Guardian Unlimited comments on News Corporation turning down the $150m asking price for Digg. They suggest that in this ‘mini-boom’ of Web 2.0, purchase prices are cooling and/or potential buyers are more wary.

In News Corporation’s instance, I don’t believe this to be the case. Instead, I think News Corporation purchased MySpace, and now thinks: “Bugger.. now what do we do with it?” Signs of cluelessness are indicated by Fox running crap TV shows via MySpace, that are only temporarily on-line, and that require the download of a custom player. News Corporation isn’t going to pay lots of money for something else it might end up not knowing what do to with.

With respect to MySpace, News Corporation purchased an Audience, not a Product or a Service. But although this audience is attached to MySpace, members are more interested in each other, and demonstrating to each other that they know each other. It’s a social thing, obviously.

TV shows are too, but MySpace hasn’t the tools for people to be social about TV shows. All you need is a forum dedicated to the show, and one thread for each episode. MySpace has neither. Advertising streams could be targeted to specific shows, and even to specific episodes, run alongside the forums. Music for each episode could be made available for purchase; linking to specific iTunes mixes even. Provide the ability to pre-order DVDs. Advertise goods and services that appear on the specific episodes.

Is this really too difficult?

One of my frequent observations on websites for small businesses and organisations is that they are still perceived as a ‘build-once’ activity. This means that the website gets built, and never gets updated. No new content, no new sections. Just stagnation.

Circumstantial evidence obtained throughout the eight years that we’ve been running Junctionbox Media indicates that there is a strong correlation between organisations and businesses that grow and the frequency with which their website is updated. I’m sure this relationship works in both directions.

It’s often cited that ‘we need a content management system’ in order to update content; rather than providing copy to ourselves. Something remarked upon by customers as well as our competitors. But that’s not the case. We can work in new content to static sites very quickly. We have the tools and experience to do this. Furthermore, many website owners have no idea where to start with new content: the text, graphics, editing. What do you need to say? Why? How?

Thinking that this will all change if you install a content management system is foolish.

This weekend, my friend Mark pointed me to the ‘new page in the Trumba story’. Trumba is a calendaring service that allows organisations to publish, promote and communicate events online. On 18 October 2006, they announced a radical shift in their market. They are no longer interested in individuals, small businesses and not-for-profit organisations. They’re going after ‘larger organizations and businesses’ who ‘are paying us $100 per month or more because they see the positive impact our tools have on their online event marketing efforts’.

This means that their base paid service price (which was $39.95 per year) is now $1199.40 per year. A 30 fold increase. There’s no longer a free version either. However, Trumba have given users plenty of notice, and they can export their data.

But, there are currently over 3,500 public Trumba calendars. That’s a lot of users. A lot of people who might blog about this change in direction. 37signals talk about people growing out of their products, but this is the first time I’ve known a Web 2.0 company to outgrow their customers. Customers are truly one of the most valuable assets for a business (why else would Google buy YouTube, or Fox buy MySpace), so it’s a remarkable decision to take.

Is there an alternative? Yes. There are a lot of calendaring tools around and the comments on the Trumba blog indicate the alternatives that people are considering switching to.

Kiko joined the TechCrunch DeadPool recently. Which calendaring solution is next?

More tips from my brain:

• When listing employment history in your CV, put it in reverse chronological order, so your most current experience is listed first.
• If you don’t know how to sell off-line and fulfil orders off-line, you’re not going to be good at doing either of these things on-line.

News reached me yesterday that Slim Devices, makers of the Squeezebox and Transporter digital music streaming technology, has been acquired by Logitech. There is much discussion on their forum about what this means for the future of the company, its products and its market.

Would you buy an audiophile network music player from Logitech?

Seems Logitech and Slim Devices will need to take great care over how the products get marketed.

In March 2006 Keyspan announced the TuneView Remote, a wireless remote control with colour display, allowing two way communication and control of your iPod or iTunes. They have a news page with the information. It was originally intended for release in May 2006, but May came and went, and this text got posted on their site:

[UPDATE: TuneView will not be available in May. A new launch date will be announced in June.]

Some readers may have noticed that we’re no longer in June 2006. But there’s been no further news. Yesterday I decided to contact Keyspan for an update. After jumping through hoops to a) find some way of contacting them, b) pretend my question is a support request (which is where pre-sales requests live, apparently), and c) having to register with Keyspan just to contact them, I got this response:

We haven’t updated the website but we do have new info. Which product are you interested in?

TuneView for iPod or TuneView for iTunes?

This raises two issues:

1. Why don’t support staff read support requests? My question referred to the ‘TuneView Remote’ and the ‘TuneView USB Adapter’ – the same terminology, in the same context, as their announcement.
2. Why isn’t their website being updated? Is it to keep the support staff in employment?

In related news: the support responses come back to you via e-mail (with an appropriately unique subject line), but you cannot reply via e-mail. Instead you have to login to their support site.

[Update: 9 November 2006] I still haven’t heard back from Keyspan. Great support guys!