Blog.Photobucket.com

Photobucket Launches Mobile Web Experience

Photobucket Goes Beyond the Desktop:
Leading Photo Site Launches Mobile Web Experience

Photobucket Mobile Recreates the Site’s Web-based
Uploading, Browsing and Searching Capabilities

PALO ALTO, Calif., January 15, 2008 – Photobucket, one of the Web’s most popular hubs for managing personal media, today announced the launch of Photobucket Mobile, giving its millions of users access to Photobucket features on web-enabled mobile devices. Users can access Photobucket Mobile by visiting http://m.photobucket.com on their mobile device.

Through Photobucket Mobile, users can:

• Browse existing personal and public Photobucket content directly from mobile devices
• Upload photos and videos to Photobucket from mobile devices
• Share photos and graphics with individuals via email from mobile devices
• Search Photobucket’s billions of photos and graphics
• View a variety of featured photos and images every day from the Photobucket Mobile Home page

The demand for Photobucket Mobile has steadily increased among its user base. An internal survey of thousands of Photobucket users conducted by Fox Interactive Media’s Research and Strategy Solutions in August 2007 found that 80 percent have a camera phone, 36 percent use the camera in their mobile phone every day and more than half (52 percent) have access to the Internet from their mobile phone.

“The growing demand for Photobucket Mobile proved to us that now was the perfect time to unveil a fully-functional mobile platform,” said Alex Welch, President of Photobucket. “Photobucket Mobile offers a great destination for our avid users to upload, search and share their digital media, wherever they are. As photo sharing continues to move beyond the desktop, our users look to share their digital life moments instantly. Recreating the Photobucket experience on a mobile platform is a critical part of meeting this need.”

Photobucket CEO & Co-Founder named finalist for Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year!

Photobucket CEO and Co-founder, Alex Welch,
Named Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2007 Award Finalist in the Rocky Mountain Region

DENVER, June 19, 2007 – Photobucket, the world’s largest personal media site, today announced that CEO and co-founder, Alex Welch, is a finalist for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2007 Award in the Rocky Mountain Region. According to Ernst & Young, the awards program was designed to recognize outstanding entrepreneurs on a regional, national and global level who are building and leading dynamic, growing businesses. Alex Welch was selected as a finalist from over 65 nominations by a panel of independent judges.

Important Photobucket Announcement

Dear Photobucket Friends:

As you may have already heard, today Photobucket announced that it has accepted an offer to be acquired by Fox Interactive Media (FIM), a division of News Corporation. This is a really big piece of news for us at Photobucket.

First and foremost, we expect nothing to change in our day-to-day operations. After the transaction is closed and finalized, the plan is to operate Photobucket as an independent, standalone company within FIM.

We plan to continue developing innovative tools that enhance self-expression and give you the best media sharing, linking and searching experience on the Web. Partnering with FIM will give us added resources and support to deliver on this vision, as well as the ability to offer new features for you -- our most important audience.

If you have questions or just want to drop us a line, write a comment here on the blog, or email us at pbsupport@photobucket.com. We read all your emails and messages. Keep them coming. And most importantly, keep all the great ideas coming.

I thank you for your support, and for all the ways you teach us what is truly meaningful about the Photobucket experience. We are extremely excited about Photobucket’s future, and look forward to continuing to bring you the very best personal media site in the world.

Regards,
Alex Welch, CEO, co-founder, Photobucket, Inc.

Photobucket Announces Mandy Moore Video Mash-Up Winner

Photobucket is proud to announce the winner of the Mandy Moore "Extraordinary" Remix contest!

Vintage High School in Napa California is the proud winner of a free acoustic concert by Mandy Moore for their graduating class of 2007.   Watch their remix to see why their school won!

Mandy Moore called the winner last week and will be performing at their highschool this Thursday!

All other school entries will be receiving a signed poster for their participation.  Again, congrats on an "Extraordinary" video and "Extraordinary" graduating class!

Read the entire media alert.

Photobucket hits the big Four-O

We're pretty excited here in Denver and Palo Alto. We just hit 40 million users. This is a great milestone for us -- we've come a long way since 2003. Not only that, but ComScore (the leading Web site that measures visitor numbers) puts us at the #1 spot in the US for photo sharing sites, and #4 in the US for the multimedia Web sites.

Photobucket on CNN Money!

"The biggest Web site you've never heard of." We know you all know us. But now someone at CNN Money does too. Nice article. We wanted to share it.

NEW YORK (Fortune) -- Photobucket is the most important site on the Internet that hardly anybody understands. Unpretentiously, it has built an essential service that didn't need to shout out for attention, the way MySpace, YouTube, Facebook, Flickr, or other related sites have. Yet it's built an audience of 38 million members, a figure now growing more than 80,000 per day. That's up from just 50,000 members at the end of 2003. More.

Photobucket Hitwise#1 award winner

We were thrilled to hear today that we're now a Hitwise #1 award winner for year ending December 2006.  The Hitwise award recognizes websites from over 160 industry categories that are leaders in their industry. A nice way to end the week!

Photobucket Doubles Bandwidth Connections to Cogent Communications

Cogent Communications Group, Inc. (Nasdaq: CCOI) announced today that Photobucket has doubled its bandwidth connections with Cogent. Photobucket, the online personal media company where over 37 million people create, manage and share their personal digital media, continues to experience explosive growth. The site is adding over 85,000 new users each day, which is resulting in significantly increased IP traffic demands.

Cogent has been Photobucket's primary provider of Internet bandwidth since 2005 and continues to support Photobucket's goal of reliable performance and uptime for their users. Part of that experience is making sure there is always enough capacity to handle traffic growth. This has resulted in several capacity upgrades for Photobucket and Cogent over the years, to keep in line with this continued user growth.

"We turned to Cogent for their pricing, we stay with Cogent for the quality and performance of their network combined with their superior customer support," said Darren Crystal, CTO and Co-Founder of Photobucket. "Our users are the trendsetters when it comes to social media -- their demands continue to grow as they upload more images, videos and remixed content. We are relying on Cogent to help us keep pace with the resulting bandwidth demand."

"Social networking is on the rise and so is the popularity of integrating media formats such as photos, graphics and video which all drive increased demand for bandwidth. Cogent is perfectly positioned to handle this bandwidth explosion by having ample capacity at the most attractive pricing in the industry," said Dave Schaeffer, CEO Cogent Communications. "Photobucket exemplifies how Web applications are able to advance and keep pace with user demands, with the availability of more and more bandwidth."

Photobucket is the Web's largest personal media site, with more than 37 million users. Photobucket's users store their photos, videos, remixes and images on Photobucket, and link from Photobucket to all their online profiles, personal Web sites and blogs. It serves over one billion content calls a day to the MySpace community alone. In the January 2007 ComScore rankings, Photobucket is the #6 most popular entertainment site in the US, and #35 most popular Web site overall.

About Cogent Communications

Cogent Communications (Nasdaq: CCOI) is a multinational, Tier 1 facilities-based ISP ranked by Ovum-RHK as the largest provider of Ethernet services in the United States. Cogent is also ranked as the 56th fastest growing company in North America on Deloitte's Technology Fast 500 List for 2006. Cogent specializes in providing businesses with high speed Internet access and point-to-point transport services. Cogent's facilities-based, all-optical IP network backbone spans 14 countries and provides IP services in approximately 90 markets located in North America and Europe.

Since Cogent's inception, Cogent has unleashed the benefits of IP technology, building one of the largest and highest capacity IP networks in existence. This network enables Cogent to offer large bandwidth connections at highly competitive prices. Cogent also has the ability to offer superior customer support through end-to-end operation of the network, enabling Cogent to control all aspects of service delivery and network monitoring.

Cogent Communications is headquartered at 1015 31st Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20007. For more information, visit http://www.cogentco.com. Cogent Communications can be reached in the United States at +1-202-295-4200 or via email at info@cogentco.com.

Information in this release may involve expectations, beliefs, plans, intentions or strategies regarding the future. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties. All forward-looking statements included in this release are based upon information available to Cogent Communications Group, Inc. as of the date of the release, and we assume no obligation to update any such forward-looking statement. The statements in this release are not guarantees of future performance and actual results could differ materially from our current expectations. Numerous factors could cause or contribute to such differences. Some of the factors and risks associated with our business are discussed in Cogent's registration statements filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and in its other reports filed from time to time with the SEC.

Web site: http://www.cogentco.com

Pump Audio and Photobucket Deliver Legal Music for Online Video Creations

Pump Audio and Photobucket Deliver Legal Music for Online Video Creations

Tens of millions of consumers gain access to copyright-cleared independent music to synchronize with their personal media on the Internet

Hudson Valley, NY – March 6, 2007 – Pump Audio, the leading provider of quality independent music to content creators globally, today announced that it has reached an agreement with Photobucket to provide copyright-cleared, independent music to the tens of millions of Photobucket users who create and share remixes of their photos and videos using the Adobe® web-based video remix technology integrated on Photobucket’s site. Photobucket users can now easily add music from Pump Audio to their mashups.

Photobucket is the online personal media company where over 35 million people create, manage and share their personal digital media, and is the third largest video hosting site behind YouTube and MySpace. Pump Audio provides a proven, legal music solution with original songs perfectly suited for synchronizing to online productions. Photobucket has licensed hundreds of songs across dozens of genres from Pump Audio’s catalog of more than 75,000 tracks.

“Music truly brings a video creation to life, and it was important to us that our users be able to incorporate music into their remixes,” said Alex Welch, CEO, Photobucket. “Pump Audio’s independent music solution helps Photobucket offer our users a wide selection of music that does not violate copyright infringement laws.”

Photobucket recently launched a web-based video remix and editing service, powered by Adobe Systems Incorporated. Using this remix service, Photobucket users can combine images, videos, text, and music provided by Pump Audio to create content mashups from their Photobucket albums, without requiring any additional downloads.

