1) The Simpsons are going to… cable! FXX, the recent comedy-focused spin-off of Fox-owned FX network has claimed the first cable rights to The Simpsons in a massive, $750 million dollar deal (though this could rise as new seasons are produced) that includes over 530 episodes (and counting). This is the biggest off-network deal in television history, adding another record to the long-running series. Perhaps even more intriguing is the deal’s inclusion for online streaming on the soon-available FXNOW mobile app as well as via video-on-demand. More details on the deal and scheduling are sure to emerge before the syndication begins next August.

2) An even bigger deal may be soon on the horizon as Time Warner Cable appears to be on the market with interest from both Comcast and Charter. First, the Wall Street Journal reported Charter Communications Inc. was nearing an agreement to raise funds for the purchase, a move that falls in line with Liberty Media’s John Malone’s (which owns 27% of Charter) recent pushes for cable consolidation. If that wasn’t enough, CNBC reports Comcast is also interested in a deal for Time Warner Cable, a move supported by their shareholders. This officially makes Time Warner Cable the belle of the ball, as TWC stock jumped to a 52-week high amid the purchase chatter. The FCC hasn’t said anything yet because of course not. But one has to wonder what role they’ll play.

3) Speaking of those guys, the FCC, under newly-appointed chairman Tom Wheeler, has voted to raise the cap on how much foreign entities can own of broadcast stations, both radio and television. Currently, there is a 25% cap on how much foreign companies can invest, a level current commissioners are described as outdated.

4) A new study out of (the) Ohio State University and Annenberg Public Policy Center has found the level of gun violence in PG-13 films is now greater than R-rated films. The study looked at 945 films from 1950 to 2012, noting an overall increase in gun violence and a marked increase in PG-13 rated films since that rating’s inception. The authors call for new restrictions from the MPAA as related to gun violence, particular in those lower rated films.

5) Two of the most iconic pop culture figures of the last 50 years, Superman and James Bond, have now had long-standing copyright lawsuits settled. First, Warner Bros. won an appeal case against the estates of Superman co-creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, ending a copyright claim filed back in 2003 and giving them complete control. Next, MGM & Danjaq have now acquired all copyrights for James Bond after settling with the estate of Kevin McClory, who opened the case 50 years ago after claiming he proposed the idea for making a Bond film to creator Ian Fleming.

6) A big courtroom victory for Google and fair use as a federal judge has ruled Google Books is considered fair use and “provides significant public benefits.” The case had been active for nearly 10 years, when a coalition of authors and publishers started the case in 2005. The ruling will surely move to appeal, but the precedent for fair use is powerful and will certainly have impact beyond just Google’s service.

7) From lawsuits ending to one just beginning: the National Music Publishers Association (NMPA) held a conference where they announced their intention to take legal action against music lyric websites, claiming the sites profit from copyrighted works through their ad revenues. The publishers have targeted 50 websites and sent takedown notices, claiming they will not push for legal action unless the requests for heeded.

8) A new wrinkle in the enduring, critical lawsuits against network streaming startup Aereo as the National Football League and Major League Baseball have taken a side against Aereo, claiming they will move all of their games to cable if Aereo is found to be legal. This “friend of the court” filing with the Supreme Court aims to sway judges and show support for the multiple broadcasters taking Aereo to court. Barry Driller, a major investor of Aereo, doesn’t seem fazed, claiming the NFL is “just making noise.”

9) In the same week Sony released its next-generation video game console Playstation 4 with over 1 million sales, the company announced plans to cut $100 million from Sony Entertainment, making the company leaner and more focused. A large part of this will be reduced film production, a move Amy Pascal says will create “a more equitable balance between risk and reward.”

10) It probably won’t lead to Obamacare level criticism, but Barack Obama hasn’t made friends with some visual effects artists. After it was announced President Obama would visit DreamWorks Animation studio for a speech and visit with Jeffrey Katzenberg, visual effects artists at the company have planned to protest the visit due to the increased outsourcing of jobs to foreign countries.

And finally, two silly stories from a silly industry:

The Internet exploded this week when it was reported an “It’s A Wonderful Life” sequel was being planned. In a surprising twist (like in the movie!), Paramount announced it would fight any proposed sequel, claiming any project would require a license from the studio. With the film possibly dying a quick death, we will all have to ask an angel to show us a world where this sequel did, in fact, get released.

