The Tickle File is ftm's daily column of media news, complimenting the twice weekly feature articles on major media issues. Tickle File items point out media happenings, from the oh-so serious to the not-so serious, that should not escape notice...in a shorter, more informal format.

We are able to offer this new service thanks to the great response to our Media Sleuth project in which you, our readers, are contributing media information happening in your countries that  have escaped the notice of the international media, or you are providing us information on covered events that others simply didn't know about. We invite more of you to become Media Sleuths. For more information click here.

The Tickle File is a time honored journalistic tradition. Invented in 1761 by Urs Tickes, editor of a long disappeared Swiss newspaper, it is an effective tool for organizing article ideas.

To each journalist Tickes would hand 10 file folders saying "Halten Sie Ihre Ideen organisiert und Ihre Schreibtisch sauber, verdammt!"

Unfortunately Tickes met an unfortunate demise. While personally escorting a shipment of 10 million file folders from Sweden, the boat was sunk and all, including Tickes, was lost. Rumors of involvement by a militant Swiss journalists guild - Die organisierte Gesellschaft des Rechtgehirns, durcheinandergebrachte schweizer Journalisten - were never proven.

The legend of Tickes continues...

Here is the ftm Tickle File with notes from the ftm team...and you!

Tickle File Week of November 13, 2006

Three Georgia (Europe) TV Stations to Merge

Tbilisi-based TV stations Rustavi 2, Mze, and Pirveli Stereo are to merge, according to Koba Davarashvili, director general of Rustavi 2.

The Georgian Industrial Group will become the primary shareholder in the merged group via its Georgian Media Incorporated. GIG’s business ranges from cement to coal mining, to a charter airline, to the media. Already GIG owns 22% of Rustavi 2, 22% of Mze and 65% of Pirveli Stereo. Rusatavi 2 already had a shareholding in Mze. No management changes are contemplated, according to Davarashvili

Rustavi 2’s major competitor is Imedi TV in which News Corp. took a minority interest in April.

Ford To Spend More Advertising Money on Emerging Technologies

Ford, which usually spends around $2 billion annually in advertising, says its going to spread its spend in 2007 to cover more play on emerging technologies.

Not that television, its prime medium, is done, but things are changing. “The days of running a 30-second commercial on three major commercial networks are over,” said John Felice, Ford general marketing manager, at a Bank of America auto conference.

Television  “is still a very important element of your marketing mix but it’s much more broad, much more deep, much more integrated and experimental,” he said. “Having alliances that make sense for that target consumer and activating those alliances are all part of the marketing platform.”

Will AP News Give The “Power” To Thomson’s Financial Customers?

Thomson Financial has signed with the Associated Press to provide its coverage of North American news to its financial clients in the hope of becoming more news competitive with the likes of Reuters, Bloomberg, and Dow Jones.

While no one can compete with the AP on its breadth of North American news coverage – the all-important question twill be how quickly will that AP news get written and appear on Thomson wires where the need for speed is far greater than for newspapers or broadcasters, even the Internet.

There’s an old adage in the financial news business –those who get the news first are all powerful, those who get is second or later are powerless.

Thus those financial services that have their own complete news services know that every second counts – indeed many traders say they make a deal based on the headline of an alert and don’t even wait for the story – so what will be all important to Thomson in this deal is how quickly AP provides the breaking alerts.

New Private Radio Stations Take to Air in Morocco

The Moroccan government licensed its first private radio and television stations last April. Operators were deadlines to set up and start broadcasting. Ten radio stations and one TV station received licenses in what the regulator called the “first wave” of private broadcasting.

Radio Hit, Chada FM, Radio More and Radio Atlantic have been on the air since November 17, covering Casablanca, Rabat and other large cities. Coverage of smaller cities should be completed by May 2007.

Medi 1 Sat – the first private TV channel – is expected to launch in December, suffering several technical delays.

Lebanon and Morocco are the only Arab States to license private broadcasting.

