The sun shone for Barack Obama at the annual Allen & Co mogulfest in Sun Valley, Idaho, where many campers gave the Democratic hopeful the thumbs up.

In keeping with a tradition held every presidential election year at the confab, Allen & Co  passed around a faux ballot box for attendees inviting even their kids to cast their votes for their favorite candidate.

“Obama. I think he’s going to win,” said Sony Corp head Howard Stringer. Many others at the gathering privately pledged support for Obama.   The crowd draws a large Hollywood contingent, which is traditionally pro-Democratic and even Republican supporters like Rupert Murdoch have predicted a Democratic landslide in November. Who’d expect Rupert  to pick a loser?

(Photo: Reuters)

Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang — the target of a proxy battle by billionaire investor Carl Icahn and a takeover offensive by Microsoft — just arrived in Sun Valley for Allen & Co’s mogul confab. It looks like he wishes he was elsewhere.

Yang was also spotted by the Sun Valley Inn with former Time Warner CEO Dick Parsons, probably asking for advice on how to handle Icahn.

(Photo: Reuters / Rick Wilking / (l to r) Google co-founder Larry Page, Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang, Google co-founder Sergey Brin)

We’re wondering how many iPhones Apple and its telecom partners actually stocked in the 21 countries where it will be sold first. Are some fans who camped out for the launch waiting in vain?

We’ll soon find out. But this is what we can gather from the UK, expected to be one of the biggest selling markets. Actually it’s a bit worrisome, if, say, you live in London and really, really want an iPhone on Friday.

Apple’s only UK carrier partner, O2, says it will have a very limited supply of the phone – like a few dozen phones per store. O2 has already sold out online.

What’s more, according to telegraph.co.uk, only about 50,000 phones have been shipped to the UK (it’s not clear how they came by the number). But to put this in perspective, O2 said it was getting 13,000 orders a second at a peak time on Monday.

 You don’t have to be a math wizard to see that supply wouldn’t keep up with demand for very long under that scenario. 

Apple watchers were slow to bet how many devices it has ready. Mark McKechnie, an American Technology Research analyst who covers phone rivals Nokia and Motorola, but not Apple, looked to phone industry trends.

“For an initial phone launch five millon would be extreme for day one. One million would be more in line with a normal handset launch,” he said.

Okay, let’s say one million phones. That would mean a stock of over 47,000 devices on average for each of the launch countres.

It sounds like a lot of phones until you consider this: Apple sold 270,000 of the first and more expensive iPhone in the first few days after its launch last year ONLY in the United States and ONLY with AT&T Inc.

But even if Apple runs out in the first weekend it may not be the end of the world. Only a longer term supply void would cause worries that the company was having production problems.

“If you see any period of time where there is an outage of supply for more than a few days anywhere that would be concerning,” said Pacific Crest’s Andy Hargreaves.

((Photo: Reuters - iPhone fans wait outside Telia store in Stockholm)) 

Here’s a hot one we found on the Romenesko journalism business blog: A reader is suing The News & Observer, McClatchy’s paper in Raleigh, North Carolina, for cutting staff and the size of the paper.

Keith Hempstead, a Durham lawyer, filed the suit last month in Wake Superior Court. He says he renewed his subscription in May just before the paper announced on June 16 the layoffs of 70 staff members and cuts in news pages. The paper, he says, is now not worth what he signed up for and therefore the cuts breached the paper’s contract with him.

Hempstead — a former reporter at the Fayetteville Observer — told Friedman that he likes the paper, but hates all the staff cuts that he says hurts their quality and is antithetical to the way the newspaper business ought to be run. He is seeking unspecified damages and attorneys’ fees, but added that he’s in it for the love, not the money.

N&O Executive Editor John Drescher has quite the witty riposte:

“We’ve had some really good papers recently, and they’re worth more than the 36 cents a day that Mr. Hempstead is paying us,” Drescher said.”In fact, he owes me money,” Drescher continued. “So when he gets a lawyer, he can work with my lawyer and figure out how much he’s going to pay me for the excellent coverage he’s been getting recently.”

It may be nothing more than a way to raise awareness, but if Hempstead wins, he may end up killing the paper.

McClatchy is cutting about 10 percent of its 14,000-strong staff in a bid to trim costs as advertising revenue, the lifeblood of its business, declines. Still, the stock market is killing the company and other newspapers. How badly? Today, the stock is down 5 percent. At $5.05, it’s at half the price it was three months ago, and has lost 81 percent of its value in the past year. You could argue that they need every penny they have at this point.

