Nielsen, 7
Ning, 13, 55–56, 58–66, 69, 71, 73, 84–85, 154, 203, 218, 237, 242
Nintendo, 48
Nokia Ventures, 163, 164
Nosek, Luke, 167
nonprofit organizations, 17–18
Novell, 46
Obama, Barack, 14–17, 136–37
Obama, Michelle, 16
Obama Girl, 16
O’Connor, Flannery, 28
Ofoto, 7, 184
Omidyar, Pierre, 143–50, 157, 158, 175
onSale, 147
OpenSocial, 61, 215
Open Water, 109–10
Opsware, 58
O’Reilly, Tim, 54
Orkut, 203, 204, 215, 219
Orlando Sentinel, 33
Overture, 221n
Ovitz, Michael, 59
oxytocin, 73
Palm, 161–64, 168
Pareto, Vilfredo, 62–63
Pareto’s law, 62–63
PayMe, 170
PayPal, 11, 59, 60, 61, 64, 66, 69, 158, 163–80, 181, 213, 216–17, 221, 231, 243
eBay and, 157, 168–70, 175–80, 217, 218
fraud and, 172–75, 177
PayPal War, The: Battles with eBay, the Media, the Mafia, and the Rest of Planet Earth (Jackson), 169, 170, 176
PayPlace, 175
PCs, 50–51, 53–54, 76, 79, 101
People, 8
Perfect Store, The (Cohen), 143–45
Photobucket, 189–90, 243
Pincus, Mark, 211–13
Plastics Inventor, The, 24
Plaxo, 67
PointCast, 102–3
Politico, 182
politics, 14–17, 72
Ponzi, Charles, 30–31
Ponzi schemes, 29–31
population, 235–38
pornography, 6, 7, 58
positive-feedback loops, 12, 44
Powell, Michael K., 182
power law curve, 62–63
privacy, 224–29
Puente, Tito, 168
pyramid schemes, 29–31
Rackspace, 5
Radius Marketing, 222
railroads and trains, 83, 113
Rand Corporation, 44, 69
RateMyFace.com, 8
Razorfish, 17–18
Reagan, Ronald, 90–91, 130
Real Networks, 190
relationships, online, 73–75
religion, 235
ResponseBase, 186
Revver.com, 129
Rexall Drug Company, 35
RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), 116
Ringo.com, 194–95
Rivers, Joan, 18
Rivers, Melissa, 18
RocketMail, 104
RockYou, 18, 56, 215–19, 244
Romero, Chris, 56
Rubbermaid, 36
Ruby on Rails, 153
Ryze, 203
Sacks, David, 169, 178, 179
Salon.com, 4, 82
Samaritan, 110–11
Samsung, 137
Sandler, Adam, 126
Sayama, Sandi, 214–16
scaling, 144–45, 151–56, 172, 187, 188, 195, 207, 215n, 236
Schleir-Smith, Johann, 80, 82
Schmidt, Eric, 227
Schwartz, David, 222–23
Schwarzenegger, Arnold, 136
Scrabulous, 18
screens, display, 76–78, 84
search engines, 221, 224, 229
Sears, 37
Second Life, 183
Security Exchange Company, 30
Sequoia Capital, 12, 91–92, 180
Shen, Jia, 215–16
Shenoy, Gopal, 16–17
Shutterfly, 184
Silicon Graphics, Inc. (SGI), 46–47
Silver, Nate, 182
Silverman, Sarah, 16
Simons, Elizabeth Radin, 131–32
Sipple, Oliver, 228
Six Apart, 212
SixDegrees.com, 212–13
SixDegrees.org, 246–47
Skinner, B. F., 26
Skoll, Jeffrey, 146
Skype, 60, 61, 66, 68, 157, 218, 237, 245
Skyrock, 204
Slamdance, 111, 117
Slide, 13, 18, 179, 216–19,244
Smarr, Larry, 46
smartphones, 76, 79
Smith, Jack, 89, 90, 93–101, 103, 104
smoke alarms, 36–37
SMS Sugar Man, 108
Snapfish, 184
social graph, 231–33
SocialMedia, 245
social networks, 72–73, 84, 203–4, 207–9, 218–19, 228, 233
advertising and, 222, 226, 231
failed, 211–13
widgets on, 214–19
SocialVibe, 247
Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr, 160
