PaidContent.org |
November 23rd, 2008 |
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Vivendi (EPA: VIV) SA has yet to decide whether it will keep its 20 percent stake in NBC Universal or exercise its annual option to sell, CEO Jean-Bernard Levy told analysts at a Morgan Stanley conference in Barcelona today. According to Bloomberg, Levy said: "Right now, considering the general expectations [...]
PaidContent.org |
November 23rd, 2008 |
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Now it's Hollywood's turn to feel the financial crunch, and it comes in the form of an even deeper slump in DVD sales. Stats compiled from studios themselves and independent media tracking services reflect a downward trend, NYT reports. And it has insiders like Amir Malin, a partner at media-focused [...]
PaidContent.org |
November 23rd, 2008 |
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The BBC has been blocked from beginning a £68 million ($101 million), four-year program to add video bulletins to its 65 local UK websites - a proposal that had been vigorously contested by concerned commercial publishers. After a five-month inquiry, the BBC Trust regulator said on Friday the plan would [...]
PaidContent.org |
November 11th, 2008 |
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Back in October we noted that Time Warner-owned Warner Bros. was still hopeful of reclaiming some lost ground in the broadband-rich-but-piracy-ridden Korean movie market by releasing films on demand two weeks before their DVD release, and this despite Sony, Paramount, Universal, Buena Vista and 20th Century Fox having shuttered domestic [...]
PaidContent.org |
November 10th, 2008 |
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Social media studio SpectrumDNA has acquired Revyver, a Seattle-based digital design firm. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Revyver will operate as the studio's subsidiary. SpectrumDNA was founded in 2006 by former Warner Bros. exec Jim Banister, and develops white-label and branded "enginets" (or custom websites, applications and [...]
Machinima.com, the Los Angeles-based online gaming site focusing on the Machinima genre, has received $3.85 million in capital from MK Capital and other private investors. The company's site allows users to showcase their machinima video, and says it serves about 30 million videos views per month. It has advertisers such [...]
Let's beat the bootleggers at their own game. That seems to be the sentiment at Warner Bros., as the studio has announced plans to make its movies available by VOD in China—becoming the first major Hollywood studio to do so. Warner Bros. has partnered with Beijing-based Union Voole Technology, a [...]
It is a bloody Monday in big media/Internet land, as layoffs, reorgs and senior exec moves continue: George Kliavkoff, the Chief Digital Officer at NBC Universal (NYSE: GE) and main brain behind conceiving and developing Hulu, is leaving the company. He will be there till the end of this year, [...]
ESPN.com is slated to get a major redesign this January, according to John Skipper, the sports networks' EVP of Content, speaking at ContentNext Media's EconSports conference. In a Q&A; with NYT TV sports and business reporter Richard Sandomir, Skipper said that the revamp will be video-centric, including a larger video [...]
In the opening panel at ContentNext Media's EconSports conference, moderator Will Leitch, founder of Gawker-owned sports news blog Deadspin, remembered the reaction among sports executives when they first saw his approach to covering sports. "They were surprised at how quickly we posted and the interaction with readers." Now, he added, [...]
Economist.com took a pass on the free-content phenomenon first time around - now, just as flares and yo-yos came back in to fashion, the publisher sees pay walls regaining popularity in an advertising downturn. The news mag's site already charges for stories over a year old and, publisher Paul Rossi [...]
Mobile vet Robert Tercek joins OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network as president of digital media. Tercek was CMO of mobile gaming firm MForma back in the day and before that was SVP-digital media at Sony Pictures Entertainment. Just prior to the OWN position, he was the co-founder of health and [...]
Fox Interactive Media (NYSE: NWS) is working with digital publishing company Lin TV to build up parent News Corp.'s local broadcast sites. So far, the FIM and Lin TV have launched two sites, for Rhode Island's www.wpri.com and Florida's www.fox10tv.com. Over the next few weeks, an unspecified number of other [...]
NBC Universal (NYSE: GE) finally has filled the top post at iVillage ... Jodi Kahn has resigned as president of global digital media for Readers Digest Association to join NBCU as EVP of the iVillage Network. She'll report to Lauren Zalaznick, president, NBC Universal Women and Lifestyle Entertainment Networks, replacing [...]
After offering a hint about its plans last month, female-centric Glam Media has released Brash, its new male-focused lifestyle and entertainment online hub. Brash is being targeted to men 18-49 years old and is beginning life with more than 25 sites including ArtistDirect, DigitalTrends.com, Squidoo and SpirlFrog. Samir Arora, Glam's [...]
When the economy really started heading downhill last year, the thinking was that the migration of ad budgets from traditional to digital would accelerate. Now, with pessimism settling in after another turbulent week in the financial markets, the doomsayers are turning to online. AdAge looks at the prospects of online [...]
Portfolio |
October 16th, 2008 |
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W., the man -- a.k.a. George W. Bush -- sees the world in black and white. W. the movie, Oliver Stone's two-hour-plus portrait of the 43rd president of the United States, paints things more in shades of gray. As for the movie's chances of box office success? If the muted [...]
Practically every other sentence uttered by Viacom President/CEO Philippe Dauman in a Q&A; at the day two of the Dow Jones/Nielsen Media and Money Conference featured the words "operating efficiently and prudently"—a fair indication of how dark the media economy is looking right now. Asked about his relationship with with [...]
The big question following the last few weeks following the enormous swings of the financial markets is this: how bad is it going to be? Michael Burgi, editor-in-chief of Mediaweek posed a number of depressing questions to a panel of media luminaries at the Dow Jones/Nielsen Media and Money Conference. [...]
NBC Universal (NYSE: GE) is widening the purview of its local TV stations' sites, even as it tries to downplay the sites' identities as broadcast extensions. The sites, which are being relaunched around station sites in nine cites, are being encouraged to develop their individuality and not have a uniform [...]
Even though Sony (NYSE: SNE), Paramount, Universal, Buena Vista and 20th Century Fox have all shuttered domestic operations in South Korea following years of sagging sales, Warner Bros. thinks it can reclaim some lost ground in the market by releasing films on demand two weeks before their DVD release. South [...]
