Posts on Media  

David Card | September 05, 2008, 04:57 PM
A Good First Take on Shoe Circus
Anybody who reviews Crispin Porter + Bogusky's BillG/Seinfeld campaign after seeing only the first chapter is asking for trouble. That said, this is the most insightful review I've seen yet, courtesy Andrew Frank of Gartner. Gawrsh, I bet I'm not allowed to mention them anymore......( more )

David Card | September 04, 2008, 12:47 PM
Wieden + Kennedy at Inverge
Wieden + Kennedy's director of digital strategies, Renny Gleeson, gave a very entertaining preso at Inverge on brand marketing in the interactive social world -- bedecked in rolled jeans and red sneakers with lime-green soles (you were expecting dress casual, maybe?) -- but one that raised more questions than answers....( more )

David Card | September 04, 2008, 09:57 AM
Social Everything?
Met with a handful of clients and prospects yesterday in Seattle. During one pretty free-form conversation with Classmates -- one of the few companies that has pulled off paid consumer content online -- the discussion ran along the lines of, if the Internet was a connection layer, and HTML etc....( more )

David Card | September 04, 2008, 09:53 AM
Invergence?
I'm at the Inverge conference in Portland for the next couple days. I'll post about cool stuff....( more )

Barry Parr | September 03, 2008, 07:05 PM
No comment? No problem.
I love Matt Haughey's thoughtful post on the differences between comments on blogs in 2008 and those back in the day (five years ago). But I think the root of the problem (described in various media outlets over the past year or so) of snarky, or mean-spirited, or generally unhelpful...( more )

Barry Parr | September 02, 2008, 02:17 PM
Google Chrome: Paging Dr. McLuhan
It wasn't the feature set of Google's Chrome browser that got me excited, nor was it opening yet another strategic front in Google's cold war with Microsoft. Nor was it the comic book by Scott McCloud, although that's really cool. Lately, my mind has been on Javascript. For most of...( more )

David Card | September 01, 2008, 09:09 PM
Google Browser: Told Ya!
Google will do a browser after all. As predicted. A few times. (Is that better or worse?) Old Jupiter report on what makes Google tick, that seems to still work pretty often. Yes, it's about platforms again. And about using APIs to control developers, and user interfaces to lock in...( more )

David Card | August 31, 2008, 01:07 PM
Come Next Election, More Than "Entirely Possible"
I rarely quote Frank Rich. But think about this for a few minutes: YouTube, the medium that has transformed our culture and politics, didn’t exist four years ago. Four years from now, it’s entirely possible that some, even many, of the newspapers and magazines covering this campaign won’t exist in...( more )

Thomas Husson | August 28, 2008, 05:34 PM
Mobile Social Networking
o2 & MySpace or Orange & Bebo were among the most striking deals between European mobile operators and online social networking sites in 2007. Many have followed since then and a bunch of mobile-only players are also claiming to have great audiences. Handset manufacturers have also embraced the trend and...( more )

David Card | August 28, 2008, 10:52 AM
Going Green, Embracing the Groundswell, etc, First Take
Emily calls it going corporate. Jeremiah calls it a mash-up. Irregahdless, as I think they say in Southie, what it means is putting together the two best teams in social media-marketing-computing research. And you know, even to this old cynic, it's already feeling like a team. (That whole Cambridge-Manhattan thing...( more )

Mark Mulligan | August 26, 2008, 10:36 AM
What I Want From Apple
It’s been pretty quiet for some time now regarding iPod and iTunes rumours. All Apple buzz has been around the iPhone. So add that dynamic to us being smack in the middle of the silly season and it makes sense that rumours are finally beginning to bubble up, principally around...( more )

David Card | August 22, 2008, 08:56 PM
What Needs to be Covered at the Olympics
D@mn, how did I miss this? I am now a fan of Icelandic handball, regardless of whether handball should be an Olympic sport or not. First, we have sharks and Brennivin: The seafood-related alcohol beverage. "When we eat the shark we drink this Brennivin," Sigfus Sigurdsson said, referring to the...( more )

David Card | August 14, 2008, 10:36 PM
What th-? Part II
Uh, why does the FiOS installation guy in the TV ad hold a Kindle posing as a digital notepad? Stoopid product placement? Hints at future products? In-joke? Or just ad hoc substitution by a prop guy?...( more )

David Card | August 14, 2008, 10:22 PM
What th-?
Potter fans are not amused. The sixth Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, originally scheduled for a November 21 release, has now been moved to July 17, 2009 in the US and major international markets Warners claims it's because the writers' strike threw off the skeds for...( more )

David Card | August 14, 2008, 01:57 PM
Efficiency, Hollywood Style
I guess if you already know a movie script is going to be crappy and require dozens of re-writes from multiple teams of writers who don't talk to each other, it makes sense to get to it earlier rather than later: "We all want this movie to go into production...( more )

David Card | August 14, 2008, 08:24 AM
Play Ball!
Must-read interview in the Journal with MLB.com ceo Bob Bowman. On the state of mobile sports content for now: People don't look at their phone for very long. It's about 30 seconds. And that's how people are used to enjoying non-voice content on their wireless devices. For a live baseball...( more )

Mark Mulligan | August 12, 2008, 09:06 AM
Napster' Subs Down
Things are not looking good for music subscriptions at the moment. Recently Real announced a just one percent growth in their subscription revenues and now Napster have announce that it has lost 52,000 subscribers in Q2 compared to Q1. Added to that (according to their latest 10-Q SEC filing) quarterly...( more )

David Card | August 12, 2008, 08:01 AM
Paper Planes and Pineapples
This morning, M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes," previously a non-hit from a year-old album, was (still) number two on the iTunes singles list. (Not on Amazon.) It's featured in the trailer for the stoner flick "Pineapple Express." Whatever it takes. Five years ago, fans would have had a hard time buying a...( more )

David Card | August 11, 2008, 10:14 AM
Social Segmentation, Part XIII
I'm not sure more is better when it comes to creating customer segmentation analysis based on social media activities and attitudes. Still, the virtual discussion is fruitful, and it makes me think about demographics vs. psychographics vs. generational schemes. And to wonder how much the models we create now will...( more )

David Card | August 11, 2008, 07:34 AM
Is Google a Media Company?
The NY Times asks, "Is Google a Media Company?" Of course it is. It makes its money from advertising. The Times is actually asking a deeper question about Google's own properties competing with more traditional online media for your eyeballs and time, and what its role as the dominant search...( more )

David Card | August 06, 2008, 08:52 AM
Q2 Online Advertising Scoreboard
For those of you keeping score, a roundup of Q2 online ad revenues: - Google. Own sites up 42% to $3.5 billion. Network up 22% to $1.7 billion. International outgrew US and is over half of Google's total for the first time. - Yahoo. Own sites up 14% to $1...( more )

Mark Mulligan | August 05, 2008, 03:06 PM
Another Nail in the Coffin of Cross-Media Synergy?
Sony are buying out Bertelsmann’s share of their SonyBMG joint venture for $1.2bn (that’s roughly two MySpace’s). These are clearly challenging times for the music industry but this is as much about Bertelsmann’s efforts to refocus its strategy, steadily unraveling the media megalith created during the cross-media-synergy years of former...( more )