(Here’s an updated chronology. This first posted June 9)  

2007

January 9 - Apple Inc CEO Steve Jobs unveils iPhone in the tech industry’s most anticipated new product introduction of the decade.

June 29 - Apple and U.S. carrier partner AT&T Inc start selling iPhone as technology enthusiasts form long lines outside Apple stores.

July 25 - After big build-up, first weekend sales figures reports disappoint investors. Apple and AT&T sold 270,000 iPhones in first 30 hours; but customers only activate 146,000 of the devices due to initial AT&T service problems.

Sept 5 - Apple cuts price on iPhone with eight gigabytes of storage to $399 from $599. Discontinues sales of four-gigabyte version. Also introduces iPod Touch, an iPhone without the phone, with Wi-Fi connections.

Sept 7 - Apple offers $100 rebate to appease customers angered over iPhone price cut.

Sept 10 - One millionth iPhone sold 74 days after launch.

Sept 24 - Apple warns users against unlocking iPhones to work with network carriers other than Apple’s exclusive U.S. partner, AT&T.

Nov 9 - Apple introduces iPhone in Europe through exclusive deals in Britain with 02, in Germany with T-Mobile, and in France with Orange.

Dec 3 - Apple sued for patent infringement related to iPhone’s visual voicemail feature by Klausner Technologies Inc.

Dec 31 - Apple sold 3.7 million iPhones in its first six months on sale.

2008

Feb 5 - Apple introduces 16-gigabyte iPhone for $499.

March 6 - Apple says its plans to enable corporate e-mail on iPhones, pitting it against business e-mail market leader Research in Motion and its Blackberry line of devices.  Apple offers tools for independent developers to build iPhone software.

March 31 - Apple has sold 5.4 million iPhone units to date. Apple ranks as world’s third largest maker of smartphones, with 5.3 percent versus mobile phone giant Nokia’s 45.2 percent and Blackberry-maker Research in Motion’s 13.4 percent, market researcher Gartner Inc says.

April 23 - Apple CFO reaffirms the company’s original mid-2007 goal of selling 10 million iPhone units by the end of 2008. 

April/May - Apple stores run out of iPhones. Apple announces plans with carriers in South Asia to sell iPhones in Australia, India, the Philippines and Singapore.

June 9 - Apple unveils 3G iPhone, with faster Web links than its predecessor and the ability to support third-party applications such as games and email. The eight-gigabyte 3G iPhone is priced at $199, while the 16-gigabyte phone is priced at $299. 

July 11 - iPhone 3G goes on sale in 22 countries. Fans around Asia queue for two days before the phone’s launch. Websites are swamped with early orders. 

Reuters iPhone 3G coverage
Sources: (Reuters, Apple Inc, SeekingAlpha.com, Gartner Inc)
(Photos: Reuters, Apple Inc, Scoble: Brian Solis/Flickr.com)

Big changes are underway at Bloomberg LP, both in the news division and the way the company is structured.

As we reported on Wednesday, the company’s multimedia operations will be set up as a new division, while a new incubator shop called Bloomberg Ventures will be run by the company’s former CEO and current sales chief, Lex Fenwick (see this piece for Fenwick’s insights). Bloomberg also is changing the way its sales teams hawk its news, data and financial products.

What does it all mean? From talking to around a dozen employees, we determined that it’s about shaking up the management a bit and consolidating power under the company’s two top executives, Dan Doctoroff and Peter Grauer. (Who shows up in Ian Austen’s New York Times story from last month about the rivalry between Bloomberg and this blog’s parent company, Thomson Reuters Corp.)

Here is what Grauer told The New York Times for Thursday’s paper:

[W]hile other media companies are forecasting layoffs, Bloomberg was continuing to grow. The company also announced a bonus system tied to personal and departmental goals. Terminal revenues are pegged at about $6 billion this year, for example, and if the company reaches $10 billion in sales in four years, every current employee will receive a bonus equivalent to 70 percent of their salary; reach the goal sooner, and the percentage increases; reach it later, and the percentage decreases.

Portfolio.com’s Jeff Bercovici delved into the personality aspects, noting that this may mark a shift in Bloomberg’s corporate culture. (Jeff referred to it as “famously bizarre” and noted one source’s comment: “It’s the beginning of an effort to really dial back the Kool Aid-y aspects of the company.”

Here’s more from Portfolio:

[U]ltimately more significant could be smaller adjustments meant to make Bloomberg a more rewarding place to work. These reportedly range from a newly-stated commitment to flexible work schedules to a rejiggering of one of the most distinctive features of life at Bloomberg, the program of bonuses known as ‘certs.’

