It has been suggested that Digg Patriots be merged into this article or section. (Discuss) Proposed since January 2011.

Digg, Inc.

Digg logo
Type	Private
Founded	San Francisco, California, United States[1]
Founder(s)	Kevin Rose[2]
Headquarters	San Francisco, California, United States
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Matt Williams[3] (CEO) Kevin Rose (Founder) (ex-CEO) Jay Adelson (ex-CEO) John Moffett (CFO) Owen Byrne (Co-Founder) Ron Gorodetzky (Co-Founder)
Revenue	US$8.5 million (2008 est.)[4]
Employees	40[2]
Website	digg.com
Alexa rank	185 (June 2012[update])[5]
Type of site	Social news
Advertising	Banner ads, referral marketing
Registration	Optional
Available in	Multilingual
Launched	December 5, 2004 (2004-12-05)
Current status	Active

Digg is a social news website. Prior to Digg v4, its cornerstone function consisted of letting people vote stories up or down, called digging and burying, respectively. Digg's popularity prompted the creation of copycat social networking sites with story submission and voting systems.^[6] The website traffic ranked 178th, behind one of those competitors, Reddit, by Alexa.com as of May, 15 2012.^[5] Quantcast estimates Digg's monthly U.S. unique visits at 4.4 million.^[7]

History and description[link]

Digg started out as an experiment in November 2004 by Kevin Rose, Owen Byrne, Ron Gorodetzky, and Jay Adelson. The original design was free of advertisements, and was designed by Dan Ries. As Digg became more popular, Google AdSense was added to the website. In July 2005, the site was updated to Version 2.0. The new version featured a friends list, the ability to "digg" a story without being redirected to a success page, and a new interface designed by web design company silverorange.^[8] The site developers have stated that in future versions a more minimalist design will likely be employed. On Monday June 26, 2006 version 3 of Digg was released with specific categories for Technology, Science, World & Business, Videos, Entertainment and Gaming as well as a View All section where all categories are merged. Digg has grown large enough that submissions sometimes create a sudden increase of traffic to the "dugg" website. This is referred to by some Digg users as the "Digg effect" and by some others as the site being "dugg to death." However, in many cases stories are linked simultaneously on several popular bookmarking sites. In such cases, the impact of the "digg effect" is difficult to isolate and assess. On August 27, 2007, Digg altered its main interface, mostly in the profile area. The domain "digg.com" attracted at least 236 million visitors annually by 2008 according to a Compete.com survey.^[9]

Digg CEO Jay Adelson explained at the 2010 "Bigg Digg Shindigg," which is part of the South by Southwest Interactive Conference, that Digg is getting a major overhaul and redesign.^[10] In an interview with Wired magazine, Adelson explained that "Every single thing has changed" and that "the entire website has been rewritten."^[11] Adelson explains that the new Digg will essentially eliminate the duplication problem. It will also help prevent so called 'power users' from dominating the site with their submissions. The new Digg will also offer users a personalized homepage, based on their diggs, that is tailored to their specific interests. The commenting system will be updated to "help fight bad behavior like trolling or group-burying." The entire look of the site will also change. Adelson summed up the new Digg by saying, "We've got a new backend, a new infrastructure layer, a new services layer, new machines — everything." John Quinn wrote in a Digg blog post that the company was going to stop using MySQL and begin using Cassandra, a distributed database system.^[12]

On April 5, 2010, Kevin Rose announced that he would be assuming the position of CEO as Jay Adelson had stepped down.^[13] Although, some time later he has disclosed that he is actively seeking a replacement CEO as the role takes up too much of his time that he would rather spend doing other things, such as angel investing.

On August 25, 2010, Digg released v4. The site experienced a number of bugs and glitches that resulted in a backlash from Digg users in the form of verbal opposition and, initially, heavy posting of articles from Reddit - a competitor of Digg's. Digg's business development director Matt Van Horn left Digg after the official update of version 4.^[14]

On September 1, 2010, Matt Williams took over as CEO, ending Rose's troubled tenure as interim chief executive.

Potential sale[link]

Several reports have come forward claiming Digg has been trying to sell itself to a larger company since early 2006.^[15] While Adelson claims that Digg will meet with any potential buyers, he denies that they will actively begin talks for a sale. The most recent sale talks were with Google in July 2008 for approximately $200 million. On July 25, during the due diligence part of the potential sale, Google informed Digg that they were not interested in the purchase.^[16] As a result of Google's decision, Digg entered into a third round of funding, receiving $28.7 million from investors such as Highland Capital Partners.^[17] With this funding, the company plans to move from their current offices to accommodate a bigger staff base.^[18] On December 2, 2008, BusinessWeek reported "Digg Chief Executive Officer Jay Adelson says the popular news aggregation Web site is no longer for sale, and the focus of the company is to build an independent business that reaches profitability as quickly as possible. That means the four-year-old startup will dial back some of its expansion plans, instead prioritizing projects that generate revenue and profit."^[19] On December 18, 2008, BusinessWeek analyzed Digg's financial statements. They reported that Digg lost $4 million on $6.4 million of revenue in the first three quarters of 2008.^[4]

Features[link]

Facebook Connect[link]

In May 2009, Digg launched a new feature integrating Facebook Connect with Digg.^[20] The Digg integration with Facebook connect allows users of Digg and Facebook to connect their accounts. When a Facebook account is connected to a Digg account, Digg articles can then be shared on the user's Facebook page.^[21] Facebook Connect also allows Facebook users to log into Digg with their Facebook account, thus bypassing the normally required Digg registration.

