One of the frequently heard complaints about iPhone applications is that with more than 85,000 options, finding good ones can be tricky and time-consuming. Could the answer be yet another app?

Envio Networks on Tuesday is launching Chorus, a free app that shows users the ones their friends are trying out and suggests ones that might interest them. The Andover, Mass.-based company, which has received funding from Matrix Partners and North Bridge Venture Partners, specializes in social-networking technology and saw the Apple (AAPL) device as a good showcase for what it can do.

“We think that shared discovery is a very powerful concept,” said Manish Jha, Envio’s chief executive, who ran ESPN’s mobile unit previously.

To use Chorus, you register and add some friends, which you can do by inviting phone contacts, Facebook friends or even contacts in your immediate vicinity, who must also be Chorus users. You can then see apps they’ve added in an “activity feed,” which looks and behaves similarly to Facebook’s news feed.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

SB Nation, the network of sporting sites owned by Sportsblogs Inc., is getting a makeover focused on real-time updates, a bid to increase traffic between its Web properties.

The redesign went into effect late Wednesday and includes a “storystream,” similar to Facebook’s news feed, that wraps up articles, blog posts, videos and other content about hot topics like Melanie Oudin’s U.S. Open advance and Brady Quinn’s starting for the Browns on Sunday. Editors monitor news outlets, Twitter feeds and SB Nation’s sites for each storystream and keep them frequently updated, said Jim Bankoff, the company’s chief executive.

A recent storystream on Allen Iverson’s move to Memphis, for example, pulls from Sports Illustrated, ESPN, a Reebok commercial on YouTube and one of Mr. Iverson’s own tweets. “Effectively what we’ve created here is a blog on the Allen Iverson story,” Mr. Bankoff said.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

Last November, the Wall Street Journal ran a Heard on the Street column that proposed that Disney (DIS) ought to buy Electronic Arts (ERTS). The following month, they revisited the idea.

This morning, Janney Montgomery Scott analyst Tony Wible dusted off the concept in a report in which he launched coverage of Disney with a Buy rating. The logic isn’t that hard to figure out. Disney owns ESPN, the television, radio and Web sports programming juggernaut. Electronic Arts is a huge player in sports video games with its EA Sports line, including the Madden football franchise, Tiger Woods golf games and FIFA soccer games, among many others.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

Never heard of Jeremy Roenick? That’s okay. We don’t judge here. The hockey jocks at ESPN may think differently, though.

Writer Patrick Hruby calls the planned retirement San Jose Sharks player Jeremy Roenick a blow to videogame players the world over.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

Hulu, the online TV service launched two years ago by Fox and NBC, has enjoyed incredible success with viewers–too much, it may turn out.

Two weeks ago, comScore’s report that Hulu had pulled into the top three streaming video sites was quickly followed by news that Disney (DIS)–the corporate parent of ABC and ESPN–was taking a stake in the venture.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

A few weeks back, someone pointed me to a Twitter message where one Twitter user was (jokingly) accusing another of copyright infringement for repeating a message. While the situation was amusing, you knew it was only a matter of time until the question became more serious.

Read the rest of this post

If you haven’t read, ESPN has said that they will be aggressively bidding for the retransmission rights for the 2016 Olympics. Notice that I didn’t say TV rights. The battle for the Olympics rights will be in spreadsheet projections done by ESPN, NBC and probably DirecTV that will take into account what revenues can be generated by TV advertising (traditional and interactive), cable/satellite subscription revenues, an ever-increasing market size for mobile video and advertising, and of course audio/video and text advertising of all types.

Read the rest of this post

I wrote some long stories for the Sports Business Journal, but nothing comes close to John Ourand’s magnum opus on ESPN in this week’s issue. Ourand, who worked on the report for three months, takes a deep look at the sharp-as-a-pistol folks from Bristol–and the way they are viewed by advertisers, media buyers, leagues and competitors.

The story keys off a well-traveled PowerPoint presentation called “The Emperor’s New Clothes: How ESPN’s Multi-Platform Strategy Hasn’t Improved Ratings” that claims moving to ESPN doesn’t help sports raise ratings in comparison to broadcast nets and that its vaunted multi-platform strategy doesn’t add much overall. Basically, as Ourand says, the idea is to bash everything about ESPN, which has been a lightning rod for criticism for much of its existence.

Read the rest of this post