On May 1, Indaba Music (www.indabamusic.com) will launch their advanced online production console with integral new features for their international community of professional and amateur musicians. Using the application, musicians can access, edit and mix their music from any computer in the world. The console will now allow for mix down, where individual tracks submitted by different users are mixed together into a single file, creating a finished song ready for distribution. Other new features include looping, automated pan/volume and the ability to export session tracks and information directly to ProTools, Logic, and all other desktop audio applications. The new console builds upon the features of the existing site console, which include multi-track editing, auditions and session track contributions from multiple users, a chat window for real time communication, and the ability to save multiple mixes of the session.

Where once music creation was bounded by geography and online opportunities scarce, Indaba Music now offers a diverse community and an easy-to-use set of collaborative tools in one place. Indaba is a Zulu word that invokes the spirit of collaboration and community. It refers to a gathering or a forum for sharing ideas, and it embodies concepts that are central to the mission of Indaba Music.

Indaba Music’s additional features include public or private “Sessions” to manage new recording, mixing, or mastering projects together and a recommendation system whereby site members are suggested to other users that they may be interested in working with. As part of building a new marketplace for music creation, Indaba offers the ability to establish terms and payment for work and then to rate the experience of collaborating with other session members, forming a meaningful feedback system.

What’s Going Down2Night.com
Seattle, San Francisco and Tri-Cities,WA among first to have Local Nightlife Broadcast by Text Message

(Seattle, WA)—March 16, 2007 – Have you and your friends ever wondered: “What are we doing tonight?” Seattle start-up Down2Night.com seeks to answer that question. Down2Night www.Down2Night.com is a free service that broadcasts SMS text message notification of a users favorite local nightlife venues they choose, on the days they choose.

Down2night.com launched this week with Seattle, San Francisco, and Tri-cities, WA for the alpha version. Rollout into other major cities across the nation will follow as popularity and feedback pour in. 

Down2Night.com is after the mobile social networking industry officially introduced in 2001, and has since exploded into a $3.45 billion dollar industry in the US alone.

Mark Michael/CEO and Daniel Rust/Chief Architect both in their early twenties co-founded Down2Night.com. They agree that down2night’s primary users will be the 18 to 35 year old professional crowd.

“This market segment is the most mobile-savvy group having SMS messaging experience, while also being the individuals that spend the most time and money attending musical events, and visiting clubs, lounges, and other nightlife establishments says Mark Michael CEO/Co-founder.”

Many of the notifications will also include specials, discounts, or coupons providing free or reduced rates for products, services, or cover charges with just the presentation of a text message.

The expected promotion in each city is planned to include discounts at local nightclubs, lounges and eateries, and a public "Launch" party, along with more conventional advertising.  

"With down2night, the user and establishments contribute event(s) or messages into the system and have it available to their peers/patrons online within minutes; using this dynamic portal, the event information broadcasted to the public can always be accurate and up to date," explained Rust.

Future enhancements will allow someone traveling to Las Vegas to temporarily sign up for that city and receive notification of special events at their favorite casinos, nightclubs and performances.

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Contact:
www.Down2Night.com “What’s Going Down 2 Night?”
a Synapse Corporate Solutions, LLC Company

• Current Seattle Venues: 103
• Current San Francisco Venues: 173
• Current Tri-cities Venues: 22
• Improved Navigation
• Mashup with Yelp (http://www.yelp.com) showing snippets of the last 5 reviews added
• Browse and view what other "spots" users have subscribed to
• "Map My Spots", which is a Google Maps mashup of your "spots" shown visually on a map
• Mash up/Integration section for XML Feeds
• Embeddable flash widget to display your favorite "spots" on your MySpace profile, blog, or personal web site
• See who has subscribed to the same spots you have
• RSS feed of the top events going down in your city
• RSS feed of events going down at your "spots"
• Select what days of the week you want to be notified via text message
• Receive one text message at 3pm on each day you have selected, listing your spots and what events are going down on that night
• Add new events at your "spots"
• Vote on current events at your "spots"
• Subscribe to your favorite nightlife "spots" (i.e. clubs, bars, lounges, and venues) in your city
• Live search of the "spots" in your city
• View how popular a "spot" is based on the number of subscribers, events, and messages
• Add messages and discussion about "spots"
• Upload an image to represent you on the down2night site

According to the New England Journal of Medicine, and the American Medical Association, using a program like SugarStats will reduce the complications associated with diabetes by as much as 40%.

