Week commencing 26th November 2007
 BBC
Worldwide, ITV and Channel 4 are joining together
to launch an on-demand service from next year, with the working
title of 'Kangaroo'. The UK service will carry a broad range of
programming and will be a rich entertainment site where consumers
can catch up on recently aired shows and watch old favourites. The
joint venture will be owned equally by the broadcasters and will
work independently as an aggregator of both joint venture partners
and third party content. The service is also intended to encourage
other quality content providers to join the service to further enhance
the viewer experience. The service, which is subject to formal approval
from the BBC Trust and each broadcaster's board, is intended to
complement the BBC iPlayer, which will have content listed within
the new service. ITV.com will continue to feature a 30 day catch
up facility alongside simulcasts of ITV1, ITV2, ITV3 and ITV4 and
news, clips, stills, exclusive content and interactivity across
and around ITV programming. Channel 4's website will host a catch-up
service including accompanying comprehensive programme information
and clips, whilst 4oD will evolve into the new service. In a joint
statement, the broadcasters said that the new service will be able
to share the cost of the latest technology and enable rapid technological
enhancements whilst building on the experience of 4OD, ITV.com and
the BBC's iPlayer. (Source Mediatel)
The controversial documentary series looking behind the scenes
at the Queen got off to a pretty good start last night, picking
up a peak of seven million adult viewers (a 28.4% share of the audience),
but this was not enough for it to defeat I'm A Celebrity.... On
for an hour and a half from 8.30pm on BBC One, Monarchy: The Royal
Family At Work had an average audience of 6.5 million adult viewers
(a 27% share).
It was uncertain whether the documentary would ever be aired after
the controversy over the programme's trailer - which appeared to
show the Queen walking off "in a huff" when she had not
- ended up with the controller of BBC One, Peter Fincham, resigning.
Over on ITV1 at 9pm, I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here! grabbed
a peak audience of 7.5 million adult viewers (a 33.8% share). The
jungle-based reality show had an average audience of seven million
adults (a 30.4% share). This did not leave much left for Dragon's
Den, on BBC Two also at 9pm. Yesterday evening's instalment once
again saw a selection of budding entrepreneurs attempt to gain some
of that appealing Dragon cash. The show had a peak of 2.7 million
adult viewers (an 11.3% share) which was pretty impressive when
measured against the other heavyweight shows on offer. (Source -
Mediatel)
Virgin Media is to merge its television and online advertising
sales operations as it looks to tap into growing agency and client
demand for cross-platform advertising. It plans to start selling
ads across its online portal and pay TV platform from January. In
readiness for the move, Phil Townend, head of advertising for the
Virgin Media portal, will report to James Wildman, managing director
of Virgin Media's sales house Interactive Digital Sales. While there
has been some activity between the two teams over the past year
- especially on sponsorship deals - until now, Virgin's 12-strong
online sales team has mainly operated independently to IDS, which
employs 86 people. The aim is to now fully integrate the team into
the IDS offices and run multi-media accounts on agency business.
Wildman said: "The integration enables us to harness the value
of our assets. Our ambition is to isolate the communication effect
of our digital environments on advertisers' campaigns and to develop
new commercial models that realise the value of this approach."
Townend added: "Digital trading is becoming more formalised
between large agencies, clients and top digital media owners. The
space between online and broadcast is coming together, with the
increase of audio-visual consumption across new platforms, and agencies
are increasingly setting up to be able to take advantage of this."
(Source - Mediaweek)
 Johnston Press, plans to roll out a news subscription service
via mobile phones across its 120 titles next year. The new service
will be rolled out gradually using telecommunications provider g8wave
and featuring local headlines. Subscribers will be able to choose
between either a general news alert service or updates. Third party
advertising opportunities are being investigated and trials will
be carried out before the sevrice is extended across larger publications.
(Source - MediaWeek)
Customer publisher Seven Squared has tied
up with Sainsbury's to launch a magazine targeting young
families. Fresh Ideas for Young Families will be a quarterley magazine,
mailed to approx. 250,000 Nectar Card loyalty scheme members who
purchase baby-related products. It will be sent out in January 08
for the first time following a successful trial last month. (Source:
Media Week)
Kerrang! the monthly music magazine will
be trialling a new interactive ad in its December issue. The ad
enables readers to access exclusive music from rock group Pendulum
via a mobile internet site. The reader has to firstly text the word
Kerrang to download a programme for the code. (Source Media Week)
Metro is expanding again into the North West and East of England.
Numbers have yet to be confirmed but apparently there are large
areas still un-reached. (Source Mediatel)
 Ofcom has started inviting applications for a new Digital Audio Broadcasting
(DAB) radio multiplex license to cover mid and west Wales. The communications
regulator is inviting interested parties to apply for a licence,
which would last for 12 years. The new Welsh DAB license is one
of a number of new local digital radio services planned by Ofcom.
The regulator is aiming a significant expansion of digital radio
services throughout the UK.
