Better late than never. Nintendo of America today announced that Amazon Instant Video is now available for the original Wii console. The service has been available for the Wii U since late 2012, just before that console’s TVii service came online.
Wii owners can now grab the Amazon Instant Video app from the Wii Shop Channel for free. After registering their Wii console using both the Wii and the Amazon website, users can browse through movies and TV shows for purchase or rental. Amazon Prime subscribers gain access to free streaming titles through the Wii, just as on other platforms.
Though it would have seemed unlikely just one year ago, Amazon has successfully turned its fledgling video streaming service into a real competitor to Netflix’s Watch Instantly service. It accomplished this by using its considerable resources and influence with Hollywood studios, which sells millions of DVDs through Amazon every year. Last year Amazon inked deals with ESPN, NBCUniversal, and EPIX – a joint venture between MGM, Viacom, and Lionsgate. The company also managed to put an Amazon Instant Video app on the other two major video game consoles (the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3) as well as many new “smart” TVs being sold.
One of the best parts about Chrome has always been the omnibox, and the ease with which searching the web is compared to browsers that came before it (though some have caught up in this regard now). Google has made additional search-related improvements to Chrome over the years – most notably the addition of Google Instant. But more search-friendliness is on the way.
Google announced today that it is going to begin testing variations of Chrome’s New Tab Page in which the user’s default search provider will be able to add a search box or “otherwise customize” the page.
“While you can search straight from the omnibox in Chrome, we’ve found that many people still navigate to their search engine’s home page to initiate a search instead,” says software engineer David Holloway on the Chromium blog. “The goal is to save people time by helping them search and navigate the web faster.”
“We’ll also allow search engines to display the user’s search terms right in the omnibox, which avoids the need for a second search box on the results page,” adds Holloway. “This new capability, along with other ways to improve search suggestions, are exposed in a new Embedded Search API, an extension of the existing SearchBox API. Search engines can implement any part of the specification if they’d like their users to experience a customized variation of the NTP experience.”
A small set of users on the Dev channel on Windows and Chrome OS how have Google selected as their default search provider will start seeing test variations starting today. Halloway says Mac will be coming soon.
Is it just me or is Chrome OS getting more and more WIndows-looking? Remember, when you just signed in, and you were in Chrome, and that was basically it?
Google has gradually added more of a traditional operating system-like interface to its OS, and that continues today with the latest stable update, which introduces a new redesigned app list (pictured above).
“Notably, we made the apps list much more compact, so you can access your apps without interrupting your browsing experience,” says Google software engineer Xiyuan Xia. “We also added a search box at the top of the apps list, which you can use like an omnibox to search the web, specific websites, or the apps on your computer.”
There’s also a new print UI, which has been available in the beta release for over a month. It integrates your printers in Google Cloud Print into the Chrome print dialog, so you can print to a cloud-ready printer, Google Drive, Chrome on your mobile device or to Fed Ex Offices.
Other new changes in the latest stable update include:
You can select your own custom wallpaper
New, offline-capable Google Docs app
Update Adobe Flash to version 11.3.31.230
Flash Access Support
Seccomp Flash sandbox
New Shill connection manager
WiMax support in Shill
LTE Support for modem manager
Support Standard USB audio devices
Support wireless (bluetooth and others) Gamepads
Update GTalk Plug-In to version 3.3.3
Update Netflix Plug-in to version 2.0.5
Kernel rebased to 3.4
Gestures: support 3-finger tap/click as middle button
Resolved issues Samsung users were experiencing with Verizon Wireless activation
“The Stable channel has been updated to 21.0.1183.0 (Platform version: 2465.127.0) for Chromebooks (Acer AC700, Samsung Series 5 550, Samsung Series 5, and Cr-48) and Samsung Chromebox Series 3,” says Google’s Josafat Garcia.
The update will be rolling out to these devices over the course of the next several days.
Vevo, Warner Music Group (WMG), Fullscreen, Maker, and Machinima make up the top five partners, and all of them work with YouTube build their audience and monetize content.
