Possible Free Tabloid from LA Times

The Los Angeles Times may start a free daily tabloid, in a bid to up its circulation, reports Reuters via Yahoo! News. Sister paper Chicago Tribune already has such a paper, called Redeye, which reaches 600,000 readers - a large number for a newspaper - many reportedly in the desirable 18-34 demographic.

Several newspapers publish such freebie papers to counter loss of subscriptions and paid ads resulting from popularity of the Internet.

No Honey for Pooh Family

An appellate court upheld a ruling from 2004 dismissing a suit by the owners of Winnie the Pooh against Disney, reports the Los Angeles Times. The suit had claimed that Disney had failed to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in royalties for merchandising, software, and home video.

The ruling, against the heirs of Stephen Slesinger, who obtained the rights to the famous bear from the stories' author, A. A. Milne, was based on a finding of misconduct against the family - specifically, that they had hired an investigator who broke into Disney offices and rifled through the company's trash.

Sony Starts Digital Studio (2)

See other post. (This post is a placeholder because there were too many keywords to all fit on the other post.)

Sony Starts Digital Studio

Sony has started a studio called Deca to identify, develop, finance, market, and distribute new media content on various platforms, reports Online Media Daily. The division/entity received $5 million in outside funding. It's unclear why Sony sought outside money.

Deca is one of a number of such ventures (name, key founder and key financing, per the article):

Deca - Sony Pictures - Mayfield Fund, General Catalyst Partners, and Atomico Investments (started by Skype and Joost co-founder Niklas Zennstrom)

Vuguru - Michael Eisner (former head of Disney)

FunnyOrDie.com - Will Ferrell - Sequoia Capital (large VC)

60Frames Entertainment - United Talent Agency (UTA) and Spot Runner (digital agency partly owned by WPP Group, huge ad agency conglomerate)

Worldwide Biggies - Albie Hecht (producer) - NBC Universal

BermanBraun - Gail Berman (former Paramount Pictures president) and Lloyd Braun (former Yahoo Media Group head) (both are experienced TV execs)

Unclear whether any of them will be able to bridge the gap between user generated content (UGC) and Hollywood, and whether they can make a lot of money doing so.

Oracle v. SAP Trial Date Set - in 2009

Oracle's lawsuit against SAP accusing SAP of unlawfully downloading thousands of pieces of copyrighted code and documents from Oracle's servers continues to work its way through the legal process. The latest development is that a trial date was set -- for approximately 1-1/2 years from now -- reports CRM Buyer.

The long lead time probably stems from the fact that this is a very complex dispute, with thousands of downloads alleged and both sides wanting to interview a large number of witnesses. The case may not settle until significant discovery has occurred, and both sides have educated themselves as to the strengths and weaknesses of their case. For more, see previous post.

Disney's MVNO is N.O.G.O., Again

Disney is shuttering its Disney-branded cellphone service, reports Variety. The service ran on the Sprint network, which meant that Disney was an MVNO, or Mobile Virtual Network Operator.

Last year, Disney closed down its ESPN-branded MVNO operation. In sports terms, that's 0 for 2. Seems like outside content brands just don't translate into the mobile network world.

Verizon Wireless Cleans Up Its Act

Last week, Verizon Wireless blocked text messages from an abortion-rights group (see previous post), a decision that was widely publicized yesterday. Today, Verizon changed its mind, and called last week's decision an "incorrect interpretation of a dusty internal policy" (!), reports the New York Times.

Hollywood-Created Internet Programming

The Los Angeles Times has a nice piece on the labor issues Hollywood faces in creating online content. The gist is that such work is non-Guild, the studios often form one-off non-Guild subsidiaries, and there is uncertainty about business models and whether the work is promotional or deemed to be original content. No news there, but a good summary of the issues.

Vonage Patent News - Redux

More bad news for Vonage on the patent front. As I noted in an earlier post, Vonage was found liable for patent infringement in separate suits in Missouri and Virginia. Now the Virginia verdict, for over $50 million plus 5.5% of future revenue, has been upheld on appeal, reports CNET News.com.

The verdict might be reduced somewhat on remand, because Vonage won as to one patent out of three, but the news isn't good for the co. No word on whether Vonage will appeal.

Verizon Wireless Content Discrimination

Verizon Wireless has refused to allow an abortion-rights group to send pro-choice text messages to its members, reports the New York Times. Other carriers have permitted the group, Naral, to do so. Verizon says its position is viewpoint-neutral, and applies to all "controversial or unsavory" texts, but texting appears to be more widely used by liberal groups than conservatives.

Naral may have little recourse legally. There's a law prohibiting common carriers like telcos from discriminating based on content, but that law applies only to voice communication. Ironically, it was adopted over 100 years ago, to prevent Western Union from discriminating in transmission of telegrams, which of course were a form of text messages.

Little help will come from the First Amendment - it applies only to government action, not corporate. Let's hope public pressure makes a difference - and that Congress steps in to amend the law. Shame on Verizon Wireless.