Live Blogging Capital Factory Demo Day--Sept. 7, 2011

[ Image from the Capital Factory promo video, available here. ]

The LAUNCH team live blogged the Capital Factory Demo Day, from the opening keynote to the five Capital Factory startup pitches to the final talk on recruiting talent.

Our profiles of the summer 2011 class: StoryMix, GroupCharger, SwimTopia, SpeakerMix and HelpJuice.

3:54: Joshua Baer is wrapping up. They want to boost the whole ecosystem -- thanks people for showing up today. Startup crawl is next -- meet other companies in Austin and those from today.

3:53: Yes, people who work at big companies are used to longer timelines. You need people who understand startup timelines. Someone who was at a big company can work at a small company if they've had experience at smaller organizations in their career or have had experience growing a small team within a larger company.

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HelpJuice Is Steroids for Your FAQ Page

WHAT: Companies can outsource the updating of their knowledge base to HelpJuice, which hosts and will automatically update FAQ pages after the company has approved an answer. Results are populated as questions are typed into the FAQ search field.  

LAUNCHERS: Emil Hajric, an 18-year-old Sarajevo transplant, previously founded Chalkboard, which creates software specs for clients that map out user experience and the design interface.

WHY: Companies receive hundreds, in some cases thousands, of questions a day. Companies can focusing more on product development and ways to engage their customers by outsourcing the FAQ. Many company FAQ pages are not helpful and/or incomplete.

WHEN/WHERE: Aug. 2011 / Austin

BACKSTORY: Before joining Capital Factory, Emil put up a landing page for a product he called "Questionify" and described a product that would keep a company's FAQ page up-to-date by collecting all of the questions customer ask. Almost immediately...

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"Conan" TV Studio Available on Airbnb

TeamCoco, the digital team behind "Conan," is sharing its studio in October to Los Angeles tourists through Airbnb. 

There is a catch, however. "Conan" will film the guests' entire stay and be featured on the show. The room type is a shared room and guests will have access to the couch, which has been grazed by celebrities, and...

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Condé Nast Decision to Free Reddit Not Related to Dead Babies, Jailbait or Pot

Erik Martin, reddit general manager, told LAUNCH the Condé  Nast decision to free Reddit had nothing to do with the company's controversy stemming from Reddit subeddits like jailbait, dead babies or its decision to run free ads for California Proposition 18 for marijuana legalization last fall.  

Since Condé  Nast acquired Reddit in 2006 for what is believed to be $12.8M, the decision to purchase the news-sharing site was viewed as out of character for the Condé  Nast brand...

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Groupon Postponing IPO-- Zynga Likely Will Go First

[ Groupon CEO Andrew Mason in 2009. ]

Groupon has cancelled its IPO road show and is reassessing the timing of its public offering on a week-to-week basis according to a Wall Street Journal report. This means social gaming site Zynga, which filed in early July, could go public first. CNBC reported Zynga's IPO would likely be in October rather than September.

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