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New Century Network, the online network boasting 140 newspaper sites, has changed its strategy, dropping its content development effort, NewsWorks, a consumer gateway to the sites. The company said it would focus exclusively on selling advertising across the network.
Matt Drudge, the controversial Internet gossip columnist and self-described Inside-the-Beltway-muckraker, has been signed by the Fox News Channel to host his own show. The name and date of the show have yet to be determined. The 31-year-old Drudge produces the politically-flavored news site, The Drudge Report.
Last week, financial data provider Standard & Poor’s, New York, launched its first consumer-oriented online service, called S&P Personal Weatlh. The new site customizes users’ financial profiles and offers relevant investment advice. Ikonic, San Francisco, developed the site.
Imgis, the Cupertino, Calif.-based ad management software developer, has signed new customers for its AdForce product: publisher Hachette Filipacchi, London-based FortuneCity and AdAuction.com.
Internet advertising rates, as measured by cost per thousand (CPM), have stabilized after a steady 10-month decrease, according to AdKnowledge. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company states that February’s average CPM has been $37.36. Last year, after peaking in April at $39.94, the average fell to $37.21, the study, Online Advertising Report, concluded. The statistics were gathered from 1,056 sites.
Lycos, the search engine that has been aggressively forming partnerships and content deals to expand its service, last week announced a deal with The Electronic Newsstand (www.enews.com), an online magazine subscription retailer. The agreement calls for Lycos to incorporate subscription sales onto its site. In return, Lycos receives a guaranteed base payment of $10.5 million.
CBS SportsLine came in third place at the OXVIII Olympic Winter Games, according to audience measurement results from Relevant Knowledge, Atlanta. Over the 16 days of the Games in Nagano, Japan, CBS SportsLine saw its average traffic jump a whopping 245 percent, but overall it fell behind ESPN SportsZone and the official, IBM-produced Olympics site (nagano.olympic.org) with 1.48 million unique visitors.
Cable network A&E Television last week launched several sites for cable modem users. The two sites center around U.S. President Teddy Roosevelt and baseball star Jackie Robinson. They were created by New York-based new media shop Interactive8.
ADSmart, an Andover, Mass.-based Internet advertising network that aims to link advertisers and agencies with targeted Web sites and audiences, has pared down its member sites to six key affinity groups as part of a new strategy. The current 45 sites, with a reach of 7.1 million viewers a month, are now grouped into the categories Generation-X, college, sports, travel, technology and finance/investing. The network previously consisted of 80 sites.
Elemental Interactive Design + Development, Atlanta, launched a redesign of Turner Network Television’s Web site (www.tnt.turner.com) on Thursday. The site features all of the network’s programs.
Studio Archetype, a design firm based in San Francisco, has announced plans to open offices in Brazil and Australia. The shop has developed Web sites for clients IBM, American Express and UPS, among others.
The Internet Advertising Bureau, New York, has re-elected ESPN Internet ventures senior vice president Rich LeFurgy as its chairman. Turner Interactive’s Richy Glassberg was elected vice chairman and Lot 19’s Kate Everett Thorp was chosen as secretary. The nearly two-year-old organization boasts more than 175 members.
