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Local Digital Ad Revenue to Hit $37.9 Billion by 2015 [STUDY]

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 22:45:48 +0000

Spending on local digital ads will grow from $23.3 billion in 2011 to $37.9 billion in 2015, according to BIA/Kelsey. However, the local media research firm lowered its expectations for combined digital and traditional local advertising revenues in 2011 from $136.2 billion to $135.9 billion. The share of digital media spend will increase from 14.6 percent of all local ad revenues in 2010 to 18.9 percent in 2012 and 25.4 percent in 2015, according to Kelsey’s “Annual U.S. Local Media Forecast, 2010-2015 – Fall Update.” The company also measured expenditures on social media by local and national advertisers, noting that $4.6 billion will be spent on social network ad formats in 2012, up from $2.1 billion in 2010. By 2015, that will go up to $8.3 billion. National advertisers dominate in social ad spending, though; in 2012, $3.5 billion of the $4.6 billion total will be spent by national ad buyers. More About: Advertising , location

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Local Digital Ad Revenue to Hit $37.9 Billion by 2015 [STUDY]

Penguin Becomes Latest Publisher to Sell Digital Shorts

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 20:45:00 +0000

Penguin is the latest publisher to test out e-singles with the launch of Penguin Shorts, an ongoing digital series of original fiction and nonfiction titles from authors like Colm Toibin and Anita Brookner. The program is launching in the UK first, with nine titles being released on December 1. All are priced at £0.99 ($1.58) or £1.99. ($3.17) In the U.S., Penguin has been publishing short-form “ Penguin eSpecials ” since 2008, and those will be rebranded as Penguin Shorts next year. A glance at the two countries’ lists suggests that Penguin has a little work to do in terms of branding and merging the titles under one banner. Most of the U.S. “eSpecials” are fantasy, romance and mystery titles (“Romancing Lady Cecily,” “Kris Longknife: Training Daze”), while the UK’s Shorts tend toward more serious topics like immigration and history’s great battles. Penguin aims to publish new e-singles each month and sell them across e-bookstores. In the U.S., Open Road and Rodale both recently announced e-singles publishing programs, and the “big six” publishers are experimenting with individual e-singles across platforms. I expect the next step for these publishers is more branded programs like Penguin Shorts. More About: books , ebooks , penguin For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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Penguin Becomes Latest Publisher to Sell Digital Shorts

How One Company Saved Thousands of Dogs Using Social Media

Sun, 13 Nov 2011 20:31:02 +0000

Frank Barry , professional services manager at Blackbaud and blogger at NetWits ThinkTank , helps non-profits use the Internet for digital communication, social media and fundraising so they can focus on making an impact and achieving their missions. Find Frank on Twitter @franswaa . Social media is all the rage, but does it actually help create real change in the world? The folks at Best Friends Animal Society would answer with a resounding yes ! Best Friends has introduced the Invisible Dog Campaign , a nod to the invisible dog leash from the ‘70s and ‘80s. “Invisible dogs” refer to the forgotten pets found in city shelters that face tremendous odds to get adopted. “[We’re] turning that into a real message about adopting dogs unseen in the nation’s shelters,” explains Claudia Perrone, marketing manager for Best Friends. Best Friends provides a valuable example of social media mobilizing people to take action in the real world. 1. Beginner: Hashtags Use them — constantly. Twitter hashtags are an extremely effective (and free) way to consolidate topics and information that relate to your campaign. The Invisible Dog campaign uses #InvisibleDog in every tweet, every mention, every IRL adoption event and on the home page of its microsite to spread the word and let people track the whole conversation around the campaign. 2. Intermediate: Drive Action The Invisible Dogs campaign asks people to take action by pledging online. Without pushing people to make an immediate commitment to adopt a shelter dog, the campaign urges people to pledge any action (adoption, dog walking, etc.) that helps invisible dogs. So far 1,758 people have made the pledge. 3. Advanced: User-Generated Content and Events Letting people run with your message or events is scary, but it can be worth the effort. Best Friends hosts a DogWall where people share adoption photos, videos, text stories, tweets and Facebook messages. People can text photos to the wall instead of logging in to upload. Best Friends is also using Meetup.com’s Everywhere capability to let people create their own events all over the country. People sign in with their Facebook accounts to join or to create a local Invisible Dog walk or “pup crawl.” What’s Next? Most interesting, Best Friends gathers user-generated content to identify dogs that need help. It’s also planning to work with FourSquare on National Shelter Check-In Day this Nov. 12. The content, conversation and online social-sharing activity generated by this digital movement will help Best Friends save thousands of dogs by 2012. More About: contributor , features , hashtags , Social Good , Social Media , user generated For more Social Good coverage: Follow Mashable Social Good on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Social Good channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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How One Company Saved Thousands of Dogs Using Social Media

