• Column: New Media to Affect Broadcast Upfront
    The broadcast networks have a big problem, says the Hollywood Reporter's Diane Mermigas. The television upfront season, an advertising institution, is just six months away, but she says there is no way the networks can launch a new season with the kind of pricing and strategies used in the past. She says that this year, just to maintain last year's pricing and volume levels, the networks may have to throw in new media or a few extra product placements, as now more than ever the economics of the $18 billion network TV upfront is being scrutinized. Why? Because advertisers are …
  • BitTorrent, MPAA Reach Strange Agreement
    BitTorrent, an open-source software program that lets users swap files, has made a curious deal with the Motion Picture Association of America, saying it (BitTorrent ) will do its utmost to curb illegal file swapping on its Web site, specifically by removing pirated files from its search engine, according to Forbes.com. The curious part is that unlike Napster, which enabled such illegal file swapping through its central server, BitTorrent is just software that can be endlessly tweaked by its users, like different strains of the same flu. In other words, there's not much BitTorrent can do to enforce the promise …
  • Google Opens Door to Separate Bidding on Search, Contextual Pages
    For years, advertisers have been asking Google to let them bid separately for the contextual ads that appear on Google's publisher network, as opposed to those appearing on its search engine results. Now they can, reports ClickZ. Last week, Google quietly added "content bids" to its AdWords program for advertisers, which lets them bid more or less for content (ads running on its AdSense publisher network) than search. Many advertisers have had mixed responses to the effectiveness of their AdSense campaigns. Previously, when advertisers signed up for both search and contextual bid for keywords, they had no choice whether their …
  • Q3 Online Retail Sales Up 27 Percent
    Online retail sales hit $23.32 billion in the third quarter, up 26.7 percent from last year's third quarter, the Census Bureau of the U.S. Department of Commerce said. By comparison, total retail sales in the same period were up 8.5 percent, to $957.9 billion. Online retail sales now account for 2.3 percent of total sales, but the Commerce Department weighs this figure against all U.S. sales, including those that would never be performed online, such as gasoline and service station sales. Barring those types of sales, Internet Retailer says online's proportion would likely be 6 percent.
  • Craigslist Founder to Launch Community Journalism Project
    Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist, the Web site that has single-handedly revolutionized classified advertising in the U.S., is now setting his sights on a new market: journalism, reports The Guardian, a British paper. Speaking at an Oxford University forum, Newmark said he plans to bring his "wisdom of the masses" approach to his new journalism project, which is expected to launch in the next three months. Newmark said the project will use a similar ad model to the one deployed by Craigslist. Citing recent news scandals, Newmark said journalism has "lost the trust" of the public, because papers "are afraid …
  • Google Gives Froogle Local Touch
    Google has added a feature to its largely unsuccessful Froogle comparison shopping service that lets merchants provide local shopping information. Besides contact, location and mapping information, the service now also provides up-to-the-minute inventory updates, so users would know ahead of time if a retailer currently carries the item they're searching for. Google is licensing the inventory data from an unnamed third party. Executives and analysts agreed that the service would be useful for bulky items users would rather not have shipped to them. Local postings on the Froogle site will be free to retailers; Google plans to monetize the service …
  • AOL To Grow Portal User Base Through New Instant Messenger
    America Online is launching yet another new version of its popular AOL Instant Messenger application with a new, impressive-sounding name: AIM Triton. In the past, this wouldn't even have been worth a brief mention, but this time there are some serious improvements in the offing. Among them, voice-over-Internet Protocol functionality, an address book, and more and bigger links to AOL's Web pages and services such as AOL Radio. The company's strategy is to use the popular application, which has far greater penetration than AOL's Web portal itself, to drive more traffic to the company's other properties, thereby growing its audience …
  • Internet TV Start-Up Circumvents Cable, TV And Phone Companies
    Time Warner Inc.'s America Online and IAC/Interactive Corp. are two of the many big names lined up behind Brightcove, a new start-up developing Internet television technology. Brightcove's tools are interesting to investors because they give owners of movies, TV programs and other video content a way to sell directly to consumers on the Internet without having to go through cable, satellite or phone companies. Consumers either buy the content through subscriptions or by downloading. Brightcove also offers content owners ways to sell advertising and/or syndicate their content through revenue share agreements with other Web sites. As of today, Brightcove's major …
  • Gates Sees New Xbox As Home Media Center
    Anyone with a pulse knows that Microsoft's much-anticipated Xbox 360 game console debuts today, and most people will likely think nothing more of it than as something their kids will nag them about between now and the end of the holiday season. However, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates is expecting everyone to want to own one of these things--and not just because it plays pretty games. According to the Associated Press, Gates sees the Xbox 360 as the center of a strategy that will eventually tie in elements of Microsoft's new online initiative, Windows Live. For instance, Gates expects gamers from …
  • Sony BMG Sued for Bundling Software with CDs
    In separate lawsuits, Sony BMG has been sued by the Texas Attorney General and California's Electronic Frontier Foundation for embedding software in millions of its CDs that exposes users' computers to potential security risks. The company reportedly did this to limit music piracy, but bloggers discovered earlier this month the security threats the bundled software poses to computers. The copy-protection software was installed on 52 recordings, nearly 5 million discs. Sony BMG responded to the concerns with a public apology on its Web site last week, urging users to trade in their affected versions for free nonrestricted ones. The company …
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