The company, which describes itself as “a group of humanists and computer scientists,” is basically trying to fuse machine learning with human understanding. It’s backed by Skype co-founder and über-angel Janus Friis, who lent a glowing quote to the launch release:

“Futureful makes it fun to surf the web again. Everyone should try it. And this is only the beginning of what Futureful can become.”

So, how does that square up with the reality of using the app?

I’ve been playing around with it a bit pre-launch, and I have to say the simplicity of the interface appeals, particularly when you compare it with the iPad version of StumbleUpon. That said, it can be a bit confusing at first, and that’s partially a data issue.

What you’ll see is an in-app browser, much as you’d get with Twitter or StumbleUpon, but with two rows of tags at the top. The first row is what Futureful’s artificial intelligence engine is proposing, based on the personalized information it gleans when you sign in using Twitter or Facebook. The second row takes in the tags you’ve picked.

That’s where it gets confusing. If you have multiple tags, sometimes they will all light up — if two are activated, for example, that means the piece of content you’re looking at covers both subjects. Sometimes, though, only one will be activated at a time. The example where I saw this happen involved the tags “swarm” and “robots”. This should really produce something relating to swarm robotics, perhaps, but it doesn’t.

“If you do some queries, a lot of them will combine,” co-founder Marko Anderson explained to me. “That might lead to content that’s older or less relevant. The system makes a decision that an article is closely related to ‘swarming robots’, but we’re not including that in the query.”

Similarly, sometimes if you swipe down to check out a second page related to your chosen tag, it will default to a Google search results page. As Anderson noted, this is about populating Futureful, and that’s hard to do before it has a significant number of users.

“Certain topics are very well covered and certain aren’t,” he said. “The technology is in very good shape, but it’s always a data problem with search. Now that we’re getting it out there, we’re going to continually ramp up the index. Users can also add content. It’s not alive yet until many people are dynamically using it.”

But is it fun? Yes, in a curious way. I like that it doesn’t regurgitate the same content over and over, and Friis isn’t blowing hot air when he talks about getting a sense of things to come. It’s a very different kind of search from Google, to be sure – think serendipity rather than looking for something specific – but the mechanism is intriguing, and it may well evolve into something useful down the line.

Speaking of Futureful’s future, Anderson told me the immediate next steps will involve more countries and more platforms – iPhone first, as that version is pretty much developed, then Android. But the company is also playing around with various data visualization ideas, perhaps around trending topics and so forth.

Which sounds good, as this team is clearly pretty smart and imaginative, but I just hope the Futureful app retains its elegant simplicity, rather than going too far down the ‘what kind of search would you like?’ route. There’s a nugget of something powerful here, and it needs to develop in its own way.

That’s a notable change of tune from October 2011, when GigaOM first broke the story of Vdio’s existence. Back then, everything pointed to Vdio going into the video subscription business, and leaks in the following months hinted at plans to combine a Netflix-style subscription with transactional VOD. Those plans have seemingly been scrapped, and the new homepage describes the service the following way:

“A better way to watch. Rent or buy movies and TV shows worth tuning in to.”

Vdio’s homepage features a screenshot showing off some of its studio partners. Click to enlarge.

The accompanying screenshot shows popular movie and TV show titles like Prometheus, Breaking Bad, Ted, Monsters Inc., The Dictator, Family Guy, Pulp Fiction, Doctor Who, The Woman in Black, Real Steel and The Amazing Spider-Man.

Judging from these titles, Vdio has partnered with Disney, Fox, Sony Pictures, Universal Pictures, AMC, BBC America, Lionsgate, Paramount, CBS and DreamWorks Pictures – a pretty impressive list.

Just as noteworthy however is that Vdio is going to launch in the U.S. right away as well. Last year, the company said that it would initially only be available in the U.K.

The story behind Vdio’s delayed launch

Vdio’s team in December of 2011 at a restaurant in Slovenia, where some of the company’s engineers used to be located. Much of this staff was let go three months later.

Vdio has been a bit of an enigma ever since our first report about the company. The team behind it stealthily worked on the service since late 2009, and signs initially pointed towards a launch in early 2012. But in March, Vdio abruptly fired most of its engineering and design staff, including its CTO Justin Erenkrantz and a number of other people who had previously worked with Friis on the ill-fated video streaming service Joost.

