Nielsen has acquired technology advertising analysis company Vizu and plans to make Vizu’s Ad Catalyst available immediately.
“Until now, Nielsen measured an online advertising’s reach but not its effectiveness,” reports TechCrunch. Vizu will allow advertisers to access real-time data regarding Internet advertising campaigns.
“Eventually, Nielsen will do more to integrate Vizu’s features with its measurement of online ad reach, and with its cross-platform products,” notes the post.
The goal, says Scott McKinley, Nielsen executive VP for Ad Effectiveness, is “bringing data out of Vizu systems and connecting up with how we measure television, so we can offer advertisers a complete picture of reach and effectiveness across television and online.”
In related news from Lost Remote: “The social TV analytics and curation company Trendrr is planning to launch a new service that will enable TV stations to measure social conversations around local programming and talent — and compare those conversations with their competitors.”
According to the report, Trendrr plans to initially launch the service in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago during the next quarter. It will add new sources to combine with the data it currently measures from Twitter, Facebook, GetGlue, Viggle and Miso.
In a guest post for AllThingsD, RBG Networks CEO Jef Graham argues the TV Everywhere concept can help cable companies fight Netflix, YouTube and Amazon — and add up to $12 billion in total revenue over the next three to five years.
Graham explains how traditional television advertisements are ineffective, as they are not focused. Yes, advertisers can choose specific shows, time slots, and, in some cases, can target viewers by area code, but these types of advertisements are still less focused than Internet-based advertising.
TV Everywhere allows advertisers to track IP addresses to better understand viewers, and thus better cater the advertising experience to particular interests.
“Men aren’t seeing ads for women’s shoes, for instance; someone doing Web searches in advance of a trip to Hawaii might see pitches for hotels or rental cars,” explains Graham. “And since there are now often multiple Internet-enabled devices in a given home, ads can be targeted directly to the device that a particular family member uses most often.”
TV Everywhere also helps to solve problems with DVRs and commercial-skipping technologies. People are more inclined to watch advertising while viewing on-demand content on a laptop or tablet than when they DVR a program, so this helps drive advertising dollars back into television programming.
“And as the technology side of the house has worked through its issues and stands poised for broad deployment, we see the barriers breaking down on the content side as well,” concludes Graham. “We expect to see a similar pattern for targeted advertising — the technology is in place, and the new ad model will follow as the stakeholders work through their negotiations, with everybody coming out a winner.”
Google and the UK’s PRS for Music have released a new study entitled “The six business models for copyright infringement.”
The research, conducted by BAE Systems Detica, finds that live television is the fastest-growing segment of copyright infringement. “Global page views of live TV sites were up 61 percent for the year ending May 2012,” notes paidContent.
The other business models featured in the report include P2P Community, Subscription Community, Music Transaction, Rewarded Freemium and Embedded Streaming.
“This study provides data-driven insight into how copyright infringement operates as a business across a range of business models,” explains the executive summary. “It shows that websites are most commonly funded in part or in combination by either advertising or payments.”
“For each segment, this study helps to identify which are the significant economic drivers. This data is likely to prove useful and insightful to industry and policymakers who seek to tackle infringement by ‘following the money.'”
The report notes that live TV sites link to a mixture of illegal streams and paid television, with a third based in the U.S. Two-thirds of these Live TV Gateway sites are funded by advertisers. Additionally, they are more likely than the other business models mentioned above to have mobile sites and a significant social network presence.
“Our research shows there are many different business models for online infringement which can be tackled if we work together,” said Theo Bertram, Google’s UK policy manager. “The evidence suggests that one of the most effective ways to do this is to follow the money, targeting the advertisers who choose to make money from these sites and working with payment providers to ensure they know where their services are being used.”
The article includes a graphic from the study that offers an excellent overview of the different categories. The full report is available for download from PRS for Music.
The office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) has held private meetings to discuss and draft an international copyright provision to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
USTR spokeswoman Carol Guthrie explains that “the United States is proposing a new provision, consistent with the internationally recognized ‘3-step test,’ that will obligate parties to seek to achieve an appropriate balance in their copyright systems in providing copyright exceptions and limitations for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.”
“These principles are critical aspects of the U.S. copyright system, and appear in both our law and jurisprudence,” adds Guthrie. “The balance sought by the U.S. TPP proposal recognizes and promotes respect for the important interests of individuals, businesses, and institutions who rely on appropriate exceptions and limitations in the TPP region.”
