Did Rupert Murdoch wait way too long to fix MySpace? It’s easy to get that impression from the News Corp. earnings call today.
The takeaway: The site is losing traffic and money and is going to get at least $100 million less from Google than it once thought. “It’s a work in progress,” News Corp. says, over and over again.
Yesterday, Viacom told Wall Street that its third quarter had been better than most analysts expected. Today Time Warner delivered a similar report: Revenue was on track, but cost savings improved the bottom line. That won’t help hundreds of Time Inc. employees who face job cuts this quarter. Meanwhile, the company can’t ditch AOL soon enough: It has already spent $100 million prepping it for a spinoff this year.
Here’s another quick glimpse of the advertising market, courtesy of Viacom. The cable giant says ad sales are still down, but that the rate of decline is slowing. And in the fall of 2009, that constitutes pretty good news.
Many 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.
So now that the economy is officially growing again, when will marketers start spending again? It can’t happen soon enough for ad-supported companies (and their employees). Today’s unpleasant news: Magazine heavyweight Meredith says things are getting better, but they’re still worse than last year, which was pretty bad to begin with.
Here’s the counterpoint to Publicis’s mildly optimistic take on the ad market yesterday: Rival ad-holding company Interpublic Group’s report, which is mildly pessimistic. But the takeaway is the same: If things get better, anyone who’s not Google won’t see much real sign of it until next year.
The man who helped shape CBS’s standalone Web video strategy explains himself, for the record.
It’s all well and good for Google to say the worst is over. But what about media companies that survive on revenue streams other than search ads?
Things should be better for them, too, says Publicis, one of the biggest advertising companies in the world. The French holding company, which announced its results today, says things bottomed out this summer.
No surprise that Americans are dropping their newspaper subscriptions, as a new batch of numbers from the Audit Bureau of Circulations showed yesterday. But before you file this under “death of newspapers,” something to ponder for a second: This might not be the worst news in the world.
The publisher delivered a pleasant earnings surprise yesterday by cutting costs. Now it’s hoping for a revenue bump, if advertisers will play along.
The New York Times announced plans to cut eight percent of its newsroom payroll this week, citing “economic thunderstorms,” which suggested that this morning’s earnings results were going to be particularly unpleasant. Surprise! They’re not that awful, at least by the diminished standards of the newspaper industry.
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.
Vevo, the music industry’s version of Hulu, now has its own version of Providence Equity, the outside investor that took a flyer on the Web TV and movie joint venture: Abu Dhabi Media Company has purchased a stake in the company from owners Universal Music and Sony. No financials released, though I’m told the deal values the JV at $300 million.
After a couple of miserable quarters, NBC Universal finally has some good news to announce: Boosted by a one-time gain, earnings actually increased in Q3, even though the entertainment conglomerate’s revenue kept dropping. Perhaps those numbers will cheer Comcast investors, who have been beating up the cable company ever since news of its talks to buy NBCU surfaced last month.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt couldn’t be any clearer: He’s been saying, over and over, that he thinks the recession is in his company’s rear-view mirror. And Wall Street has been listening: It has been steadily pushing up the search giant’s shares for months. Today we get to find out just how good Google’s growth story is.
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.
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 »
