Beerleaguer reportedly purchased by Comcast SportsNet

In March, Comcast SportsNet purchased Philadelphia sports blog The700level.com. Three months later, CSN has apparently made another move.

Last week, Jason Weitzel, the founder of seven-year-old Phillies blog Beerleaguer.com, announced that his site had been acquired for an undisclosed sum.

Like in the 700 Level deal, the property was bought out entirely though it will retain editorial control and its founder was given a position with CSN.

Weitzel, who spent eight years at the Reading Eagle newspaper, most recently at readingeagle.com, says he left to take a content manager position with Comcast Sports Group. But he says he’s not worried about stepping on the toes of Enrico Campitelli, the 29-year-old founder of the 700 Level.

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Comcast Roundup: Aol wants confidential files, quiet concerns on NBC deal and more

DEFINITE READS

• WebNewser reports that Aol has requested to see confidential documents involved in the public filing from the Comcast-NBC acquisition.
• The New York Times reports that local TV broadcasters have resigned to ‘quiet concerns’ with the NBC deal, worried about its impact but fearful of disrupting their own negotiations with the cable giant.
• The Wall Street Journal reports that Comcast rivals ‘flooded’ Monday’s call for public comment on the NBC deal.

After the jump, David L. Cohen hits the company blog, Comcast SportsNet buys another local sports blog and more.

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Comcast SportsNet purchases sports blog The700level

Comcast SportsNet has purchased The700level.com for an undisclosed sum, the popular sports blog announced on its site today.

Launching in January 2004, the blog will become a CSN property, though founder Enrico Campitelli Jr., 29, will be brought on as a full-time employee to edit and oversee the product. The site’s other contributors will be used as freelancers.

“We’ve been doing it a long time and I like to think we do it pretty well. But there were maybe two or three other Philly sports blogs in existence when I started. Now there are hundreds,” Campitelli says in his announcement. “This move allows us to not only differentiate, but to also put my undivided attention and effort into making this site a must visit destination for Philly sports fans.

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Links: Don’t attract outside tech firms, a college iPhone course and More

DEFINITE READS

• The Inquirer’s Mike Armstrong reports on a study that finds little benefit in tax-based incentives used to attract high-tech companies, instead recommending encouraging existing companies to grow.
• A Wired magazine blog profiles Philly 8-bit scenester RJ “RJD2″ Krohn.

After the jump, a Sixers forward with an IT problem, a college iPhone course and more.

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Links: Innovation Philadelphia reflects on GCECS, Hugh Douglas speaks science and More

Updated 11/9/09 @ 10:22 a.m.: Added Innovation Philadelphia link

DEFINITE READS

• Venture Beat reports that New Hope-based teen social network myYearbook is pushing its virtual currency hard toward growth in its fresh profitability.
• Innovation Philadelphia gives its own review of their Global Creative Economy Convergence Summit held early last month. See our interview with Innovation’s chief Kelly Lee here. Read their additional blog post here.
• Keystone Edge has a Q&A with University City Science Center President Steven Tang.

After the jump, Lockheed in space again, Hugh Douglas chats about science and six other tech stories, including our best read piece of the week.

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Shop Talk: Community leader focuses on Cadence Rowing performance wristwatch business

The Vo3 is Cadence Rowing's flagship stroke rate watch, the first in an expanding series.

In 2002, Vanja Buvac choose a path that would affect the next seven years of his life.

To create a product he had envisioned as an amateur rower in Cambridge, Massachusetts, he would have to become an engineer to design it or a patent attorney to protect it.

Buvac wanted to make it easier for rowers to track performance and saw an opportunity to create a portable device that could record stroke rate, unlike traditional in-cockpit stroke counters. He had a simple solution: incorporate the technology into a wristwatch. Rowers could wear it as a status symbol or strap the timepiece directly onto an oar.

“I thought, ‘do I hire an engineer to help me concoct this thing, or a patent attorney to help me patent it,” the tall, thin entrepreneur says, seated on a couch in his East Arch Street office, overlooking a spacial view of Center City. “I looked at the price of both. Engineers I could get for $40 an hour, patent attorneys were $300. So I said ‘alright, I better learn patent law instead of engineering,’ he says, laughing.