Volcano, Hawaii - Marston Alfred, founder and chief architect of SugarStats.com, himself a diabetic since he was 9 years old, has developed a web based self-management application in which users can track, manage and monitor the most essential and important of their diabetic information online. Through a user-friendly web interface using the latest in web and information technology, SugarStats.com also enables the Diabetic to selectively provide friends, family, educators and health care professionals ‘read only’ access to their statistics. Primary elements affecting blood sugar levels including medication, food intake and physical activity are addressed in a manner that is not overly complex or too feature rich, enabling the end user to expediently self-manage via the Internet and Internet-enabled mobile devices. The core of this system will be available free to the public.

20.8 million people, approximately 7.0% of the U.S. population, have diabetes. Diabetes was the sixth leading cause of death listed on U.S. death certificates in 2002. The prevalence of diabetes is increasing at an alarming rate, as are the associated personal and societal costs, including long-term complications such as blindness, kidney damage, cardiovascular disease and lower-limb amputations. Further studies show diabetes and its complications cause substantial loss in quality of life, are the fourth most frequent reason for ambulatory physician visits, and incur $132 billion dollars in U.S. health care expenditures, directly and indirectly annually. There is now abundant evidence that complications of diabetes are preventable.

According to Dr. IM Stratton, Al Adler, HA Neil, et al, management of glycemia in diabetes is crucially important to the prevention of both acute and long-term complications. In general, every percentage point drop in A1C blood test results (e.g., from 8.0% to 7.0%) reduces the risk of micro-vascular complications (eye, kidney, and nerve diseases) by 40%. When programs like SugarStats were used regularly by the diabetic, they showed an average of a 1 point drop in the A1C levels.

Web-based tools have been emerging as effective methods for lowering HbA1C levels and several other key health markers in diabetics such as blood pressure however, to date, none have been available to the public. SugarStats.com provides a proven means to substantially lower these important health markers while also supporting the important opportunity to shift the focus of diabetes management toward patient self-management.

Alfred was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes as a child. He always felt dissatisfied and uninspired with the various ways to monitor and track his blood sugar levels and trends, finding them either over complicated and involved, or pedantic and & ‘boring’. Now 24 years old, Alfred’s professional expertise in the field of computers, networking and Internet technology/programming provided the foundation from which he developed for himself an engaging, informative, time saving and means to effectively address his diabetic management needs. From his personal quest, SugarStats.com has now emerged to support Internet-accessible diabetics the world over an alternative means to effectively address, control and ultimately improve their health.

Alternate Contact: Daerick Lanakila at dlanakila [@] sugarstats.com SugarStats POB 909 Volcano, HI 96785

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Permission to Reprint:
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Journalists, newsletter publishers, bloggers and others: You may reprint anything in this article as long as you include a link to our website and email.

Need a screenshot of what a diabetic would see on their personal SugarStats page along with more info regarding SugarStats is available at http://www.sugarstats.com/tour

CONTACT: Marston Alfred at 619-573-4071
SugarStats
PO Box 909
Volcano, HI 96785
http://www.sugarstats.com

About This Release: If you have any questions regarding information in these press releases please contact the organization listed in the press release. Issuers of press releases and not PR Leap are solely responsible for the accuracy of the content.

The company plans to announce that it’s buying Five Across, an 11-person company based in San Francisco that has developed software that allows large companies to easily add social-networking features to their Web sites without needing to hire a team of engineers from Stanford to do it. Using this tool, companies will be able to add communities so that users can share audio, video and photos, as well as post blogs, podcasts and profiles.Cisco has not disclosed terms of the deal, which is expected to close in the third quarter Cisco’s fiscal year 2007, which ends April 28, 2007. While at first blush it seems odd that Cisco, a company that sells hardware to shuttle bits around the Internet, would buy a software-based, social-networking company, analysts following the company say it actually fits in well with Cisco’s long-term strategy.

“Social networking is all about attracting more eyeballs,” said Danielle Levitas, senior analyst and vice president for IDC. “And it’s interactive in nature, so people are downloading and uploading pictures and video. They are streaming media. It drives a lot of traffic on the network, which causes a need for more capacity. And Cisco is the company that provides all that infrastructure.” For more than a year, Cisco has been implementing a strategy to broaden its product portfolio beyond simply being the “plumbers of the Internet.” The company has been aggressively pushing into new markets that are more consumer focused, such as video, home networking and even consumer electronics.

