Monday, July 31, 2006

Who is looking at YouTube


One of these six companies will buy YouTube by ZDNet's Russell Shaw -- All the buzz around video site YouTube indicates that the closely-held company could have a market value of around $1 billion.Given those numbers, it is only natural to crystal-ball YouTube's future: private, IPO, acquired, acquirer?To me, there are only six candidates with the business model and deep pockets to buy YouTube whole. Let me [...]

Sunday, July 30, 2006

Urge to Zune as iTunes to iPod


Download the latest copy of Windows Media Player 11 and you will see an online store called Urge.

Given the level of integration the Zune has with Windows Media Player it will probably copy the hugely successful iTunes.com music store model. Urge has more than two million songs available for download.

Although the technical specifications haven't yet been released, Microsoft has confirmed that the Zune will come with inbuilt wireless networking, allowing you to update your music over a wireless network. None of the rival players yet have this function.

Thursday, July 20, 2006

A Wake-Up Call From Craig McCaw

From Business Week, July 18, 2006

Imagine a future like this: You’re on the Acela high-speed train from Boston to Washington and you want to touch base with friends in Beijing and London. You pull out your laptop and moments later are catching up via video link — even as the train thunders along at 150 miles an hour. Later, as you zip past the White House in a cab, you grab the same laptop to catch up on e-mail, then boot up your media player to watch a few minutes of the afternoon ball game of your hometown favorite, the Boston Red Sox.

If Craig O. McCaw gets his way, you’ll be able to do all that, and more, in as little as three years’ time. McCaw’s Clearwire Corp. has amassed enough licensed radio spectrum to create a nationwide, wireless broadband network based on an emerging technology called mobile WiMAX — a powerful cousin of WiFi. Clearwire got a big boost on July 5, when Intel Corp. (INTC ) and Motorola Inc. (MOT ) pumped nearly $900 million into the company. The tech giants aim to turn WiMAX into a mainstream consumer technology and hope to make lots of money selling the chips, laptops, cell phones, and other gear that work with it.

McCaw famously upended Ma Bell by building a cellular phone network in the 1980s, a business he later sold to AT&T (T ) for $11.5 billion. Now he could be poised to do much the same to today’s cable, satellite, and telecom players by providing a cheaper alternative to the broadband services they currently offer. “Filling a need that others aren’t addressing has always been a focus of the companies that I have been involved with,” McCaw says.

Not so long ago, McCaw’s WiMAX gambit seemed less threatening to the entrenched players. There were no industrywide standards for mobile WiMAX, so the equipment was too expensive to roll out on a large scale. But last year the industry adopted the long-awaited standards, which helped bring Motorola and Intel into the game. Add McCaw’s control of one of the biggest chunks of WiMAX spectrum, and he seems well positioned.

The cable guys and telcos profess themselves unfazed by McCaw’s WiMAX ambitions. But you can easily imagine people preferring to subscribe to a Clearwire service that allows them online access anywhere rather than one that restricts them to their home. What’s more, because WiMAX infrastructure is so much cheaper to build than traditional networks, Clearwire can likely afford to offer a nationwide mobile service for as little as $25 a month. Suddenly, paying $60 for Verizon Wireless’ (VZ ) Broadband-Access service looks a lot less attractive.

This is not just a question of luring away rivals’ subscribers, either. McCaw’s WiMAX play also could put in jeopardy the billions of dollars the telcos and cable companies are investing to make their broadband networks faster and more reliable. For example, Verizon is spending $20 billion to $40 billion to roll out fiber-optic lines to homes over the next 10 or so years. Meanwhile, the cellular carriers have spent comparable amounts on so-called 3rd Generation networks that are supposed to let subscribers watch “real-time” TV on their phones, among other things. WiMAX won’t necessarily make these investments redundant, but it could provide enough competition to make it hard for the carriers to recoup the billions spent.

DEFENSIVE MOVES
So is no one standing in McCaw’s way? Well, some of the key players are already making moves that could fend him off. The cellular carriers are working with PC makers to extend their broadband business beyond phones. Business commuters already are snapping up new plug-in modem cards that allow them to get online anywhere. Verizon Wireless and its ilk also have been cutting prices on both the cards and monthly broadband subscriptions.

