Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, speaking to the Washington Post, thinks there’ll be

“no media consumption left in 10 years that is not delivered over an IP network.”

he went on to say this specifically means:

“no newspapers, no magazines that are delivered in paper form. Everything gets delivered in an electronic form.”

You can watch the whole interview over at the Washington Post

I don’t agree with him, buy the way. Newspapers are certainly declining fast and the business model for any printed product including books will have to evolve. But the printed product won’t disappear, it just may be very different from today. In segmentation, size, content, distribution method and frequency of publication amongst others.

Newspapers have done deals in the US letting advertisers use Google to place ads in over 200 major titles including the Washington Post and the New York Times. This makes up about half the total newspaper circulation in the country. Rather than seeing Google as a competitor stealing revenues from print, the titles are welcoming the development as a source of additional revenue. (more…)

Japanese Online shopping giant Rakuten has distributed thousands of copies of Zero90 magazine, a pilot cross media culture magazine targeted at young people. If readers take pictures of certain articles in the magazine via their mobile phone and upload them, they receive promotional videos on their mobile telephones in return, including a contest mechanism. The Rakuten online store tie-in has its own web page offering the products featured in the promotion.

The technology was developed in partnership with Clementec, using their M4 process.