DigitalJournal.com has re-launched as a revenue-sharing social network website offering financial rewards to readers for posting news and comments.
The beta version site pays people to blog, post news, videos, comment on and rate stories, with greater frequency of community interaction leading to higher levels of remuneration from a monthly cash pot.
Readers are paid for their contribution by being given a share of advertising revenue as they create the aggregation and comment pages on which it is carried.
The new home page now carries user's news alongside more traditional editorial, similar to the recently redesigned Netscape home page.
The free subscription allows users to submit stories - a la Digg - by writing a headline, a brief explanation and a link to the host page.
"Our goal is to develop the strongest user-powered news site on the internet, and provide tools for users to exchange comments and ideas on news that matters to them," said Chris Hogg, editor-in-chief of DigitalJournal.com.
The site was founded in 1998 as an online technology/lifestyle publication. It spawned a quarterly magazine before taking its latest incarnation.
But it is not yet the retirement fund it seems - contributors have to work hard for their money.
October's cash pot was $1000 from which leading earner Wolfman2001 took home the princely sum of $349.38. If paid in Canadian dollars - it's not that clear - the amount equates to £162.
Since registering on 22 September, Wolfman2001 has blogged 645 times, added 1,437 comments and uploaded 358 images.
The developer's claim the more people sign up, the greater the revenue pot, from which they can draw, will become.
To prevent contributors going hungry in the meantime, other readers can also donate funds to them.
11.30.2006
Zune's social network
Zune - Social Networking Differentiates It From iPod Microsoft has released details of its upcoming Zune product, an iPod-like device that is squarely aimed at challenging Apple's dominance of the online music market. TechCrunch, Engadget and PaidContent have all the details, so I just want to focus on a couple of interesting Internet features of Zune.
1) Zune will have a social network (iPod/iTunes doesn't)
This is clearly going to wake Apple up, because a social networking aspect is the one glaring feature missing from its otherwise excellent iPod/iTunes online music combo. Zune's social networking will be based in Zune Marketplace, the equivalent of iTunes. Songs can also be shared via wireless technology on the Zune device.
It also seems that Zune will have as good a selection of music as iTunes, although details are sketchy at this stage.
2) Zune is centered on connectivity
This is what Microsoft truly believes is its advantage over Apple - ability to connect Zune across a network of devices. Zune will no doubt over time hook into the PC, Xbox, TV, etc. While Apple announced its own inter-connection plans with iTV this week, in this case Apple is the follower and not the leader.
Of course the big advantage Apple has is its brand and design, which a lot of people think is enough to continue its success. And given the early screenshots of Zune, with its brown(!?), black and white colors and its monolith-like shape - well, let's just say that Apple designers won't be feeling the heat any time soon!
Summary: Zune Experience
Microsoft's vision for this is summed up here: "Zune is Microsoft’s music and entertainment platform that provides an end-to-end solution for Connected Entertainment."
It's a social platform, as well as a music one. This currently differentiates it from Apple, so it's a good move by Microsoft. It also promises a very connected experience across devices, which plays to Microsoft's strengths. Whether all this is enough to challenge Apple, which has already won over the hearts of the mass market with the iPod and iTunes, will be interesting to see.
1) Zune will have a social network (iPod/iTunes doesn't)
This is clearly going to wake Apple up, because a social networking aspect is the one glaring feature missing from its otherwise excellent iPod/iTunes online music combo. Zune's social networking will be based in Zune Marketplace, the equivalent of iTunes. Songs can also be shared via wireless technology on the Zune device.
It also seems that Zune will have as good a selection of music as iTunes, although details are sketchy at this stage.
2) Zune is centered on connectivity
This is what Microsoft truly believes is its advantage over Apple - ability to connect Zune across a network of devices. Zune will no doubt over time hook into the PC, Xbox, TV, etc. While Apple announced its own inter-connection plans with iTV this week, in this case Apple is the follower and not the leader.
Of course the big advantage Apple has is its brand and design, which a lot of people think is enough to continue its success. And given the early screenshots of Zune, with its brown(!?), black and white colors and its monolith-like shape - well, let's just say that Apple designers won't be feeling the heat any time soon!
