CNet to be bought by CBS for $1.8B: More Big Media moves coming?

CNet, one of the pioneers in online content, will be bought by US network CBS. Normally I wouldn’t pay much attention to such an acquisition, but given the atmosphere in lately, it makes such transaction a little more interesting.

CNet will be acquired with a $1.8B price tag and for that amount of cash analysts are thinking CBS paid a higher premium for an “old” internet company. The deal was facilitated by the pressure by activist stockholders on CNet’s side and stocks jumped when the news was announced. But enough about the financial aspect of the deal– I’m more interested on the logic of it and how it makes sense, web-wise.

Prior to this acquisition, people were smarting over Microsoft’s proposed acquisition on online giant Yahoo.  This deal is similar in many ways to the Microsoft-Yahoo deal that fell through, in the sense that a “traditional” media company is gobbling up a smaller, but better positioned company for long term viability. CBS has recognized the move of the media consumer to the web and they more or less have seen that their interactive media offerings will not be enough to make them a significant player in the next 10 years. CNet has demonstrated that it can give content to sustain itself for more than a decade. (Given that most pre-dotcom bubble companies are gone, that’s a pretty good achievement.) If CBS wanted to be a major player in the coming rounds of digital media battles, it needed more resources and properties in that front.

CBS had already joined the digital media party by acquiring last.fm before. Their rivals have made steps in the same direction, with News Corp’s acquisition of former social network darling MySpace two years ago and there could be one media company that will eventually buy Facebook. Pundits are saying Big Media and Big Business still have the internet and digital media itch. Could this deal be a sign of consolidation in the next couple of years?

Jakob Nielsen’s 25 Years in Usability

Usability pioneer Jakob Nielsen celebrated his 25th year in the field and he is pretty pleased with his career choice.

I recall doing my master’s thesis on web usability and one thing I found inescapable was that as a researcher, you HAD to come across Nielsen’s work. By my estimates, 60% of the literature I sifted through during my scholarly research on web usability cited Jakob Nielsen’s works in the early 1990’s. I would say Nielsen’s research from 1992-1995 laid the foundation for most of the usability tenets analysts and designers adhere to.

So my hats off to Mr. Nielsen. 25 years in any field means dedication and commitment, but 25 years in usability means there’s a lot of stupid design and usability problems in the world. :P

Do you want to work at Yahoo? Read on.

I received a “tip” from a very reliable source that Yahoo! South East Asia is looking for people for a couple of their openings here in the Philippines. This makes perfect sense as Yahoo! is beefing up its search presence in the country and gearing up for aggressive partnerships in the local scene. I believe Yahoo! is the last of the Top 3 search engines (with Google and Microsoft being the other two) to establish a presence here in the Philippines. (Am I correct?)

What are the two openings? The first one is for a Search Editor who will be in charge of primarily building taxonomies, classifying online content and analyzing search behavior. The other opening is for a Partner Account Manager, who will be working closely with Yahoo’s advertisers and resellers and tasked to implement plans to expand Yahoo’s client base.

If any of the two positions appeal to you or if you have any questions on the full job descriptions, shoot an email to job_opportunities (at) yahoo.com.ph, with the position as the subject heading.

Gotta love em “tips.” :P

Six Apart’s Blog It: Micro-blogging Heaven

When I read about the launch of Six Apart’s Blog It, I was immediately curious. The application is one that resides in Facebook but it gives the user the capability to cross-post in blogging platforms like Bloggger, WordPress, Typepad, among others.

I installed the app in my Facebook account and I realized there was nice little feature most people were overlooking– the micro-blogging aspect to it. In Blog It, you can have a universal post for Twitter, Pownce and your Facebook status. It really saves you the time to visit each site and updating them or having unsynchronized status messages for the sites you use.

I’ve tried it out, associated my Twitter and Pownce accounts and BAM!. Micro-blogging heaven. The only thing left is adding Jaiku, Yahoo Messenger and GTalk and you will have The One Status That Rules Them All.

Try Blog It out, it’s pretty nifty.

Live Blogging at The Corporate Blogging & Online Reputation Management Seminar

I’m live blogging here at the Corporate Blogging & Online Reputation Management Seminar, the follow-up event to the Corporate Communications 2.0: Corporate Blogging Seminar I held last March 7, 2008.