David Card | August 04, 2008, 10:38 AM
Buckcherry Fans Won't Get Fooled Again?
My favorite MSM finally addresses a story that's a couple weeks old. But at least it manages to get the words "credibility" and "Buckcherry" in the same sentence, something I would have thought challenging. For better ways to market to your fans than leaking songs to "piracy" sites, see these...( more )

David Card | July 31, 2008, 09:36 PM
Welcome, Forrester. Seriously
Eh, seems I've used this gag before....( more )

David Card | July 30, 2008, 07:43 PM
Jim Thistle
A good teacher for me, and a talented TV news guy, as anybody who lives in NYC, LA, or SF, and has compared their pitiful offerings to Boston TV news, knows....( more )

Thomas Husson | July 30, 2008, 06:16 AM
Golden Frequencies - another good signal for telecom players
During my holiday break, the report from my colleague Laurence Meyer has been published: Terrestrial TV and the Digital Dividend: Assessing the Role of High Definition in the DTT Market. See here. Following my previous post, no political decision has been made yet in France. According to an interesting article...( more )

David Card | July 29, 2008, 11:23 PM
End-of-Tunnel Lights in Redmond?
If this is real, it's just what they need. There may be life in the old dog yet. Now buy Yahoo. Or Facebook. Microsoft is incubating a componentized non-Windows operating system known as Midori, which is being architected from the ground up to tackle challenges that Redmond has determined cannot...( more )

David Schatsky | July 29, 2008, 11:22 AM
Who Cares If We're Getting Dumber?
As consumers spend more time with the Internet they are spending less time with books. {Clients can see some recent Jupiter work on media consumption trends here.) Some observers are worried. Motoko Rich had a great piece in the New York Times over the weekend that looked at the impact...( more )

Mark Mulligan | July 28, 2008, 08:45 AM
When I Was a Lad…
This isn’t my ‘thing’ but she clearly has strong mix of songwriting talent, vocal quality and musicianship. She’s rough round the edges and is far from the finished article, but nothing the nurturing of a record label wouldn’t solve. Why am I posting this? Just to illustrate the power of...( more )

David Card | July 28, 2008, 08:29 AM
Who's a Pepper?
I'm a Dr Pepper fan -- yes, it does taste a little like prune juice -- but I suspect this comment's meant to be as ironic as the new ad campaign: The study's findings resolved a conundrum for Dr Pepper Snapple Group, the Plano, Texas-based company behind the soda. "How...( more )

David Card | July 24, 2008, 06:48 PM
Puzzled by Mister Softee and Zuckerbook
Okay, re-upping with Facebook is good (certainly, Facebook itself is clueless about how to make money advertising), and adding search is extra spice. But Google's whining about its MySpace deal because it can't monetize search on a social network. The key to social network marketing is branding marketing, not direct...( more )

David Card | July 23, 2008, 08:38 PM
NY Times iPhone App cont'd
I still like it, but bunches of sections don't actually update. Including "Technology" it seems. How can that possibly be the case?...( more )

David Card | July 22, 2008, 09:47 AM
Not *That* Big a Fan....
I'd say over the years Jupiter has been as bullish as anybody on subscription-based on-demand music services, but we're still pretty conservative in our forecasts ($235M in 07 going to, um, maybe $600M in 2012) and analysis, and we may be even more so this year as the number of...( more )

David Card | July 22, 2008, 09:04 AM
Would You Like Fries with Your News?
Eh, whatever it takes, I guess. Two cups of McDonald’s iced coffee (BUY!) sit on the Fox 5 TV news desk, a punch-you-in-the-face product placement (BUY!) to chase down your morning news. I chuckled more at the Las Vegas Sun's coverage than at the NY Times'. But the Times revealed...( more )

David Card | July 22, 2008, 08:47 AM
"I Don't Have SpongeBob. I Have SquishyGuy."
Guess who's side I'm on in this one? That's not a mashup, or commentary, it's thievery ;-> Sue the b@stards! Leslie Ann Hooker, a Fort Lauderdale costume-company owner, thought she had found a way to run her business without running into trouble. "I try to make my costumes look 40%...( more )

David Card | July 21, 2008, 07:40 PM
NYTimes' iPhone App Does the Job
Thanks to a tip from former Jup, Joe Wilcox, I am now addicted to the New York Times app for the iPhone. Nice clean interface, default tabs include Business and Opinions (wise choices), and....it comes with ads. That you can click through! Wow, this whole mobile marketing thing just might...( more )

David Card | July 16, 2008, 05:08 PM
MTV Soundtrack: Lots of Experiments Going On Here
I'm still trying to get my mind around MTV's Soundtrack, in alpha as of today. It's a site that will try to blend artist and fan communities (with some social networking features from Flux) with editorial content and listening and discovery and, well, you see what I mean. For one...( more )

David Card | July 15, 2008, 09:09 PM
Gratuitous Plug for Possibly Dying Sport
This has nothing to do with anything, except that: a) my Mom's a Canajun, and my dad was raised in T'ronta b) my sportswriter buddy assures me hockey players really are regular guys, which makes them a pleasant contrast to the other Big Jocks of Pro Sports: Quoting Sports Illustrated's...( more )

David Card | July 14, 2008, 12:39 PM
Rhinos and Wolves
I have been known to say the TV industry is a little more "disciplined" - code word for less ego-driven - than movies or music. I should have known better. Must-read blow-by-blow story in the Journal of NBC's and Dick Wolf's squabbles over licensing Law & Order. "...He is a...( more )

David Card | July 10, 2008, 10:16 AM
Premature Death-Reporting?
“He said, ‘If you have old media, you should sell,’” according to one attendee, who spoke anonymously because the sessions are off-the-record. “If you own newspapers, sell. If you own TV stations, sell. If you own a movie studio, sell.” If you own a social media start-up that isn't Facebook,...( more )

David Card | July 10, 2008, 09:00 AM
Fashion Froward
Not sure I'm ready for this: Changing hemlines have long been a hallmark of women's fashion. But this summer, it's men's hems that are rising. Brooks Brothers has raised pant hems about half an inch in its top-of-the-line Golden Fleece suits and is leaning toward a slightly shorter pant length...( more )

IanFogg | July 09, 2008, 11:18 AM
Enter Our Research Survey on HDTV, VoD
The TV industry is being transformed by multiple trends: consumers embracing high definition; Internet TV viewing; IPTV roll outs; TV catch-up and other on demand services becoming increasingly mainstream. Jupiter is conducting its annual TV Executive Survey for the European Digital Home Service. If you work for a broadcaster, a...( more )

David Card | July 09, 2008, 09:18 AM
Getty and Flickr: Sounds Good; Details Sketchy
Flickr and Getty Images are definitely two great brands that should go great together, but it was pretty difficult getting any details out of the two when they briefed me the other day. Under the arrangement -- money does change hands but no one's talking -- Getty editors will pore...( more )

David Card | July 09, 2008, 08:22 AM
MSM Google Backlash Continues
Gee, first it was a juicy daycare mini-scandal, now the Journal shows just how screwed up Google's YouTube ad efforts are. Hint, fixing ad operations was codenamed "project spaghetti." Chinks in the armor? From a Jupiter report on Competing with YouTube. According to consumers, YouTube excels across all criteria, including...( more )

David Card | July 08, 2008, 09:31 PM
Sign of the Apocalypse?
Unless I'm mistaken, that's a decidedly lukewarm review of the iPhone 3G from Uncle Walt....( more )

