide Show, 2.) Save Slide Show, and 3.) Share Slide Show. There are 4 presets to scroll pictures: Sliding, Stars, Collage, and Checker. Photos can be directly imported from your PC hard drive, Photobucket account, Flickr account, MySpace account, or direct URLs. There are also several themes and sizes to alter these slide shows.

One of the co-founders of Slide is Max Levchin, a co-founder and former CTO of PayPal. Levchin is from Kiev, Ukraine, then moved to Chicago to attend UIUC. After PayPal went public in 2002 and his 2.3% stake was converted into $34 million after the eBay acquired PayPal, Levchin started Slide in 2004.

Levchin had also created Yelp, a review-centric social network. Previous investors include Founders Fund, BlueRun Ventures, and Peter Theil, the other co-founder of PayPal. Levchin aims to make money by adding sponsored pictures in slide show image crawls. Currently, Slide and Yelp are based in San Francisco. SFGate.com has a detailed history of Levchin’s past.