News Bytes: June 19

Scripps Networks announced a syndication deal with AOL Video to distribute clips of programs from HGTV, Food Network, DIY and Find Living on AOL sites including Food, Home and Slashfood. The deal includes an ad revenue sharing agreement.

Mobile entertainment provider Viva Vision announced a strategic partnership with the Sports Illustrated Group to license its proprietary slide show application to produce a SI Swimsuit slideshow for mobile handsets.

Ego TV signed a deal to distribute its shows via Clearspring video widgets, beginning with web drama Malibu U., Ego TV's new series following sorority girls' lives in trendy Malibu, CA. Ego TV's Dream Jobs with Tom Arnold and Anatomy of a Rock Star - Doc McGhee will also be featured.

Verizon also announced plans to upgrade its Fios broadband service to accommodate video-happy customers' need for speed. Rates of 50Mbps down/20Mbps up for $140/month and 20Mbps down/20Mbps up for $65/month will be available across its 16 state footprint beginning next week. Comcast launched its 50Mbp down/5 Mbps up service in Minneapolis in April for $150/month but doesn't expect to roll it out nationally until 2010.

TVN Entertainment Corp has entered into a long-term VOD services agreement with Fox Cable Networks to help enhance its own VOD offerings surrounding such core linear brands as Speed, National Geographic Channel and Big Ten Network. Ericcson Group's Tanberg Television unveiled a new content management system called MediaModeler enabling telco operators to offer online video content to television customers through a single, customized user interface.

A new mobile ad platform is being developed by digital Sidebar to deliver ad content using the white space that appears when customers dial a number or send and receive SMS messages. Content includes promotions which link to interactive and multimedia entertainment. Sidebar enables targeting of content to users by age, gender, interests, use patterns and day & time.

Updated: Yahoo’s Exit Door Blown Open: Garlinghouse,Makhijani, Lu Leaving; Reorg Plans Still Fluid
Yahoo’s (NSDQ: YHOO) senior management exodus is picking up steam by the minute: next to go is Brad Garlinghouse, the head of Yahoo’s communications and communities group—and author of the infamous “Peanut Butter Manifesto,” is leaving the company, fed up with the current path the company is taking, we have confirmed. The news was first reported by Techcrunch. Also, not yet confirmed by us, but TC reports that Vish Makhijani, the SVP and GM of Search, is leaving to become the CEO of Yandex, the Russian search engine which is headed for a big IPO.

Garlinghouse is not leaving for any specific job yet, though if recent exec departures are any indication of where the wind is blowing, it would probably be a VC or PE firm.

Meanwhile, Kara reported this morning that the next one out the exit door is Qi Lu, Yahoo’s EVP engineering for Search and Advertising Technology Group. Lu holds about 20 patents and has been heading up Yahoo’s search revenue development projects. Updated: NYT is also reporting that Makhijani and Lu are leaving, and that Makhijani is taking on the CEO role at Yandex.

Our sources say any big reorg plans at Yahoo are still fluid, as the dust on any other senior execs staying or leaving has not yet settled. All these departures mean that Yahoo’s network division, which runs all services on the portal, is without its top leader and two of his four deputies. It is expected that Hilary Schneider, EVP for global partner solutions, will take on more responsibilities.

Menwhile, Jeremy Zawodny, the tech evangelist at Yahoo who left earlier this month, is now joining Craigslist, he announced on his blog...he will be working on the tech side.

Industry Moves: Changes At FIM’s Scout: SVP Patrick Crumb Leaves For Liberty Media; Husvar New GM
Patrick Crumb, the SVP at Fox Interactive Media (NYSE: NWS), and GM of sports site network Scout Media, which FIM bought in 2005, has left the company, and is joining Liberty Sports Group, the newly formed subsidiary of Liberty Media (NSDQ: LINTA). He is joining as EVP of Business Affairs and General Counsel. Crumb had worked with Scout since 2001 and had served as Scout’s President & General Counsel, a member of its board of directors and an investor. In his new role, Crumb will be responsible for leading the group’s efforts in growth and expansion across all existing properties while seeking out new business ventures locally and nationally, it said.

