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Can Donald Trump help WWE's stock?

World Wrestling Entertainment (NYSE: WWE) is calling on an old friend to help it bring in an audience beyond the media company's hardcore demographic. Donald Trump, who has worked storylines with WWE before (remember the battle between Trump and Vince McMahon, the one that saw McMahon lose his hair?), recently appeared on WWE's Raw television program. In fact, TVSquad.com discussed the high-profile promotion Trump's involvement received over this past weekend. TV Squad also covered the little controversy caused by Trump's "purchase" of WWE's famous asset (I honestly cannot believe that some investors actually sold the company's stock based on a storyline).

Using Trump isn't a bad idea. He's a pretty good performer, and he seems, at times, like a natural for the wrestling business. How should an investor process his involvement, however? Does it show that WWE is having a hard time developing engaging angles with its own talent roster?

Continue reading Can Donald Trump help WWE's stock?

CNBC is developing an animated show -- no joke

When I read on our sister blog TV Squad that CNBC was developing an animated show, I couldn't believe it. Then again, this is the same TV network that thinks Donny Deutsch is a talk show host and that Maria Bartiromo is a journalist. Anything is possible.

Just to be clear, I am talking about a cartoon. Not the type of "animation" that viewers of Jim Cramer's Mad Money show regularly enjoy. I used to work for The Street.com, the company he co-founded, and I can tell you from firsthand experience that Cramer is almost as energetic in real life.

Getting back to the cartoon, CNBC's show is based on a comic strip called CEO Dad. I checked out the strip's Web site and found it amusing in a Dilbertish sort of way. The strip features the adventures of Frank Pitt, "President and CEO of Pitt Packaging International, the third largest manufacturer of Styrofoam peanuts in Bucks County, Pennsylvania."

I'm not smart enough to predict whether CEO Dad will be a smash hit. I didn't think Sanjaya Malakar would last on American Idol and the appeal of Crocs Inc. (NASDAQ:CROX) shoes eludes me.

This got me thinking what could be next for CNBC. Perhaps a musical version of Squawk Box? What about Cramer action figures? The possibilities are endless.

GE & NBC expect a billion in digital profits -- only the beginning?

Internet-ready televisonNBC, a subsidiary of General Electric (GE), expects to make a billion in profit from digital content by 2009. This, from a company that actively tried to quash viral web clip activity early in the year, even though that one clip "Lazy Sunday" arguably made Saturday Night Live hip again -- or at least got people talking about the show. Over at our sister blog, TVSquad, Brett Love reports that AT&T is set to offer 20 web channels of broadband internet television. Right here, my colleague Victoria Erhart wrote about Time Warner's new offerings. It's a long way from the original WebTV.

Al Gore (himself a TV exec, besides his other projects) believes that television needs to become more internet-like, that the internet itself is still a long ways from being technologically able to replicate television's power to reach people.

Has mainstream video content on the internet reached the tipping point? Maybe the real question is, how long from now is the day when the internet and television are the same thing?

Symbol Lookup
IndexesChangePrice
DJIA-89.2312,801.23
NASDAQ-23.352,903.88
S&P 500-9.311,342.64

Last updated: February 11, 2012: 08:08 AM

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