I had a chance to briefly chat with Vdio CEO Ian Aaron about the upheaval a couple of months ago, and he told me that the company’s decision had a lot to do with the fact that Friis already had another media venture on his hands: Rdio, the music subscription service that is competing with Spotify and others, had already solved a lot of the problems that Vdio was working on. “We were literally reinventing the wheel,” said Aaron. That’s why the decision was made to share resources instead, he explained.

Vdio’s close alignment with Rdio

Aaron insisted at the time that despite those shared resources, Rdio and Vdio still remained separate companies – a line repeated by a Rdio spokesperson when my colleague Robert Andrews inquired about the two companies in September.

However, the relationship between Rdio and Vdio seems to grow closer by the day. Vdio’s website is hosted on Rdio’s servers, and the screenshot of the service prominently features the user name of Rdio’s VP of Product Malthe Sigurdsson. Vdio’s Terms of Service also reveal that users will be able to log into the service with their Rdio account. The two services apparently plan to offer users a way to use payment information provided for Rdio’s service to pay for movies bought on Vdio, and gift cards will work for either service. From Vdio’s Terms of Service:

“Unless otherwise specified or inapplicable, you will be able to use your Vdio Purchase Offerings on Rdio and your Rdio Purchase Offerings on the Vdio Service.”

Also interesting: Vdio’s Terms of Service now list Rdio’s address, and not its original Santa Monica office, as its principal business address. I wouldn’t be all too surprised if the two companies made their bond official once Vdio emerges out of private beta – but right now, it’s still unclear when that will be.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user jaaron.

Stealth online TV start-up Vdio and music rival Rdio have been part-combined behind the scenes, as the pair’s backers assemble a two-pronged digital entertainment assault of their own.

Rdio was founded by Skype co-founders Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis in 2010, while Friis also kickstarted Vdio for a still-secretive move in to online movies.

Although the two entities are related, they had remained separate. Now, with Vdio’s launch still languishing, much of the two teams was combined back in May, paidContent has learned. Many staff now have dual roles across the two companies.

The closer coming together follows the March unveiling of Rdio’s own redesign. Alongside, Vdio also has undergone a pre-launch rebuild – one reason for its gestation time. Launch may now happen toward year’s end.

A Rdio spokesperson tells paidContent: ”Due to common ownership, Rdio and Vdio share select resources. However, Vdio operates as a separate company and Ian Aaron currently serves as the CEO.”

The tie-up does not go as far planning a single super service offering both music and movies. More likely the case, Vdio is calling on Rdio’s product team to get its development back on the road.

Also, although subscription is gaining traction as a new on-device digital music consumer model for outlets like Rdio, it is not yet set in stone that subscription will be Vdio’s chosen method.

In fact, in many countries, rights to distribute movies by subscription are harder to come by, since large multi-nationals already hold exclusive rights. Vdio may get fresher movies by offering them as PPV.

Rdio launched in Norway last week, where it will take on Spotify’s Scandinavian might.

Vdio is much anticipated since Zennström and Friis have unfinished business in online video. Their last effort, Joost, was valiant but did not gain significant enough traction and was eventually sold.

The offering is pretty familiar: Rdio is delivering the same web-based streaming service as it does elsewhere. It looks like there have been some local additions to the catalog, but there are a few touches that suggest localization of the service itself has not been a serious priority — signup, for example, uses American-style date format rather than the European one, which feels a little off.

The big story, of course, is the competition with Spotify. The unannounced arrival takes the San Francisco startup directly onto its London-headquartered rival’s home turf, nearly a year after Spotify did the reverse by launching in America.

However, Rdio — which already launched in Germany earlier this year — may feel a certain sense of familiarity with its new surroundings: the service was started by Skype co-founder Janus Friis, a Dane who is domiciled in London.

On the surface, Rdio’s rollout seems to follow pretty much the same pattern as its big rival: premium subscriptions cost £4.99 or £9.99 per month ($8.08 or $16.17), which is more than Rdio’s American pricing, but follows the same structure as Spotify. Given the similar package on offer — unlimited desktop streaming for lower tier customers, and mobile streaming and offline syncing for the higher price — it seems the market has settled into that 5/10 shape for now.