Digg Dialogg[link]

Digg Dialogg allows Digg users to submit questions to a preselected famous individual who agrees to do an interview with a reporter chosen by Digg.^[22]

Digg Bar[link]

On April 2, 2009, Digg released the Digg Bar, which provides a toolbar above the top of a site allowing the user to produce shortened urls, or access digg comments and analytics without leaving the page.^[23] On April 5, 2010, Kevin Rose announced on the official Digg blog that the controversial DiggBar would be eliminated with the implementation of the 4th version of the website.^[24] This was Rose's first major announcement since succeeding Jay Adelson as CEO.

Digg API[link]

On April 19, 2007, Digg opened their API^[25] (Application Programing Interface) to the public.^[26] This allowed software developers to write tools and applications based on queries of Digg's public data, dating back to 2004. Since then, many blogs^[27][28] have sought to keep up with all of the ongoing Digg API projects.

Digg App[link]

Launched on March 23, 2010 for iPhone and April 1, 2010 for Android, the Digg App allows users to access the Digg site directly through the app. Users can use the app to browse the stories, Digg favorites, and share on Facebook. Currently on Version 2.3, the free app allows users to login using their Digg login, or connect using Facebook or Twitter. The app easily allows sharing with friends through the social media platforms, and allows users to integrate Digg news into their feeds, as well as display their own Diggs or comments.

Criticism[link]

Mob mentality[link]

Unlike the present Digg algorithm, which works on user diversity, in 2006 it was much more dependent on flocking behavior among users to determine the promotion of content. During this period an anonymous user posted a blog accusing an O'Reilly writer of stealing Digg's CSS.^[29] The Digg mob flocked to the story and it was promoted with nearly 3,000 votes. Digg founders Kevin Rose, Jay Adelson and Daniel Burka expressed dissatisfaction on finding Digg's code on Mallett's sites.^[30] Mallett responded and clarified that the unauthorized use of code was committed by the contributors to the open source Digg clone, Pligg, which he was using.^[31] Kevin acknowledged the misunderstanding and notified Pligg developers of the issue.^[32] Adelson contacted Mallett thanking him for clearing the issue and expressed support for his claims. Another O'Reilly blogger in defense of Mallett posted a criticism of Digg's mob mentality.^[33] Digg mob's failure to the Mallett story has also been attributed to groupthink which is different from the wisdom of the crowds which requires independence among the nodes.^[34]

Moderation and algorithms[link]

The purpose of Digg was to give editorial powers back to the masses. However, the second version of Digg began using a secret algorithm that blurs the transparency that was expected by the users. In 2006, the site began to be gamed by their top users.^[35] Supernova17 was banned after agreeing to promote a story for cash to an undercover Digg sting operation.^[36] Another group of users openly formed a niche 'bury brigade' .^[37] The users defended themselves claiming their actions were in accordance with the wishes of Digg users. Digg tried to offset criticism by hiring computer scientist Anton Kast to develop a diversity algorithm to prevent special interest groups from dominating Digg. A townhall was organized and the users demanded the shouts feature be discontinued.^[38] By 2008, Google increased their page rank for Digg and many 'pay for Diggs' startups were created to profit from the opportunity. According to a popular blog a single front-page story was sold for $500 at that time.^[39] Usocial and Diggfront were given cease and desist notices from Digg which they ignored. After the release of Digg v4, there had been more questions with the algorithm.^[40]

AACS encryption key controversy[link]

Wikinews has related news: Digg.com suffers user revolt; Founder will not fight

On May 1, 2007, an article appeared on Digg's homepage that contained the encryption key for the AACS digital rights management protection of HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc. Then Digg, "acting on the advice of its lawyers," removed posting submissions about the secret number from its database and banned several users for submitting it. The removals were seen by many Digg users as a capitulation to corporate interests and an assault on free speech.^[41] A statement by Jay Adelson attributed the article's take-down to an attempt to comply with cease and desist letters from the Advanced Access Content System consortium and cited Digg's Terms of Use as justification for taking down the article.^[42] Although some users defended Digg's actions,^[43][44][45] as a whole the community staged a widespread revolt with numerous articles and comments being made using the encryption key.^[46][47] The scope of the user response was so great that one of the Digg users referred to it as a "digital Boston Tea Party".^[48] The response was also directly responsible for Digg reversing the policy and stating: "But now, after seeing hundreds of stories and reading thousands of comments, you've made it clear. You'd rather see Digg go down fighting than bow down to a bigger company. We hear you, and effective immediately we won't delete stories or comments containing the code and will deal with whatever the consequences might be."^[49]