Mike “The Situation” “The Stupid Nickname” Sorrentino of Jersey Shore ‘fame’ is under federal investigation as the U.S. Attorney’s office has issued subpoenas for company records from businesses Sorrentino owns like MPS Entertainment and a clothing line. I would make a joke about this, but I don’t know enough about this ‘celebrity’ to say something witty.

1) Apple has lost an antitrust lawsuit brought by the Department of Justice in a ruling that found Apple to have colluded with five major book publishers in an effort to raise e-book prices. To summarize Apple’s actions, they helped push the e-book publishing market from a “wholesale” model to an “agency” model, “where publishers set the price and Apple got a fixed percentage of the sale price.” This was all part of Apple’s attempts at undercutting Amazon, who have dominated the e-book sales, having once held 90% of the market. A hearing has been set for August 9 to discuss remedies/damages, but Apple says it is already planning an appeal.

2) Just what is happening at Hulu? After weeks of buyer speculation, with recent reports claiming a final group of four buyers (including DirecTV and Time Warner) were making moves to finalize a deal, the sale was called off entirely. The current owners, 21st Century Fox, NBCUniversal, and Disney, claimed the final offers didn’t meet their expectations and have come to a unified strategy. However, reports claim the three owners are considered bringing in more partners, with Time Warner Cable being a potential front runner. Who knows what will happen, as Hulu has been placed on and taken off the auction block before.

3) Speaking of Time Warner, they have some bigger issues at hand as their deal with CBS for retransmission ended in June, and the #1 network is asking for a huge increase in fees. The behind-the-scenes negotiations have spilled out into public threats by CBS to pull the plug, using the threat of blackouts to pressure Time Warner into giving in, claiming in a new ad blitz that Time Warner is, “threatening to hold your favorite TV shows hostage and drop CBS.” While currently nothing has been done, public outcry of blocking a free-to-broadcast channel could lead to FCC or Congressional action.

4) After recently deciding to cut ties with Warner Bros. after eight years, Legendary Pictures has come to a new distribution (and co-financing/marketing) deal with NBCUniversal. The new five-year deal will begin in 2014, following Legendary’s focus on tentpole action films which they hope to leverage with Universal’s theme parks and other cross-promotional opportunities.

5) The announcement and reveal of Rolling Stone’s August issue generated massive controversy, as the cover depicts alleged Boston Marathon Bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and has drawn comparisons to the similar style of framing as their celebrity-laden covers. The cover and the surrounding controversy has led to multiple retailers refusing to carry the issue including Kmart, CVS, Walgreens, Rite Aid and some 7-Eleven stores. The city of Boston has responded as well, with college bookstores taking varying degrees of bans/display and mayor Thomas Menino writing to Rolling Stone’s publisher bemoaning the cover that “rewards a terrorist with celebrity treatment” rather than focus on the survivors.

6) Following last week’s news of the departure of President of Interactive Entertainment Don Mattrick, Microsoft has now detailed a organizational realignment which sees Julie Larson-Green, formerly the head of Windows, becoming the head of a new entertainment-focused group that includes all hardware development, games, music, and video. This shift comes at a crucial time for Microsoft with the release of the XBox One later this year, stuttering Surface tablet sales, and the PR snafu of the new XBox policies and their subsequent reversal.

7) Following the lead of News Corp. and Time Warner, Tribune has announced plans to separate its publishing and broadcasting divisions that will see the Tribune Publishing Co. take control of its eight newspaper holdings, while Tribune Co. will retain the local TV stations, WGN America, and stakes in Food Network, digital and real estate assets. The spin off is meant to allow both companies to retain greater focus and tailor operational strategies to better suit their mediums. Some are wondering if this means a potential selling of either new company in the future, as Tribune is not publicly traded.

8) Although Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, AOL, and other advertising network managers recently unveiled a set of voluntary “best practices” to help fight copyright infringement, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) does not think it is enough. The anti-piracy plan calls for the networks to respond to copyright holder complaints with a dedicated contact person. The ad network would then lead an investigation to decide whether to contact the site, deny ad placement, or simply remove the site from the network. MPAA chairman Chris Dodd claims this only addresses a small part of the problem while placing too much burden on the rights holders… like the people in the MPAA.

9) In a follow-up to reports a few weeks back regarding the shutting down and then reopening (a less-staffed) Greece public broadcasting station, the Greek government has now launched a new network, Greek Public Television (EDT), to take over for the Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation (ERT). ERT’s staff is now opposing the new channel, demanding a re-opening of the original broadcaster.

