PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from New Delhi: After the advertising blitzkrieg to mark Rajiv Gandhi‘s birth and death anniversaries, and the death anniversary of his grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru earlier this year, Union ministries and Congress-led State governments and departments have once again splurged heavily to mark Indira Gandhi‘s death anniversary today.

In the 12 newspapers surveyed, there are 64 advertisements of various sizes, amounting to approximately 31½ published pages to mark the assassination of the former prime minister on this day, 27 years ago.

In contrast, Vallabhbhai Patel, the late Union home minister, whose birth anniverary too falls on October 31, gets 9 advertisements in the same 12 newspapers, amounting to 3 published pages. While there are multiple advertisements for Indira Gandhi, no paper has more than one ad for Patel.

The breakup of the Indira Gandhi ads are as under:

Hindustan Times: 22-page main issue; 9 Indira Gandhi ads amounting to 4¼ broadsheet pages

The Times of India: 30-page issue; 13 ads amounting to 6¼ broadsheet pages

Indian Express: 22-page issue; 9 ads amounting to 4 broadsheet pages

Mail Today (compact): 36-page issue; 3 ads amounting to 2¾ compact pages

The Hindu: 24-page issue; 8 ads amounting to 4 broadsheet pages

The Pioneer: 16-page issue; 7 ads amounting to 3¼ broadsheet pages

The Statesman: 16-page issue; 4 ads amounting to 2 broadsheet pages

The Telegraph: 22-page issue; 5 ads amounting to 2½ broadsheet pages

***

The Economic Times: 26-page issue; 3 ads amounting to 1½ pages

Business Standard: 14-page issue; 2 ads amouning to 1 page

Financial Express: 20-page issue; 1 ad amounting to half a page

Mint (Berliner): 24-page issue; 0 ads

This computation is only for 12 English newspapers; many other English papers have been left, as indeed has the entire language media which are more numerous than the English ones, several times over.

Among the 13 advertisers wishing the dear departed leader are the ministries of information and broadcasting, commerce and industry, steel, women and child development, health and family welfare, human resources development, development of north east region, and social justice and empowerment.

The state governments advertising their love are those of Rajasthan, Delhi and Andhra Pradesh. Besides, most newspapers carry an advertisement inserted by the Congress party.

All told, so far, this year, tax payers money have been spent in buying 265 advertisements amounting to 132 published pages in the 12 newspapers.

Last year, on the 19th death anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi, the historian Ramachandra Guha wrote in an edit-page article in The Telegraph, Calcutta:

“A back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that on May 21, 2010, perhaps Rs 60 or 70 crore were spent by the taxpayer — without his and her consent — on praising Rajiv Gandhi. Since the practice has been in place since 2005, the aggregate expenditure to date on this account is probably in excess of Rs 300 crore.”

Also read: Rajiv Gandhi death anniversary: 69 ads over 41 pages in 12 newspapers

Jawaharlal Nehru death anniversary: 24 ads over 11 pages

Rajiv Gandhi birthday: 108 ads across 48 pages

Filed under: Issues and Ideas, Media Tagged: Business Standard, Churumuri, Financial Express, Hindustan Times, Indira Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Mint, Rajiv Gandhi, Ramachandra Guha, Sans Serif, The Economic Times, The Hindu, The Indian Express, The Statesman, The Telegraph, The Times of India, Vallabhbhai Patel

YouTube and Hollywood, which have been circling each other for years, are finally getting together.

But instead of moving movies and TV shows to the world’s biggest Web site, they’re trying something different: Google is handing out more than $100 million to dozens of partners to create new “channels.”

The idea is to make “professional” content that advertisers will pay a premium to be near, instead of the grab bag of videos that dominate the site and that often sell at very low prices.

This isn’t news, of course: YouTube reps have been holding meetings and auditions for most of the year, led by former Netflix executive Robert Kyncl. And we’ve known about the deal terms, and many of the partners, for some time.

But now the site is finally talking about them publicly and promising that it will start unveiling some of the new programming next month. Some of the channels — each of which will have a couple hours of original programming per week — will feature people you’ve heard of, like Madonna, Jay-Z,  Ashton Kutcher and “Modern Family” star Sofia Vergara.

But the channels aren’t all premised around the idea of celebrities and Hollywood per se — just the idea that someone with some idea of how to make good stuff will start making stuff specifically for the site.

For instance, BedRocket Properties, the video start-up backed by the Huffington Post’s Ken Lerer and run by cable TV veteran Brian Bedol, will do four channels, including a soccer-themed channel in conjunction with Major League Soccer, and an action sports channel produced along with Wasserman Media Group.

Another example: IGN, the videogame Web site being spun off by News Corp., will produce a game-themed channel along with the Shine Group, the TV production house recently purchased by News Corp. (News Corp. also owns this Web site).

It’s worth noting that some of the channels will be run by people who are well-versed in creating Web video — and video for YouTube in particular. Machinima, for instance, which also specializes in game-themed stuff, is already one of YouTube’s most prolific partners, and essentially runs a network within YouTube’s network.

Maker Studios, which is producing three channels, is another outfit that already specializes in YouTube. And Demand Media went public this year, in part because it had figured out the art of cranking out Web videos very, very, quickly, at very, very low prices.

YouTube may not be releasing all of the channels and partners today, perhaps because it doesn’t actually have all of its deals signed yet. And at least one partner told me that some of the mechanics of the deals, like control of ad sales, had yet to be worked out.

That’s hard to imagine, given the amount of time that YouTube has been at this. But it’s also hard to imagine why you’d announce a big consumer-focused deal at the end of a Friday. So, who knows.

We do know the general outlines of the deals, though: Google will advance most of the creators up to $5 million, and in return will get commitments to produce a couple hours of programming a week for the channel. Once the programmers have earned back their advance from YouTube, they’ll split ad revenue with the site. The programming will be exclusive to YouTube for at least the first year of the three-year deals.

What we don’t know is how this stuff will actually work: $5 million won’t go very far if the partners use traditional TV and film budgets, so many of the partners are going to have to supplement that money with investments of their own — and they’re going to have to work on a tighter budget. And just because there’s a bit of Hollywood shine associated with this stuff doesn’t mean that people will actually watch — or, most crucially, that advertisers will pay up.

Google may also try other methods to get high-end video stuff. The company made a stab at Hulu when that video site was on the block. And it has indicated that it’s interested in licensing some content in international markets, where it thinks it can get more bang for its buck.

Kiran Bedi is indeed wrong, but when media persons sit to judge her it is a bit of a laugh. Clearly, they do not look in the mirror. Instead of seeing this as an opportunity to question all sorts of voluntary agencies and their modus operandi, we have a situation where a person is pinned down for wrongdoing without a backward glance at how the whole NGO business works, often with the media’s involvement. Kiran Bedi has been fudging her bills, where she charged inflated amounts from her hosts. The main source was airline tickets. She would travel by economy class, that too at a discount because of her gallantry award, and charge business class fares. We now have these sanctimonious NGOs tell us that they took it at “face value”. Most NGOs send the tickets themselves. So, why did they let her use her travel agent? And what sort of auditing departments do they run? The reason for keeping quiet is not that they were afraid of Ms. Bedi’s wrath – they obviously did not mind shelling out Business Class fares – but because their finances will lead to many question marks. This is my point. The media and certain activists have taken a convenient yo-yo stand on the Jan Lokpal Bill campaign. They propped him up and were completely besotted by Team Anna. After they were done with the photo-ops of the caps and the fasting and dancing, they realised that there were chinks in the armour. No one was interested in the deeper questions – it came down to superficial put-downs. Let us get this fudging business clear. Kiran Bedi has admitted to it and says she will return the excess money that she wanted to use for her own NGO. Where do the NGOs get this kind of money that they can afford to invite people from different cities for seminars? I have often posed this query when we rubbish other institutions. Do you know that most of the activists themselves travel Business Class, stay at fancy hotels, and order the best food – for what? To gupshup about the state of the nation, the homeless, female foeticide, dowry, terrorism, communalism? Check out the number of people who have left their high-paying corporate and bureaucratic jobs to “serve the nation” or, “become useful members of society” or, “fight communalism”. They could do all of these by continuing to work. The reason is that activism has become a paying proposition. Have you seen the huge ads put up in newspapers inviting you to attend some conclave or the other? Is it affordable or even appropriate to shell out this kind of money on overheads? Besides government grants, there is a good deal of foreign sponsorship and donations from industrial houses. While the international ‘intervention’ often comes with some amount of side-effects (pushing of substandard products and services clubbed with the do-good, feel-good stuff), some of the Indian business black money that is not stashed away in banks abroad is routed to charitable organisation, with income tax exemption. Why does the media not raise a voice about this? Has the media ever questioned journalists who attend these same seminars? Oh yes, the same journalists who give inflated bills to their accounts departments for their travels and hotel stays and “related expenses”. Journalists who sit at the desk and make phone calls but charge taxi fare for the quotes. Journalists who try to get tickets and freebies because they think they are in a position to ‘arrange something’. Journalists who do not have to spend a paisa at restaurants and spas because they just might mention it, in passing, in their next column. Journalists who give us scoops that are fed to them by interested parties or who conduct sting operations that are again paid for by interested parties. Of course, it is not only the media at fault, but also those who host such talks. Corporate India’s ladies who lunch get a big high when they invite a person who can indeed talk and add to their resume. They flash such people as trophies to display their own worth as ‘aware citizens’. That some media people are doing their evening show with this group should be an eye-opener rather than a can-opener. If, as some commentators wish to know, why people from public office enter the fray late in the day to become part of NGOs, then one might wish to ask them why they have timed their queries now and not for all these years. Do they ponder about it when they go on government-sponsored junkets? The problem is that this whole Anna Hazare campaign has been a sham, and revealed more shams both on the inside as well as on the outside. It showed us how the ruling party and the opposition got to pay politics; the arrests also reveal a lot about those who got away without a scratch to their reputations. It is rather disingenuous of Digvijay Singh to say that if Kiran Bedi can offer to return the money, then every bribery case can be closed by saying the bribe-taker will return the money, including, A. Raja.This is some gumption. A minister in the government of India is caught in a scam of frightening proportions and another government person uses this as an analogy. He is also quite gung-ho about such a thing happening at the highest level. The 2G Spectrum scam is not just about bribes, but also about how the nation was taken for a ride with the government, big industrialists and lobbies involved. It is about how the government functions and not merely who took how much. This case has come under scrutiny; many others do not. If political agencies get a chance, they try to co-opt the activist groups. Most are willing to go along because it is the easy option. In some cases where they need the government to act, it does become a crucial mutual involvement. Therefore, if a political party invites activists, and they fudge figures about travel expenses, then what will the political parties do? Why not question the complete lack of balance by media groups? One can understand individual commentators taking a particular position, but why do they blatantly follow the newspaper/TV channel line? Where is their independence? Those who talk about objectivity should really look in their own backyards. There is favouritism everywhere and the media indulges in it as much as politicians, and the ‘activist’ role of the media should also come under scrutiny. Tavleen Singh, Indian Express columnist, while raising some important points, makes a rather shocking comment:“My own observation is that many NGOs working in India appear to be funded by organisations bent on ensuring that India never becomes a developed country… In order for India to become a halfway developed country, we need new roads, airports, ports, modern railways and masses more electricity. In addition, according to experts, we need 500 more cities by 2050. The odd thing is that the NGOs who oppose steel plants, nuclear power stations, dams and aluminum refineries in India never object to the same things in China.”Is this the definition of development, and the only model? As I have already said, many NGOs do have an agenda, but not only if they are funded by organisations that do not wish to see a developed India. By this logic, Gujarat should have no NGOs. And why must Indian NGOs object to what happens in China? Has the Indian government opposed the self-immolation of Tibetan monks and nuns in support of the Dalai Lama’s return? Has the BJP done so? Has the media done so? Forget the NGOs for a while. Think about how these plants were to come up, who was to be uprooted and how it would affect the environment. If this development is only for those setting up factories and making India technologically advanced, then why are we still the hub of western-powered outsourcing? Are the NGOs involved here? Why absolve the fat cats of business only to hit out at the NGOs unless they are specifically playing dirty? How many media people have taken free jet rides, attended fancy wedding functions abroad and written glowing accounts of them? Will they be sanctified as the facilitators of development? Or do they need to get closer to the seats of such power or perhaps such development? These are trick or treat queries. Ask them we must, for there is much beyond Kiran Bedi, whose banshee persona was in fact given a boost by the media when they needed her sound bytes. They were birds of a feather, until she was grounded. The still-feathered ones have taken wing and are giving us a bird’s eye-view. (c) Farzana VerseyAlso published in Countercurrents- - -My earlier related piece on such superficiality: Kiran's Dance, Illiteracy and Symbolism