“User generated content, such as photo slideshows and video mashups, has created a significant opportunity for independent music,” said Steve Ellis, founder and CEO, Pump Audio. “Photobucket is an innovator in helping consumers bring their personal media to life, and shares our position that personal media communities can respect copyright law and also expose their users to high-quality independent music.”

Unlike stock music, Pump Audio’s catalog consists of real songs by thousands of independent artists worldwide. Because Pump Audio works directly with independent artists, it can offer a unique licensing system for managing and delivering the rights to use tracks in online productions. Pump Audio’s licensing model already has attracted major media customers, including MTV Networks, NBC Studios, HBO, New Line Cinema and advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi. Under its artist-friendly system, Pump Audio splits licensing revenues with musicians, and the artists retain complete ownership over their music.

Working together, Pump Audio and Photobucket also are creating a new venue for participating artists to gain additional exposure to Photobucket’s massive user base. Pump Audio artists will receive a visual credit with information about the music being used in Photobucket mashups, creating a new promotional opportunity to directly reach potential fans. Photobucket users can embed their mashups into any web page, blog, or social network profile, and also share with family and friends, so artists will have the potential for broad exposure.

About Pump Audio

Pump Audio licenses the world's best independent music to content creators worldwide. Founded in 2001, Pump Audio has established itself as a leading provider of digital music for TV and advertising producers. Now Pump Audio is becoming the soundtrack of the Internet, opening Web access to its catalog of tens of thousands of songs so creators of all types can build music into their video and interactive productions. With Pump Audio, artists can license their music into productions without giving up any ownership, while content creators can discover new music ready for use. Based in the
Hudson Valley, Pump Audio can be found at http://www.pumpaudio.com.

CNET - Adobe will offer ad-supported Photoshop online

Adobe will offer ad-supported Photoshop online
Hoping to get a jump on Google and other competitors, Adobe Systems plans to release a hosted version of its popular Photoshop image-editing application within six months, the company's chief executive said on Tuesday ...

More at:
http://news.com.com/Adobe+to+take+Photoshop+online/2100-7345_3-6163015.html

Freewebs Teams With Photobucket

Freewebs Teams With Photobucket

Freewebs Members Can Now Instantaneously Add Photos, Slideshows and Videos Directly to Their Freewebs Sites and Blogs from Photobucket

SILVER SPRING, Md., and DENVER, Feb. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Freewebs, www.freewebs.com  the world's easiest place to create multimedia websites and blogs has joined forces with Photobucket - the online personal media company where over 35 million people create, manage and share their personal digital media. Now, Freewebs users are able to add photos, slideshows, videos, and remix videos from existing Photobucket accounts directly to Freewebs' publishing platform.

"This is just the first step in what's going to be a strong partnership," said Freewebs' President Shervin Pishevar.  "Our 14 million members expect unprecedented ease of use from Freewebs to create multimedia sites and blogs. Photobucket's partnership and deployment of its JWidget allows members access to extensive libraries of still images and videos -- from their own albums and from publicly available content on Photobucket."

This relationship involves Photobucket's JWidget partner program along with Freeweb's soon-to-be released Remote Publishing API.  Freeweb's API will allow users to post content directly to their Freewebs accounts from Photobucket and other popular online destinations.

"The online, engaged, and creative youth that are core to Photobucket's customer base want simple tools for self expression, and easy ways to share their content with their communities," said Alex Welch, CEO of Photobucket. "Freewebs is a great partner destination for that."

About Freewebs.com

For everyone with an Internet connection and something to share, Freewebs www.freewebs.com provides the toolkit to express their voice on the web through its versatile publishing platform.  To date, Freewebs members have created more than 14 million comprehensive websites including blogs, photos, videos, music, e-commerce and more.  Founded in 2001, Freewebs is privately held and based in Silver Spring, Md.

About Photobucket

Photobucket is the easiest and most reliable way for people to create, manage and share their personal media online. With more than 35 million users, Photobucket is a creative hub linking billions of personal photos, graphics, slideshows, and videos daily to hundreds of thousands of web sites -- including MySpace, Facebook, Bebo, Friendster, eBay, Craigslist, Blogger and Xanga. In addition to linking, Photobucket users share their personal digital media by email, instant messaging, and mobile devices. Photobucket users upload more than 7 million personal photos, graphics and videos to Photobucket every day, and the site is growing at a rate of 85,000 new users a day. Photobucket currently serves over 70% of all content links to social networking web sites and serves over 3 billion images and video requests every day.  The company actively moderates content to create a safe environment for its users, partners, and advertisers. Photobucket has offices in Palo Alto, California and Denver, Colorado and is located online at www.photobucket.com

Additional News Coverage re: Photobucket and Adobe

February 20, 2007

Adobe and Photobucket remixing video

Karyn Johnson,

Peachpit

Commons

The No. 3 video sharing site behind YouTube and MySpace, Photobucket has teamed with Adobe to bring its users a Web-based video remix and editing tool, allowing them to combine images and video with text, frames, effects, transitions, and music.

More at:

http://www.peachpitcommons.com/?p=518

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February 21, 2007

Adobe, Photobucket Bring Video Tools to the Web 

Patrick Hoffman, eWeek

Adobe Systems announced Feb. 21 that it has formed a partnership with Photobucket to bring its Web-based video remix and editing technology to the Web, enabling Photobucket users to access Adobe's video editing tools for free.

Adobe's Web-based video remix and editing technology lets Photobucket users customize to drag and drop music, effects, transitions and titles to videos while also allowing users to reorder, trim and split clips.

"Our Web-based video remix and editing technology is just one of the many ways that we are evolving our business to satisfy the incredible demand for Web-based applications," said Geoff Baum, group product manager at San Jose, Calif.-based Adobe.

More at:

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2097379,00.asp

February 21, 2007

Photobucket Offers Online Video Mashups

Mike Sachoff, Web Pro News

Photobucket has launched a new service that will allow its 35 million users to do video editing online with technology powered by Adobe. The Adobe Web based video remix and editing technology is currently in Beta. Users can now combine photos, videos, text, and music to create videos or mashups of content from their Photobucket albums.

“At Photobucket we’re committed to helping our users get the most out of their personal media, and have fun doing so,” said Alex Welch, CEO, Photobucket. “Collaborating with Adobe gives our millions of users a simple way to create mashups that showcase their personality and creativity. Users can either broadcast these mashups widely, or share with a small group of friends and family.”

Photobucket users can combine images and video with captions, bubbles, frames, transitions, and music by dragging and dropping content to a sceneline. Users can work with content from their albums or they can choose from the publicly shared images and videos on Photobucket.

More at:

http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2007/02/21/photobucket-offers-online-video-mashups

February 21, 2007
Photobucket teams up with Adobe to offer free online video mashups
Staff, Graphic Exchange Network

Photobucket has announced the launch of a new service that lets users combine images, videos, text, and music to create personalized videos or “mashups” of content from their Photobucket albums.

The Adobe video remix and editing technology which drives Photobucket's new service is a Flash-based application built using Adobe Flex. Adobe says that the Photobucket toolset, currently being offered as a beta application, offers "a simplified interface, introducing consumers to video editing they can quickly master."

Adobe’s video remix and editing technology, which requires Adobe Flash 9, opens directly in the browser on Photobucket’s website. It is initially available via limited public beta to Photobucket Pro users, and will be available for free to Photobucket’s entire user base of 35 million members by early March 2007. For more information, visit http://blog.photobucket.com

February 21, 2007

Photobucket introduces web-based video editing tools

Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica

Adobe and Photobucket announced a partnership today that will allow Photobucket's 35 million users to do basic video editing online through the web. The tools will be implemented in a browser using Flash and will enable users to remix their photos and home videos with other elements, such as music, video captions, and transitions—all without the use of dedicated video editing software.

More at:

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070221-8891.html

February 21, 2007

Adobe Brings Premiere to the Web

Ed Oswald, BetaNews

Adobe is bringing its video editing tools online through multimedia storage site Photobucket, which would make them available for free. The application would be based on technologies used in Adobe's Premiere product, it said.

"We aim to simplify the powerful editing and compositing capabilities that make Adobe software the undisputed creative leader, so that anyone can post eye-catching compositions online," Adobe creative solutions senior vice president John Loiacono said in a statement.

More at:

http://www.betanews.com/article/Adobe_Brings_Premiere_to_the_Web/1172077086

February 21, 2007

Adobe Cuts Print Spending, Turns Focus to Online Ads

Editor, Adotas

Creative software developer Adobe Systems, makers of popular tools like Photoshop and Flash, will be cutting its spending on print advertising to spend more on online advertising, says Marketing Week.

According to the publication, Adobe has seen a lot of success with print advertising, but has decided to pay more attention to the Web. Today, the company announced that it would be working with Photobucket to provide the online photo sharing service with a suite of online video-editing tools based on Adobe Premier and powered by Flash. Adobe acquired Flash when it purchased Macromedia in 2005 for $3.4 billion in stock.

More at:

http://www.adotas.com/2007/02/adobe-cuts-print-spending-turns-focus-to-online-ads/

February 21, 2007

Adobe & Photobucket - Video Editing for the Masses

Scott Fegette, Scott Fegette

Well, it's been speculated for some time, but Adobe just announced it's partnership with Photobucket, to integrate Flex-based video editing capabilities into the popular photo and video hosting site. As noted in the release, this should be the first of many such partnerships over the coming months, and I'm really looking forward to digging into the Adobe RIA-powered editing experience, myself.

More at:

http://weblogs.macromedia.com/sfegette/archives/2007/02/adobe_photobuck.cfm

February 21, 2007
Adobe’s Video Editing Tools Online at Photobucket
Staff, Killer App

Consumers can now edit their home movies online using Web-based video remix and editing tools from Adobe. Adobe’s tools -- which let users add music, captions, bubbles, transitions and titles to videos, as well as reorder, trim and split clips -- are available at Photobucket, a digital media site with 35 million users.