10) Aereo has won again at the courts, as a U.S. appeals court has declined to rehear the case brought by major broadcasters like Disney’s ABC and Comcast’s NBC. The broadcasters claim Aereo (an online television start-up that retransmits over-the-air networks) infringes copyright, but courts refused to shut down Aereo at a hearing back in April. The larger cases (CBS Broadcasting Inc et al v. AEREO Inc and WNET et al v. AEREO Inc) are still being decided, but for now, Aereo will stay on the… online.

1) Rupert Murdoch has had an eventful few weeks following the announcement of his divorce. First the good news, as the splitting of News Corp. into publishing and entertainment arms has led to big business for the newly named 21st Century Fox, which will hold onto the film and television studios as well as their cable channels. The immediate result was 21st Century Fox getting one of the highest valuations over Disney and Viacom with a growth in shares over 2%.

2) Now for Murdoch’s bad news, as reports this past week allege Murdoch was caught on a secret audio recording admitting to bribery of police officials, stemming from the investigations into News Corp. tabloids hacking into phones in Britain. Murdoch belittles police and the hacking inquiry, while giving support to his staff for their known behaviors. Scotland Yard has already requested access to the tapes, while Parliament member and Labour Party politician Chris Bryant has requested the FBI take action and press corporate corruption charges against News Corp.

3) Major shake-ups in Warner Bros. executive management structure, starting with the ousting of Pictures Group President Jeff Robinov.   Rather than simply replace Robinov, Warner Bros. instead has created a new three-person team to lead the division, made up of Greg Silverman, Sue Kroll, and Toby Emmerich, all promoted from within. However, the three will all be reporting directly to Warner CEO Kevin Tsujihara, giving him more direct power over the film studio, in addition to his increased control of the television side.

4) Sticking with Warner Bros., Legendary Pictures is officially no longer tied to Warner, with talks ending and Legendary’s Thomas Tullmoving onto talks with others studios, such as Fox and NBCUniversal, with the latter seeming the most promising.

5) One more story for Warner Bros., as the studio has clashed with The Weinstein Co. over the title of TWC’s upcoming film “The Butler.” Warner won an arbitration over the title after asserting their rights to the title due to a 1916 comedy short of the same name (Of course!). TWC’s attorney David Boies plans to appeal and possibly file a lawsuit challenging the MPAA’s ruling, citing the claim of a confusion over the films as having “no plausible basis.” Warner Bros. responded, citing past TWC “rules violations.” This should move fast, as the film (Whatever it will be named) is currently scheduled for an August 16 release in the U.S.

6) Jim Carrey has come out against the violence in “Kick-Ass 2,” the upcoming sequel that Carrey himself co-stars in and features heavy violence involving an 11-year hold vigilante. A tweet referencing Sandy Hook had Carrey saying he couldn’t support the level of violence in the film. Executive producer and original comic writer Mark Millar responded with surprise, noting how Carrey approached them about appearing in the sequel after enjoying the original.

7) The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (the Academy Awards folks) has extended an invitation to 276 film professionals to join the Academy, an unusually large number. The list of names is markedly younger than in years past, as well as more diverse with several invitations to Latinos and an expansion of the documentary branch.

8) Just months after he helped reveal the XBox One, Microsoft’s president of Interactive Entertainment Business Don Mattrick has left the company to become CEO of social gaming giant Zynga, best known for Facebook games like Farmville. Mattrick was lured away with a compensation package from Zynga of over $50 million in cash and stock.

9) Two of the largest book publishers in the world have merged, with the newly formed Penguin-Random House becoming the undisputed king in publishing and a possible competition to Amazon. Penguin-Random House now controls about 30% of trade book sales.

10) Jay-Z’s Magna Carta Holy Grail will not have its official retail release until tomorrow, but after partnering with Samsung that saw the company purchase one million copies for its smartphone and tablet users to download via a free app, the album will likely be certified platinum immediately upon its release. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) changed their rules for certification to allow those pre-release digital sales to Samsung to count towards its total immediately, rather than waiting the normal 30 days for digital sales. Billboard, however, will not count the one million Samsung sales towards its total for ranking on its Billboard 200 chart. So… we may never know if Jay-Z’s new record is actually popular.

1. The big news in Hollywood last week that caught many by surprise: Kevin Tsujihara was named CEO of Warner Bros. The studio is hopeful he’ll bring stability, but especially digital distribution savvy. Also shooting for stability is MGM, which is reworking its credit line to free up more money, while 20th Century Fox also cut a new financing deal. Unrelated bonus link: a Nielsen demographic study of movie audiences.