And in November, Comcast (CMCSA ), Time Warner Cable (TWX ), Cox Communications, and Advance/Newhouse Communications cut a deal with Sprint Nextel Corp. (S ), the only other company with nationwide WiMAX spectrum. The partnership allows the cable guys to offer cellular phone service, key to competing with the telcos. But they also could resell Sprint Nextel’s WiMAX service or even buy some of its spectrum. “The [Sprint] deal lets cable providers keep their options open as far as wireless goes,” says Charles S. Golvin, an analyst for Forrester Research Inc. (FORR )

Then again, Clearwire is already forging strategic partnerships of its own. AOL, for example, resells the company’s WiMax service. Meanwhile, satellite provider DirecTV Group Inc. (DTV ) has expressed interest in WiMAX as a way to compete with the cable companies and telcos. And despite Sprint-Nextel’s deal with the cable guys, it would be premature to rule out a partnership between that company and Clearwire. Neither can offer complete national coverage, so they might be forced into some kind of a roaming WiMAX agreement.

With his enviable track record, vast spectrum holdings, and now huge war chest, McCaw’s Second Act is already well under way.

This article is from Business Week. If you found it informative and valuable, we strongly encourage you to visit their website and register an account to view all their articles on the web. Support quality journalism.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

News Corp. targets the WiMAX ZONE

News Corp. and its majority-owned DirecTV business are reportedly embarking on an ambitious plan to set up a nationwide WiMAX network in the U.S. through strategic partners.

Craig McCaw's Clearwire wireless broadband company that recently raked in $900 million from Intel and Motorola to deploy WiMAX nationwide maybe in the spotlight. Sources say News Corp. and DirecTV are in advanced talks with Clearwire for a project that could take at least two years and $2 billion to provide News Corp. and DirecTV with a valuable wireless interactive broadband loop the companies can use to sell content, goods, advertising and services directly to consumers.

Talk about a significantly better business case for WiMAX and for Clearwire, which is positioning itself as just another broadband service provider. With its valuable MySpace property, News Corp. has been rumored for some time to be interested in WiMAX, with some thinking it might build its own network or bid in the upcoming advanced wireless services auction.

It is the powerful, anywhere-anytime wireless connection that News Corp. aims to maintain with the core younger consumers of MySpace and its TV channels. In the process, News and DirecTV could leap ahead of many broadband distributors.

Having its own interactive pathway to consumers in the U.S. would put News Corp. in an elite class of major content providers that also own their own broadband platform that now includes only Time Warner, which boasts the Time Warner Cable pipes and a wealth of production, distribution and archive assets.

WiMax, which is short for World Interoperability for Microwave Access, also promises to provide more security and speed. McCaw, a cellular pioneer who sold his former company to AT&T a decade ago, has looked to Intel and Motorola to more than doubled the financial resources he planned to raised from going public with Clearwire, which he launched in 2003. That nearly $1 billion in funding is enough to deploy WiMax in several U.S. cities. Clearwire already provides WiMax service to several hundred cities in the U.S., Mexico, Ireland, Belgium and Denmark.


Tuesday, July 18, 2006

1,000 Order-Pulling Words and Phrases!

Do you have the right "proven" order pullers in your ads! These words create excitement, Curiosity, Motivation, and above all Action!

Here are the top 20 order pullers:

1. ACT TODAY!

2. AT YOUR REQUEST

3. ADDED VALUE

4. ABSOLUTELY NO OBLIGATION

5. ANALYSIS

6. AUTOMOTIVE DISCOUNTS

7. AS SEEN ON TV

8. APPROVED BY MAJOR COMPANIES

9. A MUST!

10. A CHILD COULD DO IT

11. ASTOUNDED

12. ANYONE CAN DO THIS

13. A WINNING OFFER

14. AT YOUR OWN PACE

15. APPROVED

16. AT YOUR FINGERTIPS

17. AUTOMATIC

18. ANYTIME

19. ANYWHERE

20. ABSOLUTE

view more

Million Dollar Home Page, 500 Words, 400 Phrases

In 2005 a university student in the UK took the marketing world by storm when he came up with an idea to pay for his university fees. By the beginning of 2006, Alex Tew had sold all 1 million pixels on his Million Dollar Homepage and with it had earned himself over $1 million. Not only that but the page itself was so popular that the people paying for advertising space on there, more than made their money back.

