Leaguescape, a recently launched poker-modeled Fantasy Sports site is trying to provide the one-stop shop for all things betting on Fantasy Sports. Following the online poker business model, Leaguescape is trying to revolutionize the Fantasy Sports industry as PartyPoker did poker.

In 2003, an accountant from Tennessee turned a $39 investment into $2.5 million. How did he do that? Chris Moneymaker became the first World Series of Poker Champion (WSOP) in tournament history to originally qualify from playing the online version of the game. Moneymaker’s remarkable victory sparked a realization that people could make more money sitting at home and becoming a professional poker player rather than going to work.  In ‘03, there were 839 entrants into the WSOP. In 2004, only one year later, the number tripled to 2,576 and in 2006, the entrant field was over ten times larger at an astonishing number of 8,773.

Likewise, it’s estimated by the Fantasy Sports Trade Association that nearly 30 million people play fantasy sports in North America alone. This figure has been growing at 15% a year and seems to be one big event away from exploding into every living room and office in the US – where fantasy football alone has an estimated $1.1 billion a week in lost productivity for employers. For the fantasy sports industry, these numbers mean big business, as Fantasy Sports is estimated to have a $3–$4 Billion annual economic impact across the sports industry overall. So with a “Moneymaker Effect,” could Fantasy Sports explode even further in the United States and around the world? It’s possible, and it helps that Fantasy Sports are exempt from the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), as it deems Fantasy Sports a skill game, providing a safe marketplace for Fantasy Sports “betting.” The average Fantasy Sports player spends about $500 a year, and with continued growth and a possible boom, the industry could continue to expand.

Leaguescape gives you ultimate freedom in customizing the leagues size, ensures your league is filled with paid players, and eases payments by digitizing them. Leaguescape also offers unique salary cap daily games where users draft a team within a salary cap and your players compete against another player’s team each day.

Leaguescape completely follows the poker model; meaning they allow play money which can be exchanged for real money, player points, reward systems (which can be exchanged for money), plan to offer rewards for the top performing player per sport, and unique promotions such as their 100% deposit bonus and $10 free signup bonus. Leaguescape believes that Fantasy Sport leagues don’t need to be filled with friends; rather they encourage playing with other unknown players, just as online poker does.

Leaguescape’s business model and fees are structured after online poker as well. A tournament in online poker has a 10% fee associated with the buy-in and it usually lasts 30 minutes to several hours. Leaguescape has the same 10% fee for each wager in its season long games, which last 4-6 months depending on the sport. For daily games, Leaguescape has lowered its fee to just 5%. Leaguescape applies a proven business model to an emerging Fantasy Sports industry; one that could spark an industry revolution.

Leaguescape is on Twitter

While there’s no shortage of blog platforms out there on the market, most of them are basically a re-hash of the same old things. If you want simple blogging, options exist, but they are usually quite limited in what they let users do.

ReachBy.com is a simple blogging platform with some new and unique advantages that make it a solid startup. After chatting a bit with Tolu, we came to think that the readers of Generation-Y Startup might be interested in hearing about it.

A beta version of ReachBy was recently released. Here are some reasons why we think it has a bright future ahead of it.

Reaches a Wide Market

ReachBy provides features for new bloggers and savvy pros alike.

For those new to blogging, a ReachBy “Stream”, as they’re called, is a compelling place to start an adventure into the blogosphere.

We know that setting up and designing a blog is confusing for many people new to the practice. People simply don’t want to invest time or money into starting a blog, especially when they don’t know if they’re going to stick with it. A ReachBy Stream makes it easy. You just sign up for an account and then you’re basically ready to go. You can upload your avatar and a background picture to customize your Stream, similar to Twitter.

Experienced bloggers might be interested in ReachBy, too, since the dynamic interaction platform allows readers to contribute their own blog posts to a Stream. With this, you can take content contributions from anyone, without having to give them sign-in access to your blog. It’s similar to posting on someone’s Facebook wall. But, in this case, bloggers can take contributions from readers or other writers, then edit the content and post it. Of course, the system also allows readers to comment on posts.

For example, let’s say your favorite rock band is the Kings of Leon and you decide to start a Stream about them. Then readers and other contributers can add updates, performance reviews, post videos, discuss the latest album, etc. Basically, anyone can add to the Stream of content, and you act as editor to make sure all the content is the right fit.

