Shuffle Board

Yahoo!’s board is getting a full Loeb-otomy.

Activist investor Dan Loeb completed his boardroom overhaul yesterday with the appointment of a fourth Yahoo! director. PayPal co-founder Max Levchin was named to the board, while two holdouts from the old guard, Brad Smith and David Kenney, will depart.

The changes come seven months after Loeb, the head of New York hedge fund ThirdPoint, settled his bitter proxy fight with the Web portal in exchange for the right to appoint his slate of directors.

The latest board shake-up adds another friendly face for CEO Marissa Mayer, who also got her position thanks to Loeb’s bare-knuckled brawling. Mayer worked at Google with Levchin, who sold his startup Slide to the search giant. He is also the chairman of Yelp.

Getty Images for TechCrunch/AOL

Yahoo!’s new boss and new mother Marissa Mayer is being joined on the board by fellow Google alum Max Levchin, a successful tech entrepreneur, as the corporate family takes on the look of

a tech leader.

“Max is someone I’ve admired throughout my career for his phenomenal sense for great products and keen focus on user experiences,” Mayer said in a statement.

The changes are another break from the past dysfunction that had plagued Yahoo! as it churned its way through executives.

Former CEO Scott Thompson, who was hired after the ouster of Carol Bartz, was pushed out earlier this year after Loeb uncovered a discrepancy in his resumé.

The embarrassment was Loeb’s victory. He won a seat on the board, along with two seats for directors of his choosing. He had been looking for a fourth director to implement his plan of returning Yahoo! to its Internet roots.

“This breaks the cycle,” said Colin Gillis, an analyst with BGC Partners. “Yahoo!’s problems were top-down from the board.”

Much of the old board is gone, including co-founder Jerry Yang and ex-chairman Roy Bostock, who both left this year.

Loeb has made a fortune on Yahoo! since September 2011, when he first bought a 5.15 percent stake for about $825 million. That stake has grown to 6.5 percent and is worth almost $1.2 billion.

“It’s a hard road still, but Yahoo! was trading as a distressed asset and now it has bumped up off those levels,” Gillis said. “The direction is the right way.”

Investor confidence is on the rise, in part due to Mayer’s leadership and Loeb’s show of support. He continues to buy shares, and last month added 3 million, pushing his stake to more than 75 million shares.

Meanwhile, Mayer is making her own moves, installing Henrique De Castro as operating chief. He is focused on running Yahoo!’s advertising business.

Mayer has been concentrating on software, including a recent e-mail redesign and a new Flickr, the company’s answer to Facebook’s popular photo-sharing service Instagram.

But the biggest changes are yet to come with an overhaul of the Yahoo! homepage, which is expected to bring a whole new look to the most popular Web portal.

Ryan Jacob of the Jacob Internet Fund said that Yahoo! ’s stock moves, including the selling of part of its 40 percent stake in China’s Alibaba, have made it one of his fund’s top holdings.

“It’s taken a long time, but we are finally seeing some of the value being appreciated,” Jacob said. “We’ve had to be very patient with this one.”

gsloane@nypost.com

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Wynwood co-working center funded by Knight Foundation, angel investors

The LAB Miami announced Thursday it will open a 10,000-square-foot co-working center in Miami’s Wynwood neighborhood and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and local angel investors are investing $650,000.

As Miami’s startup community continues to grow, The LAB Miami said its “work-learn campus” will offer an in-house mentor network that will include investors and serial entrepreneurs, said Wifredo Fernandez, co-founder of The LAB Miami with Danny Lafuente and Elisa Rodriguez-Vila.

The LAB Miami, now in a 720-square-foot space in the same neighborhood, turned a Goldman building at 400 NW 26th Street into an artsy, modern space that can support 300 members, including tech startups, programmers, designers, investors, nonprofits, artists and academics.

In addition to offering space to work, the new co-working space plans to offer courses and workshops in business and technology — including a startup school and code school — as well as art, design and education, Fernandez said. It will be a welcoming space for traveling Latin Americans, too. “We want this to be a community center for entrepreneurs,” said Fernandez, explaining that the mix of activities and workshops will be structured by the needs of the LAB’s members.

While the Knight Foundation’s Miami office has sponsored many entrepreneurship events in the past four months, this is the foundation’s largest investment announced so far in its efforts to help accelerate entrepreneurship in Miami, said the Knight Foundation’s Miami program director, Matt Haggman. The Knight Foundation’s Miami office, which made accelerating entrepreneurship one of its key areas of focus this year, is investing $250,000 with the rest of the funding coming from a group of investors lead by Marco Giberti, Faquiry Diaz-Cala, Boris Hirmas Said and Daniel Echavarria.

