Archive for January 2012
CoVoiturage raises $10 Million to spread ride-sharing across Europe
Yesterday and this morning, TechCrunch, LesEchos and subsequently FrenchWeb (who somehow managed to get the ‘exclusive’?) announced that Blablacar, Comuto, and CoVoiturage raised $10 Million, with Accel Partners leading the round. The trick here is that all three of these companies are the same, branding themselves differently in each country (UK, Spain, and France). The […]
StartInParis: What it is and what it could be.
This evening, Laurent Kretz and Jonathan Benoudiz will host the 14th edition of Start In Paris, arguably the only startup event in Paris worth attending every. single. time. For those who don’t knowF, StartInParis is a FREE event that takes place once a month, and allows 5 Paris startups to pitch to an audience of 300. In addition, there […]
[rant] Bouygues answers #FreeMobile "Lalala, I can't hear you"
I wouldn’t consider myself a “fan” of Bouygues – in fact, in France no one is happy with their ISP, no matter who they have. In conversations, you more often hear “Oh, you have [SFR/Bouygues/Orange], they suck!” followed shortly by a “I mean, I don’t like [not the one you have], but at least I […]
How Xavier Niel got 42K Twitter Followers in 4 Tweets and Shook-up the French Mobile Market
Behold Xavier Niel, the man who may very well be on his way to achieving Steve Jobs-status in France. It would be a first for the country that has traditionally celebrated the bureaucratic public sector to private enterprise. But Xavier, who is a college dropout and ranked amongst the richest Internet entrepreneurs, is about to […]
Curioos releases Wacom collection and integrates Tumblr
Curioos, a digital art publish house, releases their 2nd collection of artwork, curated this time by digital design tablet maker Wacom. Their 1st collection was curated by Fubiz CEO Romain Colin; they also have some great new Tumblr integrations.
What's Happening with Seesmic?
Seesmic has always been a company for French startupers to watch. The company was founded by the infamous Loic Le Meur, who’s reputation actually does surpass his resume, having been the example of French serial entrepreneurship to the country that invented the word but lacked the spirit. Tech enthusiasts will undoubtedly recognize the Seesmic name, […]
Start Working on Your Side Project Tonight
To me a side project is taking an idea and building it from scratch. You do not have to complete it, it doesn’t need a business model or turn into a company over time, it doesn’t even need to make sense to other people than you. It is just a way to experiment. If later […]
With Artistoon, French artists can now sell personalized portraits online
If you’ve ever been a tourist in Paris, you’ve probably been to Montmartre (and if you haven’t, well, shame on you!). If there was a “Silicon Valley” for famous European artists, Montmartre would be it. Vincent Van Gogh, Salvador Dali, Claude Monet and Pablo Picasso all lived or worked there at some point in time. […]
Can France do Social?
In my most recent efforts to understand how to take a city and turn it into a startup city, I’ve been toying with an idea given to me by Jason Calacanis: I posed him the question of how European cities could create an ecosystem on the same level as (note: not “replicating”) the Silicon Valley. […]
New Year, New Design, New Writers, and New Resources
2012 is here, and The Rude Baguette is changing with the times! We launched The Rude Baguette on Halloween hoping to bring together some of the English bloggers in France to one place. We had this idea in our head that the people who were interested in knowing what was going on in France were […]