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Reuters to do financial MySpace

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The Guardian reports that Reuters i planning to launch their very own MySpace. The community will only be available to Reuters subscribers, all 70,000 or so of them. In other words, they’ll probably not have any real problems getting the word out there.

“You will see us, later in the year, launch a version of MySpace for the financial services community,” said the chief executive, Tom Glocer. “It won’t have the latest hot videos and the ‘why I am into Metallica and the Arctic Monkeys’ blogs. Instead we are going to give our financial services users the ability to post their research or if they are traders, their trading models.”

No launch date was given, but chances are you’re not welcome anyway.

Originally posted on March 2, 2007 @ 8:23 am

Syntagma to open up network magazines and share ad money

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SyntagmaSyntagma Digital is opening up its network magazines to the outside world. This means that blogs that fit into the Allusionz network magazine for instance, will be able to apply for inclusion.

The move will allow external sites inclusion in our rolling feeds, plus graphic representation on the portal and participation in the Editor’s Pick of the Posts. In addition, they will become recipients of any magazine-wide advertising deals we negotiate. Involvement will not change the ownership, hosting arrangements or running of non-Syntagma Digital sites in any way.

Syntagma going ad network, eh? They sure have got a 50+ stock of sites already to put ads on, and now they want to get bigger to get better deals. I pinged John Evans of Syntagma about this.

How will you split the revenue with participating sites?
We’re currently looking at a 70/30 split in favor of the client. That beats what’s on offer elsewhere, at least to my knowledge. It also has added advantages in terms of traffic.

What’s your goal with adding more sites to the various network magazines? Are there any milestones you want to reach, and where will it lead eventually?
The goal is to use increased page views to secure better advertising. It makes sense to maximize the use of the content platforms we’re creating in a way that benefits everyone involved. As for milestones, the system is totally expansible with no limits that I can see.

An interesting move indeed. Syntagma caused quite a bit of snickers in the blogosphere last year with their talk about network magazines, as opposed to blog networks, but since the successful launch of the magazines (and the redesign of the network) the ideas of Evans & Co. seams a whole lot more thought through.

I’ll not say that this next step is a logical one, but since Syntagma already is working with so many sites, adding more to further power up the network magazines (and the ad packages I’m sure they represent) might be a good idea. It will be interesting to follow the development of this concept.

Disclosure: I was hired for designing both the network magazines and the new Syntagma templates.

Originally posted on March 2, 2007 @ 5:21 am

Project Entropia to attract banks, locks ped-US$ rate

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Project EntropiaOnline game Project Entropia is trying to attract actual banks to give extra cred to its own money, the ped. 10 ped is locked to $US1. The idea is to get people used to mixing ped with their real life money, and therefor let them spend money made/earned/borrowed in the game in real life.

In an interview with a Swedish newspaper, Project Entropia developer Mindark’s marketing manager Carl Uggla said that banks from all over the world have contacted the company regarding this opportunity.

There is a page on banking licenses over at the Project Entropia website. Here we learn that Mindark will earn interest, of course, they’re in it for the money after all.

Personally I’d not want to invest money in a virtual world that might disappear in an instant, if Mindark goes bankrupt. That has already happened once, although the company seems to be making profits now.

One thing’s for sure though, virtual worlds are having a huge impact on the new media business, with Second Life leading the wave. PR tricks to get coverage or actual business models? We’ll see where it ends.

Originally posted on March 1, 2007 @ 2:33 am

EA goes after the female gamers

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iVillageGaming trade mag MCV reports that Electronic Arts have signed a deal with NBC owned iVillage, a female oriented site with more than 16 million members. EA will provide casual games through its Pogo.com service at iVillage, and therefor hopefully reeling in more female gamers. Like EA didn’t have enough with The Sims series or what?

iVillage COO Ezra Kucharz added: “The number of women playing games online has clearly exploded and, as the leading destination for women online, we know it was time for us to carve out a space where our members could play to their heart’s content.”

While the deal itself is most likely a good one for both parties, I’m pretty sure EA is hoping to score quite a few game sales as a result of this. A quick glance at the casual games available at Pogo.com reveals that strong EA brands such as SSX, Command & Conquer, PGA Tour Golf and Need for Speed have a presence there.

Originally posted on March 2, 2007 @ 8:33 am

CNet launches BNet, pretty pretty

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BNetCNet’s launch of business manager focused site BNet surprises me in a very positive way. Although it apparently have been running in beta since February 1, the site was news to me. Besides, it’s officially launched now, according to MediaWeek, so who cares?

BNet takes on the bizmags right on, if you ask me. There’s lots of competition in this segment, but CNet have the means to reach out, and I’m pretty sure they’ll power BNet with video content and a lot more.

Also, BNet looks great. Always a treat to browse a good looking site, huh?

Originally posted on March 2, 2007 @ 5:05 am