The Tina and Barry Show: Tina Brown the former editor of everything you can think of got into Barry Diller's pockets for a new online project

By SDH Like almost everyone who once worked on the print media side at some point or another, Tina Brown is taking her next act to the web and got Barry Diller to come out of his pockets to back it. Brown will launch a new un-named aggregated news site which seems to be the norm now because there is a need for more destinations as to read the same aggregated shit. Diller seems to be the go to person if you have a half way decent idea for a website. One of his most recent backings is the Huffington Post spin off, 236.com. Brown's new venture is already being compared to other sites like Huffpost and the Drudge Report and may even have an editor already. We're sure Brown won't be throwing a huge bash to celebrate the launch of her latest effort. Diller is really rolling them out huh? IAC is set to roll out their website for brown people next week. While some have speculated that the site is an attempt by Diller to rejuvenate IAC, such analysis is surely hyperbole. IAC, after all, still is a $6.1 billion company even after its shares have been nearly halved in the past year. Additionally, IAC's online content efforts of late -- including financial site FiLife.com, a joint effort with News Corp.'s Dow Jones, and political comedy site 23/6 -- are of negligible value compared with such IAC assets as Ticketmaster, Ask.com and

Has Barry Diller been faking it all along?

“He has a vision, and he’s not quite sure what it is, you know. And then he kind of fakes it until he makes it.” -Diane von Furstenberg, Barry Diller’s wife and IAC board member By SDH The battle is in full swing between IAC/Interactive Corp CEO Barry Diller and majority shareholder John Malone. The latest back and forth may have tipped in Diller's favor, but things from the past may come back to bite him where the sun doesn't shine. Diller's fashion designer wife and IAC board member,” Diane von Furstenberg during a "60 Minutes" interview sort of painted her husband as a winger and/or a pretender by saying he “Fakes it till he makes it". Statements like these can probably serve up a huge blow to Diller who is fighting for dear life to hold on to the maze of companies known as IAC/Interactive Corp. So has Barry been faking it? According to many analysts he isn’t an effective CEO. Diller’s decision to split up the company in 5 stand alone companies is seen by some as the result of something that was built up so fast, it got out of hand. One of Diller’s biggest acquisitions Ask.com which originally had delusional episodes of taking on search giant Google, recently announced that it is changing its focus from Google and will transform itself into a search engine locked in on married Southern and Mid Western women. Is this the result of another fake it till you make it approach that failed? The coming weeks will decide Barry Diller’s legacy. Will he be remembered as a builder of businesses for other media CEOs or will he be remembered as that, and a builder and ruler of his own empire? If John Malone wins, he (Barry Diller) will be remembered as the man who built a major internet company only to find out he wasn’t the boss all along.

Ask.com admits defeat, changes focus from Google to married Southern and Midwestern women

"No matter what (Ask) did, it just wasn't enough to get people to leave Google, This looks they are raising the white flag." - Chris Winfield, President 10e20, a search engine consulting firm. BY SDH Since being acquired by IAC/Interactive Corp, Ask.com has undergone some changes. First Barry Diller killed Jeeves changing it from Askjeeves.com to just Ask.com, then it tried to take on Google turning it's focus to search, (wishful thinking), now Ask.com is about to take on something even tougher than Google, women. The site is remaking itself into a search engine for married Southern and Midwestern women looking for their next pie recipe. Apparently Ask.com feels these women have been ignored by other women targeting media companies like Sugar Inc and Glam. Well this is true because these companies are focused on trendsetting city women, so Ask.com may have found a sweet niche, or so Ask.com CEO Jim Safka hopes!

Even Barry Diller thinks he may be out of a job in the coming weeks

BY SDH Barry Diller can't seem to catch a break at all. Ever since the man has been in the media and entertainment business he has worked for someone. When he set up his internet holding company first as USA Interactive and then later on as IAC/Interactive Corp, we all thought this was finally Barry's turn to be the boss. But as it turns out, Diller was really never the boss at IAC. The real boss was and is John Malone who is in the middle of shaking up IAC until Barry Diller falls out. It all started when Diller said he was going to split the company into 5, which Malone said will cut his power drastically. So now Malone is trying to get back his super voting shares from Diller and its looking like he will prevail. Even Barry Diller feels it. During a recent panel hosted by Zelnick Media and Variety, Diller had a defeated tone when asked about the battle between him and John Malone. But Diller shouldn’t worry because he has to remember that he may have the track record of always being pushed out of companies he built, but he also has a track record of making comebacks. If Diller does indeed get the boot from atop IAC he can take a page out of former Disney CEO Mike Eisner's book and slowly build a small online media company with content that can be spun into other areas. Or he can join forces with Eisner and target start-ups. But maybe Malone is a nice guy and will let him take one of IAC’s businesses.