Late last year, it created the Media Solutions business unit, which develops and markets products to digital media content owners. The head of the group, Dan Scheinman, has said the next step for Cisco is to work more closely with the companies that are creating the movies, TV shows, music and other multimedia content that end up in consumers’ homes. Cisco executives say this acquisition will likely lay the cornerstone of its digital media strategy, because social networking is an important way that people connect with and discover content. This will become critical for big media companies, such as the movie studios and television networks, as they continue to move their content onto the Internet.

As audiences find more ways to consume content, whether it be on the Web, on a cell phone or on another portable device like an iPod, media companies need to maintain their connection to these consumers to continue to make their brands relevant. Disney has already seen the value in the social networking phenomenon. It recently revamped its Web site to create a MySpace for tots. Kids are able to play games, watch music videos, customize their web sites with Disney characters like Tinkerbell or chat with other kids.

Disney’s new site was home grown and took more than a year to design. But Cisco hopes that with the Five Across software, it can help other media companies build these features much more quickly, making it more plug-and-play. Cisco is approaching this market much like it has any other new market it has entered. Executives at Cisco said that Five Across is just the first of many acquisitions to come. That said, it’s still unclear what other pieces Cisco may feel it needs to assemble to fully build out its portfolio.

But one thing is becoming clear. As Cisco moves into this new market, it’s going to face a slew of new competitors from Google to Yahoo to Microsoft, which either own social-networking sites or offer tools to help build social networking into Web sites. So far, these companies have focused on allowing people to add social-networking features to their personal blogs and Web sites. None of them has developed a comprehensive solution that could be sold directly to large companies. “It will likely change who Cisco views as competitors in the future,” Levitas said. “But it won’t happen over night. Yahoo and Google are offering some of these tools piecemeal. And it’s not like everyone will rush out to buy Cisco’s software right away.”

By Marguerite Reardon Staff Writer, CNET News.com

TechAddress: Tell me a bit about your company, what it does and what’s your value proposition?

Likebetter: I don’t know about you, but I take a ton of digital photos. I literally have ten thousand photos on my hard drive, just sitting there in folders. No one besides me has ever seen them, and really, I only saw them when I took the picture in the first place. This shouldn’t be.

We want to help you dust off those monster collections of photos, by acting as a “goodness filter” that only the best photos can pass through. You upload your collection to likebetter, send a link to your friends, and within minutes you have a list of your best photos - which you can then do cool stuff with, like exporting them to flickr, printing them, or posting them on your blog.

TechAddress: What makes your company stand apart from your competitors?

Likebetter: There are a ton of companies in the photo space. No one that we know of has tackled this particular problem in the way we have.

A lot of companies have adopted our lovely interface though. Which we take as a compliment, and then we make catnip voodoo dolls of their creators, and introduce them to Felix.

Likebetter.com stands out from other photo-centered sites like Flickr because it’s all about helping you find your best photos. Since finding your best photos is hard, and Flickr isn’t helping much, we’re fixing it ourselves.

TechAddress: What are some of the main features?

Likebetter:

* It’s much easier to upload tons of photos at once here than there.

* Social editing features - your friends sort and rotate your images for you.

* Photo viewing and voting are the same - whenever someone views your photos, they’re giving you feedback. Everyone participates in some small way.

* Exporting to other photo sites (soon): no one we know does/allows this. Most photo sharing sites don’t allow sharing in this way, which sort of defeats the purpose. You own your photos, so we’re going to help you do what you want with them.

* Our interface is super-simple and really, really pretty.

TechAddress: Who’s your target customer or audience?

Likebetter: Anyone with a digital camera, really. Since that list now includes my mom, it must be really, really big.

Our power users are photographers, graphic designers, web designers; anyone who works with visual information, and needs to evaluate it in some way. There’s nothing stopping you from finding your best logo designs, web site layouts, or whatever you want. We’ve kept likebetter general on purpose.

TechAddress: Any new things in particular that you’re working on right now?

Likebetter: Lots of stuff. Right now we’re fleshing out the flickr/smugmug/etc integration. That’s coming soon.

TechAddress: Where do you see your company heading in the future?

Likebetter: Likebetter should be the place you put your pictures as soon as you plug in your camera.

TechAddress: Any negative feedback or criticism regarding technology and services?

Likebetter: No, none really (hurray!). Some people complain about a lack of so-and-so a feature, but we just add it and they’re happy.

Scaling was a hard problem to lick, and will likely continue to prove difficult in the future. It’s just one of those things you need to deal with.

TechAddress: So what would you say is the guiding principle behind your company?

Likebetter: Make something that people want.

TechAddress: What is the mission of your company and what are you bringing to the market that is innovative?

