Dylan Hunter

I always love these arguments - “you can’t actually let the consumer decide to just consume what he wants… you’d lose all that great… other content… that he doesn’t… want.. to consume…” Unfortunately, though the next logical word, the “nevermind” rarely actually gets to see the light of day!

For me, I pay $70/mth, (not including high-speed internet) for something like 150 channels of content, so that my kids can watch 3 channels - Disney, Nick Jr and Noggin - and so that my wife can put me through the horrid nightly torment of having to watch endless editions of the same stupid story on the 45 versions of Law & Order. So, I’m paying the equivalent of $23 / channel / mth for what I actually want, (presuming that I want said torment, to keep my wife happy). Tell me that a la carte will have me paying more than that, and I’ll listen.

Otherwise, no, I don’t want to watch Hispanic MTV, (or any MTV, for that matter - sorry, that phase of my life is over) and totally don’t care that there may not be enough funds to support the latest Survivor or The Apprentice: Martha Stewart Edition. Sure, go ahead and hit me up for something on the Public TV realm, (making sure _they_ actually get the funds) but other than that, if I don’t consume it, I shouldn’t pay for it - simple. And if enough people aren’t willing to watch and pay to keep The Military Channel up and running, it _should_ die. And if they come after one of my History Channels, and they can’t generate enough funds to keep themselves afloat, yes, they should die, too. Imagine if each channel had to actually compete for viewership with content - bizarre idea, isn’t it?

More here

Another good little blip on free music file sharing vs. paid in Europe. The most important part of the article - “Among the 46% of European online 15-24 year olds who use the Internet to consume music….40% do not consider the CD to be a good value for money…”

The RIAA and IFPI can and will*1* continue their campaigns against their members’ most involved consumers, but so long as this situation remains, where consumers feel like they are receiving less value than they are giving up when consuming music, there will continue to be a strong, and well-motivated free file-sharing community.

As someone who’s had to work free-to-consumer business models for years now, there is _absolutely_ no question in my mind, there _is_ some level >0 where the majority of these folks would feel like they were receiving an even exchange for their money, and would indeed pay for it.

Now, I know full well there’s not a chance in hell that the established music industry will engage in the real hard work of trying to figure out how to make this thing work until someone else, (Apple, others) forces them down a path, so, suppose will have to look to keep helping be that force! *2*

More here
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*1* Since that’s effectively their sole purpose in being, and they’re now smelling blood with the horrible recent US Supreme Court Grokster decision

*2* And I know the companies that support the RIAA and IFPI would never in a million years consider this, but it definitely keeps occuring to me - maybe, as multimedia continues to become more and more prominent, music as a fully-independent media vehicle has largely had its run, and it’s time to do something different. I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I’ve thought to myself that when I buy a SharkTales or Robots DVD, I think I should be able to bring it with me in the car, load it into my CD player, and get the soundtrack as part of the package. If you want to goose the price of DVD up by, say, $1-2 / unit to pay for that, yeah, I’d go for that, and then you, Music Companies, would get, let’s say, $24 / yr, (presuming one kids’ DVD / mth @ $2 royalty) for someone that otherwise might spend $18, (presuming 2 soundtrack purchases / yr) or a net increase of 33% on Gross Rev, not including the fact that if my kids’ DVD included such soundtrack for that $2, I’d definitely be tempted to buy more of them, (gated, of course, by the quality of the content that the movie industry can come up with, but hey, wouldn’t that be something - two different media divisions of many of the same companies pooling time, effort and resources to actually help develop better content - I know, I know, whoa Boy, what are you thinking? ).

Silent media - long dead.

Black and White media - largely had its run.

Non-HD video media and Non-Interactive media - both have maybe another 10 yrs of life.

It’s time to start not just thinking about, but actually working toward, the kind of much better marriage of value generated vs. cost required that can do away with the horribly conflicted relationship between music companies and their most voracious consumers that exists now, (and then we can all stop wasting our money on the RIAA & IFPI, since it’s _our_ funds that are being used against us).

Overheard from one teenager to another on her way out from Panera:

Teen 1: “You going to the game tomorrow?”

Teen 2: “Duh!”

(Teen 1 nods, turns and heads off…)

Makes me feel all warm and cozy inside….

Came across this site while working on a revised company name, (a nice, mindless activity for the day before Thanksgiving! ) have been laughing solidly for the better part of a half an hour, and the scroller is still only about 10% down the page!