David Card | July 08, 2008, 11:08 AM
Now *That's* Authentic
Quoting the Times story on brand-supported music: Caress, the body-care line owned by Unilever, commissioned the Pussycat Dolls singer Nicole Scherzinger to record a version of Duran Duran’s “Rio” that it gave away on its Web site to promote its “Brazilian body wash” product. Just think: a manufactured artist doing...( more )

David Card | July 04, 2008, 09:56 AM
Happy 232nd
This year's patriotic plug, even it disparages a few Virginians. Happy Fourth. Throw another burger on the grill for me....( more )

David Card | July 03, 2008, 07:22 PM
Era-Ender?
The more I think about it, the less this is like "slip-sliding into a recession" than "End of an Era." Starbucks Corp. on Tuesday effectively ended its era of blanket expansion by saying it will close 500 more locations in the U.S. and cut 7% of its work force. Starbucks...( more )

David Card | July 03, 2008, 07:04 PM
Nostalgic Fourth
What they do in my hometown on the Fourth....( more )

Mark Mulligan | July 03, 2008, 06:15 PM
Viacom Taking Lessons from the RIAA?
The BBC reports that a court has just ruled that Google hand over details of every video ever watched on YouTube to Viacom. Yes , you read correctly, every video ever watched. But most importantly details of every viewer (including IP addresses) are also to be handed over. Viacom’s dispute...( more )

David Card | July 03, 2008, 08:34 AM
No Mas, Por Favor
I got a Verizon LG ad on my MyYahoo page this morning. In Spanish. Rest assured that, though I have lived in California, in classic dumb amuhrican mode, I do not speak Spanish. Yahoos, you're going to have to prove you target a little better if you're going to get...( more )

David Card | July 03, 2008, 08:12 AM
Promoting Baseball the Old-Fashioned Way
I really like the creative for the subway advertising campaign that's running in support of baseball's All-Star Game, which is in Yankee Stadium this year. I wish I could link to it, but I can't find any online references, even after searching pretty hard. Modell's, Nike, and the MLB seem...( more )

Mark Mulligan | July 02, 2008, 04:39 PM
And then there were three
Warner Music have announced that they are licensing to Comes With Music. So now just EMI remains out in the cold but they have publicly indicated that they will join. So next step for Nokia is a decent selection of indies. One would hope that they’re talking to Merlin to...( more )

David Card | July 02, 2008, 03:23 PM
Best Wishes, Charlene
Best wishes to rival fellow analyst Charlene Li on her new adventures. Even if they do call it "social computing" -- bleah -- in Cambridge.......( more )

David Card | July 02, 2008, 08:49 AM
More Tail-Wagging
The Journal's Lee Gomes goes after the long tail again, aided by a Harvard Business Review article. Wired's long-tail hypemeister Chris Anderson responds, and a little more. To paraphrase myself from some Jupiter research, it's not saying much to acknowledge there are long-tail markets. Rather, you have to prove: -...( more )

David Card | July 01, 2008, 06:01 PM
Can TiVo Save TeeVee?
TiVo as the savior of the television business, rather than the scourge? (Of advertising, that is, see Figure 2) You know, I almost buy it. Sourced from Alley Insider. We have an updated DVR forecast for clients (25% US household penetration going to 38% in five years - in line...( more )

David Card | June 30, 2008, 11:08 AM
Rhapsody's Trio of Announcements
Rhapsody's offering DRM-free MP3s in its store, launching Rhapsody for Verizon, and trying to re-ignite a syndication strategy that has fizzled so far. I wish Rhapsody would be more aggressive with ad-supported initiatives, but "the economics are challenging," according to Rhapsody execs. DRM-free paid music downloads are inevitable, and just...( more )

Barry Parr | June 27, 2008, 08:46 PM
I'm ready to own a top-level domain
Way back in 2002, I blogged "Let a thousand top-level domains bloom". How about a million? A billion? ICANN wants to allow anyone with the gumption and the tech chops to own their own top-level domain. When we end the artificial scarcity of domain names, we'll end the artificially high...( more )

David Card | June 24, 2008, 08:27 AM
Who'll Measure the Measurers?
What's wrong with this picture? The largest seller of online advertising apparently wants to be the go-to source for measurement data whose primary purpose is to sell advertising. Great job if you can get it....( more )

David Card | June 18, 2008, 11:20 PM
Oprah's Not the Only Hit-Maker in Books
Apparently, Amazon rocks, too. First-time fiction authors are lucky if their publisher orders an initial print run of 15,000 copies. But in a sign of Amazon.com Inc.'s growing clout with readers, a debut novel championed by the e-commerce site has gone into its seventh printing -- a total of 90,000...( more )

Barry Parr | June 18, 2008, 07:38 PM
I was too easy on the AP
The Associated Press's "Don't quote us" policy is worse than I feared. Not only are they employing DMCA takedown notices against clear cases of Fair Use and requiring payments for quoting as few as five words -- their proposed licensing agreement has an anti-disparagement clause: You shall not use the...( more )

Mark Mulligan | June 17, 2008, 04:34 PM
What next for EMI?
Over the last week I’ve had half a dozen different press calls about various different EMI stories, so I thought it was a good time as ever to reflect a little on the embattled label. Since Terra Firma’s take over EMI has been the source of many stories ranging from...( more )

David Card | June 17, 2008, 09:45 AM
The Continuing Saga of the Tween Hit Machine
There are always a few gems in the story whenever the Journal writes about Disney's kids talent factory. "We can't stockpile this type of talent because of their ages..." - Gary Marsh, president, entertainment, Disney Channel Worldwide If only they could freeze, or clone them! Disney officials say that their...( more )

Barry Parr | June 16, 2008, 05:01 PM
The AP's customers deserve better
I was surprised to find myself mildly sympathetic to the AP's desire to keep bloggers from quoting from its stories. After all, unlike just about every other media organization on the planet, the AP doesn't have a web business to promote. The distribution of AP stories to its clients is...( more )

Thomas Husson | June 16, 2008, 10:20 AM
Green Porno
Green porno represents an experiment in storytelling for digital platforms according to the Sundance website. These short series about sex life of insects (?) have been specifically designed for the small screen. Not a joke at all. Budget of 70,000 $. Conceived, written, directed by and featuring Isabelle Rossellini. Bought...( more )

David Card | June 15, 2008, 03:58 PM
More Fun with Contextual Ads, Social Networks Edition
By now, everyone has their favorite contextual ad goof-up story. But this one might shed some light on why Google remains disappointed so far with its MySpace ad-serving deal. "Buy the Prisoner" says the ad atop my page (along with two ring tone ads that pull from my favorite bands...( more )

David Card | June 12, 2008, 11:53 PM
Dear Steve
(Ballmer, that is, not Jobs): Buy Facebook. They come with some baggage. But you've been smacked....( more )

David Card | June 12, 2008, 07:09 PM
How Ya Gonna Stop Google Now, Part Whatever
Now that Yahoo's going to make more money by showing lots more Google paid search ads on its own search results pages and Microsoft said it doesn't want all of Yahoo, but is still open to part, we get a partial answer to How Ya Gonna Stop Google Now -...( more )

