“1) as Rashmi notes, SlideShare has had audio functionality for quite some time, see TechCrunch review over a year ago”

Ans :
See my updated clarification(the one in blue) in the post.You will get your answer.

“2) PR is certainly not the primary vehicle for SlideShare customer acquisition; most folks come to the site via SEO & widget embeds
3) “exhaustive PR”… um, no not really. they don’t even have a current FT hire or equivalent handling marketing or PR. Rashmi & team do a pretty decent job, but it’s a small amount of anyone’s time at best. they just make a great product, and people talk about.”

Ans :
The point emphasised here is not the “Slideshare customer acquisition” but the “hype” it has created for itself which simply overshadows its competition.And PR is certainly the reason for it.An easy ex. is getting featured on Techcrunch(not one but many times),which isn’t an easy game
for any startup.
The reason,why the slideshare development team is located in Delhi,India but the three founders are in US is for obvious reasons(to get cheap development and maintainence from India and to exercise networking and PR stuff in US)

“4) no login strategy — again, Slideshare has had a feature ro unregistered uploads for a long time.”

Ans :
Read it again…
“No login Strategy – I have rarely seen a service being able to implement “No login required” technique in such a fine way.You genuinely don’t require a registration before file upload but still you will have a tendency to get your registered afterwards.Try it yourself…”

Here,i have just praised Myplick for its way of performing this “no login reqd” stuff beautifully
(No mention of Slideshare,whatsoever),so don’t feel so envious(that,this time slideshare didn’t the applauds)”

“again, best of luck”
Ans:
See,i am not an advisor to Myplick or having some monetory interests associated with it unlike you(you,being Slideshare advisor,http://www.500hats.com/sys-tmpl/startupclients/ )
But i had to write this comparison bcoz i actually discovered myplick only when i got stuck up within a slide(sort of hung)on slideshare and had to find some other site to get my ppt uploaded without any transition glitches.
Before that.i,didn’t even know myplick.

But in the end,i would still praise Slideshare coz i think it’s an achievement in itself to use your networking in such a way that people don’t even try to look for any other alternative(until forced,which happened with my case)

So,Best of Luck to Slideshare team and to you as well

“1) as Rashmi notes, SlideShare has had audio functionality for quite some time, see TechCrunch review over a year ago”

“2) PR is certainly not the primary vehicle for SlideShare customer acquisition; most folks come to the site via SEO & widget embeds
3) “exhaustive PR”… um, no not really. they don’t even have a current FT hire or equivalent handling marketing or PR. Rashmi & team do a pretty decent job, but it’s a small amount of anyone’s time at best. they just make a great product, and people talk about.”

“4) no login strategy — again, Slideshare has had a feature ro unregistered uploads for a long time.”

“again, best of luck”

1) as Rashmi notes, SlideShare has had audio functionality for quite some time, see TechCrunch review over a year ago:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/07/23/slideshare-adds-audio-synchronization/

2) PR is certainly not the primary vehicle for SlideShare customer acquisition; most folks come to the site via SEO & widget embeds.

3) “exhaustive PR”… um, no not really. they don’t even have a current FT hire or equivalent handling marketing or PR. Rashmi & team do a pretty decent job, but it’s a small amount of anyone’s time at best. they just make a great product, and people talk about.

4) no login strategy — again, Slideshare has had a feature ro unregistered uploads for a long time.

i could go on, but i think you’ve already dug a pretty deep hole with the inaccuracies above.

my suggestion: best way to compete is to focus on your own product & customers, and just keep making it better.

again, best of luck.

But i don’t have much time point out fallacies in your post ,they are far too many.

Anyways have a look(or listen) at(to) this
http://www.slideshare.net/ethos3/what-teachers-make-515731

you will know why they have best by their side.

@dave:
So,what’s the base acc. to you,dave ?