CNN.com following the new trend toward local news
Daily newspapers are focusing on local news in an effort to revive sagging circulation and advertising rates. Now the nation's 24-hour television news channel is going hyperlocal on its web site in an attempt to snag some of the fast-growing online advertising market as well as market share from its two biggest competitors: MSNBC and Yahoo. While CNN typically focuses on national and international headlines, the cable channel yesterday teamed with Internet Broadcasting in a deal that will allow CNN to use local stories from the Minneapolis-based company's 70 local TV station web sites and vice versa. CNN and Internet Broadcasting hope their content swapping will increase traffic to CNN.com as well as the local TV web sites. If that happens, each web site could potentially charge higher ad rates and allow the Internet Broadcasting affiliates to expand national ad sales. Growth in online advertising by local companies has more than doubled over the past two years to $5.7 billion in 2006. While newspaper web sites capture 36 percent of the local online ad market, TV station web sites are only getting 7 percent, but that number is growing. CNN.com’s traffic lags behind competitors MSNBC.com and Yahoo. They are affiliated with major internet portals that funnel visitors to their news sites, something that CNN has lacked until now. Internet Broadcasting's 70 sites make it the sixth-most-viewed news property on the web, according to Nielsen//Net Ratings.

Sprint phones start streaming Pandora's online radio
Two companies are teaming to turn your cell phone into a radio jukebox. Sprint has reached a deal with online music service Pandora, which allows its users to enter a song or artist that they like to create a personalized radio station with an ongoing stream of songs with a similar sound and style. Users can save up to 100 stations in their account and can create stations directly on their phone or online. The service is currently available on five Sprint phones but will expand by the end of June. After a no-charge 30-day trial, it will cost $2.99 per month plus any other standard Power Vision data rates.

Study: Kids are making fewer illegal downloads
Kids are doing less illegal downloading of movies and songs, but not for the reason you might think. They’re worried more about causing damage to their computers by picking up a virus or getting in trouble with mom or dad than about breaking the law. According to a survey from Business Software Alliance, 36 percent of 8-18s make illegal downloads, a 26 percent drop from a similar survey in 2004. As for the reasons behind the drop, 62 percent said that they were worried an illegal download might come with an attached computer virus, while only 52 percent worried about getting in legal trouble. Fifty-one percent were concerned about downloading spyware, while 48 percent were worried about what mom and dad would say if they found out. Music is the most often pirated by kids: 30 percent admitted getting tunes online without paying.

Hitwise: Online, it's 'Idol' finalist Blake over Jordin
Jordin Sparks seemed to have the advantage over Blake Lewis based on last night’s towering “American Idol” performance, but if internet buzz is an indicator, Lewis may actually get the win. For the week ended May 19, internet searches for “Blake Lewis” outnumbered those for “Jordin Sparks” by 25 percent, according to online intelligence company Hitwise. The previous week Lewis had 270 percent more web searches. Of course, many searchers were seeking information on something other than the contestants’ musical prowess. For example, 5.9 percent of all searches for Sparks during the week ended May 19 were about her physical stature, while 4.3 percent of Lewis’ searches were for “Blake Lewis gay.” Just 2 percent of Lewis’ searches had anything to do with his music or singing style, but that’s still more than the 1 percent of Sparks’ searches that had to do with her music.