Obama's Digital Fundraising

The way Obama expected to aquire more than one billion throuhh this campaign would be through using small dollar fundraising through the means of email, social media, mobile and the website. In total Obama raised about $690 million digitally in 2012 and about $500 million in 2008.
The main way in which Obama managed to gain more money was by a large number of small transactions rather than fewer large amounts of money. This was more appealing to more people because a larger number of people would be happy giving away a small donation therefore he got millions of people supporting him as opposed to his competitor who relied on the richer people to make large donations which did not appeal to many people because large investments which potentially have no change of returning back to them would not be worth their time or money.

Wikinomics

This term 'Wikinomics' was created by Williams and Tapscott to describe the effectiveness of user collaboration on websites (also known as wiki's) to achieve a far better standard of information on a topic. The largest example of this today would be Wikipedia. This would be classed as a wiki because users can add or remove information on any of the pages provided by this site and there is also links to other pages on this website. Therefore growing the amount of research hosted by the site more and more each day.
The four main principles of this Wikinomics theory would be:

• Peering. This is said to replace the hierarchical form of use among the majority of websites these days and provides the wiki's with a more collaborative approach to this new concept. 
• Ideagloras. This represents a place on the internet where a large group of people or businesses go to exchange information amongst each other. 
• Prosumers. This new word was created to describe the usual consumers of information becoming producers of it aswell through the means of social networking. An example of this would be through the website 'Twitter'. This is a perfect example because anyone can post up any news you like and it can easily be shared or viewed by thousands of people. 
• Globalization. This means that there is no geographical limit as to where you can view wiki's as long as you have an internet connection and a device to let you access it. This means that wiki's can be updated by almost anyone therefore acquiring a greater and possibly more accurate piece of information.  

ASA

The Advertising Standards Authority is the United Kingdoms independent regulator of advertising across all media. They specialise in the areas of complaints about adverts seen or heard and the checking of advertisements to ensure that the material is not misleading, harmful or offensive to the audience. If it is this company may take action against this material.

BlockBuster and HMV into administration

Both of these shops have been in the news recently due to their low income as of new technology, forcing these businesses to close down. The main reason why these business have had to do this is because of other new businesses providing a more suitable and quick, possibly even cheaper service.
For example in terms of BlockBuster, this shop used to be the only place where you could watch a movie without actually buying the disk, and this was a much more preferred option for most people because they wouldn't want their homes filled with DVD's. This however was where the internet came in because this allowed people to communicate and share files over the internet without any sort of strong regulation. This meant that when businesses moved onto the internet to provide a similar service to BlockBuster's, it was quicker and easier for people to do without leaving their house to rent a movie. Businesses that have made use of the internet for this reason would be Netflix and LoveFilm. Because both of these businesses have been in the internet game for a long time now, BlockBuster would have a hard time competing with these top dogs, therefore having no choice but to close their stores.
This is also apparent for HMV because music is now so easily available over the internet and having virtual copies of songs instead of racks of CD's is now more efficient and suits alot of people these days. Therefore a similar effect as to what happened with BlockBuster is now happening to HMV because its competitors who have been doing the online trade business for a while now would be businesses such as iTunes and Amazon to name a couple.
These reasons for both businesses are only the legal implications, there is also pirating which has to be taken into account because both music and films can both be easily acquired for free which would also be seen as a problem for the newer businesses trading over the internet, but they have a much better chance of keeping up with this than those who do not provide this service.

OFCOM Regulation

OFCOM which is formally known as 'The Office of Communications' handles the regulation for broadcasting, telecommunications and postal industries in the United Kingdom. This government approved corporation mainly works in the protection of material which could be either harmful or offensive to the public and could ban this material from being shown. Another one of OFCOM's aims is to represent citizens and consumers by promoting competition.

Amazon and Play in the news

Amazon offers free MP3's to CD buyers.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/amazon/9793647/Amazon-offers-free-MP3s-to-CD-buyers.html

Amazon are offering free MP3's of the CD's they have bought going back to 1998. This includes more than 50,000 CD's from Sony, Warner and many other independant labels. This service is only available in the US at the moment but is hoping to be available in the UK at the end of 2013.

Play.com closes direct retail service.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-jersey-20953357

Play are moving out of the direct retail business intending to become a marketplace on from march 2013. In a statement Play.com said: "Moving forward we are intending to focus exclusively on our successful marketplace, which is our main business area, and to phase out the direct-retail part of our business."

The Long Tail Theory

This theory is giving people more unpopular content through the means of the internet because you can afford to either stock more of less wanted items in warehouses, or because the content is virtually there to download and own. This can apply to many different medias such as Films. The way in which the long tail theory can apply here is that you will be able to either find either independant or old films on a website to order and own a copy of, or simly just either stream the film or download a copy. This means that the internet has made the more unpopular products more available to the few people who want them. This was unlike times before the internet were you would rely on the local shop to stock the item in which you want, and the chances of them having a item which wasnt wanted by a lot of people is slim, so the internet provides more availability.
Another example of a media which can use this theory would be music. This is the same again because now because of the internet you can order albums off a website or you could stream or download them. This means that the company's who stock the item can afford to expand their product range into the niche market. By giving people more products to choose from and having a diverse range of items, company's are benefiting from this new method of distribution because it allows them to hit many different target audiences and still aquire their custom.

Graph showing the 'Long Tail' in terms of sales.

Internet Memes

An Internet Meme is an idea, usually in the form of a image, which is virally sent around the internet through the means of forums and social networking sites etc. Memes are not just images however, they can also be videos or even just words or phrases that have became a phenomenon over the internet. An example of an Internet Meme in the form of an image is shown on the right.