Pulse2 Technology and Social Media News » Fox Interactive

Startup 5to1 Comes Out Of Stealth To Make Advertising More Relevant

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 11:09:42 +0000

5to1 is a start-up that launched out of stealth mode at the TechCrunch50 conference. The company aims to make it easier for advertising companies to sell off remnant advertising. Remnant advertising is inventory that was unable to be sold due to ad space or time.

Many people that view news websites will notice there is quite a bit of ads that seem totally irrelevant from the publisher’s brand. The team behind 5to1 includes former Fox Interactive executives Jim Heckman and Ross Levinsohn. 5to1 even raised $4.5 million in seed funding.

5to1 helps get rid of the ineffective ad campaigns that only benefit the networks selling the campaigns. The end goal of the service is to increase the quality and revenue of advertisements.

Hulu Launches Days Of Summer

Amit Chowdhry — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 21:11:07 +0000

Every weekday between today and mid-August, Hulu will be streaming a new movie, documentary, or sci-fi film.Â The calendar of the films is available at: http://www.hulu.com/summer.Â Here’s the catch: you won’t know what is playing until the day of.Â While this is an annoying feature, I’m sure it’ll keep users coming back to Hulu out of curiosity.

Hulu’s first movie of the event is Lost in Translation starring Scarlett Johansson and Bill Murray.Â The movie is about a man that comes to Tokyo to film a whiskey commercial bonding with a woman that he would most likely not find himself getting along with.

Hulu Days of Summer has a widget too.Â The widget can be embedded in blog posts, social networks, etc.Â The widget can be seen below.

Hulu is a video website created through a partnership between NBC and FOX.Â Hulu directly competes with Google’s YouTube.

News Corporation’s FOX Division Acquires 56% Of Video Advertising Company, UTarget

Amit Chowdhry — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 23:37:28 +0000

“We want to be very closely associated with online video, where we see a huge opportunity. There is a lot of online video available but very little is advertiser-friendly and even less of it is bought and sold on planner-friendly terms. We are going to capitalize on our knowledge of how television advertising is bought and sold, but adding the unique targeting and performance capabilities of online video.”
-HernÃ¡n LÃ³pez , President of .FOX Networks

News Corporation’s .FOX Networks division has acquired 56% in video advertisement company, UTarget. The Windsor, United Kingdom-based advertising company has 630 publisher websites with 15 second ads built in before the videos.

The acquisition price was undisclosed. HernÃ¡n LÃ³pez , President of .Fox Networks reported to paidContent that the its a “reasonable multiple” based on its revenue of the last 12 months: Â£5 million+. UTarget will now be called Utarget.Fox. UTarget ads will now be delivered to News Corporation’s subsidiaries such as MySpace in different countries.

Information Source:
[1] paidContent: Fox Buying Majority Of UK Video Ad Outfit Utarget by Robert Andrews

MySpace.com Releases Official Latino Version

Amit Chowdhry — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 22:52:04 +0000

â€œResponding to the needs of our growing Hispanic membership, MySpace Latino offers content that is culturally relevant to Latinos in the U.S.,â€ stated Vice President Managing Director of MySpace Latino, Victor Kong. â€œThanks to our strategic media and content partners, MySpace Latino will showcase the sports, entertainment, and video content that our users are most passionate about, while creating a truly U.S. Latino bilingual hub for our users online.â€

Social networks are rushing to adapt to different languages and cultures around the world with MySpace and Facebook being no exception. Today MySpace officially unleashed their site in Spanish called MySpace Latino. MySpace has roughly 9.7 million Hispanic members using the social network.

One thing that MySpace beats Facebook at is catering their look & feel to the Hispanic community rather than just translating the language. MySpace Latino has several relevant partners such as ImpreMedia, the Spanish Broadcasting System (SBS), Billboard en EspaÃ±ol, and Remezcla.com. MySpace Latino has several relevant partners such as ImpreMedia, the Spanish Broadcasting System (SBS), Billboard en EspaÃ±ol, and Remezcla.com. MySpace Latino will also feature an exclusive show called Show Secreto that stars Tego Calderon, Locos por Juana, Circo, and a special guest.

Some of MySpace Latino’s newest communities include AcÃºstico, Get Your Band, Backstage, La Oficina, EntÃ©rate, TodoFÃºtbol and En Tu Ciudad.Â Competitors include ElHood.com, Quepasa.com, MiGente.com, LatinosConnected.com, MyGrito.com, and Vostui.com