2. Fruitvale was a big winner at Sundance, which Variety critics thought was a successful, if commercially inclined, festival this year. Also of note was the equal gender balance of directors in competition, a first for the festival. This is representative of a higher percentage of female directors active in independent cinema than Hollywood studio filmmaking, according to research shared at Sundance by USC researchers.

3. There are still some Blockbuster stores left to shutter, and sadly, 3,000 jobs will be lost in this latest round of closings. Stores are also closing in the UK. Dish is still backing the Blockbuster brand, though, with a new On Demand redesign coming. But iTunes rules the online On Demand world right now, while discs fight to maintain home video sale prominence.

4. The music industry is having trouble making streaming royalties worth it to musicians. Too bad they can’t all enjoy a Super Bowl sales bump from being a halftime performer or make $8 million in ad deals like “Gangham Style” (though you have to watch out for sound-alikes) or have fans who are big pirates.

5. The company that supplied my very first video game console one lovely Christmas morning way back when has filed for bankruptcy, though apparently Atari hasn’t been what it used to be for awhile now, and it will even sell the iconic logo. Some other gaming bummers: THQ is being dissolved, Disney is closing a game studio and laying off fifty people while shifting to a focus on mobile and social gaming, and weak Wii U sales and 3DS piracy are hurting Nintendo.

6. Despite those bummers, the video game industry’s many challenges, and EA posting a recent loss, EA executives are optimistic about the future of console gaming. There’s a new Xbox coming with more processing power, and we’ll soon hear more about a new Playstation, though some think Sony should just move on from that platform’s legacy.

7. Samsung is warning that major smartphone growth is over, but maybe the company’s just bitter that Apple has surpassed it as top US phone vendor. The iPhone is declining in Asia, though, and Apple is losing tablet ground globally to Samsung and others. Apple’s still doing good work with tax loopholes, though. And at least it’s not BlackBerry.

8. France is having none of your English-language “hashtag” business on Twitter. For the French, “mot-dièse” will be the word for # on Twitter. (Mot-dièse means “sharp word,” though a sharp symbol leans the other way than the hashtag symbol, but hey, quoi que). France is also demanding that Twitter identify users who tweet with racist and anti-Semitic hasht…er, mots-dièse. Back in the US, Twitter’s dealing with a porn problem on the new Vine platform and is trying to censor porny hashtags. I doubt the French would respect that. #prudes 

9. GIFs are on the decline?!

10. Some of the finer News for TV Majors posts from the past few weeks: Soap Contract Conflicts, Glee’s Song Theft, Super Bowl Ad Issue, Netflix Strategies, More on Netflix, 30 Rock Reflections, Spoiling Super Bowl Ads, CNN Changes, TWC & Dodgers, Aereo Update, The Following Criticism, Pilots Updates.

Programming note: Because I recently took on some new time-consuming duties, like Associate Online Editor for Cinema Journal, I’ve regretfully had to step away from WAYM for the time being. But don’t fear: WAYM will still be here! Eric Hoyt’s media industries course will be taking over for the rest of the semester on the regular bi-weekly schedule, and I can’t wait to see what they can do with it. (Sage advice: When in need of a good link, Lionsgate and porn are always there for you.) See you later!

1. Giant publishers Penguin and Random House are combining forces, a move which some say is absolutely necessary for survival against the onslaught of e-book competitors, and it’s likely that consolidation will continue, with money rather than culture driving publishing. A new era is also heralded by the Macmillan Dictionary going online only.

2. Brooklyn is becoming a key moviegoing region, thanks to new ventures like a hybrid theater/DVD rental store/bar. Further south, Virginia has seen its status as a movie production region boosted through tax incentives, with Lincoln providing a model example. The loser in that scenario is Los Angeles, which has lost over 16,000 production jobs since 2004, and now LA stands to lose porn workers too.

3. It’s shaping up to be a decent year at the movie box office, and there’s also increasing money to be made in video-on-demand, foreign markets (though China’s now a question mark), product placement, and branding.

4. Warner Bros. is beset by in-fighting, while Sony Pictures’ financial struggles continue. And though Sony insists the studio’s not for sale, Viacom’s CEO says fine, we totally don’t want to buy your stupid studio anyway. And now here comes Michael Eisner getting back in the game with Universal, which might mean…Are you sitting down? (Right, you’re probably sitting at a computer)…a new Garbage Pail Kids movie.

