Business

Ryan has spent more than five years covering business, technology, and telecom-related subjects for a variety of publications based in New York and San Francisco. Ryan currently works as a writer for TechCrunch. ? Learn More Over the past year and a half, social TV analytics company Bluefin Labs has gone from being a stealth startup to becoming an invaluable provider of research for TV networks, brands, and agencies who want to delve into the social conversations that are happening around TV shows. Now, as it prepares to take its next steps forward, the company has hired veteran agency executive JP Maheu as its new CEO. Bluefin Labs provides detailed analytics around social messages that TV viewers send while watching television. It scours Twitter and other social networks in realtime to determine audience sentiment and affinity data around various TV shows. It can tell networks which shows viewers are most engaged with, what shows share affinity graphs, and the like. It can also pro...

Ryan has spent more than five years covering business, technology, and telecom-related subjects for a variety of publications based in New York and San Francisco. Ryan currently works as a writer for TechCrunch. ? Learn More Netflix announced that it has named former Warner Bros. executive Kelly Bennett as its chief marketing officer, six months after it lost its last longtime marketing head Leslie Kilgore. After 12 years on the job, Kilgore stepped down from the position in January. The resignation occurred after Netflix received an unprecedented uproar over a split of its streaming-only and DVD-by-mail services, a rate hike due to the separation, and the kerfuffle surrounding the re-branding of the DVD business, which it later backed off from. While the moves were driven by Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, the company’s communication with its customers proved to be the company’s real downfall. Recently, the company has been in the midst of a turnaround, but it was still in need of a new ...

Ryan has spent more than five years covering business, technology, and telecom-related subjects for a variety of publications based in New York and San Francisco. Ryan currently works as a writer for TechCrunch. ? Learn More Former Twitter Chief Scientist Abdur Chowdhoury is working on a new, super-stealthy project called Pushd. Details are scarce, but here’s what we know: According to an SEC filing, he’s teamed up with Summize co-founder Eric Jensen and the two have raised $1.35 million for the venture, which is based in New York City. Chowdhoury joined Twitter with the company’s 2008 acquisition of search engine Summize. He became Chief Scientist at Twitter, while Jensen became Twitter’s Tech Lead for Search and Relevance. Last fall, MG reported that Chowdhoury, Jensen, and the rest of the Summize team left Twitter, amidst a high-profile shakeup of management at the social network. His resignation followed the departure of Twitter co-founder Biz Stone, as well as several key produc...