In what has become a snarky rite of spring, ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel on Tuesday afternoon affectionately skewered his network, before turning his sights on the competition. Speaking at the tail end of ABC’s 2012-13 upfront presentation, the star of Jimmy Kimmel Live wearily upbraided media buyers, telling the likes of Mindshare CEO Antony Young and MagnaGlobal chief Tim Spengler that he was getting tired of having to deliver his annual message to the advertising community. “I’m sick of it. I’m sick of new shows. I’m sick of the old shows. I’m sick of research. I’m sick of demographics. I’m sick of Anne [Sweeney]. I’m sick of Paul [Lee], and I’m getting sick of you,” Kimmel beefed. “How many times do I have to tell you that this is bullshit? This is bullshit.” With that, the comic launched into a five-minute bit that saw him ridicule some of ABC’s more egregious miscues. According to Kimmel, the jaw-droppingly awful comedy
Read MoreAs the freshly crowned CEO of Yahoo in January, Scott Thompson initiated a series of dramatic acts to get the company back on track. The most notable was to make the boldest — or most boneheaded — move the head of Yahoo could make: Filing a patent infringement lawsuit against Facebook . The controversial move was wildly unpopular in Silicon Valley and even among many Yahoo employees. But after a week-long, drawn out controversy over a fake computer science degree on Thompson’s resume, he is reportedly headed out , and now global media head Ross Levinsohn is in the driver’s seat as interim CEO. Now one of the big questions is: Will Levinsohn take steps to repair Yahoo’s relationship with Facebook, especially since it has proved to be one of the most fruitful the ailing Silicon Valley Internet giant has seen in years? Sources say that some members of Yahoo’s board, as well as the top exec, would welcome a settlement with Facebook on the litigation. Thompson was the main advocate of the in-your-face strategy against the social networking giant, levying a barrage of legal claims at a critical time — the quiet period before Facebook’s public offering this month. So, if Yahoo wanted to turn back the tide of rancor toward Facebook, now is the time it could happen. The lawsuit essentially deemed Facebook a thief of Yahoo’s social innovation, claiming that were it not for its many years of research and development, products such as its News Feed, privacy settings, advertising models and more would never have come into existence. “Facebook’s entire social network model, which allows users to create profiles for and connect with, among other things, persons and businesses, is based on Yahoo’s patented social networking technology,” one line from Yahoo’s lawsuit reads.
Read MoreABC News and Univision on Monday announced a joint venture to launch an English-language TV news network aimed at Hispanic Americans. Both partners will own a 50 percent stake in the network, which is yet to be named. The signal will go live sometime in the first half of 2013. Financial terms were not disclosed. In advance of the network’s linear TV debut, ABC News/Univision will unveil a new website this summer. Content tailored for mobile devices and a social media component are also in the works. Aimed at the nation’s English-speaking and bilingual Hispanic population, the network will cover the issues that are particularly relevant to the growing demographic, including: the economy, jobs, health care, immigration, education and politics. Along with hard news, the channel also will offer a measure of lifestyle/entertainment programming. In selecting English as its default setting, the new network is looking to serve assimilated Hispanics and those who effortlessly toggle between the two languages in school, at work and at home. As the country’s largest Spanish-language media organization, Univision already provides news content in its native tongue. According to the most recent U.S. Census data, the Hispanic population as of April 2010 stood at 50.5 million, marking a 43 percent increase from 35.3 million in 2000. Mexicans are by far the predominant ethnic group in the Hispanic subset (31.8 million). Hispanics now account for 16 percent of the country’s total population. That number is projected to nearly double to around 30 percent by 2050
Read MoreOn March 25, 2009, Yahoo CEO Scott Thompson — when he was then president of PayPal — appeared on the TechNation radio show to talk about the revival of the eBay payments unit. At the end of the largely charming interview, Moira Gunn asked him a direct question about his college degrees, specifically noting they were in accounting and computer science. “Your bachelor’s degree is in accounting and computer science. Now, from both of those, I mean that’s, that’s pretty obvious that’s PayPal,” asked Gunn. “What are the most important things you learned?” “Yeah,” begins Thompson, failing to correct her at all on the fact that he does not actually have a computer science degree — only one in accounting. Then, he soon went even further, touting his early tech training at his Stone Hill College, near Boston, which did not offer a computer science degree at the time he went there from 1975 to 1979. “And that’s really the background that I have and it started back in my college days and I think that’s really the wonderful part thing of being an engineer is you think that way,” said Thompson. In the most generous interpretation, it’s not quite clear or not if Thompson was saying “Yeah” to her statement of his academic credentials, or if he was not actually listening. But it’s a careless oversight on his part not to have corrected her about the degrees, which could also be said about a computer science degree being present on his bio for more than a half-dozen years at eBay and later at Yahoo without some notice by him. Because, while Thompson has had a long career as a tech exec, as well as a stint as a CIO, academically speaking, a computer science degree did not happen in his college days nor did he graduate as an engineer. That became apparent earlier today when Yahoo confirmed that it included inaccurate information about Thompson’s academic background on its Web site and in its regulatory filings.
