Finally saw a company I want to blog about at “Under the Radar” The founder of this one, FFWD,is the former founder of iLike.
He says he is now working on a way to revolutionize television. A way to navigate through the video web that’s as simple as channel surfing and as simple as search. It organizes all the content available on the Internet into sets and then makes them into personalized channels. Reinvigorates the “channel” with social awareness and behavioral targeting. All you do is add channels to your profile, and then every click of the FF button brings up another item in the channel, and the result is a mash-up of your personal preferences.
All the information about you may already be on Facebook or Friendfeed, and ffwd can take that information and use it to create your channel.
There’s also a remote control function that lets you have more control. Once you create your channel, you can take the data and the application to the Wii or any other platform you want to use. So whatever navigational capabilities the Wii has, you can use to navigate your channel.
Because the founder had been successful, FFWD’s Series A came from Draper Fisher. Now they’re announcing a Series B, and looking for content partners to have their content indexed.
What did the judges think: Kara Swisher: YouTube has fumbled the discovery issue — like a library with all the books on the floor. But Kara Swisher doesn’t really understand how this will help. Afraid it will drive people down a cul de sac of niche-ness. Charlene LI: this is a feature, not a full solution.