Oxygen: Women Are Addicted To Facebook, But Unsure Where To Draw The Lines

For a large segment of women, checking Facebook has become a primary part of their morning routine, with the act of scrolling through status updates the first thing they do when waking. In a poll last month of 1,605 U.S. adults who use social media, 34 percent told NBC Universal’s Oxygen Media Facebook comes before brushing their teeth and nearly 40 percent are self-described “Facebook addicts.” The survey also found that 26 percent of women 18- to 34 get up in the middle of the night to read text messages and 37 percent of that group say they have fallen asleep with a PDA in their hands.

Touting Redesign, MSNBC Declares Pageviews ‘Dead’

The big idea behind just about every website redesign these days generally revolves around “less is more” minimalism. But it looks like MSNBC.com’s redo actually means it: the new site, which just went fully live, promises to do an end with clicking on stories and on ads. By introducing a single-page-only format, the company hopes to sell large, customizable ads to marketers as it tries to build a larger audience.
It is also promising to swear off reduce the use “standalone” slideshows, something that has become a staple of many news sites to drive pageview counts as a way of measuring audience usage and engagement to advertisers—instead relying mostly on slideshows that are “integrated,” though the difference was a bit unclear (update: Commenter Jason Lotito correctly points out that integrated slideshows “are part of the page, and don’t require you clicking to the next page.”). As a rep for the cable net told us,“Msnbc.com is in the business of selling advertiser experiences, not ad units.”

The Real Genius Of The Kindle? The Return Of ‘Unitasking’

Thomas E. Weber is the Editor of SmartMoney.com and a veteran business and technology journalist. A former Wall Street Journal senior editor and bureau chief, he created the paper’s first column devoted to the Internet. Those with short attention spans can follow him on Twitter @tweber, or email tweber@smartmoney.com .
When’s the last time you did only one thing at a time?
If you’re reading this—particularly if you’re in the news or content business—there’s a good chance you’ll have trouble answering that question. Technology has long been on a relentless march to “help” us do more things at once. Content is no exception. From TV news screens packed with crawls and overlays to online news, where that newspaper web site is apt to be one of umpteen browser tabs open at once, we’re all juggling ever-more threads of information simultaneously.
But one new technology is taking consumers in the opposite direction, and I’ve found it has unexpectedly helped me reclaim control of my attention span. It’s the Kindle. Unlike most digital devices, Amazon.com’s e-reader makes it difficult to multitask.

Much has been made already of the Kindle’s significance for publishers. By creating a payment infrastructure for digital reading matter, the Kindle is helping prod many to reconsider charging for their wares instead of relying on advertising revenue. Less discussed has been the Kindle’s tendency toward unitasking—but it’s clearly part of the device’s appeal, and it, too, offers lessons for publishers.
Here’s why. The problem right now isn’t just figuring out what type of content people will pay for. An overlooked part of the puzzle—one that’s finally beginning to get more attention—is what type of environment will foster that willingness to pay. And an environment that helps overloaded infovores regain their concentration could have appeal.