Here’s a new trailer for HBO’s upcoming series “The Newsroom,” by famed Hollywood screenwriter Aaron Sorkin.

The series — by the man behind the hit television show “The West Wing” and the Facebook movie “The Social Network” — is set at a cable news channel under siege in the new-media age.

In other words, lots of hand-wringing over blogs and tweeting, along with the drama.

It looks tasty, and Walt Mossberg and I will be asking Sorkin about it at the 10th D: All Things Digital conference at the end of this month, where he will be appearing as a speaker.

Enjoy (I also included another trailer, that starts off the “Newsroom” series):

Add another speaker to the stellar list for the 10th D: All Things Digital conference, which is taking place in a little more than a month: Aaron Sorkin.

For those who have followed the long and award-filled career of the well-known playwright and Hollywood writer, it’s an astonishing litany of success — from “A Few Good Men” to “The West Wing” to “Moneyball” — filled with more unusually clever lines than anyone has ever penned.

But, most famously for tech, Sorkin also wrote the screenplay (and also won an Academy Award) for “The Social Network,” about the rise of Facebook and its unusual co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

The film caused a lot of controversy in Silicon Valley over its depiction of Zuckerberg as an evil genius of sorts, of course, but few can argue that it was not a corker of a movie.

We are excited to talk to Sorkin about that experience, as well as his take on the state of entertainment in the digital age. He’s about to debut a new HBO show in June called “The Newsroom,” set behind the scenes at a cable news show. It deals with the massive changes roiling through the media industry and it begins, natch, with a viral video.

Sorkin is also set to make his Broadway debut as a librettist for the upcoming musical “Houdini.” And he’s also working on another new movie, based on a book about the downfall of Sen. John Edwards, which he’ll adapt, produce and direct.

Sorkin will be joined at D10 — which will be held in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., just south of Los Angeles, at the end of May — by a litany of major players in tech and media, including: Apple CEO Tim Cook, New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz and many more.

And we still have more speakers to come, but until then, here’s the famous line from “The Social Network” — something about a billion dollars:

Today, Bloomberg Businessweek is releasing its second “How To” issue, in which the magazine asked over 60 well-known people how to handle “real world problems big and small … from how to make coffee at home to how to save Greece, and even tell readers how to buy a supertanker and a dinosaur.”

Okey doke!

My favorite is one from Carol Bartz, titled “How to Speak Your Mind,” which made me dearly miss the mind-speaking stylings of the ousted Yahoo CEO. Well known for her ability to toss off a curse like it was breathing, she knows of what she speaks.

“Agreeing is easy,” she says. “Disagreeing takes more guts.”

Word. (That’s her above giving me the business at our seventh D: All Things Digital conference in 2009.

Here’s her priceless advice on the subject:

If you’re going to be a straight talker, you have to believe that it’s a virtue, that it’s an attribute you want associated with yourself. If you have an opinion and you just state it, it allows the other person to either try to change your opinion, to agree with you, or to agree to disagree — they have an action they can take. If you are quiet, people think you agree. How can you then further the conversation when you’re at different points and it’s not really exposed? Agreeing is easy. Disagreeing takes more guts. Several years back, when I was CEO at Autodesk, there was a very senior-level woman who was very smart and well-spoken, but she did not wear appropriate clothes. It was distracting and she was not being taken seriously. I said to her manager, who was male, “You need to tell her.” He said, “Oh, no way.” So I called her in and frankly stated what I thought was happening. I told her, “You’re not getting the respect you deserve.” I said, “Go to Nordstrom’s and get a personal shopper. Just say, ‘I’m a senior businessperson and need help dressing like one.’” She came back, and honest to God, it was a different person. She said she felt really good. And her currency went way up. Early in my business career, if people asked me a question, I’d try to answer it honestly. And that was rewarded. I had managers who wanted me around because I would actually tell them what was happening. I was raised by my gram, and she was a pretty straight talker because she thought you could handle it. My advice is, dip your toe in. If you’re honest and truthful, what is somebody going to say, that you’re stupid because you believe something? Being honest and truthful is part of being a good friend, a good associate, and a good leader. It’s also why I know I could never be a politician.

Walt Mossberg and I could not be more thrilled to announce that Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, will be the opening-night speaker at our 10th D: All Things Digital conference.

It will be Cook’s first appearance at D, as well as his first time being onstage at an event not run by Apple or for investors since he was named CEO last August.

Since then, Cook has increased the enormous progress made under the late Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs, with the iconic Silicon Valley giant putting out a number of new and innovative products and also becoming one of the most valuable companies on earth.

(Of course, Jobs had made a half-dozen always memorable visits to our stage over the last decade, the last of which was in 2010 at D8.)

