Briac

* Janet Takavoli takes on Michael Lewis * Bob Metcalfe: The day dotcoms were invented * The next blockbuster Silicon Valley IPO will be Facebook Skype * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London rises early, European shares climb, the Nikkei slips and China shares bounce back. * Carl Icahn's six biggest busts (is Genzyme next?) * Eric Schmidt: A broadband catapult for America * Rob Go: Why VC is like poker and stinks for new players * The effects of employment on influenza rates: Are pink slips better than flu shots? * Q&A with Wilbur Ross, who is looking to buy in the insurance, TIPS, RMBS and regional banking markets. * Tickets are now on sale for our upcoming peHUB Shindigs in Boston (3/31) and San Francisco (4/14). Get yours today...

* Happy National Green Shoots Day * Nick DiUlio: What economists are learning from cyber economies * The Greek tragedy of Wind Hellas: "Private equity and banking can be very constructive functions of the economy, but they will destroy this industry if the leading players do not regulate themselves." * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London falls early, European shares slip, the Nikkei rises and China shares hit 5-week low. * Recent MBA grads head (far) east * Is another bankruptcy wave on the horizon? * Roger Ehrenberg: It's time to end the FASB (and shake up the SEC) * NYC taxi drivers overcharged riders by more than $8.3 million last year. * NPR's Ian Chillag uses all 119 of Tribune Co's banned words in a single sentence. * More than 370 tickets already sold for our Boston Shindig, which is taking place on March 31. Get yours today.

* The 10 biggest IPO flops in history * Dave McClure: Startup metrics for pirates * The receptionist as an endangered species * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London rises early, European shares sink, the Nikke gains 0.6% and Hong Kong and China shares finish higher. * Chadwick Matlin: How long can TiVo keep bleeding cash? * Don't forget to get your ticket to the peHUB Shindig in Boston, taking place on March 31. * For the third time in three years, the world has a new richest man. In your face, Bill Gates. * Steve Rattner speaks on the future of the auto industry (although not on the pay-to-play scandal -- although not for our lack of asking). * Martin Peers: "If Dirty Harry was on Wall Street today, more speculators would be telling him, yes, they do feel lucky. At least, that is, judging by the number of stocks subject to agreed-takeover deals trading above the buyout price. While that is usually an indication that arbitragers have reason to expect a higher bid, in these cases it reflects more hope than anything else."

Mark Suster is a venture capitalist, serial entrepreneur and owner of one of the best office views in Los Angeles. He also has become a blogging phenomenon, joining the pantheon of VCs whose every word is devoured by startup CEOs. He and I have spoken a few times informally, but it was about time to put something on the record. So what follows are 5 Questions for Mark Suster: GRP Partners once was known as Global Retail Partners, and is best known for deals like Starbucks, Costco and P.F. Chang's. What's a tech guy like you doing there? I'd love to set the record straight on this. We did a lot of that retail and consumer stuff in the 1980s and early 1990s, but our first independent fund was in 1996. Since then, We've backed Overture, CitiSearch, LastMinute.com, DealerTrack, Bill Me Later and more. We invested in HealthDataInsights, which is just ripping it up. We also did Qualys, a software-as-a-service company that's got double-digit millions in revenue run rate.

* Marion Maneker: Subscriptions are micropayments * Gregor Macdonald: The myth of energy breakthroughs * Ex-Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz: "I feel for Google – Steve Jobs threatened to sue me, too." * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London rises early, European shares flatten, the Nikkei remains unchanged and Chinese shares slip. * The perils of nonprofit recruiting * Bank books reveal depth of problems * Spark Capital's Bijan Sabet: Scale first, monetize second * Foursquare co-founder Dennis Crowley: Facebook isn't for real-life friends anymore * More than 250 of you have bought tickets to the peHUB Shindig in Boston. Get yours here. * Making a killing: "Billions of dollars in corporate bonds sold to retail investors come with an unusual provision that could be used to generate a fast profit. There's just one catch: Investors must team up to buy the bonds with someone who is about to die."

