CBS Interactive Acquires Clicker.com

Is this CBS's answer to Hulu?

CBS has been the lone major-network hold out from Hulu, the Internet TV service backed by News Corp, Disney, and Comcast-NBC Universal. However, going up against rivals collectively 13 times its size isn't easy. Once viewers go to Hulu for their Internet TV, what will draw them away to Clicker? If CBS has a great show or 2 people might come but when they settle in for the evening it'll be Hulu on their screen and CBS will be missing out. (Mashable article)

Fox News Looking for Trouble on Electric Autos

Fox News criticized the U.S. Department of Energy’s decision to hand nearly $1billion in loans to energy-efficient car developers Fisker Automotive and Tesla Motors. The reason? Both California companies currently produce expensive cars that are made in Europe, not America, Fox News noted on its programs. Not so fast, says HybridCars.com: “While the all-electric Tesla Roadster is currently being built in England, and components of the Fisker Karma plug-in hybrid are made in Finland, Fox neglected to fully explain that the loans will be used to establish US manufacturing facilities for more affordable future models.” A deeper analysis on this can be found at non-profit Media Matters. (WSJ VC Blog)

Payback!

Berkshire Hathaway, Inc. Cuts Moody's Corporation's Stake To 16.98%-Reuters
Thursday, 23 Jul 2009 10:15am EDT 

Reuters reported that Berkshire Hathaway Inc lowered its stake in Moody's Corporation. Berkshire sold 7.99 million shares of the parent of Moody's Investors Service for $217.6 million, or an average $27.25 per share, on the open market this week, according to a U.S. regulatory filing late Wednesday.

Moody's Downgrades Berkshire Hathaway, Inc.'s AAA Credit Rating-AP
Thursday, 9 Apr 2009 02:50am EDT 

The Associated Press reported that Moody's Investors Service lowered Berkshire Hathaway, Inc.'s rating to Aa2 from Aaa. 

Pfizer, AmEx, Cisco Lead Charge Against Hourly Legal Billing

With the recession crimping legal budgets, some big companies are fighting back against law firms' longstanding practice of billing them by the hour.

The companies are ditching the hourly structure -- which critics complain offers law firms an incentive to rack up bigger bills -- in favor of flat-fee contracts.

Pfizer Inc., which spends more than $500 million a year on legal matters, says it expects to reduce its domestic law-firm spending by 15% to 20%, largely through flat-fee arrangements. It will pay 16 law firms lump sums to handle various portfolios of work, such as litigation and tax matters. "I have told firms you cannot make your historical profit margins" on Pfizer work, said the pharmaceutical giant's general counsel, Amy Schulman.

At Sidley Austin LLP, Sara Gourley, a partner, said changes made by Pfizer have given her more freedom to put the best mix of lawyers on a legal matter. Pfizer used to have a rule that no lawyer with an hourly rate higher than a second-year attorney's could bill the drug company for legal research. Now that costs are fixed, Ms. Gourley says, she has been able to assign a senior associate to perform Pfizer legal research who could get the answers much more quickly than a junior lawyer might. (WSJ)

Gut Reactions: Moral Conviction, Religiosity, and Trust in Authority

Gut Reactions: Moral Conviction, Religiosity, and Trust in Authority

Daniel C. Wisneski, Brad L. Lytle, and Linda J. Skitka
Psychological Science: Research, Theory, & Application

Morality and religiosity are often thought to go hand-in-hand, but theories in moral development suggest that religious beliefs tend to require the ongoing presence of external leaders and rules, while moral beliefs are held even in the absence of such authorities and institutions. New research shows morality and religiosity also have different effects on our trust in political leaders. When volunteers were asked about a controversial issue, those with stronger moral convictions expressed greater doubt that political authorities would make the "right" decision about the issue, while religious people had more trust in the political authorities. Results also suggest that these opinions stem from gut reactions rather than deliberation. (Psychological Science)

Twitter Answers Idea

Gobry has a cool idea to monetize Twitter. It's Mechanical Turk on steroids.

As EMC choses McAfee over its own RSA Security division for Mozy security, EMC's head of RSA, Coviello, says McAfee is all wrong

"Anti-virus software is less effective every year" because of the
speed with which malicious hackers now generate new viruses to test
vulnerabilities, declares Arthur Coviello, president of RSA, the
security division of EMC Corp. "By the time a security company sees it and figures out an anti-virus [software fix], there are 30 more viruses."

