Amid the chaos, the Digital Everything arrives

Five years ago we boldly forecast the “Digital Everything,” a future where information, communications, entertainment, business, home life, transportation and the interconnected pieces of personal, daily living are conducted in an always-on mediascape. That future arrived in Las Vegas this week at the Consumer Electronics Show. It comes to your homes, offices, vehicles, and life […]

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Looking the wrong way

The U.S. agency that regulates broadcasting, the Federal Communications Commission , has finally decided to allow publishers to own both newspapers and broadcast stations in the biggest U.S. markets. No one is happy. Publishers don’t think the ruling goes far enough. Cable TV companies say it is anti-competitive. Public-interest groups forecast a new round of […]

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It’s looking a lot like Christmas, especially if you’ve just come home with a $38 million severance package

Tribune Company is a U.S. media conglomerate that owns newspapers and television stations coast to coast, including the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times. Tribune acquired the LA Times in 2000 when it purchased Times Mirror Co. for $8 billion. All of Tribune, including the Times Mirror assets, is now worth $3.8 billion, according […]

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Win, win, win

MTV, the Associated Press and the Knight Foundation today unveiled “Street Team 08,” a stunning collaboration that could help define newsgathering, distribution and a news-business models into the future. Made possible by a $700,000 grant through Knight’s News Challenge, MTV has recruited and is equipping 51 young, citizen journalists to cover the 2008 elections through […]

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D-Day for news publishers?

We’ve forecast the inevitability of The News Wars as news providers continue to lose audience and revenue to online aggregaters who redistribute content that others produce, frequently at great expense. Owing to parochialism and intransigence, newspaper publishers have been unable to either mount a united front or to develop meaningful innovation to compete against the […]

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Now that’s an immune system

Google’s pursuit of all things media remains relentless. In recent weeks it announced its Android operating system for mobile phones, its OpenSocial standard to link applications across major social-networking sites, and filed a patent application for a magazine of sorts that would allow users to collate Web content around which Google would wrap targeted ads. […]

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Apple calls it the iPhone

A study by Nokia forecasts that 25 percent of the entertainment consumed by people in five years time will have been created, edited and shared within their peer circle rather than created by traditional media groups. Nokia calls it “circular entertainment.” Dale PeskinDale is co-founder emeritus of We Media. www.wemedia.com

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And to think the election is only 10 months from now

2007 has been celebrated for digital innovation in U.S. politics. The Huffington Post teamed with Slate and Yahoo! for the first online “mash-up” debate. MTV and MySpace launched instant-messaging forums for online viewers to send questions in real time to presidential candidates. And, of course, all the candidates launched spunky web sites that feature videos […]

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