Vevo tops the list of partners with 41,000 unique monthly viewers, and almost 695,000 videos streamed throughout the month of May. Warner Music Group comes in second, but trails behind significantly with only about 22,895 visitors and 172,985 videos streamed.
Machinima takes third in the ranking and had 17,625 visitors in May and streamed almost 430,000 videos. So, not as many visitors, but a lot more videos streamed. Fullscreen, comes in fourth with 12,484 visitors and just under 80,000 videos. Maker placed fifth, with just under 10,000, but 93,588 videos streamed.
* More than half of each channel’s unique viewers were under the age of 35.
* About 1 in 6 Americans who watched online video during May 2012 streamed video on the WMG YouTube channel (almost 23 million unique viewers).
* Vevo led the top five partners in total streams (695 million), while Machinima averaged the most streams per viewer, 24 in May 2012.
* Machinima also captured the highest composition of male viewers (62.6%), while others hovered closer to a 50/50 female/male split.
* Fullscreen and Vevo skewed toward a slightly older demographic, as 15.3 and 15.7 percent of their viewers are 50 years or older, respectively.
* Maker drew 9.7 million unique viewers who averaged nearly ten streams per viewer.
So there you have it, YouTube still reigns supreme as an online streaming video provider. They continue to find new ways to deliver unbelievable amounts of content and somehow pay the bills at the same time.
In a statement from Jim Cicconi, AT&T Senior EVP of External and Legislative Affairs, posted on AT&T’s policy blog this morning, the company slams the FCC by seemingly mocking T-mobile, who is in the process of laying off 1900 call center employees. AT&T asserts that they would’ve kept the call centers in business, if the FCC would’ve listened to them. Essentially, Cicconi’s statement blames the FCC for T-Mobile closing up some of its shop.
Below is Cicconi’s blog post:
“Yesterday, T-Mobile made the sad announcement that it would be closing seven call centers, laying off thousands of workers, and that more layoff announcements may follow. Normally, we’d not comment on something like this. But I feel this is an exception for one big reason– only a few months ago AT&T promised to preserve these very same call centers and jobs if our merger was approved. We also predicted that if the merger failed, T-Mobile would be forced into major layoffs.
“At that time, the current FCC not only rejected our pledges and predictions, they also questioned our credibility. The FCC argued that the merger would cost jobs, not preserve them, and that rejecting it would save jobs. In short, the FCC said they were right, we were wrong, and did so in an aggressive and adamant way.
“Rarely are a regulatory agency’s predictive judgments proven so wrong so fast. But for the government’s decision, centers now being closed would be staying open, workers now facing layoffs would have job guarantees, and communities facing turmoil would have security. Only a few months later, the truth of who was right is sadly obvious.
“So what’s the lesson here? For one thing, it’s a reminder of why “regulatory humility” should be more than a slogan. The FCC may consider itself an expert agency on telecom, but it is not omniscient. And when it ventures far afield from technical issues, and into judgments about employment or predictions about business decisions, it has often been wildly wrong. The other lesson is even more important, and should be sobering. It is a reminder that in government, as in life, decisions have consequences. One must approach them not as an exercise of power but instead of responsibility, because, as I learned in my years of public service, the price of a bad decision is too often paid by someone else.”
AT&T has followed the FCC’s rules for providing IP Relay services for disabled customers and for seeking reimbursement for those services. As the FCC is aware, it is always possible for an individual to misuse IP Relay services, just as someone can misuse the postal system or an email account, but FCC rules require that we complete all calls by customers who identify themselves as disabled.
I wonder if I should contact the FCC the next time i receive a confusing Family Plan bill from AT&T.
Vacation. Depending on who you ask, it can either be one of the most stressful endeavors a person can undertake or it can be one of the most sublimely relaxing spoils a person can do for themselves. Either way, one detail is omnipresent: you gotta figure out where you’re going. As a gesture to help out with this decision, YouTube announced today that it has launched a new channel specifically designed to help you decide on where to go.
