Following Australian Startups and Tech Trends

Aussie Startups Carnival 2008, kicks off today. We would like to thank all our participants for the time and effort they have put in to make this happen. We are delighted to showcase our first participant Scouta . Scouta , the name of the product and service, owned by Recommendation Ventures Pty Ltd , is a recommendation engine that is provided to retail, media, and content websites via a web service. It's added via javascript and can provide up to a 30% increase in sales or click-throughs. Scout also has a public recommendation service for amateur-generated content like podcasts, video podcasts, and hosted videos (on sites like YouTube, Metacafe, etc.). It has an iTunes plug-in that will provide recommendations for content that is consumed on iPods, iPhones, and AppleTVs. That means a member of Scouta can listen to podcasts or watch videos on their iPod, and receive recommendations that match their interests or tastes. Richard Giles and Graeme Sutherland founded the company. Th