Author: Serkadis

Last week, we reported on Apple dropping restrictions on VoIP iPhone applications working over 3G. The change would allow VoIP apps, which previously only worked over Wi-Fi, to make calls using 3G. Popular VoIP apps like iCall and Fring announced 3G support immediately after Apple relaxed the restrictions, but Skype was conspicuously absent from the party.

Today, Skype finally announced plans for a 3G-enabled version of its iPhone application, and it looks to be a fairly significant update. In addition to allowing 3G calls to other Skype users, and SkypeOut calls to actual phone numbers, the new version of the software will also feature an indicator for determining call quality in real time, and “CD quality sound” when calling other Skype users.

The upgraded sound quality comes from the inclusion of Skype’s SILK codec, which was first seen in Skype 4.0 for Windows. According to Skype, the benefits of SILK include:

• Improving audio bandwidth going from 8 kHz to 12 kHz, meaning that a SILK conversation sounds like you are in the same room as the person you are speaking with
• Providing real-time bandwidth scalability to deal with degraded network conditions
• Balancing codec optimization between voice, music and background noise, each of which can have an impact on the overall user experience
• Delivering a robust solution that delivers a more consistent audio experience, regardless of network conditions and an individual user’s voice signature.

I rely on Skype heavily for podcasting, and I can attest that Skype 4.0’s sound quality was a huge step forward from previous versions. Given the reception variability with 3G connections, SILK should adapt itself very well to the mobile VoIP experience.

There was no mention of video chat capabilities, but I’m hoping that Skype will offer chat on the iPhone sometime this year (Fring already does). Even without dual-cameras, it’s still possible to video chat on the iPhone by shooting yourself with the camera, and talking through the speakerphone. It’s not ideal, but it’s still a better video chat solution than having nothing at all.

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Media information company Nielsen has released new data on the top 10 mobile internet sites and brands. It shows that, to a large extent, mobile internet usage mirrors total internet use, with Google, Yahoo, Facebook, and Microsoft among the most visited mobile brands. Surprisingly, the AOL network ranked fifth in terms of traffic.

Nielsen estimated from its mobile sample that in December 2009 the total mobile internet audience was 62 million. Over half of mobile users visited a Google or Yahoo brand in December. Facebook and MSN/WindowLive/Bing ranked third and fourth. And the AOL brand saw 17.3 million mobile users in December.

A look at the top mobile websites shows that AOL email accounted for 7.3 million mobile internet visits, which leaves 10 million unique visits coming from AOL’s wide array of content sites. It was certainly a surprise to this Google devotee, and demonstrates that the AOL brand still has legs.

A comparison of the top 10 mobile brands with the top 10 overall internet brands shows a few differences in how people are using the mobile web. The mobile sites in pink above are those that don’t appear on the top 10 list for overall internet usage. Not surprisingly, people care about weather, news, and sports when they are on the go, and Weather Channel, CNN and ESPN have succeeded in transporting their brands to mobile. The brands in gray to the left are sites that did not appear on the mobile list. Again, not a surprise to learn that mobile internet users are not as likely to watch videos, get tech support or buy products from their cell phones.

Nielsen estimated the total US internet universe to be 196 million in December 2009. With the mobile internet reaching 62 million, that means that 32% of all internet users are also using the mobile web. While the majority — 68% — of internet users still use only a computer, it’s encouraging to see these large numbers only 2 1/2 years after the release of the first iPhone, which brought the mobile web to an estimated 42 million phones worldwide.

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Today was a back and forth session, and in the end the Dow closed at 10,267, down 29 points.

The NASDAQ scratched out a 1 point gain and the S&P lost 6 points to close at 1097.

A few companies big names like Walmart (WMT), Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT), and Disney (DIS) picked up some modest gains.

Crude oil fell a bit after announcements that supply rose higher than expected. Oil fell $0.27 to $76.96. Natural gas futures also fell slightly by 50 basis points.

Silver took a big hit, dropping 2.5% to $16.33 an ounce. Gold lost $7.80, falling to $1110.20 an ounce as the dollar strengthened. Copper futures are down 3.5%.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Dow Closes Up Over 110 Points, Huge Day For Gold
• Jim Rogers: Stocks To Be Crushed Any Day Now
• Kyle Bass Is So Bearish On Japan, He Financed His Home In Yen

Monster (MWW) will buy Yahoo (YHOO) HotJobs for $225 million in cash, the companies announced today.