“This is an important part of our strategy,” said Haggman. “Entrepreneurs need places to gather, connect and learn.”

The LAB Miami has already hosted several events, including HackDay and Wayra DemoDay earlier this week, and the co-working space plans to open for membership in January.

Co-working space will start at $200 a month to use the communal tables, and private offices that will accommodate up to six are also available. The LAB will also offer “Connect” memberships for $40 a month, which allows members who do not need co-working space to participate in events. In addition, there will be phone booths, classrooms, flexible meeting spaces, a lounge area, a kitchen, a “pop-up shop” for local fashion, art or technology products, a shower for those who bike to work and an outside garden with native landscaping.

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‘Jewish Spirituality’ lecture series to start Dec. 16

Temple Israel of Greater Miami will kick off its Jewish Spirituality Series on Sunday with Rabbi Arthur Green, who was named one of the "top 50 rabbis in America for 2012," by Newsweek Magazine.

Green will speak on the topic, "Spirituality for a New Era."

A highly respected scholar, teacher and expert in the field of contemporary Jewish spirituality, Green is rector of Hebrew College Rabbinical School and professor emeritus at Brandeis University. He also is the author of several books, including Radical Judaism: Rethinking god and Tradition. His most recent book is titled Hasidic Spirituality for a New Era.

The event will start at 9:30 a.m. with a light breakfast followed at 10 a.m. by the program, at which time Green will engage participants in an open conversation about the future and how each person can play a more active role shaping it.

The series will continue on Jan 22, when Nathan Katz, who arranged for the Dalai Lama to come to Miami three times, will speak on "Contemporary Global Spirituality."

According to a press release from the temple, more and more Americans describe themselves as "spiritual but not religious." In his lecture, Katz will focus on the question, "What is spirituality, and can it truly be separated from religion?"

The author of 15 books, including Who Are the Jews of India, a National Jewish Book Award finalist, and his recent memoir, Spiritual Journey Home, Katz is a Florida International University research professor in the School of International and Public Affairs, the Bhagwan Mahavir professor of Jain Studies, academic director of the Jewish Museum of Florida-FIU, and director of the Program in the Study of Spirituality, which is a co-sponsor of the series.

Rabbi Rami Shapiro, an award-wining author, poet, educator and the founding rabbi of Temple Beth Or in Miami, will close out the series on March 1, with the topic, "Amazing Chesed."

According to the press release, many Jews do not believe that grace is a central concept in Judaism, and an essential element in living "Jewishly." Shapiro disagrees and will draw from many facets of Jewish wisdom to answer that question in the affirmative.

Shapiro is recognized as one of the most creative figures in contemporary American Judaism and his prayers are included in worship services across the denominational spectrum of American congregations.

Admission to the series is free and open the public, and will be held in the Wolfson Auditorium at Temple Israel, 137 NE 19th St.

For more information call the temple at 305-573-5900 or email info@templeisrael.net.

New dean

Warm congratulations to the Very Rev. Douglas Wm. McCaleb, who recently was elected the new dean of the Episcopal North Dade Deanery.

McCaleb, the spiritual leader at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral at 464 NE 16th St., was elected at the 43rd Annual Diocesan Convention.

The Diocese of Southeast Florida is composed of six deaneries, divided geographically for both administrative purposes and for representation on the diocese’s Executive Board. McCaleb is the executive head of the deanery, which is responsible for the planning and financial aspects of the deanery, as well as being responsible for the study of the needs and opportunities of the church and to evaluate diocesan programs. In his position of leadership, McCaleb will also delegate the necessary authority and responsibility to carry out such work.

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New Flickr iPhone app to compete with Instagram and Twitter with 16 filters

Hot on the heels of its email redesign, Yahoo (YHOO) announced on Wednesday that it has completely redesigned the Flickr iPhone app. The new app borrows heavily from Instagram and focuses on what makes Flickr special: photos and communities. Yahoo’s new Flickr app also includes 16 filters with their own fancy names to go head-on with Instagram and Twitter’s recently updated app that added eight filters. Users can now access the Flickr app with numerous accounts including Facebook (FB) and Google (GOOG) and photos can be shared to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr or via email. The new Flickr app is available for free on iPhone but to our disappointment, there isn’t an iPad-optimized version.

