Schmidt, Zuckerberg, Bartz Top All-Star Web 2.0 Summit Lineup

by Clint Boulton

Web 2.0 Summit co-hosts Tim O’Reilly and John Battelle started the show with some housekeeping stuff, as usual.

Eric Schmidt joins O’Reilly and Battelle on stage, where he talks about Google TV, Android, competition with Facebook, whose Messages product seems aimed at Google’s Gmail, as well as the success of AdMob, the mobile ad platform.

But the real fire for Schmidt’s keynote was this unnamed device, believed to be the Nexus S smartphone. Schmidt said the phone was equipped with a near field communications chip that, combined with Android 2.3 and the right applications, would enable mobile payments.

After his conversation, the media scrambled upstairs, where yours truly sat next to Schmidt and his phone, which was taped over to hide the brand. We were able to confirm T-Mobile was the service provider.

Yahoo Executive Vice President and Chief Product Officer Blake Irving discusses Web service integrations with Twitter and Zynga, but the big news was Yahoo Local Offers, a local business deal program not unlike Facebook Deals or Foursquare’s service.

Irving, who joined Yahoo from Microsoft six months ago, offers a riff on the periodic table of elements to describe Yahoo, which in short is designed to engage users and keep them entertained. Yahoo CEO Bartz would simplify this strategy hours later in her keynote conversation.

Rubinstein presided over the deal to sell Palm to HP, where he now is building the Palm Pre 2 and several other webOS 2-based products. He said both Apple and Palm lost their way at one point. While Apple found its mojo, the book has yet to be written on Palm as it seeks to challenge Apple and Google in consumer devices.

RIM co-CEO Balsillie lashed out at Apple for its draconian App Store policies, including its failure to recognize Adobe Flash has added value for users.

When she came on stage Nov. 16, Carol Bartz was asked to sum up Yahoo’s raison d’??¼tre; she described it as “Content, communications, media and innovation.” Then she elaborated; “maybe it’s taken me two years, but I’ve got it.” The question was pointed; Yahoo has struggled to identify itself even under Bartz, who brokered the deal to offload Yahoo Search to Microsoft.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg makes his third appearance on stage at Web 2.0 Summit, where he’s promptly tag-teamed with questions by co-hosts O’Reilly and Battelle about Facebook Messages, Google and privacy, among other topics.

When Battelle suggested that Facebook asks forgiveness for unleashing new products that push the privacy envelope, Zuckerberg said he thought the social contract between Facebook users allows for some leeway. That should go over well on Capitol Hill.