And here’s a short passage illustrating life at 731 Lex:

To be sure, (Matt) Winkler is a notoriously combustible boss, and Bloomberg employees put up with a degree of regimentation and monitoring in their jobs unheard of elsewhere in the news business. One friendly acquaintance there I called while reporting this story was so terrified he might be tracked down as a leaker, he hung up on me, pausing only to berate me for using his office number.

You know what they say: loose lips might sink ships…

(Lex Fenwick photo: Reuters)

The new iPhone is expected to attract hordes of buyers when it goes on sale on Friday in more than 20 countries, helping Apple Inc handily beat its target to sell 10 million of them by the end of 2008. The launch began in New Zealand at 1201 GMT on Thursday. Use the map below to follow Reuters reporters and photographers around the world as the new iPhone goes on sale.

View Larger Map

We’re once again wondering who will blink first in Hollywood.

The Screen Actors Guild and the major firm and television studios are having another pow-wow today, and the subject is an ominous sounding “final offer” that management has presented to the union.

As we have seen, the talks so far haven’t gotten around the same sticky issues that prompted a strike this winter by the Writers Guild of America strike. So a take-it-or-leave-it offer by the studios doesn’t sound too promising if the entertainment biz is to avoid another strike.

But wait! SAG executive director and chief negotiator, Doug Allen, suggested on the eve of his union’s formal response that the door to further deal-making remained open. He had this to say in an interview with Reuters:

“I don’t know that those categorical statements are always to be taken at face value,” he told Reuters. “In fact, somebody from the WGA told me they got a total of 10 final offers from the AMPTP (during their talks). So we’ll see.”

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reports that the studios may be looking at a slight change in strategy. It reports:

“The studios, fearing SAG leadership might drag negotiations on through the union’s elections in September, are considering adopting a more aggressive strategy. The producers have discussed the possibility of publicly asking SAG leadership to allow its members to vote on the current deal or declaring an impasse in the talks, which would allow them to implement parts of the current offer.”

Keep an eye on:

• In a CNBC television interview, Sumner Redstone says his daughter is no longer the company’s heir apparent and that she will leave the Viacom board as part of an agreement he had reached with her (NY Times)
• Financial news and data company Bloomberg LP is creating several new units as part of a reorganization that includes a shuffling of top management (Reuters)
• Interpublic Group, the advertising services company, named Matt Seiler as global chief executive of its Universal McCann media buying agency as part of a broader shake-up (Reuters)
• Yahoo will let customers, academics and even rivals build customized Web search services on top of its own technology, introducing a resale model into a major Internet market where it ranks a distant No. 2 to Google (Reuters)

(Photo: Reuters)

Camping out at the Sun Valley Lodge bar on day 2 of Allen & Co’s annual Sun Valley mogul fest — a time honored tradition — is kind of like Disneyland for folks like us.

Slightly to extremely inebriated tycoons of the media and tech industry wander the lobby huddled in small groups chatting about stuff that few will remember in a few hours, while reporters try to keep pace with the liquor consumption and the conversation.

A quick snapshot:

• Google co-founder Sergey Brin on Yahoo: “Good company, good partner. A lot of excitement going on. For recent events, talk to the CEO.” We think he meant Yahoo’s Yang, who has yet to show up. Brin then realizes that standing next to him is Sony Executive Deputy President Katsumi Ihara. Ihara to Brin: “We called you last year about something and we never heard from you!” Brin to Ihara: “I have something for your TVs.” Out of nowhere, Sony CFO Rob Wiesenthal jumps in to rescue Ihara. Fun’s over.
• While I was chatting up Comcast CEO Brian Roberts, New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg jumped in: “If he offered cable service in New York City, I’d switch in a second!” Brian fires back: “Let me tell you. Here’s the next President of the United States.” (We think he meant the next next President)
• Winner of high wattage table of the night:  Google co-founder Larry Page, Legg Mason’s Bill Miller (Yahoo investor), former Yahoo CEO Terry Semel, Yahoo President Sue Decker, Davis Advisors’s Christopher Davis, Sergey Brin. In response to a question about what everyone talked about, Brin tells the AP reporter Jeremy Herron that he learned about money markets. 

(Photo: Reuters/Rick Wilking / (l to r) Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Google’s Sergey Brin, Allen & Co.’s Nancy Peretsman at Sun Valley 2007)

Further to our earlier post on the hottest looks in executive casual at Sun Valley, here are a few more outfits hot off the runway.

Who gets your vote for America’s next top model?

Mouse over the photos to identify your favorite executive and comment below.

(Photos: REUTERS/Rick Wilking)