The big question as the two go head to head may be the difference between their catalogs. The general consensus seems to be that Spotify has deeper listings, but Rdio is better at getting new releases on board.

A cursory look through the top 20 UK albums suggests that they’re pretty — most interestingly neither have access to Adele’s 21, one of the U.K.’s biggest selling records of all time and currently #2 in the album charts. Spotify (which is part-owned by the big record labels) has famously struggled to get those tracks into its catalog, but Rdio users in America can listen to it. That indicates some jiggery-pokery going on with the labels over rights — though the extent is not clear yet.

Given those similarities, the question seems to be whether Rdio’s offering is enough to tempt away Spotify’s substantial user base, which has built up over several years. Or is Spotify’s gravity — and new offerings like its iPad app, launched Wednesday — going to make it hard for Rdio to make headway?

– Trinity Mirror: The publisher has restructured its operations for the third time in the last 12 months, and there have been a number of changes in digital management as a result. Paul Hood, who had been digital marketing director, is leaving the company. Steve Anglesey is now the deputy publisher and will be in charge of sports content and helping publisher Matt Kelly with web-publishing strategy. Ben Rankin is now confirmed as editor of Mirror.co.uk, and 3am.co.uk editor Isabel Mohan will now also be associate editor, celebrity, while Rachel Wheeler will be deputy editor of 3am.co.uk.

– Orange Digital: France Telecom (NYSE: FTE) this week announced the formation of a new in-house digital agency, Orange Digital. Led by new CEO Dominic Collins, it is first working with the rest of France Telecom’s businesses to develop their customer-facing online presence. The first piece of work, it says, is redesigning the Orange.co.uk portal. Over time it will also be looking to pitch for similar work for Orange’s partners.

Rdio says that deal will make it one of the first music apps in Verizon’s app store, and one of the first to use Verizon’s carrier billing backend for the subscription. The service — which gives users access to their music from the cloud, with the ability to listened to cached music when offline, as well as playlists and other social features — will be available for now on all Android devices as well as the Samsung Galaxy Tab tablet. No word now on whether Verizon will extend that to other platforms such as iOS.

Rdio and Verizon are not giving a breakdown of how much revenue Verizon will take from these subscriptions. One possible marker for how much Rdio is willing to share: In February, Rdio’s CEO, Drew Larner, complained to paidContent.org that Apple’s in-app payment revenue share, in which Apple takes 30 percent, makes it “untenable” for companies like Rdio to exist on that platform.

The Verizon news comes amid a string of news from Rdio. Last week Rdio announced that people can start paying for their Rdio subscriptions using Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) Payments, as an alternative to regular credit card payments.

And earlier this week it announced a partnership with EchoNest, a “music intelligence platform” that lets developers integrate different music data and services into apps they are writing. This partnership will integrate Rdio’s eight-million track catalog into that platform, and will give developers the ability to embed the Rdio player into other apps.

The company is also expected to announce in coming days further expansions of its API strategy.

Marisol Segal, Rdio’s executive director of content and marketing, tells mocoNews that the Verizon deal is not exclusive and there is a chance that there will be more deals with other carriers in the future. “We’ll continue to add platforms as we see demand for them,” she said.

Rdio silence on numbers. All is moving ahead, then, except it’s still hard to see how well Rdio has done as a business up to now. The startup is still cagey on how many users it has picked up since launching in August last year — we heard an unconfirmed rumor of only 50,000 in February, which is tiny if you compare it to Spotify’s recent claim of one million subscribers — and it is still mum on when it plans to launch internationally (for now, it’s only in North America).

There is also that pesky problem of all the other cloud music competitors. Segal, at this point, sees that more as an advantage than a challenge, however.

“I think there is still a lot of education that needs to be done in relation to music and accessing content on subscription rather than purchasing downloads,” she said. “So I think competition is valuable.” Investors will have a limit to their patience on that of course — witness the recent sale of Thumbplay to Clear Channel, reportedly for a bargain price after the cloud-based music streaming service picked up only 20,000 users for its product. Like Rdio’s premium tier option, Thumbplay’s service cost $9.99 per month.

