In This Update:
• Google Accuses Verizon of Planning to Dodge 700 MHz Open Access Rules
• Audience Measurement Firm TNS Rejects WPP’s $1.9 Billion Offer
• MK Capital Finalizes Acquisition of Kontiki from Verisign
• Microsoft Brings TV Shows from NBC, Others to Zune
• Qwest Signs Wireless Deal with Verizon, Drops Sprint
• Marc Andreessen Asked to Join Facebook’s Board
• Rearden Commerce Secures $100 Million Round of New Funding
• Sprint Mulls Shedding Nextel Unit
• Buzznet Acquires Music Community Absolute Punk
• Skyhook Introduces Geo-Targeted Ads for Mobile App Developers
• IAB Completes Industry Guidelines For Video Ads
• Survey: Newspapers Likely to Be Free in the Future
• Out Of Print CD’s Get New Life via Amazon On Demand
• Researchers Use Akamai to Find Local BitTorrent Peers
• Comcast Abandons P2P Bill of Rights
• StoryBids Launches Product Placement Marketplace
• PrimeSense Raises $20 Million, Offers Immersive 3D Gaming Rigs

Google Accuses Verizon of Planning to Dodge 700 MHz Open Access Rules
IP DEMOCRACY
On Friday, Google urged the FCC to block Verizon Wireless’ $4.7 bil. successful bid for the C Block band of spectrum in the recently completed 700 MHz auction unless Verizon is forced to agree that open access rules apply to handsets it provides its own customers. Specifically, Google claims that Verizon Wireless has no intention of abiding by the open access rules governing the C block spectrum for devices it gives to its own customers and that the FCC should condition Verizon’s grant upon a clear commitment that Verizon will not exclude these handsets from the requirement. Google all but accuses Verizon of planning to ignore the portion of the C Block open access requirements that say that C Block licensees “may not disable features on handsets it provides to customers.” Google says that Verizon has never strayed from its initial position that open access requirements do not apply to handsets that it gives its own customers.
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Audience Measurement Firm TNS Rejects WPP’s $1.9 Billion Offer
TELEGRAPH.CO.UK
Taylor Nelson Sofres, the market research group, said last night it had rejected a £1bn bid from Sir Martin Sorrell’s WPP. TNS said WPP had made two separate offers, the latest being tabled on Saturday and rejected by the TNS board yesterday as “opportunistic” and undervaluing the company. WPP made a written offer to buy TNS with a mixture of cash and WPP shares at an effective value of 230p for every TNS share at current prices, putting a value on the group of just under £1bn. Under the terms of the bid WPP would have paid 154p in cash and offered 0.1214 WPP shares for each TNS share. “The board has no hesitation in rejecting this opportunistic proposal as it substantially undervalues the company even on a standalone basis,” said Donald Brydon, chairman of TNS.
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MK Capital Finalizes Acquisition of Kontiki from Verisign
VENTUREBEAT
MK Capital has completed its previously announced acquisition of content delivery network Kontiki from Verisign for an undisclosed price. As announced, Verisign is likely divesting Kontiki for a price lower than the $62 million it paid for it two years ago. MK Capital is one of the venture capital companies that provided initial funding to Kontiki before the Verisign acquisition. Verisign started looking for a buyer for Kontiki back in December as part of a corporate restructuring. The company went through changes during 2007 after long-time CEO Stratton Sclavos resigned and was replaced by William Roper. Now Verisign is focusing on its core Internet businesses. Kontiki was founded by Netscapee Mike Homer in 2000 and its content delivery network is now used by a number of Fortune 500 companies to handle their web video traffic.
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Microsoft Brings TV Shows from NBC, Others to Zune
REUTERS
Microsoft Corp said it will start offering television shows for its Zune portable media device, more than two years after Apple Inc introduced the feature for its iPod player. Microsoft’s Zune has one thing that Apple’s market-defining iPod and accompanying iTunes store does not — TV programs from General Electric’s NBC Universal. Those shows and more than 800 TV episodes including Comedy Central’s “South Park” and MTV’s “The Hills” will be available at the Zune store starting on Tuesday for the equivalent of $1.99 in Microsoft points that must be purchased in advance.
