Part 1 Some time ago, my colleague Chris Gilbey and I held a discussion about how a cease fire could be brokered between the content Industry and the File sharing community. Chris explained to me that the nature of the problem was that there was no central organisation that the content industry could [...]
This is the question that the LA Times posed in a story about the writers strike. First the music industry was disintermediated by the internet, and now the movie and TV industries are waking up, courtesy of the writers, to the fact that the only game in town is Google…. and perhaps Microsoft…. or Apple. [...]
Several days ago the dumbest analysis of modern technology was written. Randall Rothenberg piece in the LA Times argued that YouATube was the product of a vast left wing conspiracy, a product of the Students for a Democratic Society. And on and On. Just stupid. It's a product of the same thinking that has us [...]
Meeting long time journalists is fascinating. Their paradigm is so old school. The net is alien. It's a window into a different world. Still about preserving the sanctity of “the paper”. Take the LA Times, which is struggling, readership down 7% to high 700's daily. A paper who's website is pathetic. Yet, all they've done, [...]
Snakes on a Plane is a wild ride high concept movie with Sam Jackson as the star. Poisonous snakes are let loose on a plane and start attacking passengers. The cool thing is that much of the action and ideas were suggested by internet fans and forums after the plot was revealed some time ago. [...]
So I am sitting here at the end of my day, waiting for a bottle of Chablis to chill in the fridge and checking my email before I finally stop for the day. And it has been a pretty busy one…. did a presentation to my friend Roger Buckeridge, the Sydney based VC, for a [...]
US retail sales of video game hardware, software and accessories hit a record $10.5 bln in 2005 as strong demand from portable gaming gadgets offset weakness in console players, says NPD Group The old record was $10.3 bln in 2002. 6% higher than the $9.9 bln of 2004. Big movers were portables like Nintendo Ds, GameBoy Advance and Sony [...]
In a striking move AOL will stream old TV shows (from Warner, its conglomerate affiliate company) no longer in syndication. It will use a TV model of advertising breaks. Called In2TV it will have hundreds of hours available. This is another step in the old TV business model breaking down. Another in making the internet the [...]
All over the world blogs are eating newspaper lunches and still the papers do nothing about it. The Los Angeles Times, or Sydney Morning Herald, or London Times have tremendous consumer equity and faith in their brand. Often, because of hundred of years of publishing news. Now, blogs have shown then the opportunity and market to publish in [...]
Bird flu is the rage. What about ordinary flu? Last year there weren't enough doses of the flu vaccine in the US. Chiron blew it. This year Chiron appear to have different production problems. Still not enough vaccine. But why is it that every year there's an issue? Surely, there's a known problem with a deadly [...]