David Card | June 10, 2008, 08:05 AM
Minimal Value-Add iPhone Post
So it seems like Apple won't change the basic value chain for mobile phones after all. By moving back to a straight, up-front subsidy from the carriers, rather than a services revenue sharing arrangement, Apple is saying the iPhone is going to play by the same rules as everybody else....( more )

David Card | June 09, 2008, 09:02 AM
NY Times Shows Spin Mastered Video
I'm a guy who's pretty comfortable with product placement, and pretty hard on bloated news organizations. But I'm a little anxious about this story in the NY Times on promoting a hot new toy -- Bakugan Battle Brawlers -- via old fashioned roadshows. The story comes complete with photos and...( more )

Mark Mulligan | June 09, 2008, 08:37 AM
Step Against The Tide
In an apparently counter-zeitgeist move Warner Music have announced that they’re pulling their content from Last.FM’s ad-supported on demand music service. Wired ponders whether this be part of a negotiating tactic by WMG with a view to securing an equity stake. This probably isn’t too far off the money. This...( more )

Thomas Husson | June 06, 2008, 04:23 PM
Where will you watch the Euro 2008?
on such a screen? I was ironic about it 2 years ago at the time of the World Cup. Tomorrow, the European football cup will start and last until the end of June. Several operators will try to leverage the event to launch DVB-H. This is the case for...( more )

David Card | June 05, 2008, 09:05 AM
Spoken Like a True Media Mogul
Why Microsoft ceo Steve Ballmer wants to dominate online advertising: "...I have to admit that I'm annoyed by the four 20 seconds [of ads], but not annoyed enough to pay a buck . . . I think at the end of the day most people say, "Heck, if I can...( more )

David Card | June 02, 2008, 09:18 AM
Umm, That'd Be "Women," Not "Girls"
Somebody explain to me how David Carr at the New York Times can write about women's sites under the headline "Slumber Parties Go Digital"?...( more )

David Card | May 30, 2008, 10:08 AM
Probably Science Fiction?
From Michael Crichton conversation with Slate's Jack Shafer: "I want a news service that tells me what no one knows but is true nonetheless," he says. 15 years ago, Crichton predicted the death of mass media, to be replaced by some kind of fee-based infobot or something. Shafer thinks he's...( more )

David Card | May 29, 2008, 07:21 PM
No Way to Build an Operating System
This is no way to build an operating system. Microsoft Watch opines, based on the D6 conference stage show: Windows 7 will ship in 2009, almost certainly in time for holiday PCs. Microsoft disclosed today that there would be no major architectural changes from Vista, which would greatly reduce development...( more )

David Card | May 29, 2008, 07:20 PM
No Way to Build a Media Brand
This is no way to build a media brand. The CW has farmed out its Sunday night to Media Rights Capital, and this is the line-up. I'm sympathetic with the challenges of programming a second-tier broadcast net against Sunday night football, whatever HBO's top gun is in any given season,...( more )

David Card | May 28, 2008, 11:44 AM
Google Hearts Mobile Marketing
Der chief Google lurves der mobile. More than video or social media, apparently. I'm not so sure about this: FAZ: What about video and display advertising? Eric Schmidt: A lot of opportunities are in video and display. But there are things where you can do ads on, but some things...( more )

David Card | May 25, 2008, 10:26 AM
Dubious Data Point for Predicting Box Office Performance
Yesterday, in line for an Indiana Jones showing in ten minutes, there were more people in front of me pre-buying for next week's Sex in the City debut, which was selling out, than for Indy. And they were a little embarrassed about it. This is probably a downtown Manhattan thing,...( more )

David Card | May 21, 2008, 05:57 PM
Some More Thoughts on Microsoft's Cashback Search
...courtesy Jupiter search lead analyst Evan Andrews: - Cluttered results pages are generally unsuccessful, and the user experience fairly involved, requiring substantial cashback discounts to entice - Microsoft risks alienating the affiliate marketing crowd – not to mention it will require many marketers to manage an entirely new channel, and...( more )

David Card | May 21, 2008, 01:41 PM
Live Search Cashback: It's Not Just About Rebates for Searchers
A lot of the coverage based on leaks focused on the user angle of Microsoft's new Live Search Cashback program, so I'll point out a few things from the marketer's perspective, as my NDA has lifted. Microsoft's pitch to paid listings marketers is that they can move from a cash...( more )

David Card | May 21, 2008, 09:35 AM
How Many Sr. Time Warner Execs Does It Take To...
Quoting the Journal, spinning off Time Warner Cable will: Not only will it make Time Warner more content-focused, it will free up management to find a long-term solution for the company's AOL Internet unit. Seriously, I doubt this is the case. I think they've had a few folks working on...( more )

David Card | May 20, 2008, 11:21 PM
Yahoo Microsoft Speculation: Stop the Madness
The speculation-o-meter's absurdity dial is on 11. According to SmartMoney columnist James Stewart, who should know better (Den of Thieves - good book, DisneyWar - not so much), writing in the Wall Street Journal: If Microsoft essentially buys all of Yahoo's ad business, both search and display, then it gets...( more )

Mark Mulligan | May 20, 2008, 11:26 AM
Napster Goes MP3, Well Sort of
Napster have announced the launch of a MP3 download store. What does it mean? 1 – Napster recognize the value of DRM free downloads as a means of differentiating from Apple (whom most of the majors are still holding their MPS catalogue from) 2 – It enables Napster to sell...( more )

David Card | May 19, 2008, 10:07 PM
C'mon, Steve, What Do You Really Want?
The speculation-o-meter just reached "absurd." Here's what Microsoft needs: - Critical-mass marketplace of ad buyers - Possibility to combine search marketplace, display marketplace, and direct premium ad sales, because Google can't do that - Many, many eyeballs to put its search technology and marketplace in front of - Potential critical-mass...( more )

David Card | May 16, 2008, 08:10 AM
Second-Day Thoughts on CBS-CNET
I'm not quite as bearish on CBS-CNET as colleague Barry Parr. Barry's critiques of CNET ring true -- they're a former leading online media innovator that still has some good content, but has fallen behind on many of the new trends in online media distribution and networking. And Barry says...( more )

Barry Parr | May 15, 2008, 04:43 PM
What CBS and CNET really need
CBS and CNET may be the worst possible partners for each other. Back in the late nineties, I worked at CNET. It was a pretty heady moment. The company seemed to be setting new standards and best practices every day. But now, CNET doesn't seem interested in setting the pace...( more )

David Card | May 14, 2008, 07:07 PM
Signs of the End of Western Civilization, Part CCC
From a PR email: "We’d love to see a post of it on your site for feature and/or preview. The show could best be described as “The Darwin Awards meets Faces of Death,” telling the true stories of actual deaths and recreating them through awesome comic-book style graphics, acting, CGI,...( more )

David Card | May 14, 2008, 01:25 PM
Online Ad Forecasting Poll
It's online ad forecasting season, and we really would like Jupiter clients input. The survey on our site is too small to be useful -- so I'm not posting any results except to say it looks mighty bullish to me (a plurality says 25% growth or better), and the results...( more )

David Card | May 14, 2008, 09:38 AM
What Happens if a Story Breaks, but Nobody PRs It?
YouTube's announcement of rudimentary buzz-targeting -- that is, placing its ad overlays on videos as they become popular -- strikes me as at least the most important tech news that broke yesterday. I mean, c'mon, Carl Icahn? Craigslist lawsuits? Yet, most of the tech blogs, and all of MSM have...( more )

