iTunes now second largest music retailer in U.S.
A new study shows iTunes has passed Best Buy and Target and is now second only to Walmart in sales of music in the U.S. According to Apple, the iTunes store now has more than 50 million customers and has sold more than 4 billion songs. Press release after the jump.
Pesky mucus hard to forget, even for DVR users
A new study by NBCU finds that some ads are memorable – even for users of TiVo and other digital video recorders – who skip through the ads. Among the most memorable spots? Those Mucinex ads with the green phlegm monsters, and Bourne Identity ads with Matt Damon (who my female friends would note is [...]
Why a journalism class leans toward Obama
This is fascinating. A University of Washington journalism class is aggressively blogging the 2008 campaign. They’re attending primaries and caucuses, cameras and laptops in hand. The professor, David Domke, says he’s noticed a lean towards Obama among the students in part because of the way Obama’s campaign staff respected the bloggers. “The Obama campaign treated [...]
Fake TV site promotes internet scam
Look at WACT-TV’s website, the award-winning Action 25 News… Snazzy, huh? Well, it’s completely fake. All a scam to sell job training DVDs for $300 a pop. (Thanks, Jack!)
Yahoo launches Digg clone with a twist
Yahoo Buzz debuted in beta overnight, and at first glance it looks and behaves exactly like Digg. Vote stories up and the most-buzzed appear on Yahoo’s home page. But there’s one big difference: you can’t submit a story. Explains Wired‘s Scott Gilbertson: “Buzz aggregates stories from select publishers and then users can vote them up [...]
Briefs: Quarterlife, Digg, HBO, March Madness
- The web original show Quarterlife premieres on NBC tonight at 10/9c – Digg founders hold town hall meeting on site problems, features – HBO launches YouTube channel with clips from popular shows – CBS projects $21M in digital revenues for March Madness
Online revenue continues ‘unabated growth’
The IAB released new online advertising numbers for 2007 that show a 25 percent growth over the year before. In the fourth quarter alone, revenues totaled $5.9 billion, a 13 percent increase over the third quarter. “The record $21.1 billion year of interactive advertising is the culmination of consecutive record quarters throughout 2007,” said David Silverman, partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers. “The continued record growth evidences the importance and uniqueness of interactive media to both consumers and the marketers that are trying to reach them.” Press release…
The lowest-rated Academy Awards ever
Oscars ratings were down 20 percent over last year to 32 million viewers — the lowest since Nielsen began tracking viewership back in 1974. Adds MediaWeek: “ABC tried to put a good face on the declines, pointing out the a larger number of viewers could have watched the telecast in DVR playback, and that the [...]
Another big advertiser pulling back from TV
Like many big advertisers, Kimberly-Clark says it’s adjusting its media mix to spend less on TV and more on “nontraditional media,” including the internet and event marketing. In 2004, Kimberly-Clark spent 60% of its budget on television. This year, it will spend 46%.
KYPost.com working out of WCPO
The print edition of the Kentucky Post pulled the plug at the end of the year, and KYPost.com continued on with a much smaller staff. And in an interesting twist, KYPost.com moved into WCPO-TV’s newsroom, as both are owned by Scripps. Reports Broadcasting & Cable’s Michael Malone: “With the newspaper industry across America under siege, [...]
Briefs: Clear Channel, EA, Comcast, Google TV
- Clear Channel settles with Providence in TV station deal (WSJ link) – Electronic Arts offers $2 billion for Grand Theft Auto maker – Comcast vs. BitTorrent to be focus of FCC hearing – Director of Google’s TV ad program to speak at TVB
Wanna skip that ad? Tough luck
ABC and Cox’s cable systems are rolling out a new video on demand service with free shows like Lost and Grey’s Anatomy. The shows will have shorter commercial breaks with local avails for ABC affiliates. But… it disables the fast-forward button during the commercial breaks. “This does counter the DVR,” said Anne Sweeney, the president [...]
Hurry up, Hulu!
After Saturday Night Live’s four-month absence – I wanted to share a couple of clips from last night’s Tina Fey-hosted show. So naturally I dialed up hulu – the NBC/News Corp. joint venture to plop down clips on a few MySpace pages. Except… last night’s show still isn’t available. Obviously Saturday Night Live is… um… [...]
Broadcasting & Cable, Variety up for sale
Publishing company Reed Elsevier is putting Reed Business Information, a collection of 400 trade publications, up for sale in an effort to reduce its exposure “to advertising markets and cyclicality.†Broadcasting & Cable, Multichannel News and Variety are among the publications. PaidContent, which has redefined the trade publication model online, quotes a “top contender” in [...]
Broadcasters dodge FCC DTV bullet
The FCC was planning to require broadcasters to air a rigid, frequent schedule of PSAs promoting the upcoming shift to digital television (which happens February 17th of next year). But fortunately for broadcasters, the FCC is moving to a more flexible proposal that’s backed by the NAB. (By the way, have you seen the FCC’s [...]
Are you an angry web producer?
I have to admit I’ve been spending a little too much time reading AngryJournalist.com. It’s sad, really, because in a way it’s a running diary of an industry in the throes of painful change. “I’m angry because our newspaper is dying and our leaders are more concerned with rules that say we can’t wear jeans [...]
Sports Illustrated scores with swimsuits (duh)
Over the years, Steve Safran used to joke that Lost Remote should change our online business model to the most successful of them all: porn. (Well, I guess it would the second most successful, behind Google.) We resisted the urge, but today there’s more proof that there’s nothing like barely-dressed models to attract massive audiences. [...]
Young cutting costs, expanding VJs
We mentioned before that Young Broadcasting is planning some deep cost cuts across the group, and now there are some specifics behind the plan. Lost Remote readers will find it interesting that one of the cost-cutting moves is to increase the use of videojournalists at its stations.