Details from the release:

• "Monster and Yahoo! have also entered into a three year commercial traffic agreement, to take effect upon the closing of the acquisition."
• "Monster will become Yahoo!’s provider of career and job content on the Yahoo! homepage in the United States and Canada."
• "The traffic agreement calls for performance based annual payments calculated by clicks and expressions of interest, subject to annual floors and ceilings."

This is a long-anticipated but still very smart move by Yahoo. HotJobs is not central to Yahoo's core portal business. This way it gets to unload the costs of maintaining the service, some cash now, and some cash later.

Some other businesses we expect Yahoo to try to sell next include Yahoo! Games and Yahoo! Shopping. Earlier today, Jeff Bercovici reported that Yahoo has given up trying to sell Yahoo! Small Business.

One group this deal could negatively impact are the newspapers in Yahoo's Newspaper Consortium, Though Yahoo says it will maintain that partnership by "providing both search and display advertising, content distribution, and its ad-serving platform," the biggest draw for newspapers was always the ability to sell into and split revenues with HotJobs.

Yahoo bought HotJobs $436 million in 2002.

Here's the release:

Monster Worldwide, Inc. announced today that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the assets of Yahoo! HotJobs, a leading online recruitment website, from Yahoo! (NASDAQ:YHOO - News) for $225 million in cash. Monster and Yahoo! have also entered into a three year commercial traffic agreement, to take effect upon the closing of the acquisition, in which Monster will become Yahoo!’s provider of career and job content on the Yahoo! homepage in the United States and Canada. The traffic agreement calls for performance based annual payments calculated by clicks and expressions of interest, subject to annual floors and ceilings. In addition, the traffic agreement provides Monster with an exclusive right for a period of time following the closing of the acquisition to negotiate similar traffic agreements with Yahoo! properties on a global basis, including countries in Europe, Asia and Latin America, subject to certain limitations.

“HotJobs with its significant customer base plus the traffic agreement are an ideal complement to Monster’s innovative recruitment solutions and global reach,” said Sal Iannuzzi, chairman, chief executive officer and president of Monster Worldwide. “These agreements, combined with Monster’s career Communities and our recently introduced 6Sense™ semantic search technology, will bring substantial new benefits for employers seeking more qualified candidates and job seekers searching for more relevant opportunities across a wider range of industries – globally.”

“Bringing together Monster and HotJobs creates even greater access and opportunities for both recruiters and job seekers,” said Hilary Schneider, EVP, Yahoo!. “The transaction with Monster enables us to continue to provide an important service to our users through the traffic agreement. Yahoo! remains focused on its core businesses and delivering exceptional experiences to users, partners and advertisers.”

Monster believes that the acquisition of HotJobs and the traffic agreement with Yahoo! will provide a number of benefits to jobseekers and employers, who today have more diverse competitive choices than ever before, and a value to all of its stakeholders, including its shareholders. These include:

Anticipated increase in job matches and search efficiencies – By bringing more diverse job and career opportunities, tools and resources together in one place, employers and job seekers will enjoy greater convenience and more precise search results and better matches with Monster’s patented 6Sense™ search technology and other innovative products.

Expected expansion of job seeker pool for employers – Monster will be able to offer its employers a significantly larger pool of candidates across diverse geographies and industries. Based on Media Metrix comScore reporting, last year HotJobs averaged 12.6 million unique visitors per month.

Expected expansion of the number of job postings across industries for job seekers –Through the combination of Monster and HotJobs job postings, job seekers will have access to more job opportunities in one place in those industries currently leading job creation, including healthcare, finance and insurance, retail, manufacturing, information and wholesale trade.

Broader reach anticipated for recruitment advertising through additional media alliances and reseller agreement – With the addition of HotJobs’s network of more than 600 daily and weekly newspapers, Monster’s alliances with local papers will grow to a total of approximately 1,000, giving Monster reach in all 50 states. The additional newspaper alliances, through their online and print classified ads, will further Monster’s current strategy of connecting job seekers with smaller, local businesses, particularly in healthcare, education, and skilled and hourly job categories.