So we are looking forward to hearing Cook’s perspective on where the industry and Apple is going, and perhaps to get a glimpse into what makes its new leader — who is also a longtime Apple vet — tick.

And Cook knows a lot, to be sure.

Before he was named CEO, Cook played a critical role as COO at Apple, responsible for worldwide sales and operations from its supply chain to sales activities to service and support globally. Cook also ran Apple’s Macintosh unit.

Before Apple, he worked at Compaq, Intelligent Electronics, and even spent a dozen years at IBM.

Cook joins a D10 speaker list that is full of major players in tech and media, including: New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz, as well as many more.

(And we still have more speakers to come.)

A month ago, I posted an initial list of speakers for the 10th D: All Things Digital conference.

After a decade, the event — which is held in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., just south of Los Angeles, at the end of May — has attracted another amazing group of speakers, including: New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg; serial entrepreneur Sean Parker, who will appear with Spotify co-founder and CEO Daniel Ek; Zynga founder and CEO Mark Pincus; Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz; LinkedIn Chairman and VC Reid Hoffman, who will appear with the social business site’s CEO Jeff Weiner; and Skype CEO Tony Bates.

Now, here’s another group of stellar speakers we’ve added to the programming lineup (and there are still even more big names to come in the weeks ahead): Oracle CEO Larry Ellison; former tech analyst superstar and now VC Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins; Intellectual Ventures’ Nathan Myhrvold; Pixar co-founder and Disney animation head Dr. Ed Catmull; and Visa President John Partridge.

Larry Ellison, CEO and founder of the enterprise giant Oracle, needs little introduction, as one of tech’s highest profile figures and a true Silicon Valley icon. Frankly, I think the short bio that’s on Oracle’s Web site says it all: “Larry Ellison has been CEO of Oracle Corporation since he founded the company in 1977. He also races sailboats, flies planes, and plays tennis and guitar.” There will be a lot to talk about with the voluble and always entertaining exec — who appeared at the D conference once before many years ago — from the current state of the tech industry to insights to where it’s all going. (In addition, Ellison has agreed to appear on a panel we are doing as a tribute to his close friend, Apple’s former CEO Steve Jobs.)

Another well-known tech figure is Meeker, who is now a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, having joined the storied venture capital firm in early 2011. She focuses there on investments in its digital practice and via KP’s Digital Growth Fund, working with companies such as Spotify, Jawbone and One King’s Lane. But Meeker is perhaps best known for her long stint — 1991 to 2010 — as a star Internet research analyst at Morgan Stanley, where she brought many of the Internet’s great companies to the attention of Wall Street and beyond. She also wrote a series of groundbreaking reports on the landscape. That includes her annual “State of the Internet,” which Meeker will debut this year at the conference in an extended demo of her always riveting Internet trends presentation.

Nathan Myhrvold is also a tech legend, having worked for 14 years as chief strategist and CTO of Microsoft. But, instead of retiring, the avid inventor decided to focus on patents, founding and leading a controversial company called Intellectual Ventures, which buys them up and licenses them out (or sues if it doesn’t sell). With all the mishegas around patents right now, it’s a good time to have Myhrvold back to explain it all and perhaps to take some of the blame for the explosion in intellectual property lawsuits. (Myhrvold also co-authored a cookbook, “Modernist Cuisine,” so we hope we will also get some sort of futuristic cooking demo. Perhaps, Patently Delicious Flan?)

Speaking of tasty, the animation from Pixar over the years has been just that and it’s been one of Disney’s greatest acquisitions. Given how much Pixar has contributed to animation technology, we are glad to finally get Dr. Ed Catmull onstage. As co-founder of Pixar Animation Studios and president of Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios, he will discuss where entertainment and technology are intersecting and where they are not. Catmull is a geek’s geek in the industry — having also founded the computer graphics laboratory at the New York Institute of Technology, the computer division of Lucasfilm, as well as Pixar, which he did with chief creative officer John Lasseter. Get ready to talk about image compositing, motion blur, subdivision surfaces, cloth simulation and rendering techniques, texture mapping and the z-buffer. Also, Catmull’s five Academy Awards.

Lastly, it is perfect timing for bringing on John Partridge, president of Visa. With swirling issues around online identity theft, digital privacy, the future of money and the rise of upstart competitors such as Square, Partridge has his hands full at the credit card giant. One of the most neglected arenas in tech, the way we manage payments is perhaps the biggest story of the next era, especially as it relates to mobile and the rise of smartphones as all-purpose devices.

Famed Hollywood movie director James Cameron has always been a geek, most especially an ocean geek, so it’s no surprise that he would be the one to dive seven miles down into the Mariana Trench’s Challenger Deep.

