Yahoo! announced today they will spend 100mil dollars on a new advertising campaign designed to get beyond Silicon Valley and Silicon Alley and out to the people...

According to Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz, "When you get outside of New York City and Silicon Valley, everybody loves Yahoo," Bartz said Tuesday during a press conference that was webcast. "Why are you (the media) so cynical about us? Be cynical about frigging Google. If you don't love us, leave us alone."

Her frustration aside Google is the darling of not only the Valley and Alley but also Wall Street and much of the rest of the world for a reason. Back in the day when I was at the company they had daring and innovative campaigns such as the man with the fish, space junk falling to earth and this little ditty:

According to the news Yahoo! will have ads that highlight efforts to show people how to customize pages that they see on Yahoo!, smokin... I'd go out on a limb and say most people know Yahoo! what is does well and what is does not, If I had say 100k of that money access to their focus results I know I and others could come up with a spot that creates passion with style and would be memorable like their spots from the early days of the company, what Yahoo! needs is to take a risk not charts and graphs...

What Yahoo! has always done best was their site as a portal, a launching point to other sites and perhaps they should go back to their roots?

Do you...Yawn?

As now updated in Silicon Valley Insider, Google is not or has not, or will not purchase BrightCove, this according to Dan Rayburn.

A BrightCove client gave me an ear full several months back about their view of the platform
"I know I alluded to the new API being completely for programmers only. Brightcove will call it "sophistication", but synonymous with that word is another one: snobbery (in our case, tech snobbery). The thing I appreciate about it is at least they're transparent about their elitism. Look at it like this: in an era where it's becoming more about simple-yet-effective apps, Brightcove's taken their platform in an entirely opposite direction. The unfortunate thing is, as a result, if you REALLY want to get your money's worth, you can't just hire for the creative -- you've got to hire a programmer who knows their way around the API".

Whatever your position about BrightCove they would certainly realize a net gain from being brought in under the large Google umbrella, the more interesting question is what would be in it for Google say beyond the BrightCove customer base?

Much has been written about Google's burn rate with respect to YouTube, What BrightCove wanted to be when they first launched. Will Youtube have to start charging for content if they are going to trim their 50Million plus dollar per year streaming costs? Perhaps this will take the form of a tiered system where there are always cats falling out of trees just in SD and for just a minute or two...but with HD content and longer form fare becoming their paid model, perhaps it will be something that competes with Netflix though they currently do not have a hardware solution so I am not sure of the value proposition for watching movies on my large home set is?

To compete with the U.S. entertainment industry, the British Government has lifted the restriction on product placement on U.K. programming. Children's programs will be restricted from product placement and the BBC will also not such placement

BBC Video segment

The FCC has is launching an investigation to determine if there is "adequate" competition amongst carriers such as AT&T and Verizon. In the 5-0 vote, the commission will pursue such this question in addition to an investigation already underway to see if exclusive contracts, like the Apple iPhone with AT&T harms consumers.

The commission with look into three areas of interest
- The CC inquires about which analytic framework and data sources will most clearly describe competition in the mobile wireless market.
- The inquiry will include new market segments not covered thoroughly in previous reports, such as device and infrastructure segments.
- The vertical relationships between "upstream" and "downstream" market segments, and how these relationships affect competition.

The release on the FCC site, does not indicate a forum for public comment though letters to the commission would be our recommendation.

Exclusive distribution deals are common in various sectors though its is different then just buying a hard drive from one on-line supplier verses a large box retailer as there is an on-going relationship and reliance with service as is the case with the wireless carrier. In addition, as the commission said in its release, "wireless mobility has become central to the economic, civic, and social lives of over 270 million Americans"

Do these numbers and the reliance on mobile technology raise the bar to where wireless carriers should be considered vital national interests such as airlines? Should carriers be prevented from practices that inflict economic harm to consumers? They already practice an informal economic pact of matching and maintaining price levels, is this a form of price fixing? What about choice, should carriers be able to dictate what platforms people have access to? Its not just a simple matter of moving from one provider if you're not happy.

For example, Verizon appears to have more robust coverage in and around New York City, but on the other hand they have a history of being very slow to deploy new handset technologies though they will claim they provide more testing to ensure compatibility with their network. I've heard this statement several times when visiting retail stores, does this mean the iPhone is not a mature and stable platform?

Should consumers be able to purchase the platform of their choice and use it on whichever network they feel provides the best coverage and customer service, well yes..