Basking Ridge, N.J. - Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ) announced on Thursday that it has partnered with Screenvision to test a new text messaging promotion that will interact with moviegoers in theaters before the show begins. Scheduled to debut this month in 10 U.S. markets, the program will poll moviegoers on their music preferences and ask them to text their responses, with audience results then displayed on the movie screen. Screenvision's cinema advertising network currently reaches 14,000 screens across 2,300 U.S. theaters.

London - The BBC, whose board recently criticized the U.K. broadcaster's website as being too costly, has announced plans to put all of its TV channels online for streaming to U.K. residents, Variety reports. The company has already launched a download service for its programs called iPlayer, and placed BBC3 and some digital channels online, but expects to add BBC1, BBC2, BBC4 and children's channels CBeebies and CBBC online by the end of the year.

New York - Glam Media, a group of vertical content and advertising networks targeting women, on Thursday announced that it has partnered with Russell Simmons-backed hip-hop social network Global Grind, to launch a new vertical network of sites and blogs targeting the hip-hop community. Earlier this week, the company announced the launch of another new vertical content network, Glam Family, to be headed by former SheKnows.com president and CEO Mike Meyers. Glam Family will launch in the third quarter, and focus on parenting, pregnancy and baby-related content.

New York - CBS-owned (NYSE: CBS) social music discovery service Last.fm on Thursday announced a partnership with New York City concert promoter Bowery Presents, to hatch a new Last.fm-sponsored concert series that will feature emerging artists. London-based Last.fm has held similar events in the U.K. since late last year. The first New York shows, which will be filmed by Bowery Presents for screening on Last.fm, will feature bands including Lightspeed Champion, Flowers Forever and Fleet Foxes.

New York - Recently retired U.S. Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O'Connor has announced her support for a new video game called "Our Courts," an online interactive civics program designed for children in grades 7 through 9, Reuters reported.

Tokyo - Tomonobu Itagaki, the star designer at Japanese video game publisher Tecmo whose Team Ninja created the "Ninja Gaiden" and "Dead or Alive" franchises, has announced his resignation from the company and a lawsuit against his former employer over alleged unpaid bonuses, IGN.com reported.

Madrid - The major record labels' units in Spain announced on Thursday that they have filed a $20 million copyright infringement claim in the country against Pablo Soto Bravo, the founder of MP2P Technologies -- which operates file-sharing sites including Piolet, Omemo and Blubster. In their complaint, the units of EMI, Sony (NYSE: SNE) BMG, Universal Music and Warner Music (NYSE: WMG) -- represented in Spain by industry trade group Promusicae -- allege that Pablo Soto obtained profits from the sites both via paid advertising, and subscription plans.

Los Angeles - Disney (NYSE: DIS) plans to merge its Walt Disney Internet Group (WDIG) online unit with its Disney Interactive Studios video game business to form a new unit to be called Disney Interactive Media Group, PaidContent reported, citing an internal memo from Disney CEO Bob Iger. The new unit is expected to be led by current WDIG president Steve Wadsworth.

Basking Ridge, N.J. - Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ) announced on Thursday that it has signed an agreement to pay $28.1 million to acquire Alltel, the Arkansas-based telecommunication services provider. Alltel serves more than 13 million customers in 34 states, including 57 primarily rural markets that Verizon Wireless does not serve.

Silver Spring, Md. - In major step to becoming a public company, Discovery Holding Company (DHC) and Advance/Newhouse Programming Partnership said that they have agreed to combine their stakes in Silver Spring-based Discovery Communications, a move that leads the way for the company to become publicly listed.

Washington - The Washington Post Company said that it has launched The Slate Group, a new online publishing entity that will oversee Slate Magazine, Slate V, TheRoot.com and The Big Money, a business site launching later this year.

London - Inuk Networks, a provider of IPTV delivery services, announced on Thursday that it has completed an $18.6 million second round of funding, led by broadcaster S4C and venture capital firm Wesley Clover.

San Francisco - Kiptronic, a provider of streaming ad insertion technology, has landed a $3 million second round of venture capital, VentureWire reported.

Fair Lawn, N.J. - LiveU, a developer of technology that can transmit live video over wireless networks, announced on Thursday that it has raised $9 million in a second round of financing, co-led by Canaan Partners and Carmel Ventures.

When it comes to broadband internet access, you can have speed or large volumes of data transfer. You can't have both. One certainty in the broadband world is that for those of us with cable or DSL modems connecting us to the internet, there is still a finite amount of bandwidth available. When a user consumes a disproportionate and significant amount of bandwidth, it can and will slow down everyone. I hate that.

Mixx.com, the social news website supported by many big mainstream media brands, is in the news for releasing results that show its traffic has more than doubled in May. I was following the thread on this story this morning on Techmeme and thought I'd share some Hitwise data that may answer some of the questions being raised. Marshall Kilpatrick at Red Write Web suggests that while the growth is impressive he is surprised the site receives less than 5% of the traffic that goes to Digg. Erick Schonfeld at TechCrunch points out that the growth in May came as a result of links from the bottom of all CNN.com stories.