That would be into the Earth’s deepest place, in a tiny, vertical green tube. He’s the first person to do the treacherous dive alone — technically, it is 6.8 miles or 11 kilometers — an exploration he did with National Geographic.

It took about two hours to get down and a little over an hour to come back up. When he got back to the surface, Cameron was first spotted by the helicopter owned by his friend, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen (more power-nerding!), who was also along for the adventure.

While down in the bottom of the sea, Cameron gathered samples and readings, but he also found time to tweet:

Just arrived at the ocean’s deepest pt. Hitting bottom never felt so good. Can’t wait to share what I’m seeing w/ you @DeepChallenge

— James Cameron (@JimCameron) March 25, 2012

The well-known filmmaker has done two big movies related to the ocean — “Titanic” and “The Abyss,” but it is less well known that the lush landscape of “Avatar” got its color and design concepts from the sea.

I know all this and more about Cameron’s watery interests from an interview he did at the eighth D: All Things Digital conference in 2010. In it, he talked a lot about diving, including wanting to use submersibles to make sure the BP oil company was telling the truth about its spill back then.

Here’s the full video interview from D8, which is well worth a watch:

And here is a fantastic animation video National Geographic did of the dive:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120326/deep-diver-james-cameron-talked-ocean-geekery-way-back-at-d8/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120309/here-come-the-first-d10-speakers-new-york-mayor-michael-bloomberg-entrepreneur-sean-parker-zyngas-mark-pincus-and-more-on-the-red-hot-seat/ http://allthingsd.com/20120309/here-come-the-first-d10-speakers-new-york-mayor-michael-bloomberg-entrepreneur-sean-parker-zyngas-mark-pincus-and-more-on-the-red-hot-seat/#comments Fri, 09 Mar 2012 18:40:29 +0000 Kara Swisher http://allthingsd.com/?p=182153 Even though our D: All Things Digital conference always sells out well in advance every year without our announcing even one single speaker (like this one, too), it’s the action on stage that truly matters.

And in 2012 — which also happens to be the 10th anniversary of the confab of tech and media titans — it’s already shaping up to be another fantastic event in terms of programming, with a lineup of onstage appearances that is sure to make some news.

There are many more very big names to come, but Walt Mossberg and I are pleased to introduce the first group of interviewees, which will give you a glimpse into the firepower we expect at D10 in late May. It is again being held in Rancho Palos Verdes, just south of Los Angeles.

The initial speakers we have confirmed so far include: New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg; serial entrepreneur Sean Parker, who will appear with Spotify co-founder and CEO Daniel Ek; Zynga founder and CEO Mark Pincus; Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz; LinkedIn Chairman and VC Reid Hoffman, who will appear with LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner; and Skype CEO Tony Bates.

It’s hard to imagine someone we have wanted to have onstage more than Michael Bloomberg, a man of many talents and interests. He’s known worldwide as the 108th Mayor of the City of New York. First elected in November 2001 (and again in 2005 and 2009), he is also one of the most compelling politicians in the U.S. today.

But Bloomberg is also a pioneer in terms of the business of digital news and information technology, having built a huge and groundbreaking media company and information service. Bloomberg (the company) has 310,000 subscribers to its financial news and information service, and more than 15,000 employees worldwide.

There will be a lot to talk about with him, from the upcoming presidential election to the state of our government to the future of innovation, news and technology.

Also sure to be voluble is Sean Parker, the legendary Silicon Valley entrepreneur who has been on the cutting edge of innumerable important digital trends of the recent decade. In 1999, Parker co-founded Napster, the controversial and industry-changing music service, at the age of 19.

He followed up with early contact information service Plaxo, and then shifted over to his critical involvement as founding president of Facebook in its early days as a start-up, an experience which was dramatized in the movie “The Social Network.” Parker continued to found and also invest in companies, from Causes to Spotify to his most recent, Airtime, a social video company that he is doing with his Napster co-founder Shawn Fanning.

Parker will be appearing onstage with Daniel Ek, another serial entrepreneur and technologist, who started his first company in 1997 at the age of 14. The Swedish native later co-founded online music phenom Spotify in 2006, with Martin Lorentzon.

The former CTO of Stardoll and founder of Advertigo leads a company that is changing the way music is delivered and consumed by fans, against a backdrop of intense change in the industry, succeeding even as a plethora of other services have stumbled.

Also a groundbreaker is Zynga CEO and founder Mark Pincus, yet another serial entrepreneur, whose latest effort in the online gaming arena has finally resulted in his biggest success. It recently went public, and now has a nearly $10 billion market cap.