Summary: Zune Experience
Microsoft's vision for this is summed up here: "Zune is Microsoft’s music and entertainment platform that provides an end-to-end solution for Connected Entertainment."
It's a social platform, as well as a music one. This currently differentiates it from Apple, so it's a good move by Microsoft. It also promises a very connected experience across devices, which plays to Microsoft's strengths. Whether all this is enough to challenge Apple, which has already won over the hearts of the mass market with the iPod and iTunes, will be interesting to see.
Wink Social Search, now with people search
Wink calls itself a social search engine. It is that and more. Wink is also a community where you register to get access to bookmarking and tagging search results and adding them to thematic collections. Last week Wink added people search. They crawl Bebo, MySpace and LinkedIn, allowing you to search for name, username, location, interests and more.
What is Wink Social Search?
Wink’s web search option searches Google and rank the search results according to their own People Rank algorithm. Registered Wink members can re-rank search results, bookmark and tag sites they like and block results they don’t like. Wink’s PeopleRank uses this information along with tags from Digg, del.icio.us and Yahoo MyWeb and other similar services to refine the ranking according to the input from the users.
Wink also lets you create collections, grouping the best links for a topic all in one place. You can subscribe to other people’s collections, you can make them public and let other people add to your collections, or you can make them private so that only you can see them. Public collections will show up in the Wink search results. When testing Wink, we made a collection of sites that we consider to be among the most important sources of search engine news.
If you come across other users who have the same opinions on results as you do, you can add them to your friends list and/or subscribe to any collections they have made.
So in addition to the PeopleRank, which may or may not be an improvement on Google’s ranking, you can benefit from seeing the collections, tags and recommendations of other Wink members.
Wink relies on lots of user interaction to make the site a useful tool and really improve the search results. It seems that in it’s first year in business, they have not quite reached critical mass. But Wink could still attract a lot of users.
Wink People Search
The new people search feature may attract a large number of potential users from Bebo, MySpace and LinkedIn.
It appears under the People tab on the homepage. Wink crawls Bebo, MySpace and LinkedIn, so when you use Wink’s people search, you search an index of more than 100 million profiles from these three social networking sites.
You can search for name, username, location, interests and more, and you can narrow your search by network, gender, age and whether they’re single or taken. You can even search specific areas of a profile page. The advanced search options can be found behind the link “More ways to search” to the right of the search button under the People tab.
In the search results, a little icon identifies in which network Wink found a person. Depending on which information a person has in her profile, Wink includes name, photo, location, interests and more
If you find someone who shares your interests or come across an old friend, you can “Wink” them to add them to your your wink page for later.
The new people search feature can prove to be useful for people who spend a lot of time on networks like MySpace. But for this tool to mature, Wink needs to add more networks and to become more visible to the people who use them.
What is Wink Social Search?
Wink’s web search option searches Google and rank the search results according to their own People Rank algorithm. Registered Wink members can re-rank search results, bookmark and tag sites they like and block results they don’t like. Wink’s PeopleRank uses this information along with tags from Digg, del.icio.us and Yahoo MyWeb and other similar services to refine the ranking according to the input from the users.
Wink also lets you create collections, grouping the best links for a topic all in one place. You can subscribe to other people’s collections, you can make them public and let other people add to your collections, or you can make them private so that only you can see them. Public collections will show up in the Wink search results. When testing Wink, we made a collection of sites that we consider to be among the most important sources of search engine news.
If you come across other users who have the same opinions on results as you do, you can add them to your friends list and/or subscribe to any collections they have made.
So in addition to the PeopleRank, which may or may not be an improvement on Google’s ranking, you can benefit from seeing the collections, tags and recommendations of other Wink members.
Wink relies on lots of user interaction to make the site a useful tool and really improve the search results. It seems that in it’s first year in business, they have not quite reached critical mass. But Wink could still attract a lot of users.
Wink People Search
The new people search feature may attract a large number of potential users from Bebo, MySpace and LinkedIn.
It appears under the People tab on the homepage. Wink crawls Bebo, MySpace and LinkedIn, so when you use Wink’s people search, you search an index of more than 100 million profiles from these three social networking sites.
You can search for name, username, location, interests and more, and you can narrow your search by network, gender, age and whether they’re single or taken. You can even search specific areas of a profile page. The advanced search options can be found behind the link “More ways to search” to the right of the search button under the People tab.
