April 5, 2008

Weekend Update: Deal or No Deal

Microsoft Takes Hard Line, Targeted Ads Work, NHL Goes to the Net, CEO Pay Rises and other news

By 360 Staff

NEWS UPDATE FOR WEEKEND OF APRIL 5-6, 2008

Must Read
Deal or no deal? That’s what Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer told Yahoo’s  board Saturday, promising that if Yahoo didn’t act within 21 days on Microsoft’s acquisition offer the deal would be put directly to shareholders, The NY Times reports. And it wouldn’t be good news for the value of Yahoo, Ballmer promised in an email sent Saturday. Yahoo’s board is “reviewing the letter,” The Wall St Journal reported, citing unnamed sources.[NYT] [WSJ]

Briefly Noted
AT&T and Verizon plan to use spectrum won during the recent FCC auction to build super fast broadband networks that should be ready in about three years. [WSJ]

On Wednesday the NHL switches on its 7-channel broadband site, composed of a live studio show and plenty of original content, including goalkeepers reporting on how tasty the hot dogs are at the arena. [NYT]

Concerned about declining revenue, Fox Interactive Media is shuffling senior ad execs, The Wall St Journal reports, taking what once was a central ad-selling unit and breaking it apart so that top advertising officials report directly to the CEOs of individual properties, such as social networking site MySpace. [WSJ]

Comcast studied sending targeted ads to viewers and found they were less likely to change channels than households receiving random ads, The Wall St Journal reports. [WSJ]

CEOs are still making the big bucks despite measures designed to link their compensation to company performance, The NY Times says. [NYT]

Got a few minutes to spare? Take a survey of digital PR and Marketing in the cable industry sponsored by ACC and CableFAX.

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