Before founding Zynga in 2007, Pincus had already started three other companies: Push start-up Freeloader in 1995; automated tech-support company Support.com after that; and early social networking site Tribe.net in 2003.

(I met Pincus when he was at Freeloader in Washington, D.C., while writing a profile of him for the Washington Post, so I have enjoyed tracking his progress since then.)

Pincus is also an avid angel investor, with early stakes in Napster, Brightmail, Twitter and Facebook.

Reid Hoffman was another early investor in Facebook, along with many of Web 2.0’s most successful ventures. Well-known in Silicon Valley as an entrepreneur and VC, and recently dubbed the “start-up whisperer” by the New York Times (although I am not sure exactly what that means), he’s also chairman of LinkedIn, the business-networking service that also recently went public (at a $10 billion valuation, too).

He’ll appear with LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, who started out life in Hollywood, but soon made his way to Silicon Valley as a top exec at Yahoo. After running its media division, Weiner spent a short time at venture firms before going operational again at LinkedIn.

What it takes to build and maintain momentum as tech companies move into more mature stages, as well as how the social networking space evolves, are among the many topics on tap for the pair.

The evolution of a start-up phenom — in this case, Internet telephony service Skype — will be among the topics covered by Tony Bates, who is now a president at Microsoft, which bought it last year.

As such, he is responsible, says the software giant in its description of his job, “for overseeing the company’s direction, strategy and overall mission to become a global communications service that will eventually reach billions of users.”

That’s a tall order for Bates, who came to Skype from a top job at Cisco. Bates has deep roots (or maybe, routing?) in the guts of the Internet, having done backbone-engineering strategy for Internet MCI. The U.K. native also holds nine patents.

Lastly, given all the activity we expect will happen between government regulatory agencies and tech companies over the next few years, we felt it was key to bring in FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz. He has been at the FTC as a commissioner since 2004, but was given the top job by President Barack Obama in 2009.

Among his priorities, according to his bio, is “promoting competition and innovation in the technology sector through law enforcement and policy initiatives; and protecting consumers’ privacy — especially while they are using the Internet.”

Uh-oh!

Leibowitz knows from regulation, having served as the Democratic chief counsel and staff director for the U.S. Senate Antitrust Subcommittee from 1997 to 2000, where he focused on competition policy and telecommunications matters, as well as a similar stint at the Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism and Technology before that.

There will be a lot more speakers to come, of course. But, so far, we think D10 is off and running fast.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120309/here-come-the-first-d10-speakers-new-york-mayor-michael-bloomberg-entrepreneur-sean-parker-zyngas-mark-pincus-and-more-on-the-red-hot-seat/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120227/youtube-boss-salar-kamangar-takes-on-tv-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/ http://allthingsd.com/20120227/youtube-boss-salar-kamangar-takes-on-tv-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/#comments Mon, 27 Feb 2012 19:38:42 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=176460 Some 800 million people visit YouTube every month, and they watch and upload a staggering amount of video there every day. It works really, really well.

So why is Google trying to overhaul the site, using “channels” filled with clips from professionals?

YouTube head Salar Kamangar has a bunch of answers for this question, but eventually you can get to the one that really matters: He thinks that making the site look more like traditional TV will convince marketers to pay traditional TV ad rates.

He explained the concept at D: Dive Into Media last month: “If you see a dog on a skateboard video, the CPMs, the cost per thousand impressions, are about $2. Now, if you package that [video] as part of a dog lover’s channel or a skateboarding interest channel, that same video can command a $20 CPM.”

YouTube is going to depend on advertising for most of its revenue, but Kamangar also discussed YouTube’s interest in offering subscription services down the road. Given that Kamangar, Google’s ninth employee, oversees all of the company’s video efforts, that’s worth keeping in mind as it edges closer to selling cable TV.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120227/youtube-boss-salar-kamangar-takes-on-tv-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120217/new-yorker-editor-david-remnick-likes-technology-but-he-loves-print-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/ http://allthingsd.com/20120217/new-yorker-editor-david-remnick-likes-technology-but-he-loves-print-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/#comments Fri, 17 Feb 2012 18:07:18 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=175900 Information may want to be free, but New Yorker editor David Remnick has no interest in giving away his magazine. If he had his way, each issue would be behind an online paywall.

That doesn’t mean Remnick is a Luddite. He’s interested in using digital assets to expand the work his writers and editors have created, when the magazine gets ported to the iPad. And he admits to a cautious interest in social media outlets like Facebook and Twitter.

But Remnick’s overwhelming priority is producing the best possible magazine each week, and he seems content with the notion that most people will read the print version.