The Photobucket announcement is just the first of many, Adobe says. The company expects to announce more partnerships with Internet companies and media properties over the coming months. All of the online services will be free and ad-supported.

More at:

http://www.killerapp.com/content/publish/article_309.shtml

February 22, 2007

Photobucket to Introduce Web-based Video Editing Capablities
Staff, Tech Buzz

Yesterday, Adobe and Photobucket announced a partnership to introduce basic online video editing capabilities into Photobucket. Once the flash based video editor is implemented, users can perform rudimentary functions like remixing their photos and home videos with music, video caption and transition. The web-based video editor is also said to have clip trimming and splitting features as well.

More at:

http://tech-buzz.net/2007/02/22/photobucket-to-introduce-web-based-video-editing-capablities/

February 21, 2007

Free Web-Based Video Editing by Photobucket

Staff, A Free and Decent Blog Host

Photobucket an online personal media company where over 35 million people create, manage and share their personal digital media, today announced the launch of a new service, featuring lightweight, web-based video remix and editing technology powered by Adobe Systems Incorporated. The Adobe web-based video remix and editing technology is available online as part of the Photobucket user experience, and is currently offered as a Beta application. Photobucket users can now combine images, videos, text, and music to create personalized videos or “mashups” of content from their Photobucket albums, without requiring any additional downloads.

More at:

http://dnoviceblogger.blogspot.com/2007/02/free-web-based-video-editing-by.html

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February 22, 2007

Are you Photobucket-ing?
Marianne Young Ledesma, CSdeSigns

Today, I was pleasantly surprise to read a press release that Adobe has partnered with Photobucket to deliver a new lightweight remix and video editing tools right into Photobucket's site.  The same useability concepts taken from Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements are applied, and I am so excited to try it out myself. Premiere Elements is so much fun, easy to use and very intuitive, I sometimes even forget the complexities of the science behind video editing.  If you're only starting out, the idea gallery is a good place to start.

More at:

http://blogs.adobe.com/CSdeSigns/2007/02/are_you_photobucketing.html

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February 22, 2007

Win/Mac: Adobe Adds Video Editing Tools to Photobucket Site
Staff, Graphics.com

Adobe's video remix and editing technology will be directly available to Photobucket users.

Photobucket lets its users create, manage and share their personal media online and has racked up some impressive numbers. Founded in 2003, the site has more than 35 million members, and serves an astonishing 3 billion media items daily, via members links from such sites as MySpace, eBay, Craigslist and Blogger. Adobe's Premiere line of video editing tools includes both Elements and Pro, and with the upcoming integration Photobucket users will be able to make use of a Flash-driven implementation that lets them add drag and drop music, effects, transitions and titles to their videos, as well as reorder, trim and split clips. Users can work with content from their own albums or access over 2.5 billion publicly-shared images and videos on Photobucket.

More at:

http://www.graphics.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3521

 

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February 22, 2007

Adobe and Photobucket team for online video editing tools

Adobe transforms its video editing solutions into online hosted services

Jonny Evans, Macworld

Photobucket users can now edit video they upload to the service using a suite of online tools, thanks to a deal with Adobe.

Adobe has launched its Flash-based online video remix and editing technology in partnership with Photobucket. The free service will be driven by advertising revenue, the partners hope.

The plan extends of Adobe's existing video editing products — including Premiere, which will soon return to the Mac platform — as online services.

More at:

http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/index.cfm?newsid=17297

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February 22, 2007

Adobe puts video-editing online

Video-hosting site integrates Adobe's tools

Zoe Mutter, PC Advisor

Adobe’s web-based video-editing technology will be delivered online when it’s integrated into the free image and video-hosting service, Photobucket.

Adobe’s web-based video editor will launch directly in the browser on the Photobucket website and allow users free and direct access to video-editing tools to perform a variety of operations such as dragging and dropping music, effects, titles and transitions to videos. It will be delivered as a lightweight Adobe Flash application and will therefore be accessible to more than 700 million computers that support Flash Player software.

More at:

http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/index.cfm?newsid=8499

 

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February 22, 2007

Photobucket Offers Free Adobe Video Editing

Walaika Haskins, TechNewsWorld

Photobucket users will soon have access to Adobe video editing tools online. The utilities will enable Photobucket Pro subscribers to remix, create effects and add music to content uploaded to the social networking site. The software offered by Adobe is the "lite" version of the company's editing tools -- a move likely intended to entice users to buy enhanced versions.

Adobe (Nasdaq: ADBE) and Photobucket have teamed up to give the site's 35 million subscribers free access to basic video remixing and editing technology online. With the first-of-its-kind offering, users can incorporate music, effects, transitions and titles into their videos.

More at:

http://www.technewsworld.com/story/55921.html

February 23, 2007

Photobucket Debuts New Video Remixer

Michael Calore and Scott Gilbertson, Wired Blogs 

Earlier this week Adobe and Photobucket announced a partnership to bring some Adobe Premier-like editing and remixing capabilities to Photobucket users. The new tool lets users take video clips and images, and remix, caption and enhance them to create new movies which can then be shared with the world at large.

More at:

http://blog.wired.com/monkeybites/2007/02/photobucket_deb.html

February 21, 2007

Adobe to release video editing tools online
Sourav Dutta, Digital Media

Asia

Adobe Systems plans to deliver its software technologies online, with the launch of its web-based video remix and editing technology. Adobe and Photobucket have announced a partnership to integrate Adobe web-based video remix and editing technology directly into Photobucket, giving Photobucket users direct, free access to digital video editing tools. The agreement reportedly marks a new stage in Adobe's delivery of its video software technologies that underpin flagship products such as Adobe Premiere Elements and Adobe Premiere Pro.

The company expects to announce more partnerships with internet companies and media properties over the coming months. These free services are expected to be driven by advertising revenue – and by offering customers upgrade paths to Adobe Premiere Elements and Adobe Photoshop Elements software.

 

More at:

http://www.digitalmediaasia.com/default.asp?ArticleID=22305

February 21, 2007

Adobe To Launch Ad-Supported Web 2.0 Video-Editing Tools

The online versions of Adobe's Premiere Element and Premiere Pro products are augmented by a partnership with Photobucket.

Antone Gonsalves, TechWeb

Adobe Systems on Wednesday unveiled plans to supply online video-editing tools to Web sites in return for sharing ad revenue, and said Photobucket would be its first partner in the new venture.

The maker of software for creative professionals said it was entering a "new stage" in offering over the Web capabilities found within its flagship Premiere Element and Premiere Pro products. In making portions of these tools available on Web sites, Adobe hopes to grab a piece of the booming online advertising market, and introduce its products to people who may eventually decide to upgrade to the desktop software versions.

Photobucket plans to make Adobe's tools available in March to all of its more than 35 million users. The tools are currently available in beta only to Photobucket Pro customers. The site lets registered users edit and upload video or photos, and share them with others. They can also broadcast them publicly and post their creations on other sites, such as EBay, online classified ad site Craigslist, and social networks MySpace and Facebook. Photobucket claims to have 17.6 million visitors a month.

More at:

http://www.informationweek.com/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=3I1ZQQ3KW43CKQSNDLPCKHSCJUNN2JVN?articleID=197007906

February 21, 2007

Adobe To Launch Ad-Supported Web 2.0 Video-Editing Tools

Antone Gonsalves, Dr. Dobb’s

The online versions of Adobe's Premiere Element and Premiere Pro products are augmented by a partnership with Photobucket.

Adobe Systems on Wednesday unveiled plans to supply online video-editing tools to Web sites in return for sharing ad revenue, and said Photobucket would be its first partner in the new venture.

The maker of software for creative professionals said it was entering a "new stage" in offering over the Web capabilities found within its flagship Premiere Element and Premiere Pro products. In making portions of these tools available on Web sites, Adobe hopes to grab a piece of the booming online advertising market, and introduce its products to people who may eventually decide to upgrade to the desktop software versions.

More at:

http://www.ddj.com/dept/webservices/197007915

February 21, 2007

Photobucket Adds Free Online Video Editing

Geoff Duncan, Digital Trends News

Photo sharing site Photobucket has just added a new tool to its online arsenal: free lightweight video editing tools from Adobe.

Online media hosting company Photobucket has announced a limited beta trial of lightweight online video editing tools from Adobe. The video editing tools are offered as a Flash-based application built with Adobe Flex, and aims to offer video editing capabilities Adobe first brought to market with Premier. The online tools offer a simplified, consumer-oriented interface enabling users to combine images and video with captions, bubbles, frames, transitions, music, and other effects via drag-and-drop. The tools enable users to re-order content and clips, trim elements, and split directly into the sceneline all from a Web-based interface. Via Photobucket, users have access to more than 2.5 billion public images and video clips they can use in their own productions.

More at:

http://news.digitaltrends.com/article12331.html 

AP - High-tech entrepreneurs grapple with build-or-sell dilemma

February 23, 2007
High-tech entrepreneurs grapple with build-or-sell dilemma

Michael Liedtke, Associated Press

Denver-based Photobucket also prefers to remain independent as it strives to nearly double its registered users to 60 million by the end of this year, said Alex Welch, who has raised about $15 million in venture capital since co-founding the site in 2003. Photobucket's 35 million members currently upload about 7 million photos and 35,000 videos per day – second only to YouTube and MySpace.

More at:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/N/NEXT_BIG_DEAL?SITE=MOCOD&SECTION=BUSINESS&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2007-02-23-13-12-00

Adobe Brings Video Editing Tools Online

Adobe Brings Video Editing Tools Online

Photobucket Relationship Highlights Strategy of Delivering Simple, High-Impact Creative Software to Millions             

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Feb. 21, 2007 — Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) is pioneering a new way to deliver its industry leading creative software technologies online, with the launch of its web-based video remix and editing technology. Today, Adobe and Photobucket announced a partnership to integrate Adobe web-based video remix and editing technology directly into the Photobucket user experience, giving 35 million Photobucket users direct, free access to world-class digital video editing tools. The agreement marks a new stage in Adobe’s delivery of its renowned video software technologies that today underpin flagship products such as Adobe® Premiere® Elements and Adobe Premiere Pro.