In the search results, a little icon identifies in which network Wink found a person. Depending on which information a person has in her profile, Wink includes name, photo, location, interests and more
If you find someone who shares your interests or come across an old friend, you can “Wink” them to add them to your your wink page for later.
The new people search feature can prove to be useful for people who spend a lot of time on networks like MySpace. But for this tool to mature, Wink needs to add more networks and to become more visible to the people who use them.
Norwest invests $10 mln in Indian social network
A top Silicon Valley venture capital firm has invested $10 million in Indian Internet community Sulekha.com on a bet the social network site can become a much bigger player in the fast-growing market.
Norwest Venture Partners, led by Indian-born managing director Promod Haque, said the $10 million in Series A financing would fund the expansion of Sulekha's focus beyond India's top eight cities and into new business segments.
"Suffice it to say that the goal is to go into smaller Indian cities," he said in an interview on Tuesday, adding the English-language site may eventually offer regional dialects.
Sulekha encourages social networking and local commerce in 25 cities in India and around the world. Beyond self-published blogs and online directories, users can buy and sell classified advertising, as on Craigslist.com, or do other transactions.
Founded in 1998 in Austin, Texas, by electrical engineer Satya Prabhakar, Sulekha first targeted non-resident Indians, before spreading to Indian cities. It had funding from Indian early-stage Internet and mobile investor Indigo Monsoon Group.
Haque, who ranks among Silicon Valley's top deal makers, is joining Sulekha's board.
Already this year, Norwest, a $2.5 billion venture capital firm based in Palo Alto, California, helped fund the formation of Indian travel services site Yatra Online.
"We are very bullish about the macro trends driving consumer Internet businesses in India," Haque said, citing explosive broadband Internet and mobile phone use and vibrant consumer spending by Indian's growing urban middle class.
Ninety-five percent of Sulekha's 10 million pages are user-generated material from hundreds of thousands of member contributors. It counts 1.5 million members, Sulekha said.
Sulekha, which has spent little on marketing, ranks behind Rediff.com (REDF.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and global names like Yahoo, Google and MSN in Web page-views, a key metric for advertisers, but outpaces any site in India in classified ads and yellow pages look-ups.
It has offline partnerships with book publisher Penguin and newspaper companies DNA and Indian Express to distribute the work of tens of thousands of bloggers, and plans to spend more on marketing with partners such as mobile carriers.
Norwest Venture Partners, led by Indian-born managing director Promod Haque, said the $10 million in Series A financing would fund the expansion of Sulekha's focus beyond India's top eight cities and into new business segments.
"Suffice it to say that the goal is to go into smaller Indian cities," he said in an interview on Tuesday, adding the English-language site may eventually offer regional dialects.
Sulekha encourages social networking and local commerce in 25 cities in India and around the world. Beyond self-published blogs and online directories, users can buy and sell classified advertising, as on Craigslist.com, or do other transactions.
Founded in 1998 in Austin, Texas, by electrical engineer Satya Prabhakar, Sulekha first targeted non-resident Indians, before spreading to Indian cities. It had funding from Indian early-stage Internet and mobile investor Indigo Monsoon Group.
Haque, who ranks among Silicon Valley's top deal makers, is joining Sulekha's board.
Already this year, Norwest, a $2.5 billion venture capital firm based in Palo Alto, California, helped fund the formation of Indian travel services site Yatra Online.
"We are very bullish about the macro trends driving consumer Internet businesses in India," Haque said, citing explosive broadband Internet and mobile phone use and vibrant consumer spending by Indian's growing urban middle class.
Ninety-five percent of Sulekha's 10 million pages are user-generated material from hundreds of thousands of member contributors. It counts 1.5 million members, Sulekha said.
Sulekha, which has spent little on marketing, ranks behind Rediff.com (REDF.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and global names like Yahoo, Google and MSN in Web page-views, a key metric for advertisers, but outpaces any site in India in classified ads and yellow pages look-ups.
It has offline partnerships with book publisher Penguin and newspaper companies DNA and Indian Express to distribute the work of tens of thousands of bloggers, and plans to spend more on marketing with partners such as mobile carriers.
