Has has e-commerce changed in the last ten years, asks Shopcade founder Nathalie Gaveau. Last week, Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten announced that it had led a $100 million investment in Pinterest, alongside Andreesen Horowitz, FirstMark Capital and Bessemer Venture Partners. After the investment was announced, CEO Hiroshi Mikitani said that he believed Pinterest’s content would show a high conversion rate, primarily as a result of the creative use of beautiful images to create interest circles. In addition, Rakuten’s merchants will benefit from Pinterest-driven traffic. Rakuten happens to also be the acquirer of PriceMinister, which it purchased for €200 million in 2010 in order to increase its activity in Europe. At the time of the acquisition, PriceMinister had more traffic than eBay in France, with over ... Continue reading →
How 30 scaffolders, builders, police, fire and ambulance crew rescued 63st teenager from her homeBritain's fattest teenager Georgia Davis, 19, needed urgent medical careIt took the 30-strong team almost eight hours to get her to an ambulanceRescuers built a bridge to carry her and had a crane ready if it was neededCost of the operation to get her out of her home will run into the thousands By Luke Salkeld PUBLISHED: 18:00 EST, 24 May 2012 | UPDATED: 18:51 EST, 24 May 2012 A teenager weighing 63st was taken to hospital yesterday with the help of builders, scaffolders and members of all three emergency services.Georgia Davis, 19, needed urgent medical care but it took around 30 people almost eight hours to get her into an ... Continue reading →
A hand-picked audience of Kernel subscribers and Kernel 50 members discussed Andrew Keen’s new book last night at Adam Street Private Members’ Club. Last night, at Adam Street Private Members’ Club, an invitation-only roundtable discussion hosted by The Kernel’s Editor-in-Chief Milo Yiannopoulos welcomed Andrew Keen, author of Digital Vertigo: How Today’s Online Social Revolution Is Dividing, Diminishing, and Disorienting Us. What began with a discussion about the implications of social technology on the internet rapidly expanded into lively exchanges about the future role of the state, the dark impulses of Silicon Valley and the frightening spectre of tech-generated unemployment. Kernel 50 members Harry Briggs, Damian Thompson and Ella Weston joined a lively group for what we hope was the first of many such high-level discussions ... Continue reading →