Yahoo! will continue to manage its broader Newspaper Consortium (NPC) partnership, including providing both search and display advertising, content distribution, and its ad-serving platform, to newspapers in its NPC.

The transaction is subject to clearance under Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act and other customary closing conditions. The transaction is currently expected to close sometime during the third quarter of 2010, subject to regulatory review. Monster expects to realize operating synergies from the acquisition and currently anticipates the transaction will be breakeven on a pro forma full year earnings in 2010 and accretive thereafter, inclusive of the costs incurred under the traffic agreement.

Stone Key Partners LLC and Bank of America Merrill Lynch acted as financial advisors to Monster in connection with this transaction. Allen & Company LLC provided a fairness opinion to Monster’s Board.

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Stunning singleton Jennifer Aniston is giving her Beverly Hills mansion a female-friendly makeover.

According to the March issue of Architectural Digest — which features The Bounty Hunter star — Jennifer had her home’s bathroom converted to remove all traces of male!

“[The house] originally had his-and-hers baths, but Aniston has turned the ‘his’ into a spa bath with a soaking tub…..” the mag wrote after touring Jennifer’s hillside home, built in 1970

The Bounty Hunter star couldn’t be more pleased with the renovations to turn her home into a Zen-filled hideaway. The complete overhaul took approximately two-and-a-half years.

“I entertain for a living, and I entertain,” Jennifer told Architectural Digest. “The house has a rather glamorous, old-fashioned Hollywood quality. I can just imagine the Rat Pack stopping by; someone is playing the piano, and people are laughing in the next room….It’s like a big hug.”

We recently wrote about location-based mobile social network Loopt’s push to launch deals for check-ins, and today, the startup is putting use check-ins to philanthropic use. For every check-in at Chipotle, Panera Bread, or Whole Foods around the country, Loopt will donate $1 towards the Haiti earthquake relief. Half of the proceeds from the check-ins will be given to the American Red Cross and the other half will be donated to Doctors Without Borders.

Loopt founder and CEO Sam Altman said the spots were chosen primarily because they are seeing many check-ins at these vendors. It’s truly a generous and worthy initiative and it also provides a noble inventive for users to enable Loopt’s check-in technology, which the startup recently launched.

Text messaging has also played a significant part in fundraising for Haiti earthquake relief; with mobile donations reaching $35 million.

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There’s been a lot of hoopla the past week over Amazon’s fight with book publisher Macmillan. The main issue is that Macmillan wants higher prices for its e-books, while Amazon wants to keep prices down for its Kindle device. Amazon went as far as to pull all of Macmillan’s books from its store, but quickly admitted that they’d eventually have to give in to Macmillan’s demands. Why? Well the obvious answer is Apple, whose new iPad device with its iBooks Store is allowing publishers to set higher prices. But don’t forget Amazon’s other rivals too.

One reader wrote in to tell us how he was looking for The Politician, a new book by Andrew Young about John Edwards. The book, which is published by Macmillan, is not available on Amazon.com right now due to the dispute. When the man noticed that he turned to Amazon rival Barnes & Noble for the book — and from the looks of it, he’s not alone. The book is actually the number one best seller on Barnes & Noble’s entire site. On another rival’s site, Borders, it’s the number five best seller.

Pressure from Apple aside, Amazon can’t afford to blackball these publishers because people can so easily turn elsewhere to get the book. Even though it’s not available on Amazon, The Politician is still the number 49 best seller on the site through partner sellers — even though they’re selling the book for significantly more than Barnes & Noble or Borders (or than Amazon would if it were available through them).

[thanks Shmuel]

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There’s been a lot of talk in the last year or so about the fact that the recording industry supposedly “missed an opportunity” to “monetize” online music a decade ago when it failed to come to an agreement on licensing with Napster. The idea was that Napster could have been iTunes, and people would be paying for music. That claim is made, yet again, in a CNN article about the decade since Napster, with a Forrester analyst claiming:

“That four-year lag [between Napster and iTunes] is where the music industry lost the battle,” said Sonal Gandhi, music analyst with Forrester Research. “They lost an opportunity to take consumers’ new behavior and really monetize it in a way that nipped the free music expectation in the bud.”

