Daily Marauder

ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA

Here is a one-month stock chart comparing Apple (down 40 percent), Google (down 20 percent), Yahoo (ditto), and Microsoft (down about 10 percent). Microsoft is holding up best. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/10/09/brutal 10/9)

Yahoo’s stock closed at $13.76 today, down another 5.6%. And this isn’t just part of the market’s overall meltdown - the Nasdaq fell just 0.8% today, and Google, Yahoo’s main direct competitor, was down just 2.3%. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/10/08/yahoo-closes-at-1376-what-a-train-wreck 10/8)

Netflix will tack an extra $1 onto its monthly subscription fees for unlimited use of Blu-ray titles, the DVD rental company said Wednesday. The new charge reflects the discs’ higher costs, Netflix told its customers in an e-mail alert. Reuters (10/8)

EMI.com is launching a consumer-oriented digital download site featuring audio and video downloads from EMI artists. The company views it as more of a “learning lab” to study how users interact with and discovery new bands rather than as a legitimate rival to iTunes or Amazon, according to the FT. (Cynopsis 10/8)

Video clipping service 1Cast launched in beta as a perspective legal alternative to Redlasso.com, the blogger-focused news clipping site shuttered earlier this year to due copyright pressures. Striking agreements with news broadcasters and programmers, 1Cast offers licensed clips enabling users to create personalized video-clip playlists on specific topics, viewable via PC, smartphone or by using 1Cast’s embeddable widget. (Cynopsis 10/8)

Naughty America, a porn production company based out of Southern California, is building an Adobe Air-based storefront called Naughty America Direct that is basically an iTunes for porn. The app includes full-length DRM-free scenes for $1.99 each that are available in formats compatible with the iPod and iPhone, and requires no subscription. To grab an invite to the app’s ongoing private beta, go here and enter the code “techcrunch”. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/10/08/come-and-get-it-naughty-america-is-building-an-itunes-for-porn 10/8)

A new study from Veoh Networks, an online video site, indicates that viewers who watch programs online are more engaged than those who watch on television. Significantly for marketers, the study showed engaged viewers are twice as likely as other online video viewers to remember the advertising they have seen. TVWeek.com (10/8)