Wednesday, May 14, 2008

May 14, 2008

BET

BET Rolls Out a Night of Original Programming with the BET News ...

Britain’s biggest magazines. Whether its fashion, beauty or lifestyle titles ; British magazines rarely feature women of color in their pages, which is a telltale symptom of much larger disease plaguing England’s multi-cultural society. In the first ever news special for its audiences in the United Kingdom, BET reveals that people of colour in the U.K. are experiencing a etquot ;Beauty Blackout.etquot

CBS

CBS returns to roots with fall schedule
Crime and comedy are coming back in full force to CBS’ schedule next season as the network re-embraces the genres that have performed best for it in recent years. After taking a creative detour last fall with outside-the-box concepts, CBS is adding some new procedurals and opening up another night of comedy. CBS will expand its successful Monday night sitcom lineup to Wednesdays, as expected.

CW NETWORK

CW 2008 Fall Schedule vs. 2007 Fall Schedule

As badly as the CW has done this season, its hard to imagine they’ll do worse next season. They’ve already sold off Sunday night to a third party. What else are they going to try next fall to reverse their slide? Two of the six of the new CW Fall 2007 shows (Reaper, Gossip Girl) introduced in Fall 2007 survive into Fall 2008. The three new shows introduced for Fall 2008 (90210, Surviving The Filthy Rich, Stylista) seem targeted much more directly at young women than the shows they replace.

FOX

MySpace Wins Largest-Ever Anti-Spam Award

A notorious "Spam King" and his partner owe MySpace about $230 million in damages after a federal judge awarded the popular online hangout what is believed to be the largest anti-spam judgment ever. Parent company News Corp. hopes the judgment will serve to deter other spammers.

MTV

MTV Greenlights 'The Real World' Season 21 in Brooklyn

It's all systems go for the record-setting 21st season of The Real World. MTV has given the nod for production on the next edition of the longest-running reality series to begin. Season 21 moves the show from the west coast to the east for The Real World: Brooklyn.

MTV Tres draws plan for animated series

MTV Tres' new programming lineup emphasizes musical discovery and includes the channel's first shortform animated series, it announced at its New York upfront presentation. The bilingual entertainment channel is launching new music block "Fresh Music Mondays" and unsigned talent search "Dame Un Break."

Radiohead and MTV Join Against Human Trafficking

In an unprecedented and exclusive collaboration, MTV EXIT (End Exploitation and Trafficking) Campaign and Radiohead have partnered to produce a music video for Radiohead's track "All I Need" off the album In Rainbows. The music video has premiered globally on all MTV platforms since May 1st and will potentially be seen in 560 million households worldwide.

UNIVISION

Univision shakes it up

Six weeks before Univision Communications is set to face Mexican media giant Televisa in court, the top-rated Spanish-language broadcaster in the U.S. announced a 2008-09 lineup dominated by Televisa product

AFRICA

African Countries Seek Common Approach Against HIV/AIDS

Stakeholders in Africa in the fight against HIV/AIDS are proposing a common African approach to curbing the pandemic. More than 70 percent of the world’s infected are said to live in sub-Saharan Africa. Voice of America English to Africa’s Lameck Masina reports that statistics show more than two thirds of all people with HIV/AIDS live in Sub-Saharan Africa, where more than three quarters of all AIDS deaths in 2007 occurred.

Kenya: Mobile Phones to Be Used in Aids Campaign

This week, the mobile phone will be used in a peculiarly Kenyan initiative aimed at promoting an HIV/Aids awareness programme. Young people participating in the programme are simply expected to play games on their mobile phones. The proponents of the project hope that as they play, the youths will also have a chance to get educated on vital HIV/ Aids issues.

Namibia Touts New Program to Fight AIDS

“We have a five-year strategic plan looking at how effectively to reduce [the] HIV problem,” she said. “We have the five components; the first one, we want to look at leadership, empowering the leaders on HIV and AIDS because we know that without a political will, there is no way we can go further in this fight.”

New African Effort to Build AIDS Research Center in Ghana

In Ghana -- a new effort to fight AIDS in Africa. The Africa Life Aid Project is the creation of the Ghana-based charity the Woyome Foundation for Africa, which is pressing for interventions in the fight against the disease. Voice of America English to Africa Service reporter Lameck Masina says the Africa Life Aid Project includes a series of events to raise funds to fight the pandemic.

World Bank says HIV/AIDS to remain a challenge in sub-Saharan Africa

For the foreseeable future HIV/AIDS will remain an unprecedented economic, social and human challenge for sub-Saharan Africa, the World Bank said Wednesday, calling the 50-nation region the epicenter of the disease and announcing a new strategy to fight the epidemic.