Organized ideologically motivated censorship[link]

On August 5, 2010, progressive blogger Ole Ole Olson (aka "Novenator") posted a report to AlterNet about a year-long effort of organized burying of seemingly liberal articles from the Upcoming module of Digg by a conservative Yahoo! Groups mailing list known as DiggPatriots and an associated page on coRank; he also accused leading members of the mailing list of participating in behavior which violated the Digg Terms of Usage, such as creating "sleeper" accounts in the event of administrators banning their main accounts for terms-violating behavior as well as vexatious "reporting" of seemingly liberal users for banning.^[50][51] The post was immediately followed by the disbanding and closure of the DiggPatriots list, and an investigation into the matter by Digg.^[52]

Digg v4[link]

On August 25, 2010, when Digg updated to version 4, the site was unreachable or unstable during the launch day and the weeks following. A large number of the site's members have complained about the new design and removed features (such as bury, favorites, friends submissions, upcoming pages, subcategories, videos and history search).^[53] Kevin Rose replied to complaints on his blog where he promised to restore upcoming pages and fix the algorithm.^[54]

In an open letter to Rose, Alexis Ohanian, founder of rival site Reddit, said :

this new version of digg reeks of VC meddling. It's cobbling together features from more popular sites and departing from the core of digg, which was to "give the power back to the people."^[55]

Ian Eure, former Digg engineer, explained on his blog why the update cannot be reverted, but the old features can still be ported to the new architecture.^[56]

Disgruntled Digg users declared August 30, 2010 as the 'quit Digg day' and began digging up stories submitted by Reddit's auto submitting publisher account filling up the front page.^[57][58][59] Reddit also temporarily added the Digg shovel to their logo to welcome fleeing Digg users.^[60]

Digg's traffic dropped significantly after the launch of version 4,^[61] and publishers reported a drop in direct referrals from stories on Digg's front page.^[62] Recently hired CEO Matt Williams attempted to address some of the users' concerns in a blog post on October 12, 2010, promising to reinstate many of the features that had been removed. Digg banned RSS Submissions. Digg said "The simple act of forcing a manual submission helps to combat spam and ensures that quality content appears on Digg."^[63][64]

Timeline[link]

See also[link]

Internet portal

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official site
• Inc. Magazine profile of Kevin Rose

Julia Mancuso

Mancuso in December 2006
Disciplines	Downhill, Super G, Giant Slalom, Slalom, Combined
Club	Squaw Valley Ski Team
Born	(1984-03-09) March 9, 1984 (age 28) Reno, Nevada, U.S.
Height	5 ft 6 in (1.68 m)
World Cup debut	November 20, 1999 (age 15)
Website	juliamancuso.com
Olympics
Teams	3 – (2002-10)
Medals	3 (1 gold)
World Championships
Teams	5 – (2003-11)
Medals	4 (0 gold)
World Cup
Seasons	13th – (2000–12)
Wins	7 – (3 DH, 2 SG, 1 SC, 1 PS)
Podiums	31
Overall titles	0 – (3rd in 2007)
Discipline titles	0 – (2nd in DH & K, 2007), (2nd in SG, 2012)
Medal record Women’s alpine skiing Competitor for the  United States Olympic Games Gold 2006 Turin Giant Slalom Silver 2010 Vancouver Downhill Silver 2010 Vancouver Combined World Championships Silver 2011 Garmisch Super G Silver 2007 Åre Combined Bronze 2005 Bormio Super G Bronze 2005 Bormio Giant Slalom Junior World Ski Championships Gold 2004 Maribor Combined Gold 2003 Puy St. Vincent Super G Gold 2002 Tarvisio Downhill Gold 2002 Tarvisio Giant Slalom Gold 2002 Tarvisio Combined Bronze 2004 Maribor Super G Bronze 2003 Puy St. Vincent Downhill Bronze 2001 Verbier Combined

Julia Mancuso (born March 9, 1984) is a World Cup alpine ski racer with the U.S. Ski Team. Born in in Reno, Nevada, she was the gold medalist in the giant slalom at the 2006 Winter Olympics and the silver medalist in both downhill and combined at the 2010 Winter Olympics. She has also won four medals (two silver and two bronze) at the World Championships and seven races in regular World Cup competition. Her three Olympic medals are the most ever for a female American alpine skier.

Racing career[link]

Mancuso made her World Cup debut at Copper Mountain, Colorado, on November 20, 1999, at the age of 15. She scored her first World Cup points (top-30 finish in a race) during the 2001 season. While she often struggled in World Cup races over the next few seasons, she enjoyed exceptional success at the Junior World Championships, winning a record eight medals, including five golds in 2002, 2003, and 2004.

Her World Cup results improved dramatically during the 2005 season, as she climbed to ninth place overall from 55th place in 2004. At the 2005 World Championships, she won bronze medals in both the super G and the giant slalom competitions. Her gold medal at the 2006 Turin Winter Olympics was unexpected, as she had just three podiums that season, though all were within weeks of the Olympics. Only one of those podiums was in giant slalom, a third place in the final GS race before the Olympics.