Another € Billion Deal Struck

Lehman Brothers, Mid Europa Partners and Al-Bateen Investments announced the €1.19 billion purchase of Ceske Radiokomunikace from Bivideon, an investment company owned by Iceland’s billionaire Thor Bjorgolfsson and Deutsche Bank.

Once the Czech state owned radio and TV infrastructure company, Ceske Radiokomunikace AS has continued to leverage itself into a major telecom unit, buying the Tele2 Czech mobile business in May to become the number 2 Czech mobile phone provider.

The deal is the largest leveraged buy-out, so far, in the Czech Republic .

Could UK TV Junk Food Ban Also Hit Magazines?

With British TV stations still trying to figure out how to replace junk food advertising aimed at children under 16 that will be banned next January, the next media sector that will probably get hit with a similar ban are magazines.

The Advertisement Standards Authority is said to be coming up with recommendations it will make soon to the health minister scaling back junk food advertising in children’s magazines.

The UK Health Ministry seems to like what the Office of Communications (OFCOM) has recommended for television, and reportedly has officials looking at how such bans can also be applied to billboards, the Internet and radio.

CBS Appeals In Federal Court the Nipplegate FCC Fine

CBS has gone to the Philadelphia Appeals Court to argue against the $550,000 fine against it by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for the wardrobe malfunction during the 2004 Super Bowl half-time show when Janet Jackson’s nipple made it onto terrestrial TV for the blink of an eye.

The FCC’s viewpoint: “CBS continues to ignore the voices of millions of Americans, Congress and the Commission by arguing that Janet Jackson’s halftime performance was not indecent.” CBS’ viewpoint: The FCC has yet to find one shred of evidence to show that CBS knew about, or played any part, in what happened.

CBS is also appealing against four profanity rulings.  It told the appeals court it is “seeking a return to the FCC’s previous time-honored practice of more measured indecency enforcement.”

There Are Limits To How Long We Will Watch An Internet Video Clip

Consumers are far more likely to stream video online rather than download it, according to a video study conducted by market research firm Pathfinder for video search engine Podzinger.

The survey also says that a video ad of 15 seconds is okay but beyond that patience runs out and also video ads need to be refreshed – there is also aggravation watching the same video time after time unless it is so clever as to attract one’s attention time after time like many of the Super Bowl ads that seem to particularly target humor.

News is still the most popular video with entertainment accounting for 36% of all video online play, but only 6% of available video is in the entertainment category.

Sign Of The Times: Armored Cars Advertised ON CNNI

A sign of our violent times: BMW is advertising armored cars on CNN’s service seen in Europe and the Middle East.

Spanish Newspaper Circulation Dives in September

Observatorio de la Prensa reports circulation at the big eight Spanish newspapers fell in September. Hardest hit was ABC, dropping 17.8%. Total circulation of the largest Spanish newspapers fell 4.2%.

La Razón y La Voz de Galicia gained 4.8%

EGM figures, considered authoritative, will be released in mid December.

FM License for Baden-Württenberg Advertised

A set of FM frequencies will be available for coverage in the major population centers of the Baden-Württemberg State, including Stuttgart, Freiburg, Heidelberg, Heilbronn, Karlsruhe, Pforzheim.

The license for bigFM expires in 2007 and Landesanstalt für Kommunikation Baden-Württemberg (LfK) President Thomas Langheinrich noted in the announcement statement that its audience has been shrinking and a new youth channel “could” expand radio listening.

The regulator opened for applications beginning immediately. Apply on-line at http://www.lfk.de/ausschreibungen/hoerfunk/main.html.

Helsingin Sanomat Prints Pictures From The Winter War, Continuation War

Finland and the land now known as Russia have, over the centuries, fought more than 40 wars together. The common joke in Finland used to be that one night the whole country got drunk and the next day found itself fighting the Russians.

Among the fiercest of those wars were the Winter War (1939 –1940) and the Continuation War (1941 –1944).  The fighting on both sides was particularly brutal.

Very stark black and white pictures taken of the horrific effects of such fighting – half naked pictures of Finnish women and children strewn on the ground, a soldier holding a burned infant corpse in his arms, even cannibalism by some Russian troops – have been stored in a Helsinki garrison. This past Sunday a ban on publishing those pictures expired and Helsingin Sanomat printed some of those horrifying pictures in its Sunday newspaper and also on its web site.