Barry Diller's website for brown people, is still in the making and scheduled to launch on April 10th

BY SDH We recently asked about the status of that website Barry Diller said his company was working on geared towards the brown community and it looks like its still live and kicking in the womb. The site is scheduled to debut on April 10th and its name may be revealed this week. Johnny Taylor, the fella heading the project (photo above) says that the name of the website will have a Charlotte touch, whatever that means. Ironically Taylor sits with The Charlotte Observer to talk more about the project and how there is nothing else out their like it. He also says that its targeting not just African American's but all people of color including Jamaicans because they don't consider themselves African Americans! Hmmm!! Why would Jamaicans consider themselves African Americans?

Just Wondering: With all that’s going on, will Barry Diller's planned website for black people still fly?

BY SDH Last April IAC/Interactive Corp, made the announcement that they were working on a website geared towards African Americans. A name was never revealed or even a tentative launch time. However since the announcement we haven't seen or heard anything related to the project. IAC CEO Barry Diller has since been tangled in a back and forth with IAC shareholder and some say his boss John Malone about the direction of the company. The battle may even see Diller exiting if John Malone gets his way. But what’s the deal with the black web project. Was it quietly scrapped getting lost in the shuffle of the ongoing battle between Diller and Malone, or is it still on track for a launch?

John Malone now has an additional 369 reasons to throw Barry Diller out on his ass, and more in this Afternoon's round up

-SDH For IAC/Interactive Corp CEO Barry Diller, news that the company lost $369.9 million in the fourth quarter, on a big write-down at its mortgage referral business couldn't have come at a worst time. Reports like this will just give Diller's indirect boss John Malone more ammunition in his quest to re-gain Liberty's 62% voting shares from Diller and use them to show him the door. [AP] So Time Warner says they are working to split AOL's outdated dial business from it's newly rolled out ad driven business. But if Time Warner is looking to sell the dial up business, who in the world would want to by a declining business? [CNNmoney] Businessweek announced today that it has named Jessica Sibley in a new roll as Senior Vice President and Worldwide Publisher [PRNW]

Operation Regime Change

BY SDH Barry Diller built IAC Interactive Corp via acquisitions of profitable web properties bringing them under one roof to form his internet holding company which is home to well know web destinations like, Expedia.com, Match.com and more recently collegehumor.com. But if you ask us, Diller may have just been put on notice by Liberty Media boss John Malone who holds a reported 30% stake. During an interview late last year, Malone said that he no longer thinks Diller brings value to the company. Now Malone is acting on this statement by trying to kill the Diller era. In a bold but expected move, Malone asked a court for the go ahead to force Diller out, and perhaps hand the CEO title to a younger more energetic fresh thinker from within or outside the company who will perhaps bring that value Malone claims Diller lacks? Diller has to be feeling the Neuse tightening around his neck. Clearly Malone and company are congregating on IAC’s borders for a full scale attack with the objective of regime change at IAC. But will Malone’s potential invasion be unilateral or will he bring others on board? Malone is not known for raiding corporations and forcing change like the Suge Knight of corporate America Carl Icahn. But he carries more weight than many of the CEOs of the companies he holds shares in. When Malone upped his stake in IAC, Liberty Media claimed at the time, they upped their stake in IAC to take advantage of IAC’s low stock price. But only an idiot would buy that. If Barry Diller were to look out his office window through binoculars, he will see Malone and his troops looking right back at him through their binoculars just waiting for the right time to take the kill shot. Rupert Murdoch came out alive from a possible Malone attack, will the same happen for Diller?

