Thompson on Hollywood

Google+ Update: 20 Million Users Projected by This Weekend, User Tips, Will It Survive?

Will Google+ take off? According to this report from Paul Allen, Google+ will reach 10 million users today--thanks to the increasingly popular invitation button--and 20 million by this weekend. Google+ turns two weeks old today (here's Wired's must-read history), and Allen's statistics give evidence that there is in fact a demand for Google+, despite Facebook already having 750 million users. Moreover, Google is not doomed even if this social-networking attempt fails. Google+ has posted this message (pictured) for those not adequately connected to receive an invite.

By Anne Thompson
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July 12, 2011 8:26 AM
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Disney and Time Warner Chase AMC, Soap’s Second Life on Internet, Google+ Brand Pages

After AMC Network spun off from Cablevision last week, such buyers as Time Warner and Walt Disney Co. have made a run at purchasing the network, reports AdAge. One fund manager at GAMCO, who oversees some four million AMC shares, says that the network would benefit from a sale because of its current popularity due to acclaimed shows Mad Men, The Walking Dead, and Breaking Bad (pictured). In addition to AMC, AMC Networks also controls IFC, WE TV and the Sundance Channel.

By Maggie Lange
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July 8, 2011 6:43 AM
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Video: A Quick Look at Google +

I have not been invited yet to Google +, although frustratingly, others have invited me to join. But Google had to shut down that option after too many people rushed to sign up. Check out Google's demonstration video for Google +. If you're like me, Facebook has become this huge mass of disparate folks ranging from close family and friends to work colleagues and acquaintances and people I don't even know. Twitter is easier--anyone can follow me, and I can select who I follow. But when one group starts live-tweeting a movie or football game--that could be done as a Google + hangout without either imposing it on disinterested Twitter followers or asking people to temporarily unfollow you.

By Anne Thompson
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July 3, 2011 11:03 AM
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Media Watch: Facebook Feedback Council, Hulu to Sell, Tablet Users Double by 2012, Salon Chief Out

-As Facebook looks to generate more ad revenues, the social networking hub is forming a twelve-member client council composed of leaders in the advertising world as well as Facebook’s largest clients, reports Ad Age. The group will rotate yearly, allowing a large mix of companies to participate. The first dozen include Nick Brien, CEO of McCann Worldgroup and Wendy Clark, Coca-Cola’s head of integrated marketing.

By Maggie Lange
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June 23, 2011 6:13 AM
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News Wrap: Comcast Flushes Exec Perks at 30 Rock, Advertisers Love Facebook

New NBC Universal owner Comcast is flushing the executive perks at NBC's New York headquarters, 30 Rock. Comcast's diminishing of the previous corporate culture includes the elimination of private toilets. Top NBC suits will be moved down one floor from their current home on the 52nd, but their new offices will be smaller, more transparent, further from NBCU co-owner GE, and have communal lavatories.

By Maggie Lange
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June 20, 2011 5:14 AM
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Google Changes Algorithm to Block Low-Quality Content Farms

Applaud Google for doing the right thing in the fight against low-quality content farms. Google has announced that it has altered its search algorithms (stateside for starters) to favor high quality content. They explain here:Many of the changes we make are so subtle that very few people notice them. But in the last day or so we launched a pretty big algorithmic improvement to our ranking—a change that noticeably impacts 11.8% of our queries—and we wanted to let people know what’s going on. This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites—sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites—sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on.

By Anne Thompson
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February 25, 2011 6:29 AM
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Digital Viewing Transition: The Rise of Netflix

In their excellent year-ahead discussion on KCRW's The Business, host Kim Masters and guests John Horn (the LAT) and Michael Schneider (Variety) agreed that 2011 marks a watershed year in the transition from traditional to digital viewing choices. They think the shift will come faster for movies than television. "The studios are burning along with huge overhead and a lot of movies that aren't working," says Masters, a confessed Luddite who defends theater-going.

By Anne Thompson
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January 6, 2011 2:03 AM
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New Living Room: from Netflix Streaming to Google TV

At book group last night, we not only picked David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas (in development with the Wachowskis and Tom Tykwer), but debated the relative merits of TiVo and Roku, the best way to get Netflix streaming on TV and the breadth of the Netflix catalogue of free-stream titles. I use my PS3 and a disc to get my Netflix "watch-instantly" queue to pop up on my TV. The other night on a whim, I clicked play and watched the enjoyable Anna Wintour doc The September Issue. More pleasures await me, but I do find it frustrating that many (even older) titles that are in my DVD queue aren't yet available.

By Anne Thompson
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August 18, 2010 8:19 AM
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Sheen Heads for Jail, Fuqua Biopics Shakur, Anderson Casts Scientology Film, Boardwalk Empire Pops

Charlie Sheen is choosing 30 days of jail time over probation, which was too risky, reports TMZ. In a plea bargain, Sheen will plead no contest to third-degree misdemeanor assault for hitting his wife Brooke Mueller on Christmas Day and immediately start to serve what will likely amount to 17 days in jail in Aspen, Colorado. He has to complete 36 hours of anger management before the hearing June 7. Mueller and Sheen both went into rehab following the incident, and Sheen took off time from his hit TV show Two and a Half Men. He'll get his time out of the way before filming begins in early August. The show has been renewed for two seasons; Sheen now earns a reported $2 million an episode.

By Sophia Savage
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June 1, 2010 4:04 AM
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Google's Schmidt Talks to Newspaper Editors

Too few newspapers ask the question "what would Google do?" So the man many consider to be journalism's nemesis, Google CEO Eric Schmidt, addressed the American Society of News Editors in Washington, D.C. this week. While he wants Google to be helpful to the news profession, Schmidt said that the Internet has “replaced the economics of scarcity with economics of abundance and all of us are dealing with the consequences of that.”