WorldFish’s Anti-HIV/AIDS Projects Wins World Bank Award

WorldFish Center scientists in Malawi and Cameroon have won the World Bank's Global Development Marketplace awards for projects that offer cutting-edge solutions to pressing social and economic concerns.

Zimbabwe: Council Sets Up HIV/Aids Steering Committees

THE Zimbabwe Business Council is setting up steering committees in the provinces to enhance the response of business to the HIV and Aids pandemic and to contribute to the development of the national policy, an official said yesterday.

CARIBBEAN & LATIN AMERICA

Buju Banton pleads with artistes to clean up lyrics

Buju Banton, the popular dancehall artist is pleading with fellow dancehall entertainers to clean up their lyrics in order to stem the social decay that is not only present in Jamaica but most of the Caribbean countries where the music is very popular. Lyrical content in dancehall music has been a hot topic in the Caribbean lately.

Glenmuir erupted for RE-TV Tour

After a few words from the sponsors: Coca Cola and Digicel, Melina from the Jamaica AIDs Support spoke a few words about the disease and her experiences. "I've been living with HIV for some years now, Glenmuir listen to your parents and teachers, abstinence is best, it's your right!"

World Bank Approves US$65 Million for Social Protection, Early Childhood Development and HIV/AIDS in Jamaica

The World Bank Board of Directors approved three loans for Jamaica totaling US$65 million to support the country's efforts to strengthen its social safety net, improve services for young children and their parents, and support HIV/AIDS prevention and control.

EUROPE

Online questionnaire for sexual health providers

By collecting information from sexual health providers and health promotion workers across Britain the MESH Projoct will be able to build a picture of how services meet the sexual health needs of men who have sex with men and how they might be improved for men who have sex with men from ethnic minority backgrounds.

ADVERTISING NEWS

Online Ads Showing Signs of Economic Wear

Online advertising is starting to feel the effects of a tepid economy, according to industry analysis firm PubMatic. Based on data from "billions of ad impressions" and several thousand online publishers, PubMatic asserts that clicks per thousand monetization rates are dropping.

YouTube to Offer Ads With Buzz Targeting

YouTube is offering advertisers the ability to pair their in-video ads with clips the site believes are on their way to becoming viral hits. A new algorithm identifies videos that are on the up-and-up in terms of audience. YouTube describes buzz targeting as "a strong marketing opportunity."

HIV/AIDS AND SEXUAL HEALTH NEWS

Hosting Summer's Sexiest Benefit, AIDS Service Center NYC Teams ...

Join celebrity hosts Mackenroth and Christiana, Playboy Playmates, the cast of Naked Boys Singing!, superstar DJ Vic Latino, club sensation amberRose Marie, singer Grace Garland, NY Times Bestselling author Emily Giffin, Food Network's newest star Sunny Anderson, sexpert JamYe WaXman and many more special guests for the summer's sexiest fundraiser, promoting safer sex in the age of AIDS.

The Female Health Company Reports 267% Increase in Second Quarter ...

"We are very pleased to report record revenues and earnings during the first half of our 2008 fiscal year," noted O.B. Parrish, Chief Executive Officer of The Female Health Company. "Growing acceptance of the female condom as the only available barrier contraceptive method controlled by women that allows them to protect themselves against HIV/AIDS is the basis for our growth. The FC Female Condom is now available in over 100 countries, and we believe it will play an increasingly important role in the global battle against HIV/AIDS in the future."

The half-a-million condoms giveaway

The Flowers Heritage Foundation acquired one million latex prophylactics for a vast giveaway program in April - distributing them to local agencies such as the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, Haight Ashbury Free Clinics and the Black Coalition on AIDS. But when those programs collected all they needed, the "Condom Room" at Flowers headquarters was still stacked with 500 boxes, each containing 1,000 of the rubber devices.

MOBILE NEWS

Hearst Lets Readers Shop via Text Messages

Hearst, the publisher of such magazines as Cosmopolitan and Good Housekeeping, is announcing a deal with mobile technology provider ShopText to enable readers to make purchases, sign up for samples and enter sweepstakes through mobile phone text messages.

GyPSii Takes the Lead in Mobile Social Networking With New and Improved Feature Set

GyPSii is a mobile lifestyle application; a location based friend-finder, a place and event finder, a networking site for communities and a home to share pictures, video, audio, and content with friends and other groups. GyPSii also uses location information to effortlessly “Geo-tag” entries and to provide a powerful location based database of User Generated Content.

MULTI CULTURAL NEWS

Essence founder Ed Lewis named chairman of Latina Media Ventures

Latina Media Ventures LLC (LMV), the leading integrated media company for bicultural U.S. Latin women, today announced that Edward Lewis has been named Chairman of the Board. Mr. Lewis will work closely with the LMV management team to further strengthen and expand the company’s platforms, including Latina Magazine and its digital media and consumer events businesses.

