Media

The iPhone hype has either reached a high point or totally jumped the shark, depending on your personal opinion. Playboy.com just announced that it has launched its official iPhone effort, which it calls "iPlayboy."

We'll just say that it sure gives "touch screen" a whole new meaning.

Playboy's virtual goodie bag for the iPhone consists of 12 "sexy non-nude wallpapers" for the sleek Apple handset, a special photo album with another dozen photos of Playmates, an episode of Playboy's Sirius Satellite Radio show, and a video customized for the iPhone'… Read more

Expensive sports rights are a major cost for the United States television industry. Sports also brings huge ad revenue and a male audience that is much prized by advertisers because it's so elusive.

Now the NBA has signed new TV deals that run nearly a decade. This time the buyers get significant rights to Internet distribution of games, highlights and related content. Clearly, this is just another step toward the Internet becoming a full-fledged alternative to typical TV distribution. An ESPN executive said its Web site had a million unique visitors daily during the NBA playoffs earlier this year.… Read more

The video venture created by media conglomerates News Corp and NBC Universal finally has a leader.

The tentatively named NewCo has hired Jason Kilar, a longtime former Amazon.com executive as CEO. Kilar is credited with helping form Amazon's video and DVD strategy during his 10 years at the company.

NewCo will distribute full-length movies and clips from at least a dozen television networks and two major film studios over the Web, including at three of the Web's largest Internet portals, AOL, MSN and Yahoo. Some of those contributing content, besides NBC and Fox include Comcast, MySpace and … Read more

Just last year, Netflix announced that it owned a patent on its business model and sued Blockbuster for patent infringement.

Why would a company like Netflix -- the proven leader in the "mail me" renting business -- decide to pick on a company who was doing all it could to stay afloat by trying the same business model? Because Netflix smelled blood and business is business. Without Blockbuster nipping at its heels, Netflix would not only be able to rule a business model that will take us into the next decade, it would be free from any significant … Read more

In typical conference fashion, there are too many simultaneous presentations and each panel is filled with such a diverse group of individuals that the overall experience is almost like going out for dim sum. You get a taste of a lot of things, but by the time you stumble onto something truly satisfying, there just isn't enough to leave you fulfilled and you find yourself looking around you in the hopes that him or her crosses your path sometime in the near or distant future.

Right now, I'm sitting in on a panel focused on collaboration. JD Lasica is moderating the panel, and Kent Bye is speaking about his collaborative documentary The Echo Chamber Project. Kent's project has fascinated me ever since I first learned about it over a year ago and he's developed some rather robust tools to help establish a distributive editing process.

… Read more

BOSTON--Device and network technology is not holding back mobile video, it's the money makers who can't agree on what to do with it.

At least that was the consensus among several mobile video leaders, including Nokia and MobiTV, at Red Herring East's Wednesday panel on mobile video.

"From a network and device perspective we are ready," said Ray Derenzo, vice president of business development for MobiTV, one of the leading mobile video distributors.

Proprietary nuisances, on the other hand, are an issue.

"It's all about the open platform," said Nokia research director … Read more

More advertising dollars are flowing to the Internet, in a trend that started years ago. Advertising Age has come out with its annual look at the United States top-100 advertising spenders. There are few surprises, but it's confirmation of what you've probably been seeing and expecting. Internet ads now account for 5.5 percent of total spending by the top 100 advertisers in the U.S. That adds up to nearly $10 billion, and the Internet's about even with radio and ahead of outdoor.

What are the biggest losers? TV's share of ad spending has been … Read more

On Wednesday, CNET News.com checked in with Jeff Berman, MySpace.com's general manager of video operations, to hear more about the gargantuan social network's latest project: MySpace TV. The New York Times reported Tuesday that MySpace would be refurbishing its in-house video operations this week, creating a new video hub at myspacetv.com (site not yet active) to host a mix of amateur and professional media content. Berman filled us in on exactly what to expect.

"It's really just the next step in what has been a very busy few months for us on the … Read more

The official numbers aren't in yet, but reports indicate that the debut of Michael Moore's documentary on the health care industry is a smash--this despite being downloaded on file-sharing sites a week before the opening.

Sicko sold out in the 43 theaters across the country where it appeared during "sneak" previews last weekend. The film's producers, the Weinstein Company, won't reveal earnings, but in New York, the movie appeared on one theater screen and still managed to bank $70,000. By all indications, this is a blockbuster number.

I've been tracking how Moore's expose … Read more