Mark Mulligan | May 14, 2008, 08:00 AM
imeem Takes on Yahoo and AOL
Social music site imeem have been placed as the number one US music-streaming service in the US, ahead of Yahoo and AOL. The rankings aren’t from either of the main measurement companies (Comscore and Nielsen) so will doubtlessly be contradicted / challenged by other rankings. Also the difference between imeem...( more )

David Card | May 09, 2008, 12:18 PM
Google, Yahoo Remain Favorite Brands Online
Google's nosing ahead of Yahoo as the top online brand, according to a Jupiter consumer survey. But the kids like the social media. The question asked respondents to pick their top two favorites. Clients can check out the data on Quantify, and compare it with the results last June....( more )

Mark Mulligan | May 07, 2008, 10:45 AM
Qtrax have signed a content partner, no really they have.
Now that the dust has settled on the Midem furore Qtrax have announced the important addition of Universal Music Group and Universal Music Publishing to their roster of content partners. You may recall that Universal were the first to sign up with competitor Spiral Frog. Universal have been carving out...( more )

David Card | May 06, 2008, 09:30 PM
Why Sync, Indeed?
I like this post by Microsoft's Mesh team, too. It makes a great case for "fat client" personalized UI engines that manipulate data that is temporarily stored locally. It seems that locating that data in the cloud would solve a lot of the sync problems created by multiple local data...( more )

David Card | May 04, 2008, 07:56 PM
How Ya Gonna Stop Google Now, Part II?
Of course, Yahoo needs a strategy for competing with Google, too. Unlike Microsoft, Yahoo is not competing with Google to be the leader in supplying core technology platforms. However it is competing for search ad dollars and users. More important, Yahoo, like Microsoft, is talking about ad-buying and –selling marketplaces...( more )

David Card | May 04, 2008, 07:48 PM
So How Ya Gonna Stop Google Now?
Assuming Microsoft doesn’t take another run at Yahoo, what does it do now? I don’t love big mergers, but I understood why Microsoft wanted Yahoo. Yahoo was the best way for Microsoft to: - Gain share in advertising fast - Put its search technology in front of a lot more...( more )

David Card | April 30, 2008, 11:23 PM
This Just In: American Idol May Be Fixed
Stoopid judges expose Idol as Quiz Show, 21st century edition. Wotta surprise. And who cares? It's pop entertainment, people. As Mr. Seacrest anxiously glanced offstage for help, Mr. Jackson, beside Ms. Abdul at the judges’ table, gently prompted her to make comments “just on the first one.” Confused, Ms. Abdul...( more )

David Card | April 30, 2008, 08:36 PM
AOL 1Q08 Ad Revenue Details
Some more details on AOL's ad business after I finally got to listen to Time Warner's 1Q08 earnings call. Overall advertising was up 1% to $552 million. That's down 11% from Q4. Besides screwing up its sales force, management blamed that result on: - $19M accounting difference a year ago...( more )

David Card | April 30, 2008, 08:30 PM
Time Warner Loves Day and Date VoD
A tidbit from Time Warner's earnings call. Warner Bros. et al are very pleased with VoD day and date trials. That is, releasing a movie to VoD at the same time it's released to DVD. (DVD used to have the earlier release window.) So much so it's planning to release...( more )

Mark Mulligan | April 30, 2008, 02:59 PM
What Does the Rest of 2008 Hold Part I
Part one of another semi-regular series, this week Apple and Nokia Apple and Nokia have their horns locked in an intriguing corporate duel, each opening up secondary fronts on their opponent’s turf in a bid to out-flank them: Apple with the iPhone and Nokia with their music strategy. The new...( more )

David Card | April 29, 2008, 11:49 AM
TV Guide Talks Online Video Guide Strategy
PaidContent is wisely wondering about TVGuide.com's future if the proposed merger of TV Guide/Gemstar and Macrovision goes through, especially since Macrovision hinted it might unload the magazine. Meanwhile, among other things, TVGuide.com is attempting to establish itself as the guide to (professional) video content online. There'll be a lot of...( more )

Thomas Husson | April 29, 2008, 10:07 AM
DVB-T just in time for EURO 2008
Echoing my previous blog, I just received some more news on mobile TV: Vodafone Germany will launch two new DVB-T models just in time for EURO 2008. It reminds me of DVB-H just in time for the Football World cup. What happened in 2 years' time? Well, to the great...( more )

David Card | April 29, 2008, 08:21 AM
You Only Hurt the Ones You Love, Part XIII
What's wrong with this sentence? The marketing hoax is an attempt by the South Korean electronics company to overcome the commoditization of the television business. Perhaps this is an attempt at irony; surely it's not an accurate description of LG's marketing strategy. LG is trying to combat TV price declines...( more )

David Card | April 28, 2008, 07:59 PM
Take It Away, Please
Well, it's only day one of NPR's new morning show, The Takeaway, but I'm distinctly underwhelmed. According to coverage in both the Sunday Times and the Journal the new show is an alternative to Morning Edition in major markets like New York and Boston that's supposed to feel fresher, using...( more )

Mark Mulligan | April 28, 2008, 02:49 PM
Comes With Insider Rumours
Another Comes With Music ‘insider’ story in today’s Register, attempting to throw further doubt on Nokia’s business model for the offering. This is the second ‘insider’ CWM story in as many weeks, which begs the question ‘why?’. Is it just because CWM is newsworthy, or are some vested interests getting...( more )

David Card | April 24, 2008, 08:30 AM
Suds
Amusing Journal story about Miller-sponsored Brew Blog that constantly tweaks archrival Anheuser-Busch. Stuffy Anheuser declines to comment, but a beer trade pub is certainly in a snit: Not so crazy about the blog is (Harry) Schuhmacher, the editor and publisher of Beer Business Daily. Mr. Schuhmacher, who charges $440 a...( more )

Thomas Husson | April 24, 2008, 05:11 AM
DVB-H to be launched in Switzerland and Austria
As expected with the forthcoming UEFA Football cup, Austrian and Swiss players will soon launch DVB-H mobile TV offerings. See here and here. As in 06 with the German World cup, the idea is to leverage a sport event as a marketing catalyst to educate customers on new services. It...( more )

Barry Parr | April 22, 2008, 08:56 PM
I love Google's new primary reporting tool
Google's new primary tracking map is amazing. The level of data-intensity is amazing and I love the sparkline-inspired charts for each county. This is a wonderful example of how to illustrate a massive amount of information in a a simple way. It's churlish to want more, but what I really...( more )

David Card | April 22, 2008, 06:06 PM
Yahoo 1Q08 Earnings Call Highlights
Yahoo showed results slightly above consensus, maintained 08 guidance on revenues, and slightly raised them for cash flow. Since everybody blogs earnings calls real-time, I'll focus on the key highlights and most important "color" comments. - Advertising revenues for Yahoo's own sites were up 18% to $966M. They were down...( more )

David Card | April 22, 2008, 10:50 AM
Some Un-Cruddy Digital Stuff
Of course digital is more than just free stuff. Amazon is the best media store ever. The Internet is the best library ever, and Google is the best index of same. On-demand music services are the best radio ever, and the iPod is the best portable media device ever. Mobile...( more )

