After rumors of his interest in acquiring Playboy sent its stock on a short flight, Virgin Atlantic CEO Richard Branson said today his company has no interest in buying the magazine.
“Reports that Virgin Group is looking to buy Playboy Enterprises are untrue,” a Virgin spokesperson said in an-email to Reuters.
On Wednesday, the Daily Mail reported Branson was “tipped as a potential buyer.” The story followed a report in the New York Post that Playboy was quietly floating an asking price of $300 million, or about three times its market cap, for the company.
via Virgin Denies Playboy – M and A and Finance @ FolioMag.com.
Finally, Amazon has issued a statement about the deranking debacle, and I get to write a whole new post instead of adding another update to the ridiculously long one below! This afternoon, spokesperson Drew Herdener told the Seattlepi.com:
This is an embarrassing and ham-fisted cataloging error for a company that prides itself on offering complete selection.
It has been misreported that the issue was limited to Gay & Lesbian themed titles — in fact, it impacted 57,310 books in a number of broad categories such as Health, Mind & Body, Reproductive & Sexual Medicine, and Erotica. This problem impacted books not just in the United States but globally. It affected not just sales rank but also had the effect of removing the books from Amazon’s main product search.
via Amazon “An embarrassing and ham-fisted cataloging error” – Broadsheet – Salon.com.
LOS ANGELES — With so much focus on the economy lately, it’s no wonder that the economics of worker productivity are also receiving considerable scrutiny — especially when it comes to viewing porn on company time.
Human Resources departments at companies worldwide are grappling with workplace wankers and the various issues surrounding their masturbatory malingering — from lost productivity to sexual harassment; from exposure to malware to liability over potentially illegal downloads, even long after they were thought to have been deleted by the user — along with the immense legal expenses some of these problems may result in.
While this observer suspects that an equal or greater amount of productivity is lost to instant messaging, email chains and other personal use of the Internet on company time, none of those venues makes for as sexy a headline as “sex.”
via The Growing Problem of Porn at Work – XBIZ.com.
Microsoft‘s latest History of the Internet promotion is a pretty lame, VH1esque mashup of various b-list comedians cracking jokes—until those comedians talk about Internet Explorer 8‘s new In Private Mode.
In this short excerpt, Microsoft endorses their product with a firm nudge and a wink. I mean, Steve Ballmer didn’t go so far as to drop trou on screen, but kudos to the company for not being total prudes about what their software is clearly designed to facilitate.
Just keep those innocent little girls on a different set than your pervy comedians, Microsoft. Seriously, I don’t even want to see them at the same lunch table. [Microsoft via Crunchgear]
via Clips: Microsoft Basically Admits that IE8 Is for Porn.
By Franklin Paul
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Playboy Enterprises Inc, publisher of one of the world’s best known adult magazines, posted a wider fourth-quarter loss, hurt by $157.2 million in restructuring and other one-time costs, as well as weaker-than-expected revenue.
The company, which posted a net loss in each quarter of 2008, also said it would be open to discussions about an outright sale of the company, or changes in the strategic direction of the flagship Playboy Magazine.
Net loss for Playboy, which in recent months has seen a management shake-up including the resignation in December of longtime Chief Executive Christie Hefner, was $145.7 million, or $4.37 per share. This compares with a loss of $1.1 million, or 3 cents a share, in the year-ago period.
Playboy posts steep loss, will consider company sale | U.S. | Reuters.
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