Digital subscription and single-copy sales have spiked following the launch of Apple’s Newsstand app two weeks ago.

Magazine publisher Conde Nast has seen a 268% jump in digital subscriptions sales per week on average, Monica Ray, Conde Nast’s EVP of consumer marketing, announced Tuesday. Single copy sales across its titles have risen 142% compared to the previous eight weeks.

The app, which accompanied the release of iOS 5 earlier this month, offers publishers two things they have long been asking of Apple: greater discoverability within the App Store ecosystem, and the ability to automatically deliver new issues to subscribers’ devices.

Ray acknowledged that the growth in sales has been partly fueled by the attention the launch received — the launch of the Mac App Store had an even greater effect on app sales for some developers — but expressed confidence that the publisher would “see a consistently higher level of growth going forward than [it] did prior to the app’s introduction.”

Nine of the company’s titles — Allure, Brides, Glamour, Golf Digest, GQ, Self, The New Yorker, Vanity Fair and Wired — are currently available on the Newsstand. Vogue, Bon Appetit and Conde Nast Traveler are scheduled to join them by early 2012, Bob Sauerberg, president of Conde Nast, said earlier this month.



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Dag Kittlaus — the co-founder and CEO of the company that created the Siri voice control feature, which Apple launched to much acclaim recently — has left the company, according to sources.

There were several reasons for the departure, which was amicable and has been planned for a while, sources said. They included Kittlaus’s family being in Chicago, a desire to take time off and an interest in brainstorming new entrepreneurial ideas.

Kittlaus has led the speech recognition efforts for Apple since Apple bought Siri in April of 2010. He had been Siri’s CEO since 2007. Before that, the Norwegian-born Kittlaus was an Entrepreneur in Residence at the Stanford Research Institute and had also worked at Motorola.

Kittlaus apparently left just after the launch of the iPhone 4S, in which Siri’s speech recognition technology was the highlight, but sources said other key execs from Siri are expected to remain at Apple.

I have queried Apple PR and am waiting for a response.

Here is a video of Kittlaus demoing Siri at the seventh D: All Things Digital conference in 2009:

[ See post to watch video ]

Internet users in Singapore who’ve visited YouTube today would notice something different: A stylized YouTube logo with a Merlion, and a SingTel/Android ad.

That’s the Singapore version of the largest video-sharing site in the world, which launched today (20th October). This new website promises to give Singapore viewers more relevant local content, which also means more exposure for local content creators.

If you’re not able to see the Singapore site for some reason, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and select “Singapore”, or visit YouTube.com.sg directly.

YouTube has also announced a licensing agreement with the Composers & Authors Society of Singapore and the launch of the YouTube Partner Program, which allows all Singapore-based video creaters — musicians, singers, short firm makers, and so on — to earn advertising revenue through the site.

So far, there are 35 localized YouTube sites worldwide. Singapore follows the Philippines as the second country in Southeast Asia with a localized site.

To usher in YouTube’s new baby, a video featuring many local celebrities has been created. They include: Mr Brown, Hossan Leong, Xiaxue, Chua En Lai, and Nat Ho. Popular Filipino singer Charice Pempengo also sent her greetings.

Google is “close” to launching its own MP3 music store, Android head Andy Rubin said today. The company has been in talks to offer a music store for some time, but Rubin shed a little more light on the upcoming service today at the AsiaD conference.

Google couldn’t launch a full-service music offering earlier, so it launched a music locker that lets users listen to their music from the cloud. The record labels weren’t happy with that move, but Google has been persistent in wanting its own MP3 music offering to challenge established players like Apple and Amazon and has been willing to do whatever it takes.

Rubin didn’t reveal much about the upcoming service, but he did indicate it would be a little different from Apple and Amazon by offering “a little twist – it will have a little Google in it. It won’t just be selling 99 cent tracks.”

Google is in an increasingly challenging position now that Apple has iCloud for music storage and will soon have iTunes Match, a $25-a-year service that lets people legally access almost any song in their iTunes library. And then there’s Amazon, which already has a strong MP3 sales catalog, its Amazon Cloud Drive for music storage and the upcoming Amazon Kindle Fire tablet that will emphasize media consumption.

While Google launched Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich last night, we’re not sure at this point if the major software update will help the music experience. And until the company completes deals with the major music labels, all we can do is wait and see.

Would you like to use a native Google MP3 store on your Android phone or tablet?

