2nd PE Round!

paidcontent.org: iContact [launched '03]...has raised $40 million in a huge second round from PE firm JMI Equity. The company, which had previously raised $13 million in funding, says in its announcement that it will use the cash to “make significant investment in sales and marketing, back-end technology, our product features and usability” and “global expansion.” It has surpassed $40 million in annualized sales—and is already hinting at an IPO to come.

5th VC round!

paidcontent.org: Etsy [launched '05] has raised a fifth VC round of $20 million [valuing the co. at $300 million] from Index Ventures [along with Accel and Hubert Burda Media]...which brings Etsy’s all-time investment to an estimated $51.6 million... [Etsy] claims to have sold merchandise worth $130.1 million in the first half of this year, and is profitable...the company says this year’s revenue should be between $30 million and $50 million, TechCrunch says.


http://www.etsy.com/fees.php

Copy Catch: US Durable Goods

August 25, 2010:

Durable-goods orders rise for first time in three months
Durable Goods Orders Rise 0.3 Percent in July
US durable-goods orders inch up 0.3%
Durable goods orders rise modestly in July
Durable-Goods Rose Less-Than-Expected 0.3% in July
Durable Goods Orders Rise Less Than Forecast in U.S.
Durable Goods Orders Rise Less Than Forecast in US as Investment Cools
US Stock Futures Slump After Durable Goods Disappoint
Treasurys up, dollar mixed after durable goods

"The Parent Company Trap"

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The Parent Company Trap
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

-- FNC ("The Most Powerful Name In News"): "The Kingdom Foundation, which has been a funder of...headed up by the guy who tried to give...he funds..."

[http://www.kingdom.net/en/CorpCocialRes_KF.asp]

Inflection point for FNC?

"MSNBC reached more viewers A25-54...in July, ranking number one in that category for the first time in a non-Olympic month in two years (July 2008)."

Hmm...

http://tvbythenumbers.com/category/ratings/top-news/cable-news

NYT: ...as “The Daily Show” keeps pointing out, these Fox bloviators never acknowledge that the evil prince they’re bashing, Walid bin Talal, is not only the biggest non-Murdoch shareholder in Fox News’s parent company (he owns 7 percent of News Corporation) and the recipient of Murdoch mammoth investments in Saudi Arabia but also the subject of lionization elsewhere on Fox.

No less a Murdoch factotum than Neil Cavuto slobbered over bin Talal in a Fox Business Channel interview as recently as January, with nary a question about his supposed terrorist ties. Instead, bin Talal praised Obama’s stance on terrorism and even endorsed the Democrats’ goal of universal health insurance. Do any of the Fox-watching protestors at the “ground zero mosque” know that Fox’s profits are flowing to a Obama-sympathizing Saudi billionaire in bed with Murdoch?...

When wolves of Murdoch’s ingenuity and the Kochs’ stealth have been at the door of our democracy in the past, Democrats have fought back fiercely. Franklin Roosevelt’s triumphant 1936 re-election campaign pummeled the Liberty League as a Republican ally eager to “squeeze the worker dry in his old age and cast him like an orange rind into the refuse pail.” When John Kennedy’s patriotism was assailed by Birchers calling for impeachment, he gave a major speech denouncing their “crusades of suspicion.”

And Obama? So far, sadly, this question answers itself.