Google to Acquire YouTube for $1.65 Billion

Google to Acquire YouTube for $1.65 Billion

Google, a company which has made billions off the online search market, has not been able to become a major player in the online video market. However, that is all going to change due to Google’s recent purchase of the video-sharing website YouTube, which Google bought for $1.65 billion. This deal came just weeks after YouTube unveiled agreements with three media companies in an effort to escape possible copyright infringements. This is Google’s biggest purchase in its eight year history.

YouTube is still yet to show a profit, but Google and other analysts believe that the video-sharing market will continue to become more lucrative as more and more consumers veer away from the television and onto the internet. Other cynics view YouTube as nothing more than a fad that is doomed due to its high volume of copyrighted material that will result in the eventual oblivion of the site (much like the once popular music sharing site, Napster).

Microsoft Corp., News Corp., and Yahoo Inc. were among the other companies that discussed the possible purchase of YouTube over the past several weeks. However, Google was the one applauded by most investors as they saw Google’s stock price rise on the Nasdaq to $429 (an $8.50 increase).

YouTube has seen its worldwide audience climb to over 72 million users, as opposed to about 3 million one year ago. It also has entered into partnerships with Universal Music Group, CBS Corp., and Sony BMG Music Entertainment. These partnerships came shortly after the agreement signed a month earlier with Warner Music Group Inc. These recent partnerships and the acquisition of YouTube are expected to help Google become the largest player in the online video industry.
















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Anti-U.S. Attack Videos Spread on Web

Anti-U.S. Attack Videos Spread on Web

Videos of Iraqi attacks against U.S. soldiers in Iraq are starting to make their way onto popular video-sharing sites such as YouTube and Google video. These videos are, for the most part, of sniper attacks and small bombings with improvised explosive devices. These videos are being posted by mostly U.S. citizens who have found them through other channels. Some videos do not show American soldiers being seriously injured, however others show soldiers on the ground bleeding and being loaded onto emergency helicopters.

Pictures of dead soldiers are closely monitored by the Bush administration and often are not disclosed to the American public. These shared videos however are giving average citizens a level of access to combat scenes never seen before. However, many of these videos have been removed from YouTube. Youtube has done this in reaction to complaints from other users. The New York Times has record of over 48 videos that were removed thus far. Both YouTube and Google video have user guidelines that prohibit the posting of videos with graphic violence. There is a policy to remove any videos that are intended to deceive or shock and disgust viewers with regards to warfare (U.S or any other).

Still, many of the videos remain, often labeled in Arabic making it difficult for American users to locate them. Also, new videos are continuously added with much of the same material as the ones before them which were deleted. Russell K. Terry, a Vietnam veteran with mixed feelings toward the videos noted, “It’s unfortunate there’s no way to stop it…this is what these guys are over there fighting for: freedom of speech.” Other users had similar things to say. They were disgusted by the videos, however they did not feel that the videos should be censored, and that their respective news stations are unwilling to tell the truths of the war.














Picture of Iraq found here

Yahoo to be Featured on H.P. Computers

Yahoo to be Featured on H.P. Computers

This past Thursday, Yahoo reported that they had agreed on a deal with Hewlett-Packard to place Yahoo search and other Yahoo services on all HP computers being sold in the United States and Europe. These HP computers will feature an internet toolbar with a combination of HP and Yahoo features. Furthermore, Yahoo will be the default search engine on many Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0 models, which are coming soon. HP consumer PC’s in North American will soon be equipped with an internet toolbar featuring Yahoo services, and Yahoo will be the preferred internet search engine for Internet Explorer 7.0. And effective immediately in Europe, Yahoo’s home page will be featured on consumer PC’s.

Yahoo and Google have been competing to win exclusive positioning of their services within the major hardware and software makers. Google has been anticipating this move by Yahoo, and realizes that HP users will gain instant access to Yahoo search, email, links, and other Yahoo services. To combat this anticipated move by Yahoo, Google has signed deals with Dell, software makers like Adobe Systems and Intuit, and media companies like News Corporation. However, Yahoo’s momentum has greatly increased with its recent partnerships.

Yahoo has made a multiyear distribution deal with Acer, the top PC notebook maker in Europe, which will place Yahoo services on Acer computers. Yahoo also has similar deals with major broadband communications providers in the United States, Canada, and Britain.

