If you're an entrepreneur who needs/wants to know more about raising money, the Toronto Venture Group is putting on an event on Jan. 10 unofficially called "The Process Land Mine Avoidance Breakfast" where you can hear from a VC, a lawyer and a financier about everything from term sheets to subscription agreements. For more, check out Rick Segal's post. If you're interested in learning more about running a start-up now versus the go-go days of the dot-com boom, the TVG is running a breakfast on Dec. 13 featuring a freshly-minted blog executive who works for b5media...otherwise known as yours truly. If you're lucky, you may even get to meet my dad and brother, who plays a key role within Canadian Tire's e-commerce operations, who I have conscipted to attend. Tags: venture capital, Rick Segal, Mark Evans, Canadian Tire

Interesting to see Yahoo snap up Bix and MyBlogLog. I've had MYB's visitor widget on my blog for many months, and consider it one of the best ways to get a handle on the links that resonate with visitors. That said, I have not participated much in MYB's community efforts, which seem to be at the root of Yahoo's estimated $10-million acquisition. It's not that I don't like the community tool, it's more than I just haven't had the time to explore it properly. Stepping up the food chain, it is interesting to see a new wave of mini-acquisitions taking place these days as the big online players look enhance their feature portfolio. In Toronto, we're still on pins and needles (well, not really that excited!) to see if the rumours about Bubbleshare being acquired by News Corp. for $5-million are accurate. Bubbleshare's Albert Lai has been invisible in recent days (he even failed to appear at the recent mesh meet-up) so something must be up. Tags: Yahoo, MyBlogLog, Bix, M&A, Bubbleshare

So how's satellite-radio doing in Canada? Canadian Satellite Radio, which operates XM Canada, said yesterday it ended its 2006 fiscal year with 120,000 customers (90,000 paid, the rest falling into the promotional and discount category). That's the good news. The bad news is it lost $102.7-million, mostly on marketing and customer acquisition costs. In a research note, Genuity Capital analyst Andrea Horan said the paying subscriber numbers for CSR were below her forecast of 96,000 but 40% of XM's net adds will come during the holiday season. While I can see how satellite-radio can appeal to certain types of customers (taxi and truck drivers, serious commuters, cottage owners), I'm still not sold on its mainstream appeal. Sure, there is plenty of programming choice but it has never struck me as compelling even when you consider it costs about 50 cents a day. Both XM and Sirius Canada have serious ambitions (XM believes it can hit one million subscribers by 2010) but they seem far more bullish than realistic. Of course, XM is a publicly-traded company so they have to be optimistic otherwise they wouldn't be seen as serving the needs of shareholders properly. CSR shares by the way have dropped by more than 40% since the IPO earlier this year. Tags: XM Canada, satellite-radio