YouTube Vacationer, as they christened it, is an archive of video footage compiled from sources like National Geographic and LonelyPlanet. Have a look at their promotional video to get excited.
The channel is currently categorized into how you plan to vacate your normal life. Some choices proffered by YouTube are Spring Break destinations, Road Trips, Family Spots, or places that are just good to go and stuff your face (Food Spots, that is). Once you’ve decided on what type of vacation you have in mind, you can browse through a carousel of videos collected under that category to help you decide on where to go. Alternately, if you’re more of a map-minded traveler, you can choose to view the videos on an integrated Google Map that displays pinned locations of each of the videos
I foresee this site being less of a planner for a vacation you’ve already worked out and more of vacation eye candy that’s going to inspire you to spontaneously plan a long getaway weekend soon. Even then, if the worse thing this new channel does is make you wanna take a vacation, hopefully you’ve got the time and means to follow through with that urge. Get outta town, people.
It seems that Nintendo still has a few surprises up its sleeve with the new Wii U console set to launch next year. The Daily is reporting that Nintendo has been developing an app store for the next generation gaming console. The current Wii console sports the Wii Shop Channel, which allows users to download games – including all their favorites from past Nintendo consoles – and a few other app-like channels and utilities, like Netflix, this would be an honest-to-goodness app store. Rumored apps include MLB.TV (which is coming to Microsoft’s Xbox 360 this Spring). Many of these apps will also run on the Wii U’s tablet-like controller, which sports a 6.2-inch screen, a camera, microphone, gyroscope, and accelerometer.
The Wii U, announced in April and unveiled at this year’s E3 game conference, continues Nintendo’s focus on innovation in the way games are played. Nintendo’s first Wii console, which launched in late 2006, constituted a significant shift in the so-called console wars. Before the Wii, Nintendo had been engaged in a game of one-upsmanship with Microsoft’s Xbox and Sony’s Playstation 2, both of which sported comparable technical specs and a game library more geared toward older, more hard-core gamers. With the Wii Nintendo altered its entire strategy: instead of perpetuating the graphics and processing arms race with Sony and Microsoft, they chose to pursue a more unique and intuitive control system, targeted at the casual gamer market that the Xbox and Playstation had all but ignored.
The strategy worked well. The Wii enjoys a significant lead over the competition in global market share (though Microsoft is top dog in the US). What’s more, the Wii brought motion control to the world of gaming, as Microsoft and Sony have since developed their own unique versions of the concept (Xbox Kinect and Playstation Move, respectively).
The Wii U is set to launch sometime in 2012, and is expected to be HD compatible (like the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, but unlike the current Wii). Many details are still unknown – pricing for the console, pricing for the app store, and a more specific release date chief among them. Whenever it launches, though, the Wii U looks to be an exciting addition to the gaming world. Check out the console’s E3 trailer below, and let us know what you think in the comments.
People who have put off giving Chrome a try now have several more reasons to set aside their usual browser for at least an hour or two. Today, three significant updates – Chrome Instant, the Chrome Web Store, and WebGL – all graduated from the beta channel to the stable build.
Chrome Instant will be the most helpful feature for ordinary users. A post on the Google Chrome Blog explained, "With Chrome Instant ( la Google Instant), web pages that you frequently visit will begin loading as soon as you start typing the URL. (‘Look, Mom – no enter key!’). If supported by your default search engine, search results appear instantly as you type queries in the omnibox."
Just enable Chrome Instant (in the "basic options" menu) if you want to try this out.
Meanwhile, people who like to sort through lots of options in search of something special may appreciate the Chrome Web Store. The video below explains a little about it.
Finally, WebGL more or less translates to "hardware-accelerated 3D graphics," and if that piques your interest, a few demos are available here.
The people behind Internet Explorer and Firefox might have to start watching their backs more than ever due to these changes.
Google announced today that it is releasing a new stable version of Chrome, which the company says is even faster and more streamlined. In fact, Google claims it is three times faster on JavaScript performance than it was two year ago, when Chrome was first launched (it’s the two-year anniversary, by the way).