5. 33% of North American peak residential downstream internet traffic now involves Netflix, but while Netflix’s growth may have drawn some online video pirates away from BitTorrent, traffic via BitTorrent is still increasing. Mega is getting back in business in New Zealand, while Pirate Bay’s founder, already in detention in Sweden, is looking at new charges.

6. Spotify’s valuation just went down, but the music service has had a good 2012, with new investors and expansions and plans in place to rescue the music industry after it finally craters. Web radio is also doing well, though the battle over online royalties stands to get fiercer, and musicians are growing more dissatisfied with Pandora. The impact of such services on music fan habits is muddled, but at least one big label is now at a digital tipping point. And through it all, the hated Nickelback just keeps making bank.

7. You’ve heard this before: Console video game sales are down, the eleventh straight month of declines. Though the impending release of new generation consoles could break that streak, rumors are that there might not be as many physical games to buy soon anyway. But here’s something new: good old-fashioned board games are growing in popularity, apparently sparked by online gaming and the desire for social alternatives.

8. Election night was a big internet and social media night, as Twitter and Facebook saw huge activity, and Instagram also made its mark. Google+? Not so much. President Obama spent considerably more on social media than his challenger did and took greater advantage of internet marketing and data, and Obama’s tech team is getting high praise for its role in his re-election success.

9. Former Hollywood exec Peter Chernin has joined Twitter’s board of directors, and it seems he has some catching up to do as he helps to plot a new future for the social media service. That future will include tweets from the Pope, though His Holiness might want to get on board with the impressive Tumblr too.

10. Some of the finer News for TV Majors posts from the past few weeks: Social Media Data, Amazon Money, Time-Shifting Down Too, ESPN’s Tebow Obsession, TV Wars, First & Second Screens, +3 Compared to +7, +7 Ratings, House of Cards Trailer, New MTV Programmer, BBC Crisis, Fox News & the Election, Rove’s Performance, Return of The Killing, Gay TV Impact.

Occasionally media companies also organize these programs. Last week I attended Time Warner’s “College Professors Thought Leadership Seminar,” focused on media research, at their new Media Lab in New York City. Presenters included vice presidents of media research from Turner, HBO, Warner Bros. Entertainment, and Time.

Halfway through the program, our MC announced that much of the research material is “proprietary” and should not be “shared” publicly. His comment shows the tension within the media industry between promotion on the one hand, and control on the other. For TW, educational aims don’t square perfectly with competitive aims. Of course I feel no such conflict.

The presenters emphasized TW’s commitment to “innovation” and “unparalleled passion for storytelling.” But they confessed also to an interest in “bolstering the ecosystem,” which eventually emerged as their main objective. In fact TW’s chief innovative strategy is TV Everywhere, the plan to restrict online program access to subscribers to cable and satellite video services. And what recommends it to company executives is precisely its supposed ability to “extend an existing successful business model” and discourage “cord cutting” (i.e., canceling multichannel video subscriptions). The industry’s dogged, perhaps panicked, insistence that its business model will survive social and technological change was one of the most instructive features of the seminar.

The Turner VP presented studies from 2008 and 2010 “proving” that audiences will sit through as many ads in online video as in linear television (non-timeshifted viewing). In these studies, more ad interruptions did not lower the viewing rate. When I suggested these studies predated the rise of Netflix, an ad-free streaming option, this executive remained serene. Audiences won’t change, he insisted, and everybody in the industry is “happy” with the interrupting ad model. I am skeptical, however, that the audience will share the industry’s contentment.

The HBO representative bemoaned his company’s lack of access to customer information, which is held by multichannel video providers (cable operators, DBS, telcos). HBO depends on those providers for marketing HBO subscriptions and so is reluctant to break from that “ecosystem,” despite evidence that there may be a market for freestanding OTT (over-the-top or streaming) HBO GO subscriptions. That HBO is reluctant to break from its providers, despite being well positioned to compete with Netflix in the OTT “space,” indicates the depth of resistance in the cable industry to such a possibility.

Famed media researcher Betsy Frank presented a biometric study in which participants wore belts measuring heart rate and respiration, and glasses with tiny POV cameras. While the study demonstrated the fragmented attention spans of “digital natives,” it left open the question of whether sustained attentiveness is a consequence of the technology used or the maturity of the users. Every media shift has produced hand-wringing over youthful attention spans; is multi-platforming a new behavior or just a newly measurable behavior?