That implies that if the industry had simply licensed its music online in 1999, rather than 2003, the dollars spent on recorded music would have remained propped up. I don’t buy it. This ignores the fundamental economics of what’s happening in the industry — but, thankfully, some folks are noticing this. Matt Yglesias points out how wrong the claim by Forrester is, by noting that the market for recorded music was due for a correction just based on fundamental economics:

Music industry executives can tell themselves that as long as they want. But under conditions of perfect competition, the price of a song ought to be equal to the marginal cost of distributing a new copy of a song. Which is to say that the marginal cost ought to be $0. That’s not a question of habit, you can look it up in all the leading textbooks. Of course real businesses rarely operate in circumstances of perfect competition, and record companies have a variety of political and legal tools they can deploy to try to protect monopoly rents. But this is hard to do. I think the real story with the iTunes store is that over time competitive pressure has impelled it to largely drop DRM and over time I expect we’ll see that the CPI-adjusted price of songs declines.

Tim Lee, who pointed us to this piece in the first place, tacks on the point that “the economic argument for free music is unrelated to ‘piracy.'” This is, indeed, a key point and one we’ve tried to make in the past, but one that sometimes gets lost in the shuffle. The basic economics of music suggest that it was going to face downward pricing pressure all along. That has little to do with unauthorized access to music or whether or not the major record labels sucked it up and did licensing deals with Napster. It was just where the market was going to head one way or the other — because, over time, more and more people would begin to realize that free music was an excellent promotional tool for other things, and that would drive more business to those other areas. That, in turn, would lead more and more musicians and their business partners to recognize the benefit as well. In fact, we’re seeing that happen today. The fact that unauthorized access to files online may have helped push that realization forward doesn’t change the fact that those pressures were going to come one way or the other.

The recording industry may have missed a chance to slow down the decline in recorded music sales, but it hardly could have kept the numbers as artificially inflated as they used to be.

Separately, the CNN article is incredibly weak in that it makes the mistake of implying that the recording industry is the entire music industry. It completely ignores the fact that the overall music industry has actually been growing as sales of recorded music have dropped. People have just shifted their spending habits, and that likely would have happened whether or not any licensing deal had been worked out in 1999.

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Um, the correct answer would be, “What is Research in Motion, or RIM, Alex.” The answer BlackBerry is like saying Playstation is the maker of the PS3. [via CrackBerry]

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The Sony Ericsson Vivaz (previously known as “Kurara”) still doesn’t have an official release date, but it looks like someone in Sony Ericsson’s camp has been playing with one lately. The company just released a pair of sample videos, marking the first time anyone outside of SE has seen footage shot on this handset. Now, given that one of the flagship features of this handset is its 720p video recording mode, we didn’t exactly expect the camera quality to be garbage – but hot damn are these videos impressive.

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Let’s say you want to buy a TiVo HD right now from TiVo.com. After all, it’s a great DVR with Netflix, YouTube, Amazon, and local networking streaming support. The only thing is you that can’t. It’s listed as out of stock. The only option available is the 1TB $499 TiVo HD XL. Does this hint that there’s a new TiVo model launching soon? Maybe the TiVo Premiere we heard about in December? Let’s hope so.

[thanks for the tip, Nate]

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With the introduction of the Sony Ericsson Aspen, Windows Mobile took a small jump forward to version 6.5.3. This latest version includes a few notable features, including capacitive touchscreen support which will cause all non-HD2 owners to toss their stylii into the air and jump for joy. Other changes include:

• Platform to enable multitouch
• Touch controls throughout system (no need for stylus)
• Consistent Navigation
• Horizontal scroll bar replaces tabs (think settings>system>about screen)
• Magnifier to bring touch support to legacy applications
• Simplified out-of-box experience with fewer steps
• Drag and drop icons on Start Screen
• Browser page load time decreased and memory management improved
• Browser pan & flick gestures smoothed and zoom & rotation speed increased
• Updated runtime tools (.NET CF 3.5, SQL CE 3.1)
• Arabic read/write document support
• Watson (error reporting) improvements and bug fixes

Thus far, the Aspen is the only handset to run this latest version of the Microsoft’s mobile operating system and we may have to wait until MWC 2010 for additional 6.5.3 handsets to emerge and updates for current handsets to be confirmed. Until then, Windows Mobile 6.5.3 is an SE exclusive.