Read MoreThe Galaxy S III wasn’t the only new thing shown at Samsung’s event on Thursday. The company showed the device running an Android version of Flipboard, the popular iPad and iPhone reading app. Flipboard confirmed the move, but offered scant details. “Previewed on Samsung S III today, Flipboard is coming to Android phones soon,” the company said on Twitter, pointing users to a page where they could provide their e-mail to get further updates. That Web page indicated that Flipboard will be available first for “select” Android models. “We plan to come to other Android phones this summer,” a Flipboard representative told AllThingsD , adding that “there’s no specific launch date at this time.”
Read MoreIn the future cars will be shared, able to avoid traffic and, above all, driverless. Or, at least that’s the hope of several of the speakers at last week’s MLOVE conference in Monterey . Looking the furthest into the future was Brad Templeton , a consultant to Google and former head chairman of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Templeton outlined the impact that driverless cars could have — everything from fewer traffic deaths to lower emissions to less space allotted for roads and parking. Just reducing the 34,000 annual car-related deaths in the U.S. should be reason enough to go driverless, but Templeton notes it would also allow for fewer cars that could be available on demand and take up less space. “Human drivers are really kind of bad,” Templeton said
Read MoreBig Fish Games founder Paul Thelen will again become CEO after handing over the job to Jeremy Lewis four years ago. The shake-up comes as a surprise as the Seattle-based casual games leader was expected to file for an IPO early this year. In a release , the company confirmed Lewis would step down as CEO effective April 30, but continue as a director. Thelen, who had been serving as chief strategy officer as well as chairman of the board, will assume the roles of president and CEO. In a memo obtained by AllThingsD , Lewis wrote to employees: “This is a natural point in our company’s progression for me to pass my responsibilities as president and CEO back to Paul, who will bring his characteristic entrepreneurial drive and creativity to the forefront.” While it is not common for founders to take back control of mature companies, it does happen on rare occasions. Some prominent examples include Apple’s Steve Jobs and Starbucks’ Howard Schultz. In October, the company wrote hefty dividend checks to its shareholders and nearly all of its employees, some of whom received as much as $100,000, depending on their tenure. The act was considered a sign that the company was preparing to go public. In 2011, the company said sales totaled $180 million, up 30 percent from the year-ago period. Big Fish Games is known for developing and publishing casual game titles, which are distributed through its Web site as consumer downloads, but increasingly on the iPad.
Read MoreFive years ago, AllThingsD.com was launched with just a few staffers, a few stories and a whole lot of hope. Also, as it turned out, with the panoply of LOLcat photos. The site had soft-launched a little earlier, but — officially — we opened our doors in the late evening of April 26, 2007. Walt Mossberg wrote about a Kodak printer; John Paczkowski wrote about, wait for it , Apple; and I opined on how then Yahoo CEO Terry Semel might save the troubled company. The more things change … Actually, despite the fact that we have grown hugely in both traffic and staff and logged almost 26,000 posts, little has changed in how ATD looks at its role in covering tech, using stringent standards of fairness, accuracy, ethics and reporting. As I wrote back then: “That is what we will be trying to do most of the time here, attempting to figure out what is happening in the digital space and explaining it in a way that is clear and cogent.” And, of course, have some fun doing it. Thus, mission accomplished and mission never accomplished too. Walt and I want to thank everyone, from our outstanding staff to our Dow Jones colleagues to the many companies we cover to, most of all, our readers. There is a lot more to come going forward and we hope to never disappoint and always delight. And, as I also wrote back then at the dawn of ATD : “But enough looking back: On to the next thing.” And to my amazing partner, Walt, you knew I could not resist:
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