Mayor Bloomberg and Latin Media and Entertainment Commission ...

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced yesterday at the annual "Made in NY" Awards reception held at Gracie Mansion new efforts of the Latin Media and Entertainment Commission (LMEC) to position New York as the center for Latin media and entertainment. The announcements included the City's first ever Latin Media Guide of events taking place throughout the city, the appointment of eight new commission members, the formation of a working group with educational institutions and industry leaders, and a newly re-launched website on www.nyc.gov .

PHILANTHROPY

The Perils of Philanthrocapitalism

For the past five years or so, venture philanthropy has been all the rage. Charity is out, social profits are in. Big NGOs have become the scourge of the entrepreneurial rich, who would rather start their own foundations and direct every dollar to their pet cause…

SOCIAL MEDIA NEWS

Facebook Adds Languages for Global Growth

Facebook will introduce tools that translate content into four additional languages in an effort to ramp up the social network's international expansion. The addition of Dutch, Italian, Norwegian, and Polish content will be followed by translations into another 20 languages.

Facebook Platform Loses Its Influence

In a blog post last week, Facebook developer Jesse Farmer declared that the Facebook Platform Party is over, citing a 27% decline in activity in the developer forum since January, a decline in overall postings of 51% over the same time period, and his finding that the average application launched in early January was 1.5 times more successful in terms of its adoption rate than ones launched in March.

It’s Even More Official: Social Networking is Hard to Monetize

Today, on May 13, research firm eMarketer lowered its forecast for advertising on U.S. social networking sites to $1.4 billion from $1.6 billion. That’s a 12.5% haircut—a significant reduction, especially since it’s coming from a research firm that has been pretty bullish on the prospects of running ads on social networking sites.

No End In Sight To Facebook's Growing Pains

Nobody's up in arms yet, but Fortune writer Jesse Hempel said that CEO Mark Zuckerberg is starting to take hits from Facebook users, developers and advertisers. Unrest amongst your entire constituency usually presages the end for a public figure or company CEO, but Facebook is private, with aspirations of eventually going public.

Social Networks Lack Successful Ad Model

eMarketer is revising its U.S. social network ad spending forecast, projecting that advertisers will spend $1.4 billion to place ads on online social networks this year, down from a previous projection of $1.6 billion. The change is due in part to a lack of successful ad models.

OTHER NEWS

ABC to Premiere Only Two New Fall Shows

Disney's ABC will introduce only two new series in the fall, in a schedule the network admits was severely affected by the 100-day Hollywood writers strike. "We certainly saw the affect," says ABC Entertainment boss Stephen McPherson. "People found other things to do."

Bravo, Showtime Touted As Gay-Friendly Companies

NBC Universal's Bravo emerged as the most "gay-friendly" company in a survey from Prime Access and PlanetOut. Following Bravo are Apple, Showtime and HBO. More than half of gay consumers polled lauded Bravo, which has featured gay personalities in "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" and "Working Out."

Digital City Limits: Austin Found No. 1 In New Media Penetration

Scarborough Research has identified the nation's most digital-savvy cities. The national survey identified 18 different high-tech consumer behaviors and purchasing patterns; it segmented the population based on the propensity to engage in these behaviors, identifying a cohort of just 6% as "digital-savvy" consumers.

How To Find Your AdWords Landing Page Load Time Data

Google announced that it would start to include landing page load time as a Quality Score factor a few months ago, and the change is slated to take effect by mid-June. This is important, as Barry Schwartz notes: "If you have a slow page load time, your AdWords ads will cost your more."
To prepare advertisers for the shift, Google is now providing landing page load time data in the keyword diagnostic section of AdWords accounts. This gives users that may have poorly loading pages about a month to make improvements before the load time starts to affect their Quality Score.

Media Content-Distribution Model in Decline

A few years ago, media moguls like Rupert Murdoch and Sumner Redstone touted the benefits of content and distribution "synergy." That strategy appears to be falling out of favor as the digital age shifts the balance of power. Distribution "used to be a monopoly," say industry experts.

Pop and country unite to fight wireless proposal

The Grand Ole Opry and MTV may be at opposite ends of the music spectrum, but they are part of a coalition urging federal regulators to stand up to a frequency grab by Microsoft and Google that could render wireless microphones useless.

Sony Video Games Unexpectedly Turn Profitable

Sony is forecasting its operating income will rise 20% this year, beating estimates, as the games division that makes PlayStation 3 consoles turns profitable. The company says operating profit will climb to $4.3 billion in year ending March 2009, some 13% higher than estimated.

Starcom Breathes Oxygen Into Media Planning

Starcom Worldwide and its research and planning partner Strategic Oxygen are now using the digital channel to map engagement in cross-media campaigns.

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