Cadence Rowing was born.

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FanGamb: Fantasy sports and gambling come together in addiction-inducing glory

Updated: 9/15/09 9:19 a.m. Business strategy

If you combine three passions taken to obsessive proportions, you’re bound to stumble upon a business plan worth investing in.

At least that’s the angle from three 20-something entrepreneurs with educations from Penn State and University City incubator DreamIt Ventures.

FanGamb is the Web-based merging of our fantasy sports addictions, gambling habits — with fake money — and athletic infatuations, says Justin Goldman, the company’s founder.

“This probably isn’t meant for someone who turns on a game here or there,” said Justin Goldman, 27, who has partnered with product development head Robert Shedd, 24, and precocious Web developer Alan deLevie, 21. “FanGamb is meant for someone who is waking up everyday to check scores from last night’s game and is falling asleep to SportsCenter.”

Justin Goldman

Today is the official launch of FanGamb’s first version, a free to join, free to play fantasy gambling league, using virtual fake money, for college and professional football. See a preview here.

Future iterations will include more sports, paid leagues, the chance to join public leagues and account upgrades.

But ahead of a national college tour promoting FanGamb with Playboy Playmates in tow, Goldman is ready for FanGamb to win over obsessively loyal sports fans and take hold of the expanding virtual gifts goods market. Philadelphia, Goldman says, just might be the best place on the planet to do the job, because what other city has more idolatry for sports and gambling?

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Friday Q&A: Darlene Cavalier, the Science Cheerleader, on the700Level

It never seems fair when brains and beauty are so adeptly synchronized.

Yet, there is Darlene Cavalier, a former 76ers cheerleader, leading a science literacy movement, right from her Society Hill rowhome, while managing a beautiful family stuffed with four young kids.

Today, as a partnership with the700level.com, the best damn sports blog in all of Philadelphia, our Friday Q&A is running on their site.

Click over now to read what Cavalier has planned for her Science Cheerleader site and who won her poker game with Michael Jordan.

Below, some goodies from our interview with Cavalier that didn’t squeeze into the700level piece, including what synthetic biology has to do with NFL franchises.

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Comcast Roundup: Advertising everywhere, executive hockey stars and More

Every Thursday morning, find all the stories you need to know about your friendly telecommunications giant in the Comcast Roundup.

2009 may well be remembered as the start of the push for alternative online revenue models.

In a trial that was understandably held in Huntsville, Ala., Comcast found that viewers shown ads targeted to their tastes and demographics watched them nearly 40 percent longer than those who were fed more standard, general interest commercials, as the Associated Press reported yesterday.

According to the AP report, that means viewers can expect to see advertising in lots of new places and often beyond the traditional 30-second variety. Interactive and targeted online-like advertisements that won’t be opted-out and will appear in, say, on-demand video or channel guides.

The advertisers are coming and the coming years will bring about a more directed pitch than ever before.

After the jump, a Comcast executive ice skates his early morning away and the three other Comcast stories you ought to read.

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Ten Philadelphia iPhone apps that don’t exist but should

The iPhone application news has to be getting a little tiresome, no?

Google says the mobile application collection is a fleeting concept. The iPhone store is completely flooded with more than 36,000 and few are making money or much worth the time.

Still, they keep coming. We reported that Comcast has its own new iPhone and iPod touch mobile app. Educational software company Blackboard and freakin’ Harry Potter have apps. Newspapers on occasion have them, but big ones like the Wall Street Journal and USA Today are trying to figure out how to charge.

Philly has many apps made by Philadelphians, like one about old Abe Lincoln and a righteous one for Philly concerts, but they are hardly comprehensive.

So why doesn’t Philadelphia, rife with culture and on the cusp (and perhaps in need of a bit) of a technology renaissance, have more of their own?

That profit problem, of course. Because, really, with rare exception no real money is being made, so it isn’t likely that a crush of Philadelphia-specific iPhone apps are going to be made anytime soon. But it sure is fun to indulge.

So, after the jump, find the 10 Philadelphia iPhone (or Windows mobile) apps that should exist, but don’t and probably never will.

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