"We’ve also been working on simplifying the ‘chrome’ of Chrome," says product manager Brian Rakowski. "As you can see, we took the already minimalist user interface and stripped it down a bit more to make it easier to use. We combined Chrome’s two menus into one, revisited the location of the buttons, cleaned up the treatment of the URL and the Omnibox, and adjusted the color scheme of the browser to be easier on the eyes."
"As always, we’re hard at work on making Chrome even faster, and working on ways to improve graphics performance in the browser through hardware acceleration," adds Rakowski. "With the Chrome Web Store, we hope to make it much easier to find and use great applications on the web. We also ratcheted up the pace of our releases so that we can get new features and improvements to everyone more quickly."
The new stable version can be downloaded here. Google has a list of all stable and beta channel updates here.
If you’re more interested in the fact that it is Chrome’s 2nd birthday, you can get more reflection on how far the browser has come in those two short years by reading this celebratory post from Google.
Google has a new beta release available for the Chrome browser with some new features. Among these, is a new user interface, which was previewed on the developer channel in June, including changes to the toolbar and omnibox.
Google software engineer James Hawkins talks about a couple of the other new features on the Chrome Blog. "One of my favorite features, Autofill, helps you fill in web forms automatically with information that you specify, such as your name, address, phone number, and the credit card number you use for shopping online," he says. "Autofill builds up and saves this information for you over time, so that you can fill in long web forms with just a few clicks without typing in the same information over again. For your security, any personal information stored in Chrome is safely stored and kept private until a user chooses to share the information with a website. Additionally, your credit card information is never saved without first asking you explicitly."
"We also continue to bring more synchronization capabilities to Chrome," he adds. "In addition to syncing bookmarks, preferences, and themes, you can now choose to sync your Chrome extensions as well as your Autofill data (excluding credit card numbers) through your Google Account. With Chrome’s sync features, you can personalize your Chrome experience and access your painstakingly curated set of bookmarks, preferences, themes, extensions, and Autofill data from any computer you choose, as long as you’re signed in to your Google Account on Chrome for that computer. To start syncing, go to the the ‘Sync’ section of the “Personal Stuff” tab in Chrome’s options."
In addition to the new interface and these features, the new beta is faster. Google has always placed a great deal of emphasis on speed with Chrome, and they continue to do so. Hawkins says its 15% faster on both the V8 and SunSpider benchmarks. You can see the progressions on these visually here.
Google recently announced that it intends to release new stable versions of Chrome every six weeks.
Now that the Round of 16 is over and we are down to the final 8 teams that will be playing in the Quarterfinals of the World Cup – most of the marketing that has accompanied the games has been played out and it’s a good time to try and look for some lessons from the International phenomenon that is the World Cup. To help, here is my round up of 10 of the most interesting marketing campaigns from this World Cup as well as some marketing lessons that they offer:
#10 – ESPN3 Live Streaming
Offering live streaming for sporting events is certainly not new, but the way that ESPN has integrated their streaming with cable providers has been excellent. For many soccer fans, watching the World Cup Live might have been their first experience at a "pay for streaming" service online. Hulu is paid for by ads, and YouTube is omnipresent – but ESPN3 took the riskier step of integrating with cable providers. By doing so, they not only managed to prove their value to their cable provider partners/subscribers – they also managed to create a great user experience because they didn’t force consumers to pay again for something they were already paying for through their home cable subscription. Big win for ESPN.
#9 – Coca-Cola History Of Celebration Coke is an official sponsor of the World Cup and has the stadiums plastered with their logo as you would expect. Continuing with their theme of happiness that was so nicely brought to life through viral videos such as "The Happiness Machine,", their World Cup spot focuses on the story of Roger Milla and his dance of celebration during the 1990 World Cup that sparked a revolution in goal celebrations (as the ad claims). The video is set to the official theme song of the FIFA World Cup 2010 and the voice over is from an announcer with a South African accent (nice touch). The last shot of Roger Milla in the stands enjoying a Coke while the voiceover talks about how he "showed the world how to live" is pure World Cup melodramatic magic.
