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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

Reddit Parent Company Gets Anti-Social About Digg

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There has been a lot of negative news about Digg coming out of Camp Conde lately and the reasons behind it are becoming clear.

Starting the year off with a prediction that Digg would become the new Friendster, Wired magazine (owned by Conde Nast Publications, also owner of Digg competitor Reddit.com) has continued to report, and according to Mike Arrington, manufacture negative news about Digg.com.

[The] bigger problem is that Wired isn’t simply reporting news about Digg. They’re making the news. And they’re going negative. In the first example, they make a prediction that Digg will fall, comparing it to Friendster. No news was reported – it was just an out of the blue roundhouse punch at Digg. In the second example the reporter actually creates the story she writes about, and willfully violated the Digg terms of use in the process. And this was done for commercial gain – the Wired story describing this has received a ton of traffic (and is actually the number 1 story on Digg right now).

As Arrington mentions, the press has immense power, but that power used irresponsibly must have consequences, otherwise the integrity of the media will go to the sewers. Conde Nast owns both Wired magazine as well as Reddit. Is team Conde playing unfair to get at the competition? If so, what should Digg do?

Team Arrington has more.

Originally posted on March 1, 2007 @ 2:29 pm

World of Warcraft Helps Cure Email Attention Disorder

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If you have had problems with sifting through hordes of unwanted email to actually get to the email that matters, Seriosity has the cure for you. The company has developed an e-mail management system that derives from the virtual economies in World of Warcraft and other MMORPGs.

The system relies on a currency, called the Serio, that e-mail readers spend to classify messages according to the level of importance. The more important the message, the more Serio you spend on it.

[The system] was directly inspired by the virtual economies of online games like WoW. There, players accumulate gold or platinum pieces or some other form of currency and can spend them on weapons, armor, dwellings and the like that have real monetary value as demonstrated by what people will pay for them on auction and third-party sites.

Ultimately, the idea behind the e-mail management system is to manage the attention of corporate employees. According to a study by Basex, e-mail-related attention-management problems along with other online tools cost the U.S. economy about $588 billion a year. For one Seriosity client, the problem costs about $1 billion a year.

CNet has the full report.

Originally posted on February 28, 2007 @ 11:55 pm

Ad supported web version of Photoshop, a blogger’s dream come true

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PhotoshopCNet broke the story on Adobe releasing an online version of Photoshop, ad supported and all. The product is to launch within six months.

Why are they doing it and what good comes out? Well, they’re doing it for the money of course. Ad supported means ad dollars, but also for the possibility of spinoff software sales. You don’t buy Photoshop for resizing images, but you might if you’re going to do more heavy graphical work. This way, Adobe can earn money on people that really aren’t interested in buying image software at all, as well as getting extra sales when they need more graphical power.

[Read more…]

Originally posted on March 1, 2007 @ 3:28 am

Death of the Paparazzi

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According to a top paparazzo, amateur camera-phone photographers are putting the squeeze on celebrity photographers.

German Hans Paul, who says he once earned $120,000 for a picture of a then-pregnant Julia Roberts, said fees for paparazzi had been driven to new lows as even fans and autograph hunters now know how to market their pictures.

The advancements in camera-phone technology have made camera-phones cheap enough and the quality of the photographs good enough to be used widely and be useful at the same time. Furthermore, online outlets have made it incredibly easy for ordinary people to be linked with newspapers and other media to sell pictures to them directly. We covered one such outlet last December.

Mr Paul highlighted the example of the pictures of the execution of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein as evidence of how images captured on a mobile phone can create news in any media. He said: “There is no doubt that we paparazzi are suffering from this. There is hardly any money to be made in the everyday business.”

The Guardian has more. (Subscription required, required information is available here)

Originally posted on February 28, 2007 @ 11:05 pm