Warner Bros., one of the largest television program production companies, also syndicates programs to local broadcast stations and cable networks. Such programs include off-network shows, such as reruns of Friends and Big Bang Theory, and first-run shows, such as Ellen and TMZ. This presenter explained that “syndication” is an old media term: they have renamed themselves “WB Branded Networks” because they offer, along with the usual episodes and 30-second spots, the opportunity to integrate advertising into these programs using three strategies. When, say, clips of Big Bang characters eating hamburgers are wrapped around a commercial for Burger King, we have “contextualization.” When a week of episodes is “themed” around an advertiser, we have a “brand takeover.” When the ad is integrated directly into the program, we have “branded entertainment.” Ellen DeGeneres, for example, promoted Ore-Ida sweet potato fries during her talk show not only with an ironic, Arthur Godfrey-inspired pitch, but also with a tongue-in-cheek dance routine using dancers costumed as giant sweet potato fries:

Integrations are as old as broadcasting itself. The inspiration for the Ellen integration is probably this 1952 example for Old Gold cigarettes:

But the Ellen integration relies on irony to disarm audience resistance to the shill.

Much more can be said about TW’s seminar, but I hope I have inspired some readers to take advantage of these industry programs. While TW may expect educators to follow its “thought leadership,” in fact industry programs give us the opportunity to develop our own informed critiques of media industry strategies.

1. The Academy has issued new provisions for future documentary Oscar nominations, including eliminating committee determination of nominations and adding a rule that a doc has to have been reviewed by the New York Times or LA Times to qualify (intended to prevent TV docs – *side eye at HBO* – from horning in on a film award). The latter has drummed up controversy, but Michael Moore insists it’s all good. Unrelated to this controversy but related to the Academy, the organization’s chief executive Dawn Hudson is under major fire.

2. IndieWire highlights 2011’s studio box office trends, as well as what happened at the specialty box office, which was apparently so much that it required a second part. Midnight in Paris led specialty grosses, while it was a down year overall for animation. British Prime Minister David Cameron wants UK filmmakers to shoot for topping one of these box office revenue lists in 2012. And the number of studios backing films that will make such lists is reduced by one, as Lions Gate has acquired Summit, thus putting The Hunger Games and Twilight series under the same banner.

3. Warner Bros. is getting tough about its DVD rental window delay, and while Netflix has caved, Redbox and Blockbuster are poised to fight. Unfortunately, Blockbuster is also poised to die. While Netflix is cooperating with Warner Bros. on DVDs, it is pulling out of the Warners-backed UltraViolet, which has yet to take off, though now Amazon and Samsung are trying to help out.

4. Publishers Weekly highlights 2011’s print bestseller trends, and USA Today says fiction sales were the big story last year, while a post-holiday e-books sales surge is the story now. It sounds like the Nook isn’t benefiting as much as it could from that, while the Kindle Fire could end up stomping other e-reader devices in the end, including the regular Kindle, not to mention other tablets.

5. Music stocks were mixed in 2011, vinyl album sales soared, rock sales were up, and digital sales surpassed physical sales for the first time, but indie labels got just a 12% cut of overall music sales. Most strikingly, only about 2% of the total album releases were responsible for 90% of new album revenue in 2011.

6. You might be tired of reading here about how video game sales in the US are slipping, so I’ll change it up for you: video game sales in the UK are slipping. The Consumer Electronics Show presented some hope for revitalizing the gaming industry, from Nintendo’s Wii U to Microsoft’s Kinect for Windows.

7. Twitter failed to predict the Iowa caucus winner but nailed it in New Hampshire, and the main takeaway is that Ron Paul could totally be the president of Twitter if he wanted. Twitter did pretty good at predicting a health epidemic, but it apparently falls short on fighting against pedophiles.

8. Twitter got mad at Google for incorporating Google+ into search data because it might diminish Twitter’s influence, and Google was all, This is your own fault, jerks. Facebook got snooty about it more quietly. Some think this is a big mistake by Google; others see it as pushing Google ahead in the online identity race. Google+ is growing, but I don’t think it’ll get to 1 billion users by August like Facebook.

9. Around the world in three sentences: Belarusians can no longer access foreign websites and India is threatening China-style controls, whereas in Sweden file-sharing has been recognized as a religion. Text messaging is declining in some countries, and globally, a mere 1% of bandwidth users are consuming half of all the traffic. Apple supplier factories in the Far East are rife with labor violations, as a This American Life segment recently exposed.