Mark Mulligan | April 22, 2008, 07:11 AM
Comes With SonyBMG
Nokia today announced that SonyBMG has signed up to Comes With Music. It's another important step forward for this potentially game changing service. Though no further details have yet been confirmed (e.g. launch date) it shows that Nokia are maintaining the momentum which will be crucial to a successful launch....( more )

David Card | April 21, 2008, 10:50 PM
The Real Reason Everything Is Getting So Cruddy
I don't really think it's about a "rebalancing of tradeoffs" or "ubiquity, scalability, extreme convenience, democratization, openness and personalization." Or especially that "the very definitions of “useful” and “needs” are up for grabs in ways that the creators of the earlier generations of consumer services and technologies could not have...( more )

David Card | April 21, 2008, 10:27 AM
Do We Really Need Another Movie Network on Cable?
While I chuckled at PaidContent's headline (Movielink Redux), my initial reaction to the Paramount-MGM-Lion's Gate JV was that it felt old-fashioned. From the announcement and coverage, it sounds like they're planning to do a Pay-TV movie network, and throwing in on-demand and Internet distribution (supposedly not ad-supported) almost as an...( more )

David Card | April 20, 2008, 05:02 PM
Give Me Back My (Broadcast) Media!
In the civilized world, on a Sunday afternoon, on TV a guy can watch sports. Or even golf. But here, in the media capital of the universe, we get to watch the Pope at Yankee Stadium. Long live PBS!...( more )

Mark Mulligan | April 19, 2008, 01:21 PM
How Much is a Comes With Music Device Really worth?
Paid Content report ‘well informed music industry’ sources as claiming that Nokia have guaranteed Universal Music $33.5 per handset for Comes With Music. That works fine for getting UMG to the table and kick starting the subsidized subscription marketplace, but it doesn’t scale well if you want a full choice...( more )

David Card | April 19, 2008, 10:58 AM
Record Store Day
Do the industry a favor. Buy a CD. I'm pretty excited to listen to new releases from three of my faves: Nick Cave, Murder by Death, and Black Francis (Frank Black). Heck, I even paid sales tax......( more )

David Card | April 17, 2008, 06:00 PM
Okay, Google Did Great. Next Comes Yahoo...
Lessons from Google pre earnings call hype: - It's very difficult to use comScore data to build financial models. Wotta surprise; that's not what they're built for. But you'd think comScore would realize that there is such thing as bad PR. - At the risk of sounding like a suckup...( more )

David Card | April 15, 2008, 01:21 PM
Dubious Data, Part XLIV
If this stat meant anything, Yahoo's ad network would be worth 93% as much as AOL's, Google's 89% of AOL's, and ValueClick's 82%. But of course, that's not the case. In Q4 of 2007, Google paid out $1.3 billion to its AdSense partners, Yahoo paid out about $430 million, and...( more )

David Card | April 14, 2008, 10:04 PM
Making Sense of Blockbuster and Circuit City
This Wall Street Journal story seemingly has the goods on Blockbuster's bid for Circuit City. It has nothing to do with industries or markets or even - gawd forbid - "synergy" or "convergence", and everything to do with greenmail (Carl Icahn), former video rental execs, and, possibly, real estate. Phew,...( more )

David Card | April 14, 2008, 08:42 PM
For Pete's Sake, Don't Base (Mobile) Forecasts on User Attitudes Toward Advertising
It's a little disconcerting that the normally supply-side biased -- and that's a good thing in many cases -- Silicon Alley Insider parrots lame not-all-that-relevant consumer research on mobile ads. Hell, everybody hates ads if you ask them. But Amuhricans sure love free stuff. Mobile advertising will happen. And it's...( more )

David Schatsky | April 14, 2008, 03:52 PM
What Are Black People Searching For?
RushmoreDrive, IAC's new site aimed at "the Black community" purports to know better than Google other search engines. And it aims to deliver to advertisers an audience with some compelling attributes. African-Americans make up just over 11 percent of the online population, according to our freshly updated US online population...( more )

Mark Mulligan | April 14, 2008, 01:38 PM
Good Digital Music Marketing Part II
Radiohead have consolidated their reputation with their Nude remix initiative in partnership with Apple. They have made vocal, guitar, base, drums and strings / fx parts available for download via iTunes and invite fans to create their own remixes and post them to a specially designed web site. This has...( more )

David Card | April 13, 2008, 02:04 PM
The New Mediators of Media Get Mediated
This is a fascinating debate, and I'm not just saying that because bloggers are being hoist by their own petard. There's more than a little disagreement on whether it's good to have your content commented on elsewhere, rather than on your own site, and users are divided on whether RSS...( more )

David Schatsky | April 10, 2008, 04:27 PM
Books Rule
Some say people don't read books anymore. A number of folks are describing, envisioning or proselytizing a future in which books may become obsolete (given the dynamic and socially constructed nature of knowledge). If you want to be taken seriously, though, you'll say those things in a book. Like one...( more )

David Card | April 09, 2008, 09:04 PM
Define "Media Business"
This is a big loss for AOL. PaidContent has learned that Lewis Dvorkin is leaving his post as SVP, AOL News and Sports, on May 1, with plans to start his own content company. Somebody convince me AOL's still in the content business. I believe them when they say they're...( more )

IanFogg | April 09, 2008, 06:58 PM
iPlayer and ISP Business Models
The debate raging between ISPs and the BBC over the iPlayer catch-up TV service highlights the strain that ISP business models are under. In essence, a combination of fierce inter-ISP competition and the confusing marketing of broadband packages, has led to a tailspin of residential broadband pricing as consumers choose...( more )

Thomas Husson | April 09, 2008, 05:46 PM
"Smart" pipes, "big fat" pipes & Citizen Kane
Tectonic shifts are happening in the mobile industry. New entrants and new approaches of existing stakeholders in the value chain are forcing operators to redefine their roles. They were some interesting quotes reported in the press in the recent weeks made by the CEOs of 2 leading operators: “…Carriers must...( more )

Barry Parr | April 07, 2008, 03:47 PM
What newspapers can learn from radio
Tribune's hiring of executives from Clear Channel is an interesting idea, but hiring programming executives seems like a mistake. The competitive instincts of radio might do the newspaper industry some good. But no media industry treats its audience with more contempt than does commercial radio. Then there's this: Meanwhile, at...( more )

Mark Mulligan | April 07, 2008, 09:22 AM
Good Digital Music Marketing Part I
(The first in a semi-regular series of digital music marketing case studies) Interesting marketing by Warner’s Infectious Records; the Subways are giving away their (rocking) new single as an MP3 download via their site. The video is also heavily featured on MySpace music (and has been for quite a while...( more )

David Card | April 06, 2008, 01:51 PM
Missing Chuck
Yes, he turned pretty far right in his old age, but he was a civil rights marcher and Kennedy-Johnson supporter in the '60s. And he was the great heroic actor of my youth. (My dad made me watch a lot of old movies; there were no heroic actors in the...( more )

David Schatsky | April 03, 2008, 12:02 PM
Got Your Converter Box Coupon?
I do not enjoy a reputation for being an early adopter, but I nonetheless have just received my TV converter box "coupons" (actually plastic cards, emblazoned with holograms, that look like payment cards, some digits erased to protect myself): If you haven't already requested one, you can do so here....( more )