She won the race despite ongoing pain in her right knee, which was finally traced to hip dysplasia.^[1] She would finish the 2006 season in eighth place, including podium (top three) finishes in three races, although she could sometimes barely walk by season's end.

At the start of the off-season, Mancuso endured arthroscopic surgery on her right hip to remove an inch-long bone spur on the ball of the joint.^[1] After several months off skis, she resumed training with the U.S. team in August, at their summer ski camp in South America. By the start of the 2007 season, she was almost fully recovered.

Mancuso at Aspen
in November 2006

Mancuso in December 2006

Although she started off slowly, with a number of disappointing results in the first few weeks as she worked back into race shape, the 2007 season would turn out to be Mancuso's breakout year on the World Cup circuit. She won her first World Cup race on December 19, 2006, a downhill in Val-d'Isère, France, and then took second in another downhill the next day. She went on to win three more races during the season; a Super G, a super combined, and another downhill. At the 2007 World Championships in Åre, Sweden, she won a silver medal in the super combined. After finishing on the podium in three consecutive races (2nd, 1st, 3rd) in Tarvisio, Italy, on March 2–4, 2007, she was tied for the overall World Cup lead. She eventually finished the season in third place overall, the best finish by an American woman since Tamara McKinney in 1984, until Lindsey Vonn won the overall title in 2008. Mancuso finished in second place in the 2007 season standings for both downhill and combined.

Following the 2008 season, Mancuso did not achieve a top-three finish in World Cup events for nearly two years due to back problems, so her silver medal in the women's downhill at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics was another surprise.^[2] The very next day, she won another silver in the Women's Super Combined, an event that incorporates both a downhill and a slalom run.^[3] However, while Mancuso was trying to defend her title in giant slalom, Lindsey Vonn crashed after Mancuso, the next skier, had started, forcing Mancuso's run to be stopped just before she reached Vonn's crash.^[4] Forced to re-start from the back of the pack, Mancuso only managed an 18th-place first run, and her strong second run only brought her up to eighth overall.^[5] On the first competition day at the 2011 World Championships in Garmisch, Germany, she once again proved her strength at big events by winning the silver medal in the Super-G.

A month later she won her first World Cup race in over four years, a victory in the downhill at the World Cup finals in Lenzerheide, Switzerland. Since this was a few days after a terrible earthquake and tsunami in Japan, she launched a fundraiser by pledging half her race earnings of the World Cup finals to the skiershelpingjapan.com campaign website.^[6]

World Cup results[link]

Season standings[link]

Race podiums[link]

• 7 wins – (3 DH, 2 SG, 1 SC, 1 Parallel slalom)
• 31 podiums – (11 DH, 11 SG, 5 GS, 3 SC, 1 Parallel slalom)

Season	Date	Location	Discipline	Place
2006	27 Jan 2006	Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy	Super G	2nd
	28 Jan 2006		Downhill	2nd
	4 Feb 2006	Ofterschwang, Germany	Giant Slalom	3rd
2007	19 Dec 2006	Val-d'Isère, France	Downhill	1st
	20 Dec 2006		Downhill	2nd
	13 Jan 2007	Altenmarkt, Austria	Downhill	3rd
	14 Jan 2007		Super Combined	1st
	19 Jan 2007	Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy	Super G	1st
	20 Jan 2007		Downhill	2nd
	21 Jan 2007		Giant Slalom	2nd
	2 Mar 2007	Tarvisio, Italy	Super Combined	2nd
	3 Mar 2007		Downhill	1st
	4 Mar 2007		Super G	3rd
2008	27 Oct 2007	Sölden, Austria	Giant Slalom	2nd
	21 Dec 2007	St. Anton, Austria	Downhill	3rd
	22 Dec 2007		Super Combined	3rd
	28 Dec 2007	Lienz, Austria	Giant Slalom	2nd
	20 Jan 2008	Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy	Super G	2nd
	22 Feb 2008	Whistler, Canada	Downhill	3rd
2010	7 Mar 2010	Crans-Montana, Switzerland	Super G	3rd
2011	5 Dec 2010	Lake Louise, Canada	Super G	3rd
	22 Jan 2011	Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy	Downhill	2nd
	27 Feb 2011	Åre, Sweden	Super G	3rd
	6 Mar 2011	Tarvisio, Italy	Super G	2nd
	16 Mar 2011	Lenzerheide, Switzerland	Downhill	1st
2012	26 Nov 2011	Aspen, USA	Giant Slalom	3rd
	4 Dec 2011	Lake Louise, Canada	Super G	3rd
	7 Jan 2012	Bad Kleinkirchheim, Austria	Downhill	2nd
	5 Feb 2012	Garmisch, Germany	Super G	1st
	21 Feb 2012	Moscow, Russia	Parallel slalom	1st
	15 Mar 2012	Schladming, Austria	Super G	2nd

Lifestyle and endorsements[link]

Mancuso's nickname among her U.S. Ski Team teammates and fans is "Super Jules".^[7] Following her Olympic gold medal in 2006, a ski run at Squaw Valley Ski Resort was renamed "Julia's Gold".^[8]