Social Integration

All of the ReachBy pages have social sharing tools embedded — a must have for any great blog platform today, but something that can be too complicated for some people to do on their own.

ReachBy also lets you promote your Twitter or Facebook page, or even other websites and blogs, by adding social icons links to your Stream. We’ve made this easy for anyone to do. Just paste a link and the icons are automatically added.

Because it integrates with social media so well, we think ReachBy can play an in-between role. Meaning, in addition to serving as a full-service blog, it can also act as a place to continue conversations and create connectivity between social media and blogs.

User Centric Approach to Ads

There have been other blogging startups based on interacting communities — like Vox. I was actually a Vox beta tester in ‘06. Vox is a great site, with great designs. It was developed by Six Apart, which is obviously one of the best startups in the past decade, so I’m not out to knock Vox. It was, and still is, a lively, fun community. However, the thing that always bothered me about Vox was that they put ads up all over my content. I had no control over it whatsoever and I began to feel exploited. At least Squidoo shares ad revenue.

ReachBy gives you full control over whether or not ads appear on your Stream. If you do decided to put ads up, guess what? You place them with your own AdSense account. Meaning, if there’s revenue made from ad traffic, you keep all of it. ReachBy places its own ads on some main pages, but it doesn’t touch one penny of income that you might generate from visitors to your Stream.

We think this is a good way to attract and motivate users. We’ve made the process of placing ads on your Stream as simple as possible.

Usefulness

We can think of many ways that experienced bloggers might make use of a ReachBy Stream.

Let’s say you develop an open-source web app or a Wordpress theme, but already have a website with information and download links for your product.

A ReachBy Stream might act as a place to get collective feedback and discuss future enhancements. It can also serve as a location for users to crowdsource solutions and help each other out with answers. Basically, you can use ReachBy as a forum on anything, then link it all back to your home website, Twitter account, and Facebook fan page. This gives you an instant way to provide support and communicate openly with your users, without having to give out your email, invest money, or spend a lot of time developing a wiki or forum on your site. Plus, if your Stream builds an audience, you can capitalize on it with ads. This is a better route than opening a Google or Yahoo discussion group. You have more control and you can make money.

Also, because the ReachBy technology platform was designed to be lightweight and fast, it loads very quickly on mobile devices. If you save a ReachBy Stream as a bookmark on the home screen of your iPhone or iTouch, ReachBy uses the avatar image from the account to automatically generate an icon with that image. Pretty fun.

More Features Coming Soon

Since ReachBy is run by a small nimble team, we’re working to make it even more interactive and dynamic. Some very novel and very cool ideas are being developed, and hopefully, we’ll be able to release them soon.

What Do You Think?

If you have a chance to visit ReachBy.com, we’d love to know what you think of the site and how we might improve it. In fact, we’re looking for beta testers to give us some feedback, so if you have a moment to help us out, we’d love to hear your thoughts. We appreciate any help we can get in our work to make ReachBy better.

I’d also like to thank Tolu for giving us a chance to tell you about ReachBy!

Two years ago, I was watching the local news when an interesting and perplexing story took hold of the airwaves.  I looked up from my computer and read the headline on the screen:  “Girl Scout In Hot Water for Using Net to Sell Cookies.”  The news reporter then went on to discuss why this young girl was in such trouble.  As it turns out, the Girl Scouts of America strictly prohibits any sales method of the cookies that does not involve face-to-face interaction, citing the importance of that particular experience in the development of a young lady.  And that’s when it hit me:

What about those organizations that do not have those rules?  What about the organizations that are still relying on door-to-door sales?  Is door-to-door even really that safe anymore? Is door-to-door even scalable?  These questions, along with a hundred others, flooded my mind.  Despite this epiphany, though, I went back to my computer, the news rolled on, and like so many times before, I stored away these thoughts and forgot about them…that is, until about six months ago.

After graduating from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, with concentrations in Marketing and Entrepreneurship, I accepted a position at a boutique marketing strategy consulting firm.  It was here that I met a very important person: my business partner.