Ellis Hamburger from The Verge penned an interesting editorial on how Twitter misses the mark by simply adding filters to its app without having the close community that makes Instagram so addictive. Led by CEO Marissa Mayer, Yahoo seems aware that mobile apps thrive on the communities that sprout up. The new Flickr app’s emphasis on how the images are displayed and shared in visually appealing and digestible thumbnails suggests Yahoo finally understands mobile.

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Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Barbara Walters Names Most Fascinating Person of 2012

Who topped the list this year?

Tonight, Barbara Walters crowned General David Petraeus as her Most Fascinating person of 2012.

"David Petraeus was not chosen this year for his war record or his exemplary service to his country," said Walters. "This is about military honor, colliding with sex and lies in the digital age."

The former head of the CIA stepped down in November after an extramarital affair was discovered with his biographer Paula Broadwell.
Petraeus, 60, was also given the number one spot in 2010. 

VIDEO: One Direction on What They Look for in a Girl 

Additionally, the legendary journalist sat down with Argo actor/director Ben Affleck, British-Irish boy band One Direction, Olympic gymnast Gabrielle Douglas, Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane, 50 Shades of Grey author E.L. James, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.
Prince Harry and Honey Boo Boo were also featured on the list but not interviewed.

This is Walters' 20th season highlighting some of the year's biggest names in entertainment, sports and popular culture.

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Schmidt: Apple lags

Google’s Android is extending its lead over Apple in the mobile-software market at a rate that compares with Microsoft’s expansion in desktop software in the 1990s, Google Chairman Eric Schmidt said. Android snared 72 percent of the market in the third quarter, while Apple had 14 percent, according to research by Gartner.

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Lennar to borrow $1.7 billion from Chinese bank

Miami-based Lennar Corp. has gotten approval on $1.7 billion in loans from China Development Bank to fund the development and construction of two major projects in San Francisco, according to a person familiar with the transaction.

The contract, set to close by Dec. 31 subject to various conditions, would mark the first U.S. loan by the big state-owned Chinese bank. One condition — tagged the “Chinese component”— is that China Railway Construction Corp. be included as a general contracting partner in the project, the person said.

Closing by year’s end is crucial because of new tax rules set to take effect, the person added.

The agreement, first reported in The Wall Street Journal, would provide funding for the first six years of what is envisioned to be a 20-year project.

The loan agreement, reached Dec. 7 after Lennar officials met in China with bank officials, provides for $1 billion in financing to a partnership led by Lennar to redevelop Hunters Point Shipyard-Candlestick Point, a site in southeast San Francisco spanning more than 700 acres, the person said. Plans for the mixed-use community call for nearly 12,000 residential units on the site. Construction is expected to begin in the first quarter of 2013.

Under the pact, the Chinese bank would provide another $700 million to a partnership of Lennar, Stockbridge Capital Group and Wilson Meany, a real estate investment and development firm, to redevelop Treasure Island and Yerba Buena Islands in San Francisco Bay. Some 8,000 units of housing are planned for the mixed-use project on 535 acres. The U.S. Navy is set to turn over the first parcel of land to the development company in late 2013.

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Parents of students at Broward school warned of Legionnaires’ Disease exposure

Parents of students at Olsen Middle School in Dania Beach were being informed on Tuesday that their children may have been exposed to someone diagnosed with Legionnaires’ Disease, Broward School District officials said.

The person with Legionnaires’ Disease was not a student, district spokeswoman Nadine Drew said. They did not say if the infected person was a teacher.

Automated ‘robo-calls’ were made to the telephones of Olsen Middle School parents that explained how the district was working with the Broward Health Department

To read the entire Sun Sentinel story click here.

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Facebook helps FBI bust cybercriminals blamed for $850 million losses

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Investigators led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and aided by Facebook Inc, have busted an international criminal ring that infected 11 million computers around the world and caused more than $ 850 million in total losses in one of the largest cybercrime hauls in history.

The FBI, working in concert with the world’s largest social network and several international law enforcement agencies, arrested 10 people it says infected computers with “Yahos” malicious software, then stole credit card, bank and other personal information.

Facebook’s security team assisted the FBI after “Yahos” targeted its users from 2010 to October 2012, the U.S. federal agency said in a statement on its website. The social network helped identify the criminals and spot affected accounts, it said.

Its “security systems were able to detect affected accounts and provide tools to remove these threats,” the FBI said.

According to the agency, which worked also with the U.S. Department of Justice, the accused hackers employed the “Butterfly Botnet”. Botnets are networks of compromised computers that can be used in a variety of cyberattacks on personal computers.

