With everyone and their mother trying to capitalize on the social networking fad, news came out recently that M.C. Hammer has a start-up to rival YouTube. This may seem like the bankrupt star is jumping on the bandwagon, but I actually think he may do well with his latest project.

"DanceJam.com. is scheduled to debut in mid-January, and will try to upstage Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) 's YouTube and become the Internet's hub for sharing and watching dance videos. DanceJam then hopes to make money by grabbing a piece of the rapidly growing Internet advertising market, which is expected to rake in $27.5 billion in 2008, according to eMarketer."

I think this has potential because while YouTube is THE dominant player in this space, the fact that Hammer is specializing on one vertical makes it interesting. If he can get traction and become the site specifically for dance video sharing, this may just work. While we may think the shared content space is saturated, I think it's just in it's infancy. Wait until technological advances enable this type of sharing and social networking over the cellphone. That's just going to be a massive market. There are some Israeli start-ups already close to a product on this. The leader is Vringo.

With Hammer's name and celebrity, he may just be able to pull this off and take some significant traffic from YouTube.

Aaron Katsman is the lead Portfolio Manager and Managing Director of America Israel Investment Associates, LLC. and Senior Editor of IsraelNewsletter.com. Disclosure: Writer has no position long or short in any stock mentioned as of 1/2/7.

Yo YouTube: It's Hammer time originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 02 Jan 2008 17:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

MC Hammer will probably always be remembered for his parachute pants, corny music videos (See below) and perhaps his most amazing accomplishment of all: turning a fortune of more than $30 million into a bankruptcy filing with his penchant for reckless spending.

But now Hammer is looking to remembered as something else: the co-founder and chief strategy officer (Whatever that is...) of DanceJam.com,

According to the Associated Press, "The Web site, scheduled to debut in mid-January, will try to upstage YouTube and become the Internet's hub for sharing and watching dance videos. DanceJam then hopes to make money by grabbing a piece of the rapidly growing Internet advertising market, which is expected to rake in $27.5 billion in 2008, according to eMarketer."

The site has already scored $1 million in start-up funds and, while any web start-up is a long-shot, I wouldn't count Hammer out. He's been rejected by hardcore hip-hop fans for being too commercial but that's indicative of his greatest talent: Hammer knows how to create a product that's enticing to the demographics "industry insiders" have already written off. In the early 90's, that was suburban youth who few thought would be interested in buying anything resembling a rap album.

Luring web travelers away from YouTube will be tough but Hammer has overcome the odds before.

Is MC Hammer the next Web 2.0 hotshot? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 01 Jan 2008 17:03:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.