Category Archives: Arts and Culture

Apple Could Put the Final Nail in Nintendo’s Coffin

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By Sam Mattera

The last six years have been terrible for Nintendo’s (NASDAQOTH: NTDOY ) shareholders. After peaking in 2007 with a market cap near $85 billion, Nintendo has steadily collapsed and has now lost over 76% of its value over the last five years.

Unfortunately, this could be the beginning of the end for the once iconic video game company. Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL ) coming entrance into the video game market, a fairly likely possibility, could signal the end of Nintendo.

Nintendo’s business model is becoming obsolete
Ironically enough, Apple and Nintendo have similar business philosophies. Both believe in marrying hardware with software, and maintaining strong control over their devices. Consumers buy Apple devices to get access to their operating systems (iOS, Mac OS); likewise, gamers buy Nintendo’s consoles to play Nintendo’s games.

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Yahoo unveils new logo

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Yahoo unveils new logo for first time since founding 18 years ago

SUNNYVALE, Calif. (AP) — Yahoo has adopted a new logo for the first time since shortly after the Internet company’s founding 18 years ago.

The redesigned look unveiled late Wednesday is part of a makeover that Yahoo Inc. has been undergoing since the Sunnyvale, Calif., company hired Google executive Marissa Mayer to become Yahoo’s CEO 14 months ago.

Mayer has already spruced up Yahoo’s front page, email and Flickr photo-sharing service, as well as engineered a series of acquisitions aimed at attracting more traffic on mobile devices.

The shopping spree has been highlighted by Yahoo’s $1.1 billion purchase of Tumblr, an Internet blogging service where the company rolled out its new logo.

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Microsoft to acquire Nokia’s handset business for $7.2 bln

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HELSINKI: Microsoft Corp on Tuesday said it would buy Nokia’s mobile phone business for 5.44 billion euros ($7.2 billion), and the Finnish firm said its CEO, Stephen Elop, would join Microsoft when the transaction closed.

Finland’s Nokia, once the undisputed leader in mobile phones, has been struggling to respond to the challenge from smartphone makers such as Apple and Samsung .

Analysts say Elop’s bold bet in 2011 to adopt Microsoft’s untested Windows Phone software has yet to pay off.

The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2014 and is subject to approval by Nokia’s shareholders and regulatory approvals. Nokia partnered in 2011 with Microsoft and uses Microsoft’s Windows software to run its mobile phones.

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Batfleck Wants to Save the Day — And Detroit

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By Emily Coyle

Batfleck is brushing Detroit’s bankruptcy blues aside and is here to save the day. That’s right, Superman and Batman are officially heading to Motor City to shoot the sequel of Warner Bros’s (NYSE:TWX) blockbuster Man of Steel, and the good news is it only took a $35-million state incentive to get them there.

According to USA Today, the Michigan Film Office announced the news Thursday and told the largest city in Michigan to expect Batman and Superman on its grounds sometime in the first three months of 2014. The original Man of Steel hit U.S. theaters on June 14 of this year, and was a blockbuster success not only domestically, but also in theaters overseas with a worldwide opening of $196.7 million.

That means good things for debt-ridden Detroit, which will benefit from the $131 million worth of in-state expenditures that the film will require, as well as its widespread popularity and far-reaching audience. Officially announcing its bankruptcy earlier in the summer, the metro area needs all the help it can get to rebuild — help to regain consumer and investor trust, and make Detroit a more appealing place to live once again.

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Filmmaker Lucas Purchases $10 Million in Starbucks Shares

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By Miles Weiss

George Lucas, the “Star Wars” creator who reaped $4 billion selling his company to Walt Disney Co. last year, invested a fraction of his fortune in Starbucks Corp. (SBUX), the world’s largest chain of coffee shops.

A trust controlled by Lucas bought almost $10 million of Starbucks shares, according to a filing yesterday by Mellody Hobson, the billionaire’s wife and a member of the Starbucks board. The couple married in June at Lucas’s Skywalker ranch in Marin County, California, and announced the birth of their daughter, Everest Hobson Lucas, this month.