While most intellectual property holders have applauded the developments, they eagerly await the release of the treaty. Without the treaty in hand, no one can analyze the precise language, which “makes a big difference in how effective it will be on the ground,” according to intellectual property attorney Jonathan Band.
Critics, such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation, complain that the propositions are nothing more than “ACTA-plus.” The organization notes that the 3-step-test “imposes rigid constraints on the sorts of ‘fair use’ provisions countries may enact.”
The European Parliament rejected the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) with a 478 to 39 vote. The overwhelming dissent effectively served a death blow to the anti-piracy and anti-copyright infringement legislation drafted five years ago by the United States and Japan.
Supporters of the legislation, including President Obama, had hoped to establish a global copyright standard, but the recent decision hurts the possibility of establishing such standards.
ACTA could still pass if six countries choose to pass the legislation, but Canadian law professor Michael Geist explains how the legislation is “badly damaged and will seemingly never achieve the goals of its supporters as a model for other countries to adopt.”
Australia, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Morocco, New Zealand, and Singapore are among the nations yet to decide on the matter, but reports indicate the nations are unlikely to pass the legislation.
ACTA opponents celebrated the decision. Activist Mike Rispoli explained that his group Access “is ecstatic that the Parliament… by an overwhelming majority, said ‘No’ to ACTA, delivering the long-awaited fatal blow to this dangerous agreement.”
“The European Parliament vote is a triumph of democracy over special interests and shady back-room deals,” added UK Pirate Party leader Loz Kaye. “It is becoming increasingly politically poisonous to be ‘anti-Internet.'”
The Infinitec Pocket TV allows consumers to transform their HDTVs into smart TVs for under $200. By connecting a small microcomputer (similar in size to a USB dongle), users can turn their HDTV into a giant screen computer with access to the Google Play Store.
The device outputs 1080p resolution through a HDMI 1.3 connection, reports Digital Trends, and runs on Android 4.0. The device also includes “a MicroSD port that will accommodate any MiscroSD card up to 32GB in size” and “comes with 4GB of internal memory.”
Customers can choose to purchase either a standard remote or an Air Remote. The standard remote uses directional pad navigation, while the Air Remote uses a gyroscopic sensor that allows users to control their televisions with gestures. The Air Remote controls an on screen mouse cursor and includes a QWERTY keyboard.
Smartphone users can control the device using the Google Remote TV app. Infinitec plans to release its own mobile application soon.
Infinitec confirms that Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Video, Facebook, Twitter, Flipboard, Google Maps and Pulse applications, among others, all work with the device.
Infinitec plans to release Pocket TV by early October for $190. Interested customers can pre-order the device on Kickstarter for $110 for the standard remote and $135 for the Air Remote.
Amazon’s Kindle Fire has been the strongest competitor to Apple’s iPad and Google’s slew of Android devices. Amazon may now take on Apple and Google in the area of 3D mapping with its purchase of UpNext.
Amazon purchased the New York-based 3D map developer for an undisclosed sum. “UpNext offers interactive, detailed three-dimensional maps of cities and venues,” according to GigaOM.
“Currently, Kindle Fire owners must use third-party apps or access Google Maps (or another service) through the Web browser,” reports VentureBeat. “We could see UpNext’s mapping platform show up on Amazon.com or see it integrated with Amazon’s mobile apps.”
The purchase will allow Amazon to move away from its reliance on Google Maps for its new line of Kindle Fire tablets. “The Kindle Fire doesn’t currently include a GPS radio but the UpNext acquisition, which would help Amazon offer native mapping capabilities, potentially points to a more robust Kindle Fire in the future, as well as an Amazon smartphone,” notes GigaOM.
The VentureBeat post features two videos demonstrating UpNext’s 3D maps on the iPhone and iPad.
Google has released Chrome for iOS, but without the latitude to integrate its JavaScript rendering engine, the app runs slower than its Android cousin.
Rather than use the JavaScript engine, Chrome for iOS uses its UIWebView in order to comply with Apple’s strict third-party developers agreement.
TechCrunch notes that many users enjoy Chrome on other platforms for its speed, but that the absence of the JavaScript engine makes Chrome on iOS appear sluggish. The post adds that the lack of speed “doesn’t just apply to page loads,” but that “there is often a slight but noticeable lag when you scroll, too.”