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Qwest Signs Wireless Deal with Verizon, Drops Sprint
REUTERS
U.S. phone company Qwest Communications International Inc and Verizon Wireless said on Monday they signed a five-year agreement for the landline provider to sell Verizon’s mobile phone services. Qwest said its residential customers will be able to choose Verizon Wireless service on its own, or as part of a “bundle” of home phone, Internet, video and wireless services. Terms of the deal with Verizon Wireless, a joint venture of Verizon Communications Inc and Vodafone Group Plc, were not disclosed.
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Marc Andreessen Asked to Join Facebook’s Board
ALL THINGS DIGITAL
Silicon Valley luminary Marc Andreessen has been asked to join the board of Facebook, according to several sources with knowledge of the situation. While the arrangement is not completed yet, sources said the longtime entrepreneur has verbally agreed to accept the post to become the fourth member of the board of the Palo Alto, Ca.-based social networking site. Other board members include Accel Partners Jim Breyer, Founders Fund’s Peter Thiel and Facebook CEO and Founder Mark Zuckerberg. Greylock Partners David Sze also has observer status on the board. Since he co-founded browser pioneer Netscape in the 1990s and helped usher in the Internet age, Andreessen has been an active investor and has created several successful startups.
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Rearden Commerce Secures $100 Million Round of New Funding
TECHCRUNCH
Rearden Commerce, a startup that helps company employees arrange and book events such as travel, dining or concerts, has raised USD100m from investors that include its largest shareholder, American Express. The round, which was rumoured in reports last week, takes total investment in Rearden to $200m and values the company at $500m. Oak Investment Partners, Foundation Capital and Chase Capital also took part in the funding. Rearden’s software links to external applications and allows users to book events such as flights or conference calls by storing details including their favourite food and the location of their meetings. Founded in 1999, Rearden offers its services to more than 1,700 corporations, up from 92 two years ago, according to tech blog TechCrunch. As part of the funding, Chase will help expand Rearden’s service to consumers by offering it to the 90m customers and small firms that have a Chase bank card.
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Sprint Mulls Shedding Nextel Unit
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Wireless provider Sprint Nextel Corp. is considering spinning off or selling its ailing Nextel unit, people familiar with the situation say. The move would be a dramatic acknowledgment that Sprint’s $35 billion acquisition of Nextel Communications Inc. in 2005 has been a failure. No deal is imminent, these people say, characterizing the discussions over Nextel’s fate as part of an ongoing strategic review at Sprint. But the fact that Sprint is even contemplating undoing the Nextel merger highlights the problems facing the No. 3 wireless carrier in the U.S.
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Buzznet Acquires Music Community Absolute Punk
PAIDCONTENT
UMG-backed Buzznet continues to roll up independent music sites. The latest acquisition is Absolute Punk an alternative music community site. The acquisition, for an undisclosed sum, follows recent acquisitions of Stereogum and Idolator, formerly a Gawker Media site. The acquisition helps Buzznet expand the areas it covers, and it gets a community of 500,000 fans. Absolute Punk will remain distinct, maintainings editorial control, with the benefit of added resources.
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Skyhook Introduces Geo-Targeted Ads for Mobile App Developers
CLICKZ
Skyhook Wireless is looking to provide mobile application developers with a new source of revenue with the introduction of location-targeted advertising to its software development kit. The new capability will allow developers of mobile applications to embed — and earn revenue from — ads that will be delivered based on a user’s geography. The ads will be provided by Quattro Wireless. Ted Morgan, founder and CEO of Boston-based Skyhook, said that mobile application developers frequently complain about the lack of an effective business model because “carriers make it difficult for them to charge money, and when they do allow them to, they take 50 percent.” The new service is intended to help developers avoid that pitfall in favor of an ad-supported model
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IAB Completes Industry Guidelines For Video Ads
PAIDCONTENT
The Interactive Advertising Bureau has completed its first update of broadband ad rules in three years. . The trade group’s Digital Video Ad Format Guidelines And Best Practices offers a range of definitions for the various formats related to linear video ads, non-linear video ads and companion ads. For instance, overlays should run 5-15 seconds with no audio until a user opts in. Noting that the space has changed greatly since the guidelines were last issued in 2005, IAB CEO Randall Rothenberg said broadband video moved well beyond the experimental phase and that new specifications were needed to help improve ads tied to online video. However, the scope of the new document is fairly limited. The guidelines do not suggest the best way to measure impressions or other metrics for online video ads. It also avoids advertising during live video streaming or the use of full-screen video, since those formats tend to be more customized, making it difficult to apply strict uniform standards.
