Daily Marauder

ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA

Yahoo’s Jerry Yang, who started the company as a Stanford University student 12 years ago and took the helm as CEO on Monday, says he’s gearing up for a long fight with Google: “I’m ready to dig in and make sure we can take Yahoo to the next level.” (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601204&sid=aVJboPs0kvPk 6/19)

Activist shareholders could pressure Yahoo to find a strategic partner. Interested parties could include News Corp., AT&T, AOL, Microsoft and Comcast. One idea that News Corp. has been studying would involve the sale of MySpace to Yahoo for a significant stake in the company. (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19296384/ 6/18)

NBC.com announced it has served “a third of a billion” video streams since launching its full episode video player in October of 2006. Full episodes of 11 shows are currently available along with clips from the new fall season.

Check out two of my favorite trailers from NBC’s fall season’s list of series.  The Bionic Woman looks pretty amazing.

Journeyman

The Bionic Woman

Today, MySpace launched the Minisode Network, which compresses hour-long TV dramas from Sony Pictures Television into brief clips aimed at attention span-challenged nostalgia fans. Episodes of “Charlie’s Angels” and other shows will be edited into shorts running under five minutes. (http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2007/06/myspace_scrunch.html 6/18)

Chris DeWolfe, founder and CEO of MySpace, is raising the prospect of teaming up with the likes of eBay to offer its users an online retail service. “We will at some point offer user generated e-commerce transactions,” he says. “So we could partner certainly with someone like eBay.” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/06/18/cnmyspace118.xml 6/19)

After 80 90-second episodes, the season finale of “Prom Queen,” an online series produced by Michael Eisner’s Vuguru, will air today. Judging from view counts and MySpace friends, the show has developed a cultish audience in the tens of thousands. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/18/AR2007061801643.html 6/19)

Nickelodeon’s virtual kids community Nicktropolis has signed nearly 4 million registered users since launching in late January, providing kids with a safe haven in which to create virtual rooms, play games and watch Nick videos. This month Nicktropolis will launch two new themed zones: Space Center and an area based on the Naked Brothers Band.

YouTube is announcing the launch of an international service in nine languages. Local language versions are now available in Britain, Brazil, France, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain, says YouTube co-founder Steve Chen at a press conference in Paris. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070619/tc_afp/internettvindustrycompanyyoutubelifestyle_070619121405 6/19)

(Below) FYI – Video was also available yesterday on Google’s site but was removed as well.

YouTube has removed clips of Michael Moore’s U.S. health-care expose “Sicko” that appeared on the site during the weekend, two weeks before the film’s June 29 opening. A 124-minute version of “Sicko” was posted by at least two users in 14 video chunks. (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3ib6d2c95cdf6b2ef37a85f5a151f1da7b 6/19)

WCSN is launching a branded channel on YouTube to deliver Olympic and lifestyle sports programming and events that WCSN covers. WCSN also announced a partnership to supply AOL Video with video segments from more than 60 different sports including cycling, gymnastics and taekwondo.

Brisbane, California-based Glam Media overtook NBCU’s iVillage to become the top web property for women, according to ComScore’s data report for the month of May. Glam’s network of magazine sites and blogs covering beauty, fashion, health and shopping gathered 17.3 million unique users last month compared to 17.1 million for the still-growing iVillage.com. (http://venturebeat.com/2007/06/17/glam-surges-to-no-1-womens-property-overtakes-ivillage/ 6/17)

(Below)  These are some really amazing social networking features.  I especially love the Chatterflix feature.  We all know that friend who just can’t stop talking during a movie.  Now that friend has an online social networking feature all his/her own.

Digital media start-up MetaBeam introduced new social media modules for its Metamenu platform to enable DVD producers to create social media applications as bonus features within their movies. The Chatterflix feature allows viewers to have a conversation with other viewers watching the same movie. Fannotate offers a secure environment for viewers to input comments, tags, and customized mashups.

Sweden-based girls site Stardoll launched its first celebrity page based around punk-pop singer Avril Lavigne. Users can stream mp3s and videos of her songs, purchase merchandise and gather with friends to form private chat/listening parties. 

I don’t know if this means that I am part of the tween demographic or not but I had a lot of fun fooling around with this site.  Sad, I know.

Delivery Agent is producing music video “shopisodes” featuring Interscope Geffen A&M Records artists Pussycat Dolls showcasing retail items for purchase. The videos are streaming on the both band’s official website and a co-branded SeenOn! site , utilizing new “hotspotting” technology that enables users to click on an article of clothing one of the dolls are wearing to be directed to a point-of-purchase.
I really love the concept but the execution needs some work.  As you watch the video, products appear on screen next to the piece of video that they correspond to.  Because a music video is generally pretty quick cutting from one shot to the next, I end up just feeling confused while watching.

As part of the company’s so-called A2/M2 measurement initiative, Nielsen is considering making Internet usage a mandatory component of its traditional television-measurement system. (MediaPost Communications 6/18)

Daily use of online video rose by 56% over the past year, according to an online Magid Media Futures survey. A majority of online Americans aged 12 to 64 are now using online video once a week or more. News stories are said to be the video content watched most regularly. (http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2192355/online-video-strong 6/19)