Auren Hoffman's Summation Push for the week of August 3, 1998

You can visit my thoughts and reflections at http://www.summation.net or you can be lazy and wait for these tidbits to be sent right to your in box (subscribe and unsubscribe information is at the end of this e-mail).

This issue:
* Ye ol' High Tech Rumors
* Random Thoughts
* Hoffman Reading List
* Hoffman Spam Index
* Summation Push Picks Links

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Ye ol' High Tech Rumors

I have received a flurry of rumors and high tech insights over the last few weeks -- mostly from speculators. I've weeded out the few rumors I think might have merit:

***Compaq sells Alta Vista.
What does Compaq want with a search engine? They bought Digital for some unknown reason and now have a great web site on their hands. Compaq isn't in the ad selling business or the portal/content business and my guess is that they are trying unload Alta Vista.

Some potential buyers I heard are Fox, DoubleClick, Disney, Zapata, and others. The only real fit of these is Zapata or DoubleClick -- and I'm not sure that either can afford Alta Vista. Another likely arrangement is Compaq will "lease" Alta Vista to one of these sites.

***LinkExchange sells.
I got this rumor from two different people and I think it might have some legitimacy. LinkExchange will likely build their business for another 9-12 months. They are at a crossroads and have to decide the next step. LinkExchange is one of my favorite web companies and I think they will be able to command a good price.

Potential suitors again include DoubleClick and Zapata -- but they also include sites like Yahoo and Lycos who want more impressions for their own ad network. Link Exchange's acquisition of Submit-It allows it to position itself as the one-stop-shop for webmasters (at least for promotion).

***Allaire sells.
Allaire, maker of the popular Cold Fusion application (of which I was an early beta tester in 1995), is the next independent software developer to be swallowed. One rumormonger claims the acquirer will be Oracle but I doubt that. I do think, however, that Allaire doesn't have the product suite to do it alone -- they need a big powerhouse behind them. One person even suggested this will be Novell.

(all rumors and insights sent to auren@summation.net will be kept confidential)

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Random Thought:

I was watching a movie the other day and a character said to another "I hate your guts." It got me to think, does anyone ever say "I love your guts"?

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When I was waiting for the BART (San Francisco Bay Area transit system) last month the screen started flashing as if a train was coming. It read: "CAPITALISM" -- No stopping it. I laughed out loud, but nobody else around me seemed to get it. They just looked back down since it wasn't the name of their train.

... or maybe they thought Milton Friedman was elected mayor of Daly City and he renamed the town.

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HOFFMAN READING LIST:

See what I'm reading that gets me to think this way:
http://www.summation.net/reading.html

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HOFFMAN SPAM INDEX:

Check out what's happening with Spam at:
http://www.summation.net/spam.html

The Hoffman Spam Index is updated weekly.

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THIS WEEK'S SUMMATION PUSH PICK LINKS:

* Free Magazine Subscriptions (http://www.yotta.com/magazine/free.htm) - get some great magazines free.
* Allaire - (http://www.allaire.com) -- potential acquisition target.
* LinkExchange - (http://www.linkexchange.com/) -- another potential target and a great promotion vehicle.

SUMMATION