Digital Marketing Forum

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has [URL="http://www.eff.org/files/filenode/social_network/social_networking_FOIA_complaint_final.pdf"]filed suit[/URL] against a number of government agencies for refusing to disclose their policies for using social networking sites for investigations, data-collection, and surveillance. The EFF is working with the Samuelson Law, Technology, and Public Policy Clinic at the University of California, Berkeley, School of …

According to a Search Software Quality survey of 492 IT professionals, 22 percent struggle most with requirements gathering. Yet the same group said they spend less than 12 percent of their time doing it. Not so at [url=http://www.lsi.com]LSI Corp.[/url], which probably made some of the storage silicon in the computer …

That is the general thrust of an interesting article that appeared in the [URL="http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-wikipedia10mar10,1,2707818.story"]Los Angeles Times[/URL] this week. It starts by describing how the offices of one of the world's most popular websites is a rented space stuffed with furniture bought off of eBay and with a printed paper sign …

Google [URL="http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/12/07/google-goggles/"]announced Google Googles [/URL]yesterday, an application that uses the camera in your Android-powered phone to take a picture, conduct a visual search, then return results. Google admits that it's very early, but this is extremely intriguing technology and it has the potential to take visual search to a whole …

The British Government's decision to throw £30 million on getting everybody online is of course laudable in its way. The idea is to save a lot of money - and as the last European country still in recession goodness knows we could do with it - by taking Government services …

I was pretty sure I wasn't the only person who cooked Thanksgiving dinner in front of, not a propped-up cookbook, but a laptop. It turns out the [I]New York Times[/I] agrees. In fact, the paper did an [URL="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/26/dining/26search.html?_r=2"]analysis[/URL] of search terms by region and by time, to see what conclusions …

Mark Cuban, the eccentric owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks, has a [URL="http://blogmaverick.com/2009/11/13/google-murdoch-madoff/"]post in his blog[/URL] this week suggesting a way to kill Google by paying the top one thousand most popular sites $1M each to leave the Google Index. He wonders if Rupert Murdoch's plan to leave the Google …

No, really, genuine bricks and mortar things that you can walk into. It seems that soon in the UK you'll be able to [URL="http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/30033/amazon-plans-high-street-shops?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter"]order something from Amazon then go and get it[/URL]. The only question is: why? I have a few theories. First, the novelty of getting everything delivered and …

An increasing number of cities in the United States and Canada are releasing data to developers to use in applications. While regions have released geographic information system (GIS) data for some time, such data required complicated software to use. Cities are now releasing all kinds of data, some of them …

The controversy over whether people will pay for content online is a vexed question internationally. Here in the UK we've heard much about News Corp/News International owner Rupert Murdoch and his plans to charge for archived material. We now have a [URL="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8385342.stm"]small local newspaper[/URL] poised to charge people to read …

Here's a switch. Instead of newspapers trying to protect the identities of the people posting to their websites, the newspaper is the one outing them. As [URL="http://www.stltoday.com/blogzone/the-editors-desk/the-editors-desk/2009/11/post-a-vulgar-comment-while-youre-at-work-lose-your-job/"]described[/URL] by editor Kurt Greenbaum of the [I]St. Louis Post-Dispatch[/I], someone posted a vulgar word in the paper's online commenting system, and re-posted it …

Thinking of looking for a flu shot while you're out shopping this weekend but don't know where to look? There's an [URL="http://maps.google.com/maps/mpl?moduleurl=http://maps.google.com/mapfiles/mapplets/flushot/flushot.xml"]app[/URL] (Google Maps) for that. Type in a location and it will show you locations in the area that offer flu shots, as well as their times -- and …

If the new [URL="http://www.flickr.com/photos/searchengineland/4117327765/"]Google interface design[/URL] is any indication, it appears that Google might actually be feeling a little heat, or at least some influence, from Bing. [URL="http://searchengineland.com/staff"]Danny Sullivan[/URL], who has been covering search for years, had a [URL="http://searchengineland.com/google-streamlines-search-options-30143"]post in his Search Engine Land blog [/URL]last week about the new …

Ever wanted to see the International Space Station but didn't know when or how to look? There's an app (Twitter) for that. Start following @twisst and using the information in your profile, it will let you know when the International Space Station is scheduled to pass by you. "So, every …