David Card | April 03, 2008, 11:44 AM
MySpace Music Announces...Well, a Joint Venture
It's impossible to evaluate the MySpace Music announcement until more details emerge and the product itself launches. But this is clearly a keystone event in digital music, with lots of potential. This is in the same league with Amazon doing a DRM-free MP3 store in terms of Big Deal-hood, if...( more )

Mark Mulligan | April 03, 2008, 07:50 AM
MySpace Music Nears the Starting Block
MySpace’s long awaited Music Service looks set to be announced later this week or early next. Though details are unsurprisingly patchy at this stage it looks set to include ad supported streaming and MP3 downloads. Reports indicate that Universal, Sony BMG and Warner are on board or on the verge...( more )

David Card | March 31, 2008, 11:18 PM
Hyping Like It's 1996
Are these geezers still rockstars? We'll know tomorrow. R.E.M. takes a shot at a more-rockin'-than-the-last-three comeback album. The U2 comparisons are somewhat unfair, even though, back in the day, all us music industry analysts wrote endlessly on their potential sell out to Warner Music for $80 million. Those were the...( more )

David Schatsky | March 31, 2008, 09:44 AM
Giant Particle Accelerator Produces Post-Modern Front-Page Story
A story on the front page of the New York Times this weekend about the "Large Hadron Collider" begins: More fighting in Iraq. Somalia in chaos. People in this country can’t afford their mortgages and in some places now they can’t even afford rice. None of this nor the rest...( more )

Barry Parr | March 31, 2008, 08:45 AM
Thinking hard about social media
Bloggers already have access to some excellent tools for content management, but are falling behind in community-building. That's why I'm excited by Chris Pirillo's announcement that he wants to build an installation of Drupal that is optimized for social media. Even if you're a big media company, or never use...( more )

David Card | March 28, 2008, 05:52 PM
Internet Video Syndication -- What Are You Waiting For?
We're in stage three of Internet video: syndication. Embrace it. The Internet video market has expanded through three distinct but overlapping phases from a limited library of paid downloads to an expansive library of ad-supported content that is syndicated across the Internet. Yet, YouTube, whose product remains largely unchanged, has...( more )

Barry Parr | March 28, 2008, 02:27 PM
A commonsense approach to moderation
Our research shows that the people who post in online appreciate good moderation. I also know from personal experience that writing and enforcing a moderation policy is a thankless job. But it's one that your users will appreciate, even if they don't know why. Boing Boing's new Q&A-style moderation policy...( more )

David Card | March 25, 2008, 07:37 PM
Stats for Music Marketers, Part XII
As of this minute, Coldplay has 392,819 friends on MySpace and 43,156 fans on Facebook. MySpace's Coldplay page has four songs on it; Facebook's one. MySpace's are embeddable on your page; Facebook's are not, yet. MySpace supports for-pay downloads (they're priced absurdly high, but that's not MySpace's fault); Facebook does...( more )

David Card | March 24, 2008, 10:29 PM
Big Trend for 2008 Online Media: Re-Inventing the Network
I may have chickened out of making any annual predictions in January -- recessions, big merger threats, etc. but who knows, maybe I'll throw some out there one of these days. If I weren't such a coward, one of my themes would have been Re-Inventing the Network Online. Colleague Barry...( more )

David Card | March 24, 2008, 10:11 PM
Trust Me, This Isn't Political
With many freedom of speech issues, you have to suck it up, hold your nose, and defend people's rights to say unpleasant things. But this is painful. Especially since Fox is possibly just holding out for an administration change and statutes of limitations. The Journal perhaps, overplays its ironic coverage:...( more )

David Card | March 22, 2008, 10:29 AM
Billy Bragg's a Little Jealous of Bebo
Even socialists need to get paid. A New England (LP Version)...( more )

David Card | March 21, 2008, 09:48 AM
This Is Getting Too Meta for Me, Part XXIII
This is a rhetorical question, but why would plugging a fashion line showing the work on a reality show about the life of a budding fashion designer not be a good idea? Ms. Conrad says she is happy the line is not on the show because it would detract from...( more )

David Card | March 19, 2008, 10:33 PM
Fuzzy Logic on Potential iPod Music "Subscriptions"
Much to my consternation, Silicon Alley Insider has become a must-read for me, but its analysis of a potential Apple digital music subscription service is a bit off the mark. ...But if that's really the only thing keeping this from happening, then this is a done deal. Right now Apple...( more )

Mark Mulligan | March 19, 2008, 10:01 PM
Comes With EMI
Nokia’s Comes With Music looks to be gaining some much needed momentum, with EMI announcing they are in negotiations to license to the offering. With Omnifone’s MusicStation Max and rumours of Apple deploying a similar approach for iPods Nokia are at risk of being beaten to the punch in their...( more )

David Card | March 17, 2008, 09:24 PM
Democracy in Media at Work
This is enough to bring tears to the eyes of a cynical, old-media apologist like myself. Even the Times, try as it might to be patronizing, has to admit: For almost six minutes — about a century in broadcast television years — Mr. Ashong, who has an immigrant’s love of...( more )

Julie Ask | March 13, 2008, 06:04 PM
Satellite TV Adoption in Morocco
This is slightly off the topic of wireless, but not technology and services. One of the things that amazed me was the presence of satellite dishes. Apparently they cost just under $100 to get the equipment, and there is no service charge. We saw red clay hut homes in a...( more )

David Card | March 13, 2008, 08:17 AM
AOL to Acquire Bebo
Not bad. Bebo has a good youth focus with its social network, strong presence in the UK, and is doing smart things with more professional content. Not entirely clear what AOL brings to the picture these days. I'll post again if there's anything interesting on the concall....( more )

David Card | March 12, 2008, 10:01 PM
So That's Journalism...
In a 1,100 word story about the alleged prostitute who brought down NY governor Eliot Spitzer, the NY Times' two bylined reporters (with help from three others) spend about 250 words on an interview with the subject and 425 quoting from her MySpace page. Three photos accompanying the story are...( more )

David Card | March 11, 2008, 08:18 AM
Plug.IN Webinar Today
Join me and Michael Gartenberg today for what will be a lively discussion on the future of the music bidness. JupiterResearch's Plug.IN Webinar Digital Music Trends & Outlook March 11th, 2008 1pm ET/10am PT Digital music was a $1.3 billion business in 2007, but it still only comprised 10 percent...( more )

David Card | March 10, 2008, 09:41 PM
Cynical Observations of the Month
I've been waiting all day for someone to comment on the NY Times wooo-scary ad-targeting-privacy story. (Regular readers know I'm a proponent of Scott McNealy's theory of privacy.) After reading several hundred words penned by the author herself, explaining why the methodology probably doesn't work, I'm still left with these...( more )

Barry Parr | March 10, 2008, 03:10 PM
No "Wire" spoilers here
I'm not going to tell you how "The Wire" -- arguably the best TV show ever -- ends. Not till next year: I'm watching it on DVD via Netflix. I think it's the best way to follow such a densely-layered, character-driven show. I'm using Netflix to follow a number of...( more )

David Card | March 10, 2008, 01:58 PM
Continuing Measurement Debate: Efficiency vs. Quality
Good piece in ClickZ. I'm with Jeff Einstein; Eric Picard from Microsoft is obsessing over technical details, sometimes at the expense of missing the main point. Einstein says: We've been obsessed with our own ability to measure performance (regardless of the metric) since day one online. Our obsession with efficiency...( more )

