When a guy like Steve B. Burke likens TV viewers’ stampede online to a “wildfire,” you know the cable industry is feeling the pressure. Burke is the president and chief operating officer of Comcast, America’s largest cable distributor.
After a decade of experimentation, companies have yet to find a reliable way to burnish their brands online. Former Madison Avenue hotshot Matt Freeman aims to change all that.
Microsoft executives have long spun visions of a world where computer users can seamlessly share information between a PC, the Web, and a cellphone. But the company has made little progress in making that vision a reality–at least until now.
As the battle for the smartphone market heats up, comparisons abound between Research In Motion’s BlackBerry Storm, released in November, and Apple’s iPhone.
For starters, both devices boast a touchscreen, forgoing the buttons found on more conventional phones. But the more important comparison, from the bottom-line perspective, lies in which device carries a fatter margin.
On TV, content is king. But on the Web, community may reign supreme. Throughout television history, the way to lure most viewers was to air the best shows. It doesn’t necessarily work that way on the Web, where many shows can be seen on multiple sites.
When I talked the other day with Bill Coleman, CEO of Cassatt and a former colleague of new Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz at Sun Microsystems, he said he was initially surprised she would take on such a demanding job. After all, she stepped back from being CEO of Autodesk to be executive chairman, seeming to head toward relative retirement.
Back in May 2008, I was on top of the world. Viewers were soaring for my newly launched Yahoo show, TechTicker, my book was about to come out and was boasting a beautifully low three-digit Amazon rank, several of my BusinessWeek columns had been among the most read stories on the site, and traffic on this blog was doubling month-over-month.
On Feb. 3, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is going to make an honest man of me. Finally I will be able to buy a legal DVD of one of my favorite movies, Carol Reed’s 1959 “Our Man in Havana.” But there’s still no rhyme or reason to what films are available in any digital form.
It’s dawn at a Los Angeles apartment overlooking the Hollywood Hills. Laura Sweet, an advertising creative director in her early 40s, sits at a computer and begins to surf the Net. She searches intently, unearthing such bizarre treasures for sale as necklaces for trees and tattoo-covered pigs. As usual, she posts them on a shopping site called ThisNext.com.
The first thing that’s coming to so many minds in the wake of Apple’s announcement that CEO Steve Jobs won’t be making his customary keynote address at the Macworld Expo on Jan. 6, is the condition of Jobs’s health. I don’t think his health has anything to do with it. Though I think the speculation that has come to surround his appearance in recent years is a minor factor in the decision.
Strange as it may sound, Apple may have an iPod problem. The iconic music player cemented the company’s reputation for innovation and fueled its financial success in recent years. But those days appear to be over. Legions of iPod owners see little reason to upgrade, especially with the rocky economy.
From the first time Steve Jobs demonstrated “the pinch”–the two-finger gesture used to zoom in and out of photos and Web pages on the iPhone–some Apple observers assumed it was just a matter of time before a multitouch-enabled screen showed up on the Mac.
To hear Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer talk about Samsung Electronics’ new upgraded smartphone, T*Omnia, Korean consumers will soon get the mother of all smartphones on the planet.
Barack Obama says that the U.S. is not doing nearly enough to create jobs through technology. Shortly after he launched his campaign, the Illinois senator promised that if elected, he would create the first-ever Cabinet-level post of chief technology officer.
When they’re not hand-wringing over the recent drop in Apple’s share price, Mac enthusiasts have been transfixed lately by the mystery product, code-named “brick,” that’s due for release later this month.
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