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Google’s library is growing.  In addition to serving as the card catalog for the ever-changing mass of digital content on the net, the search giant’s archived rare books and snagged Life Magazine’s photo catalog. They’re also now playing host to a collection of magazine back issues – full spreads, not just links.  

So far, Google has quietly made copies of more than one million articles.    According to a company blog, this is part of a broader initiative to bring more magazine archives and current stock online.  According to Google financials, it may serve another purpose too.

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The November NPD gaming statistics are due within the week but even without the register receipt detail, it’s clear the economy is having an impact on the industry.  While some companies are thriving, others are falling apart.

Nintendo’s president Satoru Iwata recently told Reuters that Wii sales more than doubled over the Thanksgiving holiday to nearly 800k units.  Microsoft similarly reported a positive initial surge.  Xbox sales were up 25% the Black Friday weekend.

Closer to the other pole, fortunes (or shoppers) aren’t being as kind to Electronic Arts.   In light of weaker than expected sales, EA announced today that they are lowering their fiscal year 2009 guidance for both earnings per share and net revenue. (The year ends in March).

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Last March, the Newspaper Association of America singled out 2007 as the worst downturn in the newspaper print ad business in over 50 years. That was three months into 2008, well before the continued deterioration of the economy this summer and fall, before the banking and automotive industries imploded. 2008 is guaranteed to register as worse.

Newsprint costs have been up. Income down. (Newspaper ad sales were off 18% in Q3(Bloomberg)). Classified ads have further migrated to the Internet. Consumption habits are changing. Traditional local ad buyers (like car dealers) are spending much less.

Punctuating how bad it’s become, the history books will record 2008 as home to the first substantial newspaper bankruptcy in years, decades.

Monday, hindered with debt from last year’s leveraged buyout, the Tribune Company, parent to the Chicago Tribune, The LA Times and the Baltimore Sun, made truths out of early rumors and sought the protection of the Delaware court.

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Earlier this week, Sumner Redstone sold his majority stake in Midway Games at a substantial loss.  He took $100,000 and the assumption of debt in trade for an investment he spent more than $500m accumulating.  The decision, many believe, was made in part to help with ongoing negotiations to restructure an $800m loan held by his National Amusements company.  Turns out, however, his sales decision may force Midway’s management to renegotiate some debt of their own too.

The Chicago area game company is currently carrying more than $150m in senior convertible debt due in 2025 and 2026.  The contractual agreements for these loans, according to SEC filings, included repurchase obligations that are triggered by a material change of control.  Redstone’s sale of his 87%  stake is just such an event. 

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The deceleration of the economy and the utter implosion of both the banking and auto industries has officially tipped the dominoes of misfortune to the media industry.  The flow of advertising dollars has shrunk.  Car dealerships are spending less to promote their products.  Banks are buying fewer ads. Historically big spenders aren’t spending. Even celebrity endorsements are falling victim.   So…this year,  instead of holiday bonuses, many tech and media companies are handing out pink slips.  

It’s hard to say whether all the cash conservation and restructuring is truly necessary or if some is just opportunistically timed to squeeze the write-offs and one-time charges into 2008 fiscal year accounting.  For a lot of people, that’s irrelevant.  This season’s greetings are anything but cheery.

Today, it was  media giant Viacom that lowered the hatchet. The parent of MTV Networks, Paramount, BET and Nickelodeon, announced a workforce reduction of approximately 7%, or 850 jobs. Click to Read More

In the U.S. NBC Universal and News Corp’s joint video on demand service, Hulu, has proven to be a big success, drawing both audience (Quantcast data) and advertisers.  In the U.K., BBC Worldwide, ITV and Channel 4 had hoped to follow a similar path with their own web service, Project Kangaroo (also known as UKVOD).  Their route now looks complicated, if not potentially impassable.

Wednesday, after a prolonged review, the U.K antitrust authority, the Competition Commission (“CC”) issued a provisional finding that the joint venture would unfairly restrict competition. Specifically, the CC believes, as currently defined, Project Kangaroo will lessen essential competition in the supply of UK TV Video on Demand programming.

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In March, venture firm Kleiner Perkins allocated up to $100m for an iPhone related investment initiative and provided an online form to allow open submissions from prospective entrepreneurs.  Thanks to an error, some of these entries were recently exposed to the public.  The mistake opened a brief but unintended window into the kinds of proposals that have been submitted.

The cause of the leak was apparently KPCB’s  former web hosting company Meteora Technologies Group.  At some point in time, an employee accidentally posted a SQL file to the web that contained 588 proposals submitted through KPCB’s online iFund submission form.

According to Tech Crunch, which first got the story, Mac developer Fruxx discovered the error and alerted Kleiner Perkins.  The file was removed but not before Google’s ever efficient spiders indexed the page and copied a portion of it into their storage cache.

While it was available, the SQL file, which was readable with any text editor/reader, provided detailed information Click to Read More