Chrome on iOS still provides a valuable experience, and includes fluid tab switchers. Users can also sync their iOS device to their desktop with Chrome’s bookmark and tab syncing features.
According to a statement from Google, the company’s “goal was to bring the same fast, secure and stable Web browsing experience you’ve come to enjoy when using Chrome on your desktop or Android device, while also adapting to platform specific technical specifications.”
“Google’s engineers, though, did what they could on iOS,” comments TechCrunch. “Sadly, those platform specific technical specifications dictate that the current iteration of Chrome for iOS can’t quite live up to what we’ve come to expect from Chrome on other platforms.”
Music streaming competition continues to heat up and Microsoft plans to enter the mix with “an expansive Xbox music service joining Spotify-style streaming with download and online-storage functions similar to Apple Inc.’s iTunes,” according to Bloomberg.
Microsoft is in negotiations with major record companies now and plans to launch the service later this year.
“By combining the best features of competing services, Microsoft seeks to build a digital product that lets customers consume music any way they like,” notes the article. “The maker of the Xbox console is building the new music business after its unsuccessful effort with the Zune service, which will close and move customers to Xbox Music, the company said on its website.”
According to “several people with knowledge of the situation,” Xbox Music will offer a streaming subscription service similar to that of Spotify and enable customers to purchase digital music via an online store, similar to the model used by iTunes and Amazon.com.
Sources also say that Microsoft wants to offer Xbox Music users an online locker, from which they can access content from mobile devices running Windows 8.
Reports indicate that an issue with Apple’s App Store was causing problems for its users this week. According to CNET, “Marco Arment, the creator of Instapaper, reported…that he was ‘deluged’ earlier this week by users who had downloaded Instapaper 4.2.3 and found that upon opening it, the application ‘crashed immediately.'”
The issue continued to plague users even after uninstalling and reinstalling the app. Arment also suggested that he’d heard of other app developers having similar issues.
“Arment found that the problem was due to what he said was a corrupt update Apple distributed through its App Store. According to Arment, the update he sent over worked just fine, so he quickly complained to Apple about the issue. Within a couple of hours, a new, reliable update was distributed and the problem was addressed,” reports CNET.
“I haven’t yet received a response from App Review, so I don’t know whether the fix was because I made noise, or simply because time passed, which may, for instance, expire a cache with the bad data,” Arment wrote in a blog post. “The only fix for people with bad copies, once good copies are being served again by the App Store, is to delete and reinstall the app.”
TechCrunch reports that Apple is aware of the problem and has been working to resolve it. “The short of it is that corrupt app store binaries, and possibly some problem related to Apple’s FairPlay DRM, is at the root of these mysterious crashes,” notes the post.
Apple issued an update late last night: “We had a temporary issue that began yesterday with a server that generated DRM code for some apps being downloaded. The issue has been rectified and we don’t expect it to occur again.”
In a related report from International Business Times, Russian security firm Kaspersky Lab has reported an app named “Find and Call,” which it suggests is the first case of malware to enter Apple’s App Store. Reportedly also found in the Android Google Play store, the malware “steals your phonebook details and sends spam SMS messages to all your contacts, claiming to be from you,” explains the article.
Retail stores have suffered from “showrooming,” a process by which customers browse products in stores, but then return to online retailers to purchase their items.
Some retailers have attempted to combat the problem by replacing bar codes with company-only bar codes that cannot be scanned and compared online.
Other retailers are transforming “their stores into extensions of their own online operations” by ” stepping up efforts to add Web return centers, pickup locations, free shipping outlets, payment booths and even drive-through customer service centers for online sales to their brick-and-mortar buildings,” reports The New York Times.
“We are living in the age of the customer, and you can either fight these trends that are happening — showrooming is one — or you can embrace them,” explains Joel Anderson, chief executive of Walmart.com for the United States. “We have a lot of assets, but they’re only assets if you embrace the trends of the customers.”
Retailers who offer pick up locations for online purchases find that it attracts different types of customers than traditional online shopping. Whereas traditional online shoppers often pay with credit cards, shoppers who order online and then pick up their order in the store often pay with cash, either to avoid identity theft or because they do not have credit cards.