New Yorker, Wired and More Coming Free to Kindle Fire for 3 Months

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 20:48:55 +0000

It’s not just apps making their way to the Kindle Fire — some 400 magazines and newspapers will also be made available when the device goes on sale Tuesday, some through extensive free trials, Amazon announced on Friday. Magazine publishers appear to be particularly bullish about the content consumption device, which they hope will bolster middling digital sales on the iPad and Nook Color. The Kindle Fire’s $199 pricetag will help many publishers get the digital editions of their magazines into the hands of their core readers. “The challenge is that we have a big segment of the mass market in middle America, who are not early adopters and are price sensitive,” Liz Schimel, chief digital officer at Meredith noted in an earlier interview with The Wall Street Journal . “This device breaks that barrier.” Conde Nast appears to be particularly confident about the platform. The publisher announced that 17 of its magazines, including Glamour , GQ , The New Yorker , Vanity Fair and Wired , would be available for free on the device for the first three months. Many titles from Hearst, Time Inc. and Meredith will be available on the Kindle Fire Newsstand from day one as well. It’s unlikely, however, that all of these editions will already be optimized for the Kindle Fire in the same way that, say, Esquire is optimized for the iPad . Newspapers will be better off, because they pull from a feed, but magazines will likely take longer to fully adapt to the 7-inch format and Android operating system on a weekly or monthly basis. More About: amazon , conde nast , kindle fire , trending For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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New Yorker, Wired and More Coming Free to Kindle Fire for 3 Months

Twitter Ordered to Yield WikiLeaks Data, iPhone 4S Battery Issues Continue: Today’s Top Stories

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 13:55:45 +0000

Welcome to this morning’s edition of “First To Know,” a series in which we keep you in the know on what’s happening in the digital world. We’re keeping our eyes on three particular stories of interest today. Twitter Ordered to Hand Over WikiLeaks Data Twitter must yield information about three users who are under investigation for their connections to whistleblowing site WikiLeaks, a federal judge ruled Thursday. iPhone 4S Owners Still Reporting Poor Battery Life After iOS 5.0.1 Update The iOS 5.0.1. update that promised to address iPhone 4S battery issues, appears to have done little to nothing for some device owners. NASA to Send Car-Sized Rover to Mars This Nov. NASA is undergoing final preparations to launch its most advanced rover, Curiosity, to Mars on Nov. 25. Further News A marketing executive has resigned her role at Twitter after less than three months with the microblogging service. Despite a grassroots Facebook and Twitter effort for the Muppets to host the 84th Oscars, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences chose eight-time host Billy Crystal. Google has acquired Katango , a startup that has developed advance people-sorting algorithms, in order to improve the quality of Google+ Circles. New stats show that Twitter has taken over the picture-sharing market from third-party apps such as TwitPic and Yfrog. LinkedIn has unveiled a new Group Statistics dashboard that allows group admins to drill down into the demographics and growth of their groups. Sony has opened registration for PlayStation Suite SDK beta. Image courtesy of iStockphoto , DNY59 More About: first to know series

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Twitter Ordered to Yield WikiLeaks Data, iPhone 4S Battery Issues Continue: Today’s Top Stories

Sony Prepping a “Different Kind of TV”

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 13:46:56 +0000

Sony is working on a “different kind of TV set” that will separate it from other manufacturers, CEO Howard Stringer told the Wall Street Journal . The details about this new TV are sketchy, but it could be related to Sony’s four-screen strategy, which aims to connect the TV, PC, smartphone and tablet in one platform. Stringer also expressed admiration for Apple’s “well organized” design, saying Sony is finally ready to “compete with Steve Jobs.” Sony has been one of the few major manufacturers supporting Google’s Android-based Google TV (besides Logitech, which has had well documented, abysmal results with Google TV), but it’s unclear whether this “different” kind of TV the Sony CEO is talking about is also a Google TV product. So far, Sony hasn’t been very successful with Google TV products, either. In fact, Stringer claims the company is currently losing money with “every TV set” it makes. SEE ALSO: 3 Issues Hindering the Spread of Connected TV In any case, the potentially lucrative connected TV market hasn’t taken off just yet; the question is which manufacturer will unlock the secret combination needed for these devices to finally start selling? More About: sony , television , TV

