Seth Gilbert, 08-29-2007
In an age of corporate sponsorships, Tuesday is iTunes day. Apple has long claimed the day as its forum to introduce new musical additions to its iTunes catalog. Two weeks ago the day belonged to John Lennon. This week, it’s his former band mates, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr. That overload of ex-Beatles is fueling a new round of thoughts on what is the most speculated of all iTunes mysteries: when will the Beatles and Apple Music take a bit out of iTunes and Apple Inc.
Theories are swirling. The latest buzz is saying maybe, September 5th will be that day. Apple has previously announced major product changes are on schedule for this quarter. The Beatles band members are getting increasingly frequent reference on Apple promotional materials (e.g. iTunes Tuesday). And now, Apple has scheduled a “Special Event” for the 5th and all reports are its iPod related.
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Seth Gilbert,
For a superstitious company, taking the same office space formerly used by YouTube isn’t a bad omen. Yesterday, Bluepulse, a provider of mobile social networking services from Australia stepped onto that four leaf clover and also announced it had closed a $6m financing.
The company, which was founded in 2002 in Australia launched a beta version of its services last year in December. They are now global. Their social networking features are functional on most Internet enabled cell phones provided a customer has an appropriate data plan.
To date the company has reported more than 2million downloads of their application. In usage, they are generating more than a 100 million monthly page views.
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Seth Gilbert,
D2C Games, a San Mateo California publisher of downloadable games, appears to be the latest company to join the lists of recently funded. Appears is the key word as there is some confusion as to the details. Most reports are saying the company, which as its name suggests is focused on direct to consumer casual sports games for consoles , mobile and PC environments, closed a $6m Series A financing. The confusion surrounds whether this was in fact an A or a B round, and when it actually closed.
Past reports noted on Paid Content and elsewhere have said the company previously took in a million dollars in seed money, and professional Series A round worth another $1.5m last year. Click to Read More
Seth Gilbert, 08-28-2007
Concerns about a credit crunch and further erosion of mortgage related securities may put a damper on debt based private equity deals, notably leveraged buy outs (LBOs) but it remains to be seen if the related interest rate and capital allocation costs will impact cash based or corporate deals. It’s actually even possible that they’ll increase the rate of corporate transactions (as private equity deals slow and sellers consider alternate buyers).
In the media industry, NBC Universal apparently isn’t concerned. According to rumors first reported Sunday, and now confirmed, NBC will go ahead with a buyout of international television player Sparrowhawk Media.
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Seth Gilbert,
With talk about convergence, Microsoft comes up a lot. They’re into gaming (Xbox), all things computers (Windows etc.), music (Zune and Windows Media Player) and they want to get more involved in the living room (Media Center) and other environments (Surface). One area that wouldn’t have struck me for a top ten list of their target markets is my car, but turns out that is a destination already on Microsoft’s road map.
GPS or operating system related software technology would be the first guesses for where and what they’re focusing on, and that’s half right. Entertainment, however, is also a big part. Microsoft already has a Window’s Automotive Platform and they’re aiming to use it to integrate and control entertainment devices. The launch was notable enough, even, to be the subject of a Bill Gates keynote speech. Now a new patent aims to expand the vision.
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Seth Gilbert, 08-27-2007
Fans of South Park can sleep easy for a few more years. In a deal signed Friday, Comedy Central’s most lucrative and most enduring (11 seasons and counting) franchise, the irreverent comedy cartoon, will see at least three more years of new episodes. The program (and its creators) will also take the reigns of its online destiny as part of a joint venture that creates a web destination at South Park Studios.
To date, South Park and its legions of fans have languished in the absence of a legitimate, authorized, Internet distribution platform for anything and everything that is South Park. For certain, there has been availability of content – offerings on Comedy Central’s home site, legions of fan sites – but with Viacom (parent of Comedy Central) embroiled in a billion dollar suit with YouTube over copyright violations, legal video clips, outtakes and other stock haven’t been widely available. Even Joost which has a partnership deal with Viacom has not had the ability to broadcast South Park.
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Seth Gilbert,
How much money does it take to build a successful advertising network for blogs and websites? Apparently a lot, and a lot means, at least $5m.
Federated Media Publishing , the two year old advertising network founded by John Battelle, former CEO of Standard Media (SMI) and co-founding editor of Wired magazine, has quietly closed a Series B private financing round worth about $4.5m. (According to a Form D filed with the SEC on the 23rd via PE Hub).
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