The BlogBank’s Jayvee Fernandez just finished his talk on “Corporations & Blogs,” which he detailed on how companies can use blogs to launch a successful viral marketing campaign. He cited the campaigns from the Trinoma Blogger Food Tour event, Delifrance Spiked Coffee, the Toblerone National Thank You Day and the Nokia Soul of the Night. I just realized that there are more and more events that are “getting it” when it comes to blogger outreach and campaigns. And that’s good. :)

AsiaPay General Manager Andrian Lee is now speaking and sharing the “Web 2.0 Case for Corporate Blogging.” He’s showing his company’s eBiz is eAsy blog to the audience, which is composed of a diverse group of people. There are SEO folks, managers, marketing and advertising people trying to know more about this blogging and Web 2.0 phenomenon.

The Q & A portion was very interesting. I joined the fray with Jayvee and Andrian in answering questions pertaining to blogging and the web. I even got share my movie & DVD review blog– Screensucked– and it went pretty well. The questions ranged from hypothetical (”What attributes should a blogger have?”) to practical (”How much are the blogger ad rates these days?”).

The afternoon session started promptly at 1:00pm with Island Rose.Net’s Dustin Andaya giving an overview of “Online Reputation Management” to the audience. He shared how Island Rose is being proactive in handling its online reputation and matches their services with good customer relations. He also recounted how an angry wife was sent flowers because she thought her husband sent flowers using Island Rose to a different person upon inspecting his credit card bill. (The bouquet eventually was a surprise gift from the husband to the wife).

Hans Koch of Syndeo Media rounded out the talks with his basic play book for Search Engine Optimization. He also took a different route in showing his presentation– he used Google Docs to show his “Search Engine Optimization in Action” presentation. His talk, while brief, was very insightful in terms of having an SEO strategy for your website.

The Q&A portion of the Online Reputation Management track was more of a “how to” session. Dustin and Hans were showing a lot of online samples of sites, as well as showing Google search results to prove their points. On one question regarding the justification of SEO, Hans said the best way to convince your boss to invest in SEO is to open Google, type a keyword related to your company and show that your company is nowhere in the top ten search results.

In my opinion, the event was a success– it was able to raise PhP17,000 for the GILAS project of the Ayala foundation. If the same cost structure prevails, this amount would be enough to fund another public school’s internet connection for one year. Inquirer.Net already has an article on the event. :)

Thanks to AIM, Ayala Foundation, Digital Filipino, Publicus Ltd, Jayvee, Andrian, Dustin, Hans and all the attendees for making the Corporate Blogging & Online Reputation Management Seminar possible. Thanks as well to Annalyn Jusay and Erwin Oliva for doing write-ups in the Manila Bulletin and Inquirer.net.

Microsoft to Yahoo!: Hostile Takeover Looms

In what could be a turning point in the stalled Microsoft-Yahoo! acquisition, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has released a public letter to Yahoo’s Board of Directors, indicating a hostile takeover if nothing happens in three weeks.

The letter is signaling that Microsoft is preparing to get the necessary numbers for forming a shareholder block that can facilitate the takeover. As the Ballmer says in the letter:

If we have not concluded an agreement within the next three weeks, we will be compelled to take our case directly to your shareholders, including the initiation of a proxy contest to elect an alternative slate of directors for the Yahoo! board. The substantial premium reflected in our initial proposal anticipated a friendly transaction with you. If we are forced to take an offer directly to your shareholders, that action will have an undesirable impact on the value of your company from our perspective which will be reflected in the terms of our proposal.

It seems Microsoft is hellbent in acquiring Yahoo! As I’ve said in a previous post on the Microsoft-Yahoo! deal, Microsoft needs this deal to become relevant  in the next decade. Yahoo! seems to have fallen behind Google and there are some indicators that say that they are slipping in terms of market share and page views. From the looks of it, this deal could potentially save both companies in the long run. However, Microsoft has yet to show it could adequately handle banner acquisitions in the past decade.

The deal that could save Yahoo! could eventually be one that could kill it.

Opera Browser passes Acid3 Web Standards Test

According to the Opera Desktop team, they have developed a build of the Opera Browser that passes the Acid3 Test. In evaluating the software, the Acid3 tests “the browser’s DOM Scripting capability, as well as continuing to probe visual rendering of CSS, SVG and webfonts.”

This also coincided with a sort of Acid3 arms race with Safari and Firefox 3. According to SlashdotSafari scored 98% and Firefox 3 garnered 71%. Where is IE in this picture? They probably still have a hangover from passing the Acid2 test.

From what I observe, the speed of adopting to web standards is inversely proportional to the market share… This has got to change.

The Author

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Regnard Kreisler C. Raquedan is an advocate of web standards and usability. He is the User Group Manager of the Adobe User Group - Philippines and Local Ambassador for the UXNet in Manila.