Yul Brynner

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.

YouTube’s Hulu Jr. Act: Chuck Norris, Yul Brynner Movies Coming to Google’s Video Site

Peter Kafka in Media on November 10, 2008 at 2:45 am PT

YouTube became the world’s biggest video site by giving people unlimited access to anything they wanted to see–as long as it was a few minutes long. But that hasn’t made much money for Google. New tack, which YouTube has slowly been adopting: Run longer stuff that will theoretically appeal to advertisers. Like, say, indie movies. Or shows from CBS. And now, a handful of movies from the MGM library, starring the likes of Chuck Norris (“Bulletproof Monk”) and Yul Brynner (“The Magnificent Seven”).

The Entire D6 Interview With the Gates Foundation's Melinda Gates (3 of 4)

Kara Swisher in News on July 30, 2008 at 7:28 am PT

We’re posting all the interviews from the sixth D: All Things Digital conference that took place in late May. Here’s Part 3 of 4 of an interview Walt Mossberg did with the Gates Foundation’s Melinda Gates. In this video, Melinda Gates talks about the best ways to fix the broken parts of the public high school educational system in the U.S.