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Friday, October 30, 2009

Bad News From the Washington Post: Ad Sales Slide Again

newspaperlessMany newspaper publishers say the ad sales slump has stopped, but not at Wapo: Both print and Web ad declines accelerated over the last quarter. Newsweek, meanwhile, saw its ad sales drop by half.

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Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Live From New York: Yahoo Introduces “You”

newyahoo

CEO Carol Bartz explains what Yahoo is getting for its $100 million ad campaign, its first global marketing effort, which was launched today in New York during Advertising Week.

Here’s the rundown of Bartz’s press conference on the branding blowout.

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Sunday, August 9, 2009

Microsoft’s Addition by Subtraction: Goodbye Razorfish, Hello Bing Customers

sale

Give this to Steve Ballmer: After getting roundly hammered in the past few years for either missing out on deals (see: AOL/Google) or paying too much for the ones he did land (see: Facebook at $15 billion), he seems to be on a roll.

Last week, Microsoft was roundly praised for the way it structured its Yahoo deal. And today, the company seems to have struck a smart pact with Publicis, which will pay $530 million for Redmond’s Razorfish digital ad agency, which Ballmer never wanted anyway. Just as important: The French ad giant will agree to buy a certain amount of search and display inventory from Microsoft over the next five years.

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Friday, July 24, 2009

What Happened to the New York Times’s Web Ads?

newspaperlessThe paper’s Internet operations used to be a bright spot. But last quarter Web advertising dropped more than 15 percent. What gives?

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Tuesday, June 9, 2009

What Internet Ad Slump? P&G Pours Money Into the Web

wheelbarrow-mutilated

Last week, I noted that Internet ad spending had dropped five in the first three months of the year, and wondered when Web ads might rebound. Here’s a data point for optimists in the “soon, real soon” camp: Procter & Gamble, the world’s biggest marketer, is pouring more into Web ads than ever. Last quarter it increased its spending on Internet display ads by nearly 150 percent.

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Thursday, May 28, 2009

Hulu: Watch Our Shows on a Big Screen, but not on a TV

Want to watch the season finale of “30 Rock” for free, whenever you want, on a big screen? Go for it, says Hulu–just don’t watch it on a TV.

Confused? Of course. So was I when I checked out Hulu’s new “Desktop” app, launched today as part of the video service’s new “Labs” collection of experimental offerings.

Basically, it’s downloadable software that makes it easier than ever to watch Hulu’s shows and clips in the same way that you’d watch TV–on your sofa, remote in hand. But Hulu wants to make sure you don’t actually think it replaces TV.

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Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Time Warner Makes It Official: AOL Spinoff Is Coming

tim_armstrong_lgIt’s hard for Time Warner to have been clearer about this, but there’s still a bit of confusion out there about the company’s plans to spin off AOL. Maybe this will clear it up: Time Warner told the SEC today that it intends to spin off AOL.

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About Peter

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 »

Ethics Statement

Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.

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