#8 – KIA Motors South Africa As the official automobile sponsor for the World Cup, KIA had fertile ground to do a lot of great things around the World Cup. Unfortunately, their actual effort seemed uncoordinated and confusing – with KIA Motors South Africa running a promotion all about offering an exclusive experience to people who engaged with the South African page or Twitter account, while the global marketing team seemed to focus on the new Soul car with a 1 minute video (embedded below) asking "what’s your soul app?" and randomly talking about anti-gravity apps. The US KIA Twitter page doesn’t even mention anything about the World Cup, the global Facebook page offers disconnected polls and the pieces of this campaign just seem out of sync in the unique way that can easily happen when global teams work in their silos and never collaborate. One commenter on their YouTube video summed it up best in their response to KIA’s question … "My soul app is the one that blocks these kind of ads." Ouch.
#7 – Cisco Around The World Continuing their Human Network campaign* Cisco uses an engaging ad showing a soccer juggling trick they call the "around the world" that spreads from country to country through young soccer fans watching a video and trying to recreate that moment. As a kid, I remember watching Jürgen Klinsmann in 1994 score an amazing goal against South Koreans and spending months practicing and trying to perfect the same move. Cisco managed to tap that moment that many soccer players and fans could relate to, and demonstrate how their global network makes sharing moments like that possible in a faster and more real way than ever before. (*Full Disclosure – Cisco is an Ogilvy client, but I did not work on this campaign).
#6 – CristianoRonaldo.com
Voted the FIFA World Player Of The Year in 2008, Cristiano Ronaldo (and his often photographed abs) may also be the best looking player in this year’s World Cup … or so I’m told. To capitalize on the attention, he relaunched his website during the World Cup and last week I got a launch announcement from a PR team announcing his new site as a place where they would be "pulling dialogue between Cristiano and his 5 million fans on Facebook and Twitter." After Portugal lost a close Round of 16 match against their neighboring rival Spain, Ronaldo was featured heavily in the news for his comments about feeling like a "broken man." Unfortunately, he isn’t sharing this despair in any sort of dialogue with his fans and his Twitter feed has been silent since before the Spain match. The lesson it brings to light is the central pitfall in creating this "revolutionary" new model for dialogue between a celebrity superstar and his fans: the whole thing falls apart if the superstar just doesn’t feel like talking.
#5 – CNN + FourSquare World Cup Promotion CNN jumped into the geolocation bandwagon around the World Cup and launched a promotion with Foursquare where they are offering special badges to people who check in at locations within South Africa as well as at viewing parties at various locations around the world. Though they are not broadcasting the games, this is an interesting chance at experimentation for the brand and if it works I imagine we will begin to see this used by other Turner Network channels like TNT around college basketball, as well as potentially around large newsmaking events that draw a crowd at viewing parties as well, such as national elections.
#4 – Bud United House Party You have to give Budweiser credit for not giving up on the BudTV idea even though their idea of a 24 hour online network fell flat. Around the FIFA World Cup, they leveraged their sponsorship to create the Bud United house where they invite one person from every one of the 32 finalist teams to live in a house together during the World Cup. The only rules were that when your team was eliminated from the World Cup, you were too. The result is an engaging online reality show that has a great premise, interesting content and a unique sponsorship activation. The only problem to see with this campaign is that they focused all their TV budget on running the same ad over and over where the fans try to distract the soccer player with an mosaic image of beer in the stands. If they used some of that budget to drive TV audiences to check out Bud United, they would have likely increased their engagement dramatically.
#3 – Pepsi "Oh Africa"
Pepsi was one of the sponsors that some felt "ambushed" the games to take away attention from the official soft drink sponsor (Coke) and got great buzz for their TV spot and viral video featuring people making a soccer pitch for several soccer superstars to play against kids in a soccer challenge. The not so subtle message is that Africa can achieve great things (like defeat international soccer stars) if her people can work together.
