In This Update:
• GazProm Media Completes $15 Million Acquisition RuTube, The YouTube Of Russia
• Google Pulls the Plug On Lively
• Microsoft Modifies Zune Subscription Model
• Mobile Group to Lead Expansion of 3G Beyond Phones
• Verizon Wireless Bets on Storm for Holiday Season
• Million LIFE Magazine Photos Archived On Google Image Search
• Apple Talking To More Labels About DRM-Free Music
• T-Mobile Launches New Web Experience, App Store
• IBM Aims to Replicate the Brain with Cognitive Computing Project
• Apptera Secures $10.5 Million for Mobile-Ad Tech
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GazProm Media Completes $15 Million Acquisition RuTube, The YouTube Of Russia
TECHCRUNCH
Russia’s media conglomerate, Gazprom Media , is now the proud owner of video-sharing site RuTube . This deal has been in the works since at least June, 2007 and is believed to be in the $15 million range . RuTube is the YouTube of Russia. Or, rather, it wants to be. According to comScore, YouTube is actually the YouTube of Russia. In September, RuTube attracted 2 million unique visitors in Russia, versus 2.9 million Russian uniques for YouTube. RuTibe is seeing some nice growth, though. It has doubled its audience since June. (All caveats about comScore estimates apply here. Their numbers for Russia should be looked at as indicative of the trend rather than as absolutes).
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Google Pulls the Plug On Lively
PAIDCONTENT
Google’s “me too” virtual world Lively will be dead by the end of the year-just six months after it launched. It was almost inevitable though, as Google debuted Lively well after the virtual world frenzy had simmered down. The service also had to compete with established worlds like There.com, IMVU and even themed properties like MTV’s Virtual Laguna Beach. Lively traffic was marginal at best (via Compete stats), and given the state of the economy, even Google couldn’t afford to devote resources to a fledgling project.
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Microsoft Modifies Zune Subscription Model
REUTERS
Microsoft Corp on Thursday announced a new music subscription plan for owners of its Zune players, which would allow them to keep 10 tracks per month and add them to their permanent collection. The Zune Pass subscription service currently gives consumers on-demand access to millions of tracks for $14.99 per month. Effective Thursday, the software company’s modified subscription plan would allow owners of Zune to keep 10 tracks per month, which has an estimated value of $10. The users can also add those tracks to their permanent collection.
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Mobile Group to Lead Expansion of 3G Beyond Phones
NEW YORK TIMES
The GSM Association and several partners, including Vodafone and Huawei Technologies, plan to promote the use of 3G (third-generation) technology in cameras, cars and other devices that could link to mobile phones. The idea is to create technical standards for devices and popularize the idea of using embedded packets, including chips and other technology required to send data over 3G wireless signals, in a range of products used in health care, transportation, utilities, energy and consumer electronics.
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Verizon Wireless Bets on Storm for Holiday Season
REUTERS
Verizon Wireless is betting on the new BlackBerry Storm for the all-important holiday season, hoping the highly anticipated smartphone can compete against the iPhone offered by rival wireless provider AT&T Inc. The No. 2 U.S. mobile service, a joint venture between Verizon Communications Inc and Vodafone Group Plc, heavily promoted four different phones last holiday season, but its focus this year is directed firmly at Research In Motion Ltd’s first touch-screen phone.
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Million LIFE Magazine Photos Archived On Google Image Search
PULSE 2
Google News has done a terrific job at making it easy to search for news stories from the past. Any Google News users can just search for specific articles and select the time period that dates all the way back to the 1800s. Now Google Images will be providing a similar service but in the form of pictures. “We’re excited to announce the availability of never-before-seen images from the LIFE photo archive. This effort to bring offline images online was inspired by our mission to organize all the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful,” wrote Paco Galanes, Software Engineer at Google.
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Apple Talking To More Labels About DRM-Free Music
PAIDCONTENT
Apple is talking to the three remaining major labels about adding more DRM-free, MP3 tracks, a year after EMI signed on. UMG, Sony BMG and WMG are still talking to Apple, and at least one is close to an agreement, this News.com report says. Meanwhile Amazon’s music store, Napster, Rhapsody and other have already amassed on the MP3 deals with these labels, but no specific evidence yet that DRM-free has spurred the sales of song downloads in the last year. One evidence does point out that with price parity, users prefer DRM-free over DRMed songs…who wouldn’t?
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T-Mobile Launches New Web Experience, App Store
VENTUREBEAT
T-Mobile USA is rolling out a new mobile web browsing experience called web2go. By allowing users to browse the “true” internet and opening a store for third-party applications, web2go brings elements of the smartphone experience found on T-Mobile’s own G1 (powered by Google’s Android Operating System) and Apple’s iPhone to a much broader range of devices.
Previously, T-Mobile users could only access mobile-specific content like ringtones and a limited number of mobile-designed web sites.
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IBM Aims to Replicate the Brain with Cognitive Computing Project
VENTURE BEAT
Artificial intelligence has been a dismal failure over many decades of research. But scientists say they’re closer to understanding how the brain works and want to build a computer modeled on the human brain. We can all have a good laugh at this, but it’s a serious effort. IBM Research and five universities have teamed up to creative “cognitive computing” systems that can simulate the brain’s ability to sense, perceive, act, interact and recognize patterns. They will do so under a $4.9 million grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, the research arm of the Pentagon.
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Apptera Secures $10.5 Million for Mobile-Ad Tech
CNET NEWS
Apptera, a company that delivers visual and voice advertising, announced on Wednesday that it has secured $10.5 million in funding from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Alloy Ventures, and Walden International. The company also announced that former Yahoo senior executive David Karnstedt joined its board of directors. According to the company, the new investment will be used to expand its mobile-advertising network and improve its MobileAd Xchange program, which allows advertisers to reach mobile-phone users.
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