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The federally-owned plaza in front of the Jacob K. Javits Federal Building in Lower Manhattan is about to get a new design. According to The Architect’s Newspaper, the composition created by landscape architect Martha Schwartz, ASLA, in the late 1990’s will be replaced by a new iteration from Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, working under Wank Adams Slavin Associates (WASA). This will be the fourth design in 20 years, counting the temporary landscape that was installed after Richard Serra’s “Tilted Arc” sculpture was removed.

The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) is funding the repair of the waterproofing of the parking garage beneath the square. ”The two-year, $5 million to $10 million endeavor entails the demolition of the existing plaza, reinforcement and repair of the parking garage roof, and installation of landscaping, lighting, security features, and other elements.” Because the problems are being fixed now, the project is eligble for recovery funds.

Landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburgh, FASLA, told The Architect’s Newspaper the design will be a “composition of curling and embracing landscape pieces” that will “make clear, welcoming gestures.” The design will retain some of Martha Schwartz’s “pop” landscapes elements, but “simplify the seating and movement across the plaza.”  Also, Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates will examine “microclimates, wind patterns, and natural and artificial lighting” to improve the visitor’s experience.  

The Architect’s Newspaper adds that the changes in the plaza have long mirrored evolving conceptions of urban public spaces. The Richard Serra sculpture caused enough controversy to fill two books and led a judge to order its removal. “The piece, installed under the GSA’s Art in Architecture Program, was further criticized as being inhospitable to federal employees, visitors, and local residents alike.” Additionally, the destruction of the “pop” plaza designed by Martha Schwartz may represent a shift towards “greener urban landscapes” for both office workers and local residents.

Martha Schwartz’s original design, which won a ASLA professional design award in 1997, is described on her Web site: “The new plaza is reconnected to its surrounding context and provides innumerable seating opportunities for people having lunch or just for watching other people. Large planters which formerly existed at the northwest and southeast corners of the site have been removed, as well as the long-empty fountain which had occupied the only sunny portion of the site. By opening up the plaza, the connections between the plaza and the street are reestablished, and the people who wish to sit can do so in either sun or shade.”

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This morning, the EU announced that it stands by Greece’s new budget.

Great, maybe that will give investors confidence that they don’t have to worry about Greece actually missing a payment.

But now there’s a new loser: Portugal. It’s the weak link for Europe to throw to the wolves.

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard:

Yields on 10-year Portuguese bonds jumped 21 basis points yesterday as funds switched their fire to the next “domino”, questioning whether the government of Jose Socrates can deliver spending cuts without a parliamentary majority. “The lightning rod has been passed to Portugal: who is next – Spain?” asked Marc Chandler, from Brown Brothers Harriman.

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See Also:

• Europe To Greece: You’re All Good, Except For These 1,224 Issues
• It’s Official: Europe Approves Greece’s Emergency Financial Plan
• Euro Breaks Above $1.40 As Markets Expect Resounding European Approval For Greece’s Budget

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding to improve public health

SPRINGFIELD — Dr. Damon T. Arnold, director, Illinois Department of Public Health, today announced Illinois is receiving approximately $3.1 million from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to help reduce obesity, increase physical activity, improve nutrition and decrease smoking in Illinois.

The award is part of $119.5 million going to states as the first of several initiatives that make up the Communities Putting Prevention to Work, a comprehensive prevention and wellness initiative funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

“Taking preventive health measures can help reduce health care costs and help people live longer, healthier lives,” Dr. Arnold said.  “The Illinois Department of Public Health will use the $3.1 million in federal funding to combat chronic diseases and promote healthy lifestyles through increased use of the Illinois Tobacco Quitline as well as obesity and smoking cessation programs.”

The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) will issue grants to the following organizations to address the problems of obesity and smoking:

• Illinois Head Start Association to increase nutritional education and awareness among children
• Active Transportation Alliance to increase physical activity levels through implementation of the “Walk Across Illinois” program
• Chambers of commerce to promote workplace wellness programs
• Specific health care systems to promote cessation services

IDPH will also work to increase the number of Illinois residents using the Illinois Tobacco Quitline by reaching out to organizations that traditionally have not used the cessation tool, such as non-English speaking service organizations, disabilities service providers, federally qualified health center clients and faith-based organizations.