During that period of Finland’s history after the wars known as Finlandization – an independent free Finland did not want to pursue policies that would purposely disturb its giant Soviet neighbour with whom it shared a 700-mile (1200 km border) – it was not seen as opportune to release pictures showing what Finns did to Russians and what Russians did to Finns during those wars. A law was passed in 1981 banning the release of the pictures but now 25 years later the ban has expired and things have changed – Finland is for the rest of this year the President of the EU and the Soviet Union is now the Russian Federation -- – and there was no further “need” to keep the pictures hidden.

What is perhaps most amazing is that the very worst of the pictures have not been printed because they are so horrific. And yet horrific is the term that comes to mind when one sees those pictures that were printed, so one can only imagine the inhumanity to man committed by man in those wars in those pictures not published.

Perhaps they should be printed as a reminder to the world of what war is really all about.

World Cup Directors Keep The World’s Press Waiting So The Press Walks Out

The invitation said 1 p.m. sharp. But those who called the hotel news conference hadn’t shown up by 2:10 pm., so the international press walked out. Not a very auspicious meeting organized by the South African 2010 World Cup Organizing Committee.

And naturally the world press’ talk has turned now to such sarcasm as, “If they can’t even organize an international news conference how can they organise an international World Cup championship”? That, no doubt, will not be lost on the FIFA chieftains in Zurich.

One local soccer (football) journalist summed it up. “We have become accustomed to this kind of thick-skinned arrogance and disrespect towards the media, but we had hoped matters would change once the World Cup operation swung into gear.”

Apparently not!

Yahoo Copies LiveDeal Strategy and Signs Classified Partnerships With Newspapers

Seven newspaper groups, representing 176 newspapers, have made a major decision to team up with an Internet technical expert for their online classified business and this could be the start of a major movement in which they can gain back some of that business lost to the likes of Craigslist and others.

Doing the deal with Yahoo means that eventually the newspapers will be able to take advantage of Yahoo technology and at the end of the day all of their content will be tagged and optimized for Yahoo searching and indexing.

To begin, however, the newspapers will post their classifieds on Yahoo’s HotJobs, and start using HotJobs technology to run their own online career adds.

Yahoo, in teaming up with newspapers, has taken a page out of LiveDeal’s book. LiveDeal struck a deal with AdStar in July so that when a LiveDeal customer posts an ad online there is also an option of publishing the ad within the print edition of the participating local newspaper by using the AdStar print ad placement platform. The print ad is created automatically using the information within the online classified ad, the software automatically formatting the ad for the selected newspaper, matching the LiveDeal category with the newspaper’s appropriate category, and submitting the finished ad to the newspaper’s publishing system for print and online publication.

LiveDeal has been actively seeking to partner with newspapers but has seen little success although the Toronto star liked the idea so much that it bought into the company and started a Canadian LiveDeal site.

But Yahoo’s size and reach appealed more to the seven groups that have now signed. They are MediaNews, Hearst, Belo, E.W. Scripps, Journal Register, Lee Enterprises, and Cox Enterprises.

Landmark Day For Google

Back on August 19, 2005, Google went public at $85 a share. It had been looking to go at around $115 but Wall Street thought that was priced too high.  Fifteen months later, on September 21, 2006, the shares cracked the $500 barrier, closing at $509.

For those who would have had the stomach for all the ups and down in between it would have been quite a ride. And quite a profit!

Google’s share of US searches actually fell slightly in percentage terms in September, falling to a 49.6% share from the 50% share it held in August.  But that’s still 3 billion Google searches, up 23% from the year before. Google’s loss was Yahoo’s gain; its September searches were up 30% over the year before and in September it had a 23.9% share of the search market, up from its 23.4% in August.

Record September for French TV Ads

The back-to-school month of September is always big; this year just bigger. SNPTV – the French Association of Television Advertisers – said advertisers spent €495.5 million this September, a 4.5% increase over 2005. Calculating in current euros month of September ad spending in France has increased 52.8% since 1996.