Filed under: media

Google, the search company that started as two guys at Stanford, openly discriminates against entrepreneurs. At least for its Google News product.
Not only is that silly and short-sighted, but it should go against everything Google stands for.
Yesterday, I applied to have SplatF included in the Google News index. Beyond the hope to publish stories that might be considered “required reading” for the masses, I also figured that people searching Google News for, say, “iPhone 4S,” might appreciate my story angle to yesterday’s news, explaining Apple’s record-breaking sales weekend in context of its other iPhone launches. (Plenty of other sites liked it enough to link to it.) Even if I’m never featured in Google News, it seems logical to include SplatF — clearly a “news” site — in a news index.
But, it turns out, that Google has a rule about the sites that it includes in Google News: They can’t be one-person operations, and they have to appear to be “organizations.” Never mind solo shops practicing entrepreneurial journalism — Google wants news with overhead!
Here is the text of the email Google sent me to reject me:
Thank you for your interest in Google News. We’ve received your suggestion and we’re unable to include it in Google News at this time. We don’t include sites that are written and maintained by one individual. We currently only include articles from sources that could be considered organizations, generally characterized by multiple writers and editors, availability of organizational information, and accessible contact information.
If you have additional questions, please visit our Help Forum at: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/news?hl=en
We appreciate your taking the time to contact us and will log your site for consideration should our requirements change.
Regards, The Google News Team
This is especially disappointing because it feels un-Google-like. Here you have a company trying to use algorithms to organize and disseminate news and information, rejecting a news and information source because of the number of people listed on its about page.
I could easily (but dishonestly) stick a bunch of friends on the site as “contributors,” or something like that, to appease Google, but I would never do that. One of the things I decided right away is that I would never misrepresent SplatF’s size by using terms like “we” or disguising that it was a one-person attempt at self-publishing the news. But apparently, Google actually draws the line at how many writers you have.
So I figured I’d try to appeal my case to Google, explaining my situation and what I’m trying to do here.
In hindsight, I probably should have worded this differently, and included more information about my background — Medill journalism degree, employee no. 2 at Business Insider, reporter for Forbes, appearances on CNBC, lots of interest from mainstream media in syndicating my content verbatim, etc.
But in the interest of transparency, this is the email I sent in response:
Dear Google News team,
Thanks for your response, but I would like to appeal.
Your ad products, among others on the market, allow journalists to make a living by self-publishing — in essence, becoming their own news organizations. The readers that Google News could send to those publishers, in turn, could help those sites grow, potentially leading to them hiring more journalists in the future.
Why is that content not worthy of inclusion in the Google News index?
In my case, I am still under the exact same professional obligation to write original, accurate stories as I was at Forbes and Business Insider, my previous employers — it’s just a different economic arrangement. You had no problem indexing my stories and sending thousands of readers to them under those circumstances. Why now?
For what it’s worth, over the past 24 hours, editors at WSJ.com and a site affiliated with Time Inc. have both linked to my site. (Which, being Google, you already know. In fact, I assume you could easily call up all the “reputable” sites that have linked to mine since I started it three months ago.) So why is it that human editors at those sites can regularly link to my content, and send new readers my way, but Google News can’t?
It seems more Google-like to *support* those sorts of endeavors — and new journalism business models — by allowing sites like mine into Google News. Not to exclude them for frivolous reasons, like organizational structure.
Thanks for reconsidering.
Dan Frommer Founder and Editor, SplatF
That didn’t go over well, apparently. I was hoping for some reconsideration and reflection from a human, but instead, a few hours later, I received the same form letter in response. Sorry, pal, you don’t have enough coworkers to matter to our database. So, here I am, rejected from Google News, and now probably on some “flagged for being a troublemaker and questioning Google” list.
Putting myself in Google’s shoes, I can understand why they made this decision at some point. Most one-person sites probably aren’t reputable news sources. And this way, there are a lot fewer sites for Google News employees to sift through on a case-by-case basis — they can just reject all one-person operations automatically, and use their policy as justification. It’s easier and cleaner for Google.
But I still think it’s an outdated policy that needs changing. Or at least a reasonable appeals process, where a site like mine could be granted an exception. Why?
I can point out several factual errors and inconsistencies in stories written by bigger newsrooms that are indexed in Google News. (Not to mention huge ethical scandals, plagiarism, and fabricated stories — stuff you won’t find at SplatF.)I can find instances of big news “organizations” — Google’s preferred variety — adding little to no value, but getting the benefit of Google News inclusion anyway. Like this ABC News story yesterday (linked last night from the Yahoo homepage) rewriting a scandalous MacRumors forum post in the format of a news article, but adding little value and not doing any work to confirm that it is actually true. (“The whole thing may have been a joke,” it admits at the end. Yet it’s news! because it’s from ABC.)And I can point out plenty of information on one-person sites, such as John Gruber’s Daring Fireball, Michael Arrington’s Uncrunched, Horace Dediu’s Asymco, and even SplatF, that is easily worthy to Google tech news searchers.Moreover, this is a new age of media, where readers and writers are connected more closely than ever, thanks to tools like Twitter, Google Reader, and even Google+. I follow individual writers just as much as I follow the organizations that employ them, and I am hardly alone. Google News and other Google platforms should be encouraging and enabling this, not stifling it. You don’t have to look far to see that Google’s competitors — Amazon and Apple, in particular — are building platforms to support self-publishing, while Google apparently rejects it.
(Google also boasts on the About Google News page, “We do things a little differently, with the goal of offering our readers more personalized options and a wider variety of perspectives from which to choose.” But apparently, self-publishing journalists aren’t included in those perspectives.)
Google’s best future is one where legacy media is decentralized, and where an aggregator like Google News helps people make sense of it all. So why is it behaving the opposite, not supporting new entrants? (Unlike, say, Techmeme, which is a much better tech news aggregator and graciously supports entrepreneurial journalism.)
Why does Google discriminate between a post I write on SplatF and one I write for, say, Business Insider, where my editorial process is the same? (Perhaps Google has an outdated view of the publishing workflow at many online news organizations?) If anything, I’m even more careful since I started SplatF, because it is just me, and I have no one else to check my work and no corporate structure to hide behind.
Anyway, now, I assume, I am banned for life from Google News. But I recommend to Google management that they think a little more about the sort of news service they want to offer in 2011. Do they want to only lift the relevance of yesterday’s news brands? Or do they want to help support the future of media, where small operations can report and analyze news with the exact same accuracy and ethics as a large corporation?
The rest of Google’s business — publishing and search technology, advertising platforms, venture capital, etc. — seems aligned with entrepreneurism and small organizations challenging big incumbents. But for whatever reason, Google News is the exact opposite. And that’s too bad.
Related: Adventures in self-publishing: SplatF’s first quarterly report

My column in today’s DNA:

If a tree falls in a forest, and no one is around to have heard it fall, does it make a sound?’ is an old philosophical question on which there has been much heated argument over the centuries. The debate is a consequence of a school of philosophy that believes that events exist from the point of view of the observer. If there is no observer, then there is no event. Others, especially scientists, maintain that events exist irrespective of the presence of the observer.
In an era of 24-hour news channels, this philosophy can be revisited. If an event occurs, let’s say a protest, and there is no media coverage, then as far as public consciousness is concerned, does the issue even exist? Groups and causes that can articulate their view in media-friendly chunks have their issues become part of the public debate. Groups and causes that cannot, do not exist as far as the public space is concerned. Political and civil society groups of all hues and shades are beginning to realise this. They have realised that media coverage works best in the media centres — Mumbai and Delhi. And, protests work best when conducted in the full glare of the media. They realise that if there is no observer for an event, then the protest is as good as being dead in the water. For example, Irom Sharmilla has been fasting to repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act for over 10 years, and it is just now that the protest has been noticed. And, that is because Anna Hazare’s 12-day fast brought Irom Sharmilla’s decade long fast into the limelight. Similarly,38-year-old Swami Nigamanand Saraswati died trying to save the Ganga from pollution caused by illegal mining. After 68 days of fasting in Haridwar he passed away. His death was covered by the ‘national media’ because it coincided with Baba Ramdev’s little drama at the Ramlila grounds. But his cause, that of saving the Ganga, is largely ignored.
Media coverage is not about how ‘good’ or ‘bad’, ‘important’ or ‘unimportant’ a cause is. It is about being part of the media’s line of sight and being able to keep catching their attention. Once the media starts paying attention, then the idea is to keep engaging the media on a constant basis, so that the cycle of publicity continues.
Today, packaging of news surrounding the protest is as important as the protest itself. Every successful protest is handled like a product. And, in a modern world, the product attributes are not as important as the packaging and promotional hype surrounding it.
That is the reason for the insistence on Jantar Mantar by Team Anna. Anna could have fasted anywhere else in India. After all, Gandhi fasted wherever he was — his ashram, jails, various cities — location didn’t deter him. But, in a modern India which is wired 24/7, it is important to be where the media is. If Anna Hazare had fasted in Ralegaon Siddhi would the event have been part of pan national consciousness or would it have been like Nigamanand Saraswati’s fast, mentioned in passing by regional news while being largely ignored by the ‘national’ media?
The recent attack by members of the ‘Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena’ on Prashant Bhushan — a core member of Team Anna — in full view of a television news crew is taking this philosophy one step further. The issue raised by the Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena becomes part of national consciousness, overnight, because it was sensational, violent, jingoistic and on tape. We would not even have heard of this fringe organisation if they had hit someone without the TV crew being present. They were mimicking the acts of Sri Ram Sene a few years ago. The Ram Sene protesting against declining ‘moral’ values — decided to go to the nearest pub and beat up a few girls who were drinking alcohol and smoking cigarettes. But, before they went to teach the girls a lesson, they called the camera crews.

As a result, an intolerant, violent, extreme fringe organisation became part of pan-Indian consciousness.

News focus on strife, violence, drama and sensationalism to increase ratings, has led to it becoming the launching pad for many a fringe organisation. These groups thrive on media coverage. Their philosophy is immaterial — their rage is what sells. In its blinkered focus on only ratings, news channels have unleashed a genie that needs to be put back in the bottle.

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I have always admired Yahoo’s Chief Trust Officer Anne Toth, given she has done a great job articulating privacy issues at the Silicon Valley Internet giant. It is one of the areas where Yahoo truly shines.

But I really like the way she quit Yahoo after more than a dozen years there, with a very adorkable and classy status update on Facebook. It’s done with respect for the company and a lot of humor.

I don’t need to say more, except read it:

It’s official — I’ve broken up with my partner of 13 years. Yahoo!, I want you to know that it’s not you. It’s *me*. Really. After 13 years, I am just not the same person I was when we met. It’s not a midlife crisis. It’s just time to move on. Try new things. You’ll always be my first…Internet company. You changed my life and I will remember you forever. I know you’ll have a hard time adjusting at first, but once you find a new privacy person, you’ll forget about me in a heartbeat. Company’s are fickle that way. But we had something really special. A unique bond. I hope you’ll remember me for giving you the best years of my life.

It’s really no surprise that technology magazines in India are so gadget focused – that’s what advertising appears to drive, and we’ve seen that online with 1731 gadget blogs*. Mint reports today that Wired, the iconic geek-culture magazine may be launching in India. The report quotes my views on Wired, but I don’t think it accurately captures what I said. So, here’s what I think Wired India needs to do:

- Be primarily online and ‘unwired’: The base that Wired targets – those at the cross-section of creativity and technology – are increasingly online, and with time, the propensity to read will change. That base is already online, and that should be the primary base. Yes, there is a market for long-form reading and one for magazines, but my belief is that it always needs to be digital first.

- Be Indian: different country, different culture, but my sense is that digitization will change user behavior in this country in ways that few can imagine right now. Wired India cannot be a facsimile of Wired’s global edition. We need our own cultural icons – they’re there, but someone needs to write about how they’re changing this country. Wired needs to do that.

P.s.: I did NOT say “Additionally, the magazine could find it challenging to serve the same quality of content in the Indian context.” I think there’s more than enough to be reported on digital culture in this country, and it’s sad that so few are doing it. We’re going to do our bit.

- Be young: I think Wired India would need an editor who is less than 40 years old. It’s not that those who are 40 won’t get it, but, even at 30, I sometimes feel out of touch with the changes in the way people are using technology. I strongly believe that for a publication like Wired, you need someone at the crossection of technology, pop culture and governance, and that person needs to be involved in and in a position to understand what the 18-30 year olds are doing. More than the age, I think you need someone mad enough about digital culture – but then, India doesn’t even have its own Henry Jenkins.

We’ll see if Wired India becomes the icon that its American counterpart is. We also need an Indian equivalent of Ars Technica, Gawker (though it’s risky), Techcrunch, Springwise and The Register. And if you want, I could tell you why they’re not there, but that’s a separate discussion.