After her coach gave her a plastic tiara as a good-luck token in 2005, she wore it over her racing helmet during several slalom races. She wore her tiara following her Silver Medal run in the Women's Downhill and again at the medal ceremony at the 2010 Winter Olympics. In 2010, Mancuso launched her own lingerie line named Kiss My Tiara.^[9] Mancuso also models lingerie and has been memorably quoted as saying, "I think underwear is my calling. You can be feminine and fast." ^[10]

Mancuso competes using Völkl skis, Lange boots, Marker bindings, and POC helmets and armor. In December 2006, Lange announced that Mancuso would be the first-ever "Lange Girl Athlete", and be the subject of posters, images, and an "ongoing effort to showcase exceptional women ski athletes who are also attractive and inspiring".^[11] She switched to Völkl skis and Marker bindings following the 2010 season; she was previously with Rossignol.^[12]

During the 2010 Winter Olympics, VISA featured Mancuso in an animated story describing how as a child she had drawn a picture of herself as a gold medalist, and closing with a photograph of her after winning the gold medal in 2006.^[13] She also starred in a commercial for 24 Hour Fitness called 'Reach Your Potential', directed by Emmy nominee Brent Roske.

Personal life[link]

Mancuso in January 2011

Mancuso was born in Reno, Nevada, and grew up in the Lake Tahoe area as the middle of three sisters, between older sister April and younger sister Sara. Her father, Ciro Mancuso, was arrested and convicted of running a $140 million marijuana smuggling operation when Julia was five years old.^[14] Her parents divorced in 1992, and her mother said that Julia "took everything out on the slopes."^[14] After his release from prison, Julia and her father became close.^[14]Mancuso's sentence was greatly reduced because of his cooperation with the government in cases against other alleged organization members and Mancuso's lawyer Patrick Hallinan. As a result of his assistance to the government, Mancuso was allowed to keep $5 million in proceeds from his trafficking business.

She graduated from The Winter Sports School in Park City, Utah, in 2000 and resides in Olympic Valley, California.

Her boyfriend is Aksel Lund Svindal, a champion alpine ski racer from Norway.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Julia Mancuso

• Julia Mancuso at the International Ski Federation
• FIS-Ski.com – World Cup season standings – Julia Mancuso
• Ski-db.com – results – Julia Mancuso
• Sports Reference.com – Olympic results – Julia Mancuso
• Julia Mancuso.com – personal website
• U.S. Ski Team.com – profile – Julia Mancuso
• Völkl Skis – athletes – Julia Mancuso
• Lange Ski Boots – team – Julia Mancuso

This article has been nominated to be checked for its neutrality. Discussion of this nomination can be found on the talk page. (March 2012)

Kevin Rose
Born	(1977-02-21) February 21, 1977 (age 35) Redding, California, United States[1]
Nationality	American
Website
kevinrose.com

Kevin Rose (born Robert Kevin Rose, February 21, 1977) is an American Internet entrepreneur who co-founded Revision3, Digg, Pownce, and Milk. He also served as production assistant and co-host at TechTV's The Screen Savers. He is currently a senior product manager at Google.

Early life[link]

Rose was born in Redding, California^[1] and lived in Oregon before his family moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, where he spent most of his childhood. He became an Eagle Scout with the Boy Scouts of America.^[2] Rose transferred to Vo-Tech High School in Las Vegas in 1992. He then attended the University of Nevada Las Vegas, majoring in computer science but dropped out in 1998.^[3] He worked for two dot-com startups through CMGI.^[1]

Career[link]

Television[link]

Rose was hired as a production assistant for The Screen Savers. He began appearing on-air, in "Dark Tip" segments, and on Unscrewed with Martin Sargent where he provided information on developing computing activities. He became a regular co-host when Leo Laporte left TechTV on March 31, 2004. On March 25, 2004, Comcast's G4 gaming channel announced a merger with TechTV which resulted in a round of layoffs. Rose moved to Los Angeles to stay with G4. On May 22, 2005, Rose reached an agreement with G4 that released him from his contract and went on to create Systm and later, Revision3, where he co-hosted Diggnation alongside Alex Albrecht for 6 years.

Guest appearances[link]

Kevin Rose appeared on the first episode of R&D TV alongside Diggnation co-host Alex Albrecht.^[4] On November 14, 2007, he was a contestant on a game show at NewTeeVee Live.^[5] On March 11, 2009, April 16, 2010, and November 28th, 2011, Rose was a guest on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon along with fellow Diggnation host Alex Albrecht.