For the first three quarters of 2006, TV ad spending was €3.87 billion, up 5.9% from the same period in 2005.

notes:

TF1 has reported profits down 20% so far this year, mainly because of high rights payments for the World Cup

Real Madrid Scores Record Football Rights Deal

Real Madrid, the super-star of super-star football, just set another record…selling TV production rights through 2013 to Mediapro Group for €1.1 billion. Pay-TV company Sogecable has broadcast rights through 2008, after which everybody will pay more.

Advertising biggie WPP Group owns 20% of Mediapro.

Lagardére Plays Big Money For Sportfive

The money in sports can be found at all levels. French media company Lagardére is now in the sports rights management business with a €865 million purchase of Sportfive, the high-profile team and venue management company.

The deal buys out RTL Group, Advent International and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners which purchased Sportfive in 2004.

WPP Group came in second in the bidding.

“If You Do Not Listen, I Will Kill You”

It’s just a quick little promo for Mina Hadjian’s show on P3. Convicted murderer Veronica Orderud, on home leave, popped into the studio and recorded a promo for her favorite show.

"Hi, this is Veronica Orderud, and I listen to Mina every day. And if you don't, I'll kill you,"

Mina’s 10 am – noon program on the Norwegian public radio youth channel is rich with clever words, sound effects and an occasional lap dance.

Time For A Yahoo Reorganization?

A senior Yahoo executive thinks its time for a change at the company that has seen its shares drop 30% this year – isn’t that kind of drop supposed to be happening to traditional media and not new media?

Among the proposals from Senior Vice President Brad Garlinghouse – shed 20% of the workforce, become more focused, and bring competing initiatives together (Yahoo runs two separate photo and music services), and drop non-core businesses.

“We need to boldly and definitively declare what we are and what we are not,” he wrote. That’s the type of talk Wall Street just loves. Could he be lobbying for Chief Yahoo?

Big Increase In Web Financial Ads

Yahoo’s share price really went south a couple of months ago when the company announced its third quarter earnings were going to be on the low end of analyst estimates because of a downturn in automobile and financial advertising. World now comes from Nielsen/NetRatings that financial ad activity has picked up and that should translate positively to Yahoo’s fourth quarter bottom line.

Financial services companies are a huge force on the web – they made up 30% of October ads, up from September’s 28% and 21% last September.

Merrill Lynch Ups Online Ad Forecast

Merrill Lynch has increased its Q4 US online revenue growth from 27% to 30%, based on word from the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) that Q3 revenue was up 33% compared to last year.

For the entire year Merrill believe online ad revenue will grow 23.3%.

Analyst Lauren Rich Fine believes the continuing success of social networking and video sites could propel advertising revenues higher. “With more spending going to social networks and online video really starting to become monetized, we suspect our estimates will need to be r3evised over time,” she wrote in as report.

Belo’s Numbers Show What Works, What Doesn’t In US Media Today

A.H. Belo is a multi-traditional media, multi-platform American media company. Dissecting its October revenue numbers gives a good an idea of what is going on in the American media today.

• With one of the fiercest mid-term Congressional elections of all time the TV group saw revenues increase 27%in October over a year ago. The political advertising was worth $20.7 million

• Internet advertising was up 56% over October a year ago.

• Newspaper advertising was down 6.6%

To Answer Our Question Posed Monday: Yes, There Is Such A Thing As Too Much Bad Publicity

Rupert Murdoch has publicly apologized for publishing OJ Simpson’s Book,” If I Did It, Here’s How It Happened” and scheduling two interviews with the former movie football star on his Fox network next week saying the project was “ill-considered”.

Murdoch’s hand-written apology came only after his people failed in their attempt to pay an amount said to be in seven figures to the families of the victims of the 1994 murders so they would give their blessing to the project going forward.

Within an hour of the families saying “no” Murdoch’s written apology was issued. 

Bill O’Reilley, a leading personality on Murdoch’s Fox News had been urging the public to boycott for life any advertiser who sponsored the interviews on the sister Fox network.