Next to my office was a guy by the name of David Adams.  David had graduated from Babson College after a rigorous curriculum of entrepreneurship and strategy consulting.  Full of energy, enthusiasm, and always big dreams, we immediately hit it off.  We’d hang out, grab a beer, listen to music, and probably most importantly, discuss business ideas.  David was one of those classic entrepreneurial inventors.  In addition to all of his early, successful endeavors while at Babson College, David had entrepreneurship in his blood.  His dad: a successful online floral retailer.  His aunt and uncle: the owner of a wildly popular coffee roasting operation that retails coffee in major grocery chains.

One day, David had casually mentioned that he was excited about an idea he had regarding the selling of artisan products from around the globe, with an overall goal of boosting the standards of living in many of the third world countries from which these products would be sourced.  To me, it sounded quite familiar:  the selling of goods online to raise money and benefit good people.  Conjuring up that Girl Scouts story two years ago, I immediately relayed to him the need that schools, organizations, and non-profits had for an online fundraising solution.  Suddenly it clicked for us at the same exact moment: “What about an online fundraising platform for worthy causes and non-profits?”  And thus, our start up, CauseShare.com, was born.

Since that day, CauseShare has evolved into a robust platform that not only allows people to raise money for a good cause through direct donations, but also through the sale of popular products, including chocolates, flowers, and many others.  With complete social media integration, and easy sharing capabilities, CauseShare empowers users to rally the support of their friends across their social networks. As we like to describe it, CauseShare is the first “people-powered fundraising tool.”  And what’s better, it exists completely online.  The reason for this? Well, with the ever-increasing number of people using the internet, and the increased role that the internet has in our day to day activities, the need for fundraising to adapt to this behavioral pattern is real.  But even more importantly, with more than 1.8 million non-profits (not including “worthy causes” as we like to call them here at CauseShare), the need for an affordable (CauseShare is free to use!), yet powerful, online fundraising tool is of the essence.  Few non-profits have the budget to afford the overly priced, overly fancy services that companies like Blackbaud offer.  The ones that cannot afford these services are part of the massive long-tail of non-profits and good causes that need a friend and partner in the constant struggle to raise money.  But yet, the big guys like Blackbaud ignore them.  One look at their product offering for smaller organizations, and you will see that Blackbaud has no interest in spending money on developing effective tools for the little guys.  Is that fair? Do the small non-profits’ causes matter less because they have a smaller budget?  We certainly don’t think so.

CauseShare is 110% committed to the little guys; to the small non-profits, the small causes, the 5k race in a town of 1,000 that benefits breast cancer, and the scholarship foundation set up in a boy’s name who was killed in a tragic car accident.  We aren’t for the big budgets, the fat wallets, or the big wigs.  We are for the everyday person, the head of fundraising for a small-town chapter of the SPCA, and the young girl raising money for her mom’s masectomy.

We fully intend to transform the way people raise money for causes that matter to them, and we are not afraid to say it.  CauseShare is the number one champion for small non-profits and independent causes, and we will never stop striving to provide good people with exceptional tools that help them reach their fundraising goals.  It’s time the little guys are given access to a tool that was custom built entirely for them.  And that tool is CauseShare.com.

And to all of our small friends out there: Consider the playing field leveled.

To learn more about CauseShare, we encourage you to explore the following sites:

Facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/CauseShare

Twitter:  http://www.twitter.com/CauseShare

Website:  http://www.CauseShare.com

Founders:

David Adams (@dmadams2)

Mike Kiser (@michaelkiser)

I recently came across this website called IdealPitch and thought I needed to share with other entrepreneurs. I am personally not so big on VCs but if you’ve been involved in a start-up in the past, you know that there comes a time when you really do need funds from an external source. I am almost at that stage and so I set out to look for ways of getting money from Angel Investors and funding groups. That’s when I discovered IdealPitch.

The website is pretty user friendly and easy to navigate. Its premise is this, get several entrepreneurs with innovative ideas on the same platform with suitable Investors and let them interact. Simple as that. The service lets you create a user account as either an Entrepreneur or as an Investor, describe yourself a little and start looking for matches. Entrepreneurs are allowed to give a brief pitch of about one paragraph or two explaining what they are looking for, occupation, expected ROI and so forth, while Investors are also allowed to do the same.

