Social networking sites are big business. Rupert Murdoch paid more than $500 million for MySpace. Yahoo! is reportedly in talks to purchase Facebook for up to $1 billion. Microsoft recently launched a test version of its own social networking site called Wallop. There are millions of users to these sites. And there are just as many ways for those users to have their information used improperly and potentially placing themselves into dangerous or exploitative situations. That’s why tech entrepreneurs Michael Edelson and Brad Weber developed BeNetSafe.com, a web-based service to alert parents what their children are writing on their public profiles. Before one thinks that Weber and Edelson are fuddy duddies wanting to stop kids from communicating with their friends, between the two of them they have six teenage children all with MySpace pages. “There is no inherent danger from the Internet or social networking,” Weber said. “This is a tool for parents to find information that shouldn’t be out there.” The pair’s service based out of offices in Sherman Oaks launched in August and so far has about 1,000 subscribers. Subscriptions can be monthly or annual and are simple to set up. With a minimal amount of information a child’s name and e-mail address parents can receive a daily, weekly or monthly report of what their children write at their sites. Edelson cautioned that their service is not spyware recording keystrokes but a collector of information available in the public domain. As they learned through personal experience, it can take hours for parents to monitor their children’s activities on the Internet. Even if the computers at home are blocked or filtered, teens are savvy enough to get around those restrictions. “Ninety percent of all kids have access to a second computer other than at home,” Edelson said. A goal of the BeNetSafe service is to educate social networking site users to be responsible about what they write. Teenagers have the mindset that when they make a MySpace page it will only be seen by themselves and their friends when it can be seen to any person who goes to the site, Weber site. Edelson and Weber have worked together since the 1980s and launched BeNetSafe through a combination of their own money and outside investors who put money into startup companies. The pair is looking for a second round of outside funding, set up an affiliate program that pays commissions to other websites sending traffic to BeNetSafe and are partnering with other companies to offer BeNetSafe as part of a bundled package with other security services. Media, New and Old Don’t believe the hype about digital cinema. That was message Technicolor executive Joe Berchtold gave Oct. 3 in a panel discussion during the PriceWaterhouseCoopers Global Entertainment and Media Outlook presentation at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills. Taking part in a discussion about traditional media companies navigating their way into the new world of digital media, Berchtold gave an overview of how Technicolor, based in Camarillo, took steps to make sure the company would not become obsolete. Technicolor for decades has been a leading firm in processing and shipping 35mm prints of feature films. As the industry makes the transition to digital cinema, Technicolor walks a “fine line” between not dragging its heels and still making an investment in the new technology, Berchtold said. This summer, Technicolor signed an agreement with a Belgian movie theater chain to install its digital theater equipment in about 130 theaters by the end of 2007. The company began its rollout in select U.S. theaters in June. One cannot believe press releases that the cutting edge technology has no faults and will bring immediate cuts to expenses, Berchtold said. There will be no cost savings to the studios or exhibitors for at least five years, and it was not uncommon for digital cinema equipment to break down over crucial weekend screenings, Berchtold said. Berchtold also told how Technicolor went about remaking itself in the face of new media formats such as digital cinema and video on demand. The company, Berchtold explained, incubated its new media business units separately to make sure they had the right resources. That conscious effort allowed for a defining of the technological applications and development of business models that put them on a path that was sustainable, Berchtold said. In June, the company underwent reorganization into four primary business units: theatrical services, home entertainment services, content services, and network services. “I think we have taken the right steps,” Berchtold said. Making Movies The digital revolution has made it all that easier for amateurs to get into filmmaking. A video camera to shoot with and a laptop to edit with is the most basic equipment a budding filmmaking needs. The trick, however, is still to get distribution for their work. “A lot of times if you are a small movie, theatrical distribution is a long shot,” said filmmaker Jim Mercurio. “It costs a lot of money and people might not be willing to put up the tens of thousands of dollars for promotion and ads to give your film a shot.” This month a project co-produced by Mercurio gets its shot when “Hard Scrambled” has a one-week run at the Fine Arts Theater in Los Angeles starting Oct. 13. A resident of Valley Village, Mercurio came to Los Angeles 15 years ago to break into the entertainment industry. “Hard Scrambled” marks the second feature work he has been personally involved with, following his 2001 directorial debut, “March.” Screenwriter and director David Scott Hay adapted “Hard Scrambled” from his own play. Mercurio describes the film as a throwback to the 70s with gritty characters and dialogue reminiscent of David Mamet. Staff Reporter Mark R. Madler can be reached at (818) 316-3126 or at [email protected] .
