New look for Dispatch Online

It seems that UK-based satellite television Free2view, which launched last week, is operating illegally without a licence according to ICASA, reports Business Report and The Weekender. The regular says it has various ways of taking action.

According to Business Report, “[t]he competition tribunal has described Caxton's intervention in last year's hearings into Naspers's acquisition of 38% of M-Net/SuperSport as pointless and ‘thoroughly devoid of substance'.

On the digital side

IOL Technology says that last year, US newspapers' audiences increased by roughly 6%.

Technology blog TechCrunch reports that on Friday, 25 January, Facebook announced that a new JavaScript client library will allow Facebook applications to be displayed on any website. “I'm not sure anyone saw this move coming, but Facebook may have just changed the game again by essentially becoming an application host,” says Duncan Riley of TechCrunch.

Meanwhile, “online community MySpace is partnering with the BBC to bring some of the British broadcaster's programmes to a worldwide audience in the site's first global content deal involving a major network,” writes IOL Technology. “The move… continues MySpace's push to become a hub for video, music and other content and more similar to Internet portals like Yahoo.”

On the TV side

Contractual issues between Isidingo producer Endemol SA and the SABC have resulted in the soapie's cast being told today to stay at home until further notice, reports News24.com.

Steve Hofmeyer will no longer be suing Rapport and Huisgenoot and intends to blog less, according to IOL. The two publications allegedly did not contact him for comment before publishing an open letter from a fitness instructor purporting to have been his lover for a decade.

For more:

• Dispatch Online: New Dispatch Online goes live
  
• Business Report: Icasa may shut new free broadcaster
  
• The Weekender: Rogue satellite TV group vows to defy Icasa on broadcasts
  
• Business Report: Tribunal slates Caxton 'envy' of Naspers
  
• IOL Technology: Newspapers see more online users in '07
  
• TechCrunch: Facebook Apps On Any Website: Clever Move
  
• IOL Technology: MySpace, BBC reach global video deal
  
• News24.com: Isidingo cast sitting at home
  
• IOL: Hofmeyr ends 'affair' with media