Filed under: ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA
ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA
In a sign of shareholder unrest over Microsoft’s bid to buy Yahoo, shareholders of both companies are sounding off. One Yahoo investor is suing the company for saying “no” to Microsoft’s offer, while a major Microsoft stockholder wants the software giant to “play hard ball.” (http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/yahoo-microsoft-faced-shareholder-unrest/story.aspx?guid=%7B3DB32FF6%2D0F4F%2D43F6%2DA698%2D96804903D4F2%7D 2/14)
Yahoo, which is laying off 1,000 employees, is finding that many of its former workers aren’t going quietly. An hour after Susan Mernit was laid off, she posted a note to her blog and updated her Facebook status. Within hours she received more than 100 responses, including job leads. (http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2008/tc20080213_782861.htm 2/13)
Amid the turmoil of staff layoffs, takeover offers and merger discussions, Yahoo has relaunched Yahoo Video. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/15/yahoo-relaunches-yahoo-video 2/15)
Check out the high definition trailer for the new Indiana Jones movie on Yahoo Movies, as reported by Techcrunch. You can’t embed the trailer, of course (that would make too much sense), but they have some ridiculous countdown widget thing that shows the exact number of seconds until the movie is released. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/14/indiana-jones-high-def-trailer 2/14)
Google is starting to test video advertising on some pages of its search results. Ads with accompanying videos will have a small button with a plus sign. Users that click the button on an ad will see a small video player that shows a commercial, movie trailer or other clip. (http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/14/google-tests-video-ads-on-search-results-pages 2/14)
Leveraged video sharing site Revver was acquired by online entertainment platform LiveUniverse for less than $5 million, reported NewTeeVee. LiveUniverse, founded by MySpace co-founder Brad Greenspan, operates sites such as Glumbert.com, BlinkYou.com and LyricsDownload.com.
Six U.S. film studios are filing civil complaints against Chinese file-sharing firm Xunlei, part-owned by Google, for copyright infringement and are seeking more than $1 million in damages. Xunlei is accused of facilitating the unauthorized transmission of hundreds of Hollywood movies. (http://www.reuters.com/article/industryNews/idUSSHA34521220080215 2/15)
Kijiji is not yet a Craigslist killer, but eBay’s competing free classifieds site is starting to build traffic. The U.S. Kijiji alone has grown from 362,000 visitors in July 2007 to 1.8 million in January, according to comScore. Kijiji now ranks as the sixth most visited U.S. classifieds site. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/02/14/watch-out-craigslist-sister-site-kijiji-is-taking-off 2/14)
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