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The Economics of Content

Nokia Aims Upcoming Smartphones At U.S.

It’s long been known that Nokia’s had a hard time selling its popular devices in the U.S.

But its latest smartphones coming have a series of enhancements that it hopes will make it more competitive. The phones will run the latest version of the open source operating system, “Symbian^3,” which was demonstrated yesterday to reporters in San Francisco. David Rivas, Nokia’s VP of Technology Management, said the new version includes significant usability and performance improvements that may drum up more interest in its products in the U.S., reports The New York Times.

The software, which was first on display at Mobile World Congress last month in Spain, won’t be ready for prime time until the end of March, and it could be another four to six months until there’s actual devices for sale.

Industry Moves: Tremor Media; TVGuide.com; NYTCo; AP; And Cablevision

—Tremor Media: Mark Pinney has been promoted to COO from CFO. He joined Tremor Media two years ago, having come from AOL’s Platform-A (NYSE: AOL). Earlier, he was CFO and chief privacy officer for Tacoda, also an AOL property.

—TVGuide.com: Christy Tanner has been appointed GM, responsible for the company’s strategy and day-to-day leadership. She previously was SVP of marketing and editor-in-chief for TVGuide.com. Prior to joining the company, Tanner was director of business development and marketing for Newsweek Budget Travel. TVGuide.com also announced three SVP promotions: Sasha Eysymontt will lead engineering, Brandon DiMassa will head up business development and Kirsten Rasanen takes on product development.

—The New York Times (NYSE: NYT) Company: Robert Christie has been named SVP of corporate communications, reporting directly to President and CEO Janet Robinson. Christie previously led brand and crisis communications at Dow Jones (NYSE: NWS) & Company as VP of communications. Prior to that, he spent four years at Sony (NYSE: SNE) Electronics.

—Associated Press: As expected, AP has named Nick Ascheim as GM of AP Digital, focusing on AP Gateway and reporting to Chief Revenue Officer Jane Seagrave. He earlier was a VP at NYTimes.com and before that, was CEO of networking/dating site TheSquare. AP also made two other promotions, as Daisy Veerasingham will now lead business development and partner relations for Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia, as SVP. Sue Cross will assume the same title for Americas.

—Cablevision: Lisa Rosenblum is now EVP of government and public affairs. In this new position, she will continue to oversee all legislative, regulatory and public affairs matters. She reports to COO Tom Rutledge.

Let The iPad Sales Begin

Early adopters take note: Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) is taking pre-orders for the iPad at 5:30 a.m. Pacific on Friday.

Last week, Apple announced that March 12 was the magical day for per-orders, but never specified a time. Now, it has been confirmed that electronic ordering will begin bright and early, according to The Unofficial Apple Weblog, which says its readers have been asking in droves exactly what hour the tablet will go on sale.

Remember, the WiFi-only device won’t ship until April 3, and the 3G version will come sometime later that month. No release date has been announced for other countries.

FCC Releases Apps To Independently Test The Speed Of Wireless Networks

Looking for real-time data of its own, the FCC (yes, the regulatory body in Washington, D.C.) has released a mobile app for iPhone and Android. Don’t worry, the feds aren’t interested in listening to your phone conversations, rather they say the purpose of the app is to provide “Americans with additional information about heir mobile data connection and to create awareness about the importance of mobile broadband connection quality.”

Essentially, the app clocks how long it takes to download and upload data to the phone. The release of the two apps come just days before the Commission is set to release its new national broadband plan on March 16, which will heavily stress the need for mobile data networks.

Six Apart's Berkowitz Joins WolframAlpha

A big name addition to WolframAlpha’s executive team. Barak Berkowitz, who headed blogging firm Six Apart until he left two-and-a-half years ago, is joining the search startup as managing director tasked with leading the “growth of WolframAlpha’s business.” Specifically, WolframAlpha says that Berkowitz will help the company build new partnerships and also establish a “significant presence” in Silicon Valley; WolframAlpha’s headquarters are in Champaign, Illinois.