Move forward a little and a few sites took the concept one stage further and in order to make the concept more search engine friendly, they sold words instead of pixels. Sites such as 500Words sold words which could be made to stand out by applying different colors and sizes.

Now, the concept has gone to the next level. The 400 Phrases site allows people looking for a new marketing edge to buy up to three words as a phrase. You can still make your phrase stand out from others with colors etc, but now you can also have a phrase that better describes your site and what it is about.

People wanting to grab their phrase though, should act quickly. The site is limited to 400 phrases and they cost only $159 each. In fact the first 50 phrases are going for only $59 so if you are really quick you could grab yourself a bargain!

LIVE multimedia experience on the SPOT!

SPOTxde Live is a real-time multimedia content adaptation engine that addresses the barriers to the seamless real-time delivery of mobile rich-media data services.

For mobile network operators and content service providers, real-time multimedia applications such as audio and video streaming, video telephony, video mail, video conferencing, video ringback tone, mobile TV, etc. offer attractive new market opportunities.

Media server vendors and video application developers are on the other end, looking for a real-time transcoding engine that can be easily integrated as a building block into their video gateway or multimedia resource function processor (MRFP). No matter which end they’re on, their revenue will be positively impacted by the real-time throughput, low latency, speed, exibility, scalability, compatibility, and effectiveness of a realtime content adaptation engine that delivers what increasing numbers of subscribers are demanding.

PERSON TO PERSON (P2P)

Video telephony: Enables mobile subscribers to
instantly add video to their phone calls – across
different networks and to any handset

Video mail: Enables voice mail with video capabilities

Video conferencing: Allows multi-user wireless
video conferencing on mobile phones and landline
video phones

Video ringback: Video content that incoming
callers see while they wait for their calls to be
answered

Push To Talk/Share: Allows users to call people or
exchange media by pressing just a single button
on their handset

APPLICATION TO PERSON (A2P)

Mobile radio: Listen to you favorite radio channel
in real-time on your mobile handset

Broadcast news, weather reports: Watch
real-time streamed special news reports, weather
warning alerts, etc.

Live TV: Watch your favorite TV program in realtime
on your mobile handset

Saturday, July 15, 2006

One Red Paperclip for a House!

Kyle MacDonald traded one red paperclip for a house. He started with one red paperclip on July 12 2005 and 14 trades later, on July 12, 2006 he traded with the Town of Kipling Saskatchewan for a house located at 503 Main Street.


Friday, July 14, 2006

Million Dollar Home Page with a Twist Offline

The million dollar homepage has resulted in an amazing offline idea.

The Sandberg Institute in The Netherlands have added a twist and taken the whole idea offline and they call it Artvertising.

Make it, Post it, Profit with eefoof.com



Could eefoof.com be the new competition to YouTube.com

When you upload a piece of media for submission to eefoof, your first hit immediately starts generating income. Each month, we measure the amount of individual page views for each item you submit, and then calculate the percentage of hits it accounted for its media type. We then use this number to figure out your share of the sites ad revenue. Once your account exceeds $25, we will send you a Paypal transfer to the email specified at account creation.

So for example, if you uploaded FUNNY.JPG, and were to calculate last month's earnings:


eefoof image hits for the month: 10,000
FUNNY.JPG hits for the month: 100
eefoof image ad revenue: $1,000
FUNNY.JPG revenue earned: $10.00
eefoof's expenses $5.00
FUNNY.JPG earned you: $5.00

iPee, iPoo, iPod

With the New iCarta from Atech Flash Technology (available July 21, 2006) you can Enhance your Experience in the Washroom with your favorite music from your iPod.









Features:

• 4 Integrated high performance moisture-free speakers deliver exceptional
clarity and high quality sound
• Charges your iPod while playing music
• Audio selector allows you to play iPod shuffle or other Audio device
• Integrated Bath tissue holder that can be easily folded as a stereo dock
• Requires AC Power (AC Adapter included)
• Easy to remove from Wall Mount

Specifications:

Dimension (W x H x D):
8.25in x 3.68in x 7.12in
210mm x 93mm x 181mm

Power Requirements:
12V, 1.5A AC adapter

Speakers:
2 x tweeters for highs
2 x woofers for lows

Made For iPod:

Compatible with all iPod with dock connectors.