Vice president of stores for the Container Store John Thrailkill notes that “the online orders for in-store pickup also tended to be much larger than typical in-store purchases, and that customers who picked up orders in the store visited about 50 percent more often than customers who shopped only in the stores.”
Rumor has it that Apple is getting closer to revealing a 7-inch iPad (the Wall Street Journal reports that the company component suppliers in Asia are set to begin production in September of a tablet smaller than 8-inches).
However, reports indicate that Apple’s late CEO Steve Jobs was critical of such a tablet.
During a conference call in 2010, “Jobs talked about how such tablets offered just a fraction of the screen size as a 10-inch tablet, while not offering a significant boost over the smartphone that most tablet buyers were already carrying,” reports AllThingsD.
Even knowing the inevitability of improved pixel density in the future, Jobs said: “The reason we [won’t] make a 7-inch tablet isn’t because we don’t want to hit [a lower] price point. It’s because we think the screen is too small to express the software. As a software driven company, we think about the software strategies first.”
Serious competitors in the low-cost, smaller tablet sector continue to emerge, including last year’s Kindle Fire from Amazon and the pending arrival of the Nexus 7 from Asus and Google.
While competitors continue unveiling smaller, more affordable tablets, “Apple may well feel that it no longer makes sense to leave the segment to competitors,” notes the article.
The launch of Samba, an advertising-based, free British broadband service, prompts GigaOM to question if ad-based mobile data can succeed.
Samba targets traveling tablet and laptop users. The customers watch advertisements to gain data credit, which they can use at their convenience. Once users purchase a Samba SIM card, they can get 3G access for free.
“Watch two and a half minutes of adverts in a day — from brands like Volvo, Microsoft and Dell — and you’ve worked up enough credit to cover more than 500MB of data,” notes the post.
Co-founder Ben Atherton explains “With Samba you earn the credit watching ads at a time that is convenient to you and then have access when you need it.”
However, GigaOM argues that ad-supported mobile services have nearly always failed in the past, and most successful ad-supported platforms “aren’t purely ad-supported at all: advertising is just one part of a complex revenue mix.”
The post also notes that ad-supported businesses are most successful when they are platforms such as Facebook and Google. “These are appealing to advertisers because they are self-service, highly-segmented, and targeted. They make money because they scale easily, they don’t necessarily require huge sales teams and they aren’t broadcast mechanisms,” explains GigaOM.
An infographic from Digital Flash analyzes social media use by gender, finding that men dominate Google+ and Reddit while women use Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest with more frequency than males.
Women account for 56 percent of all social network use in the United States, and this number carries over to use of both Facebook and Twitter. Females account for 58 percent and 64 percent of use on these sites, respectively.
Women also account for 55 percent of the online gaming population, and 60 percent of Zynga’s users are women. Women over the age of 55 account for the most Zynga gaming, as this demographic games more than males 15-24 and 25-34 combined.
Men account for 84 percent, 71 percent, and 63 percent, respectively, on Reddit, Google+ and LinkedIn.
The infographic concludes “women are far more active users of social networking sites, racking up an astounding 99 million more visits per month than their male counterparts.”
Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) announced this week it would purchase cloud-streaming game provider Gaikai Inc. for approximately $380 million.
“Through the acquisition, SCE will establish a new cloud service, ensuring that it continues to provide users with truly innovative and immersive interactive entertainment experiences,” states the press release.
ReadWriteWeb suggests that the acquisition “could completely reshape the way Sony interacts with the lucrative gaming market.” The Gaikai network could allow users to access games without the need for a dedicated high-end game console.
“Users of the free, ad-supported Gaikai service can play top-of-the-line video games on pretty much any Web-enabled device — including desktop browsers, Internet TVs, tablets and smartphones,” notes the post. “Gaikai promises to deliver a low-latency experience in gameplay even on platforms not necessarily built for gaming.”
While Sony may be looking to expand possibilities in gaming content delivery, implications of the deal go beyond such an endeavor.
“Cloud streaming services such as Gaikai and remote desktop service Splashtop are fast becoming popular ways to deliver digital content across the Internet,” indicates ReadWriteWeb. “Sony’s acquisition of Gaikai clearly validates cloud streaming as a delivery method.”
Nielsen has acquired technology advertising analysis company Vizu and plans to make Vizu’s Ad Catalyst available immediately.
