LastFM

Apple Makes Progress With Ping. Still a Long Way to Go.

Peter Kafka in Media on September 25, 2010 at 8:58 am PT

Apple has made a small but important change to Ping that improves it considerably. It’s not enough to make the much-maligned social network a real winner, but it’s a good start: Now you can recommend songs to your friends, and see the music they recommend, at the same you’re actually listening to songs.

Ping Averts Its Gaze: Apple's New Social Network Doesn't Really Want to Know Much About You

Peter Kafka in Media on September 2, 2010 at 10:26 am PT

Apple’s new “social music discovery” service only cares about what you do at the iTunes store — not in your iTunes library. Which is going to make it very hard for you to discover much about your friends’ music. What is Steve Jobs thinking?

In Mobile Gymnastics, the Motorola Backflip Scores a 6

Katherine Boehret in The Mossberg Solution on March 9, 2010 at 2:47 pm PT

The Motorola Backflip smart phone has a unique design: Its QWERTY keyboard is on the back of the device, so the screen appears to be doing a “back flip” when it opens up for use.

Lala’s Fire Sale That Wasn’t: What Apple Really Paid

Peter Kafka in Media on December 7, 2009 at 10:49 am PT

On Friday, I reported that Apple was buying Lala at a fire-sale price, which meant that investors in the music service wouldn’t get their money. I was wrong. Apple ended up paying around $80 million for the company, according to multiple sources. That’s less than half what investors valued the company at in 2008, but it’s more than the $35 million the company raised throughout its life. Which means that some investors could get their money back and more.

Exclusive: CBS Digital CEO Smith to Leave to Start a Silicon Valley Advisory Firm (First Customer? CBS)

Kara Swisher in News on October 28, 2009 at 10:00 am PT

Quincy Smith, the high-profile CEO of CBS Interactive, is planning on leaving his job at the media giant in January to start an advisory firm in Silicon Valley, according to several sources. But, in an interesting twist, Smith will remain an adviser to CBS under a multiyear contract, sources added, making it his first client. Apparently, Smith will focus intently on authentication issues for the company.

Old Michael Jackson Story: Traffic Snarls the Web. New Michael Jackson Story: Look at Our Traffic!

Peter Kafka in Media on June 26, 2009 at 3:30 pm PT

Remember all those stories about Web sites buckling under the weight of all that Michael Jackson traffic? Here’s the flip side, now being promoted by those same Web sites: Look at all of our Michael Jackson traffic! Yahoo, for instance, wants us to know that Jackson’s demise has been its good fortune. “Michael Jackson rushed to hospital” was the site’s “highest clicking” story, while Yahoo News set a record for hourly visitors.

Sirius iPhone App: No Stern? No NFL? No MLB? No Way. [UPDATED]

John Paczkowski in News on June 18, 2009 at 5:00 am PT

The too-long-in-coming Sirius XM app for the iPhone and iPod touch showed up in the App Store today and sadly, it’s more noteworthy for what’s missing than anything else. Absent from it are a number of the broadcaster’s more popular channels, among them Howard Stern’s, which Sirius often claims are responsible for driving more subscriptions than any other. Also missing: MLB Play-by-Play, NFL Play-by-Play and Sirius NASCAR Radio.

CBS Interactive/CNET Re-Org: The Complete Memo

Peter Kafka in Media on December 11, 2008 at 4:37 pm PT

CBS paid $1.8 billion for CNET last summer, and today it is dealing with the consequences: A re-org and layoffs. CBS execs won’t release a total for the number of people fired, so news will be coming out in piecemeal fashion for some time. In the meantime, here’s CBS Interactive’s new corporate structure, detailed in an internal memo distributed late today.

Van Natta Takes Playlist CEO Job, With New Investment by Pittman

Kara Swisher in News on November 10, 2008 at 9:00 pm PT

Former Facebook exec Owen Van Natta will take the CEO job at a music discovery site called Playlist, a move that had been speculated last week, after he did not end up taking another position as head of MySpace Music. Van Natta’s arrival at Playlist was not the only news for the Palo Alto, Calif.-based start-up–former AOL exec Bob Pittman’s Pilot Investment Group is also investing an undisclosed amount of money in Playlist, and Pittman will join its board. The site, which has been called Project Playlist, had previously raised several million dollars. The new round of funding super-sized that, sources said, hovering at about $18 million. “Discovery around music is exploding on the Internet,” said Van Natta to BoomTown, in an interview this afternoon, giving it as his main reason for joining Playlist.