The company expects to announce more partnerships with Internet companies and media properties over the coming months. These free services are expected to be driven by advertising revenue - and by offering customers simple upgrade paths to Adobe Premiere Elements and Adobe Photoshop® Elements software, both market leaders in the home digital video and photo editing space.

“Making Photobucket ‘Adobe powered’ with web-based video remix and editing technology will radically change the user experience for millions of Photobucket devotees and also up-level the quality and variety of content being distributed by this passionate community,” said John Loiacono, senior vice president of Creative Solutions at Adobe. “We aim to simplify the powerful editing and compositing capabilities that make Adobe software the undisputed creative leader, so that anyone can post eye-catching compositions online.”

Today’s agreement with Photobucket points the way to the kind of future partnerships and breakthrough user experiences Adobe anticipates. Adobe’s web-based video remix and editing technology is an easy-to-use video editor that allows consumers the creative freedom to infuse personality and dramatic impact into their stories before releasing them to a broader online audience. Users can drag and drop music, effects, transitions and titles to videos, as well as reorder, trim and split clips.

Delivered as a lightweight Adobe Flash® application and built using Adobe Flex™ software, Adobe web-based video remix and editing technology is accessible to the more than 700 million personal computers that today support Adobe Flash Player software. Adobe’s web-based video remix and editing technology launches directly in the browser on Photobucket’s web site, with no time-consuming downloads or platform compatibility questions to deter users from uploading and editing their videos. The new video editing capabilities in Photobucket are initially available via limited public beta to Photobucket Pro users, and will be available for free to Photobucket’s entire user base of 35 million members by early March 2007.

About Adobe Systems Incorporated

Adobe revolutionizes how the world engages with ideas and information - anytime, anywhere and through any medium. For more information, visit www.adobe.com

AOL Money & Finance - YouTube faces some (real) competition

February 20, 2007

YouTube faces some (real) competition

Douglas McIntyre, AOL Money & Finance

The number of video-sharing sites seems to rise every day. MySpace, owned by News Corp. (NYSE:NWS), has gotten on board. So has photo site Photobucket. But Google Inc.'s (NASDAQ:GOOG) YouTube remains the largest.

More at:

http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2007/02/20/youtube-faces-some-real-competition/

New TeeVee - Photobucket Adds Video Editing

Photobucket Adds Video Editing

Liz Gannes, NewTeeVee

Written by Liz Gannes- Posted Tuesday, February 20, 2007 at 10:02 AM PT

Partnering with Adobe and using their Flex¹ software, Photobucket has added rich video editing tools². Currently run as a beta program available to paid Premium users, Photobucket CEO Alex Welch assured us in a phone interview that all 35 million users would have access in March.

More at:

http://newteevee.com/2007/02/20/photobucket-adds-video-editing/

Cnet Webware - Photobucket to launch Flash-based online video editor

February 16, 2007

Photobucket to launch Flash-based online video editor

Martin LaMonica, CNET Webware

Photobucket and Adobe Systems on Monday are expected to announce a Web-based video-editing tool available from Photobucket's media-sharing site. The free service will be in beta this month to its premium customers and rolled out to all customers in March.

The service lets people take existing media, including photos and videos, stored in a Photobucket account and remix them with captions, soundtracks and other effects. Like any video-editing package, people can drop items, like video snippets, and place them onto a timeline.

More at:

http://www.webware.com/8300-1_109-2.html?authorId=128&tag=blog

TechCrunch - Newest Flash Tools on Display at Photobucket

February 16, 2007

Newest Flash Tools on Display at Photobucket

Michael Arrington, TechCrunch

 

The latest Flash photo/video/sound editing tools that we mentioned last week are now enabled at Photobucket for premium users, and will go live for all users in March. Geoff Baum at Adobe confirmed that these tools are not yet available anywhere on the web except for Photobucket.

The new tool allows PhotoBucket users to mash up photos, video and stock music files into a single slide show/video and then display those mashups on any website. The screen shots below help describe some of what they are doing, but the key changes that make the tools better than what Motionbox, JumpCut (acquired by Yahoo), and Cuts are offering on the video side and Slide and RockYou on the photo side are just how fast and easy it is to make one of these. I stopped by the Photobucket offices earlier this week for a run through, and we created a photo and video mashup and added music in a matter of moments. An example:

More at:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/02/16/newest-flash-tools-on-display-at-photobucket/

Venture Beat - Photobucket, Cuts.com, and new video editing tools

February 15, 2007

Photobucket, Cuts.com, and new video editing tools

Matt Marshall, Venture Beat

Photobucket, a Silicon Valley start-up, has quietly become the third largest video hosting site after YouTube and MySpace — reporting more than 35,000 videos uploaded every day.

Next Tuesday, it announces some extensive image and video editing tools it hopes will help keep bringing people to the site. These users can post the edited versions to any of several popular sites, such as MySpace, Faceboo or Bebo.

These Photobucket editing tools, to be announced in a partnership with Adobe (the company that makes the popular Flash technology used for video editing), could take the wind out of the sails of smaller competitors.

Photobucket will let you edit by adding captions, bubbles, frames, transitions, music, and other effects — and by dragging and dropping the resulting content to a “sceneline” (you can get a sense of the editing dashboard in screenshots below). The service goes live shortly for paying Photobucket users, and then to the other regular 35 million users in March.

Denver Business Journal - Photobucket-Adobe form partnership

February 15, 2007

Photobucket-Adobe form partnership

Bob Mook,

Denver

Business Journal

Photobucket has formed a partnership with Adobe Systems Inc. that will give users the ability to combine images, videos, text and music to create personalized "mashups" of content from their Photobucket albums, the companies said Thursday.

The new tools will enable members of Photobucket, an image-hosting and photo-sharing Web site, to enjoy a "more full experience," CEO Alex Welch said.

More at:

http://denver.bizjournals.com/denver/stories/2007/02/12/daily42.html?jst=b_ln_hl

AlwaysOn - Engaging Contagious Behavior w/Digg Yelp Photobucket CEOs

January 31, 2007
AlwaysOn: Engaging Contagious Behavior w/Digg Yelp Photobucket CEOs
Allen Stern, Center Networks

AlwaysOn is holding a workshop about how to engage contagious behavior. The panel includes Jay Adelson, Digg CEO, Jeremy Stoppleman, Yelp CEO and Alex Welch, CEO Photobucket.

Panel workshop now completed. Comments below from the panel. If there is an interest, I can post audio and video from the session.

Img by Allen Stern

Moderator: What is the definition of contagious behaviour?

Jay - engaging consumers is contagious.

Alex - i think of external and internal for contagious behavior. Includes the team - we grew from 1 to 60 pretty quick and how do you gt the culture to come together as a team. And the outbound part with listening to your consumers.

Esther - teaching users how to take control. Esther starts right out by shilling her company.

Tags
photobucket photobucket.com alwayson digg yelp

Business Week - This Week's Cutting Edge Podcast with Photobucket's Alex Welch

This Week's Cutting Edge Podcast with Photobucket's Alex Welch
Heather Green, BusinessWeek

On the Cutting Edge Podcast this week, I chatted with Alex Welch, the CEO and co-founder of Photobucket, the very popular social media sharing site that is adding 80,000 new subscribers daily for a total of 35 million registered subscribers.

Welch talks about how they're tackling advertising, the importance of moderating content, and why he's not all that worried about whether MySpace wants to cut Photobucket out of the social network.

podcasting: http://www.businessweek.com/mediacenter/podcasts/podcasting/current.html

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/blogspotting/archives/2007/01/this_weeks_cutt_5.html?campaign_id=rss_blog_blogspotting

Tags
photobucket photobucket.com

Business Week - The MySpace Ecosystem: A Survival Guide

The MySpace Ecosystem: A Survival Guide
A slew of companies have sprung up to help kids decorate their pages—and many won't make it
Anastasia Goodstein, BusinessWeek

Teens love to make stuff their own—be it writing on a favorite pair of jeans, plastering notebooks with stickers, or decorating lockers with photos of friends or celebrities. It's a natural part of forming one's identity to tell the world, "Look at me. I have these friends, support these causes, and love these bands." And as social networking sites and blogging communities have become virtual spaces for adolescents to call their own, it's natural that kids want to decorate them, too.

More at:

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jan2007/tc20070129_417133.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_technology

Those nice folks over at Aqua-Media...

... gave us a really nice shoutout the other day and we wanted to say thanks. Looks like they're doing some cool things too and it's worth checking out!

Where would myspace be without the perfect Photobucket.com ? this site really makes it easy for myspace users to post there images on the profiles.. all you need is an account, that you can get for free... then upload.. they give you a unique code to paste into myspace, and presto!... your done and your image is online for the world to see... photo bucket also has allot of other cool things to do, by the way you can also upload your videos and share them that way.. either way.. photobucket will beat any of them other sites out there.. it's fast, easy and FREE!.. Photobucket.com!

Thanks AquaJamz!

Bloggers Blog - Photobucket CEO Says MySpace Still Growing

Photobucket CEO Says MySpace Still Growing

Staff, Bloggers Blog

Photobucket Co-founder and CEO Alex Welch told CNNMoney.com's The Browser that MySpace's web traffic is still growing. Alex Welch also mentioned growth at niche social networks like VampireFreaks.com and scrapbooking websites like Two Peas in a Bucket.

Because subscribers use Photobucket primarily as a means to publish content elsewhere, Welch has a unique window into how traffic is moving around the Web. With a peek into the logs, he weighs in on the "death of myspace debate" rather definitively: Myspace "traffic is going up and to the right. It hasn't flattened at all." But at the same time, he's seeing fractionalization. Specialty networks like the goth site VampireFreaks.com are booming. And as Photobucket moves into the mainstream, its demographics are moving beyond the glitter set. Welch says users are starting to tend toward the 35/40 age range. "A lot of them have kids. Scrapbooking is huge. Two Peas in a Bucket is seeing a lot of traffic."

