Pulse2 Technology and Social Media News » Mail.com

Nikki Finke Files Lawsuit Against BoxOfficeworld.com

Amit Chowdhry — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 04:14:28 +0000

Popular Hollywood blogger Nikki Finke has filed a lawsuit against BoxOfficeWorld.com. Apparently BoxOfficeWorld.com lifts articles from Finke’s Deadline.com verbatim. Deadline.com is owned by Mail.com Media Corp.

Mail.com filed a copyright infringement lawsuit at the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles against Arthur Meyerovich and Alina Kaganovsky, the owners of BoxOfficeWorld.com.

“Defendants have copied countless original and copyrighted articles from Deadline and posted these articles verbatim on Box Office World,” stated the complaint filed by Finke. “By stealing Deadline’s content, defendants have generated Internet traffic, earned advertising revenue, and sold products that they otherwise would not have but for their theft of Deadline’s content.”

The complaint listed 21 examples of Deadline.com stories that were stolen including “Lucas Converting ‘Star Wars Saga’ to 3D” and “It’s Official: Fox Cancels ‘Lone Star.’”

This isn’t the first company Finke has taken to court. Fink sued Etrade for a recording and Women’s Wear Daily for lifting content. Finke was also in a legal conflict with HBO because they are developed a comedy called Tilda. Tilda is about a female Hollywood blogger that is similar to Finke.

[The Hollywood Reporter]

Mail.com May Have Sold For Up To $100 Million

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 06:36:54 +0000

Mail.com Media Corporation (MMC) has sold the Mail.com e-mail service and domain name to United Internet AG. United Internet AG is a multi-billion dollar Germany Internet service provider. The amount is rumored to be at about $50 and $100 million.

In the company’s announcement, MMC entered a “strategic partnership” with United Internet AG. MMC will remain as the “primary global content provider for the Mail.com portal” even though it was sold to a different company.

Mail.com e-mail users will be rolled into GMX Mail, a United Internet AG subsidiary. Mail.com and United Internet AG will launch joint properties in Germany and India. Mail.com Media Corporation also owns OnCars, Deadline.com, BoyGeniusReport.com, and Movieline.com.

[Mashable]

Jay Penske’s Mail.com Acquires Gadget Blog BoyGeniusReport

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 04:51:09 +0000

Roger Penske’s son Jay Penske is a Michigan-born entrepreneur that went to high school at St. Mary’s Preparatory and went to Wharton business school at the University of Pennsylvania. He is currently the Chairman and CEO of Mail.com Media Corp (MMC), a digital media and publishing company. Mail.com owns websites such as Mail.com, Deadline.com, OnCars.com, MovieLine.com, MailTimes, Fan.com, and HollywoodLife.com. Jay also founded a company that developed the firefly mobile phone for kids. Mail.com raised $35 million from Quadrangle Group in September 2008.

Penske has some form of interest in tech blogging because his company just acquired BoyGeniusReport.com, a website founded by former Engadget writer Jonathan Geller. BoyGeniusReport.com is about 3.5 years old and averages about one million hits per month. Geller is the sole owner of BGR and the deal was worth “multiple millions” according to AllThingsD.com who reached out to him for comment.

The website employs three writers. Geller never went to college — he dropped out of Greenwich High School in Greenwich, Connecticut and started blogging for Engadget at age 17. He started BGR in 2006. BoyGeniusReport makes money through a partnership with Federated Media, but Penske will be replacing them with another ad provider. [AllThingsD]

Former Defamer Editors Joining Movieline

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:32:15 +0000

In late February, Defamer.com was rolled into Gawker.com. This put Seth Abramovitch, Kyle Buchanan and S.T. VanAirsdale out of a job. However they were given another opportunity in the form of blogging once again for Movieline.com. Movieline was originally a magazine that started in 1989 and was stringing along for a couple of years. Jane Fonda was on the first cover of the magazine. Jay Penske, the son of automobile racing team and Penske Corporation founder Roger Penske set-up the revamping of Movieline. Movieline will be part of Mail.com, the company that was relaunched by Penske and raised $35 million in funding last year.

Quadrangle Capital, WI Harper Group, and Novel TMT Ventures Delivers $35 Million To Mail.com

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 17:32:09 +0000

Mail.com Media is a portal that is powered by the Ask.com search engine. Mail.com looks almost exactly like AOL and Yahoo! The search engine is at the top, the navigation is on the left sidebar, the news stories are in the center, and advertisements are on the bottom right and left sidebars.

Mail.com raised $35 million in it’s fourth round of funding. The funding was led by Quadrangle Capital Partners. Other investors that participated in this round of funding was WI Harper Group and Novel TMT Ventures. Prior to this round of funding, Mail.com had a valuation of about $109 million.

As part of the funding deal, Daniel Rosensweig and Andrew Frey will join the Mail.com board of directors. Frey is a Principal at Quadrangle. And Rosensweig is an Operating Principal at Quadrangle. Rosensweig is the former COO of Yahoo!

About 2 million people use Mail.com as of today. Mail.com has the ability to provide users with specialty e-mail addresses.

Mail.com was launched in the late 90′s, then shut down after the dot-com bubble burst. Jay Penske relaunched the site in 2007. Jay Penske is the son of Roger Penske, founder of the Penske Corporation. Jay is also the co-founder of Firefly Mobile, a company that manufactures cellphones with a call mom and call dad button. Those cellphones are intended for kids ages 5-12.

“We look forward to welcoming Quadrangle as a valuable partner in Mail.com, and Andrew and Dan to our board of directors,” stated Jay in a press release. “Quadrangle’s sector experience, internet expertise and extensive network of relationships will provide meaningful benefits to Mail.com as we continue to broaden our portfolio of brands, and accelerate the growth of our company.”