Liberty Sports currently consists of three regional sports networks in Denver, Pittsburgh and Seattle....Crumb is based in Seattle.

Update: Effective July 1, Crumb’s replacement at FIM is Jeff Husvar, promoted to SVP-Operations of Fox Sports Interactive from VP-business operations, and now adding the title of Scout GM. He has also been GM of WhatifSports.com. He’ll oversee all strategy, operations and production for Scout’s online and publishing businesses, according to an internal memo from Brian Grey, SVP and GM of Fox Sports Interactive. Husvar remains based in LA but will ratchet up his time in Seattle, where Scott is based.

Murdoch: Digital Could Make Up 75 Percent Of Dow Jones Revs
Dow Jones gets about half of its revenues from its digital operations right now, and within a few short years, News Corp (NYSE: NWS). CEO Rupert Murdoch expects his subsidiary to receive 75 percent of its revs from its online business. Reuters reported Murdoch’s remarks from the Cannes Lions 2008 international advertising festival, where he was joined by News Corp. COO Peter Chernin. He added that he wasn’t solely referring to The Wall St. Journal, but the other DJ properties, which include its Newswires as well as financial pubs like Barron’s and Marketwatch. Asked about what’s surprised him since taking over the company last fall, Murdoch said he didn’t expect “how cooperative the vast majority of journalists have been.”

Apple Says It Sold 5 Billion Songs; Could Movies Become A $100M Business?
Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) announced today that it has sold a total of about 5 billion songs, up from the 4 billion mark it announced in Jan this year. The more interesting bit is that it is now renting and purchasing over 50,000 movies every day, the company says. Apple has recently done deals with all of the major movie studios after a few years of trying to convince others besides Disney (NYSE: DIS) to come onto the service. At this rate, it will have sold or rented about 18.25 million movies on an annualized basis.

Cynthia Brumfield does some basic calculations on the possible annual revenues for Apple: “iTunes movie sales are priced at $9.99 (for library titles) and $14.99 (for new releases). Rentals are priced at $2.99 (library) to $3.99 (new releases), with Apple TV HD versions of film rentals priced at $1 above the standard rental prices. Assuming that the average price of a sale/rental combined is around $6, then Apple is raking in around $110 million in movie revenue alone on an annual basis.” While that isn’t necessarily a huge amount, that is the amount that didn’t exist before. It is also big in the online/digital video world.

This figure does not include TV shows, which is a much bigger business for Apple and could bring in as much as $200 million in revenues this year.

Fortune: On the music side, this represents a significant acceleration in music sales. It took Apple (AAPL) nearly three years to sell its first billion songs (Feb 23, 2006), ten months to sell its second billion (Jan. 6, 2007), seven months to sell its third (July 31, 2007) and fourth billion (Feb. 27, 2008), and only three and a half months to sell its fifth (June 19, 2008).

SPRINT NEXTEL (NYSE: S) will release its own touch-screen smart phone for $129. Dubbed the Instinct, the new smart phone boasts many of the same features of the iPhone. Sprint had announced that the Instinct would retail for the same price as APPLE’s iPhone, however, by cutting costs Sprint hopes to undermine the iPhone market.

YouTube Screening Room Launches
This evening, I’m updating live from the YouTube Screening Room launch party in Los Angeles, where a press conference will reveal more details about YouTube’s plans to showcase and distribute online high-quality short films from around the world — four shorts to be released every two weeks, with feature-length projects to be considered on a case-by-case basis. Press release includes strong language about “creating new business opportunities for filmmakers,” with all participants enrolled in revenue-sharing and able to link out to sites where the films are available for sale.

Chris is skeptical about the program’s success — what I’m still wondering, though, is if this really will give the undiscovered filmmaker a chance to get greater exposure. While YouTube Film and Animation Manager Sara Pollack was vague on how future films will be selected by an undisclosed editorial team, citing a process of word-of-mouth and filmmaker outreach, she did promise that filmmakers could email YouTube directly at ytscreeningroom@youtube.com to pitch their films. Hopefully they’ll be able to find some hidden gems in the mass of unsolicited submissions they’re doomed to receive — if only so the Screening Room can occasionally feature films produced in the last year.