The New York Times’s top editor says the paper is considering trying to charge people for a digital version again–and notes that some people are already buying one via Amazon’s e-book reader. Not enough to be meaningful, but it does prove at that least some folks will pay for stuff they can get for free.
Amazon is set to unveil Kindle 2.0 next Monday at a New York press event. But how many of the original e-book readers has it sold already? Don’t ask Jeff Bezos and company. But Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney figures Amazon sold 500,000 devices last year and that the Kindle will be a billion-dollar business by next year.
Search ads were supposed to thrive even in a recession, but there are signs that even Google has been getting roughed up: Note its efforts to make money while actually cutting costs. We’ll get a better sense of how things stand today after 4 p.m. EST, when the company turns in its fourth-quarter report card.
I vow to provide some upbeat news here sooner than later. But until then, here’s yet another downbeat data point, from Citibank’s Mark Mahaney: He predicts that search advertising, which has been the one dependable growth business during the econalypse, may be ready to start dropping, too. Which means that Google’s Q1 revenue may actually be smaller than its Q4 revenue.
The purse strings haven’t completely closed for start-ups looking to raise money–even niche Web sites that hope to stay afloat by selling advertising. Wowowow.com, a site launched earlier this year, which targets women over 40, has raised a $1.5 million round led by Bob Pittman’s Pilot Group and the Rime Group.
Yes, Cyber Monday sales were better than expected–up a not-terrible 15 percent. But Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney has gone ahead and cut his estimates for the world’s leading e-commerce company anyway: He thinks Amazon’s sales will grow seven percent this quarter, down from his earlier estimate of 16 percent growth.
It’s no surprise that financial advertising has slowed down in the first three quarters of 2008. The surprise is that it’s only been a 10 percent reduction, according to Nielsen. But next year will be worse, of course.
File under “odd timing”: On the same day that Citigroup makes headlines as the beneficiary of a $300 billion bailout/prop-up, the bank begins a new marketing campaign. But don’t worry, U.S. taxpayers–the bank you’re buying a piece of isn’t blowing much dough on this one–it’s on Facebook.
Even more Wall Street analysts are cutting their estimates for Google, making the reasonable argument that if the world’s economy stinks, that might have some impact on the world’s biggest media company. To be more specific: Citigroup’s Mark Mahaney says that big online advertisers Amazon, eBay, Expedia and Priceline will all be making big cuts in their Web ad budgets this quarter.
How could the company behind the Beatles and other music legends lose $1.2 billion in 12 months?
We’ll be happy to tell you, says the people who own that company in a 101-page report.
(It’s the financial stylings of EMI Music’s owners: The United Kingdom’s Terra Firma private equity group, which bought the company for some $5 billion in the summer of 2007.)
Peter Kafka has been covering media and technology since 1997, when he joined the staff of Forbes magazine. Most recently, he has been the managing editor of the tech and media Web site, Silicon Alley Insider. Read more »
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