Bizzy’s AM Coffee Biz-Econ Links (012506)

Free Links:

• iTunes traffic soars — Up 241% in the past year to 20.7 million unique visitors in December 2005. Nielsen has come up with some interesting comparisons of iTunes users vs. the general population.
• Someone’s getting nervous — Iran Blocks BBC Persian web site.
• Survive This Howler — “US reality TV show winner Richard Hatch has told a court he thought the show’s producers would be paying tax on his $1m winnings from the programme.”
• One word: Collectibles — Austrian police have recovered a $60m (£33.9m) 16th Century figurine stolen in 2003 called Saliera, or salt cellar, after a suspect turned himself in.
• The TimesSelect service of The New York Times has 156,000 paying subscribers — That is up from 135,000 reported in mid-November (first item at link). I don’t see how they get above 250,000 by the one-year anniversary of the service in late September. Even 250,000 subscribers would translate to only about $12 million in revenue, which isn’t enough to matter for a company this size. Then the big question will be how much attrition occurs at renewal time. The company’s overall fourth quarter of 2005 was not good. EU Rota has more about the Times’ elitism.
• Yahoo! gives up quest for search dominance — Have you ever seen a company besides Avis concede that they’ll be number 2, and they don’t care?
• When you hear the Big 2 US automakers tell the story, you have to believe that healthcare costs make US plants uncompetitive. Then why is Ford closing one plant and reducing another to one shift in that supposed universal healthcare mecca known as Canada (third paragraph at link)?
• Another UN scandal of billion-dollar proportions.

Subscription required:

• Fluoridated Spring Water? — So you and your kids don’t drink tap water? Dentists are expressing concern that kids aren’t getting enough fluoride. (It’s always something, isn’t it?) So some bottlers are stepping into the breach and have come up with fluoridated lunch-box size versions of their spring-water brands. One thing I didn’t know: Some water springs actually have fluoride already.
• Quote of the day, on compassion — “Compassion and altruism are moral only when voluntarily rendered.”