Advertisers always seem to be the last to attend a new media party (usually just after Microsoft). The latest is on cell phones, where original video content is being produced and consumed, but is not (as yet) being supported by advertisers. Just two years after News Corp.'s Fox Mobile and Viacom's MTV Networks pioneered cell phone video programming, nearly every major film and television studio is working on projects. But look at the 2006 spending numbers for mobile phones: just $421 million according to research aggregator eMarketer. Compare that to broadcast TV's $48 billion slice of the ad …

The Wall Street Journal went back on its own report late Friday, saying that merger talks between Microsoft and Yahoo stalled after engaging the industry with such news earlier in the day. CNNMoney reports that any kind of Microsoft-Yahoo advertising deal would be enough to make industry leader Google sit up and take notice. However, three days after the announcement, various reports said Yahoo decided to pull out of the talks, and rightly so, according to some analysts. Despite a poor first quarter, some say Yahoo's Project Panama is still finding its legs, and a series of savvy …

The Microsoft-Yahoo talks reported by the New York Post on Friday actually took place several months ago. And while a deal might once again be on the backburner, Microsoft is in acquisition mode. company has already splashed out between $1 billion and $1.5 billion on acquisitions this year, including the voice recognition technology provider TellMe, which Bruce Jaffe, Microsoft's vice president of corporate development, says helped boost the company's average acquisition price to more than $60 million this year, underscoring its spending mood. Microsoft's track record of integrating its more than 150 purchases since 1990 is "spotty" at …

The English Premier League, the most prominent and powerful league in world soccer, headed a list of plaintiffs that filed suit against Google's YouTube on Friday for copyright infringement. Filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, the EPL and music publisher Bourne Co. jointly sued the online video provider, charging YouTube with deliberately making money from its copyrights by encouraging massive infringement on its Web site to generate traffic. Once again, Google, which is also being sued for copyright infringement by global media giant Viacom, is using the Digital Millenium Copyright Act …

Microsoft and Yahoo are once again exploring the idea of a merger in the hope that a combined company could stave off the mounting threat posed by Google. Last year, the two tech giants discussed a merger, but the talks went nowhere. What's different this time? For one thing, Google is becoming ever more powerful. For another, the in-house efforts of both Yahoo and Microsoft's MSN have fallen flat, in comparison to the strides made by the search giant. A management reshuffling at the top of both companies could pave the way for a new merger. Microsoft's …

Once again Vonage Holdings Corp. has been denied. This time, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington denied the VoIP provider a request for a new trial in its patent infringement case against telecom giant Verizon Communications. In the wake of a recent Supreme Court ruling, the company asked to have a jury finding that Vonage had infringed on three Verizon patents overthrown, which would have sent the case back to a lower court. The company based its request on an April 30 Supreme Court ruling that Vonage claimed renders the Verizon patents invalid. The …

On Wednesday, music execs speaking at an industry conference said removing DRM isn't high on their priority list. Michael Nash, Warner's senior vice president of digital strategy and business development, said the music industry shouldn't back down from the fight to protect its content just because the music industry is being bombarded digital by piracy. Nash said: "The music industry simply has to solve the content security problem or risk the obsolescence of its business model." Thomas Hesse, Sony BMG's president of global digital business added: "We don't want the whole world to be a college dorm. Because …

Mobile phone users rejoice -- the future of wireless communication is here and it could (potentially) be cheap. According to various reports, T-Mobile is set to test a new service that allows a mobile phone to seamlessly switch between mobile wireless signals transmitted from cell towers to Wi-Fi networks, thereby saving cell phone minutes. Wi-Fi networks would also lighten the load placed on cell networks for data storage and transmission, meaning increased bandwidth for media streaming and Web surfing on phones. However, the test service costs $20 a month in addition to what users pay for their regular service …

On the Web, majority rules. Just ask Digg, the community news-sharing site, which faced a huge user backlash after the company banned a 24-year-old programmer who posted a code showing tech-savvy users how to illegally copy high-definition DVDs. The programmer re-registered and then re-posted the code on Digg, where it was seen by hundreds of thousands of Digg users and let thousands proclaim their right to free speech. Soon, the code covered Digg's homepage. As the offending programmer wrote: "If the majority decides something is true, then it's the truth." Legally speaking, Digg's decision to eventually let the …

Yahoo, the world's second-largest supplier of instant messaging after Time Warner's AOL, said it would start offering a Web-based version of its IM client, rather than requiring users to download software. The move would grant Yahoo access to the tens of millions of consumers who use computers at Internet cafés across the globe. The decision is appealing to students, travelers, business pros and millions of international users who don't own personal computers. In India, for example, some 46% of the population accesses the Web via Internet cafés. "Too many people have been restricted from benefiting from this type …