"A little company in Cupertino," he says, "showed up with a different strategy"
Source: Paley Center for Media
There is plenty of food for thought -- and plenty to take issue with -- in the breakfast talk Elevation Partners co-founder Roger McNamee gave at the Paley Center for Media late last month. SplatF's Dan Frommer and Business Insider's Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry have already linked to it. Mark Stephens has extracted one I, Cringely column -- on the decline and fall of Facebook -- and says he could have done a half-dozen more.
If you have 57 minutes to spare, there are worse ways to spend them than to watch McNamee's speech in its entirety. It's available on FORA.tv here (Flash required).
What interested me (and what we extracted below as a brief iOS-friendly YouTube video) was what McNamee had to say about Apple (AAPL), especially vis a vis Google (GOOG).
McNamee has changed his tune about the iPhone since he famously predicted on its two-year anniversary that nobody who bought the original model would be using any iPhone one month later. (See here.)
In his Paley presentation, which is mostly about HTML5 and why publishers should dive into it, Apple is the entrenched power that, in his view, dominates the Internet landscape. (If you don't own an iPad, he told his audience, buy one today. It's "the most important device since the IBM PC.")
Google, in McNamee's colorful analogy, is a Confederate general trying to defend Atlanta while William Tecumseh Sherman (presumably played by Steve Jobs) is pushing the company into the sea. (McNamee, it must be said, is a venture capitalist who has a lot of sticks in this fire.)
Still, this is good stuff.
Below: McNamee on Google's "dirty little secret" and how Apple has outflanked it. Just over 3 minutes on YouTube.
The founding partner of Elevation Partners has changed his tune about Apple
Source: CNBC
Remember Roger McNamee? He's the founding partner of the venture capital firm Elevation Partners -- a major investor in the Palm Pre -- who predicted on the two-year anniversary of the original iPhone that nobody who bought it would be using an iPhone a month later.
"Think about it," he said, in a remark I suspect he immediately MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 14, 2011 6:08 PM ET
Roger McNamee (Source: Elevation Partners)
Last December I wrote that Elevation Partners was beginning to make noise about raising a second fund, an Act 2 for its less-than-successful, $1.9-billion first effort. Elevation is the private-equity firm started by Roger McNamee, Bono and others that was supposed to focus on next-generation media and entertainment deals but drifted instead into consumer electronics (by buying Palm (PALM)), online real estate and tired old MORE
Adam Lashinsky, Sr. Editor at Large - Jun 23, 2010 5:21 PM ET
The site is making some changes, not to placate critics, but to prove they've been wrong all along. By Paul Smalera, senior editor
Yelp co-founders Jeremy Stoppelman (left) and Russel Simmons (right)
"Some businesses are never going to be happy with a paradigm that allows customers to comment, or makes them have to have to earn their content," Vince Sollitto of Yelp tells me
It's hard to argue. As Yelp has grown MORE
Apr 9, 2010 5:25 PM ET
High profile private equity shop appears to be chatting up a new fund despite string of struggling investments.
Word is that Elevation Partners, the high-profile if poorly timed private-equity firm headlined by rock star Bono and star investor Roger McNamee, is considering raising a new fund.
Elevation's investment partners (from left): Bret Pearlman, Fred Anderson, Bono, Marc Bodnick and Roger McNamee. Photo: Elevation Partners.
As surely as dogs chase rabbits or night MORE
Adam Lashinsky, Sr. Editor at Large - Dec 16, 2009 6:00 AM ETEvery morning, discover the companies, deals and trends in tech that are moving markets and making headlines. SUBSCRIBE
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