Podcasting[link]

Rose began podcasting on July 24, 2003, with the release of the first episode of thebroken while he was still working on The Screen Savers at TechTV. Rose founded Revision3 in Los Angeles, California with Jay Adelson and David Prager in April 2005.^{[citation needed]} On July 1, 2005, Rose and Alex Albrecht started the weekly podcast, Diggnation, which summarizes top stories submitted by Digg users. On October 3rd, 2011, Alex and Kevin announced that they would be retiring the weekly Diggnation show at the end of the year. The final show was taped on December 30th, 2011 at The Music Box in Los Angeles, California.^[6][7]

Startups[link]

In 2004, Rose, Owen Byrne, Ron Gorodetzky, and Jay Adelson formed Digg, a technology link website. The website was publicly launched on December 5, 2004.^[3][8] In 2007, he was named to the MIT Technology Review TR35 as one of the top 35 innovators in the world under the age of 35.^[9] On September 1, 2010, Rose was replaced as CEO^[10] by Matt Williams, a former general manager of consumer payments at Amazon. On March 18, 2011, Rose resigned from his position at Digg.^[11][12]

On June 27, 2007, Rose launched a micro-blogging site named Pownce^[13] which was acquired by blogging company Six Apart and shut down not long after. In April 2011, the technology blog TechCrunch reported on the founding of "Milk".^[14] The company is focused on creating mobile applications. The first application to be released was Oink, a tool for ranking real-world items.^[15] In March of 2012, Milk, Inc announced that it would be shutting down Oink in order to focus on other offerings.

Google[link]

On March 16th, 2012 Rose announced that he, along with the rest of the Milk team (Daniel Burka, Chris Hutchins & Joshua Lane), would be joining Google.^[16] Kevin Rose started his first day as a senior project manager for Google on March 19, 2012.^[17][18] On May 30, AllThingsD reported that Rose had moved off the Google+ team to become a venture partner at Google Ventures. ^[19]

Investments[link]

Rose invested in Gowalla, Twitter, Foursquare, Dailybooth, NGMOCO, SimpleGeo, 3crowd, OMGPOP, Square, Facebook, Chomp and Formspring.^{[20][21][22][23]}

References[link]

External links[link]

Listen to this article (info/dl)

This audio file was created from a revision of the "Kevin Rose" article dated 2005-12-18, and does not reflect subsequent edits to the article. (Audio help)

More spoken articles

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Kevin Rose

• Kevin Rose's Official Site
• Kevin Rose at the Internet Movie Database

Marissa Ann Mayer
Born	(1975-05-30) May 30, 1975 (age 37) Wausau, Wisconsin United States North America
Residence	San Francisco, Palo Alto
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Stanford University
Occupation	Vice President of Location and Local Services, Google[1] Computer programming instructor, Stanford University
Employer	Google Stanford University
Board member of	San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco Ballet, New York City Ballet, and Cooper–Hewitt, National Design Museum [2]
Spouse	Zachary Bogue (2009–present)[3]

Marissa Ann Mayer (born on May 30, 1975) is Vice President of Location and Local Services^[4] at Google. She has become one of the public faces of Google, providing a number of press interviews and appearing at events frequently to speak on behalf of the company.^[5][6]

Education and career[link]

After graduating from Wausau West High School in 1993,^[7] Mayer was one of two delegates from Wisconsin selected by the Governor of that state to attend the National Youth Science Camp in West Virginia.

Mayer received her B.S. in symbolic systems, graduating with honors, and M.S. in Computer Science from Stanford University. For both degrees, she specialized in artificial intelligence. In 2009, the Illinois Institute of Technology granted Mayer an honoris causa doctorate degree honoring her pathfinding work in the field of search.^[8]

Mayer was the first female engineer hired at Google and one of their first 20 employees, joining the company in June 1999. Prior to joining Google, Mayer worked at the UBS research lab (Ubilab) in Zurich, Switzerland, and at SRI International in Menlo Park, California.^[9]

User interface (UI) and design work[link]

Mayer has notable public involvement with Google Search and Gmail, and can be considered significantly responsible for the success of these UIs^{[citation needed]}. Fortune magazine lists her as one of the 50 most powerful women in the world and the youngest woman ever to make the list.^[10]

Recognition[link]

Mayer has been named as one of Glamour Magazine’s 2009 Women of the Year.^[11]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Appearances on C-SPAN
• Marissa Mayer on Charlie Rose
• Marissa Mayer at the Internet Movie Database
• Marissa Mayer at the Notable Names Database
• "The adventures of Marissa" February 27, 2008 in San Francisco Magazine.
• Video-Interview February 2007 (English, German intro, German subtitles)
• "Inside Google's New-Product Process" June 30, 2006 in Business Week Online.
• "Managing Google's Idea Factory" October 3, 2005 in Business Week Online.
• Good Experience interview October 15, 2002
• Marissa Mayer At Le Web: The (Almost) Complete Interview December 10, 2008 at techcrunch.com
• Digg Dialogg: Marissa Mayer July 30, 2009 at digg.com
• Marissa Mayer On 'Twitchy' Google, Her Cell Phone Number, And Maps May 25, 2011 in HuffPost Tech
• Cyberposium 12: Marissa Mayer Keynote Video
• Innovation, Sharing and Dreams, Marissa Mayer speaking at Stanford
• Google I/O '08 Keynote by Marissa Mayer
• cover story in the April 2012 issue of IEEE Spectrum (archived from the original on April 06, 2012)