MySpace founder backs SaySwap, social network for gamers
One of the founders of MySpace has backed an interactive online video gaming community allowing users to trade games, swap cheats and share tips and thoughts via blogs.
Los Angeles-based SaySwap, which claims to be the first social network for gamers, uses a virtual currency based on trading tokens to exchange games.
MySpace founder Brad Greenspan is backing the new venture through his LiveUniverse company established to nurture video, entertainment and social networking properties.
Mark Elfenbein, chief executive at SaySwap, said: "I had become frustrated with the lack of good titles at game rental stores and the steep $50+ cost of new games.
"This long-overdue service allows players to trade away their old games to acquire the games they want to play."
Elfenbein has a track record in the business. He co-founded SkillJam Technologies, a pay-for-play gaming site with over 12 million registered users, which was sold to Liberty Media in March 2006.
SaySwap registration is free, and users are allocated an initial 30 purchase points.
"Players of practically any console or device can interact with peers from around the globe to trade games for a mere fraction of the price they would pay at a traditional retailer," said Elfenbein.
SaySwap is also entering into a white label partnership with CheatCodes.com, a one million strong cheat code sharing community.
Los Angeles-based SaySwap, which claims to be the first social network for gamers, uses a virtual currency based on trading tokens to exchange games.
MySpace founder Brad Greenspan is backing the new venture through his LiveUniverse company established to nurture video, entertainment and social networking properties.
Mark Elfenbein, chief executive at SaySwap, said: "I had become frustrated with the lack of good titles at game rental stores and the steep $50+ cost of new games.
"This long-overdue service allows players to trade away their old games to acquire the games they want to play."
Elfenbein has a track record in the business. He co-founded SkillJam Technologies, a pay-for-play gaming site with over 12 million registered users, which was sold to Liberty Media in March 2006.
SaySwap registration is free, and users are allocated an initial 30 purchase points.
"Players of practically any console or device can interact with peers from around the globe to trade games for a mere fraction of the price they would pay at a traditional retailer," said Elfenbein.
SaySwap is also entering into a white label partnership with CheatCodes.com, a one million strong cheat code sharing community.
SuperSociety, announces technology that connects all online social communities under one log-in screen
SuperSociety, a social networking technology firm, announced today its plans for adoption of a new service that will target existing social networks and communities, like FaceBook, Myspace, and YouTube, and link them together using a single login platform. Members of different online communities will have the option to access their online communities under a single log-in screen; SuperSociety’s platform will serve as a mega ‘Mash-up’ — a website that seamlessly integrates content from more than one source.
SuperSociety will make this integration possible by its proprietary AI Aggregator Engine and Social Networking Protocol, patent-pending architecture technologies that will alter the way websites share information. The Aggregator Engine can automatically grab (scrape) user data from any other interactive site and contextualize it to fit the needs of SuperSociety. Using artificial intelligence, the engine can learn to adjust itself to grab different sets of data even if the data arrangement is manually altered.
“The technology we are currently developing will change the way online community users access their web pages. It will become much easier to share messages, photos, and videos with members, and will be able to transcend just one network,” said Kaz Moghim, co-core technology architect and co-founder of SuperSociety. “Users of SuperSociety will now be able to search for people in multiple social networks.”
The advanced Al Aggregator Engine will scrape, or read, user data from the screen and anonymously categorize users by demographic and interest. Potential SuperSociety advertisers will then be able to accurately market themselves within the SuperSociety webpage to users with similar interests.
With the tremendous growth in the online network communities, and its increasing disintegration and diversification, SuperSociety aims to provide a service that will consolidate the growing fragmentation by providing a single service log-in. The Company understands the value of integrating services and aims to become an all-in-one social network platform with the mission to spearhead a new phase of communication and connectivity in the virtual world.
SuperSociety will make this integration possible by its proprietary AI Aggregator Engine and Social Networking Protocol, patent-pending architecture technologies that will alter the way websites share information. The Aggregator Engine can automatically grab (scrape) user data from any other interactive site and contextualize it to fit the needs of SuperSociety. Using artificial intelligence, the engine can learn to adjust itself to grab different sets of data even if the data arrangement is manually altered.
