Filed under: BROADCAST/CABLE
BROADCAST/CABLE
Rupert Murdoch on Wednesday is expected to publicly articulate his plans for Dow Jones. During a conference call with analysts reviewing News Corp.’s quarterly earnings, Murdoch is likely to field spontaneous questions about the acquisition. (http://www.tvweek.com/news/2007/08/savoring_victory_expecting_bat.php 8/5)
Rupert Murdoch could consider selling his 50% stake in SmartMoney magazine, a Dow Jones-Hearst joint venture, to help recoup a piece of his new big purchase. Back in 1991, Murdoch sold off Seventeen, New York magazine and other titles to help finance his acquisition of TV Guide. (http://www.minonline.com/topstory.htm 8/3)
You know that song, “Party like a Rock Star”? How about “Party like a Media Mogul”? MUCH better.
Media mogul Barry Diller hosted Rupert Murdoch aboard his yacht in New York Harbor last Wednesday night to celebrate Murdoch’s takeover of the Wall Street Journal. New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. was said to be among the guests. (http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/bwiddicombe/2007/08/05/2007-08-05_barry_and_rupe_have_hull_of_a_time.html 8/5)
Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman claimed the company will top projected digital earnings of $500 million in a conference call last week. He said Viacom’s branded sites attract an average of 85 million unique global users monthly, an increase of 68% over 2Q 2006. Nick’s community site Nicktropolis is up to 4.5 million users, and a total of 1 million users have registered at one of MTV’s virtual worlds such as The Hills and Virtual Laguna Beach. Digital was a bright spot in a quarter in which profits were down slightly from a year earlier to $434 million.
BBC America present the U.S. premiere of the comedy series Lead Balloon, co-written and starring Jack Dee, on September 8 at 10p. The story line centers on Rick Spleen a well-known stand-up comedian who is disillusioned with his life and career.
The Daily Show’s Indecision 2008 is ramping up, and on the on ramp are four presidential hopefuls – Senator Joseph Biden is on this Wednesday, Senator John McCain is scheduled for August 16, Governor Tommy Thompson on the 20th, and Barack Obama finishes up on the 22nd.
QVC and HSN plan to attract “younger, hipper” viewers by booking live music acts and other entertainment programming. The home-shopping networks are also experimenting with remote shopping, allowing viewers to use their remote controls to purchase merchandise. (http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/business/la-fi-qvc3aug03,1,2936806.story?ctrack=2&cset=true 8/3)
Actor Chris O’Donnell says that the six-hour, “limited series” format being used by TNT for its CIA drama “The Company” makes it much easier for top-notch talent to participate in projects. The series, which stars O’Donnell, Michael Keaton and Alfred Molina, debuted Sunday. The Seattle Times/Philadelphia Daily News (8/4)
HBO will premiere a documentary tonight titled “White Light/Black Rain: The Destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” The film debuts 62 years after the United States detonated the first nuclear bomb over Hiroshima during World War II. (Los Angeles Times/Associated Press 8/6)
Nascar, one of the major content staples on ESPN, is looking to beef up its Hispanic audience. Sport officials say only about 9% of its current fan base are Hispanic, a percentage that pales in comparison with the number of Hispanic fans of professional basketball, baseball, football and soccer. (Brandweek 8/6)
Filed under: ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA
ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA
Yahoo Video is going back to the drawing board after losing ground to the unstoppable YouTube. (YouTube accounted for 22% of all video streams in May compared to just 4.6% for Yahoo! according to comScore.) Yahoo! has signed new partnerships with major media companies including Universal Music, EMI, CNN International, the AP, the NFL and MLB to beef up content offerings and attract a broader array of users. Yahoo also announced it will add video to its photo-sharing site Flickr in an attempt to put video “everywhere.”
Meanwhile CNN’s web-based citizen journalist tool I-Report turned one year old in the wake of the deadly bridge collapse in Minneapolis, MN. More than 450 web and cell phone-based submissions were made to CNN.com during the first 24-hours of the bridge’s collapse, the biggest response yet to a single news event. More than 6,000 submissions were received last month to I-Report.
The New York Times will launch an exclusive in-flight video magazine on JetBlue Airlines, featuring interviews conducted by Times’ journalists and content from NYTimes.com. Look for interviews with Larry David, Forest Whitaker and Brian Williams this month, as well as reviews of Apple TV. Much of the content will also be available on JetBlue’s website.
Activity by options traders suggests there could be some “large developments” in store for Time Warner, according to a report on Time Warner’s own AOL Blogging Stocks. One analyst says that Time Warner’s “seriously underwhelming” performance warrants “dramatic” change. (http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2007/08/03/options-activity-signals-a-major-development-on-the-horizon-for/ 8/3, http://www.nypost.com/seven/08042007/business/analyst_rips_time_warner_business_peter_lauria.htm 8/4)
A congressional panel voted last week to shield journalists, ad-supported bloggers, vloggers and podcasters from having to reveal confidential sources in a variety of situations, defying stated wishes of the Bush administration. The Free Flow of Information Act defines journalism as “gathering, preparing, collecting, photographing, recording, writing, editing, reporting or publishing of news or information that concerns local, national or international events or other matters of public interest for dissemination to the public.” Non-commercial bloggers (i.e., those who do not derive “financial gain or livelihood from blogging) were excluded from the bill.