Simpson was to have been paid $3.5 million for the book and interviews and there was no early word on what happens there. There was general revulsion by the American public to the announcement last week of the book and the ensuing interviews.

There had been plenty of negative media stories, including Fox affiliates refusing to carry the interviews. Murdoch used to have a media tabloid reputation that fit such a project, but he is now considered an elder statesman and perhaps the most listened to man in the American media world today. Such a project does that image no good.

Seven Group Raises €1.5 billion With KKR For Acquisitions

Australian media company Seven Group raised €1.5 billion in an equity deal with venture giant Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR). The deal creates Seven Media Group, holder of TV channel Seven Network, Kerry Stokes’ publishing business and 50% of a joint venture with Yahoo.

“It's a clever move,” said media analyst Greg Fraser, quoted by Bloomberg. KKR will invest €440 million for 50% of Seven Media Group. Big banks put up the rest.

In the five weeks since deregulation of Australian media ownership, €4 billion has been raised.

Universal Music Sues mySpace

Universal Music Group made a deal with YouTube for a royalty share when users downloaded copyrighted material and that stopped a threatened lawsuit, but similar negotiations broke off with MySpace last week and Universal has now filed suit in US District Court that the social-networking site encourages its user to share music and video over which it has no copyright.

In very harsh language Universal claims “MySpace “is a partner in theft”. It says the site “encourages, facilitates, and participates in the unauthorized reproduction, adaptation, distribution, and public performance” of material for which it does not hold copyright.  It says MySpace is trying to hide behind the façade that it required those who upload material to its site to grant it a license to publish the content, but the lawsuit says, people cannot grant a license for material they do not own.

Meantime a group of music companies, including Universal Music, lost out in their attempt in a Chinese court to ban Baidu.com, the country’s largest search engine, from continuing its popular MP3 search facility, which is basically used to download music from other sites.

It was the fact the music came from external sites and not from Baidu that got the case thrown out. The court said Baidu was not responsible for copyright infringements since it was not offering the material itself, merely it was pointing people in the direction where to find it.

Is There Any Such Thing As Bad Publicity?

The US publishing and TV worlds are really talking exception to the printing, by a News Corp. company, of OJ Simpson’s forthcoming “If I Did It” book telling how he might have killed his wife and her friend. Everyone calls it a virtual confession, but he can’t be charged twice for the same crime(s). And, in Simpson’s $3.5 million deal there are also two nights of an interview, Nov. 27 and Nov. 29 on the Fox network with the former movie and football star.

But revulsion is filling America. Even Fox employees at other channels are urging people not to watch the interviews.  Boycotts are urged of advertisers. Some Fox affiliates have already dropped the programming. Booksellers are none too happy, but mindful of first amendment rights, they are suggesting that any monies made be given to charity.

The New York Daily News, which in the last ABC audit saw its circulation drop for the first time behind the News Corp., New York Post, is blazing both barrels as it accuses the Judith Regan and her publishing company, owned by News Corp, and Murdoch of going after blood money.

So, is that all good stuff and the book will sell out and the ratings on the interviews will go sky high? Or is there such a thing as bad publicity after all? Let’s not forget that Murdoch made his start in tabloid journalism. He is no prude -- this is just up his street. Stay tuned.

GM Cars Lead Auto Impressions On The Web

More people in the US look at General Motors' ads more than any other automaker on the web with 38.4% of all such impressions. Ford is close behind with 33.1% and although DaimlerChrysler comes third it is far far behind with just 9.8% of all such auto ad impressions, according to Nielsen/NetRatings.

In September GM scored 771,047 such impressions and Ford 664,270 which could be a good reason why both companies have said they are looking at spending more money on their web activities.

The highest ranked non-US carmaker is Toyota with 3.8% of all auto ad impressions (75,961).

And while it is usually the young who are credited with being the most web savvy, when it comes to searching the web for information to help make a car buying decision the most proficient users are between 45 – 55. That might be because that age group has more money than the young – the most proficient income bracket is the $50,000 -$75,000 wage earner.