Four companies Marc Andreessen talks about

Marc Andreessen was one of the writers of Mosaic and one of the founders of Netscape.  Since then he's been actively involved in lots of businesses, as an entrepreneur and an investor.  He's definitely someone worth listening to.

In CNET yesterday he was interviewed about future trends and predictions.  The whole article is essential reading, and I wanted to list some of the companies he talks about.  All are potentially changing and disrupting the online world:

Fab is an ecommerce site.  It sells niche homewares, for members only.  When you join you're given access to the curated sales, but also given a percentage of sales from items that you share, and also from what people that you sign up buy.  You can also get inspiration from what other people are buying, a bit like Pinterest.

Uber is a taxi service.  Request a car (an American Town Car, rather than a taxi, and then track it online as it comes to you.  You can also work out the cost online, and cleverly they charge you based on their distance or time taken for the journey, according to the speed of the car.  If the car is going at more than 11mph they charge by distance, if it's less than that they charge by time spent.

TaskRabbit is an online services company, a bit like Zaarly.  Find people to do small jobs for you, like deliveries, household chores, or even virtual assistance.  All people offering to do the tasks are vetted by the company, and rated by members.

Shopkick is like a rewards-based Foursquare. Get rewards for visiting stores, checking in, or by scanning barcodes of specific items.  They've just launched this promo with Visa:



Please read the full article - lots and lots to think about!