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Sony Prepping a “Different Kind of TV”

How Sports Illustrated Got Ahead of the Tablet Publishing Competition [VIDEO]

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 19:14:46 +0000

One of the first publications to format for the iPad , Sports Illustrated has continued to adapt its issues for tablet technology . The magazine’s editor Terry McDonell spoke with Mashable editor-in-chief Lance Ulanoff at the Mashable Media Summit last Friday. SEE ALSO: 8 Digital Trends Shaping the Future of Media [VIDEO] McDonnell explained that Sports Illustrated didn’t aggressively hire additional staff to bolster the new tablet frontier. Instead, the magazine’s employees had to rapidly learn to incorporate a digital component into their everyday editorial tasks. According to McDonnell, it paid off. The Mashable Media Summit in Pictures Media Summit 2011 The Mashable Media Summit on Nov. 4 at the Times Center in New York City attracted professionals in digital, tech, advertising, sales, marketing, mobile and publishing from all over the world. Click here to view this gallery. Presenting Sponsor: AT&T More About: features , ipad , journalism , magazine , mashable media summit , Media , Video For more Media coverage: Follow Mashable Media on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Media channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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How Sports Illustrated Got Ahead of the Tablet Publishing Competition [VIDEO]

Lost Steve Jobs Interview Reveals Man on the Cusp of Change

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 18:54:04 +0000

Next week, a nearly 70-minute unedited interview with Steve Jobs will hit select movie theaters for a limited run. The film, titled Steve Jobs: The Lost Interview , is actually an extended interview, recorded in 1995 for the PBS miniseries, Triumph of the Nerds . Only 10 minutes of this interview ever found its way into the final broadcast version of Nerds . Robert X. Cringely , who produced the miniseries and conducted the interview with Jobs, had hoped to include more of the interview in future Nerds sequels, but the master tapes were lost en route from London (where production took place) and the U.S. Miraculously, director Paul Sen took it upon himself to make a VHS copy of the interview during the editing process and stowed it away in his garage. After Jobs died, Sen found the tape. As Cringely explains on his blog , that interview will now be presented to the public at special screenings at Landmark Theatres across the country. We had a chance to talk to Cringely about the interview, the process of getting it into theaters and Jobs’s legacy. How Steve Changed After the Interview Cringely’s interview with Jobs has always been viewed as seminal. It was this interview that convinced Noah Wyle to take the part of Jobs in the TNT telefilm, Pirates of Silicon Valley — and it was this interview that best encapsulated Jobs before he returned to Apple in 1997. Recorded in 1995 — when NeXT was floundering, Pixar was not yet a success and Microsoft and Bill Gates were on top of the world — it captures Jobs before his momentous second act and his unprecedented third acts of business. I asked Cringely to talk about how he saw Jobs change after this interview took place, as he found success again (and again) and as he made his way back to Apple. NeXT Made Jobs Focus on Operations Cringely says that NeXT was “Steve’s only real experience with failure. It’s not even that NeXT failed, but in comparison to the past, the Apple II and the Mac, it was [a failure].” What Jobs took away from NeXT, says Cringely, was a fundamental appreciation of operations. “Apple, before Steve left, was a mess,” Cringely says. “It was so successful, it didn’t matter what money was spent on or how it was used. It could be thrown at anything for any reason.” At NeXT, Jobs was using his own money and it was here, according to Cringely, that Jobs learned how to run a tight ship. Apple’s focus on operations — a focus that has been central to current CEO Tim Cook’s tenure at Apple — is one of its biggest strengths. SEE ALSO: WATCH: Steve Jobs’s Biographer on “60 Minutes” [VIDEO] Family Life Changed Steve Although Cringely bristles at the thought that Jobs changed in the sense that “he was no longer an asshole at work” (Cringely says he most certainly still was), getting married and having three more children had an enormous impact on Jobs. “It was astounding to see him with his children,” Cringely says. “No one expected him to be a family man — and he was! He was an asshole at work, but at home he wasn’t.” Cringely says that being a father — and being part of a family — gave Jobs a “different kind of appreciation for the customer experience.” Mortality I also asked Cringely to expand on how Jobs changed after his cancer diagnosis. He said that in accepting his mortality, Jobs “began to think about how he would be remembered and how he would be seen by history.” Cringely says that Jobs was acutely aware of his legacy and what that would mean. That’s why, he says, Jobs chose Walter Isaacson to write his biography . “Isaacson had the prestige that Steve sought, but not the technical or industry knowledge to ask the really hard questions.” In that way, Cringely says, “Steve was able to reveal parts of his story, without giving everything away.” Steve Jobs: The Lost Interview Steve Jobs: The Lost Interview will play at select Landmark Theatres on Nov. 16 and 17. Additional plans for a digital release are also in the works. BONUS: 15 Inspirational Steve Jobs Quotes Jobs quote from 2005 Stanford commencement address. Posted by livinglauren . Click here to view this gallery. More About: apple , features , Film , indie films , robert x. cringely , steve jobs , steve jobs: the lost interview , Top Stories , trending For more Entertainment coverage: Follow Mashable Entertainment on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Entertainment channel Download our free apps for Android , Mac , iPhone and iPad

