Archive for July 1st, 2008

Verizon Wireless may not challenge Apple’s dominance of digital music any time soon, but its new DRM-free music initiative could help boost its mobile data business and broaden the market beyond iTunes.

Powered by RealNetworks’ Rhapsody service, Verizon’s upgraded V Cast Music store offers unprotected MP3 tracks via a $15 monthly subscription, as well as individual downloads to mobile devices or PC.

The subscription buys unlimited access to 5 million songs from all four of the major labels–Sony BMG, Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group and The EMI Group.

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I can’t wait for Halloween, when I’m going to be dressing up as Batman, courtesy of Dominos. Among the pizza chain’s many tie-ins with this summer’s The Dark Knight are these cool pizza boxes, which include separate parts to a cardboard-costume whole. Yes, you’ll have to order a number of pizzas to complete your outfit, and there will likely be grease stains all over your utility belt, but your other option is to actually buy a costume … and go hungry.

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If you read any part of that draft of W., Oliver Stone’s Bush biopic, which hit the net a few months back, you might think it ludicrous for the film to be likened to Shakespeare. But Stone himself has done so, as part of an L.A. Times set visit interview. Lumped in with a quote in which Stone also contrasts the project to the work of Michael Moore, the Oscar-winning director’s statement is in response to the film’s level of seriousness: “W. isn’t an overly serious movie, but it is a serious subject. It’s a Shakespearean story. . . . I see it as the strange unfolding of American democracy as I have lived it.”

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Studios say industry is in “de facto strike” with actors union refusing deal; SAG stays firm on demands, continues to undermine AFTRA deal.

At one minute past midnight last night, the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers (AMPTP) expired, but today, actors continued go to work. But for how long?

Tensions in Hollywood are palpable, and through various hand-shaking and back-stabbing, actors and studios have weaved a web of sordid relationships. SAG, which represents a majority of television and film actors, is at odds with the major studios. The major studios have reached a tentative agreement with Hollywood’s number-two actors guild, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA). AFTRA is upset with SAG because the latter is trying to get the former’s deal with the AMPTP scrapped. It would all make for good television, but unfortunately its all very real.

What this all adds up to is the gloomy prospect of a second Hollywood strike this year.

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MTV is offering advertisers a jazzy new way to quantify their media spends.

The cable net has contracted with Marketing Evolution, El Dorado Hills, Calif., to offer a system based on meeting benchmarks including awareness, relevancy, new purchase intent, purchase loyalty and advocacy. Advertisers may still pay on a CPM basis, but also have the option to contract with Marketing Evolution to measure the success of their buys.

“We are creating a made-to-order tool for marketers,” said Todd Cunningham, svp-strategy and planning at MTV Networks, New York. He said the effort is an extension of “transference”—the concept that advertisers transfer consumer awareness from the media brands where  they place their messages—a practice that the network holds in high regard.

The new initiative does not follow any single platform, so that it’s “platform neutral,” said Carolyn Everson, MTV’s evp-strategy and operations, U.S. ad sales.

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At least that’s the somewhat sarcastic conclusion I’m jumping to. As I started watching the east coast feed, an email bounced into the TV Squad inbox from reader ‘Jay.’ He noted that when he tried to record The Middleman on his PC, he was greeted with an error message. I had to wait three hours for the regular airing on the left coast, but I dusted off an old Media Center PC and got that very same error, as you see in the picture. I like to think that Wendy is showing her shock and outrage at the snafu in that shot. But wait, there’s more … after the jump.

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The 1985 movie “Clue” was a box-office flop. Critics said the characters were as flat as the Parker Brothers board game that inspired the film.

Nevertheless, Hasbro Inc., which has since acquired Parker Brothers, is ready to take its turn at board game-based movies, in a deal that departs from typical collaborations between toy companies and Hollywood.

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A LONG time ago, Toys “R” Us helped introduce a generation of children to a galaxy far, far away.Thirty-one years, six films and countless tiny plastic storm troopers later, the toy retailer is hoping to once again establish itself as the ultimate destination for all things “Star Wars.”

Starting this week, Toys “R” Us is mounting digital clocks in all 585 of its stores that will count down to July 26, when more than 225 of those stores will open at midnight to begin selling toys from the latest “Star Wars” film, “The Clone Wars,” an animated movie that opens in the United States on Aug. 15. Two of the retailer’s flagship outlets, in Mission Bay in San Diego and in Times Square, will hold costume and trivia contests that night as well, and will give away limited-edition “Star Wars” toys with every purchase.

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The Eye has absorbed CNET into CBS Interactive and reorganized the unit along five areas of focus, all overseen by CBS Interactive chief Quincy Smith.Smith, who had been prexy of the unit, has been elevated to chief exec of CBS Interactive, with CNET’s Neil Ashe moving into the prexy slot.

The expanded unit is organized into technology, entertainment, sports, news and business segments, and the goal is to leverage each throughout the parent conglom. For starters, Smith said, CBS Interactive will integrate programming from skeins such as “60 Minutes” and “48 Hours” with CNET tech coverage.

“We’re going to make sure we present all that news in an integrated way,” Smith said.

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Just when you thought the New Kids on the Block reunion couldn’t get any sweeter, word comes that the guys are recording a song with another favorite boy band: New Edition.

“Donnie Wahlberg had this idea for a few months, since New Kids had the idea of getting back together really,” says producer Nadir “RedOne” Khawat, who worked on the song. “Donnie’s been looking for that one track for all of them and I think we found it.”

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