More at:

http://www.bloggersblog.com/cgi-bin/bloggersblog.pl?bblog=110071

Mashable - Photobucket, BuddyLube Snag Top MySpace Artists

January 8, 2007
Photobucket, BuddyLube Snag Top MySpace Artists

Pete Cashmore, Mashable
Photobucket announced today that over 100 of the world’s most popular musicians have agreed to use Photobucket as their preferred image and slideshow provider on social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook, and Bebo. The artists include Bow Wow, Anthrax, Hinder, Korn, Enrique Iglesias, Mudvayne, Chris Cornell, Deftones and others. They’ve also leveraged the relationship with Bow Wow to create a celebrity look-a-like contest through his MySpace page - the top two look-a-likes will receive an autographed copy of Bow Wow’s new album “The Price of Fame”, and the photos are being featured in a Photobucket slideshow.

More at:

http://mashable.com/2007/01/08/photobucket-buddylube/

PC Mag - Top Ten Stories and Trends of 2006

January 2, 2006
Top Ten Stories and Trends of 2006
John C. Dvorak , PC Magazine
2006 was one of the oddest years in computerdom memory. What exactly happened? This week, let's look at the top stories and trends to see if any themes emerge that will help us figure out what's going to happen next.

More at:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,2078274,00.asp

Gigaom - Year in Review

GigaOM Year In Review
Jackson West, GigaOM

It’s always fun to take a look at the stats at the end of a calendar year. For instance, it turns out approximately 86% of GigaOm readers visited using cable, DSL or corporate broadband connections, with only 7% using dial-up and 7% unknown. With an audience so thoroughly saturated with broadband access, it’s no surprise that the top three posts and three of the top ten search terms were related to video!

2006 was definitely the year that online video, gaming and productivity applications went totally mainstream. Below, we list the top ten companies or product search terms.
1. youtube1
2. stardoll2
3. videora3
4. photobucket4
5. amazon s35
6. guba6
7. meebo7
8. cyworld8
9. zillow.com9
10. skype symbian10

More at:

 http://gigaom.com/2006/12/31/gigaom-year-in-review/

Mashable - Bebo Launching Ad Widgets

Bebo Launching Ad Widgets
Pete Cashmore, Mashable
Mashable was the first to cover the launch of Bebo Widgets, the service that lets Bebo users put content from Photobucket, RockYou and Slide.com on their profiles. But now there’s a development to that story that’s worth mentioning: next year, they plan to add advertiser-supported widgets that act like interactive ads. The first of these will come from the American Legacy Foundation, allowing users to express their dislike of smoking.

More at:

http://mashable.com/2006/12/28/bebo-ad-widgets/

Web Host Industry Review - Functional Hosting Has Been a Hit; Could Situational Hosting Be Next?

Functional Hosting Has Been a Hit; Could Situational Hosting Be Next?
Isabel Wang, Web Host Industry Review

A few months ago, in response to Trinity Ventures' $10.5 million investment in Photobucket, Tier 1 Research wrote that "the growth in functional hosting represents a growing threat to shared hosting providers."

Photobucket has grown rapidly since then. It had 15 million users back in May but recently passed the 30 million mark. Other functional hosting services - such as YouTube, MySpace, LinkedIn - have also enjoyed unheard of momentum (and valuations!) in traditional web hosting. In contrast, GoDaddy is just now entering the photo hosting market. I'm sorry to say that I don't think its Online Photo Filer will *ever* reach 30 million users. It offers too little, too late.

More at:

http://www.thewhir.com/blogs/Isabel-Wang/index.cfm/2006/12/28/Functional-versus-Situational-Hosting

Adweek - Bebo to Roll Out Ad Widgets

Bebo to Roll Out Ad Widgets
Brian Morrissey, Adweek

NEW YORK Bebo is readying the launch of its first advertiser widgets, small Web applications users can embed in their personal Web pages.

The social network last week began allowing users to embed miniature Web applications into their profile pages, letting them choose from three photo-sharing widgets from Slide, Photobucket and Rockyou. Bebo plans to build a collection of widgets users can choose to add to their profiles.

More at:

http://www.adweek.com/aw/iq_interactive/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003525703

Red Herring - Photobucket: Picture Perfect

Photobucket: Picture Perfect

Alex Welch, powered more by intuition than experience, knows about photo-sharing.
Adena DeMonte, Red Herring

Alex Welch, 30, got his first taste of business at a rafting photography company in his hometown outside Denver, Colorado. “We took pictures of boats as they floated by, ran up the hill, jumped in our cars,” Mr. Welch begins. From there it was a case of speeding to the lab to process the pictures to get them to the rafters in hopes of selling them prints.

More at:

http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=20355&hed=Photobucket%3a+Picture+Perfect#

Mashable - Bebo Launches Bebo Widgets - 100,000 Widgets Created in 12 Hours

Bebo Launches Bebo Widgets - 100,000 Widgets Created in 12 Hours
Pete Cashmore, Mashable!

Widget developers should be deeply interested in Bebo’s latest move. They’ve just launched Bebo Widgets, and they’re reporting 100,000 widgets created by users in the first 12 hours. What’s Bebo Widgets? In case you can’t guess, it’s a service that finally allows some selected developers to gain access to those valuable Bebo profiles.

For now, they’re supporting RockYou, Photobucket and Slide.com, with RockYou offering the most advanced options. Users have a special section in their profiles where these widgets are embedded, and multiple widgets can be added. The move explains why I spotted a Bebo logo appearing on RockYou on Sunday. Users can add the widgets to their profiles by typing their Bebo username and password on the partner site (this uses Bebo’s new widget API), or by returning to Bebo and pasting the code. They also have a viral element: if you see a widget on another profile that you want to post on your own - maybe a slideshow of a party all your friends attended - you can add it to your profile with two clicks.

More at:

http://mashable.com/2006/12/14/bebo-widgets/

Web Hosting Industry Review - 0.1% of the Functionality for 99% of the Population

"0.1% of the Functionality for 99% of the Population"

Niel Robertson from Newmerix wrote a very insightful blog post last week about inversion as the cornerstone of the Web 2.0 revolution. (Niel used to be VP Research at Exodus.)

A successful web app, Niel says, looks like ZingFu, which puts a silly frame around photos that users upload. ZingFu offers about 0.1% of Photoshop's functionality, but it's instantly accessible to 99.9% of the population. In contrast, the other 99.9% of Photoshop's features might only be understood by less than than 0.1% of the population.

Following Niel's logic, a successful web hosting service might look like MySpace or YouTube or Flickr. Each of these sites offer a tiny % of the average web hosting package's functionality, but their simplicity appeals to an *enormous* audience. In contrast, the other 99.9% of web hosting features might not be widely understood among the general public. As a point of reference, none of my friends outside the industry have any idea what FTP is.

My favorite simplified web hosting case study is PhotoBucket, a company founded by Alex Welch, a former Level 3 exec. Wired reported a couple of weeks ago that PhotoBucket passed the 30 million user mark, and is signing up 80,000 new users per day. According to PhotoBucket's official blog, 30 million is also the number of (a) dog owners in the US, and (b) hot dogs consumed in baseball parks. Not coincidentally, neither activity requires HTML knowledge :)

http://www.thewhir.com/blogs/Isabel-Wang/index.cfm/2006/12/11/01-of-the-Functionality-for-99-of-the-Population

Mashable - Top 10 MySpace Add-On Sites of 2006

Top 10 MySpace Add-On Sites of 2006
Kelvin Beecroft, Mashable Labs

Kelvin Beecroft is the head of Mashable Labs, which conducts unique research into social networks, particularly widgets and other social networking add-ons. You can request research through the consulting form.

As the end of 2006 approaches, it’s clear that MySpace has spawned a cottage industry of sites supplying add-on content or media sharing services for profile owners. Many of these sites have seen phenomenal growth this year while at the same time questions loom around how to monetize. It’s interesting now to look at the top sites to see how they’re embracing such questions because for them this market is becoming big business.

So, who’s in the top 10 for 2006? The table to the right shows Photobucket way out in the lead as the top add-on site by hosting content (photos, videos and slideshows) for nearly 17 million MySpace pages. But there’s more to this statistic than meets the eye. The number three site, Freeweblayouts.net, interestingly uses Photobucket for hosting of their layout graphics such as backgrounds. The same thing is going on with ImageShack and other layout sites. These are mutually beneficial relationships because they indirectly increase the user base for photo sharing sites (thus increasing hits) while providing reliable image hosting for layout sites. This demonstrates the value of establishing good partners in fast growing markets and being able to identify who good potential partners might be.

More at:
http://mashable.com/2006/12/08/top-10-myspace-add-on-sites-of-2006/

Tech Chrunch - Piczo Announces Partnerships - Growth Still Strong

Piczo Announces Partnerships - Growth Still Strong
Michael Arrington, TechCrunch

San Francisco based Piczo, a social network for young teenagers, continues to add 35,000 new registered users per day, and claims 2 billion monthly page views. We first covered them back in September, where we compared them with the other major social networks.
The UK continues to be Piczo’s biggest market, accounting for 40% of users and 50% of page views (see TechCrunch UK coverage of the company here).

Today at 5 am PST they will announce a number of distribution and other partnerships with major Internet companies, including YouTube, Flock, Photobucket and VideoEgg.

More at:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/12/06/piczo-announces-partnerships-growth-still-strong/

Wired - Photobucket Hits 30 Million Users

Photobucket Hits 30 Million Users
Michael Calore, Wired Monkey Bites

This morning, the image and video hosting site Photobucket hit the 30 million registered user mark.

