Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes

Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes-two of my faves- will be missed! What a loss -but what a gain over 6heir lifetimes. Warm and deep heartfelt blessings to their family, co-workers and friends.

URGENT - BANK CRASH

300 PLUS BANKS COULD GO DOWN! BE CAUTIOUS OR YOU MAY NOT BE INSURED. SPLIT ACCOUNTS TO UNDER 100K. THIS INCLUDES SAVINGS ACCOUNTS! ASAP! DON'T LISTEN TO THE "SPIN".

INSURED FDIC LOSSES

GET YOU MONEY OUT IF ITS OVER 100K!

The Newyorker-BAD

Newyorker Cover Out-of-line No matter who you might endorse.
Go look at it.

InBev buys Budweiser

InBev just bought Budweiser for $48 billion or around $70 per share. Modelo-a Mexican brand-is involved as well. They need to negotiate their own deal as they are under Mexico's regulations.

Tony Snnow has Passed Away

Tony Snow has passed away. His battle with cancer has ended. My deepest sympathy to his family, co-workers and friends. He is missed both 'on and off air'.

SAG Strike in Hollywood

The Screen Actors Guild -SAG- is causing havoc again and another informal strike is underway.

Sister Union AFTRA, however, signed their deal last night. So what does this mean to Hollywoods movie market? Once again-movie productions will grind to a hault. SAG members are already stopping work although a formal SAG strike has not been announced.

OIL COST UPDATE - BLEEK

Gas is expected to go to $170 a barrel by the end of the year. That's $6-7 a gallon. Today-well we hit $143 a barrel. You should expect half of what the UK pays which is around $12 a gallon. YIKES.

The $143 a barrel is about 38% more compared to last year. We are paying approximately $600-700million a day for these increased oil costs.

Hello-Brazil has had Ethanol for more than 20 years. There are options! Learn to conserve now. More to follow from me on this-trust me.

SUVs are Dead

GM is taking a bashing from Toyota.
GM is worth 8 billion and Toyota 100 billion. GM reported they have enough money to operate through 2008 with no promises for 2009.
GM, an American icion, is going out of business. On the other hand-Toyota is flourishing with efficient green cars. Bye-bye to SUVs!

iTunes Tops 5 billion Songs!

Since 2001 Apple has been peddling songs from the iTunes store.  Currently their catalog holds pver 8 million songs.  They just announced its iTunes digital music website has sold over 5 billion songs since the service was introduced in 2001. In early 2008 iTunes blew past retail giant WalMart to become the largest music retailer in the U.S.  It is also reported that Apple is also renting and selling over 50,000 feature films -each day- making them the leader for online movie rentals!

 

KPMG Digital Content Survey

KPMG did a recent survey that revealed that venture capitalists are going to invest heavily in digital content creation over the next two years. KPMG polled 300 venture capitalists, investment bankers and corporate execs reporting that 52 percent of the repsonses believe venture investment in online and mobile content creation will increase over the next decade. Around 25 percent believe investments will increase by more than 20 percent.  There was a dead tie when asked about investment in user-generated content or professional content providers.

 

The sectors where they expect the greatest investments are; 31 percent voting for mobile applications, 26 percent for technology enablers and 20 percent voted for social media services.  Around 31 percent expect social networks to dominate mobile entertainment market revenue by 2009.

Music and gaming downloads got about 20 percent of the votes with video getting 14 p[ercent.  User-generated applications received 10 percent. The survey also revealed that 44 percent percent chose mobile social networking, 44 percent social media, 22 percent for content owners, 20 percent brand advertisers and 14 percent going to wireless operators.  As far as mobile video - 90 percent of investment firms think that mass adoption of mobile video will take place in the next five years.  Around 60 percent forecasting it will happen in the next three years.  I think the adoption will actually be faster than what they are predicting as the drop in mobile carrier prices (bundled offerings) and the reducion in cost of video cell phone will drive the rapid adoption.

Disgraced Enron CEO Appeals his 24 Year Sentence (SOX)

Remember CEO Jeff Skilling? Who can forget what he did with the Enron scnadal.  He is credited for being the most disgraced CEO.  We can also credit him as the catalyst that led to Sarbanes-Oxley. As a refresher - Skilling was found guilty of 19 counts of fraud and sentenced to 24 years in prison after his 2006 trial.   The big news on him today is the point that he may go free or get a substantial reduction in his sentence. 

 

Financial Week reports that a three-judge panel, based in the big-easy New Orleans, is expected to rule on his appeal.  Statement from Financial Week: "Surprisingly, some very prominent minds believe Mr. Skilling has a good shot at winning his appeal, or at least seeing a number of the 19 counts in the conviction overturned."  Letting him off the hook would send a bad message and quite honestly he needs to pay as other did when they lost thousands and millions in shareholder value. To let him go free would be tragic in my view - we will keep you posted. 

