Source: http://columbiamissourian.com/stories/2011/02/02/winter-storms-expected-slow-economy-slightly/
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Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Tunzala Hashimova : Azerbaijan
Started raising funds on Feb 2, 2011
Tunzala Heshimova is 31 years old. She is married and has two children. Tunzala is an Internally Displaced Person, a refugee from the Kalbadjar Region now living in the Absheron Region together with her husband and children. Tunzala has been working as a school teacher for six years. This is Tunzala?s second loan, and she is very grateful to the lenders for her first loan. At present Tunzala needs 2000 AZN in order to purchase books and tests, which are expensive, and many children are unable to afford them all.
Source: http://www.kiva.org/lend/270083
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Elevator Pitch: Lifesta
The Pitch: "Sites like Groupon that offer daily discounts from local businesses have exploded in popularity. But a lot of people who buy vouchers never end up using them. Lifesta provides a trustworthy platform for users to buy and sell these unused vouchers online. Sellers set prices for the vouchers. We take a percentage of each sale and ensure that the vouchers are valid—if not, buyers get their money back. We've had 50 percent sales growth per month, mainly through word of mouth. We're raising money to launch a national marketing campaign and hire staff."
CO-FOUNDERS: Yael Gavish and Eran Davidov
LOCATION: New York City
EMPLOYEES: None
LAUNCHED: July 2010
2010 PROJECTED REVENUE: $40,000
2011 PROJECTED REVENUE: $4 million
WHAT LIFESTA CHARGES SELLERS: Eight percent of the sale price, plus 99 cents per transaction
UNIQUE VISITORS PER MONTH: 20,000
RECENT VOUCHER OFFERINGS: Discounted facials, sausagemaking classes, kickboxing lessons, dog-walking services, and boudoir photos
FUNDING SOUGHT: $1.5 million
The Experts Weigh InTest Other Revenue Models
I think there is a good opportunity to create a secondary market around group discount sites. But it seems as if Lifesta should be able to get more from its customers than just 8 percent of each sale plus 99 cents per transaction. I think the company should test alternative revenue models. Perhaps Lifesta could buy unwanted vouchers from consumers at a discount and then sell them at a profit. There are no barriers to entry with this type of business, so it all comes down to execution. Anyone who invests in this company is essentially betting that the founders will be able to outdo potential competitors.
Jon Chait
partner, Dace Ventures
Waltham, Massachusetts
Form Strategic Partnerships
Secondary markets are a great space. Sites that let consumers resell gift cards, for example, have done exceedingly well. I am worried about the low barriers to entry, however. This is something that sites like Groupon could do themselves. The key will be quickly getting enough buyers and sellers that Lifesta becomes a very active marketplace. I think partnering with coupon sites and deal aggregators would help. Also, I think Lifesta could bring in more repeat users if it developed a way to let people track when their coupons are about to expire—and sent reminders to post them for resale.
Danny Schultz
co-founder and managing director, DFJ Gotham Ventures
New York City
A Promising Business
I'm always a little skeptical of businesses based on aggregation, but this is quite an interesting idea. Lifesta is guaranteeing the validity of its listings and facilitating transactions, which is more valuable than simply compiling deal listings. StubHub, for instance, became successful by being a safe intermediary for reselling tickets. I worry, though, that Lifesta's customers are people who use sites like Groupon heavily. I'm not sure whether that segment of customers is large enough to provide outsize returns. But if Lifesta can reach critical mass, it could possibly offer its own exclusive deals.
Dan Ciporin
venture partner, Canaan Partners
Westport, Connecticut
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/inc/headlines/~3/P-bohcKVHmY/elevator-pitch-lifesta.html
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Foreign Policy: Why Egypt Can't Barter For Reforms
With Egypt in the midst of an uprising ? and the world wondering if other Arab countries will follow ? David Rothkopf of Foreign Policy warns that when reforming a new government, Egypt must be careful not to just pick and choose its freedoms to suit their liking.
Source: http://www.npr.org/2011/02/02/133427286/foreign-policy-why-egypt-cant-barter-for-reforms?ft=1&f=1057
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Sublime Text 2 now on Mac, gives TextMate a run for its money
There's a lot to like in Sublime Text 2, including compatibility with most of the TextMate themes we've come to rely upon. Navigation is especially snappy, thanks to the Goto Anything feature, which lets you hit Apple-P and start typing to jump to any file, whether it's open, recently closed, or a subfile of some other project. File previews load in the background as you type, so you can use Goto Anything to peek at something in another file without actually opening it. Sublime Text 2 also supports multiple selections, so you can make several edits at once. It's a more refined tool than a document-wide find/replace, and I think many coders will find it useful.
Sublime Text 2's UI is still not pretty by any Mac user's standard, but improvements to the polish of the app are coming "over the next few months," along with a full Python API, spell checking, and a "distraction-free" mode. On the plus side, the app does offer split-pane editing, so you can have side-by-side documents open, or even stack them 4-up. Tabs and sidebar navigation come in handy, but they can be used or hidden depending on your preferences.
All in all, Sublime Text 2 is a worthy addition the field of coder-centric text editors on OS X, with more improvements on the way. If it's already this good as an alpha version, the final release has the potential to really blow some Mac users' minds.
Sublime Text 2 now on Mac, gives TextMate a run for its money originally appeared on Download Squad on Mon, 31 Jan 2011 16:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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