To learn more about Communities Putting Prevention to Work, visit cdc.gov/chronicdisease/recovery.

One of the things I like about Atlus is their sense of humor. That carries over to 3D Dot Game Heroes, their new PS3-exclusive action-RPG. They’ve just released a video dealing about the stresses

In recent weeks, whenever Republican Joe Walsh (pictured at right) spoke publicly about his bid for the suburban 8th congressional district seat, he opened with the same remarks.

“I feel like I’m losing my country,” the silver-haired Winnetka resident said earnestly, over and over and over again.

Proclaiming himself the tea party candidate, Walsh expressed disappointment with Republican and Democratic leaders in Washington, D.C., and he spoke of the fear and anger people across the country feel today.

“If I’m way off,” the 47-year-old Walsh told the Daily Herald last month, “I’m not going to win this primary.”

He wasn’t way off.

Despite facing hurdles that included a lawsuit by his former campaign manager, lackluster fundraising and criticisms of earlier liberal stances on some political issues, Walsh easily won the GOP primary Tuesday.

He’ll face Democratic incumbent Melissa Bean and Green Party candidate Bill Scheurer in November’s general election.

Walsh faces an uphill climb if he wants to beat Bean, who’s a member of the high-profile House financial services committee, suburban Republican leaders said Wednesday.

He’ll have to raise enough money to spread his message and be competitive – something Bean’s last GOP opponent couldn’t accomplish. He must also appeal to voters in a district that once was solidly Republican but has sent Bean to Congress three times.

Fortunately for Walsh, he has nine months to do it, said Dan Venturi, leader of the Lake County Republican Party.

“If the election were today, I would say Bean would win,” Venturi said. “But we have (nine) months, and that’s an eternity.”

Walsh topped a field of six candidates to win the Republican nomination in the 8th District, which includes parts of Cook, Lake and McHenry counties. All of the candidates espoused conservative Republican beliefs – opposing abortion, for example, and criticizing the Democratic health care reform plan.

But only Walsh claimed to represent the activists who held tea party protests last year, and it was only Walsh who talked of their anger and frustration and the need for, as he put it at a public forum last month in Barrington, a “revolution” in Washington.

He took the vitriol further at that forum by saying the race against Bean would be a war and that “she will be overrun.”

The approach was a hit with GOP voters Tuesday. Walsh won with 34 percent of the vote, far ahead of second-place finisher Dirk Beveridge, who managed 25 percent, unofficial results showed.

The GOP’s Venturi called the win “a bit of a surprise.”

“I think Joe did a better job getting at the tea party groups and the conservative base,” Venturi said. “He did a good job running a grass-roots campaign.”

That effort must build momentum if Walsh hopes to get the support of the national Republican Party and attract the millions of dollars a competitive congressional campaign requires, Venturi said.

The GOP already is focused on the neighboring 10th District race, which will pit Republican Robert Dold against Democrat Dan Seals for the seat being vacated by Senate candidate Mark Kirk.

If Republican forces think Walsh poses a real threat to Bean, they might sink some energy – and cash – into his campaign, Venturi said.

“If it’s a seven- or eight-point race, they’ll put money into it,” Venturi said. “But they won’t spend $3 million if it’s a 20-point spread.”

For updates, revisit dailyherald.com.

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A 17-year-old west suburban man has been charged in connection with a fatal crash in which his mother fell off the side of a moving pickup that he was driving.

Aurora Police and the Kane County state’s attorney say they have charged Antonio A. Vieyra of Aurora with reckless homicide. He was set to appear for bond call on the charges Wednesday morning in Aurora Branch Court, according to police.

Authorities say the single vehicle crash, which occurred at about 9 p.m. at Pine and Assell Avenues, claimed the life of Ludivina Vieyra, 50.

Reportedly, it was the culmination of an argument between the 17-year-old and his father at Vieryra’s residence.

According to police, when Antonio Vieyra began to leave the home in a 1995 Dodge pickup truck, Ludivina Vieyra apparently jumped on the vehicle’s passenger side running board in an attempt to stop him.

The suspect reportedly sped away westbound on Pine Avenue with his mother still on the running board. When he hit the brakes after a couple of blocks, Ludivina Vieyra was thrown to the street and suffered massive head injuries.