10. Some of the finer News for TV Majors posts from the past two weeks: All the TCA posts, Great Television Women, New TVs, iPad Value for Cable, Court Leaning Toward Indecency Regs, 2 Broke Girls at TCA, More Content to Xbox, Netflix’s UK Launch, Moffat & Sexism, Defending Pop Culture Studies, Louis CK’s Lesson, HBO Ends Netflix Discount, Consumer Usage Report, Reality TV Class, Comcast-Disney Deal, Netflix Doubles Up Hulu, Netflix Originals Plan, Viewing Stats, Internet Changing Syndication.

Ten (or more) media industry news items you might have missed recently:

1. Raking in $1.6 billion in revenue this year, YouTube dominates as the top online video destination, with much of that audience coming from overseas. Given Disney’s global popularity, its new deal with YouTube might pay off richly then, especially if it can nab viewers via tablets, as a new study indicates that tablet viewing pays off more than desktop viewing of online video in terms of viewer engagement. Just imagine how engaged you’d be by a 52-inch tablet playing Maru videos.

2. Home video spending finally rose this summer for the first time since 2008, and the studios are looking to bolster it even more by considering a 60-day ban on DVD rentals, while Warner Bros. is hoping its Flixster service for the UltraViolet system will move digital product, with the new Harry Potter release as an early test (to mixed reviews thus far). Few in the indie film world seem to care when a movie is released on VOD and theatrically simultaneously, but Hollywood did care about Zediva’s remote DVD streaming service, and that’s accordingly been shut down.

3. Oscar made more changes than the ones you certainly heard about, including hiring a new talent producer and scrapping the ten nominee quota for Best Picture. Steven Spielberg’s The Adventures of Tintin has tossed its hat into the Best Animated Feature ring and is already playing overseas to big box office. Based on what Peter Knegt says, the upcoming Independent Spirit Award nominees (announced November 29) aren’t likely to also make the Oscar cut.

4. Alexander Payne finally has a new movie coming out next week after a seven-year absence from features, while the master of the long absence, Terrence Malick, is reportedly shooting two movies (!) back-to-back (!) next year. To ensure that studios can afford to make more movies without absences, Gavin Polone suggests that they should take some perks away from stars, but it appears that the logic of perk-removal is leading to an exodus of execs from Twentieth Century Fox.

5. The major studios are supportive of two Congressional bills to rewrite the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and record labels want to see the DMCA rewritten too, but technology groups and musicians are staunchly opposed to the proposed changes. But hey, I’m sure content providers are acting in good faith, right? Like Warner Bros., which admitted to demanding files be taken offline under DMCA rules without actually looking at what those files were, let alone knowing if it owned them (and one of them was actually a web comment, not a file: “A scraper apparently misidentified part of a web comment as an infringing URL, and no one at the studio noticed the mistake.” Ha! Oh, Warner Bros., silly studio.).

6. Reading tablet wars! Barnes & Noble is going after the Kindle with a new Nook, and Samsung is going after both of them with the updated Galaxy Tab, while Amazon is making the Kindle more attractive with the Lending Library, though major publishers aren’t on board. If publishers continue to drag their feet, it seems possible that self-publishing could come along to usurp them. The future might also bring e-textbooks and glowing screens.

7. The music industry just got smaller with Universal and Sony’s split purchase of EMI (Universal got the recording part, Sony the publishing part), though regulators still have to sign off. While Universal can celebrate that, it received bad news that a class action suit against them is moving forth; it accuses Universal of underpaying digital royalties, including on ringtones (which are still a big business). Sony, meanwhile, just has its eye on dominating the music industry.

8. Angry Birds has big sales and big influence, and now has its own store in Finland. And with physical game sales down (though Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 certainly did alright), such phone games are showing dominance. A new study out of Michigan State says playing video games can make kids more creative. Indeed, when I play Angry Birds, I often end up formulating very creative scenarios for demolishing my iDevice.

9. Did you know the internet died last week? Only for a few seconds, and only for Time Warner Cable customers, but still. Most aren’t missing Internet Explorer, and Microsoft is basically reduced to paying users to download it. Wikipedia might need to start paying editors, because many articles are missing citations (this article also cites a German Wikipedia backlog clean-up competition called Wartungsbausteinwettbewerb, which is the coolest word that will ever appear in WAYM).

10. Some of the finer News for TV Majors posts from the past two weeks: All-American Muslim Preview, All My Children on Hold, Covering PSU, Escalating Sports Rights, EAS Glitches, Harmon Responds, Twitter Involvement, AMC’s Laziness, NBC’s Struggles, Streaming Challenge, Student Awards & Scholarship, A La Carte Experiment, Sitcoms in Syndication, Raking in Retrans, TV Set Struggles, Good Wife PSA.