Search engines have become an increasingly important part of the online experience of American internet users. The most recent findings from Pew Internet & American Life tracking surveys and consumer behavior trends from the comScore Media Metrix consumer panel show that about 60 million American adults are using search engines on a typical day….

More.

Now this is awesome news - not only in the functionality itself, (which is awesome enough by itself - can you tell that I’ve been salivating for a Tivo for several years now! ) but in that it’s the first sizeable / useful player*1* who’s writing software to use the iPod the way it should be, while concurrently sidestepping Apple’s currently restrictive role toward innovation in terms of what kinds of software, etc. can be used on / with the iPod. Though they did a truly beautiful job on the physical design of the player, there are many things I’d like to be able to differently with both the firmware*2* and iTunes, being specifically built to keep me from doing some of the things that I’d like to, (i.e. move files from the iPod back to the PC, even those files are legally mine) is, by definition, stunting.

Enough blathering, though. The rest of the release is here.

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*1* No disrespect to iPodder at all - I still use it to this day, as I find it much more powerful / useful than iTunes’ treatment of Podcasts, (with the exception of the “keep only the most recent option in iTunes, which I would love to have in iPodder, as well). Unfortunately, once iTunes sucked in Podcasts, iPodder, as an open source project, has effectively just rolled over into obscurity, putting the prime method of interfacing with the iPod back into Apple’s hands, which, even if I like Apple, allows their sole calls to limit what can and can’t be done with something that yes, they developed, but in its potential impact, really should have, (and hopefully still will) move well beyond them. TiVo, of course, has both the economic incentive and power to build, maintain and hopefully further excite more-than-Apple innovation on these kind of mobile devices.

*2* Most notably, modify the nature of how the directory structure functions as makes best sense to me. Though it’s definitely a very nice first shot, I hate not being able to modify to be easier for me. In addition, there is so much potential for the iPod to be used as an interface for a whole series of apps, but can’t do those, either, the way Apple has it set up.

New York, NY (November 21, 2005) – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) today announced that Internet advertising revenues totaled a record $3.1 billion for the third quarter of 2005, making this the highest quarter reported and the first time that quarterly revenues surpassed $3 billion. The 2005 third-quarter revenues represent a 33.9 percent increase over 2004 third-quarter total of $2.3 billion and a 4.7percent increase over the 2005 second-quarter total of $2.9 billion. Based on historical data, the annual revenue run rate for 2005 could exceed $12 billion, well above last year’s record total of $9.6 billion.

More

Going to have to keep this one in my queue for next year. Well done, Ari!

Easy As Pie
by Ari Rosenberg, Monday, November 21, 2005

YOU HAVE TO LOVE THE short work week before Thanksgiving. Its arrival signals the year is just about ready to call it a day. By lunchtime tomorrow, you can kick up your feet and start writing out a quality to-do list for when you return from this long and well-deserved weekend. You’re entitled to enjoy a slow week when it shows up next Monday, right?

On second and a more productive thought, this is the ideal week to run harder than you have the whole year. A slow business week like this is the time to turn up your sales dial, because most of your competitors have turned theirs down–so the media-buying community you cover will more easily recognize your efforts.

Let me give you an example of this kind of market timing. When I was buying print pages, the sales staff at U.S. News & World Report would work harder on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving than any other publisher in the business. They would deliver apple pies–in white boxes, with the magazine’s logo tactfully inscribed–to literally everyone they called on. The idea was brilliant: sponsor dessert at every media buyer’s Thanksgiving dinner.

The execution took a tremendous amount of effort. The delivery of the pies brought the US News sales staff out in force to all their agencies within hours of shutting down for the holiday. I recall one of my colleagues waiting in her office, bag packed, ready to take off for the weekend–but not without her pie. What stood out was how US News waited until Wednesday to ensure the pies were fresh and they were the last imprint made on buyers before the break.

Sellers have always used food to connect to buyers. Perhaps it is too late to pull off something creative for this Wednesday. However, when you return to work on Monday, your competition will be dragging–as will your buyers. Consider sending buying teams on your key accounts a gourmet fruit platter with a note welcoming them back to work with food other than turkey.

There is an old adage in baseball meant for hitters that goes something like this: “hit em where they ain’t.” If you look for selling opportunities by going where your sales competition ain’t, you are bound to get your share of hits. The market itself will present some of those opportunities, like this coming Wednesday, when everyone dozes off enough to hit a home run by simply delivering a pie. What is your plan for the next chance to go where the competition ain’t?