* I made that number up, but you get the drift.
*Planning to Hire? Or are you looking for a job? Try MediaNama’s Job Board here

Jean-Louis Gassée, who was an Apple executive for nearly 10 years, on how Jobs made computers more personal and elegant
"Humour is the politeness of despair", an approximate, Google-ish translation of "l'humour est la politesse du désespoir", a saying attributed to noted post-WW2 Left Bank jazzman, writer, and engineer, Boris Vian, So, let's start with the reverent, despairing humour of Chris Calloway in Wired magazine's memorial to Steve Jobs:
"Heaven got a major upgrade today…"
Yes, I can see the dear leader in his new abode. Having climbed his last mountain, he summons Saint Peter and utters the words that he has heard throughout his life: "You're doing it all wrong."
"Look at the name above the door, the typeface sucks, the kerning is off. The furniture is out of style – get something cleaner, fresher. And the stairs … We need something airier … I don't know, glass? Come to think of it, one of the founding partners of the architecture firm that designed the Apple Store moved in here a few months ago. Bernard Cywinski; look him up get to work."
…and then it's Saint Peter's turn to mourn Steve's untimely demise, and his own lost tranquility.
[Update: I just found this picture of the New Yorker's upcoming 17 October cover. Obviously, this is before Steve starts to take matters into his own hands.]

Back in our Valley of Tears, this Onion article provides just the right amount of serious thought wrapped in knowing derision. I can't resist but quote the entire piece, it's too good and, in a way, it's a consolation:
Last American who knew what the fuck he was doing diesSteve Jobs, the visionary co-founder of Apple Computer and the only American in the country who had any clue what the fuck he was doing, died Wednesday at the age of 56. "We haven't just lost a great innovator, leader, and businessman, we've literally lost the only person in this country who actually had his shit together and knew what the hell was going on," a statement from President Barack Obama read in part, adding that Jobs will be remembered both for the life-changing products he created and for the fact that he was able to sit down, think clearly, and execute his ideas—attributes he shared with no other US citizen. "This is a dark time for our country, because the reality is none of the 300 million or so Americans who remain can actually get anything done or make things happen. Those days are over." Obama added that if anyone could fill the void left by Jobs it would probably be himself, but said that at this point he honestly doesn't have the slightest notion what he's doing any more.
The real Barack Obama didn't disappoint. Rising above the official encomiums, he offered a well-worded and, I believe, heartfelt homage [emphasis mine]:
"Michelle and I are saddened to learn of the passing of Steve Jobs.Steve was among the greatest of American innovators – brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and talented enough to do it.
By building one of the planet's most successful companies from his garage, he exemplified the spirit of American ingenuity.
By making computers personal and putting the internet in our pockets, he made the information revolution not only accessible, but intuitive and fun.
And by turning his talents to storytelling, he has brought joy to millions of children and grownups alike.
Steve was fond of saying that he lived every day like it was his last. Because he did, he transformed our lives, redefined entire industries, and achieved one of the rarest feats in human history: he changed the way each of us sees the world.
The world has lost a visionary. And there may be no greater tribute to Steve's success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented. Michelle and I send our thoughts and prayers to Steve's wife Laurene, his family, and all those who loved him."
Just the right words, neither too many nor too few.
Praise for Steve has been plentiful, personal, and often insightful. But we also have the dissenters. Some of them are merely laughable: One unhinged dissenter, a Baptist church leader named Margie Phelps, promised to picket Steve's funeral for "teaching his neighbours to sin." Her call to arms was tweeted from an iPhone.
We have Free Software Foundation's Richard Stallman in a sadly tasteless post:
Steve Jobs, the pioneer of the computer as a jail made cool, designed to sever fools from their freedom, has died.
As Chicago mayor Harold Washington said of the corrupt former Mayor Daley, "I'm not glad he's dead, but I'm glad he's gone." Nobody deserves to have to die – not Jobs, not Mr Bill, not even people guilty of bigger evils than theirs. But we all deserve the end of Jobs' malign influence on people's computing.
Unfortunately, that influence continues despite his absence. We can only hope his successors, as they attempt to carry on his legacy, will be less effective.
You can read an excellent, balanced retort here.
Most irksome of all is Steve Jobs Wasn't God, Hamilton Nolan's heartless and crude opinion at Gawker.com. Commenters chimed in and piled on, disputing Jobs' accomplishments, ascribing them to others, condemning him for lapses of judgment in his early adulthood. This earned Nolan, who claims to have never owned an Apple product, a stinging rebuke from the Macalope. It's well worth reading, as are all his weekly posts.
I side with the Macalope, but let's not forget that the objectors play a useful role in reminding us that we shouldn't canonise Steve. He was a genius, with an ''insane'' drive that took him and his company to the pinnacle – and brought us with them – but he was no saint. The undeniable, manic drive admits a dark side. If you want the works of art, you've got to accept the real artist. As I wrote in my late August tribute (Steve: Who's Going to Protect Us From Cheap and Mediocre Now?), Steve learned to ride the animal inside him and matured as a result.
So, indeed, Steve wasn't God, but let's give him his due. To those, such as Nolan, who belittle Steve's achievements because he didn't solve world hunger, invent a vaccine, or fight for civil rights, I'll say this: computers are one of mankind's most important inventions, right behind the written word, symbolic language. Steve saw computers as an extension of mind and body. His unique contribution has been, time and again, to make computers more personal and more elegant, to make Apple stand at the intersection of technology and liberal arts.
That's what I've always loved about Apple: I remember how happy I felt when I joined the company more than 30 years ago and found it had commissioned a Ray Bradbury poem for the (unfortunately short-lived) Apple magazine. I only remember the title, "Ode to the quick computer"; and the last verse, "So cowards, what are you afraid of?"
The dissenters are entitled to their views and they have a right to broadcast them. But to the rest Of us, their postures show a deep failure of empathy for the many ways in which Steve touched so many lives, in an ever-expanding number of ways. The drive for beauty and elegance, for enchantment even, is profound. It's what makes us human, it's what Apple came to represent, and that's why so many of us mourn Steve's demise.
As Jon Stewart lucidly explained, there's another reason for the outpouring: we feel cheated. Ford and Edison died old, they had enough time to give society all they were meant to give. With Steve, we're tragically robbed of what he could have accomplished with more time.
[Update: I just found this beautiful 17 October New Yorker article by Nicholson Baker where he writes:
"Everyone who cares about music and art and movies and heroic comebacks and rich rewards and being able to carry several kinds of infinity around in your shirt pocket is taken aback by this sudden huge vacuuming-out of a titanic presence from our lives."]
I bow to the happy family man he became, to the grand master of high tech, to the once dishevelled hippie who became the manager extraordinaire of one of the world's best-run companies and, last but not least, the editor-in-chief of a large group of engineers and artists.
I leave you with a nice tweet quoting Dr Seuss…

…and a newly unearthed version of the famous Crazy Ones video, this one narrated by Steve himself, instead of Richard Dreyfuss. Call me feeble-minded, but it moves me to tears. Weeks ago, right after Steve resigned as CEO, Adweek created a version of the famous commercial in which a picture of Steve, as a young man, is added to the end, a fitting inclusion in the procession.
Lastly, a reminder of Steve's mark on Apple, powerful because it's so simply elegant, the creation of a young Hong Kong designer named Jonathan Mak:

JLG@mondaynote.com
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Sabu, the erstwhile leader of the hacking crew, says he is effectively on the run as he gives interview to Reddit readers about LulzSec's achievements, Facebook, sentencing and more
The hacker who styles himself "Sabu", erstwhile leader of the LulzSec hacking crew, claims to have a cache of emails copied from the Sun which are being stored on a Chinese server, along with data from a number of other hacks.
But he claimed this weekend that they will not be released yet: "there are a lot of interesting dumps we're sitting on due to timing," he wrote on his Twitter feed. He claims that hackers have broken into banks including HSBC and "a few others" but that they have found "no smoking guns yet" in the data there.
Sabu – who says his online handle is a tribute to the American professional wrestler – says that after the arrests in the UK and US of a number of people alleged to have been involved with the crew, he is effectively on the run. But his writing also suggests he is staying put where he lives.
"I'm past the point of no return. Not trying to sound like a bad ass, however, it's the truth," he wrote. Later he added: "The ironic twist will be that my own friends will take me down, and not these idiots who hide behind the patriot veil." He also says that "technically, I'm on the run, so there you go."
LulzSec was an offshoot of the Anonymous hacking collective which during a hacking spree in May and July 2011 broke into a number of sites, including Sony Pictures Europe, Fox.com, PBS and finally the News International site.
At the latter it altered the Sun's web page so that it redirected viewers first to a faked story about Rupert Murdoch's death, and then to their Twitter feed. The group also attacked the US Congress's web site, an FBI affiliate and brought down the web site for the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency by using a "distributed denial of service" attack.
Sabu effectively acted as the leader of the group, maintaining discipline over what they did, as leaked chatroom logs published in June by the Guardian show.
At that time he told members of the crew not to give interviews – but says his willingness to do so now is because "that was during the height of LulzSec. We all agreed to do no interviews till the end if there was ever one."
LulzSec's achievements, he says, were that it "exposed the sad state of security across the media, social, government online environments".
After the Sun hack, Sabu claimed on his Twitter feed that he was looking at 4GB of emails from the company. The claim was never confirmed, although remote access to News International's systems had been compromised.
Sabu's revelations came in a long and sometimes detailed "Ask Me Anything" (AMA) thread on Reddit. Sabu responds to a number of questions and appears to reveal a number of details about himself, such as that he is married, studied social sciences and English, that his technical hacking skills are self-taught, and that he teaches "sometimes". He claims to speak three languages – English, Spanish and German – fluently, and to have "decent" Portuguese and Italian. He says he turned towards computer hacking in 2000, when the US government "ignored the peoples' please to stop bombing Vieques" – a part of Puerto Rico used by the US navy as a bombing range until 2003. He says he likes working on cars, playing music and spending time with his family: "I'm loving life a lot this year. I barely have time for ops [hacker operations] like I used to."
That confirms other details that have been collected by rival hackers about Sabu which suggest that he is of Puerto Rican extraction, aged about 30 and based in New York.
He insists that he had no knowledge of the identities of any of the other members of LulzSec. "I simply don't know anyone's identity at Anonymous." He says that when one alleged member was arrested in the Shetland Islands, north of Scotland, he had to go and look up its location: "I was a bit impressed, even." He vehemently denies the suggestions by some that he "snitched" on other LulzSec members to the authorities.
The breakup of LulzSec meant he has "lost too many friends. [I] will probably never talk to them ever again." But he thinks that it "has already achieved what it set out to achieve".
He suggests that one of the LulzSec members, called Avunit, who quit the group when it took aim at the FBI, "is relaxing somewhere on a boat".
Asked whether he is "safe", he replies: "no one can prove it's me anyway. The beauty of Anonymous." The closest that the authorities have come to him is when in September they arrested a hacker alleged to have gone by the online handle "Recursion", who was tracked down via logs held by the British company HideMyAss, which unwittingly provided a virtual private network (VPN) connection for the attack on Sony Pictures Europe.
That arrest was "probably the closest they ever got", Sabu says. He also makes a veiled threat against HideMyAss: he alleges it "turns out to be owned by some … people who are going around buying smaller VPN providers ... We should have a nice exposé for HMA and its mother computer/investors soon. Point is: research your VPN provider thoroughly."
He says he takes a number of precautions to evade law enforcement, using prepaid phones and BlackBerrys for calls and Twitter: "they're expendable. I don't ignore you, I simply don't know you." He trusts Twitter – to some extent: "believe it or not, Twitter has not been sleeping in bed with LEAs [law enforcement agencies]. In fact it's a process [for LEAs] to get account info."
He rails at the sentencing guidelines in place for computer activity: "The penalties for any cybercrime (with the exception of child pornography) is severely archaic. And enforced by non-computer users. A DDOS (distributed denial of service) should not [attract a sentence of] 10 years at all especially when rapists and murderers do LESS than time." (The Guardian's James Ball made a similar point earlier this year.)
He thinks a hacking attack against Facebook "is pointless unless some very courages [sic] individual go and burn down its datacenter containing DBs [databases]". But he calls Facebook "a serious global cancer … they have half a billion people's psychology and family down in a database".
LulzSec does not have a Google Plus account, he says: "We do NOT have a g+ account. So whoever is running it is more than likely posing and has no affiliation to us." (Other Reddit users said that files distributed from that account contain malware.) Google Plus was launched well after LulzSec apparently broke up.
His advice to would-be emulators: "Stick to yourselves. If you are in a crew – keep your opsec up 24/7. Friends will try to take you down if they have to."
Anonymous, he says, is "no leaders, no hierarchy, no cointelpro [counter-intelligence program] drama. And we are a living, moving mass of like-minded individuals." He says it is "pure democracy", though that can be anarchic. But he thinks it will spawn "many organisations and political parties". But he says that "you don't need to be 'anonymous' or need to hack to be Anonymous. It's an idea, not a job."
He says he hopes to give a talk at the next HOPE (Hackers on Planet Earth) conference in New York, expected to run in July 2012.
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Steve Jobs’s death has prompted Simon & Schuster to move up the publication date for his much-anticipated biography by Walter Issacson. The CBS-owned publishing unit has moved up the release date for “Steve Jobs” from Nov. 21 to Oct. 24. Not surprisingly, preorders for the book are skyrocketing, and the title now tops bestseller lists at both Amazon and Apple’s iTunes.