Ofcom estimates that the new Welsh licence could cover an area with
an adult (15+) population of around 400,000. However the exact coverage
of the Welsh service will be determined by factors such as the location
of transmission sites. The closing date for license applications
is 20 February 2008. Capacity on the multiplex will be reserved
for the transmission of digital services from BBC Radio Wales and
BBC Radio Cymru. (Source - Mediaweek)
Ralph Bernard, the outgoing chief executive of GCap Media, has
questioned the viability of the 4 Digital Group radio multiplex.
Last week, Virgin confirmed it had pulled plans for its Virgin Radio
Viva station. Meanwhile, question marks remain over the future of
the planned Sky News Radio station, following Global Radio's exit
from that venture. Bernard said: "We've always said there wasn't
room for two multiplexes and I hate to say 'I told you so' - but
I told you so. The issue is all about the investment level and commitment
needed to make the investment for the long term. We were told in
the application by Channel 4 that it was going to introduce a new
exciting form of radio and we're still waiting for that." Richard
Huntingford, executive chairman of Virgin Radio, said the decision
to ditch Viva, its planned female-friendly pop station for 15 to
29-year-olds, was to help Virgin Radio focus on its core proposition
of pop and rock stations. A Channel 4 Radio spokesman said it had
to respect Virgin Radio's decision, but it was confident the multiplex
would launch with a "robust line-up". Bernard's comments
came as he announced plans to resign the chief executive post. Bernard
will remain with the company as chairman of Classic FM with responsibility
for overseeing the station's licence renewal process and he will
continue as chairman of Digital One. (Source - Mediaweek)
 Guardian
Unlimited has continued to attract more visitors than its competitors,
according to the latest figures from ABCe. The Guardian's online
presence in October rose from September's already impressive 16.7
million Unique Users* to over 18.4 million. This could be due in
part due to the relaunch of its Society, Media and Money sections
as well as the interest surrounding the launch of Guardian America.
October also saw the Mail Online regain second place with a 15%
increase from September. The site, which includes content from the
Daily Mail and the Mail On Sunday, gained nearly two million users,
up to more than 13.5 million and ousting Times Online to third place.
Although Times Online was the fastest growing site in September,
this month it dropped 1% of its users to over 12.4 million. This
comes despite the fact that Times Online has been making a big push
on the site via film downloads and new mobile services. The Telegraph's
online incarnation rose slightly from over 10.6 million in September
to around 11.1 million in October, and for the first time ever it
saw its page impressions rise past the one million mark to over
102 million. Amidst all the record-breaking figures, Sun Online
dropped over a million Unique Users in the past month, to below
the 10 million mark. This is the lowest amount of traffic the News
International site received since June.
It seems however that the Sun Online has a bigger retention of user
time, as its page impressions for the month reached more than 194.7
million compared to Guardian Unlimited's over 168.7 million. (Source
- Mediatel)
Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree Forum for travellers was relaunched
yesterday (Monday), with third-party ads carried on the site for
the first time. It is one of the first major changes at Lonely Planet
since BBC Worldwide acquired a 75% stake in the firm last September.
The move is one of a series of changes, including the sale of downloadable
chapter guides to popular destinations, while travel-related brands
including Holiday Inn and easyCruise have booked site space. Digital
marketing manager Tom Hall said the changes were in the pipeline
before BBC Worldwide acquired its stake, but agreed it would help
the site raise revenues. (Source - Mediaweek)
Companies could be infringing privacy if they dig up information
about job applicants from social networking websites, an
internet expert has warned. John Carr, chairman of the UK Children's
Charities' Coalition on Internet Safety, believes that employers
and education officials could be crossing the line when they look
up information about applicants on the web. "There are lots
of rumours about young job applicants being screened on Google or
even university tutors looking at people applying for further education,"
he said. "If that really is happening, then it could be illegal
- when the kids are posting a picture of a party, they are only
doing it to let their mates look. They are not doing it for an application
form." Britain's data protection laws are intended to prevent
private information about individuals from being used without their
knowledge or control. Regulators say that accessing publicly available
information over the internet would not necessarily breach the law,
and that it remains the duty of the individual to protect information
they put online. "Essentially if an individual - a potential
employer or university tutor - looked at someone else's profile
on a social networking site, it would not be a breach of data protection,"
said a spokeswoman for the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO),
Britain's privacy watchdog. However, it remains unclear whether
organisations covertly accessing people's private web pages or email
accounts would constitute a breach of the law. Last week the ICO
issued guidance to users of social networking sites such as Facebook
and Bebo, urging them to take their privacy more seriously. A survey
found that although 71% of 14- to 21-year-olds did not want their
future employers to look at their profiles on social networking
sites, only 40% realised that their online activities could be traced
indefinitely. (Source - Media Guardian)
 UK
Cinema Top Ten:(Weekend 23-25 Nov)
1. American Gangster
2. Beowulf
3. Stardust
4. Ratatouille
5. Good Luck Chuck
6. The Darjeeling Limited
7. August Rush
8. Shrooms
9. Elizabeth: The Golden Age
10. 30 Days of Night
Edited by Tony Oakley & Abi Ward |
