TWiST #179 News

When Groupon originally filed paperwork for its forthcoming IPO, back in June, there was some controversy over their accounting practices. Specifically, they were using a metric called "adjusted consolidated segment operating income," which left marketing and customer acquisition costs off the books.

Responding to the criticism, Groupon has amended the filing and removed the metric. And the adjusted numbers paint a significantly less rosy picture of the company's overall financial health. We now know Groupon incurred a $420 million operating loss for 2010 and a $117.1 million loss in the first quarter of 2011. In Groupon's original filing, its ACSOI accounting showed operating income of $60.6 million for all of 2010 and $81.6 million for the first quarter.

Groupon also updated this past quarter's numbers, which have just come in: a record $878 million in sales, but it still lost $102.7 million. CEO Andrew Mason has defended removing these costs from the metric because they are a one-time up-front cost based on the massively rapid expansion of Groupon in a short amount of time. He also said that he welcomes people to use any metric they want to evaluate the company.

QUESTION: Think there's any validity to using this metric to evaluate Groupon? Was it the right move to remove it? Any predictions for Groupon's IPO?

SOURCE: CNN Money (http://money.cnn.com/2011/08/10/technology/groupon_accounting/index.htm)

The social network will replace the "@Mentions" tab with two new tabs: "@USERNAME" and "Activity"

The @USERNAME stream will still show your @replies, when someone follows you, when someone favorites one of your Tweets, when someone retweets one of your Tweets, or when someone adds you to a list

The Activity stream will also show all of those things, but in relation to all of the people you follow on Twitter (i.e.- you can see if a connection has retweeted a Tweet)

Also, beginning August 15, when Twitter users post URLs that are 20 characters or longer, they’ll automatically be shortened to a ‘t.co’ link

SOURCE: AllThingsD

Google has wasted no time in adding Games to its up-and-coming social network, Google Plus. The company announced on Thursday that it was teaming with Rovio, PopCap and, yes, Zynga, to bring casual games to the site which will go public shortly. Launch titles include Angry Birds, Bejeweled Blitz and Zynga Poker. (Many of Zynga's most popular titles, such as FarmVille and CityVille, remain Facebook exclusives.)

Google insists that users will be able to control their Google+ Games experience, so it can easily be accessed by visiting the Games tab but can also be just as easily ignored. (Once on the games page, all the usual social network gaming add-ons are expected, including the ability to share your progress with your circles.)

QUESTION: How important is it for the f*ture of G+ that they get games right? Think this is going to ruin people's G+ experience? Do the naysayers even matter?

SOURCE: GigaOm (http://gigaom.com/2011/08/11/let-the-games-begin-games-available-now-on-google/)

‘Angry Birds’ mobile-phone game creator Rovio Entertainment is reportedly in talks to receive funding that would value the company at about $1.2 billion

The Finland-based game maker is said to be considering taking an investment from a company in the entertainment business

Rovio has rejected similar offers from large institutional investors

The company says they plan to make an "Angry Birds" movie and open offices outside of Finland

In March, Rovio received $42 million in funding from investors including Skype co-founder Niklas Zennstrom’s Atomico as well as Accel Partners

QUESTION: Who is the most likely candidate to be interested in backing Rovio?

SOURCE: Bloomberg

A German court issued an injunction on Tuesday to stop all sales and marketing of Samsung’s Galaxy tablet

The Galaxy Tab was the flagship devices shown off during May’s Google I/O developer conference and is poised to do battle with the iPad for market share

The ruling applies to all EU member countries (except the Netherlands)

Just last week Samsung agreed to hold sales of the Galaxy Tab in Australia as they work out their differences with Apple

Motorola’s Xoom tablet is the target of a similar court complaint made by Apple and analysts suspect that Apple will ask for an EU injunction against that device as well

SOURCE: GigaOm