Add TiVo Inc. to the list of companies trying to wed the Internet to television. The digital recording
company will soon allow customers to download TV shows to their set-top boxes via the Internet -- even before the shows air on TV.  TiVo has struck a deal with the Independent Film Channel to transmit several of the cable channel's shows through a broadband connection as part of a trial program. Participating customers will begin receiving the shows next week, said TiVo spokesman Elliot Sloane.
http://www.herald-sun.com/technology/33-636908.html

Ichan Recommends that Time Warner Sell Cable Unit, Buy Back Stock: PotomacTech, 8/15
Billionaire financier Carl Icahn is recommending that media giant Time Warner divest of its cable television business, but -- at least publicly -- isn't putting pressure on the company to sell Dulles- based America Online. In a statement released on Monday, Icahn and several hedge funds, who collectively own 120 million shares of Time Warner, said that Time Warner has "not moved quickly enough" on measures to increase shareholder value. Icahn, who said that he plans to meet with Time Warner CEO Dick Parsons, is recommending that the company separate its cable business from its content businesses, and immediately repurchase $20 billion in stock. Reports have circulated in recent days that Icahn would recommend that Time Warner sell its cable, publishing and AOL units. 
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/050815/nym133.html?.v=17

Sprint Inks Exclusive Deal on NFL Content: Business Week, 8/15
Sprint Nextel Corp. said Monday it has signed a five-year deal with the National Football League to become the league's official wireless sponsor. The company, with corporate headquarters in Reston, Va., and operations headquarters in Overland Park, said it will use the arrangement to provide exclusive game highlights, updated scores, live game video and Fantasy Football statistics to its wireless customers. It said it is working with the NFL to develop much of the original programming, which will feature content from the NFL Network and NFL Films. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8C0FQ800.htm?campaign_id=apn_tech_down&chan=tc

A Grade 'B' Move: Sprint Nextel to Saddle SPin-Off Group w/ 7.25B in Debt: LTW, 8/16
The spin-off of the local phone division from parent company Sprint-Nextel got off to a bit of an inauspicious start on Monday.

Parent Sprint Nextel announced some of its plans for the local group, which will be based near Kansas City and have a major operation in the Carolinas.

Among its key points were assigning the group, called “SpinCo” according to the Kansas City Business Journal until a formal name is picked, some $7.25 billion in debt. In a statement, Sprint Nextel said the local group would pay a cash dividend of $300 million.

However, the debt was immediately signed a rating of BBB-, the lowest level for investment grade bonds, by Fitch Ratings according to The Associated Press.
http://localtechwire.com/article.cfm?u=12074

Japan's Cellphone Giant Tries Expansion Into Credit Cards: WSJ, 8/16
In Japan's buttoned-down corporate world, Takeshi Natsuno stands out. After joining the largest Japanese mobile-phone company in 1997, he repeatedly criticized the company's parent for being too staid -- even as he held lavish parties on the company tab. Amid a sea of blue-suited colleagues, he led a news conference wearing an ivory suit. He irked the sales staff by suggesting they sell phones in a glowing-orange color. They preferred gray. Now, the fate of NTT DoCoMo Inc. could rest on one of Mr. Natsuno's wildest ideas. With DoCoMo's revenue falling for the first time in its 13-year history, the 40-year-old American-educated executive says the company needs to evolve into something like a bank. He's pushing a new line of cellphones that work like an electronic wallet with cash stored inside. Within the next year or two DoCoMo plans to introduce phones with an embedded DoCoMo credit card, company officials say. The goal: to turn Japan into a credit-happy nation like America -- and to build a lucrative new profit center for the company. "We have to enlarge our battlefield," says Mr. Natsuno, who calls himself DoCoMo's "crazy barking dog." U.S. cellphone companies are counting on data services such as email and Internet access to drive growth for the next few years. But DoCoMo's experience suggests that strategy can only work for so long. Given the Japanese company's record as a trendsetter, it wouldn't be surprising if U.S. companies also end up trying to turn their products into something more than communications devices.
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112413723322613635,00.html?mod=home%5Fpage%5Fone%5Fus

DWANGO Wirless CEO Resigns: Wireless Week, 8/16
Rick Hennessey has relinquished the reins at Dwango Wireless following a lackluster second quarter, which included a loss of more than $5 million.  Dwango reported revenue of $885,000 for the second quarter, which is a far cry from the stellar $1 million sales posted in the previous quarter. In the first quarter of the year, the time the company mainly attributed the revenue results to the launch of its exclusive catalog of ringtones developed under an agreement with RollingStone.com. Dwango said, however, in the second quarter, there was a fall-off of Rolling Stone downloads, which attributed to the overall decrease in revenue for the quarter.
In other Dwango news, the company announced the expansion of its Napster ringtone service with the launch of action-sports themed ringtones and wallpapers. The new content includes exclusive shout outs from Team Napster snowboarder Marc Frank Montoya, Supercross/Motocross racer Kevin Windham and freestyle motocross rider Adam Jones.
http://www.wirelessweek.com/article/CA635340.html

