Articles of the Day
Microsoft Eyes The Future of Web Development - Microsoft unveiled two tools that it plans to use to extend its reach into the Web 2.0 landscape — voice-activated search service via TellMe Networks, and Silverlight, a browser plug-in set to rival Adobe’s Flash.
Teens Vulnerable to Contact with Strangers on Social Networks - In a digital world increasingly dominated by social networks like MySpace and Facebook, new issues have arisen for younger consumers and the marketers who covet them. According to a new study released by The Pew Internet & American Life Project, some 32% of online teenagers and 43% of social-networking teens have been contacted online by complete strangers.
Study Finds Average Viewer Engagement Time is Cut by More Than Half - Results from a study released by rich media services provider Accela Communications suggest a new benchmark for online video viewer engagement time. And at 4.6 minutes, it far surpasses the 10.8-second average viewer engagement time reported by other rich media vendors.
Yahoo Extends Search Marketing Pact with United Online - Yahoo has extended its search and search marketing deal with United Online, a provider of consumer Web and media services. Under the new multi-year agreement, Yahoo will continue to deliver its sponsored search and web search results to United Online’s suite of serviced operating under the brand names NetZero, Juno and Bluelight.
Social Network Ad Scramble - Social networking buzz belies an impending sector shakeout, according to In-Stat’s “Social Networking: Finding Friends Online” report. MySpace’s demographics include plenty of wage earners at this point, and Boomers have social networks like Eons.com, but the In-Stat report raises an important question: How can social networks best monetize their memberships? eMarketer estimates that 2007 ad spending on MySpace will outstrip spending on all other social networks combined, so competition will be fierce.
PayPal, Skype Deliver For eBay - EBay had a markedly different day on Wall Street from its Web partner (and rival) Yahoo, delivering better-than-expected first-quarter earnings on Wednesday. Thanks to sharp growth from its Skype and PayPal units, and a higher average price of selling goods on its auction site, first-quarter profit surged 52 percent. The San Jose, Calif. firm reported net income of $377.2 million, up from $248.3 million a year earlier, sending shares up 5 percent in after hours trading. Overall sales were $1.78 billion.
Is Yahoo’s Newspaper Deal A Temporary Fix? - Yahoo CEO Terry Semel on Tuesday was bullish about the prospects for the Web giant’s new partnership with a consortium of newspaper companies to sell online advertising through a joint network. He said the initiative was an unparalleled solution for local and national advertisers.The addition of McClatchy earlier this week brings the total number of nationwide dailies to 260 that will sell ads using Yahoo’s ad targeting technology. Publishers and industry critics agree that the move is a boon, but it’s no panacea for the ailing print business. A combined sales force with established relationships with local advertisers should attract more ad dollars.
MySpace Enters News Aggregation Biz - MySpace is entering the news aggregation business-and why not? The service, called MySpace News, is a cross between Google News, which collect and arranges stories based on keywords, and Digg.com, which lets users vote stories, the most popular appear sequentially in a given category. MySpace News will send crawlers to scour the Web for stories, which users will vote on. The most popular stories become the top news on MySpace.
GOOG/DCLK: Will it Grow the Pie? - By now, I am sure that you are all tired of reading news, analysis and commentaries on Google’s announced intention to buy DoubleClick. Don’t worry. I would like to focus instead on if the deal will grow our industry. For starters, I think that the deal is a fundamental one for our industry. It touches too many market participants for it not to be. There is hardly a publisher, advertiser or agency that doesn’t have some direct or indirect relationship with either Google or DoubleClick. On that score alone, it will be big.
YouTube Beefs Up Demo Collection - In an apparent attempt to boost ad efforts, YouTube is poised to start collecting more detailed demographic information about its users. “There’s lots you can glean from looking at who’s looking at what,” YouTube CMO Suzie Reider reportedly said this week at an Advertising Research Foundation conference. “It’s a real-time focus group that happens all day, every day,” she continued, according to Advertising Age.