Perpetual Storage Backup Tapes Stolen

The University of Utah Hospitals & Clinics said Tuesday that a metal box of backup tapes containing billing records for about 2.2 million patients and guarantors was stolen from a car belonging to a storage contractor's employee. The driver for Perpetual Storage violated the storage company's policies for secure data transport, officials said. The theft, which occurred June 2, is under investigation by the Salt Lake County Sheriff's Department, the FBI and the U.S. Postal Service. The University of Utah Hospitals & Clinics is offering a $1,000 reward for return of the tapes.

 

The billing records included patient names, demographic information and diagnostic codes. Records for a subset of 1.3 million patients also contained Social Security numbers. Although officials said there is no evidence that the data on the tapes has been accessed, the health care system is notifying the affected individuals, providing them with credit monitoring, and taking additional steps to safeguard its records. It also suspended deliveries of backup tapes to Perpetual Storage pending a review of procedures.  Ref: Information Security Magazine.

Standfor Stolen Laptop - 72,000 employee records stolen

Stanford University is notifying 72,000 current and former employees that a laptop containing their personal data was stolen.

The university said on Friday that it's sending emails and letters to those whose confidential data may be at risk. The laptop contained personnel records of current and former Stanford employees who were hired before Sept. 28, 2007. As many as 72,000 could be affected, but university officials said there is no evidence that any of the data on the laptop has been accessed.

 

The laptop was stolen recently, but Stanford said it was not disclosing additional details about the theft while it's under investigation. Data on the system included names, Social Security numbers, phone numbers, salaries and home addresses. Stanford is working with law enforcement officials to recover the laptop.  In light of the theft, Stanford is convening a task force to review its policies and practices for protecting confidential information. "The university has guidelines that prohibit keeping sensitive information on unsecured computers. This effort will be redoubled after this incident," Stanford Vice President for Business Affairs and CFO Randy Livingston said in a prepared statement.

Raketu Communications Integrates with iPhone

Raketu Communications is an Internet communications, information, and entertainment company.  They just announced that they are extending their  social networking application to the Apple iPhone.  Thier integrated communications platform will enable users to collaborate and share content inside and outside of the Raketu network. Raketus' web-based Social Networking and Media Drive iPhone Application allows blog updates, bulletins and comments through their real-time communications platform.  Users can also use non-Raketu networks as well.  The platform also allows users to communicate with friends in a chat-like environment.  iPhone users can store and share multimedia across social networks like Facebook and MySpace.  Users can aslo make international calls, send texts, instant messages and email.  Some of the services are free and other services are at a discounted rate.

Nike - Cellular Photos onto Tennis Shoes

Nike is launching Nike PhotoiD - a new mobile marketing service enabling people to create customized shoes using photos they take with their cell phones. Here is how it works - subscribers submit their photos to Nike PhotoiD.  Nike then makes an image of the shoe based on the two dominant colors within the photo.  It is then sent to the cell phone via MMS.  This image can also be saved as a wallpaper for the cell phone. If the users like it they can order the tennis shoes with custom photo!  The service will launch in nine European territories: The U.K., Italy, Germany, France, Spain, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.  NOW THATS COOL!

 

Thumplay Launches "GET" Text Service

Thumbplay is a Mobile entertainment content portal. They just launched the beta version of a new service called GET.  This is a SMS-based search service that lest users buy ringtones, games, videos and wallpapers from their mobile device.  Thumbplays' GET requires customer to send a text message with the word "Get" and any artist or song title to the shortcode THUMB.  A few seconds later a reply message will arrive containing a link to all relevant content. Thumbplays' mobile catalog has more than 80,000 pieces of licensed audio, video and gaming content.

Bundled Cellular Plans - A Must

Tariff Consultancy recently released a report on Mobile Pricing changes.  The result is that unlimited data bundle plans are becoming the hot pricing model for many large mobile operators - worldwide.  "We believe that the next stage in mobile operator evolution will be those who are able to make mobile broadband a convenient, available and easy-to-use service", said Margrit Sessions, managing director of Tariff Consultancy. "This time around mobile operators have the opportunity to provide a varied service portfolio which is geared to the user needs of individual groups, rather than provide pure price discounting." 

 

My take on this is that it is a must if they want to stay competitive and retain their customers.  People have gotten so used to texting and surfing the net from theri cell phones that the phone bills have sky-rocketed. I use Verizon and my bill was over $500 a month. I recently changed to the all inclusive plan which dropped it down to $150.  If they did'nt offer this I would have been forced to jump to a provider that did offer a more reasonable plan.