http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/technology/companies/05apple.html?scp=1&sq=board%20ties%20at%20apple%20google%20scrutinized&st=cse

Appleand Google, rival companies, share two directors for their companies. This is raising question and concern as to whether the rival companies are becoming a little to close and are violating the antitrust act of 1914. This act denies the access of a board member to be involved in two rival companies. Both companies have denied comment but they have been both worned of the situation. It is feared that Google will become a problem for breaking the antitrust act because they have come close to monopolizing the Internet with their search engine. Google has worked closely with Apple with the iPhone to create gmail apps for the device.

As of now Google and Apple are doing nothing wrong to break the act but it they are still being watched carefully due to their close relations. This is being brought about more because the companies appear to be anti-competitive.

They may take over the internet!

Its Apple and Google

Courtesy of Yahoo Images

Unless their concession increase in profit the Boston Globe is doomed to close. The New York Times has threatened to close it but has decided not to so soon. It is now basically up to the Boston Newspaper Guild. The globe would need a 60 day notice before it officially closed but within that time they are expected to lose 85 million dollars. Over 75 percent of people voted for a five percent pay cut, which saved other from being laid off. Now the Times itself is trying to find ways to keep their revenue flowing but the future is unsure for the Globe. The Times already sold many of their assets, cut down the size of their paper and laid off many employees. They already made a comment that they would be willing to sell the Globe.

I find this to be unfortunate. It is becoming a  scary situation because the Globe is a huge paper and to lose it all together I don’t know what may happen. What will be the faith for the Times? Why is the Globe not continuing as an online addition? They should be vigorously trying to figure out was to create revenue because I do not hear of any attempts. They are cutting things backs to salvage profit but they are not thinking in terms of how to increase profit. Marketing ideas to increase readership and advertisements or other means of profit. One way or the other they need to figure out a way to survive. If not they cannot be a strong paper.

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New York Times Newspapers’ Esstial Strength by David Carr

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/04/business/media/04carr.html?_r=1

 This article reminds us that journalists are actually important, and being based on Mary L. Scaprio, chairwomen of the Securities and Exchange Commission, it certainly adds belief. She states that financial journalists have a great need. With a seven percent circulation loss the next expected thing is to rely on the Internet. Which logically makes the most sense. What is expected of the online news media? Well according to the times it is the perfect tool. “… the web is an amazing reporting tool in the hands if almost anyone and has enabled all manner of efforts by bloggers and others to reveal stories, Times article.

Then biggest debate how newspaper will make profit. It is suggested that writers will write for advertisers as appose to papers. I think that will lend itself to failure. What if the company has a story but forces the writer to keep it because it will tarnish the company or perhaps a partner company. I still believe that journalists, writers, newspapers, anyone who provides information need not to worry about the profit as of yet but stay content with the content. It was not expect to turn a profit, news in general, but to inform. With a new style ofgetting the infomation out there the biggest concern is accuracy. Perhaps one day the profit will come back but it will not be anytime soon.

Clear Channel Communication, the nations largest radio station reported a first quarter plummet of 23 percent and a drop of 47 percent actual cash flow. The company is laying off an additional 590 workers totaling to over 2,000 layoffs in the company. The company is 16 billion dollars in debt and another 6 billion in junior debt.  It is expected that lose one of its loans by uears end because of advertisement loss. They do have 1.4 billion of cash and may be able to survive sometime but they do need to find a way to increase profit.

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ESPN and CNBC have tickers along with their programing. It is now the desire to have these tickers to run along commeicals. Advertisers are slightly upset because they lose ad space and have to resytle their the way they create commericals. These new types of commericals are called center cut, where the important information and the high-def is centered. It creates more work for the advertiser because these commericals would be specifically invented for high defition sets and another commerical would be made for analog users.

In essance it would cost advertisers more buck for less ad time but it may be better in the long run because it would keep viewers pluged into the channel. Most people leave during commeicals or change the channel. If they are reciving say news duing the commerical the viewer may be conpelled to stick with the channel.

I think this idea may work to keep viewers around. Even if they are paying more attention to the tickers some advertisements stick in the viewers mind. This could be an alternative for now for ads that are slipping.