She was taken to Provena Mercy Center Hospital by Aurora Fire Department Paramedics where she was pronounced dead shortly after arrival.

Police say the preliminary investigation did not reveal any immediate signs of drug or alcohol involvement.

One of the key core competencies of a publication is the process of selecting “all the news thats fit to print”.

No one can read every news story.  Instead of even trying to consume everything, we all have a process we go through for discovery of news, information and topics of interest to us.  We have sources we trust for our news and information. It may be a printed paper or magazine, a website, tv news, facebook or twitter updates, or some combination of everything we have access to.

No matter how we get information there is one certainty, there is a finite number of sources we will use.

When someone selects google news as their destination for news discovery it is probably at the expense of another destination or product who aspires to be a “discovery destination”.  But lets pretend it is just an incremental source.  That for a while at least a consumer will both go to Google News and to the website of their local paper.  What is the branding message the consumer is receiving ?

When that newspaper allows itself to be included in Google News it becomes a de facto endorsement of Google News as an acceptable and probably preferable “discovery destination” . The branding message to the consumer is “I dont need to go to the newspaper homepage. Everything the newspaper has  is referenced  here in Google News. So if there is something of interest to me from the local paper, Google News will send me to their site.  I don’t need to go to both sites any longer. I can just go to Google News.

Thats not good for the publication brand and business. They just lost their position as a trusted source where real people make decisions on what content they think their readers will want to discover – to an algorithm.

But wait it gets worse.

When that consumer goes to Google News, it lists the number of sources. You immediately become one of 2,172 articles.   It is never good for a brand to be considered one of 2,000 plus sources. Ever. That makes you a commodity. All that promotion you did saying how good your reporters are ? On its way to becoming worthless. To the consumer there are 2,000 other people able to do the same thing (even though there really arent 2k sources, thats not what the branding message they get from Google)

And the bad news will keep on coming.

As a newspaper or other information source, you can never discount  the very real possibility that Google starts becoming a content creator. Why couldn’t they hire reporters ? Why couldn’t they give their content priority over all others ? More importantly, why wouldn’t they ?

Never happen you say ? See AOL. See Yahoo. Both are now creating original content in huge quantities. I promise you, someday there will be a bunch of Googlers sitting in a meeting  discussing how they can generate enough revenue and profits to increase earnings per share by a penny.  You can bet someone will pull up a spreadsheet showing the increase in CPMs for original content with the trusted Google News brand on it. It will show that by simply hiring a bunch of reporters to create news, with Google’s traffic and the higher CPMs of original content, we can make a lot of money for our shareholders. You are in denial if you think this will never happen.

It was smart to ride the Google wave of traffic when you were able to sell it all.  Things change. Now you can’t sell all your organic traffic, let alone the traffic you get from  Google.  Now the value equation has shifted.  You are endorsing Google News as a discovery destination making their brand stronger by the day.  Google News’ brand value will increase fast enough on its own. There is no sane reason to allow them to co-opt your brand and use it to accelerate the growth of a business, Google News that will very likely be your biggest online competitor

Update: I want to put a qualifier here because some people think this applies to any or all media companies. It doesn’t. This is meant for media companies that have established brands and brand equity. If you are a startup, you should use Google for everything its worth. It can be very valuable.  If you are trying to create or establish a brand, you should use Google.Google News. If you have no revenue, you should probably rethink your choice of professions and /or business, but Google traffic can only help.

For you, every visitor is a good thing and an opportunity to convert that user and build your brand image.

On the flipside if your company name is one of multiple choices that comes to people’s mind when they need the type of information/news/info you provide, then you need to think through just what impact Google.GoogleNews has on your business today and in the future.

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American Idol judge Randy Jackson and MTV have been named in a new lawsuit over allegations that the idea for their reality dance contest, America’s Best Dance Crew, was stolen from a Los Angeles dance instructor.

Last week, Dwight McGhee filed papers in Los Angeles County Superior Court suing Randy and MTV for allegedly copying his idea. The choreographer claims he pitched the format of a dancing show, titled International Breakerz League, to the network in 2004. McGhee claims the network snubbed him only to use the concept four years later without his involvement.

He is seeking $2 million, TMZ.com reports. The fifth season of America’s Best Dance Crew premiered last Thursday night.