These two search engines, Yahoo and Google, have long been in competition with each other and are arguably the most popular search engines on the internet. These strategic partnerships that each company is making will increase their popularity to an even greater level and could possibly reduce the use of less popular search engines such as AltaVista and AskJeeves.
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Choosing A College, With Help From the Web

"Choosing a College, With Help From the Web"

Many high school students these days are turning to the internet and using search engines to find information about colleges. Sites such as The Princeton Review, the College Board, Kaplan, Thompson Peterson, and Counselor-O-Matic are helping students put together a list of potential colleges to consider. The site Counselor-O-Matic, which is offered by the Princeton Review, asks for academic information such as grades, class rank, SAT scores. However, the site also inquires about the students’ preferences for school size, surrounding environment, tuition fees, and other things of that nature. Sites like Counselor-O-Matic are free to students because they make money off advertising and by selling student information to potential colleges.

The U.S. has over 4,000 colleges and universities, and these sites are very good at narrowing down the choices for students so that they can find information on the schools which best fit their academic and social needs. It is also especially helpful for those students who seek very selective types of institutions. These search engines are also extremely helpful for those students who attend high schools where the ratio of students to counselors is very high.

College counselors, however, are not very enthusiastic about these sites. Most of them feel that while they are a good way to find preliminary information about potential universities, they are not good for actually choosing a final college to attend. This is because these search engines for the most part do not take into account each students particular emotions, campus cultures, and several other factors which can only be obtained through social interaction. For this reason, counselors are encouraging students to find large lists of potential colleges on these sites, and then to meet with them to discuss these colleges further.

Others however feel that these sites are adequate to use to pick out one’s college. And soon, many of these sites will be equipped with criteria that take into account students’ personal interests, emotions, campus lifestyle, and things of that nature. And with these types of changes, it is likely that there will be more and more students turning to the internet to help choose their future college.



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Are Heavy Internet Users Anti-Social?

"The Net Effect of Internet Usage"

A new report, The Statistics Canada study, suggests that internet users may indeed spend less time with friends and family, however it does not indicate that they are anti-social. The study asked people to keep a record for all of their activities over a 24-hour period, and the study distinguished between time spent online for personal use versus time spent for work or education purposes.
It was found that heavy internet users spend less time sleeping and relaxing, and that they tend to be home bodies. They also spend less time doing outdoor activities, going to movies, and doing volunteer work. However, shockingly, the study showed that although heavy internet users tend to stay home often, they are no more inclined to spend time with family than non-users. It actually showed that heavy users actually spend approximately 30 minutes less per day with loved ones than non-users. However, both heavy users and light/non-users said given more free time in a day, their first priority would be to spend more time with loved ones.
Statistics Canada also found that heavy internet users took part in their hobbies in solitude quite often. The study found that internet users spend approximately two hours more a day alone than do non-users. However, when internet users where asked about social groups, they reported having just as large a network as non-users. Although many of these users are alone in a physical sense, they communicate with others through various online methods.
The report suggests that people who spend a lot of time online are not anti-social; they are “differently social.” Heavy internet users also reported feeling more laid back and less stressed than non-users. These heavy internet users were on average 8 years younger than non-users, and 60% were male. Students and the unemployed accounted for a higher proportion of the heavy users than non-users.

Internet Junkie picture found here

First Posting

Hi everyone! My name is Joey Fight and welcome to my blog. I am a senior marketing and management major at the University of Delaware, and I am creating this blog as part of a class assignment for Information Technology Applications in Marketing. The theme of this blog is identifying internet users. I will be commenting on articles that focus on internet enterprises, consumer internet users, and what users are doing online. I hope you all find this blog informative and helpful in understanding more about users of the internet!

My first article was found in the New York Times and is entitled, "Facebook Feature Draws Privacy Concerns". Users of the popular high school and college website, Facebook, have been complaining about the recent changes the site has made to user’s homepages. Facebook, in an effort to save their users’ time perusing their friend’s profiles, began a news feed where each user’s homepage is automatically updated with changes in their friend’s personal profiles. This new feature does not reveal any new information that would otherwise be considered private, however it does inform people of the slightest changes to others profiles. Users are now complaining that information about themselves, which was once only available on their personal profile pages, is now appearing in a wider public setting for all to see. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, maintains that the intention of the news feed was to simply provide users with interesting information about their friends in a much more efficient fashion than before. However, he says that new privacy options are currently in the works and will be incorporated into Facebook for users who would like their information restricted to their profile. These new privacy options will include safeguards which will allow users to hide entire categories from the news feed feature; categories such as which online groups they belong to or classes they are currently taking.