* Can California declare bankruptcy? * Business schools revamp their applications * Bijan Salehizadeh: Friendly advice for first-time CEOs * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London falls early, European shares slip, the Nikkei loses 0.1% and Hong Kong shares gain. * The end of WiMAX? Cisco is the latest to bail * Liz Gannes: When it comes to social sharing, don't forget about email * Tickets are now on sale for the next peHUB Shindig. Takes place March 31 in Boston (details about a San Francisco event will come next week). * John Carney changes his mind on carried interest taxation, moving from the light back into the darkness. His basic argument is an old PE standby: LPs deserve all of the profit, and also the right to (preemptively) divvy up that profit as they see fit (no matter who originally put the capital at risk). Of course, that same argument wouldn't apply to those who receive a corporate bonus (based on firm profits) in lieu of salary. Or someone who hires a contractor to redo a kitchen, sells the house at a profit and then pays the contractor with the proceeds (guess what rate the contractor must pay?). John handles all this by claiming the tax code isn't consistent -- he's right -- but doesn't that actually argue for a rule change (carried interest) that would make the code a smidgeon more consistent? As you can tell, I feel a blog post coming on later today...

* Mark Suster: What's it like being a venture capitalist? * Jim McTague: FINRA must heal itself before receiving added responsibilities * The No Prick Rule: “Hire the good, humble, kind human being first … skill-set second.” * Morning Call: U.S. futures look flat, London opens higher, European shares climb, the Nikkei gains 0.3% and Hong Kong shares jump nearly 2%. * Nick Hasell: Have London's listed private equity firms turned a corner? * Kevin Kelleher: The spark that could ignite Web M&A * ABI Research: RFID market to reach $5.35 billion this year, and $8.25 billion by 2014 * Steve Rosenbaum: "Curation, whether accidental or intentional, is rapidly becoming the future of media and publishing." * David Biello: "The Bloom box makes no economic sense whatsoever without various government subsidies, particularly a federal tax credit paired with incentives from the state of California."

* Nicholas Carson goes deep into Facebook's founding * Private equity firms cheer the return of the "staple." Critics justifiably shudder. * Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer: We're "betting our company" on the cloud. The cloud, meanwhile, declined comment. * Steve Schwarzman argues against placement agent bans (sure it's self-serving, but it's also the correct position). My only quibble is that I wish Schwarzman would have called out corrupt PE pros alongside "corrupt political hacks." After all, wouldn't PE pros be the "players" in his baseball/steroids analogy? * Morning Call: U.S. futures rise ahead of monthly jobs report, London rises early, European shares keep climbing, the Nikkei gains 0.3% and Hong Kong shares slip. * Matt Taibbi vs. Rick Santelli * Jerry Colonna: What I learned by eating Oreos * Want to buy Wall Street via an eBay auction? It will only cost you $125k. * Power Players: 50% of successful social game invites come from 10% of users

* FDIC chief Sheila Bair tells PE bigs to stop "howling" * PIMCO's Bill Gross: Can you get out of a debt crisis by adding more debt? * Josh Kopelman on online shopping: "We’ve seen more innovation in the last 10 months than in the last 10 years." * Morning Call: Wall Street futures are mixed ahead of the February ADP jobs report, London falls early, European shares briefly turn positive, the Nikkei gains 0.3% and Hong Kong shares slip. * Wisconsin has more bars than grocery stores * Delaware broadens standards for poison pills * Mark Hulbert: More often than not, the insiders get it right * Brad Feld on the proliferation of standardized seed financing docs * M&A attorney Spencer Klein: "Pent-up demand for corporate assets Is getting greater." * Starbucks will let you carry a gun into its stores, so long as you live in an open carry state. Seems like a marketing opportunity for PE-backed Dunkin' Donuts: "America stays safe on Dunkin'"

* The Google Angel Mafia * Kent Goldman: The Entrepreneur Wears Prada * The NYT delves into the TXU buyout, and suggests that hesitant lenders backed the deal to secure future work from KKR and TPG. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London rises early, European shares gain ground, the Nikkei climbs on metals and China shares hit 5-week high. * The 10 most likely M&A deals in online video * Sramana Mitra: Why B-schools set up entrepreneurs to fail * Steven Davidoff: Dissecting the profits of a private equity deal * Hey entrepreneurs: Beware of "Nigerian" email scammers posing as angel investors * Mark Maunder: "Unless your business earns revenue while you are sleeping, it won’t scale."