Sonoma Valley Film Festival, 111
Sony, 135, 136, 232
South by Southwest, 111, 117
spam, 28, 80, 82–83, 210, 218, 223
Space X, 173
Spangler, Steve, 128, 138–39
Spielberg, Steven, 46
Spinoza, Benedictus de, 72
Spiridellis, Evan, 136
Spiridellis, Gregg, 136–37
Spock, Benjamin, 32
Spoke.com, 203
SpyGlass, 51–53
spyware, 186, 210
Sridharan, Vasanth, 233
Stanford Review, 160, 165
Stanford University, 206
Stanley Home Products, 25, 26, 28–29, 31
Star Circle Pictures, 110–11
Steinman, Ronald, 109
Stephenson, Neal, 163
Stern, Howard, 7
Stivinson, Gregory, 174
Stone, Biz, 153
Stoppelman, Jeremy, 166
subservient chicken, 133
Sullivan, Andrew, 15, 182
Sulzberger, Arthur, 123
Sundance Film Festival, 110, 111
Sundance Online Film Festival, 136
Superbowl, 167
Tagged, 71, 203, 242–43
Target, 37
TechCrunch, 60, 202
technological innovations, 26, 112–13, 121–22, 220
telephones, 220
television, 26, 32
commercials on, 223
Tellme, 3
Telnet, 38, 40
Tequila, Tila, 188–89
Tesla Motors, 173
Thiel, Peter, 12, 158–68, 170–73, 177–79
ThisIs50.com, 56
This Land, 136
3DO, 143
Tickle.com, 195
Time, 8, 24, 53, 59, 188, 189
Time for Some Campaignin’, 136, 137
Time Out New York, 106
tipping points, 69
Tokuda, Lance, 214–16
tolerance, 228
Tolkien, J. R. R., 160
Tonight Show with Jay Leno, The, 136
Town Hall, 182
trains and railroads, 83, 113
Transparent Society, The (Brin), 225
TravBuddy, 203
Travellerspoint, 203
Tribe, 67, 211–12
Trippi, Joe, 17
T. Rowe Price, 13
Trump, Donald, 18
trust, 73, 209–11, 232
Tseng, Greg, 80–83
Tupper, Earl Silas, 23–26, 31, 33–36
Tupperware, 13, 23–29, 31–37, 96, 240
Tupperware, 27
Tupperware: The Promise of Plastic in 1950s America (Clarke), 28
Tupperware Unsealed (Kealing), 25
Turing, Alan, 174
Twilight Saga, The, 56
Twitter, 11, 12, 13, 18, 60, 66, 71, 72, 74, 152–53, 203, 242
ubiquitous Internet, 76, 83–84
Union Square Ventures, 13, 18, 153
Unix, 38–40, 42, 43, 49, 50, 171–73
UPI, 224
Urban Tribes (Watters), 211
USA Today, 154
Valleywag, 59
Variety, 111
Vax, 40
venture funds, 12–13
Viacom, 202
videos, 109, 130, 190
Mentos, 126–30, 133–35, 137–39
viral, 135–36, 230
see also YouTube Viola, 40
viral campaigns, 133
viral coefficients, 56–58, 81, 144–45, 193, 194, 196, 208, 233, 235
viral expansion loops, 11–14
three categories of, 18
virality, 13–14, 235–38
virality index, 68
viral loop application, 233
viral loop companies: characteristics of, 67–68, 236
index of, 239–47
viral loops, 18
double, 18, 61–62, 65
viral networks, 18
viral synergy, 158
viruses, 80, 211
virus hoaxes, 132
vital few, law of, 62–63
VKontakte, 204
Voltz, Stephen, 128–30, 134–35, 138
WabiSabiLabs, 80
Wall Street Journal, 8, 134, 185
Warhol, Andy, 71
War of the Worlds, 26
Watters, Ethan, 211
WearEver Aluminum Cooking Products, 28, 29
Webb, Maynard, 155–57
Weber, Lavon, 27
webmail, 89–105
Weinreich, Andrew, 212–13
Welles, Orson, 26
Wells, H. G., 26
We Media, 77
Western Folklore, 131
Western Union, 220
Westinghouse, George, 83
