14 DAY TRIAL // The first time the idea lit the electrical bulb above someone in the Yahoo staff was about 7 or 8 years ago, back in 2000, but it feels like it was a century ago. Finance Vision was launched in March of the same year, but it was closed down just two years later, in June 2002.
After the same period since Yahoo has been founded and up to 2000, the idea popped again out of the closed storage and into the minds of the executives. "What about a live finance video show?" they must have asked themselves and slapped their foreheads with their palms, all at once, wondering why nobody had thought of that before. Or they did know, but they must have been thinking the same way Hitler thought he would conquer Russia in the Second World War: "I have a better idea than Napoleon, I'll hit them in the summer." I wonder how long it will take Yahoo to figure out it's the same idea. I know Hitler took his time with that.
Hopefully for the Sunnyvale based company, it won't be the same fiasco Hitler's Eastern Front turned out to be, and with hosts like Henry Blodget (Silicon Alley Insider), Sarah Lacy (Business Week columnist) and Paul Kedrosky, it will most likely not be. Another unnamed host is said to be joining the TechTicker show (that is its name, from the information released so far). The first date it will be aired is somewhere in January, but a pinpoint in the calendar hasn't officially been made available.
Can you actually believe that this idea was about to be put in practice using puppets as hosts? I'm not pulling your leg, this is the actual idea of Lloyd Braun, who has since been relocated at another project or just plain fired, the data on this being a touch contradictory. "Hi, Puppet Pal Earl, what about the rising in value of the stocks of X Company, what do you think that will lead to?" Sheesh!