Yahoo's shares soared by 10% on the rumour that the software giant said to be considering a fresh bid for the internet business
Microsoft is considering a fresh attempt to take control of Yahoo, sources close to the situation have told Reuters, more than three years after its first bid for the internet business failed,
The software giant launched a $44.6bn hostile bid for Yahoo in 2008 that was vigorously rebuffed by the company. Yahoo's share price has subsequently collapsed and the firm was valued at less than $18bn before Microsoft's renewed interest was reported.
Yahoo's shares soared by 10% on the rumour, which neither company would comment on, before falling back in after-hours trading. Peaking at $15.94, the shares were still barely half the value of Microsoft's $31-per-share offer in 2008.
Yahoo axed chief executive Carol Bartz last month and said the company was conducting a strategic review of its business, prompting speculation that it was a takeover target.
Goldman Sachs and media specialist Allen & Co are working with the firm and are believed to be sounding out potential buyers. Last month, several Yahoo employees in were told in a memo that the company's financial advisers were "fielding inquiries from multiple parties that have already expressed interest in a number of potential options."
Jack Ma, chief executive of Chinese internet company Alibaba, has already expressed an interest in buying Yahoo. The US firm owns 40% of Alibaba and Ma has previously sought to buy back the holding. The two firms have had a contentious relationship and Bartz was criticised for her handling of the Chinese firm, seen as one of Yahoo's best assets.
Other potential bidders include News Corp, buyout firms Providence Equity Partners, Hellman & Friedman and Silver Lake Partners and Russian technology investment firm Digital Sky Technology. Microsoft may seek a partner to go after Yahoo, according to Reuters' sources.
If Microsoft makes a bid it will be at a fraction of the price it was prepared to pay in 2008. That bid ended in failure after an intense four-month battle that eventually led to the resignation of Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang, who has opposed Microsoft's move.
According to Reuters there are "two camps" within Microsoft. One group of executives believe buying Yahoo would be a 'knock-out blow' to rival AOL, leaving MS-Yahoo as the undisputed leading web portal. Others, though, believe Microsoft should focus on buying companies with more potential for growth.
Yahoo is still one of the biggest draws on the internet but it has lost out to Google and Facebook in the battle to win over advertisers.
At the time of the original bid Microsoft's chief executive Steve Ballmer said buying Yahoo was the best way to achieve scale online, an area where the software giant has trailed arch-rival Google.
The two firms started talking again in 2009 and Microsoft signed a 10-year deal with Yahoo to run its internet search advertising business. That deal was attacked by Google as an "attempt to exert the same sort of inappropriate and illegal influence over the Internet that it did with the PC."
Any new deal between the two firms is also likely to spark regulatory scrutiny and fierce lobbying from Google.
Tech analysts were sceptical about the chances of Microsoft bidding for Yahoo again, especially now it has secured the search advertising deal. They also argued that the sale process remains in its early stages.
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Not to be outdone by Google, AOL on Monday announced it will launch 15 new original web video series produced by or starring celebrities including Jennifer Lopez and Heidi Klum.

We also found out Monday that Google has put up $100 million for original programming on YouTube, with the search giant in talks with the likes of Tony Hawk, Warner Bros. and the production company behind TV comedy The Office. Both Google and AOL likely see original video series as a major opportunity to reach a new generation of web video consumers who have embraced Netflix and Hulu and cut the cord on cable TV.

New original programming on AOL will come from big companies like Michael Eisner’s Vuguru and Warner Bros. One could-be-big show on the list is AIM High, an action series starring Twilight’s Jackson Rathbone, about a high schooler who is also a secret government agent. Another is Jennifer Lopez’s Nuyorican Productions and Believe Entertainment Group’s Tiger Beat Entertainment, which is based on the teen idol magazine and will target the same audience with news and lifestyle features.

“We are pleased to announce a slate of programming that shows our innovative approach to video,” said Ran Harnevo, Senior VP of AOL Video, in a statement. “It provides one of the best platforms on the Web to connect advertisers with premium content at scale. We’ve built a video ecosystem supported by our data and insights into what excites viewers, combined with a deep understanding of what they share and discuss online.”

AOL has been in trouble with its stock price as of late, but the company has had positive traction when it comes to its media properties, especially the Huffington Post. It likely hopes a slate of original video will give it another opportunity to attract strong pageviews and big advertising dollars.

A full listing of AOL’s new video series can be read below:

Women
• Little Women, Big Cars: From bake sales and soccer games to gossip and divorce, four moms navigate the comedy and drama of suburban life. Starring Ed Begley Jr., Antonio Sabato, Jr., Julie Warner and Kristy Swanson. Produced by Vuguru.
• A Supermodel Stole My Husband: A lighthearted makeover show in which a frustrated wife enlists an adored supermodel to help transform her husband. Produced by AOL Studios.
• Heidi Klum on AOL: A guide to fabulous living for everyday women, including fashion, beauty, parenting, lifestyle, fitness and nutrition. Produced by Full Picture.
• Jocks & Jills: Sports show meets The View in a fresh and funny sports talk show hosted by a rotating panel of diverse celebrity guests. Produced by Flavor Unit Productions.
• Lost in Translation: Reality series following a hip-hop DJ and famous ‘Nuyorican,’ as she attempts to learn Spanish, learn to cook, date and reclaim her Puerto Rican heritage. Produced by Flavor Unit Productions.
• Fearless Living: Based on her best-selling book On Becoming Fearless, Arianna Huffington looks at the many aspects of living a fearless life – from motherhood and parenting to beauty and health to navigating the workplace to friendship, relationships and aging gracefully. Produced by AOL Studios.

General
• The Tanning Effect: Steve Stoute, best-selling author of The Tanning of America, interviews entertainment icons and pop-culture thought leaders including Jay-Z and Pharrell Williams; the series is sponsored by State Farm. Produced by AOL Studios.
• Sessions: Original, exclusive performances with hitmakers such as Alicia Keys and Adele. Produced by AOL Studios.
• Unscripted: Celebrity co-stars interview each other with users’ burning questions. Past talent includes Justin Timberlake, Jennifer Aniston, Robert Pattinson and Adam Sandler. Produced by AOL Studios.
• You’ve Got: Everyday, everyone from Barack Obama to Kevin Bacon to Paula Abdul tells the world what ‘You’ve Got.’ Produced by AOL Studios.

Men
• AutoBlog – The List :Hosts who consider themselves true automotive aficionados must tackle crazy car challenges from ‘The List,’ created by Autoblog’s expert editors. Produced by AOL Studios.
• The Interface: Exclusive performances from breaking artists, such as Mumford and Sons, Rogue Wave, Manchester Orchestra and The National. Produced by AOL Studios.
• MMA Hour: Up close and personal with the celebrities of the MMA Fighting world. Produced by AOL Studios.
• The Engadget Show: Industry leaders and tech luminaries take the stage in front of an audience of tech enthusiasts. Produced by AOL Studios.

Teens & Young Adults
• CliffsNotes Films: Short, animated, irreverent versions of literary classics, produced by Mark Burnett, Coalition Films and AOL Studios and Executive produced by Josh Faure-Brac. Columbia Pictures’ film Anonymous (in theaters October 28th) is the exclusive sponsor of the first six episodes.
• AIM High: TV broadcast-quality action series following Nick Green as he juggles high school with being a secret government agent. Starring Jackson Rathbone from Twilight and Aimee Teegarden from Friday Night Lights. Produced by Warner Bros.