1. I doubt that anyone who wanted to read it missed this, as I saw it linked everywhere, but I wouldn’t want even one person to miss out, so I’ll include it here anyway: a highly affecting profile of film critic Roger Ebert in Esquire. Plus, some of you might have missed Ebert’s response, as well another journalist’s praise for the quality work from Esquire‘s reporter. The Independent also has a fascinating story about Ebert getting his real voice back (sort of), which you can hear Tuesday on Oprah. Finally, if you’re not following Ebert on Twitter, you’re really missing out.

2. The latest social networking platform to freak us out is Chatroulette, invented by a 17-year-old Russian. If you haven’t tried it out yet, first check out this video explanation by Casey Neistat (note: some NSFW language, but no naughty images). Many have tried it out, including The Office writer Mindy Kaling, who tweeted, “Chat Roulette is horrifying. We just used it in our writers room. It was naked guys or guys in Jigsaw masks.” Also, you might unexpectedly come across Ashton. But not everybody is freaked out by it, and some even say if you hate it, you hate the internet. Of course, as a perceptive Slate article notes, we’re always afraid of new media technologies, and besides, without Chatroulette we’d never have gotten this awesome tumblr site: Cat Roulette. Bonus article: a history of social networking.

3. YouTube just celebrated its fifth birthday, and while its co-founder says that from the start they envisioned the site as the people’s voice, NewTeeVee calls BS on that and claims that wasn’t a factor until the people themselves pushed the site that way. One result of such a push: a prestigious George Polk Award for the video of the murder of Iranian demonstrator Neda Agha-Soltan. The NYT’s Brian Stelter has background info on the video, including an interview with the anonymous uploader. But the WSJ’s Evgeny Morozov reminds us that we can’t idealize the power of the internet and social media, and the band OK Go’s frustrating experience is a reminder of who’s most often really in control online. Something very much worth reading in that regard: a simple guide to Net Neutrality.

4. The Oscars are coming up next Sunday. To bolster your Oscar ballot cred, you can read some reviews from people who have actually seen the documentary shorts and the animated and live-action shorts. Also, when the ads come on during the awards broadcast and you have to actually talk to your fellow Oscar partygoers, you can use one of these handy conversation starters: hey, didja see that list of the 50 most deserving Oscar winners of all time; the story about Oscar’s anti-comedy bias; the “preview” of James Cameron’s Oscar speech; what the Academy does with Oscar night revenue; that rude email from the Hurt Locker co-producer and the outcry about it, which is only one part of the backlash against Hurt Locker that’s suddenly cropped up, though it probably won’t hurt its chances anyway; and that Variety apparently takes bribes? If you can’t make a friend with one of those, then there are no friends at that party to be had.

5. Studio news: MGM is dead broke but carries on for now. Warner Bros. is dominant. Disney’s not about the stars anymore, it’s about either the toys or the cheap but also the boys. The Wrap summarizes Hollywood’s for sale signs, while Vanity Fair gives us Hollywood’s top earners.

6.  The kiosk DVD distributor Redbook came to an agreement with Warner Bros. on a 28-day delay window for new releases, and some analysts see dark days ahead for Redbox, while studios are in a tough spot too. Mashable says it’s consumers who will lose. Winners? TechCrunch says piracy. And video rental stores like Blockbuster could benefit, if they live long enough. In a related issue, Disney wants to shorten the Alice in Wonderland DVD release window, which the Guardian sees as nothing less than a future-of-cinema issue. But rather than go read all that, you could instead just watch the very first version of Alice in Wonderland (1903) that the BFI has posted online.

7. The Wrap says the video game industry desperately needs innovation, including the possibility for “video games controlled solely by the mind.” Two other video game stories that caught my eye: the LA Times breaks down where the $60 you  spend for video games goes, and Gamasutra writes about the art of creating video game characters.

8. Some women and the media questions: Can social media bring opportunities for women? Where did all the angry rock grrrls go? And a preview excerpt from Susan Douglas’s new book: where does girl power stand today?

9. Avatar has put “virtual actors” on everyone’s mind: Forbes (with a whole series of features), the LA Times, and film scholar Kristin Thompson chime in. But how about making the animated (Buzz Lightyear) look human?

10. Finally, some of my favorite News for TV Majors links to links from the previous fortnight: pilot previews, the BBC overhaul, the ABC News overhaul, indecency complaints tallied, the lure of reality TV stardom in India, problems at Lifetime, Alec Baldwin = Jack Donaghy, interview with John Wells, and the future of serials.