9 posts and columns on Long Tail

Exclusive: SnagFilms Snags $10 Million in Funding at $50 Million Valuation

in News on January 16, 2011 at 4:15 pm PT

SnagFilms, the online video distribution site for professional documentaries, has nabbed $10 million in funding from Comcast’s investment arm and New Enterprise Associates, and will also now be distributing fictional independent releases. That and the new investment giving SnagFilms a valuation of $50 million should be big news at the 11th Sundance Film Festival, the famous independent film gathering opening in Park City, Utah, on Thursday.

Hulu Goes to the Movies (That You’ve Never Heard Of)

in Media on March 31, 2010 at 3:30 am PT

Yesterday marked the first time a feature film appeared on Hulu before running anywhere else. So why haven’t you heard about it? Because if the people behind “In The Darkness” didn’t call their project a feature film, nobody else would. But I bet we see a lot more of this from the site.

"The 2009 U.S. Digital Year in Review: A Recap of the Year in Digital Marketing" (Thanks to comScore for Letting Us Embed!)

in News on February 9, 2010 at 11:07 pm PT

The fine folks at comScore have graciously allowed BoomTown to embed a very good report they released this week about the digital landscape. Titled “The 2009 U.S. Digital Year in Review: A Recap of the Year in Digital Marketing,” it’s chock-a-block full of all kinds of interesting information, from declining growth rates for e-commerce to core search market share to social networking trends to display advertising to the big trends in video and mobile. Also, lots of pretty charts! Here’s the whole enchilada for those who like to gorge on digital data.

YouTube’s Profit Plan: Spend Less, Sell More (Duh)

in Media on August 26, 2009 at 6:30 am PT

In order to move from money pit to profit center, YouTube has to spend less, which is hard for the site to talk about. And it needs to sell more ads on more videos–which YouTube is happy to talk about. Hence, yesterday’s news that YouTube would start selling against “viral videos.”
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Portfolio Lives! Sort Of: Web Site Adopted by Condé Nast’s Corporate Cousin.

in Media on May 20, 2009 at 7:46 am PT

Never say never: Condé Nast, which is closing down its Portfolio business magazine, has decided not to turn off the lights at Portfolio.com. Instead, it is shifting control of the Web site–essentially, the Portfolio.com address and a couple years of archived content–over to American City Business Journals, its corporate cousin in the Advance Publications family.
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YouTube Preps Its (Sort of) Hulu Answer: Movies, TV Shows From Sony, Others

in Media on April 16, 2009 at 1:52 pm PT

Here’s Google’s sort-of answer to Hulu: A newly designed page to showcase TV shows and movies, along with new players and a new ad strategy. What’s not included: almost any first-run TV show or newly released movie. That’s the content that’s made Hulu successful and what’s also driven traffic to offerings from CBS and Disney’s ABC. You can’t accuse the Google guys of overselling this: In a press conference today, they described it as a “first step, a baby step.”
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Another Critic Tries Stomping on the Long Tail

in Media on December 22, 2008 at 6:09 am PT

Chris Anderson’s influential Web theorem says that endless choice equals unlimited demand. But a new study argues that most people want the same stuff–and no one wants that unpopular stuff, period.