Ari Rosenberg is a media sales consultant. Prior to starting his company, he was the vice president of sales at IGN.com. He can be reached at ari@performancepricing.com.

Drilldown on Internet Advertising Presence for Videos, Movies and Theatres

A deeper look at ad sites, viewer demographics, ad types, sizes and delivery for videos, movies and theatres

Top 10 Videos/Movies Destinations
Week ending October 23, 2005 US, Home and Work

Unique Audience (000)

Active Reach (%)

IMDb - Internet Movie Database

6,321

4.89

Netflix

3,565

2.76

MSN Movies

3,453

2.67

Yahoo! Movies

3,228

2.5

Moviefone

2,734

2.12

Blockbuster

1,469

1.14

UGO Film/TV

1,151

0.89

Rotten Tomatoes

1,063

0.82

iFILM

868

0.67

fandango.com^

821

0.64

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings NetView

Demographic Data for Videos/Movies Category
Month of September 2005 US, Home and Work

Target

Unique Audience (000)

Audience Comp (%)

Total

46,825

100

Male

24,135

51.54

Female

22,690

48.46

Age

2 - 11

1,539

3.29

12 - 17

4,896

10.46

18 - 24

2,879

6.15

25 - 34

8,172

17.45

35 - 49

17,508

37.39

45+

17,634

37.66

55+

7,330

15.65

65+

2,600

5.55

HH Income

$ 0 - 24999

2,621

5.6

$ 25000 - 49999

10,151

21.68

$ 50000 - 74999

12,909

27.57

$ 75000 - 99999

8,950

19.11

$ 100000 - 149999

7,559

16.14

$ 150000+

3,936

8.41

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings NetView

Data on the Entertainment Industry/ Movies Segment

Week ending October 23, 2005 US, Home and Work

Top 20 Advertisers

Impressions (000)

Share of all Impressions

The Walt Disney Corporation

121,169

32.5%

General Electric Company

81,168

21.8%

The News Corporation Limited

47,299

12.7%

DreamWorks SKG

40,038

10.7%

Time Warner Inc.

34,401

9.2%

Sony Corporation

23,433

6.3%

Viacom Inc

11,982

3.2%

American Zion

2,436

0.7%

Magnolia Pictures

2,209

0.6%

J2 Communications

1,608

0.4%

Rogue Pictures

1,466

0.4%

Mattel, Inc.

1,047

0.3%

Rockne & Jones

487

0.1%

Lions Gate Entertainment Corp

471

0.1%

Eagle Rock Entertainment PLC

449

0.1%

Sparq

431

0.1%

PictureHouse

411

0.1%

Anchor Bay Entertainment

404

0.1%

Tel Ra Productions

301

0.1%

Laurel Hill Entertainment

285

0.1%

Total

373,025

100.0%

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Top Ad Sizes

Impressions (000)

Leaderboard (728×90)

130,449

Wide Skyscraper (160×600)

59,438

Medium Rectangle (300×250)

44,644

Unspecified

39,466

Non-Standard Dimension

23,848

Skyscraper (180×150)

22,710

Full Banner (468×60)

15,406

Large Rectangle (336×280)

7,612

Square Button (125×125)

6,553

Rectangle (180×150)

4,880

Half Banner (234×60)

4,453

Button #2 (120×60)

3,476

Button #1 (120×90)

3,443

Vertical Rectangle (240×400)

3,154

Vertical Banner (120×240)

1,882

Micro Bar (88×31)

1,089

Square (250×250)

520

Total

373,023

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Ad Delivery Types

Impressions (000)

Share of all Impressions

Inline

350,828

94.1%

Pop-Up

10,756

2.9%

Interstitial

4,808

1.3%

Pop-Under

3,475

0.9%

Floating/Overlay

3,155

0.8%

Total

373,022

100.0%

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Data on the Entertainment Industry/ Movie Theater Segment

Week ending October 23, 2005 US, Home and Work

Top 6 Advertisers

Impressions (000)

Share of all Impressions

Regal Entertainment Group

368

54.3%

National Amusements, Inc.

254

37.5%

IMAX

34

5.0%

Loews Cineplex Entertainment

16

2.4%

Crown Theatres L.P.