Filed under: media

The social network's 'jokes in the pub' analogy, defending its decision not to take down pro-rape pages, is offensive
It doesn't matter how hard I study Facebook's terms and conditions, I still can't find the bit where it says: "Like Humpty Dumpty, Facebook is at complete liberty to interpret the words used in this document in any way it sees fit." And yet that's obviously what Facebook executives have been doing: making words mean what they want them to mean, or else they'd have removed the pages that promote rape and other forms of violence against women months ago.

The specific clause in Facebook's statement of rights and responsibilities that's supposed to protect groups against violence and hate speech instructs the user: "You will not post content that: is hateful, threatening, or pornographic; incites violence; or contains nudity or graphic or gratuitous violence." However, Facebook has now defended the numerous pages that clearly violate these terms by claiming: "Groups that express an opinion on a state, institution, or set of beliefs – even if that opinion is outrageous or offensive to some – do not by themselves violate our policies." Which is strange, because if a page entitled "Roses are red, violets are blue, I've got a knife, get in the van" isn't hateful, threatening or gratuitously violent, I don't for the life of me know what is.

It was back in August that feminists first began to notice the proliferation of pro-rape pages on the popular social networking site. Two months later over 176,000 people have signed a US-based petition calling on Facebook to take them down, and nearly 4,000 people have signed a UK-based petition calling for the same. The Facebook pages, such as the one cited above and others that include "You know she's playing hard to get when your [sic] chasing her down an alleyway" still remain.

Facebook's initial response to the public outcry was to suggest that promoting violence against women was equivalent to telling a rude joke down the pub: "It is very important to point out that what one person finds offensive another can find entertaining" went the bizarre rape apologia. "Just as telling a rude joke won't get you thrown out of your local pub, it won't get you thrown off Facebook."

And in some ways they're right: telling a rude joke probably wouldn't get you thrown out of your local pub. I'd suggest, however, that propping up your local bar while inciting others to rape your mate's girlfriend "to see if she can put up a fight" would not only get you thrown out, it would in all likelihood get you arrested as well. Still, at least you could log on once you got home and post your offensive comments on Facebook instead, safe in the knowledge that they wouldn't do anything about it.

What Facebook and others who defend this pernicious hate speech don't seem to get is that rapists don't rape because they're somehow evil or perverted or in any way particularly different from than the average man in the street: rapists rape because they can. Rapists rape because they know the odds are stacked in their favour, because they know the chances are they'll get away with it.

And part of the reason rapists get away with it, time after time after time, is because we live in a society that all but condones rape. Because we live in a society where it's not taken seriously, and where posting heinous comments online that promote sexual violence are not treated as hate speech or as content that threatens women's safety, but are instead treated as a joke and given a completely free pass.

By refusing to take these pages down, and by resorting to such a ridiculous and quite frankly offensive "rude joke" analogy to justify their decision, Facebook executives have made absolutely clear where they stand on the issue of gender hate crime. It's fine to post hateful or threatening content on their site, just as it's fine to post content that incites violence. Well, as long as it's primarily aimed at women, that is.
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Google has placed more than $100 million aside for original YouTube programming, including a major deal with retired skateboarding legend Tony Hawk, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Google wants to advance the reach of YouTube by adding original programming to its already popular mix of user-generated and professionally made videos. Google is reportedly one of the highest bidders for streaming service Hulu, indicating Google’s interest in offering programming. But if that doesn’t work out, Google could use YouTube as a place for that sort of original content and sell advertising against it.

Thus far, the biggest names Google has brought to the table include Tony Hawk and media companies like Warner Bros. and News Corp.-owned ShineReveille, which helped produce Ugly Betty and The Office.

Smaller-but-still-notable companies in talks with YouTube for original content include the production company behind hits like The Price is Right and The X Factor and the company that produced VH1′s Mob Wives.

Google will create new online programming “channels” full of professional content. The company hopes that it will be able to sell enough advertising against the programming to make back the $100 million in cash advances.

It’s possible the new YouTube programming could fit into Google’s future plans for Google+. Google could offer up these channels with Google+ users in mind as a chance for people to simultaneously watch and comment on first-run airings of shows. Offering that sort of future-looking feature set could potentially help Google steer users away from streaming leaders like Netflix and Hulu.

Are you interested in original YouTube programming?

Filed under: media

PALINI R. SWAMY writes from Bangalore: Modern journalists and wannabe-journalists are an imperviously impatient lot, who think they are the almighty’s gift to the profession.

They expect every story idea of theirs to be instantly accepted for publication, and every finished story to be published, as is, without a comma or turn of phrase being overturned.

Such careerist upstarts (among others) can draw a lesson from the Bangalore-based journalist turned researcher S. Sathyanarayana Iyer alias ‘Regret’ Iyer (in picture).

As a freelance contributor, Iyer collected so many “rejection slips” from editors, who felt there was something incomplete in his work, that instead of letting it bog him down, he took it as a challenge to gain acceptance.

Regret Iyer’s first rejection slip was for a photo-story on Bijapur in north Karnataka in 1964. With over 375 rejection slips, he has earned a pride of place in the Limca Book of Records.

47 years later, in circa 2011, he says he stills feels a rush of blood each time he gets a new rejection note which begins the ominous sounding words, “We regret our inability to publish….”

Unlike many of us who would cringe at such repeated rejection or quit the profession in disgust, Regret Iyer took it all on his chin, incorporated the “regret” notes from publications into his name (view his business card) making it his USP, and kept sending in contributions as a  writer, cartoonist and photographer.

He started three hand-written magazines (Shankar’s Herald, Image, and Gruhavani) between 1969 and ’75 to encourage amateur talent at risk of rejection like him. And ran a neighbourhood newspaper in Bangalore called Stencil for five years from 1984.

Eventually, the byline—”by Regret Iyer”—went on to adorn such publications as The Hindu, Indian Express, Hindustan Times, Sanje Vani among others. Sunday’s Kannada Prabha magazine carried an article by Iyer on the dolls of Dasara.

Iyer also launched a company under the banner “Regret Iyer Publications and Productions (RIP).”

What is more, Regret Iyer has immortalised success born out of failure. His son, a student of journalism, and his daughter, an MBA aspirant, have both incorporated their father’s nom de plume in their names.

Not to be left behind, Regret Iyer’s wife proudly calls herself Regret Vijaya.

View a Regret Iyer documentary: Crow with a broken wing

Also read: Provocation is in the eyes of the beholder

Filed under: Kannada & Karnataka, Life Etcetera, Media, Mysore-Bangalore, YouTube videos Tagged: Bijapur, Churumuri, Hindustan Times, Kannada Prabha, Limca Book of Records, Regret Iyer, Sanje Vani, Sans Serif, The Hindu

In answer to a direct question about whether his company was going to buy Yahoo at a forum at Stanford University in Silicon Valley this afternoon, Alibaba Group Chairman and CEO Jack Ma said: “We are very interested.”

Said Ma: “We are very interested in Yahoo. Our Alibaba group is important to Yahoo and Yahoo is important to us … All the serious buyers interested in Yahoo have talked to us.”

Finally, at least one crystal clear answer in the confusion at Yahoo. More importantly, it is the first time Ma has indicated that he wanted to be a principal player in any deal around Yahoo rather than an element of a buying group.

Later, in answer to a question I posed about how he was going to do that, Ma said he wanted the “whole” company, but that the effort was complicated and included a number of players.

Again, he said: “We are very, very interested.”

I also asked him if he had visited Yahoo in his trip to California, which Ma said he has not in 15 days here so far. He said he has mostly been sleeping and eating, as part of a longer-term visit to the U.S.

Ma’s declaration came as part of a lively closing keynote speech at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business, where he talked about the Chinese Internet company’s growth, focusing on how China is the next great Web economy.

Talking about competitors such as eBay, which have tried to enter the huge Asian market, he joked that “eBay might be sharks in the ocean, but Alibaba is a crocodile in the Yangtze.”

Of course, given his presence in Silicon Valley, one topic of interest was whether Ma would be heading over to visit nearby Yahoo and what role he will play in the current internal debate over the company’s future in the wake of the ousting of its CEO Carol Bartz.

The disposition on Yahoo’s Asian assets, which includes 40 percent of Alibaba and a large stake in Yahoo! Japan, are critical to the current strategic review of the company, since they make up a large part of its market valuation.

In comparison, the value of its U.S. and other global assets are small.

When later asked about his experience of being involved with Yahoo, which made a very canny investment by Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang in Alibaba many years ago, Ma also said that he would do it again, but not in the same way.

The same way has to do with the level of foreign ownership, which Ma has been trying to reduce in a number of ways and which Yahoo has thus far resisted.

To answer a question about the fight between Ma and Yahoo over its Alipay fight, when Ma spun it out of Alibaba, he said the situation was tense, but that today “the problem is solved and I am half-burnt.”

He was referring to a settlement, which will require a lot of growth from the still-nascent online payment business.

Ma was asked later about the biggest misunderstanding in the U.S. about China and vice versa. “Our job is not to solve the misunderstanding,” he said. “Our job is to change ourselves to solve the problem.”

In another query about his relationship with Yahoo’s Yang, Ma called him a lifelong friend and also said he appreciated how much that meant to Alibaba’s beginnings.

“But, this is business and not personal,” Ma said about the current situation. “While we appreciate yesterday, but we are looking for a better tomorrow.”

The first line, for those not mad fans of the classic movie like me, is from “The Godfather.”

The question is, though, will Ma make Yang an offer he can’t refuse?

Eight years ago on this day in 2003, I started Blogging.

Here's some basic info about what has transpired in eight years here at the Six Pixels of Separation Blog: over 2700 Blog entries, over 20,000 comments and over 270 audio Podcasts. If you have read or listened to only one percent of all of that content, you'll know that both acknowledging this milestone or speaking about the numbers (how big/how many) is not my style. But, when I woke up this morning and saw the date notification in my Outlook, it gave me pause. It wasn't a sense of pride or accomplishment, either. The only question that continually popped into my brain was: was all of this Blogging worth it? And, the answer is obvious: yes.