“The New Yorker — you roll it up, you put it in your bag. It’s quite easy; it’s pretty good technology,” he told Kara Swisher at D: Dive Into Media last month.

Swisher and Remnick used to be colleagues at the Washington Post, and the two of them had a wide-ranging, entertaining chat. You can see the whole thing here; it’s well worth your 30 minutes:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120217/new-yorker-editor-david-remnick-likes-technology-but-he-loves-print-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120215/martha-stewart-on-the-web-a-good-thing-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/ http://allthingsd.com/20120215/martha-stewart-on-the-web-a-good-thing-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/#comments Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:02:09 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=174915 Martha Stewart is a celebrity and a brand and a business. A big business, which generates more than $200 million in revenue each year.

But now that we’re in an age where celebrities and brands and businesses can speak directly to consumers, via platforms like Facebook and Twitter and YouTube, does that give someone like Stewart even more opportunity?

Stewart and Lisa Gersh, who runs Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, batted those ideas around with Walt Mossberg at D: Dive Into Media last month.

Stewart pointed out that her publishing group immediately embraced the iPad, where it has produced some beautiful and popular tablet editions of her magazines. And the company says it has been able to use Twitter and Facebook effectively as well.

But Stewart, whose Hallmark TV deal is ending this year, will probably look to get another TV show up on the air instead of jumping feet-first into Web video. You can see her entire interview here:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120215/martha-stewart-on-the-web-a-good-thing-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120214/viacoms-philippe-dauman-has-a-bundle-will-travel-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/ http://allthingsd.com/20120214/viacoms-philippe-dauman-has-a-bundle-will-travel-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/#comments Tue, 14 Feb 2012 13:00:11 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=174044 If you’re a tech/new media company that wants to distribute cable TV shows, Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman is happy to chat with you.

Provided you’re willing to get your head around a couple of ideas:

• If you want to buy old shows that now have limited value to the cable programmer, it’s happy to part with them for the right price. Ask Hulu, Netflix and Amazon, among others.
• And if you want the new stuff that cable subscribers get, Viacom will sell you those, too. As long you’re willing to pay for the entire bundle of Viacom’s channels, just like cable subscribers do.

From Dauman’s perspective, Viacom — and by extension, most of the big cable programmers — are in pretty good shape right now. Even though people like me like to write about cord-cutting, he says he’s not seeing any real evidence of it. Meanwhile, new digital players are giving him what amounts to found money — checks for shows he wasn’t really selling, anyway.

Exceptions? Sure. Disney’s ESPN charges a whole lot for its programs, and Dauman (and other cable guys who don’t sell sports) think that’s a problem.

Then there’s the whole SOPA/PIPA thing, which Dauman says was well-intentioned and misunderstood. And it will stay that way for a while — he says there’s no chance that the entertainment guys get new legislation through in 2012.

Dauman laid all of this out during his interview with me — preceded by a spirited, R-rated introduction by Viacom employee Snooki — at Dive Into Media last month. You can watch the entire video here:

 

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120214/viacoms-philippe-dauman-has-a-bundle-will-travel-the-full-dive-into-media-interview/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120209/the-internet-hasnt-killed-the-radio-star-clear-channel-ceo-bob-pittmans-full-dive-into-media-interview/ http://allthingsd.com/20120209/the-internet-hasnt-killed-the-radio-star-clear-channel-ceo-bob-pittmans-full-dive-into-media-interview/#comments Thu, 09 Feb 2012 19:07:42 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=173087 Bob Pittman helped build MTV, and then he helped build AOL. Both, at the time, were brand-new ways to deliver and consume media, and they helped reshape entire industries.

So what is he doing running a radio and billboard company?

The Clear Channel CEO explained his newest job choice to Kara Swisher last week at D: Dive Into Media. The takeaway: Clear Channel’s radio and billboard businesses are huge because people — both advertiser and users — like them. And they still have growth in them.

You can see the whole interview, which touches on everything from Facebook to Spotify to Tim Armstrong, here:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120209/the-internet-hasnt-killed-the-radio-star-clear-channel-ceo-bob-pittmans-full-dive-into-media-interview/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120208/hulu-ceo-jason-kilar-is-still-standing-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120208/hulu-ceo-jason-kilar-is-still-standing-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/#comments Wed, 08 Feb 2012 15:40:02 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=172445 Hulu isn’t supposed to be a success. And Jason Kilar isn’t supposed to have a job.

But the Hulu CEO is still running his site, a full year after angering his owners/bosses with a “Jerry Maguire” manifesto. And Hulu itself generated more than $400 million in revenue last year — just a few years after all the smart money was sure that the “ClownCo” would never work.

