MediaCommunications

MediaCom View: Londons current number one station, Heart 106.2, is spending 1.5m on a new marketing campaign featuring breakfast show presenter Jamie Theakston. Heart will use TV and cinema to promote the show with the tag Heart Breakfast with Jamie Theakston. Are you up for it? Heart is battling to retain their lead position over Capital and Magic in London in the next few Rajar periods.

MediaCom View: BSkyB have joined forces with Microsoft to launch Sky by Broadband. The new service will allow current subscribers on-demand access to films and sports clips including highlights of every Premiership game. They are set to run a large marketing push in the Sky customer magazine alongside a broadcast campaign to promote the service.

MediaCom View: Online publishers have always struggled with the concept of selling an audience. They are more comfortable talking about simple page impressions - which doesnt help when we are looking to dovetail the demographic approach applied to other media channels. So MSNs announcement can only be a positive one.

MediaCom View : Following the success of Sky Mobile TV in October last year, Sky announced last week the launch of the UK's first ever news video podcasting service. The new service will allow users to download Sky News directly to their iPod or multimedia player, meaning they'll be able to access news features even when they are on the move. The service can be accessed through the Sky News website, and is launching with 7 Days, a feature looking at the week's lighter stories. This should prove to be a good move by Sky and one which well see many broadcasters copy in the coming year.

MediaCom View : Thursday saw Anglo-Australian publisher ACP-NatMag launch Real People with a 6 million promotional campaign. Sitting internally next to Reveal and Best, the real life magazine hit the newsstands this week with a first issue cover price of 30p, normally 60p. It will compete directly with titles such as H Bauers Take A Break and IPCs Chat. Edited by Vicky Mayer, the former deputy editor of IPCs Now, the majority of the magazine is made up of real life stories but also included are lifestyle features, puzzles and money-off vouchers, in the first issue these can be found facing the inside front cover. With an initial print run of 1 million copies; ACP-NatMag has promised advertisers that it will achieve sales of at least 300,000. In a very aggressive market place that has seen a number of other launches over the past few years we will have to wait to see how Real People will affect the other more established titles.