Yes it is.

Starting this Blog was (and still is) without the question the single most important thing I have done in my professional life. It has changed me. It has changed the way I learn and grow and it has changed how I think about the world (and business and marketing and media and beyond). In spending some serious time soaking in this anniversary, I listed out why Blogging was (and still is) the smartest thing I have ever done.

8 Reasons Why Blogging Still Rules:

It's slow. I'm in no rush. Most brand are. They think that Social Media is cheap, fast and easy. Blogging has taught me that nothing could be further from the truth. In 2008, I wrote a Blog post called, In Praise Of Slow, that evolved into a much longer and important piece of my first business book, Six Pixels of Separation and the idea still rings true. Blogging has taught me the merits of building true relationships between an audience and content... and that takes time. Lots of time and effort. As fast and simple as it is to publish content with a Blog, success with a Blog as an engine of Marketing is a slow process. And, like a great cup of tea, the process is worth it if you have the intestinal fortitude to see it through.

Critical thinking. People like to think that Blogging is about the discourse (the comments, trackbacks, links, likes and tweets). While this makes up an important piece of the Blogging puzzle, the main reason I Blog is to publicly think about New Media and my media hacking ways. To be blunt: it's a selfish act. The only part that isn't selfish is that I publish it for the world to see, comment on and criticize. But (to be blunt again), that is selfish too, because everything that everyone tacks on to my Blog posts make me think more (and even rethink my initial positions). The simple act of Blogging forces me to think in a more critical way and to get that thinking down in writing. The writing part is (obviously) the hardest part of critical thinking. Putting your thoughts into words is not easy.

The people you meet. People often talk about stepping away from the computer to enjoy the conversation and meeting of people in the real world (more on that here: The Real World). My Blog has allowed me to not only meet, but become very close friends with people I would have never met otherwise. When I was a kid, I often wished that someone at my school liked comics or martial arts as much as I did. Now, we take for granted how easy it is to meet and connect with fellow, like-minded individuals. I don't take our connectivity for granted. Ever. Blogging has allowed me to meet and connect with people by removing the challenge of geography. While I don't often get to press the flesh with certain individuals often enough, I enjoy waking up and hanging out online with friends like Seth Godin, Amber Naslund, Julien Smith, Hugh McGuire, Liz Strauss, Christopher S. Penn, Mark W. Schaefer, Hugh McGuire, Tamar Weinberg, C.C. Chapman, Arjun Basu, Joseph Jaffe, Tom Peters, Jeff Jarvis, Jay Rosen and countless other (just look at my Blogroll on the left for more or who I follow on Twitter or Facebook:) I have coffee with all of these people each and every morning - whether they know it or not.

Writing (and reading) as art. This concept was really driven home to me after reading the book, Linchpin, by Seth Godin. Some people paint, some people scrapbook and others twiddle on a guitar in their basements. I write about business, marketing and media hacking. That is my art. For years, I thought it would sound either pretentious or ridiculous to say that writing about business is an art form. Well, this is my art. Take it or leave it.

Personal branding. Really, it's about reputation. It's easy to say something. It's easy to do something. It's hard to build a real reputation that is based on who you truly are for the world to see. This Blog is as real as it gets. It has been a tool, platform and space for me to demonstrate how I think. I believe the results are reflected in how Twist Image (my marketing agency that I own with my three other business partners) has grown over the years. I also believe that there is no better resume than this Blog to define me. I wish more people understood the power of having a living and breathing ongoing publishing platform that allows you to demonstrate how you think, that anyone can access from anywhere.

My place to go. I'm hooked on Arianna Huffington's line: "Self expression is the new entertainment." People often ask, "when do you find the time to Blog?" All I can think to myself is, "when do you find the time to watch half of the television shows and movies that you've watched?" By definition, I'm much more interested in active media than passive media. So, while you're relaxing and watching a sitcom, I'm relaxing and writing a Blog post. This is my place to go. My Blog is my treehouse. This is where I go for fun.

It keeps me regular. I made a commitment to publish six pieces of text-based content and one audio piece each and every week. You can use all the Metamucil you want, my Blog keeps me regular. Knowing that I am committed to creating and publishing this amount of content makes my ears perk up. It keeps me open to uncover new and interesting topics to discuss. The regularity and consistency of the Blog has forced me to keep that "nose for news" that I first developed when I started off in professional journalism during my late teens.

It connects me to you. Think about life before Blogging. You would be waiting for a new book to come out or for a published piece in a newspaper of magazine. No more. Blogging connects me to you. You don't need to read it every day and you don't even need to leave a comment, and yet it still connects us (some more than others). I Blog in the hopes my thoughts resonate. I Blog in the hopes that it creates a level of discourse. I Blog because I'm tired of "top 10 reasons"-types of Blog posts. I Blog in an attempt to raise the bar. I Blog because it connects me to people like you... the exact kind of people I have been waiting my whole life to meet.

Why do you Blog? Better yet, why don't you Blog?




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There’s been a lot of attention paid recently to the new “social reading” apps that were launched by a number of publishers and content companies — including The Washington Post and The Guardian — at Facebook’s f8 developer conference. Some of that has focused on the “frictionless sharing” that these apps enable, where all of a reader’s activity from the app is shared through the social network, and we’ve pointed out the risks of putting so many eggs into a basket controlled by a large platform owner. But there’s another aspect of these launches that’s troubling, and that’s the pride so many publishers seem to take in having produced a Facebook app, as though it’s the pinnacle of media innovation.

Don’t get me wrong; obviously, creating a nice-looking Facebook app the way The Guardian has takes some skill, and I’m not demeaning that ability by any means. (I don’t like the look of the Washington Post or Wall Street Journal  apps as much, but that might just be a personal preference.) But how much time and effort could these kinds of apps possibly take? There are plenty of people who have created functional Facebook and iPhone apps in a weekend, and some pretty good-looking ones in a matter of weeks. Is something like that going to make a big difference to an entity as huge as the Washington Post or the Journal? That seems unlikely (I realize that most of these apps involved a lot of work and probably took much longer).

Creating a useful or even fun app that allows people to share your content is great, whether it’s a Facebook app or an iPhone app or an app that runs on Amazon’s new Kindle Fire tablet. And Washington Post publisher Graham is quite right that reaching out to readers wherever they are and trying to engage them around your content is a good idea. Experimentation is also a good idea, especially for newspapers — which aren’t typically known for that kind of thing. But if all you are doing is creating widgets for people who live inside a specific walled garden, then I think you are missing the boat.

Why play in someone else’s sandbox?
As I tried to argue in my previous post, doing this is no different from setting up a presence inside AOL or CompuServe, or distributing those “multimedia” CD-ROMs that newspapers were so enthused about back in the late 1990s. Having a Facebook app does take advantage of the social-sharing activity that has become a bigger and bigger part of the media landscape over the past few years, thanks to Twitter and other tools, but in many ways it’s no different (and in some ways worse) than having a Twitter button or a Facebook “like” on your content — which has effectively become table stakes for media at this point.

So what does innovation consist of? For a start, it involves rethinking not just where your content lives, but how it’s created and what it consists of — in other words, taking apart your business to really look at what has changed thanks to the web and social media, and how you can adapt to that. No app is going to do that for you, and tinkering around in a “lab” probably isn’t going to do it either.

Some media outlets are trying to do this, and rethinking aspects of what media companies do: Forbes, for example, — has blurred the line between “professional journalists” and other content producers, including those who primarily do marketing or advertising-related content. In the new Forbes, posts from marketers show up alongside posts from staff writers for the magazines, just as blog posts by unpaid contributors at The Huffington Post appear alongside those from paid staff. Not everyone likes the gray area Forbes is living in, but you can’t say editor Lewis Dvorkin isn’t trying to rethink his business.

The Atlantic and some other publications, meanwhile, have been focusing on things that don’t even involve what most people would consider journalism — such as live events that are related to the content they are publishing. That’s helped turn the company’s fortunes around, just as similar real-world events have for other content companies like the non-profit Texas Tribune. And the Journal-Register, which I’ve written about before, is rethinking how its newspapers work from all kinds of different angles, including the launch of a “community newsroom” at one of its papers.

Why not think of your paper as a platform?
But The Guardian has taken by far the most dramatic steps of any newspaper in rethinking what its business consists of, with what the paper called its “open platform” project, which launched last year. Instead of spending all its time trying to put walls or sandbags around its content and control where it appeared, the Guardian released an open API that allowed outside developers to make use of its content — provided they agreed to either pay for the data, or form an advertising partnership with the paper. Instead of doing a deal just with one platform vendor like Facebook, they made it possible for anyone to become a partner.

More importantly, The Guardian‘s approach — along with other innovations like the crowdsourcing effort behind its feature on MP expenses in 2009 — was driven by a fundamental rewiring of the way it thought about its purpose and function as a newspaper. Editor Alan Rusbridger has talked about a “mutualised” newspaper, one that includes its readers as partners in discovering and reporting the news, and one that doesn’t think about itself in terms of what particular medium it uses to distribute that news. In other words, not a “news-paper” company at all, but just a news-distribution company.

The Financial Times  hasn’t done anything quite that radical, but it has broken its own ground by pinning its online future on a fully open HTML5 version of the site that works on virtually any device, because all it requires is a browser. That feels a lot more innovative than rolling out a Facebook app or an Amazon app so that readers who use one specific device can interact with your content inside some walled garden.

