MySpace founders Chris De Wolfe and Tom Anderson plan to hold Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation hostage once their current contracts expire in October. According to the blog, the pair seeks $25 million over two years each, plus a development fund of $15 million to invest in Internet companies. Not that News Corp. is blinking. MySpace and its Fox Interactive Media siblings may be the key to the media giant's future, but it's also one of the cheapest companies on earth when it comes to executive compensation." However, the company is understood to have made a counter offer of …

The first round of iPhone reviews are in, and they're very good. The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Newsweek all like Apple's sleek new device, particularly the touch-screen. However, the biggest gripe, which again was almost unanimous, came down to AT&T's wireless network, described as "pokey" (meaning slow). That's right, 2G just doesn't cut it for something this cool, and hopefully the limitations AT&T's network imposes on the iPhone will be a call to reform in the larger wireless industry. Wireless industry execs like Verizon's John Harrobin, senior vice president, marketing and digital media, contend that …

The popular 3D satellite mapping program Google Earth continues to improve, as new features and locations are uploaded. Much of this is thanks to a volunteer army of amateur cartographers. Indeed, Google Earth just might be the ultimate wiki: a virtual Earth containing information about every business in every city, posting real-time links to stories in cities worldwide as they happen. Maybe even allowing buyers and sellers to conduct business. Advertisers' heads must be spinning. What if you could walk down the street, take a picture of a given building and instantly know everything about it -- as …

Apple's new mobile phone may be Wi-Fi enabled, but most hot spots are either pay-for or password protected, which means iPhone content will still mostly run on AT&T's 2G wireless network. If it's widely adopted, WiMax (worldwide interoperability for microwave access) technology could soon change the Internet and mobile wireless industries. Compared to DSL service and mobile carriers' 2 and even 3G networks, WiMax allows more data to travel faster over a much more expansive territory. Imagine having high-speed wireless Internet everywhere without needing to switch networks every few hundred feet. Sprint Nextel, having invested some $3 …

Google and Apple, whose stocks are hovering at all-time highs, have long been the darlings of the tech-heavy Nasdaq, partly because both companies have an uncanny ability to generate buzz. The operative word is cachet, and Apple at the moment trumps Google in that category. As Google struggles with privacy issues and mounting speculation over its "don't be evil" ethos, Apple hardly gets a bad word in the press. Its customers happily lap up its expensive products. In the last six months, Apple's stock has been riding the iPhone wave, starting with the January announcement at Macworld, followed by …

Social networking penetration is at a whopping 96% among those 9-17, according to Alloy Media & Marketing. That figure refers to teens who connect to a social network at least once a week--they even use them to connect with their parents in many cases. In fact, report author Samantha Skey encouraged parents to become engaged with and involved in social networking. "This generation of teens isn't embarrassed by" talking with their parents via networks; doing so would make them feel more "comfortable" about their teens using them. If there were a theme to the responses of those …

"Flying blind," says the biz mag, "is the unavoidable consequence of coming to terms with today's most important demographic group: the digital elite who are in the vanguard of a fast-emerging global youth culture." But the risk-reward is very high. Just ask Unilver's Axe deodorant, whose marketing team was quaking in its boots when it green-lighted the catchphrase "Bom Chicka Wah Wah" created by its agency BBH. That catchphrase was for a largely traditional media campaign; even trickier is the prospect of reaching the digital generation on its own turf: the Internet. Social networking and other Web 2.0 …

The iPhone may boast a dazzling array of new features--from wireless Internet to 8 gigs of music and photo storage--but it all comes with a price tag every bit as hefty as Sony's flopping PlayStation 3, the world's most powerful video game console. It also does not work on AT&T's faster 3G network, which will make Web browsing slower when consumers aren't connected to a Wi-Fi network. Kate Rockwood, 24, a graduate student at Northwestern University, wanted an iPhone, but won't be getting one, citing a desire for a faster network speed and a longer battery life. She's happy …

As Rupert Murdoch patiently awaits Dow Jones' decision about News Corp.'s takeover offer, analysts -- expecting that deal to happen -- estimate that the media giant would allocate the expected $5 billion to further Internet acquisitions. "Rupert has a shopping list. Dow Jones is at the top of it, but it's not the end of the list," a source told the Financial Times. Near the top of that list, perhaps, is a deal that would involve the sale or a possible merger of its massive social network MySpace. At an estimated value of $10 billion, some feel …

With the iPhone, Steve Jobs and Apple will take their second stab at reformatting an industry-mobile phone, which requires striking an even trickier balance between three distinct entities: wireless carriers, mobile phone makers, and increasingly, Hollywood. Apple enters the market as a handset maker in the unique position of having strong ties with Hollywood and Web content providers through its other consumer electronics devices. Because of this, the iPhone marks a significant power shift in the dynamics between the three disparate entities, uniting content owners and cell phone makers on one side, leaving big telecom on the other. …