I particularly like this service because of how easy it is to use. It is sort of a very basic social networking site for people involved or looking to be involved in start-ups. I definitely encourage everyone to check it out. They are growing fast and have a vast collection of Entrepreneurs and Investors already patronizing them.

IdealPitch blogs here

IdealPitch is also on Twitter

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When I first entered college, it wasn’t long before I heard the words
“internship”. I would hear that word all throughout college and how
important they were. My name is James and I graduated a little over a year
ago in May, 2008. I am recently laid off and currently trying to figure out
where I want my career to go. How does this all tie together? Internships
are extremely useful for the college student to learn about an industry,
gain general work experience and network with others in the workforce. I
didn’t take this serious, and this isn’t helping my career confusion and
job-hunting. I did in fact have internships, and they were lacking in all
areas except that they taught me what I didn’t want to do. Right after
college, I realized that college students needed a better way to research
internships, and not just a job board. I jotted down my ideas, brainstormed
with friends, and finally created my website – UltimateIntern.com . I
consider myself tech-savvy, but I needed some complicated website elements
implemented. Freelance websites became my best friend, and I soon pieced
together my vision for an internship website. Of course there were speed
bumps, but my dream to start something of own that truly helped others
motivated me. Working on your passion you feel fulfilled and even if your
idea flops, you know it is time well spent. The site is now up, and now is
the time to ramp up the promotions and really grow the resource into the
powerful, valuable tool I know it can be.

The website UltimateIntern.com is geared solely towards students and
interns. It’s main feature is that it allows interns to ‘rate’ and ‘review’
their past experience. They fill out a comprehensive report on the position
and let others know all about it. Some of the numerous criteria are
co-worker friendliness, compensation, daily tasks, college credit offered,
overall learning and many more. UltimateIntern.com collects these reviews
and lets other curious students and soon-to-be interns read them. This is
very useful information for these parties, and other sites online are not
offering these comprehensive reviews. The site also offers an advice blog,
forums, an iPod(touch 8gb) contest and the ability for members to private
message the reviewer to ask more questions. UltimateIntern is free,
completely anonymous, and sure to be an effective tool for students and
anyone seeking the right internship.

UltimateIntern is on Twitter.

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I like seeing young entrepreneurs who overcome the obstacles they face and beat the odds to make a working project of a brilliant idea. In focus today is BuddingUp by a ‘budding’ gen y entrepreneur Robin Speziale. I actually do like the concept of the start-up so I thought I’ll share Robin’s words, to inspire other entrepreneurs.

Buddingup launched April 2009 in Waterloo, Canada – home of the Blackberry. Buddingup was born from the gap in the job marketplace, Sure, there are those old players such as Monster.com and Workpolis.com – but what can they offer in today’s new internet era of social networking? At the University of Waterloo, I have worked at 6 different companies for co-op/internship. However, even though my placements were exciting and fun, the job search process was dull and unfulfilling. This pain brought forth brainstorming. How can I improve the job search so
that it is fulfilling? The answer was social networking. What if job hunters
could connect with each other and help each other land a job. Or even
better, what if job hunters could connect with recruiters in real time
and discuss job openings and prospects. That would add great value to the
job search.

From that point, I focused my target audience to students and new graduates.
I realized there are not many job sites out there that help students and new
grads land a job. If you go on any large, established job board, you’ll
frequently come across jobs that require “5+ years of experience”,
“managements background” etc. Us students are left in the dark.

Buddingup solves all these problems.

Buddingup did face turbulent winds. One challenge was identifying and
refining a platform for the website. I experimented with various social
networking components coupled with Joomla, Elgg, and Drupal. However, I
finally approached the new Google friend connect technology
and integrated that into the website. Google Friend Connect provides all the
social networking aspects a community on Buddingup would require.

Also, interface design and developing content was a challenge. Buddingup has
gone through several upgrades. I now understand how important keeping an
open mind is. Because in the end, the end user is the one using your site
and you must offer them an enjoyable experience if they are to return and
spread the word. So, I have asked friends for feedback and implement those
suggestions directly into new versions of Buddingup.

However, the biggest challenge of all is website marketing, namely
attracting students and new grads to Buddingup.The saying “build it and
they shall come” doesn’t seem to work with websites. If you build something,
and nobody knows about it, they won’t come. So I went through a month
submitting Buddingup to directories, search engines etc. and spreading the
word to friends on Facebook.