Tony Hawk

Hawk in November 2006
Personal information
Full name	Anthony Frank Tony Hawk
Nickname(s)	The Birdman
Born	(1968-05-12) May 12, 1968 (age 44) Carlsbad, California, United States
Height	6 ft 3 in (1.91 m)
Weight	170 lb (77 kg)
Sport
Country	United States
Sport	Skateboarding
Medal record Summer X Games medal record Competitor for  United States Gold 1995 Rhode Island Vert Gold 1997 San Diego Vert Gold 1997 San Diego Vert Doubles Gold 1998 San Diego Vert Doubles Gold 1999 San Francisco Vert Doubles Gold 1999 San Francisco Vert Best Trick Gold 2000 San Francisco Vert Doubles Gold 2001 Philadelphia Vert Doubles Gold 2002 Philadelphia Vert Doubles Silver 1995 Rhode Island Park Silver 1996 Rhode Island Vert Silver 2001 Philadelphia Vert Best Trick Bronze 1998 San Diego Vert Bronze 1999 San Francisco Vert

Anthony Frank "Tony" Hawk (born May 12, 1968), nicknamed "The Birdman" is an American professional skateboarder and actor. Hawk gained significant fame for completing the first 900 as well as his licensed video game titles distributed by Activision. He is widely considered one of the most successful and influential pioneers of modern vertical skateboarding.^[1]

Raised in San Diego, California, Hawk was described as being "hyperactive" as a child. His parents supported his skateboarding because it served as an outlet for his excessive energy, and as Hawk's skills developed, he became a professional skateboarder at age fourteen. In 1999, he became the first skater to land a 900. In 2002, he created the Boom Boom HuckJam, an extreme sports exhibition and tour which launched in Las Vegas.

Throughout his career, Hawk has made numerous appearances in films and other media, as well as his own series of video games. He has also been involved in various philanthropic activities including his own Tony Hawk Foundation which helps build skateparks in underprivileged areas, and also including collaborations with other athletes in the charity Athletes for Hope.

Early life[link]

Hawk was born in Carlsbad, California, to, Frank Peter Rupert Hawk. ^[2][3] When Hawk was young, he was described as being "hyperactive,"^[3] and his mother says that he was "so hard on himself and expected himself to do so many things."^[1] One time, Tony struck out in baseball and was so distraught that he hid in a ravine and had to be "physically coaxed out" by his father. His frustration with himself was so harsh that his parents had him psychologically evaluated at school. The results were that Tony was "gifted," and school advisors recommended placing him in advanced classes.^[1]

Hawk attended Jean Farb Middle School from 1980 to 1981, and recently went back there for the show "Homecoming" where he set up a ramp and did a demonstration.

He turned pro by the age of 14^[1] and was the National Skateboard Association world champion for 12 consecutive years.

The 900[link]

On July 27, 1999, Hawk was the first skater to land a 900. He successfully landed the trick, which involves completing two-and-a-half revolutions with the skateboard, on the eleventh attempt. After completing the trick, he commented, "This is the best day of my life."^[4] Nearly 12 years later Hawk was still able to land his famous 900 and posted a video of the trick via his Twitter account stating "I'm 42 and I did a 900 today."^[5]

Endorsements[link]

Boom Boom HuckJam[link]

In 1998, Tony Hawk started freestyle motocross, skateboarding, and BMX with a show in Las Vegas and then on to 31 cities around the USA and eventually to Six Flags amusement parks.^[6]

Video Game Series[link]

A video game series based on his skateboarding debuted in 1999. Since then, the series has spawned 16 titles, including main series titles, spin-offs, and repackages. The latest game of the series is the Tony Hawk: Ride, which involves riding on a skateboard-shaped controller.

Hawk's role in the series was usurped by customizable player characters in later installments,^[7] but he has remained a prominent character. In the 2003 game Tony Hawk's Underground, he is a minor non-player character whom the player meets in Tampa, Florida and skates against. Impressed with the player's skills, Hawk grants them entry into a skate competition.^[8] He later appears in Moscow to teach them the "360 Varial Heelflip Lien" move.^[9] Hawk and other skaters are briefly playable near the end of the game when they skate in a promotional video for the player's skate team,^[10] and in all gameplay modes except the story mode.^[11] He appeared as a kid in the Backyard Sports series Backyard Skateboarding.

Amusement Park Ride[link]

A series of amusement park rides known as Tony Hawk's Big Spin were built in three Six Flags parks in 2007 and 2008. The ride was originally billed as the "total Tony Hawk experience" and was designed to have the look and feel of a giant red-and-black skatepark. It offered a full "extreme sports" experience, with monitors in the queue lines displaying highlights of the history of action sports and a large spinning Tony Hawk figure crowning the ride. The ride was later demolished to make way for a new ride known as Superman: Ultimate Flight (Six Flags Discovery Kingdom) announced to be open in Spring 2012. Additionally, a water park ride called Tony Hawk's Halfpipe was opened at Six Flags America in Bowie, MD.