In a court settlement Google may be allowed to sell book online. Publishers and authors would give up their rights for the book online so google could publish the online version. All would make profit from this deal but some fear what power google will obtain for having this capability. No one is in competition with them and if they presume all rights to these book what will happen in the future?

I find that google has thought of a great way to market books online and try to get more people reading unknown books but it is dangerous territory. If all the rights are given to google then what if another company wants to compete they will be unable to for the simple face that google owns the books. Once google has the rights in a permanent contract they can charge any price they desire.

If there was anyway they could make this deal go through there should be a yearly contract so that other potential companies would have an equal opportunity. It sounds like the deal is in need of a bit more tweaking. On the other hand google will be a online book powerhouse and who would not turn to google for any of their new ideas. I wouldn’t mind buying a text book online. Just as long as the pricing was reasonable and I could access it without going online.

Conde Nast Publications  closed its magazine Portfolio after only two years of running. All of it 100 million dollar star up fund had been exhausted simply because of production . Attempted were made to tweak the costs to somehow save the paper has since failed. Many magazines owned by Conde Nast has closed and has went down 39.8 percent in advertising. The company was also down in the Fortune 500 and Forbes.

The company has a some losses and this magazine was a disappointment since it was a start up and held great expectation even during the recession  but could not survive. Other Conde Nast magazines are surviving but with a loss. Some of their magazines have combined content.

Do magazines have any type of future? Are all magazines going to be published solely online? The Portfolio first fired its online staff so what does that mean. Are any start up magazines going to go to print or will it just be an online component?

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http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/27/portfolio-magazine-is-shut-down/?scp=2&sq=portfolio%20magizine&st=cse

 http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/22/business/media/22paper.html?scp=1&sq=new%20york%20time%20expect%2020%20million%20profit%20for%20boston%20globe&st=cse

What is the solution and when will it come. The Times has reported a drastic quarterly loss and I don’t know how they plan to fix it. Over time they are slowly losing the funding to hold them together. I wonder what the paper will transform into in a few tears from now. They are receiving about 12 percent ad revenue from their online addition. I was thinking though they might be able to charge for on line classified ads because of the recent uncertainties of those scam artists using craigslist. There might be a security to know that the ones paying for the ad may be legitimate and the newspapers could regulate their authenticity. Its just a thought.

As for now the paper is having real troubles, though, I do believe they will somehow get themselves out of it. Hopefully not by cutting back more.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/business/media/23adco.html?scp=1&sq=tivo%20wants%20ads&st=cse

So for those who have TiVo and wanted to skip ads entirely might not be able to do that completely. The corner of your screen will have a small pop up ad that allows you to interact with it by changing the channel to where the advertisement will provide more information. TiVo started intertwining ads a few months ago by adding text when the show was paused.

I understand that the companies need to make profit but I feel this is unfair to the viewer because there is a reason they wanted TiVo, and that was to not have to see the advertisements. This is another way to influence their viewers. I mean they are doing it beautifully but then there is no truly free from ads programs. People I think will finally come to the conclusion that it is impossible to avoid ads since that appears to be the only solution for profit. And until another method is created to gain this profit advertisements will linger around a person’s every move everyday.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/business/media/21adco.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=time%20inc.%20mine%20magizine&st=cse

Time magizine parterned up with Lexus and have come up with and online magizine called Mine. Mine consisis of a total of five magizines that the reader chooses. Then articles from those magizines are sent to the reader. The reader, upon signing of for the service, also fills out a quesstionare that allows the partered company to send advertisements and articles based on what the reader may find interestering.

Many people have signed up for the Mine magizine service but there was a recent glitch that had some readers upset. Some of the articles were outdated. The articles presented were years old and left out most recent current events. A spokes person said they are currently working on the issue.

There needs to be a date that they fill out on the questionare. I think there needs to be extra precaustion taken when it comes to online information. It is hard to read an articles and realize that it is more than 2 years old. Or if the article is not dated it makes it harder for the reader to confirm. This is one dangerous aspect of reciving news online.