Ingenio, Verizon Start Pay-Per Call Service: DMNews, 8/16
Ingenio Inc. launched a platform yesterday that lets agencies, search optimization companies and other third-party firms manage Ingenio’s pay-per-call ad campaigns for their clients.  The San Francisco company debuted pay-per-call ad technology late last year within the Miva Network. In April, AOL was the first major search engine to serve Ingenio’s pay-per-call ads. Now, agencies and others can customize pay-per-call campaigns for their clients, using Ingenio’s new Application Programming Interface program.  Meanwhile, Verizon SuperPages.com debuted its pay-for-calls ad service at last week’s Search Engine Strategies 2005 show in San Jose, CA. Using its own technology, SuperPages’ print and online advertisers can choose to bid on pay for calls, which generates calls based on bidding for ads, like SuperPages’ pay-per-click model.
http://www.dmnews.com/cgi-bin/artprevbot.cgi?article_id=33781

Media
Anoroc Agency wins '05 Gold Aster Award for Community Home Care & Hospice TV Ad: Carolina Newswire, 8/16

 Anoroc was recently recognized in the 2005 Aster Awards as being among the best in the nation’s health care marketing organizations. Anoroc was awarded a Gold Aster for a television ad, “Annie” created for Community Home Care & Hospice. The Aster Awards is the nations fastest growing healthcare marketing awards organization dedicated to excellence in medical advertising. Agencies across the nation compete to be recognized by the Asters.  Anoroc is located in Raleigh on south Glenwood. Agency clients include Clay Aiken, Rosen Divorce, Marc Brown Studios, 212 Media, Vadum and Heart of Florida Regional Medical Center. The agency’s broad scope of industry expertise includes entertainment, healthcare, law, high-tech, food, construction, defense, and retail. The agency has produced award-winning print ads, collateral, documentaries, music videos and pop music promotions.
http://carolinanewswire.com/news/News.cgi?database=headlines%2edb&command=viewone&id=5630&op=t

Banking
Bank of America Honored For Best Consumer Internet Bank & Information Security Initiative: Carolina Newswire, 8/16

 Bank of America was named best consumer Internet bank in the United States by Global Finance magazine as part of its "World's Best Internet Banks" competition.

Global Finance magazine also gave Bank of America awards for the best information security initiatives, best bill pay and presentment, as well as best online consumer credit in North America.

Bank of America is the leading online banking site, with 13.8 million active online banking customers, 6.7 million bill pay customers, and more than 1.5 billion visits annually to bankofamerica.com.  This year, Bank of America was the first major financial services company to provide an added layer of security to help prevent fraud and identity theft with a free service called SiteKey(TM). Customers pick one of thousands of images, write a title for the image and select three challenge questions. The customer and the bank can pass that information securely back and forth to confirm each other's identity -- so the bank has an added way to protect accounts and customers can make sure they are at the legitimate Bank of America Web site.
http://carolinanewswire.com/news/News.cgi?database=headlines%2edb&command=viewone&id=5626&op=t

Technology
Startup Offers Consumers Private Networking: Internet Week, 8/15
Startup Imeem Inc. on Monday launched its desktop software that lets people build their own private social networks with friends and family, so they can share files, such as photos and music; and communicate through blogs, instant messaging and chat rooms.  The Imeem software is available without charge, but the company hopes to make money by selling advertising that would be displayed to subscribers based on their use of the company's software. No information on the user would leave the desktop, officials with the Palo Alto, Calif., company said.
The fact that personal information won't be shared with anyone, unless a person chooses to share it, is what the company says is a major advantage to its products. While people can choose to build a blog on Imeem server, and share their journal with anyone interested in seeing it, they can also limit viewers to a specific group of people.
http://www.internetweek.com/news/168601833

11% of Blog Readers Use RSS Technology to Manage Feeds: Potomac Tech, 8/16
About 11% of weblog readers use RSS (Really Simple Syndication) to sort through the increasing number of blogs available, according to a new study by Nielsen//NetRatings. The firm said that 5% of blog readers use feed aggregation software and more than 6% percent use a feed aggregating web site to monitor RSS feeds from blogs. "While RSS is an established technology, the growing popularity of blogs has catapulted RSS into the spotlight as a content personalization tool," said Jon Gibs, a senior research manager for Nielsen//NetRatings. The majority of respondents to the survey were less familiar with RSS feeds. Among the other respondents, 23% understood RSS but did not use it, while two-thirds either did not understand the technology or had never heard of it.
http://www.nielsen-netratings.com/news.jsp