So what was Kilar thinking when he published that memo, anyway? And more important, what’s next for him and his site? We got to ask him directly at D: Dive Into Media last week — his first onstage interview in a very long time.

You can watch the full interview here, but you’re also going to want to watch Hulu carefully in the next few months. That’s because its strategic owners — Comcast, Disney and News Corp., which also owns this site — still don’t seem to have figured out what they want to do with the joint venture. And financial backer Providence Equity has a chance to get its money out this spring, which could directly impact Kilar’s plans, too.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120208/hulu-ceo-jason-kilar-is-still-standing-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120207/neil-young-the-donkey-and-digital-music-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120207/neil-young-the-donkey-and-digital-music-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/#comments Tue, 07 Feb 2012 16:00:07 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=171907 Neil Young has a long and storied career, but he didn’t want to talk about it when he came onstage at D: Dive Into Media last week. Instead, the musician was pushing his vision of the future: One where lots of people listen to really good-sounding music.

To be clear: Young isn’t complaining about today’s songs. He’s complaining about the way those songs are recorded and distributed.

There’s a colorful donkey input-output metaphor here, which Young uses to make his point. And he also has a plan to fix the problem.

But first he has to convince people there is a problem. And, as Walt Mossberg and I point out, lots of people have been buying (and stealing) music in the MP3 format that Young hates, and they don’t seem to be complaining about it.

Young says former Apple CEO Steve Jobs agreed with him, though. And now he’s looking for new allies. You can see the entire pitch here:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120207/neil-young-the-donkey-and-digital-music-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120206/twitter-ceo-dick-costolo-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120206/twitter-ceo-dick-costolo-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/#comments Mon, 06 Feb 2012 15:30:04 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=171635 Last week, we got to talk a deep roster of old and new media heavy hitters at D: Dive Into Media. Now we’re bringing you the full interviews from that conference, kicking off with Twitter CEO Dick Costolo.

Costolo and I started out by talking about Twitter’s recent dustup with Google, but we jumped around a lot, touching on everything from Twitter’s deep integration with Apple to its response to government censorship.

The core of the interview, though, focused on Twitter’s evolution as a business and its relationship with media companies, who use the service to promote their products. (See: Yesterday’s Super Bowl.)

I think it’s quite obvious that Twitter itself is a media business — it attracts its users’ attention, then rents that attention out to advertisers.

Costolo says that advertising will be Twitter’s core revenue driver, but he disagreed with my assessment: “We’re in the media business, but we’re not necessarily a media company,” he said. It wasn’t the only time Costolo disagreed with something I said that night:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120206/twitter-ceo-dick-costolo-the-full-dive-into-media-interview-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120205/a-super-social-bowl/ http://allthingsd.com/20120205/a-super-social-bowl/#comments Mon, 06 Feb 2012 04:32:47 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=171511 You could have watched the Super Bowl without checking Twitter or Facebook, but you probably snuck at least a few peeks in throughout the game. And a lot of you ended up typing something, too.

Bluefin Labs, a “social TV” start-up that analyzes commentary during TV broadcasts, says it saw 11.5 million comments during tonight’s game. That’s up more than 6x over last year’s broadcast.

(Bluefin competitor Trendrr says they saw a similar leap: They count 15.8 million comments for the game, up from 3.01 million.)

I’ve asked Bluefin if they’ve got any additional insight into the data, and to make sure that they’re comparing equivalent data sets. Last I recall, Bluefin had said that they get a lot of data from Twitter, and less from Facebook, and none from Google+, which wasn’t around last year, anyway.

But assuming Bluefin is comparing apples with apples, the logical conclusions here are that:

A) People are using Twitter and Facebook a whole lot more than they were a year ago; and/or

B) People are using Twitter and Facebook a whole lot more when they watch TV.

More B than A, says Bluefin marketing head Tom Thai, via email: “Sure, social media itself (Twitter, Facebook, etc) has grown in the past year. But the Social TV consumer activity growth has outpaced it. Generally seeing triple digit growth in Social TV.”

That conclusion — again, the two ideas aren’t mutually exclusive — would be good news for both Facebook and Twitter; especially Twitter, which has bet big on the idea that it can provide a “second screen” experience for programmers. CBS strategy honcho Zander Lurie seems like he’s a believer:

Twitter is helping live broadcast events more than axe bodyspray is helping dudes with the ladies

— zander lurie (@zlurie) February 6, 2012

 

Twitter CEO Dick Costolo and I spent a bunch of time talking about that idea last week at D: Dive Into Media, and we’ll have more on that tomorrow.

In the meantime, we’re expecting a series of usage updates from Twitter about tonight’s game. Here’s the first, which would mean more if we had context, so I’ll ask for that.