Photobucket is used extensively by MySpace users, LiveJournal bloggers and sellers on CraigsList and eBay. It's an easy short-term solution for publishing photos to the web if you don't have a web hosting account or if you aren't a member of Flickr or Yahoo Photos.

More at:

http://blog.wired.com/monkeybites/2006/12/photobucket_hit.html

PC Pro - Silicon Valley touches down in Oxford

Silicon Valley touches down in Oxford
Alun Williams, PC Pro
Silicon Valley came to Oxford University yesterday, for the sixth time in this annual event, and two clear themes arose: the advisability for would-be entrepreneurs to Go West and plug themselves into the Silicon Valley network, and the threat posed by Google to the traditional funding strategies for online start-ups.

Among the West Coast attendees at the Said Business School were successful start-up founders, such as Reid Hoffman, CEO and founder of Linked in and formerly of PayPal, and Alex WelchCEO and founder of Photobucket, technologists such as Chris Sacca, Google's Head of Special Initiatives, and venture capitalists, such as Allen Morgan, MD of Mayfield, one of Silicon Valley's oldest VC firms.

More at:

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/news_story.php?id=98451

Hitwise - Social Networking Sites Recover from September Decline, Facebook visits up

Social Networking Sites Recover from September Decline, Facebook visits up 16%

Today we released the Hitwise US Consumer Generated Media Report, which examines trends in social networking, photo hosting and sharing, and online video. According to the report, the market share of visits to the top 20 social networking sites accounted for nearly 1 in 20 internet visits in September 2006 (4.9% of all Internet visits). That number remained the same in October 2006.

More at:

http://weblogs.hitwise.com/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/366

GigaOm - Live Widgets!

Live Widgets!
Liz Gannes, GigaOM

We’re here at Widgets Live1, the first GigaOM conference, in San Francisco. A year ago, the rare time I heard the word “widgets” was usually in a business reporting scenario (“Say Company X wants to sell its widgets business to Company Y; when the sale is announced the stocks of the companies often…blah blah blah). Now, any company we talk to has a “widget strategy,” while some companies, such as Teqlo2 and Slide3 (both here today) are centered entirely on widgets.

More at:

http://gigaom.com/2006/11/06/live-widgets/

IMedia - User-Generated Revolution

User-Generated Revolution

Rebecca Weeks, iFilm

 Whereas Revver's strategy is to let anyone affiliate with its technology and distribute content anywhere they want, the CEO of Photobucket, Alex Welch, is betting on his destination. He added, "The average consumer has multiple online identities that he or she maintains each day. They want a central place to publish their content. Users are getting the reach for us by sharing with their friends."

More at:

http://www.imediaconnection

Reuters - Facebook touts new Web surfing scrapbooks

Facebook touts new Web surfing scrapbooks
Eric Auchard, Reuters

Want to show your friends what you're reading or watching on the Web? Facebook says you can now do it "in two clicks."

Initial partners include news sites like The New York Times, WashingtonPost.com, Dow Jones' Wall Street Journal Online and gaming sites like GameSpot.com (owned by CNET Networks, the publisher of News.com) and IDG Entertainment.

There are also links to sports sites like Time Warner's SI.com and NBC Universal's NBCSports.com, video sites such as Brightcove and PhotoBucket, StupidVideos.com and eBaum's World, and humor sites like The Onion and CollegeHumor.com.

More at:

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=internetNews&storyID=2006-10-31T131056Z_01_N31457998_RTRUKOC_0_US-MEDIA-FACEBOOK.xml&WTmodLoc=NewsArt-C2-NextArticle-1

 

·         Also located at:

§         CNET News: http://news.com.com/Facebook+touts+new+Web+surfing+scrapbooks/2100-1025_3-6131016.html

§         PC Magazine: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,2047918,00.asp

§         Reuters UK : http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=internetNews&storyID=2006-10-31T112923Z_01_N31457998_RTRIDST_0_OUKIN-UK-MEDIA-FACEBOOK.XML&WTmodLoc=NewsArt-C2-NextArticle-1

§         Reuters Canada : http://ca.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=technologyNews&storyID=2006-10-31T112439Z_01_N31457998_RTRIDST_0_TECH-MEDIA-FACEBOOK-COL.XML

Blogging Stocks - Who Will Buy PhotoBucket: It's Not For Sale

Who Will Buy PhotoBucket: It's Not For Sale
Douglas McIntyre, Blogging Stocks

PhotoBucket, the huge online photo sharing site, is not for sale. But of course its CEO decided to have a press interview to make that clear.

In September, PhotoBucket was the 41st most visited site in the US. It had 14.7 million unique visitors, putting it ahead of sites like Overstock and Craigslist. The company is independent and backed by venture capitalists who are probably hungry for the kind of quick return that MySpace and YouTube VCs got.

By talking to the press and signaling that PhotoBucket could be had for the right price, the company is probably starting a bidding war. With photo-sharing and online photo development as two key community and commercial functions on the web, there are several potential suitors.

More at:

http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2006/10/20/who-will-buy-photobucket-its-not-for-sale/

Dow Jones - Web Startups May See More Mergers

Web Startups May See More Mergers
Mark Boslet, Dow Jones Newswires
PALO ALTO, Calif. (AP) -- Google Inc.'s $1.65 billion acquisition of Internet video site YouTube Inc. has turned up the pressure on rivals to keep pace in a rapidly changing online environment.

"I think in general there are large technology and media companies that will buy their way in" to some of these companies, said Alex Welch, chief executive of photo-sharing site Photobucket Inc. of Denver.

Welch said Photobucket is not "officially for sale," but "it is possible for a company to be acquired in this space."

More at:

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/061018/web_startups_mergers.html?.v=1
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8KR84SO1.htm
http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/business/technology/15790056.htm
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/fn/4268770.html
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/business/20061018-1237-webstartups-mergers.html
http://www.hemscott.com/news/latest-news/item.do?newsId=36870146813520
http://www.sunherald.com/mld/sunherald/business/technology/15790056.htm
http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/business/technology/15790056.htm
http://www.macon.com/mld/macon/business/technology/15790056.htm

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San Antonio News - Users, money shifting to participatory 'Web 2.0'

Users, money shifting to participatory 'Web 2.0'
L.A. Lorek, San Antonio News-Express

The new breed of Internet companies and online services revolve around people.

The Pew report points to Photobucket, a socially integrated photo service that requires users to upload, share and tag their photos as an example of a Web 2.0 company. It labels Kodakgallery, a traditional online photo site, as a Web 1.0 company. It also calls Wikipedia, an interactive encyclopedia, a Web 2.0 company, compared to Encarta Encyclopedia, another Web 1.0 company. The Web 2.0 companies are growing online traffic much more quickly than the traditional companies, according to the report.

More at:

http://www.mysanantonio.com/business/stories/MYSA101006.01E.Web.2683b61.html

Clickz - Pew Zeroes in on 'Web 2.0,' Sort Of

October 6, 2006
Pew Zeroes in on 'Web 2.0,' Sort Of

Enid Burns, Click Z Networks

Sites embracing such concepts allow users to share their ideas through text, photo, video and audio. The report offers up Photobucket, where users can upload, tag, share and comment on photos, as one example of such a site. Photobucket's traffic has steadily increased, while "1.0" site Kodakgallery has idled.

More at:

http://www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3623620

International Business Times - Photo and Real Estate Sites Lead European Internet Visits

Photo and Real Estate Sites Lead European Internet Visits
By Daniel Jacobs, International Business Times
NEW YORK (International Business Times) - Europeans are visiting more photo and real-estate websites a study released on Thursday reveals.

Traffic to real-estate related websites in Europe grew by 11 percent in August, research firm comScore Networks reports, garnering 34 million unique visitors. The German website, ImmobilienScout24 led the pack, with 3.8 million unique visitors representing 18 percent growth.

"As consumers increasingly turn to the Internet in their real estate research process to view properties, check mortgage rates and calculate loan payments, their Internet behavior can be expected to become a leading indicator of overall macro-economic trends in the residential housing market," said Bob Ivins, managing director, comScore Europe.

The report also finds that traffic to the photo related websites rose 5 percent to 60 million unique visitors for August. Imageshak, a U.K based site, increased 10 percent to lead the catagorey with 13 million visitors, while Flikr, the number two site, drew 6.5 million visits.

"As Europeans sought to share their best summer pictures, Photobucket.com and Pbase.com achieved the highest growth rates, increasing 15 percent and 18 percent, respectively versus the prior month," the firm stated.

Red Herring - What the $#@! Is Web 2.0?

October 5, 2006
What the $#@! Is Web 2.0?

Whatever it is, it’s growing fast. A new report attempts to define the vague buzzword.
A. DeMonte, Red Herring

 

Most Internet startups these days claim to be the next Web 2.0 hit. Some startups, confident they’ve moved one step beyond the social web, define themselves as “Web 2.1” companies. One hapless would-be visionary even claimed his plan was so grand that it was “Web 3.0.”

 

All of which begs the question: what the heck is Web 2.0? Non-Profit The Pew Internet Project tried to answer that question Thursday with the release of a report titled “Riding the Waves of Web 2.0: More than a buzzword, but still not easily defined.”

Coined by Dale Dougherty and made popular by O’Reilly Media in 2004, the term defined the wide umbrella of the blogs, wikis and social networking sites that made up the “participatory web.”

 

“That the term has enjoyed such a constant morphing of meaning and interpretation is, in many ways, the clearest sign of usefulness,” says the report, which argues there is “little consensus about where 1.0 ends and 2.0 begins.”

 

Web 2.0 vs. Web 1.0

 

The report looks at how online activity during the time known as Web 1.0 differed from that of Web 2.0, using data from market research group Hitwise to support its findings.

 

For example, the growth of the Kodak Easy Share gallery, an online photo-sharing site the report authors consider “traditional,” has flatlined. Meanwhile, “Web 2.0” site Photobucket made strong gains. Likewise, user-edited Wikipedia has gained ground, while Encarta is losing out.