MSNBC Courts Facebook Users With BreakingNews Page

MSNBC is continuing to try make better use of social media as a distribution tool with a small effort that ties its @BreakingNews Twitter account to a dedicated Facebook page. It’s not clear how much Facebook fans want real-time news mixed with their friends’ status updates—as opposed to following @BreakingNews on Twitter themselves—but this can best be seen as a small step in MSNBC’s bid to become more credible as a social media news source in its own right.

LivingSocial Raises $25 Million To Expand Group Buying Service

LivingSocial, which develops various social apps and also runs a group-buying service, has raised $25 million in a second round of funding led by U.S. Venture Partners. The company’s flagship app is LivingSocial, which lets users indicate and share favorite things on social networks.

More recently, however, a second service—LivingSocial Deals—has gotten more attention. It provides local deals daily to subscribers via e-mail and Facebook that only go into effect when enough people agree to buy a product. LivingSocial says it will use the new cash in part to expand the number of cities where the deals exist to “dozens” by year-end.

paidContent Quick Hits 03.11.2010

»  Disney CEO Bob Iger doesn’t dismiss the notion of selling ABC (NYSE: DIS). [AdWeek]

»  After having suffered salary cuts last year, the OC Register staff has been rewarded with bonuses. [LA Observed]

»  Defunct sports publisher Fan Action is suing Yahoo’s Rivals.com for $35 million for allegedly poaching their writers. [ MediaPost]

»  Excited for the iPad? You’re probably a 25-year-old pop culture junkie. [Mashable]

»  All 199 “newsspeak” words and phrases banned by Tribune CEO Randy Michaels—in one sentence. [NPR]

»  A spotlight on the Huffington Post Investigative Fund, an online nonprofit focusing on investigative journalism. [AJR.org]

Bloomberg BusinessWeek Cuts 25; Moves A Dozen To The Wire Service

About 25 staffers were let go from Bloomberg BusinessWeek as the title prepares for its major redesign late next month. Among the 25 who were cut were senior reporters Tom Lowry and Michelle Conlin, FishbowlNY reported. The layoffs were attributed to “redundancies,” a Bloomberg rep told Mediaweek. Separate from the job cuts, Bloomberg plans to move a dozen BW reporters to the wire service.

Evri Buys Twine.com Parent Radar Networks

Paul Allen-backed semantic web startup Evri is buying Twine.com parent Radar Networks—which lets its users create pages (“twines”) on specific topics, like a type of food or art, and then connect with others who share that interest. Allen’s Vulcan Capital is the lead investor in both firms, which have been struggling for much of the last year on their own.

Verizon Wireless Bringing First 4G Phones To Market In Mid-2011

If you are holding out for a 4G phone for your next purchase, don’t bother. Verizon Wireless will not have its very first 4G handset until mid-2011.

While that’s about six months earlier than the company had said before, that’s still far enough away to burn through another contract, especially since the chance of you wanting the very first 4G phone is mighty slim. The time line was confirmed by Anthony Melone, Verizon’s CTO, who told the WSJ in an interview that the carrier could have a 4G phone three to six months after it launches the service. Verizon has committed itself to an aggressive LTE roll-out, which will launch in some markets by the end of the year.

Video: Murdoch: Newspaper Ad Model Isn't Dead

News Corp.. (NYSE: NWS) Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch celebrates his 79th birthday with a cameo on his own Fox Business Network. Among the topics ... the newspaper ad model not dead yet (if we were Gawker we’d have to follow that with “neither am I”); iPad will attract more media and eventually a video-ad delivery system; his belief that you can’t “really promote” a brand on the internet or search. And, drum roll, the money quote on search:

“Search on the internet, whether it be Bing or Google (NSDQ: GOOG), whatever, it’s free and they simply take all our expensive and we think very good content such as Wall Street Journal ... They are technologically brilliant, they are a long way ahead but they do not have the right to do it if we want to stop them.” 

Social Media Incubator Betaworks Gets $20 Million From NYT, AOL Ventures, Others

Betaworks, the NYC-based tech investor and social media incubator that has positioned itself at the center of the ‘real-time web,’ has raised $20 million in a second round of funding led by RRE Ventures and Intel (NSDQ: INTC) Capital.