“The technology we are currently developing will change the way online community users access their web pages. It will become much easier to share messages, photos, and videos with members, and will be able to transcend just one network,” said Kaz Moghim, co-core technology architect and co-founder of SuperSociety. “Users of SuperSociety will now be able to search for people in multiple social networks.”
The advanced Al Aggregator Engine will scrape, or read, user data from the screen and anonymously categorize users by demographic and interest. Potential SuperSociety advertisers will then be able to accurately market themselves within the SuperSociety webpage to users with similar interests.
With the tremendous growth in the online network communities, and its increasing disintegration and diversification, SuperSociety aims to provide a service that will consolidate the growing fragmentation by providing a single service log-in. The Company understands the value of integrating services and aims to become an all-in-one social network platform with the mission to spearhead a new phase of communication and connectivity in the virtual world.
Social Business Network for Entrepreneurs
I'm sure most of you have heard about Internet Marketers using social networks like MYSpace and others to tap into wallets of prospective buyers. Heck some of you may be using this technique now.
But what if I told you that there was a new Social Network that has recently been dubbed "The new MYSpace for business" A Social Network that is highly targeted only available to entrepreneurs where you can meet new friends, develop new business contacts, build relationships with them, get viral exposure to your business, and never be banned for including your business details, products/services or web link?
But what if I told you that this new social network would also pay you while you build your network and invite others! After all wouldn't it be fair that you get paid while your building the user base of the social network? You bet it is!
Rob Clark, Creator of BizFriendz had this to say- "I got tired of hearing about people trying to penetrate Myspace or other social networks to promote their products/services only to learn that they are getting banned or their profiles deleted because they violated their terms and conditions for "commercial use".
So my idea was to develop a social network where a user will never be banned because they included their business information, products/services, or website in their profiles but in a professionally controlled environment.
But I also wanted to offer more to the users. I wanted to put a "Spin" on it in a big way.
And that is why I also made my social network free to join but capable of paying the users a 50% commission when they invited others into their network who later chose to upgrade their accounts. An incentive that has been very motivating and is creating a buzz online evident by the hundreds that have signed up just within a few days.
Rob also says that you don't have to worry about getting spammed like in other social networks because each user can control how they are contacted within the network.
He also said that you can send announcements to your personal network about various events you can create within your account such as sales events, webinars, podcasts, teleseminars, viewing videos, etc. And guess what? You can actually earn money from the event ticket sales that you can create from your account! (If you choose to set event as fee and not free)
Think about the power of this for a minute?
You post your event in the BizFriendz Social network. Example: sales event of a product/service at your website that you offer for 50% off. You set the description, date and time, etc. of the sales event and post it live under "events" in the social network for everyone else in the entire BizFriendz network to see, attracting more people to your event. Then you also send out a bulletin or announcement to your BizFriendz network of people informing them of your sales events.
However if you choose to charge a small fee for the event tickets you created you then can eliminate the "tire kickers" and essentially pre-qualifying users as buyers. Increasing your conversions dramatically and making a few extra dollars in the process.
Of course there are too many scenarios of how selling tickets to your events can benefit you, but you get the picture.
Rob's social network does have many, many more features and other ways you can leverage the system to increase your exposure for your business. Features like personal urls, Word Press blogs, forums, instant messaging, personal mail center, groups that you can join-or create and moderate, events system, listings where you can sell things like- domain names,websites, computers, or post a job, etc., keyword Hyper link searching technology, JV matching system (coming soon) and much ,much, more.......
Evident by the scores of new profiles that are being listed every few minutes on the site, there's an obvious "viral frenzy" to sign up. Maybe it's because others are seeing people that they recognize and know already listed in the network, including well known marketing "gurus" (the flash audio player is pretty cool too!)
Well Rob's confirmation of a "viral frenzy" was with an astonishing number of sign-ups each day....
"The site has become extremely viral within about 2 weeks", said, Rob. "some days we have seen as many as 200 people join the network, the sign-ups have been climbing steadily each day."
Business owners are signing up in droves because there are no other social networks that have these powerful features or incentives to help you grow your business and drive your sales through the roof!
http://www.wendyshepherd.com/bizfriends.php
But what if I told you that there was a new Social Network that has recently been dubbed "The new MYSpace for business" A Social Network that is highly targeted only available to entrepreneurs where you can meet new friends, develop new business contacts, build relationships with them, get viral exposure to your business, and never be banned for including your business details, products/services or web link?