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Survey: Newspapers Likely to Be Free in the Future
REUTERS
Newspapers seeking to compete with the Internet are likely to become free and place greater emphasis on comment and opinion in the future, a survey of the world’s editors showed on Tuesday. The report, conducted by Zogby International for the World Editors Forum and Reuters, revealed that newspaper editors were still optimistic about the future of their publications but believed they would have to adapt further for the digital age. Some 86 percent of respondents believed newsrooms should become more integrated with digital services as two in three believe the most common form of news consumption will be via electronic media such as online or mobiles within a decade.
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Out Of Print CD’s Get New Life via Amazon On Demand
HYPERBOT
Amazon has made deals with Sony BMG, EMI and other labels to bring hundreds of out-of-print albums to CD using their CreateSpace “Disc on Demand” system. Titles include the “Hatari Soundtrack” by Henry Mancini, “Earthquake Weather” by Joe Strummer and “Motorcade of Generosity” by Cake as well as albums from Blue Note such as “Telepathy” by Bill Stewart, “Foreign Intrigue” by Tony Williams and “Carryin’ On” by Grant Green. The new CDs will be manufactured on-demand and shipped when customers place an order.
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Researchers Use Akamai to Find Local BitTorrent Peers
ARS TECHNICA
The rise of P2P traffic as a percentage of total network use has left ISPs looking for ways to limit its impact on their capacity. But computer science researchers from Northwestern University have been experimenting with ways of keeping the traffic local that don’t require the cooperation of ISPs. Systems such as those used by Verizon speed P2P transfers and reduce their burdens on ISPs by providing network topology and traffic information to P2P clients. Those clients can then use this information to identify local peers with clear paths, speeding the transfer and putting less strain on the ISPs’ larger network. These systems, however, require the explicit cooperation of ISPs, which have to consistently update the network information. The new method of identifying local peers seeks to accomplish the same thing without getting ISPs involved. It relies on the fact that commercial content distribution systems such as the one operated by Akamai obtain or generate the equivalent information in order to redirect users to a local copy of a popular web site or video. Thus, if two computers get redirected to the same Akamai content cache, they’re likely to have local access to each other.
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Comcast Abandons P2P Bill of Rights
NEWTEEVEE
Comcast SVP Rich Woundy told the audience of the DCIA’s P2P Media Summit in Los Angeles on Monday that his company is not spearheading the creation of a P2P Bill of Rights anymore. Instead, Comcast will take part in a newly formed working group of the Distributed Computing Industry Association that aims to define best practices for the P2P industry. Comcast had proposed a set of guidelines called “Bill of Rights and Responsibilities for P2P Users and Service Providers” in cooperation with the P2P startup Pando less than three weeks ago. The proposal came just two days before an FCC hearing at Stanford University about Comcast’s ongoing practice of throttling BitTorrent traffic.
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StoryBids Launches Product Placement Marketplace
ALARM:CLOCK
Irvine, CA-based Storybids launched a product placement marketplace where online video content creators can hook up with sponsors. Storybids say that they closed Series A in August 2007 from Toronto’s STN Labs. Storybids contends that a reason that online video advertising has not taken off is that viewers skip past ads inserted into YouTube vids. By placing product placements into videos you take away that problem. That makes sense. The hard part will be for a startup like StoryBids to get the attention of product advertisers. It doesn’t strike us as an immediately scalable concept.
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PrimeSense Raises $20 Million, Offers Immersive 3D Gaming Rigs
TECHCRUNCH
Imagine the Wii with 3D vision. The console would understand if you were behind an object and images would move accordingly and you could reach out with your hand to “touch” items on the screen. The technology is real and it works and PrimeSense, a small Israeli company, is trying to release it. The company, which just closed a $20 million funding round led by Canaan Partners with lead investors Gemini Israel Funds (who also provided the seed funding) and Genesis Partners. The company is moving out of development into sales.
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Tags: Accel Partners, Amazon, Apple, BitTorrent, Boston, Buzznet, EMI, Facebook, FCC, Founders Fund, Google, Greylock Partners, IAB, IPO, ISP, iTunes, Kontiki, Local, LTE, Microsoft, MK Capital, MTV, Music, NBC, Oak Investment Partners, P2P, Pando, PrimeSense, Rearden Commerce, RIM, Seed, Series A, Skyhook, Social Networking, Sony, Sony BMG, Sprint, StoryBids, THQ, TNS, U.S., Venture Capital, Verizon, Video, Wii, WPP, Yahoo, YouTube, Zune