Thursday, July 13, 2006

SearchforVideo.com to Launch Video Podcast Directory





FUSA Capital Corporation (OTCBB:FSAC), parent company of SearchforMedia Network and a leading innovator of video and audio search engine technologies, today announced the addition of a video podcast directory to SearchforVideo.com beginning Wednesday, July 12, 2006.

The popular video discovery and sharing site will now offer users an easier way to find video podcast content from among the site's thousands of sources.

Bellagio Fountains Recreated with Mentos and Coke

Viral marketing videos are becoming big business, here is one which literally took off. The idea is that if you put a mentos candy into a bottle of coke it explodes the coke out of the bottle so these guys took it to the next level!

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

The Swords are Drawn, RAZR vs KATANA

Sanyo's 6600 Katana arrives this summer via Sprint, RadioShack and BestBuy.



The Katana flip phone has a basic VGA camera, QVGA display and bluetooth.



It comes in black, blue, pink and white.

A9.com Maps right down to Street level



Where Google Earth goes for a birds eye view of the world, the new A9.com Maps from Amazon.com is right down at street level.

You can use a simple magnifying glass cursor to help you navigate to the destination you are looking for, you get to SEE exactly what it looks like, very cool!

Should you use a Blog as a Customer Service Tool

The Web and the blogosphere can be incredible tools to connect with customers and prospects. Unfortunately, if you’re not doing a good job your customers can use these same tools to let the world know.

AOL found this out when one of their customers tried to cancel his account. Vincent Ferrari had heard horrible stories about AOL’s “customer support” so he decided to record his conversation.

Ferrari put the recording on his blog, but was overwhelmed by the social bookmarking traffic. You can now listen to the whole painful affair at Putfile.com.

Read and Write Japanese emails using a BlackBerry device!

With NTT DoCoMo USA's Email Software you can read Chinese, Japanese or Korean emails on your BlackBerry device.

Namimail is a necessity for those doing business across borders between the US, Europe and Japan.

All you have to do is install CJK Namimail into your device and you're ready to begin viewing emails.

The Fastest thing on the Web

The amazing speed at which the web works is Epitomized by the growth of YouTube now ranked number 14 on the net according to Alexa. YouTube was only launched in early 2005, the power of social networking is driving this site far above others and really answers all that was promised of the net at the end of the 90's. The speed of the Internet now allows popular culture to become more truly popular than ever before.

YouTube is a way to get your videos to the people who matter to you. Upload, tag and share your videos worldwide!

MySpace reaches more kids each day than Viacom's music channel sees in a Week

Think of MySpace as an 80 million-screen multiplex where YouTube videos are always showing. Or an Infinite radio dial where DJ's play only what they want to spin.

MySpace helps News Corp. change into an Internet fueled word-of-mouth machine.

The Metamorphic Rise of Yahoo Answers




Yahoo
! Answers is a new product that allows consumers to ask questions and receive answers from individuals in the Yahoo! community


According to the Yahoo Search blog, the recently launched Yahoo Answers has now posted its 10 millionth answer.

Win Vouchers Answering Trivia




88SLIDE is a daily one minute trivia challenge format, distributed via the Internet at 88SLIDE.com, and through iTunes as a video podcast.

Is this where Amanda Congdon of Rocketboom fame is headed!

The Never Ending $20 Note


Imagine having a $20 bill in your pocket that never runs out. Well now you can with a new device from a company called Dexit. Their solution is an RFID tag which you can clip to your key ring, keep it in your pocket to use when you purchase items that you would normally use cash to buy.

Google Checkout

Find it with Google. Buy it with Google Checkout.

Want a faster, safer and more convenient way to shop online? You got it.

Stop creating multiple accounts and passwords.
With Google Checkout™ you can quickly and easily buy from stores across the web and track all your orders and shipping in one place.


Shop with confidence.
Our fraud protection policy covers you against unauthorized purchases made through Google Checkout, and we don't share your purchase history or full credit card number with sellers.


Control commercial spam.
You can keep your email address confidential, and easily turn off unwanted emails from stores where you use Google Checkout.

Another great product from Google, take a look at this video demo: