Daily Marauder

ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA by Marauder

ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA

Twitter handles are fast becoming as desirable as buying domains and Tweexchange hopes to be a marketplace for Twitter members to exchange, buy or find Twitter usernames from other existing members. Tweexchange also lets you easily find what Twitter handles have been taken and recommends alternate usernames for your desired Twitter handle. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/01/tweexchange-is-the-ultimate-twitter-name-marketplace 5/1)

The White House finally got around to setting up a MySpace page. It is spare and tasteful and doesn’t say MySpace anywhere on the page, unlike the White House page on Facebook which is clearly a Facebook page. The page is dominated by the most recent White House blog post, which currently features a YouTube video of Obama shooting hoops with the UCONN Huskies women’s basketball champs. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/01/the-white-house-gets-a-myspace-page-to-show-off-obamas-hoop-skills 5/1)

It was the last part of the advertising sector to fall and may be the first to recover, but online advertising is now in a recession. With the four largest Web advertising companies (Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and AOL) having reported March quarter financials, we can get a pretty good sense of how the sector did as a whole. If you add up the online advertising revenues of these four online advertising bellwethers, the total online advertising revenues for the quarter came to $7.9 billion, a 2 percent decline from a year ago and a 7 percent decline from the fourth quarter. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/01/the-online-ad-recession-is-officially-here-first-quarterly-decline-in-revenues/ 5/1)

Hulu has just released the latest in its series of star-studded ads, this time featuring Dennis Leary in a spot called ‘The Leary Mission’. He plays an alien trying to turn humans’ brains to mush by watching TV online. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/01/new-hulu-spot-the-leary-mission 5/1)

CBS is now the lone Hulu holdout among the big four broadcast networks. CBS, which runs its own video site, TV.com, issued a statement following Disney’s announcement: “Controlling our own rights for [our] content — in all media — preserves its value.” (Iwantmedia 5/1, http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/230979-ANALYSIS_All_Eyes_on_CBS_Digital_Strategy.php 4/30)

Disney’s deal to put ABC television shows on Hulu suggests Google’s YouTube may have to rethink its revenue-sharing business model. Content creators may start seeking payments from Google. (Iwantmedia 5/1, http://www.smartmoney.com/news/ON/?story=ON-20090430-001097-1959 4/30)

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