#2 – Nike Write The Future Nike’s online long form ad with the tagline of "Write The Future" can only be described as epic in how it manages to take all the top tier talent they sponsor and roll out a story that not only talks of their impact on the game and culture, but how what happens on the World Cup stage often does write the future for all of us. The World Cup is special in its significance to the world and watching this ad helps you understand and live that. If there is one ad most closely associated with this World Cup, it has to be the Write the Future campaign. Adidas still had a strong global showing and for "real soccer players," Adidas remains the brand most focused on soccer and stands to realize big revenue gains from merchandising as a result of the games. They made the uniforms and the often debated . But for Nike to grab just a bit of the spotlight through great creative and storytelling isn’t bad for a brand that was not the official sponsor.
#1 – Brand South Africa After the games finish and the world turns its attention to the next big sporting event, the biggest winner from these games may very well be Brand South Africa. The country has had an ambitious nation branding and marketing effort in place since 2002 – and one that in part led to their selection as the host nation for Africa’s first FIFA World Cup. The games have gone off perfectly and the biggest controversies to date have been the Jabulani ball and the inconsistent officiating – both having little to do with the host country. Using music and dance as a way into their culture, coverage of the games online and on television were filled with African rhythms and clearly stood out from anything else. Though the South African’s didn’t progress in the tournament as far as they liked, the country invited the world to their doorstep, brought out the vuvuzelas, did a disika dance and showed the world what Africa was truly capable of.
Amongst a World Cup filled with good and bad marketing lessons, South Africa deserves to stand at the top of the list with pride. Good marketing helped them get selected to host the games, and great marketing will help them inspire people to visit and invest in their country long after the final match is played and a champion is crowned.
Online analytics firm Omniture and Facebook said today they have partnered to offer marketers tools to improve Facebook as a marketing channel.
Initially the two companies will focus on the ability to automate Facebook media buying and access analytics that measure customer engagement on Facebook. The partnership builds on Facebook analytics the companies introduced last year to help marketers join the conversation and have more relevant interactions with their customers.
The partnership is aimed at helping companies more easily integrate Facebook as a marketing channel in an effort to connect and have relevant conversations with Facebook’s more than 400 million users.
“Working with us, Omniture has been able to develop a rich and immersive set of tools that will help our clients better understand the value of their Facebook advertising campaigns,” said Dan Rose, Facebook’s vice president of business development and monetization.
“By creating a single dashboard to plan, deliver and measure campaigns, Omniture can make advertising on Facebook easier and ultimately increase ROI for clients.”
Omniture customers can now use the company’s SearchCenter Plus, a combination of its search engine marketing management application with added functionality for buying Facebook Ads.
In addition, Omniture customers can now generate reports specifically designed to understand ad effectiveness for some of the unique elements of Facebook such as pages and applications.
Love it or hate it, Clear Channel Radio is pretty much inescapable; the organization claims to have a weekly audience of 110 million listeners, which represents about one-third of America’s population. It could be quite important, then, that some people who work for the omnipresent radio entity have taken a liking to Google Wave.
Dennis Elliott, a Web manager at Clear Channel, in fact reached out to Google with some compliments, and his message wound up being posted on the Google Wave Blog. Elliot began, "Just wanted to tell you guys that we are loving the wave here at Clear Channel Radio in Greensboro NC where we have 5 FM radio stations."
Then here’s another key point: "We have just started using it and only have a small number of our staff on it right now, but we plan on expanding it to everyone as soon as possible."
From there, Google Wave could make its way up (and back down) the corporate ladder, coming into use at radio stations all over the country. Or at the least, radio personalities in North Carolina might start discussing it while on the air, causing a lot of their listeners to give the real-time communication tool a shot.
Of course, it would be rather ironic if old-fashioned radio is what helps Google’s newfangled means of communication really catch on.
“Working with us, Omniture has been able to develop a rich and immersive set of tools that will help our clients better understand the value of their Facebook advertising campaigns,” said Dan Rose, Facebook’s vice president of business development and monetization. 
Dennis Elliott, a Web manager at Clear Channel, in fact reached out to Google with some compliments, and his message wound up being posted on the