Daily Marauder

ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA

I’m not sure if this was moved up in response to leaked copiess of U2’s newest album, No Line On The Horizon spreading across the Internet, but the entire the album will be streamed for free at MySpace Music. The player in U2’s MySpace Music page features a single, but if you click on the top album in the sidebar, you can hear the entire thing. MySpace says that the entire album will be streamed from February 20 to March 3, with links to pre-order it. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/02/20/forget-about-those-leaked-downloads-listen-to-u2s-new-album-on-myspace-music-for-free 1/20)

A day after news broke that Hulu had pulled its video content from CBS‘s TV.com because of “contractual” issues, CBS is fighting back with a statement: “CBS Interactive is well within its rights to stream Hulu video content on TV.com under its agreement with Hulu.” (Iwantmedia 2/20, http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/02/19/cbs-strikes-back-at-hulu 2/19)

After more than a decade of hype about the Internet being the next great stage for mass entertainment, it remains largely dominated by amateurs. Many actors and producers continue to balk at Internet projects, saying they have meager revenue potential with uncertain financial models. (Iwantmedia 2/20, http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSTRE51I01520090219 2/19)

DVD sales are declining, largely because audiences now enjoy a range of other options, such as watching movies and TV shows online. Hollywood studio bosses are scrambling to rethink their entire business model and prepare for distribution of films on the Web. (Iwantmedia 2/20, http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_09/b4121056770437.htm 2/19)

CBSNews.com launched another weekly webcast, this one about medical issues and health news. Doc Dot Com, premiering every Thursdays at 2 pm ET, is hosted by CBS News Medical Correspondent Jonathan LaPook, M.D. with help from CBS News Correspondent Richard Schlesinger and a variety of health specialists. (Cynopsis 2/20)

Meanwhile CBS Interactive’s TheInsider.com, operated jointly with CBS’s syndicated show The Insider, is launching Inside Dish with Ross Matthews, a daily web talk show combining breaking news with community features allowing fans to join in on the conversation about Hollywood and celebrities. The show officially launches today at 4 pm PT. (Cynopsis 2/20)

YouTube is beginning to attract some big marketers to its in-stream video ad program, according to a new report from Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster sourced in paidcontent.org. A recent look at the top 100 weekly clips on YouTube found a bounce back from the holiday rush identifying 29% with an ad versus 25% in January and 30% in December. Some 72% of the ads were in-video ads versus 52% in January and 63% in December. Sponsors included Adidas, Chevy, Disney, Kraft, Verizon, and Xbox. (Cynopsis 2/20)

Celebrating its fifth anniversary in the search business, Yahoo added several new features to its integrated search engine including photos and video entries with its text search. Some paid search ads also include localized elements. Similar to Google’s Universal Search product, Yahoo hopes Rich Ads in Search will help drive higher click-through revenues as the banner ad market continues to decline. (Cynopsis 2/20)

Large cable providers such as Comcast and Time Warner Cable are in talks with prominent content companies such as Viacom and NBC Universal about the possibility of putting a big chunk of cable programming online and making it accessible only to cable subscribers. If all goes according to plan, the new services will debut this year with a large amount of content that was previously unavailable on the Web. The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) (2/20)

Disney is buying Kerpoof Studio, a creator of online tools that lets kids make artwork, write stories and even create short movies. Kerpoof’s technology is being integrated into Disney.com, allowing users to create artwork around Mickey Mouse and other studio characters. (Iwantmedia 2/20, http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/finance/news/e3i120e70a153d46e4b931b5f2da0d967d2 2/19)

Canoe Ventures — the interactive and addressable-advertising cooperative created by Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cablevision, Cox Communications, Charter and Bright House Networks — is on track to release its first product despite the economic recession, according to Comcast Chief Operating Officer Steve Burke. “We’re bringing out our first product, Creative Versioning, this spring, and we have two or three other things that are getting very close to being in the marketplace and launched,” Burke said. Mediaweek (2/19)

Yahoo, Microsoft, and AOL each grabbed a small slice of Google’s U.S. search market share in January but the latter company still enjoys a dominant share with 63% of all searches, according to the latest ComScore figures. Yahoo sites accounted for 21% of the market (up half a percent vs. Dec.) while Microsoft and AOL increased their shared by only 0.1%. (Cynopsis 2/20)

comScore Core Search Report January 2009 vs. December 2008
Core Search Entity   Share of Searches (%)
Dec-08     Jan-09    Point Change
Jan-09 vs. Dec-08
Total Core Search      100.0      100.0     N/A
Google Sites              63.5       63.0      -0.5
Yahoo! Sites              20.5       21.0       0.5
Microsoft Sites             8.3        8.5       0.2
AOL LLC                      3.8        3.9       0.1
Ask Network                3.9        3.7      -0.2
Source: comScore qSearch 2.0

The only thing more certain than unemployment these days is taxes. The top-gaining category for unique visits was tax in January, according to comScore as users began to prepare for tax season. The category witnessed a 176% gain to 24.7 million visitors. Job Search, Government and travel-related sites also experienced strong gains. (Cynopsis 2/20)

comScore Top 10 Gaining Site Categories by % Change in Unique Visitors (U.S.)
January 2009 vs. December 2008
Total Unique Visitors (000)
Dec-08       Jan-09       % Change
Total Internet: Total Audience     190,650      191,863          1
Business/Finance – Taxes               8,935       24,703       176
Travel – Ground/Cruise                   8,942       13,028         46
Career Svs: Job Search                 18,826       26,702        42
Career Svs: Career Resources         38,911       48,900        26
Retail – Computer Software            30,186       37,545        24
News/Information – Politics            11,992       13,710        14
Travel – Hotels/Resorts                  26,671       29,976        12
Government                                 80,564       89,662        11
Travel – Online Travel Agents         35,565       38,973        10
Business/Finance – Online Trading   10,758       11,743         9
Source: comScore Media Metrix

A measure of the top 10 gaining properties year-over-year in Jan. pulled up two entertainment properties: Oprah.com, which recently launched its content on iTunes, and ABC.com, which has received quite a boost from the return of new episodes of Lost.  (Cynopsis 2/20)

comScore Top 10 Gaining Properties by % Change in Unique Visitors (U.S.)
January 2009 vs. December 2008
Total Unique Visitors (000)
Dec-08     Jan-09    % Change    Rank
by Uniques
Total Internet: Total Aud.    190,650    191,863      1        N/A
TaxACT                                  549        5,883   972       205
H&R Block                             1,611        6,073   277       196
IRS.GOV                               4,313      14,663   240      69
Intuit                                   6,139     16,172    163       60
Oprah.com                            2,539      5,077    100      232
Gamevance.com                    6,644     12,170     83        91
Usmagazine.com                    3,117      5,057     62        234
ABC.com                              5,496      8,760     59        126
ED.gov                                 4,469      7,080     58        163
Indeed                                 5,167      7,541     46        157
Source: comScore Media Metrix
Ranking based on the top 250 properties in January 2009.