Coviello is not giving up on winning. His point is that security must evolve beyond protecting a network's perimeters--hard points to determine as big data centers interconnect more frequently. And there are ever more types of devices for accessing a network. Security must be augmented with a means of organizing and protecting the most critical data in a system, he says, by putting that software into the management layer that controls the core of the system, and having it guard the most vital information. That way even if attackers penetrate the system the most important stuff is protected with security software that, among other features, looks for anomalies in the way the data are being used--such as, for example, if someone is seeking to transfer sensitive files to previously unknown computers in Latvia.

According to Coviello, ensuring that key data are protected by a close tie to the management layer of a data center is not something a security company can do on its own but only in conjunction with a larger provider of software and services for the network. In this world, he says, "there is no reason for an independent security industry to exist." (Forbes, ChannelWeb)

Interestingly, McAfee's CEO happens to be a former EMC exec.

Cutest funding move ever? Adopt a line of Miro code

The folks behind the open source video player Miro have launched a program that lets users adopt a line of code in order to support Miro's continued development. Aside from helping out a nonprofit, open source project, you'll also get a picture of your adopted code snippet and will be able to watch it "grow up" as the code matures. (ARS)

Brilliant Marketing Scheme is Evil and Coming Soon

Cellular operators could monitor and mine SMS traffic to find when users would likely be most receptive to marketing messages. Just sent a text to a friend asking where the meetup is for tonight's happy hour? Now's a great time to flash you an ad for John's Salon & Pub. Sent Mom some pics of the kids? Maybe you'd like Snapfish to print them for you...

The system could even be location-aware, so you get local ads. Ultimately, the system bends the line between the real and virtual worlds, and between marketing and being your personal advice column. If executed carefully, it could make your brand/service/product pretty sticky and beloved by consumers. Cross the line, and you're dead meat.

Inspiration by Brian Dolan @mobilehealth

The $300 Million Button

A couple of web designers increased sales at one ecommerce company by $300 million a year just by fixing the user interface with one little button.

Makes you think about what you're doing that's pushing away customers. (User Interface Engineering)

Remote Experts Help Rural Victims

A telemedicine facility set up at St. Joseph Hospital has been operating for about six years now, letting nationally recognized experts from the University of California at Davis sit in on local sexual assault exams. A study released in the medical journal “Pediatrics” last month found that telemedicine facilities, like Eureka's, greatly improve the quality of sexual assault examinations. Times-Standard (California)

Surgical Safety Checklist

NEJM study shows that when surgeons review a simple checklist before surgery, outcomes improve. In response, England has given surgeons until 2010 to begin using the checklist. Bravo. My only question is why it is going to take surgeon two years to learn to read a simple piece of paper. (NEJM)

Kodesh to head EMC's Cloud Infrastructure Business

EMC Corporation has announced the appointment of Harel Kodesh as President of EMC's Cloud Infrastructure Business. Kodesh will be responsible for the growth and development of EMC's global cloud infrastructure products and solutions and for the expansion of the business' partner eco-system.

Kodesh will also serve as the CEO of Decho, the recently-created EMC subsidiary focused on personal information management in the "cloud." Decho (short for "digital echo") helps individuals protect, manage and enrich the ever-growing quantity of personal digital information. As a member of EMC's executive management team, Kodesh will report to Joe Tucci, EMC Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer.

"We believe EMC is among the rare few to possess the foundational technologies, vision and fiscal strength required to succeed as a leading cloud infrastructure and services provider," said Tucci. "Harel's depth of industry and business management experience, combined with his extensive expertise designing and developing enterprise and consumer-class information management products will serve as tremendous asset to customers and shareholders as we embark into our next phase of technology innovation. We're very fortunate to have an executive of Harel's caliber join the EMC management team."

Procter and Gamble taxes fat employees, smokers. Congressman Carney says US should do same

U.S. Rep. Chris Carney says that a local program that gives workers a financial incentive to stay healthy could serve as a national model.

Carney discussed issues in an interview Friday with staff from The Daily Review. In the interview Carney also said he was very troubled over the current situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and discussed his views on the financial future of the Social Security program and ways that the No Child Left Behind Act needs to be improved.

