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Wired recently discussed the future of Amazon and puts it in an industry-wide perspective:

Amazon has swiftly become the most disruptive company in the media and technology industries. Its potential in this space is simply off the charts: bigger than Apple’s, bigger than Google’s or Microsoft’s. It’s becoming a purer version of all three.

If you are in any way interested in this market, read the article!

According to Nielsen the Android operating system had, in the smartphone segment (40% of mobile device market), a market share of 40%. Biggest competitors are Apple’s iOS (28%) and RIM’s Blackberry (19%). But perhaps even more important; of all innovators, 40% has a preference towards the Android OS in their next smartphone.

Read the full article here

And this is not just because I think the Blizzard development studio is the world’s best. Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick made a statement on an analyst event saying the company “has never been better positioned as a company.” Citing shareholder value creation being the company’s most interesting figure, having the best record for the past 20 years, creating $16 billion in shareholder value since 1990. What this should tell you is that I was right in saying Zynga is overrated and overvalued. They even released a graph detailing the difference:

Read the two posts about it on VentureBeat and start agreeing with me!
Updated: Activision Blizzard could make $1.25 billion in additional revenue in next three years
Activision Blizzard chief says “we’ve never been better positioned” in video games

I think the Groupon and other daily deals IPO’s will turn out to be more bubble than substantial shareholder value. But the market is still divided and here is some new information for those who are interested.

Like the cool new kid at school (Mean Girls, anyone?), the e-commerce evolution of the coupon (i.e. the Groupons and LivingSocials of today) has sparked a ton of venture funding interest and generated a lot of industry speculation. As daily deals companies build scale and expand reach, they are finding support from the investor community in droves. Some say this financial interest will dissipate when consumers start getting bored, the novelty wears off, the services reach a saturation point and profits suddenly dry up.

This venturebeat article briefly discusses if the Daily Deals concept iss turning out to be a bubble. It basically plugs a conference, but the numbers involved might be of interest.

Value Of Tech M&A Deals Nearly Doubled In Q2 2011 To $52.1 Billion is the heading of an interesting article on TechCrunch that is based on a recent report by Ernst & Young.

While tech company IPOs have captured buzz of late, it looks like M&A activity in the sector has been booming. According to an Ernst & Young report, big deals drove the aggregate value of global technology M&A to $52.1 billion in the second quarter of 2011, nearly doubling the deal value from the first quarter (up 92 percent to be exact).

Ernst & Young said that the surge was attributed mainly to industry consolidation and by ongoing innovations in areas such as cloud computing, smart mobility, internet and mobile video, the smart grid and solar energy.

Read the full article on TechCrunch here.

Not going to waste that many words on it anymore, but it is relevant; Groupon has posted its official figures.

Groupon’s revenue increased from $644.7 million last quarter to $878 million in the second quarter of 2011. The company managed to cut marketing costs from $208 million in the first quarter to $170 million in the second quarter 2011. However, that didn’t positively impact its net losses, which remained flat at $102.7 million for both the first and second quarter of 2011–and almost triple the $36 million loss from the second quarter of 2010. (VentureBeat)

You can really get to know (or at least that’s what they pretend) Groupon by reading their filing here. Or you can read up on the discussion surrounding GroupOn, since it’s not posting any profits and its space is being invaded by Google and others. Do you think it’s a good investment?

Great post by Paul Allen (the lesser, according to his header) on the growth he suspects or anticipates that Google + will have and the reasoning behind it.

Over the weekend I conducted an extensive analysis comparing surname and population data from the US Census Bureau to the Google Plus user base profiles. My conclusion was that as of July 4^th there were 511,000 users in the U.S. and 1.2 million outside of the U.S. for a total of 1.7 million users.

But where it gets really interesting is when he starts discussing his own company’s path alongside Facebook.

The “business opportunity” Kopelman referenced is largely gone. Web sites may use Facebook Connect to slightly improve their conversion rates and to generate some re-engagement loops with Facebook, but Connect hardly helps third party applications grow virally. Facebook has seriously restricted its viral effect for new apps, which was the #1 reason why great entrepreneurs and developers wanted to build there in the first place.

This is deep insight into social networking from a developer/industry point of view and I’m 100% sure you will appreciate it.

Read the full article on Paul Allen’s site.