Media Life Web Shorts May 31, 2007
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , trackback Apple TV gets sweeter with new YouTube deal
Couch potatoes could soon be watching Ask A Ninja and lonelygirl15 in wide screen. Apple said yesterday it plans to stream YouTube videos from the internet through its Apple TV set-top box to home televisions starting in mid-June. Right now only movies, television shows, music and other media saved onto the wireless set can be shown. The move comes after reportedly sluggish initial sales for Apple TV, which was introduced earlier this year. However, it’s unclear how Apple will contend with a $1 billion lawsuit that Viacom has thrown at video sharing site YouTube, which is owned by Google. Viacom, which owns MTV Networks, sued after finding that thousands of Viacom-owned movies had been uploaded to the file-sharing site without permission. Apple also said yesterday it will be selling Apple TV systems with 160 gigabyte drives, four times more than the original system.
Webcasters file stay in latest e-radio rights skirmish
Internet radio is not going down without a fight. Yesterday the U.S. Digital Media Association, National Public Radio and the association of Small Commercial Webcasters filed an emergency stay in the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., to stop the royalty rate increases scheduled to take effect July 15 that they claim will force some webcasters offline. In March the Copyright Royalty Board retroactively increased royalty rates for webcasters in 2006 starting at $0.0008 per song and rising to $0.0019 per song by 2010. The webcasters say the rate hikes represent a 300 percent cost increase for the biggest companies and up to a 1,200 percent increase for the smallest operators. Internet radio operators hope the stay will buy time for legislation introduced to Congress in April that would reverse the CRB decision. But copyright holders say the bill would result in a windfall of more than $50 million going to webcasters instead of U.S. recording artists, according to SoundExchange, an organization that collects performance royalties for copyright owners.
Study: Movie watching via computers is growing
The big screen is, more than ever, moving to the small screen, and it’s the small screen on top of the keyboard that’s getting a major increase in cinematic play. According to a new study from Solutions Research Group, 47 percent of American PC users have watched a DVD on their computers, a jump from 29 percent who had done so back in October of 2006. The study also found that 15 percent of Americans had downloaded a full-length film in the last month, up from 11 percent in October. Moreover, 66 percent of respondents agreed with the statement “one day all movies will be available to download at the click of a mouse,” while only 15 percent disagreed. Still, a majority of consumers are either still not aware of what offerings they can find online or not ready to partake: only 30 percent said they had visited iTunes’ movie download section, 10 percent Amazon’s movie downloads, and 8 percent had been to walmart.com’s movie download area.
Ming dynasty: Yao drives foreign NBA.com traffic
He’s a big star in more ways than one. People in China and around Asia are flocking to NBA.com to follow the career of 7-foot, 6-inch Houston Rockets center Yao Ming. According to new numbers from comScore, the online measurement company, 12.4 million visitors from around the world visited the site last month, with 36.6 percent from Asia Pacific. That was second to North America at 46 percent. While Americans ranked as the top visitors at almost 4.8 million, Chinese fans accounted for the largest number of international visitors, with 2.8 million, or 22.8 percent of visits. Canada came third with 928,000 or 7.5 percent. Europe accounted for almost 1.5 million visitors, or 11.7 percent of share. “The combination of strong global marketing efforts and the influx of several highly marketable international stars – such as [German player] Dirk Nowitski and Yao Ming – has succeeded in building awareness of the NBA brand across the world,” said Bob Ivins, managing director of comScore Europe, in a statement.
Political networking: MySpace’s fundraising tool
This time around, the internet has become far more important for presidential candidates than ever before. Now MySpace is making moves to make it even more so. The company, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., has created a viral tool that will allow candidates to raise money through MySpace, according to the Financial Times. What’s more, the tool could also be used to track how much money is being donated to each candidate through the social network. So far, despite the fact that the tool can track donations, it hasn’t been decided whether that capability will be used, according to reports. It also remains to be seen just how much money will be plonked down for the candidates through MySpace – each person will be able to donate no more than $500 through the site.
One last big push for Anheuser-Busch’s Bud.TV
Anheuser-Busch isn’t quite ready to give up on Bud.TV, contrary to prior reports. The company’s online network aimed at young men who drink beer and spend a lot of time online is being revamped with a social networking area and shorter video content. The changes come a week after the company indicated that it had given up on the site, on which it spent loads of money but saw traffic drop off quickly. “The Joe Buck Show,” for example, which showed the Fox Sports play-by-play man interviewing celebrities in taxis, will likely be scrapped in favor of one-minute shorts. The site will also draw on content from other web sites and distribute its own on video-sharing sites like YouTube. To this point, Bud.TV has featured more than 2,000 minutes of original programming and cost the brewer $15 million. But traffic to the site dropped 40 percent in March, according to comScore, and declined even further in April. A-B has blamed some of the slow traffic on a complicated admittance system designed to weed out surfers under age 21.
G-strung: Web site suspends Buddha undies sales
How does Buddha look on a G-string? To many Thais, not very good. California-based online seller CafePress.com has removed G-strings and dog T-shirts with pictures of Buddha on them after receiving protests from the mostly Buddhist nation of Thailand. “It is a good thing they understand our sensitivity,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Piriya Khempon told Reuters, which originally reported the story. CafePress’ tag line at its site is “Shop, sell or create what’s on your mind.” Other religious and potentially irreverent items there include a host of T-shirts, beer mugs and teddy bears sporting mantras like “when you get raptured I’m taking all your stuff” and “karma happens.”
Britney bares all (emotionally) in latest web posting
Ever wonder what led Britney Spears to chop off her locks and do impersonations of Sharon Stone in “Basic Instinct?” She’s trying to explain. In a note posted yesterday on her web site, Spears says she was in shock following her divorce last year and “was like a bad kid running around with ADD.” The 25-year-old mother of two filed for divorce from Kevin Federline in November before hitting the party scene, shaving her head and checking into rehab, which she described as “a very humbling place.” “I truly hit rock bottom,” Spears added. The pop star goes on to say people around her were trying to control and take advantage of her. “They knew I was beginning to use my brain for a change and cut some ties, so they wanted to be in more control of my life than me,” she said. However, Spears appears to be unrepentant about her partying. “I think it is actually normal for a yo
ung girl to go out after a huge divorce.”
Comments»
no comments yet - be the first?