Daily Marauder

ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA

Viacom is entering a five-year, $500 million deal with Microsoft that involves advertising, online games, shows and movies. Microsoft will help place ads on Viacom’s Web sites and will license Viacom programming for the MSN portal and the Xbox 360 game system’s online network. (http://www.reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSWNAS491320071219 12/19)

Barry Diller’s IAC/Interactive Corp is signing a deal with online video syndication service Brightcove to supply video services to its properties, beginning with Ticketmaster, Citysearch and news satire site 23/6. IAC, an investor in Brightcove, will handle advertising sales. (http://www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3627924 12/19)

The striking Writers Guild of America is expected to be taking time off for the holidays. When the Christmas truce expires in early January, the WGA plans to open StrikeTV.com, a site that will collect online videos and other media supporting the walkout. (http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2007/12/wga-to-write-st.html 12/19)

(Below) Next up, Google List. Google knows what you’re getting for Christmas before you do. Type in your name under the Google List search function to find out what you’re getting now. Yup. . .sarcasm indeed.

Google has announced a flight tracking service that provides up-to-date information for those flying over the Christmas/ New Year break.The service delivers details as to whether a flight is on time or delayed as well providing the estimated departure and arrival times. Using the service is as simple as typing in the flight number into Google, and the flight details will be delivered as the first search result (airline and flight number, or use an abbreviated version with a space between the airline code and flight number.) The service competes in part with Orbitz’s Traveler Update service, although Orbitz does offer associated airport information as well. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/12/18/google-knows-how-late-your-flight-is-running 12/18)

The signs are everywhere that a revolution is taking place in music. DRM is history, the price of music is falling towards zero (and sometimes even free isn’t enough to slow piracy), and even big music sites like Yahoo are beginning to break ranks with the RIAA and labels.But Amazon may be doing more than anyone else to change the way music is discovered, promoted and sold. Not only do they have a music store that only sells DRM-free music, but they are experimenting with startups who are trying to break the stranglehold that labels have on discovering, promoting and marketing new artists. These startups are giving artists a different path to find their fans. And Amazon is helping them. Today Amazon announced that it is partnering with a European startup called SellABand and will sell music from SellABand artists. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/12/19/amazon-helping-to-change-the-business-of-music 12/19)

Click the image below for an introduction video on the site’s main page.

PBS launched a channel on Joost featuring episodes of original series such as History Detectives and Scientific American Frontiers, as well as specials from PBS’ award-winning “Empires” collection.

National Lampoon signed a deal to distribute comedic video clips on social networking/entertainment site Capazoo.com via a dedicated channel. The subscription-based Capazoo shares revenue with its members by rewarding cash redeemable “Zoops” for music, videos and photos they upload or for friends they bring in.

The results of Hey! Nielsen’s “Best Music Blog” contest are in, determined by more than 1,200 user votes. Rock Island, IL-based daytrotter.com took first among 99 sites evaluated.

Daytrotter (daytrotter.com)

Rock Sellout (rocksellout.com)

BBQ Chicken Robot (bbqchickenrobot.com)

Adam’s World (adambernard.blogspot.com)

The World Forgot (theworldforgot.com)

Daytrotter

BitTorrent-based video distribution service Vuze, which we last covered in June and was previously known as Azureus, has raised $20M in a Series C round of funding led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and joined by existing investors Redpoint Ventures, Greycroft Partners, BV Capital, and Jarl Mohn. The round brings Vuze’s investment total to $34M after a Series A of $2M with BV Capital and a Series B of $12M with Redpoint, Greycroft, BV Capital, and Mohn. As part of this Series C, TiVo co-founder Mike Ramsay is joining Vuze’s board of directors. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/12/18/vuze-raises-20m-more-in-series-c-brings-aboard-tivo-co-founder-ramsay 12/18)