My goal going forward is to attract and foster a large community of students
and new grads on Buddingup who connect and network with each other. I will
also be getting in touch with large U.S. and Canadian employers shortly to
offer free advertising, $5 job postings, career page submissions, and to
motivate employers to join Buddingup. I also hope to develop a state of the
art resume system in the future where students and new grads can upload
resumes and where employers can identify great candidates for the job.

All in all my vision is for Buddingup.com to become the first spot students
and new grads come to find a job. I hope Buddingup fosters a strong job
hunter community and that Buddingup motivates employers to create
more opportunities for new grads, co-op students and interns.

Robin is on twitter! http://twitter.com/buddingup

The start-up in focus today is Anjuno, a new arrival in the music sales and download industry. Built and run by some gen y entrepreneurs, Anjuno is certainly starting to carve a niche for itself.

Company: Anjuno

Website: http://www.anjuno.com/

Funding: Private/ seeking funds

Launch date: May 2009

About Anjuno:

The way the music industry is set up now, when an artist sells a song or a CD they only receive a small percentage of the profit. Why should fans pay $.99 on iTunes when the artist only sees $.20, or $15 for a CD when the artist only gets $2 or $3? This is unfair to both the artist and the consumer.

The same thing happens in the book industry. Publishers take the majority of the profit on every book purchase. These corporations no longer need to exist to take these huge amounts of money from artists in the internet era.

Enter Anjuno. Anjuno is a pick-your-price media website where fans discover new music and books.
Anjuno lets any artist post their media and get paid directly by their fans. There is no longer a need to find a publisher for your book, or a record label for your CD. Once the Anjuno community is built up, posting a book or a song will instantly allow your media to be seen by millions of people, absolutely free.

Anjuno is also unique in its payment method. In order to discourage piracy, fans can pick whatever price they want to pay for their media, even $0. Hopefully the fans who were unwilling to pay $15 for a CD would be willing to pay $2 on Anjuno. And since Anjuno doesn’t take huge cuts of the profit, the artist makes the same amount they would’ve made selling the real CD. True fans will support their artists, and artists have the potential of making even more money than they would using a conventional fixed price payment model.

Anjuno is based in Silver Spring, Maryland. It has been up and running for 1 month and is seeking funding. Future plans include adding a video posting feature and making design changes to the site.

In this brand new series, we are focusing on new start-ups by gen y entrepreneurs and to kick things off, we are highlighting a growing and already successful venture: Under30CEO.

Company name: Under30CEO

Website: http://tv.under30ceo.com/

Funding: Private

About Under30CEO:

Leading Gen Y to stop doing s**t they hate. Why do we have to listen to the status quo? Sit in a cubicle? Do the morning commute?

We are Gen Y, we do stuff different. We do it our way. Screw your boss, start doing something your passionate about. Turn what you love into cash and make a difference in the world.

Do what you want, when you want, how you want. Live your life the way it was meant to be lived–not how corporate america wants us to live. Change the way you live, change the way America thinks. Join the tribe.

Founders:

@JaredOToole on Twitter – Jared’s Blog – Jared(at)Under30CEO.com

Jared O’Toole, a graduate of Ithaca College realized corporate finance was not for him sometime right around the interview process. Instead of continuing his job hunt he decided to hunt down his own entrepreneurial ambitions. Jared has since immersed himself fully in the social media world, focused on a way to get young people passionate about what they “do”.

Jared is also well known around the Ithaca community for his late night dance parties to artists such as Ace of Base, Journey and the Backstreet Boys. Enjoy these hits and more on the Under30CEO Youtube favorites.

@MattWilsonTV on Twitter – Matt’s Blog – Matt(at)Under30CEO.com

Matt Wilson graduated Bryant University with a clear goal of starting his own business. While in school, Matt led Bryant University to becoming the Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization of the year and became National Student Leader of the Year. After moving home he realized there was a lack of smart, innovative, and ambitious people to communicate with. This is where he began to realize the need to bring all these people together who also decided the corporate happy hour wasn’t going to be good enough.

If Matt is around he will be easy to spot as his long luxurious hair is generally flowing freely in the breeze.