Media

Case trades digital for downward dog

Steve Case is plowing $500 million into the leisure and wellness industry with the launch of a new investment company called Revolution. The former Time Warner chairman and co-founder of America Online will serve as chairman and chief executive of the new Washington-based venture, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

So far, the company's holdings lean toward the exclusive with a majority stake in a luxury time-share company called Exclusive Resorts. Case is also chairman of that company, which boasts 160 destination properties, each worth an average $2.5 million, and a $375,000 joining fee.

Other Revolution … Read more

From Baywatch to Marketwatch

Guess who rang the closing bell at the NYSE on Friday? Pamela Anderson, and that's no April Fools' joke. The actress, you may recall, gained fame at the height of the dot-com boom, when a steamy home video of the former Baywatch star and her then-husband appeared on the Net, sparking one of the most high-profile privacy debates, at least of the Web's early days. This time, Anderson was in a more button-down role--as a spokeswoman for Estee Lauder. It wasn't a banner day for the market, though--the Dow closed down more than 99 points. Maybe … Read more

Doubletake: profile advertising

DoubleClick's one-time ambitions to profile Web surfers in order to send them personalized banner ads as they bop about the Web are alive and kicking at aQuantive, one of the largest interactive ad agencies, including ad tech and a network.

DoubleClick got out of the Internet media business long ago, but aQuantive stayed the course. And last year it launched DrivePM, a "performance" advertising network that profiles people (anonymously) as they traverse the Web.

Brian McAndrews, CEO of aQuantive, said Wednesday during an informal chat that the business is booming. DrivePM made $9.5 million in revenue … Read more

Does the IRS need to know about your eBay sales?

With April 15 nearly upon us, eBay sellers may have some extra homework to do before popping their tax returns in the mail. According to the Associated Press, many people are confused about whether they should report windfalls from online auctions to the Internal Revenue Service.

The question is whether the auction activity constitutes a small business or a hobby--a distinction that's not always clear. For instance, is the person whose flea market finds fetch top dollar online operating a business?

The IRS offers a few guidelines. If the taxpayer depends on the income, acts in a businesslike manner … Read more

Sizing up spyware

Software designed to monitor Web surfers' behavior and bombard the PC with pop-up ads is a thriving business. And at least one anti-spyware researcher is trying to pinpoint just how much money adware makers are raking in from those pop-ups and other types of ads. Richard Stiennon, chief technology officer at anti-spyware software company Webroot, has estimated ads sales generated by adware are $1.6 billion.

He calculates this figure by delving into revenues reported by Claria, one of the top adware distributors, and Avenue Media. Claria, whose software is on roughly 40 million PCs, makes about $90 million in … Read more

Toyota woos Net crowd

More than 50 percent of Toyota Scion's contact with customers occurs via online chat or e-mail, Jim Farley, the company's chief, said at the New York International Auto Show on Thursday.

"We're listening," he said during a news conference to introduce the company's latest concept car, the t2B. The boxy-looking auto was created to combine the attitude of the company's boxy xB with the upscale interior of its TC coupe, Farley said. Toyota broadcast the unveiling of the car online.

The company, which caters low-priced, customizable cars like the TC and xB to … Read more

A novel podcast

Science fiction author Scott Sigler is pursuing my favorite idea yet for the pseudo-genre of podcasting ?? a serialized novel. Sigler is posting chapters of his new book EarthCore periodically to his blog, all for free. It's the only way you can get the book, at least for now.

I think this idea has real potential for other authors. Why not do early releases on audio, as a subscription service, before the print version comes out? Great promo, great way to get fans excited about a title, and wouldn't really interfere with print sales.

Funny how we're reliving … Read more

Does P2P case threaten Silly Putty?

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is counting down to next week's Supreme Court hearing on file-swapping with a daily profile of technologies they say could be at risk if the decision goes against the peer to peer companies. Today's endangered gadget: Silly Putty. And why not? Sure, bouncing it off your little brother's head is a non-infringing use, but there are all those newspaper comic strips being copied.

Can newspaper group deliver online?

It's easy to write off newspapers when it comes to winning the new media war. After all, the ink-stained wretches got trumped by Craigslist and most have lagged their real-time competitors, largely for fear of cannibalizing print. Futurists point to a day when a Google-Amazon alliance called "Googlezon" will make the New York Times irrelevant. We'll see.

In the meantime, this centuries-old business (with its strong branding, deep pockets and business know-how on both the sales and edit side) is getting smarter: Last night Gannett, Knight-Ridder and Tribune Co. said they bought a 75 percent stake in news aggregator Topix.net, … Read more