Yahoo Buys Online Contest Site Bix

By Geoff Duncan Published November 17, 2006

Internet titan Yahoo has snapped up yet another small Internet company: this time, the acquiree is Bix, a social Web site which lets users create (and participate) in online contests. Contests are broken into loose categories including photos, writing, comedy, dance, and "beauty," with perhaps the site’s best-known offering being video lip-synching – some more general contests on the site solicit votes for the best video game or best U.S. president. Site users cast votes and winners receive prizes, often offered by companies which see the contests as online promotional tools. Bix offers online tools to record audio and video (assuming users’ computer hardware is up to the task)

Bix apparently views the Yahoo acquisition as a way to bring its offerings to Yahoo’s (much) larger audience; Yahoo sees Bix’s technology and business model as a way to supplement Yahoo’s own social media offerings, offering an American Idol-like experience where visitors can be the judge.

Recommended Videos

Yahoo’s acquisition of Bix is the latest in a string of acquisitions designed to propel the company into the social media and "Web 2.0" spaces; other recent additions include Flickr, Del.icio.us, Jumpcut, and Upcoming.org.

Former Contributor

Geoff Duncan writes, programs, edits, plays music, and delights in making software misbehave. He's probably the only member…

Emerging Tech

Remember Samsung’s Ballie home robot? It may finally be inching closer to reality

Leaked app wireframes give the strongest hint yet that Samsung's Ballie home robot, first shown at CES 2020, might still be headed toward an actual release.

Samsung Ballie robot in a room next to a dog feeder.

Samsung's rolling home robot has been the industry's longest-running "will it ever actually ship" joke, and I'll admit I'd mostly given up on it. Now, there's finally a glimmer of hope.

Samsung first unveiled Ballie as a concept at CES 2020. Then, it showed it as a significantly upgraded version four years later. However, the company never confirmed a release date or committed to releasing it at all.

Smart Home

The US foreign-made robot crackdown is coming for future Roombas too

Future Roombas face new US sales hurdles, but existing models are unaffected

Roomba 980

The FCC has already made it much harder for foreign drone makers such as DJI to bring new products into the US. Now, the same crackdown is reaching a machine far more likely to be moving around your living room.

The US government recently added foreign-made advanced robotic devices to the FCC’s Covered List. The announcement appeared focused on humanoids, robot dogs, and industrial machines, but an FCC spokesperson has confirmed to The Verge that robot vacuum cleaners are covered too.

Branded Content

The GOKO M6 Robotic Lawn Mower Brings Industrial Robotics to Modern Lawn Care

7 reasons this AI-driven powerhouse makes hands-free yard work smarter than ever

Grass, Lawn, Plant

Robotic lawn mowers can save homeowners hours of manual yard work, but not every model is designed for challenging properties. While many perform well on flat lawns, larger yards with uneven terrain, steep slopes, and multiple mowing zones require a mower built for more demanding conditions.

Developed by GOKO, the consumer robotics brand of Robot++, the GOKO M6 is an industrial-grade 4WD AI-powered robotic lawn mower that brings more than a decade of industrial robotics expertise to residential lawn care. It combines AI-powered four-wheel drive, advanced navigation technologies, and AI QuadVision obstacle detection to tackle complex landscapes with less manual intervention.