In the final three minutes of the Super Bowl tonight, there were an average of 10,000 Tweets per second.

– Twitter (@twitter) February 6, 2012

Update: And here, with speed, is some of that context from Twitter PR folks, on other recent high-volume Twitter events:

Tim Tebow overtime playoff win (January 8, 2012): 9,402 TPS

2011 MTV Video Music Awards (August 28, 2011): 8,868 TPS

End of FIFA Women’s World Cup (July 17, 2011): 7,196 TPS

Brazil eliminated from the Copa America (July 17, 2011): 7,166 TPS

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120205/a-super-social-bowl/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120205/coliloquy-steams-up-interactive-ebooks-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120205/coliloquy-steams-up-interactive-ebooks-video/#comments Sun, 05 Feb 2012 16:34:40 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=171397 E-book publisher Coliloquy is doing a bunch of interesting things: The start-up is trying to overhaul the traditional book royalty system, for one thing. And it is built on an interactive platform that allows readers to influence the way their stories play out.

But what really grabbed the audience at D: Dive Into Media was a good old-fashioned helping of sex, delivered with verve from co-founder Lisa Rutherford. No need to say much more to tease this, though we should point out that Coliloquy doesn’t work exclusively with erotica. They’re also targeting teen girls with “Twilight”-like books, for instance.

Oh. And we should also note that readers who do want the steamy stuff can dial the dirty quotient up or down, depending on what floats their boat. But there’s at least one part of this clip that may not be safe for your work, so here it comes on a Sunday.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120205/coliloquy-steams-up-interactive-ebooks-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120204/khush-tries-teaching-the-world-to-songify-live-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120204/khush-tries-teaching-the-world-to-songify-live-video/#comments Sat, 04 Feb 2012 17:07:57 +0000 Peter Kafka http://allthingsd.com/?p=171255 We spent a lot of time at the D: Dive Into Media conference talking about the way entertainment gets distributed. But it was also important to talk about the way it gets created. App-maker Khush’s pitch is that it lets everyone become an entertainer, via its music apps that let even the most tone-deaf mumblers create a song.

Here, co-founders Prerna Gupta and Parag Chordia show off some of their creations, including Songify Live, a new app that will let you make music in real time with an iPhone, even if you’re a tone-deaf mumbler like myself.

I do sort of wish we’d kept audio warrior Neil Young onstage just a few minutes longer, so we could have captured his reaction to all of this:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120204/khush-tries-teaching-the-world-to-songify-live-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120202/during-the-ipo-quiet-period-please-enjoy-the-d-stylings-of-facebooks-mark-zuckerberg-and-sheryl-sandberg-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120202/during-the-ipo-quiet-period-please-enjoy-the-d-stylings-of-facebooks-mark-zuckerberg-and-sheryl-sandberg-video/#comments Fri, 03 Feb 2012 00:48:14 +0000 Kara Swisher http://allthingsd.com/?p=170893

We’ve been fortunate to host Facebook CEO and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg twice on the stage of the D: All Things Digital conference, including one appearance with COO Sheryl Sandberg.

With the blockbuster IPO filing of the social networking giant yesterday — and the ensuing quiet period — both interviews are now most definitely an interesting look-see at the pair who are leading the company.

After Facebook goes public in late May, investors will presumably get more interaction with them both, as well as deeper insight into what makes the company tick.

Until then, here are the videos from the full interviews from 2010′s D8 and 2008′s D6 (unfortunately, for goofy reasons back then, we had to cut these up into four parts).

The interviews cover a wide range of topics, including the then-distant IPO.

MORE ON THE FACEBOOK IPO:

• Facebook’s Ad Business Is a $3 Billion Mystery
• Viral Video: Farewell to the No-IPO Mark Zuckerberg
• Zuckerberg Is the Billion-Share Man: Who Owns What, Who Makes What in the Facebook IPO
• Zuckerberg Tells Investors, “We Don’t Build Services to Make Money”
• Mobile Highlighted as Key Risk Factor (and Opportunity) in Facebook Filing
• Stop All That Poking: Facebook Filing Temporarily Crashes SEC Web Site
• Zynga Accounted for 12 Percent of Facebook’s Revenue in 2011
• Facebook Has 845 Million Users
• On Its Eighth Birthday, Facebook Files to Raise $5 Billion in Massive IPO (Get Your S-1 Here!)
• Go the F**k Back to Sleep, Silicon Valley: Facebook IPO Likely to File Later Today at Earliest
• Dude, Where’s My Facebook IPO Filing? (Ashton’s on Hold!)
• The Quiet Man: Meet the Less-Known Face of the Facebook IPO, CFO David Ebersman
• Facebook Board Meeting Today for Final IPO Okays
• Facebook (Eye)PO: Tracking the Truth of the Biggest Deal of Web 2.0
• Viral Graphic: Visualizing the Facebook IPO
• Is Facebook IPO on Track for Late May?
• IPO Watch: Facebook Hiring Brunswick to Help With Comms for Expected Public Offering
• Complete Facebook coverage

