Would you pay $30 a month to watch TV via iTunes?
That’s the pitch Apple has been making to TV networks in recent weeks. The company is trying to round up support for a monthly subscription service that would deliver TV programs via its multimedia software, multiple sources tell me. The industry finds this idea both tempting and terrifying.
Is Hulu putting up a pay wall around its Web TV site? Nope.
Does Hulu want to charge people to watch Web TV? Yes.
Confused? Don’t be.
Here’s the explanation about what’s going on at the premium online video site.
Condé Nast is still in layoff mode, but that hasn’t stopped the publisher from putting together an app worth writing about. It’s part of a digital magazine strategy that actually makes some sense.
Well look at that: EMI Music Group, which had been working on a licensing deal with music start-up Grooveshark but ended up suing it instead, now has a licensing deal with Grooveshark after all.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt used the opening moments of a New York City press conference to reinforce a message he’s been delivering for several weeks: The worst is over, things are looking up, and Google is spending accordingly.
Here’s the big media deal everyone has been waiting for. Or at least, here’s the report: Sharon Waxman of TheWrap reports that cable giant Comcast is buying all of NBC Universal from GE for $35 billion. Comcast says the report is “inaccurate.”
It took Apple a year to move its first 1.5 billion apps from its iTunes store. It took a mere 76 days to move the next 500 million.
There is no shortage of places to watch TV shows free on the Web. There’s a glut of them, really. But here comes another: AT&T Entertainment. How is it different than Hulu, TV.com, Sling.com, Fancast, etc.? It’s not.
Here’s a funding story you don’t see often, recession or no: A start-up buying back its shares from its venture capitalist, at a premium.
But that’s the transaction that video-chat firm Paltalk and Softbank have completed. Paltalk, which sold off 20 percent of its equity to Softbank for $6 million in 2004, has bought the shares back. No one has spelled out a purchase price, but I’m told the deal will be considered a “single” for Softbank–it gets its capital back, plus a return–which in this economy ought to be a home run.
Can Google’s boldest attack against Microsoft succeed? Absolutely. Even if it flops.
The newly announced Google Chrome OS won’t show up until the second half of 2010, when it will first appear on lightweight netbooks. Eventually, it’s supposed to run on full-sized PCs. But Chrome OS will start working long before consumers start booting it up next year as it forces Steve Ballmer and company to open up yet another front in their long-running war against Google.
What do you do when your job working for a big music label disappears? You go to work for a pirate-friendly file-sharing service that’s being sued by the big music labels.
Hulu and other purveyors of Web TV are going to see a rush of ad dollars over the next few years. But compared to the ad money going to conventional TV, that won’t mean much. A cautionary tale.
I’m still not exactly sure why Google has become the chief suspect in the “Who Killed Newspapers” investigation playing out before our very eyes. Because it’s quite clear to me that the real baddie here is bespectacled, mild-mannered Craig Newmark, whose eponymous free service blew up the industry’s most profitable line of business: classified advertising. Here’s the argument in line-graph form.
One big reason why very few ad dollars have yet to make their way from television to the Web, even though online video is booming: TV viewing isn’t shrinking. Yet. Nielsen says more Americans are watching TV than ever before–up 1.2 percent in the last quarter–and they’re spending more time watching TV, too–that’s up 1.9 percent, to a staggering 153-plus hours per month.
A bad quarter for Disney, but it could have been worse–at least Wall Street was expecting it. After factoring out one-time charges and write-offs, Bob Iger and company earned 43 cents a share on revenues of $8.1 billion. Wall Street had been looking for 40 cents and $8.15 billion, respectively. The bright spot for the entertainment conglomerate is the same one you see at every media giant these days: Disney’s cable business.
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 »
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.
D is unlike any other executive conference. Since its debut in 2003, D has brought to life the energy and excitement of the digital revolution in an unscripted, upfront and unparalleled way. Read more »
Don't miss a post! Sign up for our Daily Email and get AllThingsD.com delivered each day.
Get columns, blogs and video from D and All Things Digital on your iPhone. Download now »
