News Bytes: July 2

Robert Redford is taking a desk at Cablevision as a consultant to help produce a series of short films for mobile devices under the Sundance Channel brand, reports the New York Times. He will likely direct them and may even appear in a few.

Adobe released a souped-up version of Reader application yesterday, the first version that allows embedding of Flash movies, Shockwave animation and other rich media goodies in PDFs without having to load a separate player. Adobe also enhanced the newest Flash format to allow Google and Yahoo to index content created in Flash, making it searchable by users around the world.

Fox Interactive Media has taken out a lease for over 420,000 square feet of office space in the Playa Vista development in Los Angeles between LAX and Santa Monica, reports the LA Times. The plan is to bring MySpace, Photobucket, Fox Sports Interactive, IGN, Rotten Tomatoes, AskMen and Fox Interactive Media Audience Network under a single roof.

Home Depot is sponsoring a Spanish-language microsite and web show for Univision.com called Handyman Al Rescate (Handyman to the Rescue) featuring 6 minute tutorials on everything from how to organize your garage to how to remodel your bathroom.

Sanity Prevails, Blockbuster Not Buying Circuit City
Troubled rental chain Blockbuster has withdrawn its bid to buy troubled electronics retailer Circuit City. The company issued a one paragraph release explaining the news yesterday:

“Based on market conditions and the completion of our initial due diligence process, we have determined that it is not in the best interest of Blockbuster’s shareholders to proceed with an acquisition of Circuit City,” said Jim Keyes, Blockbuster Chairman and CEO. “We continue to believe in the strategic merits of a consumer retail proposition that would bring media content and electronic devices together under one brand. We will pursue this strategy through our Blockbuster stores as a way to diversify the business and better serve the entertainment retail segment.”

Vid-Biz
DVDs Dominate, But Young’uns Turning to New Ways; study from Knowledge Networks shows Generation Y (ages 13 - 29) streams and downloads, but isn’t buying, video content. (release)

Yo Joe! G.I. Joe Getting Webisodes
That sound you hear is an entire generation of nerds bursting at the seams with the news that their beloved ’80s childhood cartoon, G.I. Joe, is coming back as an animated web series.

The series is called G.I. Joe Resolute (was G.I. Joe Stay the Course too obvious?) and instead of running around, spouting kid-friendly safety tips in PSAs, these cartoon soldiers will be aimed at a more adult audience. It’s written by comics legend Warren Ellis and will feature people actually dying this time.

The series debuts in first quarter of 2009 on the G.I. Joe web site. (Which leaves plenty of time to promote the live action movie coming out.) The series will have 10 five-minute episodes, and it will be capped off with a 10-minute finale.

Roku's Netflix Player to stream content from other "big name" providers
Roku's Netflix Player got off to a hot start after launching just over a month ago, and apparently its creator has big plans for the plainly designed $99 box. According to a recent report over on Forbes, Tim Twerdahl, Roku's vice president of consumer products, has affirmed that a routine software update would be hitting later this year to enable content to be fetched and streamed from other "big name" providers. Regrettably, the conversation ended there, so there's absolutely no telling which "providers" he's referring to. Still, we're certainly intrigued by the idea of this thing becoming more versatile in the coming months, but wouldn't the name have to be tweaked at the very least?[Via Silicon Alley Insider]

Is Will Ferrell Two-Timing Funny or Die?
Have you no loyalty, Will Ferrell? While Funny or Die toils along, branching into video games to show that it’s stronger than just your wit alone, you’re off gallivanting on iBeatYou, online video home of new mom Jessica Alba and that traitor Baron Davis (see our initial review of the site).

Ferrell showed up on iBeatYou last week with costar John C. Reilly on the set of their movie Step Brothers. They announced a staring contest, which they are currently winning, though it only has five entrants.

So what’s going on? Is there a celebrity video site roll-up in the in the works?

Interview: People.com’s Golin, Hauser: Being More Aggressive By Being Soft; Games Channel Introduced
Celebrity-oriented news sites have grown substantially over the past year—comScore says the category’s traffic has grown 31 percent from May 2007 to May 2008. So while the space has been identified with TMZ, Gawker and PerezHilton, which tend to zero in on the more sordid aspects of the rich and famous, People.com editor Mark Golin and Fran Hauser, People Digital’s president, insist that their site’s softer touch not only resonates with readers more, but it keeps advertisers open to new initiatives as well. Note: Hauser is speaking at our EconCeleb conference later this month in Hollywood, talking about, what else, celebrity content and transforming the brand into digital platforms.

-- Games People.com plays: One of the new initiatives that People.com unveiled this past week is its new Games channel. Launching with six games, such as Celebrity Trivia, Hollywood Hangman, Love Connection and other fun revolving around entertainment, the channel is part of what Golin and Hauser say is a key part of the site’s growth strategy. Hauser: “We’ve built five channels over the last two years. When I came to People.com [in January 2006 as GM] it was only news and photos. Since then, we have built out five separate channels: StyleWatch, TV Watch, Video, archives and a celebrity database. And now we have Games.” The addition of the new channels—along with greater use of search engine optimization and promotion of its RSS feeds—have given People.com 9.2 million monthly uniques (according to May comScore (NSDQ: SCOR) numbers), says Hauser. Golin adds: “Look at the whole entertainment category grew by 31 percent year-over-year. But People.com grew 60 percent.”

Industry Moves
-- AOL: Platform-A (NYSE: TWX) has added two execs to its Midwest team and promoted a third in Detroit. Platform-A’s Midwest team will be led by Rick Simmons, as VP-sales. He moves over to Platform-A after three years at AOL Media Networks. Tina Ienna has been promoted to regional VP in charge of Platform-A’s Detroit office while former Yahoo sales exec Craig Schumacher is Chicago regional sales director. Release.
-- At Universal Pictures, Stan Scoggins has been upped to SVP-worldwide digital asset management for the studio’s creative services group, according to Variety. Having been in charge of the division since 1998, he developed Solar, the company’s online publicity and ad materials repository for its film and TV titles. Scoggins will continue to report to Dan Wolfe, EVP-worldwide creative operations.