 

More at:

 

http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=19007&hed=What+the+%24%23%40!+is+Web+2.0%3F&sector=Industries&subsector=InternetAndServices

Digital Trends - Photobucket Reaches 25 Mln Member Mark

Photobucket Reaches 25 Mln Member Mark

Ian Bell, Digital Trends News

Photobucket, the popular image and media sharing site has blown past the 25 million member mark today.

The company is reporting growth of more than 300% over the past year.

More at:

http://news.digitaltrends.com/article11385.html

Mediapost - People on the Move

People on the Move
MediaPost Publications

Photobucket has named KAREN KATZ as senior vice president of media development and PETER FOSTER as vice president of sales.

More at:

http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.showTodaysEdition&art_type=23

The Leaf Chronicle - Find photos, Hope on World Wide Web

September 22, 2006
Find photos, Hope on World Wide Web

Jamie Dexter, The Leaf-Chronicle

 

On many nights, the glow of my computer monitor is all that can be seen in my little apartment. Coke cans pile up next to my mouse pad, almost toppled by my furious clicking.

My name is Jamie, and I'm an Internet addict.

Rather than clicking back and forth between my favorite Web sites (myspace.com and facebook.com) I decided to think outside the Web address box and look into more cool sites to share with you.

Here are a few of my new favorites:

* Photobucket: The amount of sites on the Internet that focus on photo sharing and printing is uncountable, and I've probably used almost all of them, but Photobucket has some new and interesting features.

More at:

http://www.theleafchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060922/COLUMNISTS17/609220301/1024

Financial Times - User-generated content is king in 2006

User-generated content is king in 2006
Aissetou N'gom

Fastest growing online brands in UK - 2006
1. YouTube
2. Flickr
3. MySpace
4. American Express
5. Photobucket
6. Mozilla
7. Vodafone
8. Bebo
9. Odeon
10. B&Q

2005
1. Piczo
2. American Greetings
3. Shopzila
4. Starware
5. Limewire
6. Odc
7. Wikipedia
8. Skype
9. Nickelodeon
10. Blogger

More at:

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings

TechCrunch's Arrington shares his winners and losers

TechCrunch's Arrington shares his winners and losers
Dan Farber, ZDNet

TechCruncher Mike Arrington opened the second day of The Future of Web Apps Summit with his picks of Web 2.0 winners and losers and gives advice to wouldbe startups. He also announced the next blog in the TechCrunch family, which will cover enterprise products.

Winners (got acquired): Writely, del.icio.us, Userplane, Flickr, Weblogs, Inc., Myspace, Bloglines, Truveo, Grouper, Skype, Newroo

Very good bets: Digg, Facebook YouTube, Photobucket, Zoho, Stumble Upon, Popsugar, PlentyofFish, Netvibes. Mike said he could be an executive at any of the companies, it would be Digg, which also drives 20 percent of TechCrunch traffic.

Ones to watch: Jobster, Riya, Zillow, Flock, Sharpcast, Rocketboom, 1-800-FREE411, oDesk, Second Life, WordPress

More at:

http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=3612

Social sites make up 5 out of 10 fastest growiing UK brands

Social sites make up 5 out of 10 fastest growiing UK brands
Staff, Tech Digest
Five out of the ten fastest growing websites in the UK between January and July this year are social networking / Web 2.0 based - in other words they're built on user-generated content.

Top of the pile is YouTube, followed by Flickr in 2nd and MySpace in 3rd place. Photobucket comes in 5th, with Bebo in 8th.

More at:

http://www.techdigest.tv/2006/09/social_sites_ma.html

Seeking Alpha - VC-Backed Ad-Driven IPOs Likely to Take Off in 2007

VC-Backed Ad-Driven IPOs Likely to Take Off in 2007
Paul Kedrosky, Seeking Alpha

The summer of 2006 will be seen as the trough for venture-backed IPOs. There are three factors at work:

1. The capital markets finally need new blood: Existing tech companies are doing poorly, long-buzzed turnarounds in old favorites like JDS have fizzled, and a combination of defections and acquisitions has shrunk the pool of public companies.
2. A new generation of tech companies is generating meaningful revenues, and not getting the valuations it would like in private markets.
3. Venture capitalists have capitulated on IPOs, and don't even bother trying anymore. Given a tiny opening, and they'll get one in the next twelve months, they'll unload their entire portfolios.

In 2007 look for IPOs from ad-driven companies like YouTube, Photobucket, and others, much to the chagrin of grizzled skeptics out there.

Here is a graph of some data I looked at earlier today that helped convince me we're set to see an IPO upswing:

More at:

http://seekingalpha.com/article/16367

ReadWriteWeb - The Web Photo Sharing Site Faceoff

The Web Photo Sharing Site Faceoff

Written by Alex Iskold and edited by
Richard MacManus.

In this post we profile the red hot photo sharing space, where the blogosphere darling Flickr is actually trailing in the mass market. Back in June, Hitwise posted their online photo market

statistics - which showed Photobucket with a
huge market lead at #1 and Flickr at #6. A lot of Photobucket's lead is due to its high
usage in MySpace pages - 56% of Photobucket's
traffic is from MySpace, according to Hitwise. So marketing and being part of a large ecosystem are crucial. But also important is having simple and easy to use features. So
we present here a feature-by-feature comparison and also highlight areas where particular
services stand out from the pack. 

Feature Comparison of Photo Sharing Sites

In the table below (which incidentally we did using Zoho Sheet, Zoho's online spreadsheet) we list companies from the Hitwise article as well as some additional 'web 2.0' photo sharing players.

Click for full-size table

Note that for Alexa rank we highlighted the top 5 scores - Flickr, Photobucket, Webshots, Kodakgallery, Pbase.

Pros and Cons of each Photo Sharing Site

	Pros	Cons
Flickr (owned by Yahoo!)	innovative, tons of cool features, drag and drop, sharing, RSS, badges, clustering	difficult to use for non tech savvy
Photobucket	simple, limited functionality, badges	perhaps too simple, annoying ads, no sharing and social web features
Kodakgallery	professional interface, targeting main stream	no sharing and social web features
MyPhotoAlbum	simple, has all the basic functions, each album has unique URL	no sharing and social web features
Pbase (not in the same space)	stunning professional photography, gallery-based implementation, simple	no sharing and social web features
Picasa (not in the same space yet - owned by Google)	hard to say because it is not apples to apples, but editing photos is nice	basically not (yet) in the same space, not really web-based
Picturetrail	music associated with albums, lots of badge options	unbearably annoying ads during sign up, clubs instead of groups, does not seem intuitive
Shutterfly	professional interface, targeting mainstream	no sharing and social web features
Slide (not in the same space)	runs on top of Flickr, Photobucket, etc. plugs into MySpace, blogs, etc. Fills nice niche within the space.	focused on making slideshows (it's a limitation, if you want to consider this service as a contender).
Smugmug	professional interface, a lot of album options, well thought through	not free
Snapfish	professional interface, targeting mainstream	no sharing and social web features
Webshots	has lots of social web photo features	ads, somewhat clunky, no tags (at least we could not find them)
Zooomr	conceptually interesting, some innovative UI, uses OpenID for login.	confirmation image gives you instant headache; no geography-only tag cloud; the maps are cool, but not useful
Zoto	very well designed, has the most social web features	somewhat slow, lacks printing ability

Notes

Where's Yahoo! Photos? We excluded Yahoo! Photos from this comparison because we did not have access to the new Yahoo! Photos beta, so we felt it would be unfair to review it based on the old site.

The browser twist The social browser Flock

has delivered two direct integrations with Flickr and Photobucket. What is interesting
(and also somewhat confusing) is that Flock has made a special version to be distributed
to Photobucket users. It is difficult to say what impact this deal has had on the photo
sharing market so far, but it is likely that browser integration is going to play a major
role in the future.

Conclusion

Firstly, we do not have a single online photo market. There is still a clear mainstream market led by KodakGallery and Yahoo! Photos. This market is basically focused on upload/album/print capabilities - and has little to none social aspects. 

On the other hand, Flickr is a clear leader in the social photo sharing market. It has unmatched features, usability and community. 

However the overall leader in the photo sharing market in general, and a good mix between mainstream and social web, is Photobucket. They have been able to add just enough social features, without getting too complex or fancy, to convert a lot of people from traditional photo sharing sites.

How is it all going to end up and who is going to win in this market? Time will tell, but it is likely we will end up having fewer players - and those that stick around will have a blend of features from the current mainstream and 'social web' camps. As for the bloggers' favorite, Flickr, the road to mainstream acceptance for Flickr is paved with tough competition and the need to simplify.

ECommerce Guide - Free Image Hosting for Sellers

August 25, 2006
Free Image Hosting for Sellers
Vangie Beal, Ecommerce Guide

Using images hosted on Photobucket, List.d Express is offering a free service to eBay sellers that will allow them to add these extra images directly to their eBay pages.

More at:

 

http://www.ecommerce-guide.com/essentials/ebay/article.php/3628446

Gigaom - Photobucket Rules

Photobucket1, the plain vanilla photo hosting site is now officially the king of online photo business. It now has a whopping 44% of the total market, ahead of old timers - Yahoo, Webshots and Flickr. According to data collected by Hitwise2, “its share of visits increased by 34% in the four months from February 2006 to May 2006.” Flickr is growing fast too - up 44% in the past four months.

More at:

http://gigaom.com/2006/06/22/photobucket-rules/

Hitwise - PhotoBucket Leads Photo Sharing Sites; Flickr at #6

June 21, 2006
PhotoBucket Leads Photo Sharing Sites; Flickr at #6

In the SF tech bubble that I live in, most of the talk about photo sites has been centered on Flickr. In fact, you could get the impression from most people I meet that Flickr is the ONLY site at which you can share and store photos.