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120202/during-the-ipo-quiet-period-please-enjoy-the-d-stylings-of-facebooks-mark-zuckerberg-and-sheryl-sandberg-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120201/meet-the-new-sony-ceo-kaz-hirai-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120201/meet-the-new-sony-ceo-kaz-hirai-video/#comments Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:38:30 +0000 Kara Swisher http://allthingsd.com/?p=170157

Sony said today that it had promoted the long-expected heir apparent, Kazuo Hirai, to take over as president and CEO of the consumer electronics giant.

The exec has most recently been leading Sony’s CE and video game units, which he talked about on stage at the AsiaD conference last fall.

You can see the new top dog in action, talking about a range of issues from mobile to media to gadgets in this video of the interview with Walt Mossberg at the event:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120201/meet-the-new-sony-ceo-kaz-hirai-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120131/vevos-rio-caraeff-profits-from-ubiquity-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120131/vevos-rio-caraeff-profits-from-ubiquity-video/#comments Wed, 01 Feb 2012 03:46:46 +0000 Liz Gannes http://allthingsd.com/?p=170032 Rio Caraeff doesn’t run a normal start-up. His two-year-old Vevo, which is a video distributor for the music labels, took in $150 million in the past year. The trick (besides having access to all that content from day one)? To ignore the media industry wisdom about scarcity, he said.

Here’s his interview at D: Dive Into Media today with Ina Fried:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120131/vevos-rio-caraeff-profits-from-ubiquity-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120131/news-corp-s-carey-hacking-scandal-made-for-a-difficult-year-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120131/news-corp-s-carey-hacking-scandal-made-for-a-difficult-year-video/#comments Wed, 01 Feb 2012 03:07:07 +0000 John Paczkowski http://allthingsd.com/?p=169328 Is there a culture problem at News Corp.? COO Chase Carey doesn’t think so.

Onstage at D:Dive Into Media Tuesday afternoon, Carey said the practices behind the phone hacking scandal that’s troubled the company since mid-2011 don’t extend beyond the publications at which they originated. Below, video highlights from the session which also include Carey’s thoughts on piracy, SOPA, TV everywhere and bridging the gap between consumers’ needs and News Corp.’s bottom line:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120131/news-corp-s-carey-hacking-scandal-made-for-a-difficult-year-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120131/legendary-entertainments-thomas-tull-on-making-movies-and-connecting-with-fans-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120131/legendary-entertainments-thomas-tull-on-making-movies-and-connecting-with-fans-video/#comments Wed, 01 Feb 2012 02:32:13 +0000 Ina Fried http://allthingsd.com/?p=169924 Thomas Tull knows about creating big movies.

The next step, the Legendary Entertainment CEO says, is figuring out new ways to make sure would-be fans are getting excited about the next film, and the one after that.

Speaking at D: Dive Into Media, Tull said the company wants to use social media to connect more deeply with those who are interested in its movies.

Here are the video highlights:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120131/legendary-entertainments-thomas-tull-on-making-movies-and-connecting-with-fans-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120131/salar-kamangar-its-time-to-channelize-youtube-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120131/salar-kamangar-its-time-to-channelize-youtube-video/#comments Wed, 01 Feb 2012 02:26:15 +0000 John Paczkowski http://allthingsd.com/?p=170083 Turns out videos of dogs on skateboards are far more lucrative when they’re part of a dog-lovers channel or a skateboard channel. Or both. In the D: Dive Into Media video highlights reel below, YouTube boss Salar Kamangar explains why.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120131/salar-kamangar-its-time-to-channelize-youtube-video/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20120131/espns-john-skipper-loves-every-platform-as-long-as-he-gets-paid-video/ http://allthingsd.com/20120131/espns-john-skipper-loves-every-platform-as-long-as-he-gets-paid-video/#comments Wed, 01 Feb 2012 01:46:06 +0000 Liz Gannes http://allthingsd.com/?p=169836 Give ESPN President John Skipper points for consistency. He wants to make ESPN available on every device and screen. What he doesn’t want to do is give it away for free.

Here are video highlights from his interview with Ina Fried at our D: Dive Into Media conference.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20120131/espns-john-skipper-loves-every-platform-as-long-as-he-gets-paid-video/feed/ 0