Every status has its symbol, says an advertising slogan. When starting a business, creating this symbol is part of the foundation. Yet, as essential a part of their identity as it is, most companies leave their branding in the hands of design agencies instead of keeping the process internal.

Doesn’t sound ideal? A small team of entrepreneurs in Prague think it does not. In response they developed OpenBrand, a brand building platform they dream will soon become the industry standard.

Think of OpenBrand as the Google docs of branding. It provides businesses with a private space for their branding and marketing management, based on a set of smart tools guiding the user through the branding process.

With the rise of numerous accelerator programs in Europe one cannot help but wonder whether jumping through the application process hoops, sweating through the mentoring sessions and flirting with investors at demo days are all worth a founders’ time.

When I attended the recent Startup Sauna demo day in Helsinki in December 2011, I met teams not only from Finland but also from Russia, Poland and the Baltic Rim. I was amazed how young many of the participating entrepreneurs were. So when the performance stats from Startup Sauna hit my mailbox I was curious to learn what actually happens to all those startups after they complete the seven-weeks-long coaching program in the startup co-working space Aalto Venture Garage.

Paulo Coelho, the world famous author of The Pilgrimage, The Alchemist and many other works which have in many ways become an inspiration for entrepreneurs, gave an exclusive and rare interview to TechCrunch at the World Economic Forum in Davos last night, the recording of which is published below. Coelho and I had previously been moderators at a dinner curated by Loic Le Meur on the future of social status and the interview took place in a taxi to another venue. (My write-up from the dinner will come later, suffice it to say that it was most entertaining and enlightening).

Coelho last gave an interview to Mike Arrington in 2008 where he said “MySpace Is My wife, Facebook Is my mistress”.

Coelho has oft-repeated his view that artists and artistic works do no suffer when they are copied, quite the opposite. Their distribution becomes greater and the artist comes off better as a result. Coelho has even taken to pirating his own books on The Pirate Bay.

What is interesting about our interview is his continuing vehement repudiation of the traditional book publishing industry’s response to the new platform of the Internet.

Exclusive - Yes, even more Berlin startups with news to share.

MONOQI is today launching an exclusive online shopping platform where select designers can present their wares and buyers can purchase them at reasonable prices.

Exclusive - Yet another funding round for a Berlin-based tech startup. T-Venture, Deutsche Telekom’s venture arm, and IBB Beteiligungsgesellschaft have co-invested in privately-held online video syndication and marketing company Clipkit.

The size of the round was not disclosed, but we’re told that it was a “mid-seven-digit euros” figure.

JustBook, a mobile app that allows you to book hotel nights at a heavily reduced rate, secured their first angel round, coming from a diverse group of german business angels. Among the group are Ferry and Fabian Heilemann, the brothers who co-founded Dailydeal and sold it to Google in 2011, Amiando founder Felix Haas, Torsten Oelke, Matthias Hunecke, Stefan Zoller and Manuel Nothelfer.

I don’t often get a chance to write about a startup from my home country (Belgium) that I’m super excited about, so consider me a happy camper. Meet CheckThis.com, a new micro-publishing service that lets you create and share a single, good-looking Web page in mere seconds.

CheckThis is designed for people who need a little more space than a tweet but don’t want to go through the hassle of setting up a new blog. In literally instants, you can use CheckThis to create a stand-alone page to sell your bike, hire a new developer for your startup, tell people what you’ve been up to today, set up a really quick poll, share an Instragram or Flickr photo, a party invitation with a map, a Vimeo video or whatever other casual need you might have. Quick, simple, beautiful.

Ostrovok.ru, the Moscow-based hotel booking service, just raised a triple funding boost from three of the most respected names in online travel. Erik Blachfold, CEO of Expedia, Hotwire and Tripit founder Gregg Brockway and Altimeter Capital’s Brad Gerstner all agreed to invest in the travel company.

Travel is a hot industry to invest in and Ostrovok earned the title of Russia’s fastest growing travel company. Launched in October 2010, the booking service quickly piqued the interest of some of the most experienced investors around, including Esther Dyson, General Catalyst Partners, Accel Partners, Atomico Ventures and the Founders Fund.

Exclusive - Berlin-based early-stage venture capital firm Point Nine Capital has become the first European investor in CouchSurfing, a site that helps travelers connect with locals worldwide to share accommodation, experiences and whatnot.

The investment is in fact an extension of the $7.6 million Series A round raised from Benchmark Capital and Omidyar Network in August 2011.

This is a guest post by Liam Boogar of RudeBaguette.

When I first heard about 3DayStartup last September, it was being pitched by the organisers of 3DayStartup Paris at FailCon. Listening to the idea, I thought what most people probably think at first: “Oh great, another StartupWeekend knock off.” I quickly jotted down the differences in my head: not backed by Kauffman Foundation, no winners*, and you have to apply and get accepted – sounded like a losing combination, which is how I went into their end of the weekend pitch session this past Sunday.