Lucas, 69, in December sold Lucasfilm Ltd., whose movie franchises include “Indiana Jones” as well as “Star Wars,” to Disney for about $4 billion of cash and stock. The next month, he announced his engagement to Hobson, the president of Ariel Investments LLC, a Chicago-based money-management firm with $6.3 billion in assets as of June 30.

Hobson, 44, didn’t immediately return a telephone call seeking comment. Connie Wethington, a Lucas representative, said in an e-mail that “no comments or statements will be issued with regard to stock inquiries.”

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Steve Ballmer’s Mixed Legacy

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Gates’s Successor Helped Build Behemoth, but Missteps Leave Microsoft Vulnerable

By DON CLARK and SHIRA OVIDE

MSFT +7.29% Steve Ballmer tried new operating systems, new gadgets and new management structures. But the times caught up with a man who helped build one of the greatest companies of the 20th century.

Mr. Ballmer’s surprise retirement announcement Friday follows years of criticism about the waning growth and stagnant stock price of Microsoft, a force in the personal-computer era whose power was once so great that U.S. regulators sought to break up the company.

PC sales—the lifeblood of Microsoft’s business—are on a steady decline. Business and casual users alike are switching to devices and services offered by Apple Inc. AAPL -0.39% and Google Inc. GOOG -0.40%

Investors cheered the news, pushing Microsoft shares up 7%, or $2.36, to $34.75, in 4 p.m. trading Friday on the Nasdaq Stock Market.

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Read Steve Ballmer’s Retirement Announcement to Microsoft Staff

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By Tim Molloy

Microsoft Corp. CEO Steve Ballmer announced his retirement Friday. Here is his email to employees:

I am writing to let you know that I will retire as CEO of Microsoft within the next 12 months, after a successor is chosen. There is never a perfect time for this type of transition, but now is the right time. My original thoughts on timing would have had my retirement happen in the middle of our transformation to a devices and services company focused on empowering customers in the activities they value most. We need a CEO who will be here longer term for this new direction. You can read the press release on Microsoft News Center.

I am proud of what we have achieved. We have grown from $7.5 million to nearly $78 billion since I joined Microsoft, and we have grown from employing just over 30 people to almost 100,000. I feel good about playing a role in that success and having committed 100 percent emotionally all the way. We have more than 1 billion users and earn a great profit for our shareholders.

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Sorry, iPad Mini Fans–Once Again, Google Has The Better Tablet Than Apple

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Robert Hof

*Update: On reflection and the reasonable comment of a reader, I changed the headline to say Google has the “better” tablet, not the “hotter” tablet. In contrast to a year ago, when Google’s new Nexus 7 got attention for its smaller form factor and sold out (admittedly on an undisclosed level of sales), we can’t yet say the new Nexus 7 is “hotter.” But most reviewers seem to lean toward calling it the better one at this point in time.

As soon as Google GOOG -0.26% announced its new Nexus 7 small tablet on July 24, the natural question emerged: How does it stack up against the Apple AAPL +0.55%‘s industry-leading iPad mini?

The answer, according to a number of reviewers: Pretty darn well. In fact, several reviewers place the Nexus 7 ahead of the iPad mini, and at least one recommends it over the iPad mini thanks to a combination of features that beat its rivals’:

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How Nintendo Can Win E3

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By Steve Peterson

Is there really such a thing as ‘winning’ E3? There is the external victory of being the thing most talked about in the mass media, in the game media, and on social media. Those are really three different audiences: The broadest possible audience of anyone who sees, hears or reads news; the audience of gamers who are always interested in game news, and hardcore Nintendo fans. Then there’s victory internally for Nintendo, by whatever standards it chooses to set. Ultimately, it’s the votes cast by consumers in the form of spending that counts.

Nintendo is heading into this E3 in a difficult position. Sales of hardware and software have not been meeting the company’s projections. CEO Satoru Iwata has gone on record that he intends to deliver a billion yen in profits for Nintendo this fiscal year, and implied that he may step down if that’s not achieved. This puts Nintendo in a difficult position for marketing strategy, since any marketing spending has to return a profit within the fiscal year. No long-term brand-building here; Nintendo will be looking for marketing efforts that can produce solid short-term results.


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