News
An announcement that GoFish Corp. is changing its name to Betawave in order to shift its emphasis to attention-based engagement metrics is expected today. Matt Freeman, 39, who joined digital media and entertainment company GoFish in June, remains CEO of Betawave. Company headquarters will remain in San Francisco. Freeman previously was CEO at Omnicom’s Tribal DDB Worldwide. A self-proclaimed entrepreneur, Freeman founded that company in 1998 when it launched as the digital arm of DDB. He was recruited from Modem Media by Ken Kaess and Keith Reinhard, who were DDB’s CEO and chairman at the time.
GoFish Corporation announced today that it had relaunched as Betawave Corporation. GoFish had built a portfolio of represented youth sites with a large emphasis on virtual worlds. The company says that the rebranding–and the reference to the Beta state of consciousness–reflects its commitment to advertising in contexts that promote engagement and attention over pure reach and pageviews. Betawave combines both with a total reach of 69 million unique users per month around the world averaging 54 minutes each month on Betawave partner properties. The rebranding follows a $22.5 million round of financing in Decemeber.
Introducing the most popular Internet celebrities of last year: Smosh. If you haven’t heard of the comedy duo from Carmichael, Calif., you’re not alone. But Ian Hecox and Anthony Padilla host the No. 3 most-subscribed-to video channel on YouTube. IStardom, a Web start-up that tracks Internet celebrity, declared Smosh the most popular name in online entertainment of 2008…YouTube appears to be weighted more heavily in iStardom’s celeb rankings. But the service does take other online social tools, such as Twitter, MySpace and Facebook, into account. The fact that we’re even talking about this just goes to show that social media is a lot like a popularity contest. But when the kids sitting at the “cool” lunchroom table are a couple guys who dress up as cardboard box men…it should give a glimmer of hope to any average Joe.