Politics and commerce don’t always mix. Six major firms have pulled their ads from Facebook after they appeared on a British National Party page according to BBC News. First Direct, Vodafone, Virgin Media, the AA, Halifax and Prudential were the offended parties. The incident underlined how little control marketers are afforded over where ads actually appear within social networks.
Doubleclick launched a new “teaser” online video ad format featuring about 10 seconds of Flash-based video that plays automatically within a banner ad. Universal Pictures was the first client, embedding video and links to trailers in banner ads for The Bourne Ultimatum (which topped $70 million at the box office this weekend.)
One in five broadband homes will have the technology to watch internet-based video on their TV sets by the end of 2007, according to a new analysis from Emerging Media Dynamics. The report assesses the progress made by devices such as Apple TV, Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and SlingMedia’s SlingCatcher in solving the final “twenty foot” barrier. Over 72 million broadband homes – representing over two-thirds of the marketplace – are projected to have PC/TV devices by 2017.
The internet has brought a wave of new companies that offer IP-based phone services to destinations that used to cost as much as $1/minute. (P2P network Skype is probably the best known of the group). New Stockholm-based Rebtel offers international calls from cell phones or land lines for the cost of a local connection by assigning local phone numbers to the dialer and dialee. Once you establish an IP-based connection there’s even a way to avoid this minimal fee. Unlike Skype or Vonage, Rebtel doesn’t require a software download or a separate router, which is nice.
This is a very cool idea but I can’t imagine that service providers are overly excited about it. In essence, this masks a user’s phone number so the user can ‘pretend’ to call a local number. Seems a bit sketchy to me. . . I didn’t say I wouldn’t use it. Just sketchy.
Former Nickelodeon president Albie Hecht is raising $9 million in funding from NBC Universal, Hearst and others to fund his new digital production studio, Worldwide Biggies. This week, the studio and TMZ.com plan to announce StarvStar.com, a celebrity-scandal online game. (http://www.nypost.com/seven/08062007/business/ex_nick_exec_wins_backing_business_peter_lauria.htm 8/6)
Amazon.com, continuing its spurt of initiatives to keep up with new technology, is investing an undisclosed amount in online digital music store AmieStreet.com. All songs on the site are free initially. But as more songs are downloaded from the site, the price goes up, capping at 98 cents. (http://venturebeat.com/2007/08/05/amazon-backs-amie-street-music-site/ 8/5)
Facebook, the social-networking site for college kids, is getting an influx of professionals their 30s and 40s, many of whom are high-tech execs, journalists and publicists. Facebook is seen as a new challenger to the professional-networking site LinkedIn. (http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/aug2007/tc2007085_051788.htm 8/6)
Slate and Huffington Post are teaming up with Yahoo to stage a Sept. 12 debate for the Democratic presidential contenders, hosted by Charlie Rose. Unlike the CNN/YouTube debate, this one will be online-only. HuffPo’s Arianna Huffington calls it a candidate “mashup.” (http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2007/08/02/coming_soonan_online_debate.html 8/2)
A study of America’s top 100 newspaper Web sites by Bivings Research notes that using the Internet to expand a newspaper’s reach is becoming more and more important. Some 92% of the top 100 U.S. papers now offer video on their Web sites; 95% offer at least one reporter blog. (http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.showArticleHomePage&art_aid=65207 8/6)
Better technology and the increasing popularity of broadband Internet and video on-demand are enticing more broadcasters to stream TV shows and movies online. Pioneers include the Independent Film Channel, Netflix and FEARnet, a site dedicated to horror films. (The New York Times 8/6)
Filed under: WIRELESS
WIRELESS
Glide Mobile expanded its transcoding service for the iPhone to allow support of most common video formats including wmv, .mpg, .mpeg, .avi, .divx, .mov, .mp4 and .3gp. Glide Mobile provides users a way to synchronize online content and shares it with the iPhone as well as other devices. The idea is to provide lower resolution versions of video files optimized for the lower-capacity AT&T EDGE network.
Microsoft and Nokia have partnered together to bring Microsoft’s digital rights management software to several Nokia mobile phones. DRM technology continues to raise mixed opinions from analysts, some of whom see it as a stifling influence to the expansion of mobile media. (International Herald Tribune 8/6)
Filed under: TECHNOLOGY
TECHNOLOGY
Updating treasured memories captured on analog camcorders remains a hassle for many consumers. A new crop of transfer services and analog-to-DVD recorders looks to simplify the process, with Sony’s DVDirect VRD-MC3 earning high marks from reviewers. (The New York Times 8/4)
Filed under: MISC
MISC
Both Playboy and Rolling Stone magazines are releasing archival collections on DVD. The Rolling Stone DVD set, which includes a one-year subscription to the magazine, is $125, while the Playboy set is $100. Playboy founder Hugh Hefner says the DVDs will appeal to people “of a certain age.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/06/business/media/06playboy.html?_r=1&oref=slogin 8/6)