No information on how much usage the service is getting on mobile versus other platforms — in addition to iOS, Android and Blackberry, Rdio can also be streamed via the internet as well as connected music devices in the home through deals with Sonos and Roku.

Rdio says that today around 80 percent of all users take the company’s higher tier offering priced at $9.99. “And that number is going up and up,” says Segal. That service lets people access Rdio on the Internet, via mobile and through connected home products. She notes that mobile devices “are definitely at the top of the pack” when it comes to consumption.

“We’ve been seeing [takeup of] the unlimited tier going up and up, and that was before we launched on Sonos or Roku,” she said. “We think that mobile and the ability to cache on mobile devices is a big part of the proposition for people.”

Cavallo, notes the release, is a Grammy-nominated producer known for his work with Green Day, the Dave Matthews Band and Alanis Morissette. He will join existing board members Mark Dyne, CEO of Europlay Capital Advisors; Skype/Kazaa/Joost founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom, who also co-founded Rdio and invested in it through their Atomico venture, and Rdio CEO Drew Larner.

Rdio’s says that Cavallo will help “further strengthen Rdio’s relationship with the music industry.” Given that Rdio already has deals with all the major record labels such as Sony (NYSE: SNE), EMI, Warner Music Group (NYSE: WMG) and Universal, as well as many indepedent labels, Cavallo’s role may be more about figuring out ways of further monetising those existing relationships through new services, than about getting more licensing deals.

The startup has already done a bit of business in this area, linking up with third parties to develop music experiences, for example powering the music behind the Grammy Awards’ MusicMapper service.

Rdio says it will use the $17.5 million investment to “aggressively” expand into new regions — the service is currently only available in the U.S. and Canada — and new platforms. Currently the service works as an app on iPhone, Android and BlackBerry devices; on PCs; and consumer electronics devices, such as Sonos home audio equipment. Rdio is sold on a subscription basis, at $9.99 per month for the web/mobile edition and $4.99 per month for the web-only version.

Streamed music services are a big area right now, with companies like and Spotify and ventures from the labels themselves, such as Qriocity from Sony, also trying to get in on the action. Rdio having launched already in the U.S. is a crucial step in gaining market share — and mindshare — for its service.

Rdio was launhed in June 2010 with backing from Zennstrom’s and Friis’ own VC outfit Atomico Ventures.

Mangrove has been an investor in a number of European startups including Zennstrom’s and Friis’ earlier venture Skype (which is now also an investor in Rdio), buying clubs Brands4friends and KupiVIP, Nimbuzz and Jolicloud.

The news was first picked up by the blog Quintura, based on a tweet from Mangrove partner Mark Tluszcz to MC Hammer (yes, that’s right). We have confirmed the news with Mangrove itself.

The actual amount of financing has not been confirmed — we have asked for more details on that, as well as how the financing might get used. The service is currently only available in the U.S. and Canada but the plan is to extend that to other markets, too.

Rdio, which lets users discover, listen to and share music, and works both on and offline, has apps for iPhone, Android and BlackBerry devices. Users can also access the service from a PC. The service is also expanding the number of devices with which it works: as of yesterday users of Sonos home audio equipment can also stream their Rdio playlists through their devices. Rdio is a subscription-based music service that is priced at $9.99 per month for the web/mobile edition and $4.99 per month for the web-only version.

Rdio also links up with third parties to develop music experiences, for example powering the music behind the Grammy Awards’ MusicMapper service.

Rdio was launhed in June 2010 with backing from Zennstrom’s and Friis’ own VC outfit Atomico Ventures and competes with services like Spotify and ventures from the labels themselves, such as Qriocity from Sony (NYSE: SNE).

Mangrove has been an investor in a number of European startups including Zennstrom’s and Friis’ Skype, buying clubs Brands4friends and KupiVIP, Nimbuzz and Jolicloud.

Zennström and Friis started their investment company — Atomico — four years ago. Over the last year, it has backed several startups, including mobile gaming firm Zattikka, music service Rdio, and social games site Playfire.

In its announcement, Atomico loosely lays out the criteria for how it will use the new cash. Zennström: “We will seek to invest in exceptional entrepreneurs who are building exceptional businesses. We will target companies that we believe have the potential to generate significant growth, transform their industries, and deliver strong returns.”