BIG SKY, MT -- RightNow Technologies  (Nasdaq: RNOW), a provider of customer-service software, today launched an ambitious new platform to open up the way customer service applications are built "in the cloud."

With the new "Cloud CX Platform," RightNow is honing its focus around improving customer experiences across the Web. With so much marketing hype and confusion built around "cloud computing," this is an important expansion of RightNow's CX (Customer Experience) product that the company hopes will help differentiate itself in the larger cloud services market -- basically any software than can be sold as a service (Saas).

"This is our largest product announcement to date," said Greg Gianforte, CEO of RightNow, at the launch event here this morning. "We're exposing our cloud platform to our customers."

Service-as-a-software (Saas) company Marketo is riding the trend of real-time analysis of customer behavior, making it one of the fastest enterprise software companies in the venture market and a solid IPO prospect for 2011.

The company, a startup founded in 2006, recently surpassed 600 customers in July. Marketo’s revenue is approaching the $20 million level, based on estimates from company sources that the average annual sales per customer is in the $30,000 rage. While the company is not yet profitable, it looks to be a solid IPO candidate for later in 2011 or 2012.

Still wondering why the market has such bizarre action? Why the Mom-and-Pop investor wants little to do with it? Wondering if fear of Flash Crash II runs high? Look no further, High Frequency Trading (HFT) has been indicted in full.

The blog Zero Hedge, one of the most cutting-edge and informative places to get inside knowledge on how the market works, has been pointing to anslysis from Nanex, a market data provider, on how HFT is corrupting markets and trigger May's "Flash Crash." It paints an incredibly disturbing picture of a dysfunctional market rigged by crooked robots.

I won't reprise the entire analysis -- you can wade through the orginal posting on Nanex discoveries yourself, and it's worth a look if only to see the fascinating and bizarre charts.  But I can summarize it: The markets have run amok with diabolical "quote stuffing" programs that try to mine holes in the market system and  fool other computers and markets into coughing up stock quotes at absurd prices.