The FBI said it nabbed 10 people from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, New Zealand, Peru, the United Kingdom, and the United States, executed numerous search warrants and conducted a raft of interviews.

It estimated the total losses from their activities at more than $ 850 million, without elaborating.

Hard data is tough to come by, but experts say cybercrime is on the rise around the world as PC and mobile computing become more prevalent and as more and more financial transactions shift online, leaving law enforcement, cybersecurity professionals and targeted corporations increasingly hard-pressed to spot and ward off attacks.

(Reporting By Edwin Chan; Editing by Matt Driskill)

Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Bids galore for Sony Bldg.

Lois Weiss

BETWEEN THE BRICKS

Among the bidders lining up for the Sony Building at 550 Madison Ave. are two other companies with ties to Japan: the Rockefeller Group, owned by Mitsubishi Estate; and Mitsui Fudosan America.

Vornado Realty Trust and Boston Properties are among the suitors as well, according to Real Estate Alert, while we hear there are teams of pension funds and some high net worth individuals circling the iconic tower, also known as the Chippendale Building.

Locals throwing their hats into the ring include Harry Macklowe and Steven Witkoff, along with investors from the Middle East and Israel, China, Russia and Europe.

According to Real Estate Alert, offers to the marketers — Douglas Harmon and his team at Eastdil Secured — are coming in at more than $850 million and, depending on Sony’s leaseback terms, could top $1 billion.

No one returned requests for comment.

***

When we were last upstairs at Windows of the World in the North Tower for a Building Congress luncheon on April 30, 2001, we went outside to the observatory and stood in awe of the enormous antenna.

The next time we saw the antenna, on Aug. 11, 2006, it was inside the artifact hanger at JFK — burnt, bent and in pieces. One of those pieces will be on display at the 9/11 Museum, according to a spokesperson.

Yesterday, we spent a chilly morning in the Durst Organization’s water taxi trailing a barge ferrying nine of the 18 new antenna pieces from the Port of Newark to Pier 25 near Battery Park City.

It was amazing to see the barge, pushed by the able tugboat Ann Moran, move past the Statue of Liberty with the Empire State Building and the otherwise topped-out 1 World Trade Center and 4 World Trade Center in the background.

We could feel the excitement in the harbor as lucky tourist boats and the Staten Island ferry floated by while every helicopter, tugboat and Coast Guard boat buzzed the area for a look.

The antenna pieces will be lifted one a day, weather permitting, to the top of 1 World Trade Center until the 408 foot-tall mast reaches the sky at nearly 1,776 feet — give or take an inch or so.

***

Besides the altruistic reasons for getting people back in their homes as soon as possible, the city is pushing hard for repairs on Sandy-damaged homes and buildings because the taxable status date is coming up on Saturday, Jan. 5.

To ensure your valuation is lowered for the Jan. 15 tentative property-tax roll, you can find a new form online at the Finance Department to document the damage and mail it to the agency. Finance says it is also using damage found by the Department of Buildings and aerial photography.

Assessors will also take walk-ins at the outer-borough offices, Dec. 18 through Dec. 20, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., with later hours to be announced. Bring clear photos of the damage, plus insurance and FEMA documents.

The agency will also consider this information through Feb. 1 for Classes 1 and 2, and until April 15 for Class 4. The final roll is published on May 25.

To maintain your legal rights, you must also file a formal application with Finance for correction by the Tax Commission by Friday, March 1 for all but Class 1 homes, which have until March 15.

Meanwhile, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has introduced a bill that would allow owners whose homes have lost at least half their value due to Sandy to apply for property-tax assessment reductions according to a sliding scale.

For a 100 percent loss, the taxable assessed value would be reduced to zero — but don’t forget that vacant land also has a value and is taxed.

Additionally, the city council has just passed a law to give red-tagged homes and apartment buildings deemed unsafe until April 1 to pay their second-half tax bills without any interest.

But remember, you will then have two bills to pay at that time for both January and April.

***

The building known as the King of Greene at 72-76 Greene St. between Spring and Broome streets sold last night for $41.5 million. The price equates to $1,186 a square foot for the 35,000 square-foot building.

New owner L3 Capital buys retail, but sources said this is the three partners’ biggest city bet so far and is based on finding a new anchor for the temporary Apple store that is now vacant. There are also some offices and rent-stabilized residential tenants.

The sole broker, Adelaide Polsinelli of Eastern Consolidated, declined comment.

Lois@BetweentheBricks.com

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