But what if I told you that this new social network would also pay you while you build your network and invite others! After all wouldn't it be fair that you get paid while your building the user base of the social network? You bet it is!
Rob Clark, Creator of BizFriendz had this to say- "I got tired of hearing about people trying to penetrate Myspace or other social networks to promote their products/services only to learn that they are getting banned or their profiles deleted because they violated their terms and conditions for "commercial use".
So my idea was to develop a social network where a user will never be banned because they included their business information, products/services, or website in their profiles but in a professionally controlled environment.
But I also wanted to offer more to the users. I wanted to put a "Spin" on it in a big way.
And that is why I also made my social network free to join but capable of paying the users a 50% commission when they invited others into their network who later chose to upgrade their accounts. An incentive that has been very motivating and is creating a buzz online evident by the hundreds that have signed up just within a few days.
Rob also says that you don't have to worry about getting spammed like in other social networks because each user can control how they are contacted within the network.
He also said that you can send announcements to your personal network about various events you can create within your account such as sales events, webinars, podcasts, teleseminars, viewing videos, etc. And guess what? You can actually earn money from the event ticket sales that you can create from your account! (If you choose to set event as fee and not free)
Think about the power of this for a minute?
You post your event in the BizFriendz Social network. Example: sales event of a product/service at your website that you offer for 50% off. You set the description, date and time, etc. of the sales event and post it live under "events" in the social network for everyone else in the entire BizFriendz network to see, attracting more people to your event. Then you also send out a bulletin or announcement to your BizFriendz network of people informing them of your sales events.
However if you choose to charge a small fee for the event tickets you created you then can eliminate the "tire kickers" and essentially pre-qualifying users as buyers. Increasing your conversions dramatically and making a few extra dollars in the process.
Of course there are too many scenarios of how selling tickets to your events can benefit you, but you get the picture.
Rob's social network does have many, many more features and other ways you can leverage the system to increase your exposure for your business. Features like personal urls, Word Press blogs, forums, instant messaging, personal mail center, groups that you can join-or create and moderate, events system, listings where you can sell things like- domain names,websites, computers, or post a job, etc., keyword Hyper link searching technology, JV matching system (coming soon) and much ,much, more.......
Evident by the scores of new profiles that are being listed every few minutes on the site, there's an obvious "viral frenzy" to sign up. Maybe it's because others are seeing people that they recognize and know already listed in the network, including well known marketing "gurus" (the flash audio player is pretty cool too!)
Well Rob's confirmation of a "viral frenzy" was with an astonishing number of sign-ups each day....
"The site has become extremely viral within about 2 weeks", said, Rob. "some days we have seen as many as 200 people join the network, the sign-ups have been climbing steadily each day."
Business owners are signing up in droves because there are no other social networks that have these powerful features or incentives to help you grow your business and drive your sales through the roof!
http://www.wendyshepherd.com/bizfriends.php
Boost Mobile launches loopt, GPS-enabled social network
Boost loopt is a new location aware social network service from Boost Mobile and loopt. Using the phone's built-in GPS, Boost loopt automatically updates your location for a private list of friends. Users can update their status and geo-tag locations with text and photos.
Competing carrier Helio recently launched a similar feature called Buddy Beacon. It's not quite as sophisticated, but is also built into their new Drift handset with no extra fees (GPS services will be built into all future Helio handsets).
The service will officially launch for Boost Mobile subscribers on November 20th. It costs $2.99 per month with the first month available for free as a trial. As a further promotion, Boost is allowing customers to use loopt for free through the end of the year.
Competing carrier Helio recently launched a similar feature called Buddy Beacon. It's not quite as sophisticated, but is also built into their new Drift handset with no extra fees (GPS services will be built into all future Helio handsets).
The service will officially launch for Boost Mobile subscribers on November 20th. It costs $2.99 per month with the first month available for free as a trial. As a further promotion, Boost is allowing customers to use loopt for free through the end of the year.
CityTools to launch as a 'social network for newspapers
U.S. CityTools will launch next month a platform that allows newspapers to share content and even use articles written by the public. According to the developers, several U.S. newspapers are already interested by the service.
