What can a 153-year-old news publisher teach five tech startups? Digital expertise may flow both ways as Ireland’s newspaper of record offers desk space and funding to new companies whose products it hopes to adopt. Read more »
Twitter set off its first major public relations crisis this week when it suspended the account of a journalist who had been criticizing the social media site’s corporate partner, NBC, over its Olympic coverage. It is finally trying to fix things. Read more at GigaOM »
Twitter has restored the account a U.K. journalist who is at the center of a firestorm over corporate control of media and speech. And the tweet that landed him in trouble is still visible on his timeline. Read more at GigaOM »
You want to know which media companies are making the most money in the digital economy? Welcome to the second-annual paidContent 50 list Read more »
NBC asked Twitter to suspend the account of a journalist who has been a prominent critic of its Olympics coverage. Twitter — an NBC partner — complied. Is this censorship or is there some other explanation? Read more at GigaOM »
Irony of ironies – after encouraging fans to tweet copiously, the International Olympic Committee requests London 2012 attendees limit their output only to “urgent” status updates. The problem – mobile updates from some attendees have clogged a mobile network used by official TV data suppliers. Read more »
The BBC’s commercial wing is promising six months of office space and advice to new start-ups. But what will it get out of the program, and how will it help fledgling companies? We ask the woman in charge. Read more »
Starting today, our article pages have a different look. It’s not only a cleaner look — it provides better context for readers, improved sharing options, and better opportunities for commenting and discussion about our stories. Read more at GigaOM »
Details are sketchy right now, but it appears that the director of Independence Day and Godzilla is one of the partners behind a new online film portal that promises to reward users for paying attention to the trailers they watch. Read more »
Roku has raised $45M in additional funding from News Corp., BSkyB and others. The company wants to use the funding for further international expansion, and also hints at additional partnerships with pay TV providers. But who is the mystery “unnamed strategic investor” that joined this round? Read more »
Netflix’s first disclosure of European subscriber numbers shows it has quickly become a big competitor to local incumbent Lovefilm, thanks to heavy marketing outlay. Read more »
With Netflix returning to narrow profitability, all of its other regions growing, and 1 million subscribers added in the first six months of operation in the U.K and Ireland, CEO Reed Hastings said the time is right to expand into Western Europe. Read more »
A long-running dance between the European Commission and Google over antitrust allegations is finally coming to an end amidst reports that the two sides have reached an “understanding.” Read more at GigaOM »
There are plenty of sell-your-picture platforms out there already that give people the chance to become semi-professional photographers. But German startup Photocircle has a twist: it’s encouraging those taking pictures to support social projects in the photogenic places they visit. Read more »
UK regulators will next month consider whether to go on allowing voting in TV talent shows via mobile apps, following high-profile slip-ups by one of the industry’s leading vendors. Read more »
Traditional TV will dominate, viewing on other devices is growing, and researchers can’t agree on how many people will watch the Olympics on mobile and tablet – that’s the conclusion from sifting research forecasts on the matter. Read more »
Amazon is amalgamating development teams from two acquired companies in to a London “centre of excellence” for streaming movies, TV and music on devices around the world. Read more »
Speaking with paidContent at the Olympic Park, International Olympic Committee social media head Alex Huot explains social media rules must safeguard TV rightsholders, and says big media can find a new role for themselves… Read more »
New iPad app Niiiws takes a popular concept — aggregating stories from around the web and pulling them into a single, beautiful discovery service — and adds a twist: it works only with national news outlets. Can it stand out from the crowd? Read more »
Real-time soccer fantasy betting outfit Picklive’s founders look toward their next early-stage startup, after selling to digital pools operator Sports Millions. Read more »
The London Olympics’ host team will launch two digital products next week, joining broadcasters, other media, the IOC and the games’ organising committee in seeking fans’ electronic mindshare. Read more »
German startup PaperC adds a twist to the idea of academic textbooks by letting people purchase a single chapter — or even just a page. Now, in order to raise funding it’s not going a traditional route: it’s holding a public auction. Read more »
The International Olympic Committee pushes out integration with a host of social platforms and attempts to clarify rules as London 2012 draws near, following recent criticism of its policies Read more »
A British judge raised eyebrows last week when he ruled that Samsung’s tablets did not infringe Apple’s patents because they were not as “cool.” Now, the same judge has followed up with an unusual order. Read more »
Half a year after formation, the music subscription service spun out of Omnifone is readying to go at the unlimited-access opportunity – but all such hopefuls will be challenged to go against Spotify. Read more »
Global No2 video service Dailymotion is expanding its white label streaming service to try and capture a greater share of the market. Can its new features draw in more users and help the company meet its targets? Read more »
Papagei.tv wants to use movies and other video entertainment to help people learn new languages — and it’s doing well out of the gate, with at least €10m to extend its immersive language-training courses and a role as the official language trainer for Germany’s Olympic team. Read more »
The man who has been given the job of reworking France’s controversial anti-piracy legislation says cutting off the internet connection of filesharers is probably wrong. But don’t expect him to go easy on those of accused of illegal downloads. Read more »
The controversial world of paywalled academic publishing has been hit by a major shift, with the British government saying it will make open access to scientific research a condition of public funding by 2014. Read more »
News Corp’s part-owned UK satcaster tentatively launches the first phase of what could be the start of a strategy-changing new business line – internet-delivered pay-TV that puts its satellite dishes in the shade. Read more »
France’s Supreme Court has set aside a critical piracy ruling won by Google in 2011, leaving the door open to the search giant being forced to censor some of its autocomplete listings to prevent copyright infringement and piracy. Read more »
In social TV’s second-screen dream, timing is everything. And German startup wywy has just burst out of stealth mode with an impressive set of tools for keeping broadcasters, advertisers and viewers in sync — as well as control of long-established media monitoring service Idioma. Read more »
Roku just started rolling out a firmware update to its media players that includes a translation of its user interface to Spanish and German. This comes just days after we broke the story that Roku is eyeing Germany and Span as its next foreign markets. Read more »
The market for in-video product placement is growing in TV and Hollywood. A company whose software inserts digital products after editing is accepting more funds to go at the sector. Read more »
Rovio has finally released its next title after the smash hit Angry Birds — a physics puzzler called Amazing Alex that reworks an existing iPhone game with a few little extra touches. Will the Finnish company prove it’s not a one hit wonder? Read more »
The European Commission proposed a law on Wednesday to pave the way for easier digital distribution. Prominent musicians, however, immediately slammed the proposal, saying it fails to fix problems of inefficiency and embezzlement. Read more »
A newly-launched startup called Foundd is taking the algorithmic approach, while its Berlin neighbour Tweek.tv is going for the social angle. But why has no winner emerged in this space already? Read more »
Digital music retailer 7digital is shaping up to be one of the main smartphone competitors to iTunes Store, as it announces another big manufacturer carriage deal. Read more »
The promising social TV app startup Zeebox, which is due for U.S. launch this summer, will next head to Australia. Read more »
Moshi Monsters creator Mind Candy has announced the purchase of UK games studio Origami Blue to help lead its experimental labs project – but the company’s first acquisition is unlikely to be its last, with a new head of M&A joining. Read more »