Whitcomb, Aber, 189
Whitman, Meg, 149, 154–55, 175, 179
Whitney, Eli, 40
widgets, 214–19
Will.i.am, 16
Wilson, Erasmus, 220
Wilson, Fred, 13, 18, 153
Wired, 222
Wise, Brownie, 25–27, 29, 31–35, 37
World of Warcraft, 183
World’s Fair, 26
World Wide Web, 38–45, 48, 50, 51, 53, 54, 70, 71, 158, 220
Wozniak, Steve, 35, 93
Wretch, 204
X.com, 170–73
Xerox, 46
Xiaonei, 204
XING, 203
Yahoo, 64, 66, 91–92, 101, 105, 135, 147, 152, 196, 198, 202, 221, 221n, 228
Flickr and, 185
Hot or Not and, 4–5, 7
PayPal and, 175, 177
YouTube and, 191
Yale University, 206
Yammer, 203
Young, Jim, 1–9, 11–12, 67, 190
YouthStream Media Network, 213
YouTube, 11, 12, 18, 60, 61, 64, 66, 69, 76, 109, 117, 135, 137–38, 153–54, 180, 190–91, 217, 243
Google and, 191, 218
Mentos video on, 129–30
Obama and, 16, 17
Zak, Paul J., 72–73
Zelon, David, 119–20
Zogby International, 224
Zollo, Fred, 120
zombie bots, 80
Zuckerberg, Mark, 205–9, 231–32
Zynga, 244
Copyright
VIRAL LOOP. Copyright © 2009 Adam L. Penenberg. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Hyperion e-books.
Adobe Digital Edition September 2009 ISBN 978-1-4013-9493-6
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
* In 2004, Jerome Heckencamp, who worked at Los Alamos after graduating from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, pleaded guilty to two counts of gaining unauthorized access and recklessly damaging eBay’s computer systems, in violation of 18 USC Section 1030(a)(5) (B). He also admitted to penetrating computer systems at Qualcomm, Lycos, and others. The following year he was sentenced to eight months in prison and required to pay restitution of $268,291.
* Apparently Thiel and Levchin didn’t realize that “confinity” is an actual (albeit obscure) word that means “community of limits.” If they had, they might not have chosen it.
*After Facebook became an iconic company, the three seniors sued Zuckerberg in March 2007, alleging a smorgasbord of misdeeds, including copyright infringement, breach of contract, misappropriation of trade secrets, and fraud. The case settled out of court in 2008 for a reported $65 million, more than two-thirds of it in private stock that cannot be sold without board approval. Most of the $20 million in cash went to lawyers and taxes.
* Scaling wasn’t their only hitch. Before RockYou, Tokuda and Shen had been working on a photo slideshow for software developer Iconix, which accused the two of stealing intellectual property. The case quickly settled.
* One of those adherents was none other than Bill Gates, though he did eventually come around. Or as Negroponte put it: “Bill has an extraordinary ability of being wrong…then suddenly changing his mind…and being right at exactly the right time.”
*Google didn’t invent keyword search. A company called Overture did, and had a patent to prove it. In 2002 Overture, which was subsequently bought by Yahoo, sued Google, which settled the case for $300 million in stock in 2004.