4

0.6%

MUVICO Theaters

2

0.3%

Total

678

100.0%

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Top Ad Sizes

Impressions (000)

Share of all Impressions

Large Rectangle (336×280)

223

32.9%

Button #2 (120×60)

205

30.2%

Leaderboard (728×90)

181

26.7%

Button #1 (120×90)

40

5.9%

Half Banner (234×60)

12

1.8%

Full Banner (468×60)

9

1.3%

Wide Skyscraper (160×600)

4

0.6%

Skyscraper (180×150)

4

0.6%

Total

678

100.0%

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Ad Delivery Types

Impressions (000)

Share of all Impressions

Inline

677

100.0%

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Note: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance reporting data reflects advertising activity served on pages accessible via the World Wide Web and not within AOL’s proprietary service.

# SAN FRANCISCO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Nov. 2, 2005–Telephia:Telephia Data Shows Ethnic Differences Among Audiences Of Top Sports Mobile Websites: CNN-Sports Illustrated’s Audience Has a High Concentration of African-Americans; CBS Sportsline Visitors Skew More Hispanic; and the Yahoo! Sports Audience Is Equally Strong In African-American and Hispanic Segments…

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Nielsen//NetRatings, a global leader in Internet media and market research, announced today that newspaper Web sites grew 11 percent year-over-year to 39.3 million unique visitors in October 2005, comprising 26 percent of the active U.S. Internet population, or one out of every four Internet users. The 11 percent increase exceeds the growth of the active Internet universe
as a whole, which rose three percent year-over-year…. More

Ok, now I’m thoroughly disconcerted… By now, we’ve all heard of Sony’s XCP/DRM/rootkit fiasco, (and we’ll leave any more commentary on to the many others who will be so tempted - limiting my only addition to another in hopefully a growing chorus plugging membership in the EFF! ).

But now, if I want to remove Sony’s unauthorized invasion into my computer, I have to trust and DL MS’ anti-spyware app? Good God, what’s next, Satan offering to help me fend off Beelzebub? Now this _is_ heavily disturbing - I need to evaluate who is more evil - Sony for not only their foolish DRM stuff, but, more importantly, their horrible attitude to letting people remove it once they were “outed,” or MS, who is only using this as a thinly-veiled play to increase downloads of their Giant software, which really has little other purpose than allowing MS to scare the bejesus out of any normal user who installs anything that keeps IE from diverting a whole mess of free traffic over to MSN, (you didn’t seriously think anyone actually _chooses_ to go to MSN for anything other than Hotmail, did you?)

Scylla and Charybdis all over again….

Ok, so I’m 2 yrs after when the guy wrote this - still new info to me, and am sure to others, (and yes, also works with PC’s).

Also, on another iPod-related note that was certainly true as of early this year, (not sure if Apple’s fixed - probably not) for any new iPod folks on Windows, if you’re having problems syncing your iPod to a networked drive,*1* make sure that you don’t have any networked drives mapped as an E drive. For some reason, the iPod is hardcoded to become the E drive on Windows, (at least on XP) and if you have a networked drive pre-assigned as E, you’ll find that iTunes will simply sync your source with whatever harddrive you have mapped as E, rather than to your iPod, (i.e. I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out why iTunes kept creating 2nd copies of all my music on the harddrive that they were on in the first place, and couldn’t find anything about it on the web, so here it is! ).

Simple fix - unmap your current E drive, dock the iPod, (you’ll see it’ll take over the E assignment) and then just re-map your former E drive to another letter, and you should be fine.

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*1* I.e. I keep all my music, etc. on my desktop downstairs, which has turned into a glorified file and print server.

Ok, technically this is a couple of days late, but after wasting what seems like weeks of futzing through Rhymezone, One Look, multiple thesauri, variant X lang to English translation programs, and myriad Whois queries to try to find _some_ hole through the Domain Squatters, my new contextual search company has at least a temporary name, good enough to get me through Ad-Tech NYC on Mon - Hunteractive, (get it, “Hunter” & “Interactive”? ).

It’s certainly more than a tad self-aggrandizing, so will most likely be changing it later, (or I’ll fall into the standard partnership problems of “Hunteractive” followed by “Hunter, Samactive,” followed by “Hunter, Sam, Kellyactive,” etc, etc.) but it’ll do for now.

Not much there yet, (other than some simple graphics work on the logo with The Gimp, which I’m quite proud of, given that I’ve barely used before! ). But, to enable our friends, the spiders, it’s at www.hunteractive.com

Also found a great site for generating favicon’s - www.html-kit.com/favicon