Health care

To address the high cost of health insurance, Carney said the federal government needs to get involved in programs designed to prevent poor health.

Carney said a successful preventative program at Procter & Gamble’s Mehoopany plant could serve as a model for what could be done nationally.

The plant reduces its employees’ payments toward their heath insurance premiums if they meet any of six different measures of health, such as if they stop smoking, keep their blood pressure in a normal range and have a normal body-mass index, Carney said.

If they meet one of the measures, they’ll see in their paycheck a $7 reduction in the amount they pay toward their health insurance premiums, and if they meet all six, their health insurance premiums are reduced by $42 per pay period, he said.

As a result of the Procter & Gamble program, “productivity at the plant has increased, sick days have dramatically decreased, and employees are actually competing with each other to get healthier,” Carney said.

“I think the Procter & Gamble program is a way ahead (a way forward) for health care,” Carney said.

An emphasis on preventative health programs would also save taxpayers large amounts of money, because taxpayers currently have to pay the bills of people who lack health insurance and are treated at emergency rooms in hospitals when they become very sick, he said.

Daily Review

Business Model or Advertising Gimmick?

AT&T has announced plans to bring its mobile phone service business model to laptops, subsidizing the cost of the devices for customers who sign a 2-year service agreement.

A closer look at the plan reveals significant differences between the phone and laptop programs that make them apples and oranges.

First off, laptops cost more to begin with. This means that while mobile handset subsidies generally account for more than 50% of the device's total cost, laptop subsidies will probably be in the 15% to 30% range.

Next, laptop net service traditionally costs less. That may be because it was only available in a very limited way, but so what: the point is - phone service expense is already a consumer budget item, but people aren't used to paying monthly for their laptop. Just ask Boingo.

Finally, the laptop is not exclusive to AT&T like so many mobile handsets are. That element of lock-in doesn't exist in the computer industry. (And let's hope it never does...)

AT&T, Lenovo Offer Subsidized Laptops, Information Week

Richard Sarwal Returns to Oracle

After only nine months on the job, VMware's head of research and development is packing his bags and returning to Oracle.

Richard Sarwal resigned his post effective immediately in order to
resume his life at Oracle, where he spent almost two decades. Sarwal
was plucked from the database outfit by VMWare's former-CEO, Diane
Greene, in December 2007. from the Register

Why don't drug ads work? Or do they?

excerpt of article by Keith J. Winstein and Suzanne Vranica

(Companies Featured in Article: Amgen, Schering Plough, Novartis)

Consumer advertising for prescription drugs had a negligible impact on sales of products studied by Harvard Medical School researchers -- in a finding that may confound both advertisers and their opponents.

The study may undercut the arguments of opponents of such ads, which have been allowed almost nowhere outside the U.S. Critics say they lead to drug overuse and misuse by impressionable patients pressing their doctors to prescribe what is seen on TV.

But the study also raises the question of whether the pharmaceutical industry's $4.8 billion annual spending on such ads is a waste of shareholders' money. from WSJ U.S. Drug Ads Questioned

Hospitals Share

What is it with different hospitals sharing the same name? Beth Israel and Beth Israel Deaconess is confusing enough, but I can't make heads or tails of Mount Sinai Medical Center and Mount Sinai Medical Center.

Both are large metropolitan hospitals with affiliated medical schools. Both have the same name. One is in New York, one is in Miami. They are apparently unaffiliated and try to pretend the other doesn't exist. Mount Sinai NY has 1,171 beds and 2,181 attending physicians. Mount Sinai Miami has 955 beds and more than 700 physicians.

P.S. There's also one in Toronto. 472 bed Mount Sinai Hospital.

Trounson handed $3B, told to build stem-cell therapies

Alan Trounson’s job is to figure out how to spend $3 billion.
Doesn’t sound that tough on its face, but there’s a pretty
big catch: He’s supposed to give the money to people who can find
stem-cell-based medical therapies within a decade.

Trounson, a researcher who was a pioneer of in-vitro fertilization, runs the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, the shop set up after the state’s voters approved raising $3 billion in bonds to fund stem cell research. He’s profiled in today’s WSJ. from WSJ Health Blog

Google May Start Venture Fund

Btw, Sergey Brin's wife is a former partner at health investment fund Catalytic Health. from NYTimes DealBook