Likebetter: Wait, is this a trick question? Are you trying to get me to change my story? Likebetter is going to revolutionize the telecommunications industry, of course.

TechAddress: Where are you in terms of funding and your lifecycle?

Likebetter: We were funded by ycombinator.

TechAddress: If your technology or service is not formally launched yet, when’s the launch date? If you have already launched, when was your launch date?

Likebetter: October 2006. Digg was very helpful.

Hey everyone -

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted and I wanted to get the New Year underway by clearing up a couple of perceptions that have arisen around attempts to manipulate (game) the listing of home page stories on Digg.

Since the early days of the site, we’ve known that people try to game Digg, and since the beginning, we’ve developed tools to prevent it. It’s obvious to us that this is just a normal dynamic of a growing site and is similar to what sites like Google, Yahoo! and hundreds of other sites have been dealing with for years. But in the last several weeks the noise around this topic has grown and so I wanted to post and explain our position on some of this and some upcoming changes.

Click here to read the rest of the article. Click here to comment on the article.

TechAddress: Tell me a bit about your company, what it does and what’s your value proposition?

Conduit: Conduit is the inventor of the community toolbar concept. Community toolbars are a great new way to engage users and drive loyalty as they put the best of any website directly on the users’ browser. Today’s Web savvy organizations are looking for new ways to connect and engage their users, beyond the boundaries of their Web site.

As an example, Major League Baseball launched a ‘Conduit’ for each team in the league so the fans can stay connected with scores, plays, team information, tickets and breaking news on their favorite team, straight from the browser.

Bottom line, a Conduit community toolbar delivers:

• More Traffic: Drive higher traffic through unprecedented face time, resulting in an average increase of two extra clicks per user, per day
• Brand Presence: Conduit allows publishers to put their brand directly on the user’s browser
• Lower Attrition: Retain customers through engaging content, community chat, contests, and more
• More Revenue per Customer: Monetizing users beyond the boundaries of the Web site. Drive higher spending with more targeted offers and more relevant services delivered via a ‘Conduit’

TechAddress: What makes your company stand apart from your competitors?

Conduit: There are several things, but most importantly there are three:

1. Hosted turnkey service approach which eliminates all the challenges of traditional software offerings.

Typical off-the-shelf toolbar building software requires technical resources, constant maintenance staff, and presents issues in regard to user support and security, not to mention their limited component offerings. In the past, these challenges have prevented the majority of smaller websites from building and launching their own branded toolbars.

Conduit dramatically changed the model from traditional software to a hosted, global, turnkey service that is very easy to use, and requires no maintenance or technical skills. This has resulted in Conduit’s community toolbars exploding in less than 18 months to over 5 million users in 112 countries, 125k publishers in 22 languages, and over 30,000 downloads a day. For more details, see our recent milestone news release here.

2. Conduit’s business model is powered by search, which enables us to be completely free to the publisher and yet empower the toolbar with the most required functionality – search.

Conduit monetizes user searches via its Google search partnership, thereby delivering superior user experience despite being a free service for organizations.

3. Conduit supports its customers with a full suite of solutions that walks the user through the entire toolbar creation process:

• Building (Conduit provides easy to use Toolbar Wizards that make building a snap)
• Promotion (Pre-made templates for toolbar promotion include banners and download pages)
• Maintenance (Changes made to the toolbar in the hosted environment are automatically reflected in the toolbar field)
• Analysis (Reports to help optimize the solution for maximum value to publishers and users)

TechAddress: What are some of the main features?

Conduit: Conduit is free, hosted, extremely easy-to-use, completely customizable, ready in minutes, guaranteed to be secure, and available in 22 languages. The Toolbar Wizard is easy to use tool for any publisher, despite their level of programming expertise.

There are several key features that have contributed to our explosive adoption:

• Pre-defined components including customizable menus, news ticker, RSS reader, radio, chatroom, NEW video window, email notifier, weather button, and more
• Open environment that allows publishers to develop their own custom components using standard web development technologies
• A set of customizable search tools, powered by Google
• Cross-platform solution enabling publishers to provide instant availability in IE & Firefox
• Pre-packaged marketing templates for deployment and promotion
• Analytics and reports for management of the community toolbar
• Hosted solution enables seamless and dynamic updates of content, components, and updates
• 24/7 free support for publishers and users via email
• Fully localized by supporting 22 languages for the toolbar and its peripheral pages

TechAddress: Who is your target customer or audience?

Conduit: Any website with a passionate community of online users can benefit from a