Full Article:

ExtremeTech - Flock Evolves the Browser to Web 2.0

Flock Evolves the Browser to Web 2.0
June 19, 2006
By Michael W. Muchmore

The Internet is supposed to be interactive, right? It's not just about being a passive watcher of Web sites, but about sharing your input, as well. The Flock browser is an attempt to bring some of the Web 2.0-style concepts right to the application that gives you a view of the interweb. Built on top of FireFox, Flock incorporates "mashups"—the hip buzzword for web service integration—with social bookmarks (with del.icio.us and Shadows), photo sharing (with Flickr and Photobucket), and blogging—with tools built into the browser for posting to your blog. In fact, it's this integration on which Flock's creators intend to build their business model, cutting deals with other web services.

Full Article:

Rocky Mountain News - Snapshot hot shots

Snapshot hot shots
Entrepreneurs Alex Welch and Darren Crystal turned a hobby into the most popular photo-sharing clearinghouse on the Web

By Joyzelle Davis, Rocky Mountain News
June 19, 2006

The Web's most popular photo-sharing site started as Alex Welch's hobby. The then-Level 3 engineer was frustrated with most online picture sites, which thwarted his efforts to swap pictures with friends. So he wrote a program during his off hours that created
Photobucket, a clearinghouse that allows users to post their images to social-networking sites such as MySpace.com and e-commerce sites like eBay while storing all of their photos in one location.

Full Article:

American Photo - Photobucket Ranks as Top Photo Sharing Site for April

Photobucket Ranks as Top Photo Sharing Site for April
Photobucket.com attracted 7.8 million unique users for the month of April, beating out Yahoo! Photos, Kodak, Webshots and Flickr.

BY JAY DEFOORE

June 2006

With digital camera sales exploding, a number of elite
photo-sharing sites are fighting to keep up with the growing
demand for online storage, sharing and community services.
Nielen//NetRatings recently released a study of the top five photo sharing sites on the Internet, and we were surprised by what we saw.

Photobucket.com edged out Yahoo! Photos as the top online photography destination for April, attracting 7.8 million unique users for the month, representing a 45% growth over April 2005.

Full Article:

Tier 1 Research - Photobucket secures more financing; Functional hosting keeps growing

Photobucket secures more financing; Functional hosting keeps growing
Photobucket, a privately held content hosting provider, confirmed that it had secured $10.5mn in a second round of financing from Trinity Ventures. T1R spoke with Photobucket, which plans to use the funds to engage new hires and accelerate its growth. The company is looking to expand its advertising sales, product marketing and business development teams in Palo Alto, and its development team in Denver, covering the areas of software, content moderation and customer support. Photobucket previously closed a $2-3mn round of financing with Insight Venture Partners.

Full Article:

Wall Street Journal - Internet photo site helps MySpace thwart porn

Internet photo site helps MySpace thwart porn
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
By Julia Angwin, The Wall Street Journal
DENVER -- Working quickly, Photobucket.com employee Jeff Gers can look at nearly 150,000 images on his computer screen during an eight-hour shift, or about 300 a minute. His job is to find and destroy anything that might cause offense, a task that's getting harder all the time.

Every day, nearly four million new images pour into Photobucket, a Web service that allows people to store images and videos online, share them with friends and display them on other Web sites. He's come across pornographic snowmen, camera-phone snapshots of young
people's anatomy and, quite frequently, an animated cartoon of a girl lifting her shirt.

Full Article:

Red Herring - Photobucket Scoops $10.5M

Photobucket Scoops $10.5M

Photo and video hosting site has won success as a tool rather than a destination.

Digital media hosting site Photobucket raised a $10.5-million second round of funding Monday, primarily from Trinity Ventures.
The Palo Alto, California-based company is a rare find among young Internet startups. It is both profitable and popular outside of a select group of in-the-know digerati. Photobucket has more than 16 million members and is growing by 2 million members per month. The free site gives users 1 gigabyte of space as well as easy access to publishing on sites such as eBay, MySpace, Blogger, and Neopets.

 Full Article:

TechCrunch - PhotoBucket Closes $10.5M From Trinity Ventures

PhotoBucket, the company that drives 2% of total U.S. Internet traffic, will announce a $10.5 million Series B round on Tuesday. The round was funded by Trinity Ventures. General Partner Gus Tai will join the PhotoBucket board of directors.

Full Article:

Yahoo Publisher's Network - Making Web 2.0 more fun than a barrel of sock monkeys

You might have heard some of this “Web. 2.0” buzz. While it’s
supposed to be everywhere these days, even the technorati sometimes
have a hard time coming up with a concise definition – usually they
murmur something nebulous about “Web sites behaving like
applications.”

Full article:

SFGate - Video bloggers claim spotlight

Jay Dedman's life plays out in snippets of video, captured on a handheld video camera and posted on his online diary, Momentshowing. A Manhattan subway bomb scare spurs him to post a photo montage of Sept. 11 and the days before and after. In another entry, he reveals his budding romance with fellow blogger Ryanne Hodson. Most recently, he documents their recent cross-country move from New York to San Francisco.

Full Article:

Business Week - Photobucket: One Big Under the Radar Startup

Photobucket: One Big Under the Radar Startup
Heather Green

This week, I met with Photobucket. Until a month ago, I had never heard of them. But their name started to bubble up among the conversations I was having with VCs, and then they came into town.

Photobucket is a company that has bootstrapped its way into attracting aroung 14 million users. And they're adding 2 million users a month. Founded in 2003, the company says its cash flow positive and has in total raised $2.5 million in venture money.

What they do is pretty simple: They do image and video hosting. Essentially, people upload photos, animations, and now videos, to Photobucket, and then they use a little bit of code to put the bits and pieces of their lives on blogs, eBay, Neopets, or 60,000 other sites that work with Photobucket.

There is one thing I found interesting and another thing that I think is confusing. Photobucket decided early on to be a tool, not a community. So they just follow people around, through their lives, as they move from site to site, without worrying about what's hot or not.

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/blogspotting/archives/2006/04/photobucket_one.html?campaign_id=search

TechCrunch - 2% of U.S. Internet Traffic goes through Photobucket

2% of U.S. Internet Traffic goes through Photobucket
Michael Arrington

Photobucket isn’t as flashy as YouTube or Flickr, but they have 14 million users, 80 uploaded photos per second and, just two weeks after launching their video product are nearly matching YouTube with 30,000 daily uploaded videos (YouTube is 35,000/day). And, Photobucket is both profitable and cash flow positive.

More at:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/04/19/2-of-us-internet-traffic-through-photobucket/

CNNMoney - Is there an Online Video Bubble?

Is there an online video bubble? Plenty of start-ups are hoping to cash in on the online video craze. Is there enough money to go around?

By Paul R. La Monica, CNNMoney.com senior writer
April 18, 2006: 12:29 PM EDT

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - Meet the next big television star: You.
Web sites such as the insanely popular YouTube are turning average schmos with a video camera into pop culture phenomena. And naturally, corporate America and investors have taken notice of this growing trend. But with so many sites cropping up and trying to attract financing from venture capitalists, a couple of questions need to be asked. Is there really enough demand for so-called user-generated content, especially when more big media companies like CBS (Research) and Disney's (Research) ABC are putting mainstream programming online for free?

Full Article:

Colorado Startups - Denver’s PhotoBucket is a red hot destination

www.photobucket.com
ColoradoStartups.com
March 23, 2006
Filed under: Initial coverage, Denver — david @ 11:42 am
Denver’s PhotoBucket is a red hot destination
Guess what web site I’m referring to:
• It gets 3 times the unique monthly visitors that Facebook does
• It serves up 50 billion distinct pieces of content every month
• It acquires over 65,000 new registered users a day.

MySpace? Flickr? No. Let me give you some more clues.

Full Article

New York Times - Hungry Media Companies Find a Meager Menu of Web Sites to Buy

Hungry Media Companies Find a Meager Menu of Web Sites to Buy
Glu Mobile, Cnet and PhotoBucket.com are among the companies that have elicited merger speculation.
By MATT RICHTEL

Media companies are still hungry. Is there much left for them to consume that they'll find satisfying? NBC Universal's $600 million acquisition of iVillage, an early Internet company catering to women,
highlights the continuing interest by media companies in adding new Web sites to reach and connect with consumers, hobbyists, parents, investors, car buyers, Scrabble players and virtually every other niche audience.

Full Article

ZDNet - Fastest Growing Websites of 2005

Fastest-growing Web sites in November 2005: PhotoBucket, MySpace, FaceBook, Memegen by ZDNet's ZDNet Research -- Nielsen//NetRatings released the list of fastest growing Web brands for November 2005, out of the more than 2,000 sites that met minimum reporting levels of at least 1 mln unique visitors a month. Visitors age 12-24 are more likely than the average Web user to visit these fastest growing sites, which show approximately 50-90% more [...]

NIELSEN//NETRATINGS REPORTS THE FASTEST GROWING WEB SITES

Nielsen/Netratings Press Release

NIELSEN//NETRATINGS REPORTS THE FASTEST GROWING WEB SITES

Wall Street Journal - Smile, You're on Photobucket

Smile, You're on Photobucket
Bloggers Looking to Share Images
Flock to Upstart Photo-Hosting Site
By VAUHINI VARA
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE
September 26, 2005
A year ago, relatively few people had heard of Photobucket.com. While
the upstart Web site is still far from a household name, it has emerged as
the most popular online photo destination in recent months, drawing more
visitors than established sites from companies like Eastman Kodak Co. and Yahoo Inc.
Photobucket.com Inc., started by a photo buff who wanted a better way to share images with his friends,
has seen traffic surge tenfold in the past year. In August, it had 12.2 million unique visitors, compared
with 9.6 million at Yahoo Photos and 5.9 million at Kodak EasyShare Gallery, according to research firm
Nielsen/NetRatings.

Full article:

Nielsen/Netratings - Web Image Hosting Sites Show Explosive Growth

Nielsen/Netratings Press Release

Full Press Release Here.