"What we are trying to do is create a system where the barriers to a relevant flow of information are really removed while everyone still has their commercial interests intact," said president of CityTools Robert Cauthorn.
An audacious aim, considering both objectives of free-flowing information and sustained profitability have been the weights dragging the newspaper industry down.
The program’s publishers hope it can compete with dominant search engines because it rids itself of the “mass aggregation,” “shotgun approach” of Google-like engines. Instead it will provide “the same kind of mass but it’s all relevant to local readership,” Cauthorn said.
“Imagine this as a combination of a file-sharing network and a social network for newspapers (…) all for the benefit of the reader, the advertiser and the publisher – everybody wins,” Cauthorn.
It still sounds a hair too idealistic, but this networking platform could become a major factor in the conglomeration of news sources and media companies. The real losers could be small publishers, discouraged by the cost of the service – $650 flat per month – and slowly effaced by efficiently networked media giants.
Source: journalism.co.uk
"What we are trying to do is create a system where the barriers to a relevant flow of information are really removed while everyone still has their commercial interests intact," said president of CityTools Robert Cauthorn.
An audacious aim, considering both objectives of free-flowing information and sustained profitability have been the weights dragging the newspaper industry down.
The program’s publishers hope it can compete with dominant search engines because it rids itself of the “mass aggregation,” “shotgun approach” of Google-like engines. Instead it will provide “the same kind of mass but it’s all relevant to local readership,” Cauthorn said.
“Imagine this as a combination of a file-sharing network and a social network for newspapers (…) all for the benefit of the reader, the advertiser and the publisher – everybody wins,” Cauthorn.
It still sounds a hair too idealistic, but this networking platform could become a major factor in the conglomeration of news sources and media companies. The real losers could be small publishers, discouraged by the cost of the service – $650 flat per month – and slowly effaced by efficiently networked media giants.
Source: journalism.co.uk
AOL upgrades messenger, integrates social network
NEW YORK (Reuters) - AOL said on Wednesday it will launch an upgrade to its instant messenger software with new features that let users track some of the online activities of their friends.
The debut of AOL Instant Messenger, or AIM 6.0, lets users link to "Really Simple Syndication," or RSS, feeds of their friends that keeps track of friends who upload videos or posts pictures to sites such as Google Inc.'s YouTube or Yahoo Inc.'s Flickr.
The upgrade, which also provides easier-to-find links to AOL's own take on social networks, popularised by rival service MySpace, comes amid a restructuring of AOL announced this summer.
Eying the surge in online advertising sales growth, the online unit of the world's biggest media company Time Warner Inc. decided to give away most of its services for free. It continues to operate a dial-up Internet service, but no longer markets the service.
Early signs of progress came at the end of the third quarter when it reported a 46 percent growth in online ad revenue.
"This version (of AIM), and a lot of what we are doing in AIM Pages, is extending the user-generated communications platform on their terms with what people care about," AOL Vice President Marcien Jenckes said.
Other features of the upgrade include the ability to leave messages for friends even if they have logged off and a feature that lets users save text logs of their conversation.
AIM users can also add up to 1,000 friends on their buddy list.
More than 42 million messaging users are on the AOL Network. Over 30 million of these use AIM.
The debut of AOL Instant Messenger, or AIM 6.0, lets users link to "Really Simple Syndication," or RSS, feeds of their friends that keeps track of friends who upload videos or posts pictures to sites such as Google Inc.'s YouTube or Yahoo Inc.'s Flickr.
The upgrade, which also provides easier-to-find links to AOL's own take on social networks, popularised by rival service MySpace, comes amid a restructuring of AOL announced this summer.
Eying the surge in online advertising sales growth, the online unit of the world's biggest media company Time Warner Inc. decided to give away most of its services for free. It continues to operate a dial-up Internet service, but no longer markets the service.
Early signs of progress came at the end of the third quarter when it reported a 46 percent growth in online ad revenue.
"This version (of AIM), and a lot of what we are doing in AIM Pages, is extending the user-generated communications platform on their terms with what people care about," AOL Vice President Marcien Jenckes said.
Other features of the upgrade include the ability to leave messages for friends even if they have logged off and a feature that lets users save text logs of their conversation.