Other new investors include AOL (NYSE: AOL) Ventures, the New York Times (NYSE: NYT), Softbank Japan and Softbank NY, DFJ Growth, and Lerer Media Ventures, CEO John Borthwick tells us.

Return Of The Album? Pink Floyd Wins Online Bundling Right

The album’s not dead yet - well, not in Pink Floyd’s case at least. A judge has ruled in favour of the prog rock band, which went to the UK High Court for the right to have its material sold online only the form of albums, not individual singles, which have became the dominant form of digital download.

Pink Floyd’s contract with EMI - which was signed 11 years ago ago, before the online music boom - says its albums must only be sold as a whole and in a set order. EMI argued this applied only to “physical product”, but, according to Justice Andrew Morrit’s ruling, via Bloomberg: “There is nothing in the terms ‘album’ or ‘record’ to suggest they apply to the physical product only.”

@ Media Summit: Sulzberger: Metered Model Is Right Today—But 10 Years From Now, Who Knows?

Just a few weeks after NYTCo (NYSE: NYT) chairman and publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr. and president and CEO Janet Robinson discussed the company’s new metering pay model at our conference, the pair continued to tease out the idea.
at Bloomberg BusinessWeek’s Media Summit 2010.

In a conversation with James Ellis, Bloomberg BW’s assistant managing editor, they also spoke about the role of cost cutting, the lessons of Times Select, and the relationship between the Sulzberger family and outside shareholders.

The Day Abu Dhabi Became An Unlikely Crossroad For Search Wars

At the powerhouse Abu Dhabi Media Summit here at Yas Island in Abu Dhabi, two of the biggest third-party search deals are being negotiated behind the scenes, we have learned. It just so happens that all the players involved were here for the last day or so: Google (NSDQ: GOOG) CEO Eric Schmidt, News Corp (NYSE: NWS) contingent of Rupert Murdoch, James Murdoch and Jon Miller, and AOL (NYSE: AOL) CEO Tim Armstrong.

The Mobile Stats That Keep Microsoft's Execs Up At Night

Here’s why Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) is launching a “completely new smartphone OS.” The latest smartphone platform market share figures were released today by comScore and Microsoft posted the steepest drop. The new Windows Phone 7 Series—due later this year—can’t come to market soon enough.

Former RealNetwork's CEO Rob Glaser Says For Now Apple Has Won

In Rob Glaser’s first public appearance since stepping down as CEO of RealNetworks (NSDQ: RNWK), he implored that it is incumbent upon companies to work together in order for the wireless sector to continue its break-neck pace of innovation.

Glaser did not hint at what he might do next, but instead, he stuck to his usual routine of talking fast and making as many points as possible in his time allotted. One theme in particular was exceedingly clear: he believes closed operating systems are a threat to the mobile industry. In the words of Ben Franklin, he said: “We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

Requests May Signal That FTC Will Block Google's AdMob Purchase

Google’s proposed (and now delayed) acquisition of mobile ad network AdMob appears to be drawing even more regulatory scrutiny from the FTC. Bloomberg cites sources who say that regulators now want “sworn declarations” from Google (NSDQ: GOOG) competitors about the $750 million deal. The key sentence in the Bloomberg report comes from a former FTC general counsel, who says that “agency officials typically collect declarations ‘when they think there is some significant chance’ the agency will ask a court to block a merger, or seek to modify a deal.”

News Corp. Mulling Sale Of Struggling Mobile Content Properties

News Corp. (NYSE: NWS) may shed the ailing Fox Mobile Group, including the Jamba and Jamster brands, to focus on digital properties, like MySpace, reports The Financial Times.

A sale would not be a big surprise. After News Corp. acquired the company in two separate chunks from VeriSign (NSDQ: VRSN) for a total price tag of $381 million, it failed to do much with the asset. Last year, it created the Fox Mobile Group to roll out a new video service for smartphones, which was rumored to be akin to Hulu, but that project has been delayed several times. In addition, the group has been decimated over the past year, by layoffs and a mass executive exodus that led to the departure of the CEO, COO and CMO.