Free voice is going to be ubiquitous within two or three years?

Posted on October 3, 2005
Filed Under Technology | Leave a Comment

WSJ.com reports on Google bidding to offer a free and open Wi Fi service to the City of San Francisco and looks at what it means for more traditional telecoms companies.

Ironically, most of the newer, bigger Internet entrants see telecom services almost as an afterthought, not a key product. Companies like Google, Yahoo Inc., Microsoft and eBay consider free voice just an add-on service they can provide consumers to win their business loyalty and make their main businesses more attractive. For example, eBay customers could buy and sell more if they can talk to each other. EBay and Google have even said explicitly they are not seeking to compete with telecoms. But whether it’s deliberate or not, some industry executives and analysts think their plans potentially could steamroll the telecom model.

“I believe that free voice is going to be ubiquitous not in 10 years; within two or three years,” News Corp.’s Rupert Murdoch told a Goldman Sachs investor conference last month.

WSJ.com points out that - despite widespread speculation - Google have stated they have no plans to extend the service nationally if it is successful. 

LA Times chases readers with shorter celebrity focused stories

Posted on October 3, 2005
Filed Under Advertising, Newspapers | Leave a Comment

 

WSJ.com reports that: 

After five years of sagging circulation and
advertising, new managers at the (LA) Times are pushing for more coverage of
Hollywood and celebrities. They want shorter stories and more regional
reporting in the intensely competitive bedroom communities around Los
Angeles. And there is a campaign for more combination coverage linking the paper and its Web site.

They are looking to turn around an 18% drop in circulation the title has experienced in the last 5 years.

Yahoo launches Open Content Alliance

Posted on October 3, 2005
Filed Under Digitisation | Leave a Comment

The FT reports that Yahoo are following Google with the announcement of their involvement in a major digitial archiving project - the Open Content Alliance. 

Initial members of the consortium include: University of Toronto, Adobe Systems, the European Archive, Hewlett
Packard Labs, the UK’s National Archives, O’Reilly Media, the Prelinger Archives and the Internet Archive.

The big difference from the Google Print project is that “content under copyright will be made available through the OCA only with the copyright holder’s authorisation.”

Search Engine Watch notes that “At the option of the copyright holder, copyrighted content may be distributed through a Creative Commons license,” going on to explain that “Creative Commons is a non-profit organization whose licensing encourages personal use, reuse and re-purposing of digital content. Content that is made available on the OCA website will be available in PDF and other widely adopted formats. This approach enables mass media and independent publishers to
expand their reach by submitting content that spans categories, file formats and languages while retaining their copyrights.”.

Chronicle.com points out that the Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers, has endorsed the Yahoo plan. In a press release, Sally Morris, chief executive of the association, said, “We welcome the launch of the OCA because its approach respects the rights of publishers and other copyright owners.”

According to project leaders  neither Yahoo nor any other group involved has been given exclusive rights to the content - material will be made available so that it can indexed and searched by other search engines.  Yahoo will get things going by paying for the scanning of an 18,000-volume collection of American literature at the University of California.

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