John Malone takes bigger chunk of Barry Diller's world

-BY SDH One of the most powerful men in media, John Malone is hardly written about and gawked at by mainstream media, but we doubt he gives a shit. He is arguably the most powerful known unknown in the biz and has the power to make even the biggest of them run for cover like the time he had Rupert Murdoch shaking in his pants. Now Malone's Liberty Media holding company has swallowed 14 million shares of the Barry Diller ruled IAC/Interactive Corp for $339.5 Million upping Liberty's stake to about 30%. Could Malone have taken a bigger chunk if he wanted, or does Diller have some Rupert Murdoch like, poison pill in place to block such a move? Stake Is Bought in IAC/InterActiveCorp [NYT]

John Malone is what you would call a cock blocker, but he isn't necessarily blocking cocks

-MARTY It seems like every time a media company wants to make a move, they have to go through John Malone first. Rupert Murdoch had to throw him a bone to hold him off from attempting a takeover of News Corp, now Barry Diller, Chairman of Internet company Interactive Corp (IAC) will have to throw him a thick piece of stake to distract him so he can split IAC into five publicly traded companies. We will call him "The Media Sheriff" It looked like a master stroke. IAC Interactive (IACI) Chief Executive Barry Diller announced that his collection of Internet companies will be separated into five public companies. Diller, long a Wall Street darling, hopes to use the deal to restore some of the luster lost by his business in a year of sliding shares. The tactic appeared to be working. IAC's stock price jumped 7.5%. But the announcement is only the first step in what could be a messy, protracted battle with IAC's largest shareholder, John Malone's Liberty Media (LCAPA), owner of a 24.1% stake. Under the terms of a long-standing arrangement with Malone, Diller controls and votes Liberty Media's shares in any deal. Still, in order to see the breakup through to its fruition, Diller will probably need to offer some concessions to Malone, the Liberty chairman who has publicly suggested he wants out of the arrangement. In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Malone dissed Diller, saying, "There was time when there was, I think, a 20% Barry premium" on Wall Street. He added: "Today you could argue there is a Barry discount." The upshot is Malone and Diller will probably have some serious talks in coming weeks before Diller can finalize his plans, several sources say. We don't know but it seems as though John Malone may be the most powerful man in media. He had Rupert sweating bullets and now Barry Diller has to sweet talk him into letting him split up IAC? We have a list coming so lets see who comes out on top! IAC: Breaking Up May Be Hard to Do [BW]

Barry Diller's online destination for brown people

-LENN HINDSMANN Internet mogul Barry Diller is seeking some black love and he plans to get it via a new website targeting black Americans and other ethnic minorities online. No name for the new venture has been revealed but plans seem to be in motion being that the launch is set for sometime in January 08. Diller will have to fight to get his footing as other websites targeting the same demo have been dominating for years. Though this is indeed the case, none of the currently dominating sites have done the aggressive marketing IAC sites are known for. We’re sure this launch won’t be one of those under the radar launches and will come full blast with ads via TV, online and print. However we’re shocked Diller didn’t go the acquisition route, buying an already established operation and building on it. Perhaps none caught his eyes. IAC will face heavy competition from other players that have flocked to the space as the number of African-American Internet users -- and advertisers' interest in reaching them -- continues to increase. Time Warner Inc.'s AOL Black Voices offers news, videos and blogs that highlight prominent African-Americans, such as actress Halle Berry or presidential candidate Barack Obama. The site, which attracts about 3 million unique monthly U.S. visitors, according to comScore Networks Inc., also assembles articles on themes likely to resonate with the community. BlackPlanet.com, operated by Community Connect Inc., is a social-networking site that aims to connect African-Americans over common interests and issues, such as the latest trends in black fashion and music. The site includes an online dating service and a job-search engine for employers. IAC Site to Court MinoritiesIn Push Into Growing Sector [WSJ]

Analysts attempt to predict Rupe and Barry's next move as they yap about their companies today

Suddenly Rupert Murdoch is an Internet big shot along side long time Internet big shots like Barry Diller. Analysts are speculating about what their next moves will be even if they love News Corp more than they do Diller's Interactive Corp. The head honchos of IAC/InterActiveCorp and News Corp appear to believe that the ability to deliver content and interact with audiences offers a strategically prescient opportunity. That's probably why we will see luminaries Barry Diller, chairman of IACI, and Rupert Murdoch, chairman of News Corp., each delivering keynote addresses at The McGraw-Hill Companies' 2007 Media Summit in New York City today and tomorrow, say Standard & Poor's analysts. Diller and Murdoch Work the Web [Businessweek]