Film and television appearances[link]

In 1986, Tony Hawk was a featured skateboarder and skater-double for Josh Brolin in the movie Thrashin'. In 1989, he appeared as a skateboarder in Gleaming the Cube. In 2002, he appeared in Neal H. Moritzs's and Christopher Gilcrest's film xXx playing the role of one of Xander Cages stuntman friends, and later in the movie, a skateboarder at a party. In 2004 he played himself in the Australian skateboarding movie Deck Dogz. In 2006, Tony Hawk appeared in a cameo on the film Drake & Josh Go Hollywood as himself; when Drake & Josh steal his car to escape from two crooks with the Geo (iPods) that carry illegal information for counterfeiting money. Tony Hawk also asks for the cops to give Drake & Josh a police escort to Sunset Studios, for a performance on TRL. Hawk has had a cameo in the movie, The New Guy. Hawk appeared in Jackass: The Movie with Mat Hoffman and Bam Margera, skateboarding in a fat suit and Jackass 2, while skateboarding through an obstacle course. Tony appears in the film following the 2006 Gumball Rally, 3000 Miles, again with Bam Margera. He also plays the police officer who arrests Ryan Dunn in the movie Haggard: The Movie. Hawk also made a brief cameo appearance in Lords Of Dogtown as an astronaut, where he is shown comically falling off the skateboard as he is a "rookie". He played himself in an episode of Rocket Power.

Hawk was featured as an extra in the "Weird Al" Yankovic video "Smells like Nirvana". He can be seen sitting in the bleachers during the crowd sweep near Dick Van Patten. He also made a cameo appearance in the Simple Plan music video for "I'm Just a Kid", he can be seen, in a crowd, watching kids at a high school skating..

On television, he has also appeared in Action (TV series), What I Like About You, The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, The Tom Green Show, The Naked Brothers Band and Zeke and Luther, So Random, and All That. Hawk was a guest on the kid's show on Nickelodeon, Yo Gabba Gabba.^[12] In 2000, he played himself in Max Steel. He also guest voiced on The Simpsons episode "Barting Over", where he played himself, along with fellow San Diegans Blink-182. In the episode, Hawk lends Homer a new board from his brand where complete rookies are able to perform at the top levels. He ends up having a comical play off with him after Homer begins to show him up. On the PBS Kids show Cyberchase, he guest starred as Slider's long-lost father, Coop. In the CSI: Miami episode "Game Over" he played a game programmer who was murdered. In 2008, he played on Million Dollar Password. Hawk also played on Fox's Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader. Tony Hawk helped design the world famous Canvey Island skate park in 1982 and has hosted Cartoon Network's "Hall of Game" sports award show on February 25, 2011. Hawk was also on the Live-Action/Animated Talk Show Take Two With Phineas and Ferb. Hawk appeared on the internet cooking show Epic Meal Time on October 28, 2011 to celebrate the show's one year anniversary, where he can be seen in the final scene eating a deep-fried pizza cake. He also guest starred on the ABC comedy, Last Man Standing. He also played a skater in Police Academy 4: Citizens On Patrol.

Skate videos[link]

This section requires expansion.

• 1984: The Bones Brigade Video Show (Powell-Peralta)
• 1985: Future Primitive (Powell-Peralta)
• 1987: The Search for Animal Chin (Powell-Peralta)
• 1988: Public Domain (Powell-Peralta)
• 1989: Ban This (Powell-Peralta)
• 1992: Feasters (Birdhouse)
• 1992: Untitled (Birdhouse)
• 1993: Ravers (Birdhouse)
• 1998: The End (Birdhouse)
• 2001: One Step Beyond (Adio)
• 2007: The Beginning (Birdhouse)

Personal life[link]

Hawk with Lhotse Merriam in 2007.

Hawk married Cindy Dunbar in April 1990.^[13] They had a son, Riley Hawk (born December 6, 1992) whom they named for one of Hawk's ancestors.^[14] Riley also skates for Lakai Limited Footwear and Baker Skateboards.^[15] The couple divorced in 1993.^[3] Hawk married Erin Lee in 1996. They had two sons, Spencer (born March 26, 1999) and Keegan (born July 18, 2001). Lee and Hawk divorced in 2004.^[3] Hawk married Lhotse Merriam on January 12, 2006, on the island of Tavarua, Fiji.^[16] The couple's first child, a daughter named Kadence Clover Hawk, was born on June 30, 2008. The couple announced their divorce on February 7, 2011.^[17]

Tony launched the Tony Hawk Foundation, which has given away more than $3.4 million to help build well over 400 skateparks around the U.S.A. The Foundation supports projects in low income areas and helps underprivileged kids. In 2007, Hawk, Andre Agassi, Muhammad Ali, Lance Armstrong, Warrick Dunn, Jeff Gordon, Mia Hamm, Andrea Jaeger, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Mario Lemieux, Alonzo Mourning and Cal Ripken, Jr. founded the charity Athletes for Hope^[18] which helps professional athletes get involved in charitable causes and aims to inspire all people to volunteer and support their communities.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Tony Hawk

• Official website
• tonyhawkfoundation.org
• Tony's Birdhouse Skateboards website
• Tony Hawk at the Internet Movie Database