AIM users can also add up to 1,000 friends on their buddy list.
More than 42 million messaging users are on the AOL Network. Over 30 million of these use AIM.
Nokia Slips a Little Yahoo! Inside its Phones
Nokia Slips a Little Yahoo! Inside its Phones
We already know about the Verizon/YouTube match up, but now Nokia fans are getting some love too, albeit of a different kind. As of today, all of Nokia's Series 40 phones will include integrated versions of Yahoo! Mail and Messenger. The apps will be built right into the UI making it easy to get all those annoying fwds your friends send via e-mail while you're on the go. Add to that the ability to block them while logged onto Messenger and its like you never left your computer. The apps will roll out with the 6300, 5300, and 5200 phones.
BitTorrent Signs Licensing Deals With Viacom, News Corp
LOS ANGELES -- BitTorrent Inc., developer of a popular online file-sharing tool, said it has reached licensing deals that will boost the number of movies and TV shows it can offer as part of a video download service launching next year.
The closely held company said it signed agreements with Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures, News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox, Lionsgate Entertainment Corp., Palm Pictures and Kadokawa Pictures USA.
The San Francisco-based BitTorrent also inked content deals with cable television networks G4 and Liberty Media Holding Corp.'s Starz Media along with several Viacom-owned networks, including MTV Networks, VH1, SpikeTV, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and Logo.
Financial terms of the licensing agreements were not disclosed.
Added to BitTorrent's lineup were films such as "X-Men The Last Stand," "Saw III" and "Mission: Impossible III," and TV shows "Star Trek," "Laguna Beach" and "South Park."
Earlier this year, BitTorrent announced content deals with Time Warner Inc.'s Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, Egami Media, Hart Sharp, Koch Entertainment and The Orchard.
Unlike other video-on-demand services, which distribute movies stored on their own servers directly to computer users, BitTorrent uses a peer-to-peer technology that assembles files from separate bits of data downloaded from other computer users across the Internet. The technology makes the distribution of large files faster and less expensive.
BitTorrent plans to debut the commercial video service in February and expects to offer thousands of video titles in addition to music and software. The company has yet to disclose a pricing scheme but has said individual TV shows could be priced as low as $1, and movies will be sold for about the price of a DVD.
TV shows and most films can be purchased and burned on a backup DVD, although the copy will only play on the computer used to buy the original and not on standard DVD players. Some films will only be available for viewing a limited number of times.
Last year, BitTorrent agreed to remove links to pirated versions of movies from its Web site and eliminate online links leading to unauthorized content owned by the seven studios that are members of the Motion Picture Association of America.
The closely held company said it signed agreements with Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures, News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox, Lionsgate Entertainment Corp., Palm Pictures and Kadokawa Pictures USA.
The San Francisco-based BitTorrent also inked content deals with cable television networks G4 and Liberty Media Holding Corp.'s Starz Media along with several Viacom-owned networks, including MTV Networks, VH1, SpikeTV, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and Logo.
Financial terms of the licensing agreements were not disclosed.
Added to BitTorrent's lineup were films such as "X-Men The Last Stand," "Saw III" and "Mission: Impossible III," and TV shows "Star Trek," "Laguna Beach" and "South Park."
Earlier this year, BitTorrent announced content deals with Time Warner Inc.'s Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, Egami Media, Hart Sharp, Koch Entertainment and The Orchard.
Unlike other video-on-demand services, which distribute movies stored on their own servers directly to computer users, BitTorrent uses a peer-to-peer technology that assembles files from separate bits of data downloaded from other computer users across the Internet. The technology makes the distribution of large files faster and less expensive.
BitTorrent plans to debut the commercial video service in February and expects to offer thousands of video titles in addition to music and software. The company has yet to disclose a pricing scheme but has said individual TV shows could be priced as low as $1, and movies will be sold for about the price of a DVD.
TV shows and most films can be purchased and burned on a backup DVD, although the copy will only play on the computer used to buy the original and not on standard DVD players. Some films will only be available for viewing a limited number of times.
Last year, BitTorrent agreed to remove links to pirated versions of movies from its Web site and eliminate online links leading to unauthorized content owned by the seven studios that are members of the Motion Picture Association of America.
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