Post and thumbnail photos courtesy of Flickr users Sandy Honig and Jeremy Mates

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.
Facebook and the future of our online livesNewNet Q1: Content Farms and Niche Networks on the RiseContent Farms: The Players, The Benefits, The Risks

Apple's CEO always wanted to get something great to the customer without any obstacles – except that they should pay
Ten years is, of course, a long time in media. Ten years ago, if you wanted to download some music, your best bet was Napster or one of the filesharing systems such as LimeWire or KaZaA. There were legal services, but they were so dire they wouldn't pass much muster today: there was PressPlay and MusicNet (from rival groups of record companies), which required $15 a month subscriptions for low-quality streaming (when most people had dialup connections, not today's broadband). You couldn't burn to CD. They were stuffed with restrictive software to prevent you sharing the songs.
What happened? Steve Jobs happened, mainly. The hardware and design team at Apple came up with the iPod (initially intended to be a way to sell more Macintosh computers), and then followed the iTunes Music Store – a great way to tie people to Apple by selling music. In 2003 Jobs persuaded the music companies – which wouldn't license their songs to bigger names like Microsoft – to go with him because, he said, Apple was tiny (which it was, at the time). The risk if people did start sharing songs from the store was minimal, he argued. The record labels looked at Apple's tiny market share (a few per cent of the PC market) and reckoned they'd sell about a million songs a year, so they signed up.
Apple sold a million in the first week of the iTunes Music Store being open (and only in the US). It sold 3m within a month. It's never looked back.
Nowadays Apple sells TV shows, films, books, apps, as well as music. We take the explosion in available content for granted. But without Jobs, it's likely we wouldn't be here at all; his negotiating skill is the thing that Apple, and possibly the media industry, will miss the most, because he got them to open up to new delivery mechanisms.
Content companies have been reluctant to let their products move to new formats if they aren't the inventors, or at least midwives. Witness Blu-ray, a Sony idea which wraps up the content so you can't ever get it off the disc (at least in theory); or 3D films. Yet neither is quite living up to its promise, and part of that comes down to people wanting to be able to move the content around – on an iPod, iPhone, iPad or even a computer – in ways the content doesn't allow. Apps downloaded directly to your mobile? Carriers would never have allowed it five years ago. Flat-rate data plans? Ditto. But all good for content creators.
Jobs pried open many content companies' thinking, because his focus was always on getting something great to the customer with as few obstacles as possible. In that sense, he was like a corporate embodiment of the internet; except he thought people should pay for what they got. He always, always insisted you should pay for value, and that extended to content too. The App and Music Store remains one of the biggest generators of purely digital revenue in the world, and certainly the most diverse; while Google's Android might be the fastest-selling smartphone mobile OS, its Market generates pitiful revenues, and I haven't heard of anyone proclaiming their successes from selling music, films or books through Google's offerings.
Jobs's resignation might look like the end of an era, and for certain parts of the technology industry it is. For the content industries, it's also a loss: Jobs was a champion of getting customers who would pay you for your stuff. The fact that magazine apps like The Daily haven't set the world alight (yet?) isn't a failure of the iPad (which is selling 9m a quarter while still only 15 months old; at the same point in the iPod's life, just 219,000 were sold in the financial quarter, compared with the 22m – 100 times more – of its peak). It's more like a reflection of our times.
So if you're wondering how Jobs's departure affects the media world, consider that it's the loss of one of the biggest boosters of paid-for content the business ever had. Who's going to replace that?
Steve JobsAppleComputingAppsDigital mediaMedia businessCharles Arthurguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Since the camera phone has essentially turned any casual observor into a potential photojournalist, an extra pair of eyeballs in Libya could eventually become a temporary appendage of a larger news collecting organization.

Bakha Dutt's response to Radia tapes

Take a look at Tuesday night’s box score in the baseball game between New York and Toronto. The Yankees won, 11-5. Now look at the weather summary, showing a high of 71 for New York. The score and temperature are not subject to debate.

Yet a president’s birthday or whether he was even in the White House on the day TARP was passed are apparently open questions. A growing segment of the party poised to take control of Congress has bought into denial of the basic truths of Barack Obama’s life. What’s more, this astonishing level of willful ignorance has come about largely by design, and has been aided by a press afraid to call out the primary architects of the lies.

People will believe what they want to believe irrespective of the facts that are merely inconvenient. Even in 2010, a sizeable percentage of the population believes that the Sun revolves around the Earth. So how can you expect a black President to convince them that he is a Christian and a citizen?

"Today, I am the proud owner of approximately 20 books – six of which are craft books. To move from one extreme to the other took some serious work, and was not an overnight process. It started with the realization that I was not so much attached to the stories and words themselves, but the physical books sitting on the shelves. Once I had that realization, I began to let go of some of my books, and moved slowly towards a more minimalist reading collection."

As we move toward ebooks or reading online, physical books retain is a nostalgic reminder of an activity that we once enjoyed. Mind you, that we still enjoy reading however, the mode of reading has changed. And it should. After all, shouldn't the content matter more than the medium? Admittedly we are not there yet but are definitely headed that way.

"Last Monday, the word got out that Rolling Stone had a stunning piece about General McChrystal, in which he and his aides were critical of the White House. It’s the kind of scoop that thrills magazine editors, and no doubt they couldn’t wait to get their issue on the stands.

The problem was, nobody else could wait either. On Tuesday morning, a PDF of the piece the magazine had lovingly commissioned, edited, fact-checked, printed and distributed, was posted in its entirety on not one but two Web sites, for everyone to read without giving Rolling Stone a dime.

It was a clear violation of copyright and professional practice, and it amounted to taking money out of a competitor’s pocket. What crafty guerrilla site or bottom-feeder would do such a thing?

Turns out it was Time.com and Politico"

"India is the only major newspaper market in the world where newspapers are open to selling their stories. The problem isn’t that Indian proprietors are evil or that they’re looking for short-term benefit while eroding the paper over time. In my experience of six newspapers, the proprietor has always been more knowledgeable than the editor.

The problem is the reader. It is unthinkable that its readers would continue to patronize The New York Times if it were revealed that the newspaper’s reporting was available for sale. But in India it’s fine, and the space is available for the proprietor to profit."

It's crushing it in ratings, crushing it in profits, crushing it in influence.

Wolf Blitzer is Jewish, a former AIPAC official, and -- to use Shales' smear-campaign formulation -- has frequently "been accused" of pro-Israel bias; should CNN bar him from covering those issues?  David Gregory is Jewish, "studies Jewish texts with a top Jewish educator in Washington," and has conducted extremely sycophantic interviews with Israel officials. Should his background be cited as evidence of his pro-Israel bias?

"The factual statements Brooks uses in his argument are wrong. Not arguable, or questionable, or suspicious. Wrong. And since everything else flows from those wrong facts, the rest of the column can't be taken seriously."

I’m told that Twitter is a river into which I can dip my cup whenever I want. But that supposes we’re all kneeling on the banks. In fact, if you’re at all like me, you’re trying to keep your footing out in midstream, with the water level always dangerously close to your nostrils. Twitter sounds less like sipping than drowning.

Pentagram’s Luke Hayman, designer of, among others, Time, New York, and Travel + Leisure, was asked how this new format would change the world of magazines and came up with five ways off the top of his head.

Legacy Compatibility Mode - makes many applications that use outdated Apple® Remote code compatible with OS 10.6.2 (optional, can be enabled/disabled)

Just hours after Jon Stewart’s sharply observant takedown of Keith Olbermann’s Special Comment segments, the Countdown host launched into a diatribe that made Stewart’s segment look like a love letter.

Systems such as Wikipedia, Flickr, Delicious, Facebook, Twitter, Hunch and various parts of the open source movement are based around small contributory systems, bodies of work in which there are incremental improvements by multiple contributors, or exposing small actions that would be insignificant in isolation, but are meaningful in the aggregate.

Though forthcoming, my friend was anxious to preserve her anonymity; Facebook employees, after all, know better than most the value of privacy. As she is not permitted to divulge company secrets, and would like to remain employed, her name has been omitted from this interview. It provides an interesting snapshot of the inner workings and culture of Facebook in the summer of 2009.

Interesting how a man can retain his top position in the wildly fluid business world.

Chase’s and Whedon’s very different voices would come to represent the new style of TV making, less sentimental and more freewheeling, willing to alienate viewers, capable of a slow build not over episodes but over whole years—in striking contrast to the slick, interchangeable legal and medical procedurals, the syndication-friendly format that dominated the networks.

Here’s a brief history of the Internet, including important dates, people, projects, sites, and other information that should give you at least a partial picture of what this thing we call the Internet really is, and where it came from.

Click through these lists and you’ll see a different world than you would have thought possible on Twitter.

A year ago, terrorists took over the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower, India’s fabled five-star hotel, in an attack that left 172 dead across the city. As India still seethes over the bungled rescue efforts, those who survived the 60-hour ordeal reveal the full horror of what happened.

Dell says it has made $3 million using Twitter.

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.

Despite all the recent Twitter-enthusiasm about this platform's unique power to alert millions of people in decentralized and previously unavailable ways, there are quite a few reasons to be concerned about Twitter's role in facilitating an unnecessary global panic about swine flu.

Are reporters allowed to misrepresent themselves?

But it is, above all, the smallness of the national conversation that baffles. The debate never rises above the battle tactics of who is with whom, and who ditched whom, and who said what in reply to what the other one said. The politicians, seemingly incapable of ideas, are wise not to attempt any. But the press, whose task is to challenge them, plays along, writing drivel analyses like the analysis with which I began, treating the thing like a sport, tit-for-tat, tat-for-tit, until it is time to go home.

Twitter co-founder Biz Stone says the San Francisco start-up is watching the outside initiatives closely as it prepares to launch its own fee-based services this year

Print media industry in India has joined the growing list of businesses seeking a bailout from the government to combat a sudden downturn in the economy after three years of rapid growth.

Spend a weekend with a network production crew, and you’ll discover what it really takes to turn the on-field action into televised entertainment. When will IPL learn?

Real investigative journalism?

What are these renegade cybergeeks doing at the New York Times? Maybe saving it.

...as telecast on a regional news channel. Press conference is in English.

...because he has experience on the battlefield and in journalism, right? Nah! But has that ever stopped anyone from becoming a journalist?

The New York Times (NYT) became the second to last major newspaper to run a front page display ad today. But nothing like our Times of India who had a full-front-page ad for Indya.com

“Barack Obama will win: It’s all in ‘The West Wing.’ ”

Reporter gets assualted by Palin supporter for talking to Obama supporter

IT’S been more than eight years since “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” made its first foray into presidential politics with the presciently named Indecision 2000, and the difference in the show’s approach to its coverage then and now provides a tongue-in-cheek measure of the show’s striking evolution.