Crenk

TripTouch is a Tel Aviv startup that focuses on the travel industry. The site is built for independent travellers who want to make the most of their trips around the world. The site is a social network mixed with search facilities. They have partnered with Kayak to provide accommodation and travel search, which seems to mix in nicely with the overall look and feel of the site.

Everything on TripTouch is based around local feel, so once you select which town anywhere in the world you would like information on, then you will receive local photos, news, travel information, weather, currency information and the ability to search for flights and accommodation. Everything in one spot!

Additionally, they have added a social network in which also acts as information when searching locations. For example if I travel to Brisbane (AUS) and write a little comment about the place, then it will appear in the search results when someone else looks for the same location.

Currently, TripTouch is still in beta stage but it has the making of the one stop shop for travelling information.

The auction for the Edgeio assets has finished and Looksmart have walked away with all the assets for $280,000. Patrick Chapman talked to Mike Arrington about the purchase yesterday and said it still too early to know what Looksmart will do with the Edgeio assets.

I have read a lot of articles in the last few weeks about Edgeio and how there company was destined to fail (mainly from all the traffic coming from Techcrunch), but I think the technology is quite good and the idea was very sound but execution was quite poor. Im glad Looksmart has taken over the assets and im interested to see where they can fit them in to their portfolio.

I was read ShoeMoney yesterday and he reviewed a new advertising product that I had to mention on here.

Welcome to the Rubicon Project. The Rubicon Project is a new product that has already received $6 million in funding and is based around the very competitive market of online advertising. About a year ago I had an idea of starting an advertising network based around an open marketplace, since then this has been done several times over and it seems when someone comes up with a new idea it is only a month or so before there are 10 of them in the market.

The Rubicon Project however is a unique advertising model that actually has ties with over 300 ad networks, including the big boys like Google, Yahoo and ValueClick.

The Rubicon Project ensures your website is making as much money as possible by optimizing it for not only the highest paying advertising company but also for demographic/geographical data.

Now unlike a few selected people I am still waiting for my Invite to their private beta. However in the mean time make sure you head over to the Rubicon Project and have a look at their 3 min. video.

Guy Kawasaki posted a very interesting article on Monday, “Financial Models for Underachievers: Two Years of the Real Numbers of a Startup“.

The post is written by his friend Glenn Kelman who runs Redfin. Glenn decided he wanted to bare his financial soul so that other entrepreneurs could get greater insight into the witchcraft called financial modeling. The article is a two part posting in which he reveals his numbers and his lessons. It is very interesting for a young entrepreneur, so make sure you take a look!

Shvoong Homework is designed to assist students of all ages manage and organize their homework. Instead of using messy and disorganized notebooks, students can use Shvoong Homework to type-up their schoolwork, keep it organized, and then share it with individual or groups of classmates, the entire class, students from other schools entirely, or no one at all.