David Card | March 09, 2008, 06:42 PM
Singing the Sad Song of Internet Radio
I've been listening to a Live365 online dixieland radio station for two and a half hours and have heard the same three ads -- plus house ads for Live365's premium service -- for the whole time. (Needless to say, I minimized the player and so haven't seen the banner ads.)...( more )

David Card | March 08, 2008, 05:18 PM
Bug Report
Was it just me, or did anyone else do a Silverlight "upgrade" for Macs that resulted in constant browser crashes and forced me to re-install Adobe-Macromedia's Flash player?...( more )

Nate Elliott | March 07, 2008, 07:36 PM
Twittering
I've always thought Twitter might be a bit pointless -- it certainly looks that way from the outside -- but everyone tells me that once you start doing it, you can't stop. So I'm about to find out. You can find me at twitter.com/nate_elliott....( more )

David Card | March 05, 2008, 02:44 PM
AOL Taking Another Shot at Building Out IM Platform
AOL is opening up more of its core IM technology in an effort to establish it as a mash-upable platform. The Open AIM developer forum has the details, and TechCrunch offers its very positive early take. Here's a couple of additional points, derived from my conversation with AOL. - This...( more )

David Card | March 03, 2008, 10:40 PM
You Just Can't Trust Those Rich WASP Gang-Banger Authors
Honestly, it doesn't really bother me when "memoirs" are faked, as long as they're good literature reading. But this is too funny. Yeah, it's probably a good idea to cancel the author's book tour. In “Love and Consequences,” a critically acclaimed memoir published last week, Margaret B. Jones wrote about...( more )

Barry Parr | March 03, 2008, 10:12 PM
Getting TV all of out of proportion
Television is in some kind of weird middle-aged adolescence. Everywhere you look, it's awkwardly proportioned. I've become used to widescreen TV's electronics stores and public places showing regular old TV broadcasts stretched horizontally to fill the space. We wouldn't want to waste all those pixels we paid for -- or...( more )

Nate Elliott | March 03, 2008, 08:35 PM
The Social Networking World
[Via Greg Verdino] Le Monde printed a cool map a few weeks back covering the social networking world. The map isn't quite perfect. While there's some data to support the idea that Bebo are the largest network in the UK, there's almost no chance they're bigger than MySpace across all...( more )

David Card | March 03, 2008, 03:42 PM
Aren't, Like, "Brian's Song" and "Hoosiers" the Best Sports Movies Ever?
I've said several times in this forum, that ESPN is the very model of a modern media company (since the Times is using that headline elsewhere today, I'll steal it back). However, I dunno about this one. Aren't sports movies by definition corny? How does that fit with the ESPN...( more )

David Card | March 03, 2008, 03:34 PM
Digital Music Futures Webinar
Come hear colleague Michael Gartenberg and me debate the future of digital music. We're hosting a Plug.IN webinar next week. JupiterResearch's Plug.IN Webinar Digital Music Trends & Outlook March 11th, 2008 1pm ET/10am PT Digital music was a $1.3 billion business in 2007, but it still only comprised 10 percent...( more )

David Card | March 03, 2008, 03:27 PM
No Sign of Game-Changing Yet
It's never too late to gloat. Told ya. Macworld says Apple had, at the end of February, 351 movies for rent at the iTunes store, rather short of the 1,000 it promised at launch....( more )

David Card | February 27, 2008, 10:17 PM
Missing Link for Music Marketing?
Intriguing disconnect from my panel at Digital Music Forum East this morning. Amidst the usual -- is it, what, 10 years now? -- running whine-fest about the major labels vs. the start-ups, I asked some of the New New Thing social media start-ups what they could offer to a label...( more )

David Card | February 27, 2008, 09:20 PM
RIP Bill Buckley
As rat-faced, conservative, WASP Yalies go (is that a redundancy?) he was a very funny and thoughtful one. I'll miss him....( more )

David Card | February 26, 2008, 10:06 PM
Panel-Moderating at Digital Music Forum
I'm at Digital Music Forum East tomorrow. I know I'll see you there; all the hipster digi-music types will be in town....( more )

David Card | February 23, 2008, 10:35 AM
Jupiter Clients React to Potential Microsoft-Yahoo Merger
Microsoft's passing around a memo from platforms & services chief Kevin Johnson to its employees about its proposed merger with Yahoo. In it, it reiterates what it perceives as the benefits of the merger, with a particular focus on the goodness for the industry: First, the industry needs a more...( more )

Thomas Husson | February 20, 2008, 04:12 AM
zaOza - Vivendi Mobile Entertainment
As my colleague Mark Mulligan pointed out yesterday, Vivendi officially launched its new content portal zaoza. In fact, the service was announced back in November (see here) and launched in beta under the name "magic zaoza". The idea was to create buzz among VIPs who could access the content for...( more )

David Card | February 15, 2008, 07:08 PM
Happy Birthday, YouTube
YouTube is three years old today. Ponder that. And dream....( more )

David Card | February 14, 2008, 09:19 PM
3D Will Never "Save" the Movie Theater Business
There's a throwaway graf in an otherwise solid Wall Street Journal story about the showdown between 3D concert movies from U2 and Hannah Montana that really bugs me: The situation underscores the challenges of 3-D technology. The industry is touting 3-D as its best shot at combating increasingly sophisticated home-theater...( more )

Nate Elliott | February 14, 2008, 01:02 PM
Valentine's Day Fun
I've handed off leadership of our online dating research this year -- you can see David Card's analysis of the market, and our newest online dating forecasts, in Monday's press release -- but since it's Valentine's Day I couldn't help posting a link to The Onion's brutally funny take on...( more )

David Card | February 14, 2008, 08:30 AM
Signs of the End of Western Civilization, Part LXII
Seen this morning on a bus billboard: "Clay Aiken in Monty Python's Spamalot."...( more )

David Card | February 12, 2008, 09:34 PM
We're Hiring
Funnest job in the bidness. Associate Analyst, Music and Media San Francisco, CA or New York, NY A media analyst at JupiterResearch is a thought leader and industry figure in the fastest-growing sector of entertainment and media. JupiterResearch's brand and resources, combined with your skills, provide a platform for the...( more )

David Card | February 10, 2008, 11:12 AM
"Seven and a Half Cents Doesn't Mean a..."
Hollywood writers, if I were you, I'd take the deal. The LA Times has some details on the contract the studios and networks offered to the Writers Guild of America yesterday. The contract would pay a fixed rate of $1,200 per year for one-hour shows streamed over the Internet during...( more )

Barry Parr | February 07, 2008, 07:36 PM
Think locally, act Googley
Google has announced that they plan to provide news by geography. So far, what I've seen doesn't work very well. For example, Google only seems to find the zips that are actually in the text of the story and doesn't seem to reflect any actual geocoding on the part of...( more )

Mark Mulligan | February 06, 2008, 03:39 PM
Do you Believe in Coincidences?
Now here’s a funny thing: Google are reportedly in the latter stages of negotiating a deal which will see them offer free music downloads in China in partnership with a local digital provider. Three major record labels are said to be signed up and the move is part of a...( more )

David Card | February 06, 2008, 09:04 AM
AOL Q4 Advertising Results
According to documents posted at Time Warner, AOL's ad business looked like this: Total ad revenues for 2007 - $2.2B, up 18%. Domestic ad revenues minus r