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50 Cent files lawsuit against “Shoot the Rapper” game

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Famous rapper 50 cent has sued Internet advertising company Traffix Inc. for using his image illegally in a new game called “Shoot the Rapper”. This lawsuit will amount to at least $1 million for damages incurred.

This new game shows 50 Cent walking back and forth in an ad across the top of a Web page while the viewer is encouraged to shoot him by aiming and clicking with the mouse.

Although it does not use the 50 Cent’s name, his lawyer believes that this image resembles the character and physical description of the rapper.

Originally posted on July 21, 2007 @ 11:24 am

Fotolog enters multi-year search agreement with Google

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fotologcom.jpgFotolog.com and Google today announced a multi-year search technology and services agreement where Google will be the exclusive search and keyword-targeted advertising provider for Fotolog’s growing international network.

Google will provide search functionality and advertising across Fotolog’s network under a three-year agreement. Fotolog users will be able to search the site for photos, blogs and online communities, and will also have the ability to search the Web from any page. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

Fotolog is a photo-blogging site with a large audience in Europe and Latin America. With more than 15 million unique users and 3.5 billion page views a month, Fotolog ranks 20th on Alexa’s list of the world’s most-trafficked websites, 20th in page views in Comscore’s May 2007 report, and thereby weighs in as the Web’s third-largest social network as measured by traffic.

Fotolog also announced that it is nearing the milestone of 10 million registered members— a little more than two months after hitting the 8-million mark. More than 4 million new members have joined Fotolog in the first half of 2007, making the site one of the largest independently operated blocks of traffic on the Web. Fotolog is the number 10 site in Spain, according to Comscore, and in Argentina, Fotolog is the number one web domain in the country.

Originally posted on July 20, 2007 @ 11:40 am

Idearc Media and Neighborhood.com sign distribution agreement

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idearc.jpgIdearc Media Corp. and Neighborhood.com have signed an agreement that allows Idearc to place its Superpages.com performance-based advertisers across Neighborhood.com’s search platform.

“As the local search expert, we are pleased to partner with Neighborhood.com to extend our advertisers’ content over their local search platform,” said Eric Chandler, President – Internet for Idearc Media. “This new agreement expands our distribution, allowing us to deliver relevant search campaigns for a greater number of our local and national advertisers.”

“The local search market is growing rapidly as people are going to the Internet first to search for local business information and local services,” said Joel Lefkovitz, Founder of Neighborhood.com. “The integration of Superpages.com advertisers into our site gives us the ability to offer local and national advertisers access to the targeted, quality traffic they need to drive their advertising campaigns.”

In 2006, Superpages.com, the expert in local search, had more than 2.8 billion network searches and more than 18 million small-to-medium-sized business listings in the United States, 11 million of which feature enhanced content.

Originally posted on July 19, 2007 @ 10:00 am

Yahoo invests in Tyroo

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Yahoo! Inc. today announced a significant investment of over 35% in Tyroo Media.

Based in Gurgaon, India, Tyroo, a part of Smile Interactive Technologies Group (Smile Group), is a completely self-serve ad-network offering best of breed advertising solutions for both advertisers and publishers. Today, Tyroo boasts of over 1200 registered publishers across the country.

The cash infusion by Yahoo! will be used to invest aggressively in technology and sales network to reach out to the vast number of small and medium sized advertisers and publishers in India. Tyroo plans on offering newer ad-formats, enhanced customer support and greater flexibility to advertisers and publishers in managing campaigns. Tyroo plans on differentiating itself by its knowledge of local requirements and on-ground support in both pre and post-campaign phases. As part of its expansion plans, Tyroo expects to set up sales offices across the country and triple the team size by the end of this year. In connection with this investment, Yahoo! Inc will be represented on the board of the company.

Originally posted on July 18, 2007 @ 5:58 pm

Travel Ad Network to rep Kayak.com eNewsletters

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kayakcom.jpgTravel Ad Network (TAN), a vertical ad network in travel, announced that it has become the exclusive sales representative for the ad inventory in Kayak.com’s weekly Trip Ideas newsletter. TAN will also rep inventory in Kayak’s daily Fare Alerts and Buzz Alerts. This is also the first time that advertisers will be able to reach the Kayak audience with graphical ads.

The Kayak newsletter is a weekly mix of unique travel destinations, one-of-a-kind themes, and pop-culture infused humor e-mailed every Wednesday. A Destination Spotlight in the emails will give tourism destinations a particularly prominent position to promote themselves to Kayak subscribers.
Consumers who have opted-in to receive Fare Alerts and Buzz Alerts specify where and when they want to travel, along with the price they want to pay. Kayak then searches millions of available flights and alerts the user when the fare meets or beats their desired price. Users can request alerts either daily or weekly.

Originally posted on July 18, 2007 @ 12:20 pm