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Lost Steve Jobs Interview Reveals Man on the Cusp of Change

Lucky Mag Wants to Help Women Shop–With Their Phones

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 18:43:52 +0000

“We have one mission only,” says Brandon Holley, editor in chief of Lucky Magazine . “And that is to help women shop.” These days, that means helping women compare prices and manage their shopping lists on their smartphones. The Lucky Shopper app for iPhone and Android devices purports to do just that. The app allows consumers to scan an extensive range of barcodes, including QR codes , UPC codes, Microsoft Tags and Digimarc watermarks. Once scanned, users are sent to a Google shopping page where they can then choose from a list of vendors to complete their purchase. If there’s no barcode, users can snap a photo instead. If a user isn’t ready to make a purchase, he or she can attach a “sticker” and notes to save the product for later reference. Access to some of luckymag.com ‘s content is also available through an in-app browser. Compared to other scan-and-shop apps on the market, Lucky Shopper falls short. Most apps — including Google Shopper and eBay’s RedLaser — allow you to scan multiple kinds of barcodes and automatically save your scanning history. Google Shopper even lets users search by image recognition, text and voice, and pulls up relevant discounts from Google Offers . The shopping features on those apps are also better integrated, allowing users to complete purchases online or locate nearby stores in far fewer steps. Still, Lucky ‘s app has potential. Holley says she and her team want to create an all-in-one shopping cart that would reside on luckymag.com and sync across multiple devices. Users could use the app to tag items they’re looking at in stores, or to, for instance, quickly purchase replacement eyeliner when they’ve suddenly discovered they’ve run out. A bookmarklet would allow users to save things they were looking at across the web. Users would also be eligible to get discounts on the items they’d scanned, and get email notifications when the items they’d saved went on sale, a la Have to Have , Svpply and Lyst . Holley also mentioned the possibility of interacting with Lucky editors through the app, perhaps for feedback or recommendations. Lucky even plans to edge into SCVNGR ‘s turf. Holley and her team demonstrated one possible promotion, in which Lucky readers would be invited to come into Ann Taylor stores to scan barcodes on various clothing items to win products or secure discounts. Should Lucky build out the app further, it could have the potential to compete in the space, particularly given the brand and its readers’ affinity with shopping. For now, we recommend you stick with Google Shopper, unless you’re really keen on accessing Lucky content in app form on the go. More About: Android App , conde nast , fashion , iphone app , lucky magazine , shopping

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Lucky Mag Wants to Help Women Shop–With Their Phones

Windows Phone Market Place gets encryption

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 08:15:14 +0000

Piracy has long moved on from ships boarding one another and plundering whatever is on board the other ship, to the much more modern (and less bloodthirsty method) version that involves unauthorized downloads of work in the digital format – most notably, music and movies. Well, having said that, Microsoft intends to prevent app piracy on their Windows Phone Market Place with a new encryption set in place. It seems that this encryption, when fully implemented across the board, will be able to prevent sideloading of illegally downloaded XAPs from Microsoft’s servers. What do you think of this? I am quite sure that this will not stop anyone who really wants to bring home a Windows Phone 7-powered device from purchasing one, although those who are on the fringe and have been dealing with pirated apps, music and other forms of digital media will think twice. Better some form of protection than none at all, I say. Windows Phone Market Place gets encryption , By Ubergizmo . Top Stories : Galaxy S2 Review , Droid Bionic Review ,

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Windows Phone Market Place gets encryption