Fresh Intelligence : Radar Online : Dot-com Bubble Boy Josh Harris Returns to Web : '90s prankster Josh Harris meshes MySpace with YouTube
Josh Harris, the merry prankster of Silicon Alley circa 1999, has emerged from hiding, and launched a new web startup—this time in Los Angeles. Operator11.com, a "social television network," is like a mashup of YouTube and MySpace that allows users to collaborate on the creation of video webcasts. It's also a little like Harris's legendary dot-bomb, Pseudo, but with user-generated content. The site launched in May without fanfare—except for a jeering mention from Valleywag, after an unsuspecting visitor to the site was greeted with live footage of a gentleman whacking off. ("Good publicity," Harris says.) Otherwise, the site has been flying low, an altitude that doesn't come naturally to a serial provocateur once worth as much as $40 million.
The burgeoning wind power industry has spurred the construction of new manufacturing plants in Arkansas, Kentucky, Oklahoma, and South Dakota. DMI Industries, a wind tower manufacturer, announced in May its plans to acquire a facility near Tulsa, Oklahoma, that will give the company the ability to produce larger towers for offshore wind plants and to ship them overseas. DMI intends to modify the existing plant for its purposes by early 2008. The facility features 500,000 square feet of production space and will ultimately employ up to 450 people. In late June, Knight & Carver held the grand opening for its new 26,000-square-foot wind blade production and repair facility in Howard, South Dakota, bringing at least 35 jobs to the state. On July 18th, LM Glasfiber announced that they will also build a new wind blade facility, to be located in Little Rock, Arkansas. The plant will begin operations early next year and will employ more than 1,000 people within five years.