In 1968, a teacher named [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Elliott"]Jane Elliott[/URL] performed a seminal experiment with her class of third-graders. Wishing to teach them about prejudice, she told them that kids with blue eyes were superior to those with brown eyes, gave the blue-eyed kids all sorts of privileges, and made the brown-eyed kids …

Rupert Murdoch is not a stupid man, his business empire is evidence of that. For anyone to become a media mogul requires smarts, but those smarts seem to be deserting Murdoch as he continues to play the fool and deny that old monetisation methods do not work for the new …

My thanks to @girlygeekdom on Twitter for highlighting what must be the most surreal Internet marketing plan ever - [URL="http://www.sugababeslovewindows7.com/index.html"]British girl band the Sugababes are being used to promote Windows 7[/URL]. There is a website called 'sugababeslovewindows7' to announce it. I'm as flummoxed as anyone by this. Let's take to …

If you've ever had Google Maps literally send you up the river or down a sidewalk, you may have wondered whether the company ever actually sees the areas it maps. Now, it does, through an increasing number of volunteers who make corrections and add more detail to maps, according to …

You know you've established your brand when its name becomes a verb (for example to 'Google' something). A company called [PostRank](http://www.postrank.com/) might hope the same holds true for adjectives, as in "What's your PostRank?" The company hosts an ingenious service that tracks the millions of Web postings that appear every …

A [URL="http://gawker.com/5367093/mcsteamy-v-gawker-media-llc/gallery/5"]lawsuit[/URL] over a website's [URL="http://gawker.com/5339221/danes-anatomy-mcsteamy-his-wife-and-a-fallen-beauty-queens-naked-threesome"]publication[/URL] of a celebrity threesome sex tape is provoking some [URL="http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2009/11/does-gawkers-publication-of-mcsteamy-sex-tape-constitute-fair-use315.html"]thoughtful discussion[/URL] about fair use. Not to mention giving PBS, [URL="http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2009/11/what_a_celebrity_sex_tape_laws.html?sc=fb&cc=fp"]NPR[/URL], and the [URL="http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/25/mcsteamy-vid-lawsuit-its-a-copyright-beef/"][I]New York Times[/I][/URL] the opportunity to talk about sex tapes. The tape consists of [I]Grey's Anatomy[/I] actor Eric Dane and his wife …

You can always count on Rupert Murdoch, the cantankerous News Corp. chairman, for a good laugh and he didn't disappoint this week during [URL="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7GkJqRv3BI&feature=player_embedded#"]an interview on Sky News Australia[/URL] in which he boldly stated his sites would pull out of Google Search. In fact, he once again accused search engines …

Twitter has [URL="http://status.twitter.com/post/240745460/retweet-feature-temporarily-disabled"]suspended its new retweet function[/URL]. Now, this takes me back. When I started writing about technology this stuff was commonplace. A software company would announce a new version or a new package, its target date would come and go and then it would be released as buggy as …

Calling social media sites a "productivity black hole," the UK IT services group Morse said that staff who use Twitter and other social networking sites while at work are costing UK businesses £1.38bn every year, according to the [URL="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8325865.stm"]BBC[/URL]. More than half those surveyed said they used social networking sites …

Everyone seems to be talking about how [URL="http://www.itwire.com/content/view/25376/53/"]first Facebook[/URL] and now Twitter are being adopted by business users, as if the concept of social networking in a business environment was somehow new. Of course, the truth is that services such as LinkedIn have been providing just that for many years …

Far from being made superfluous by the Internet, a [URL="http://www.ala.org/ala/research/initiatives/plftas/2008_2009/index.cfm"]recent study[/URL] by the American Library Association finds that the library is often the only source of free Internet access in a community. More than 71 percent of all libraries (and 79 percent of rural libraries) report they are the only …

It's almost reassuring to see a large company make basic mistakes like this - UK toy store [URL="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/6500683/Hamleys-fails-to-renew-web-address.html"]Hamley's[/URL] (one of our best-known retailers, a tourist destination in its own right so I'm told although personally I find it looks a little dated) forgot to renew its domain for a few …

It would appear that Ask.com, the search site which used to be known as Ask Jeeves, [URL="http://news.yahoo.com/s/cnet/20080704/tc_cnet/830110784399841617"]has purchased[/URL] Dictionary.com Dropping the 'Jeeves' branding after 10 years, the search engine retained the same 'ask a straightforward question' approach to Internet searching. With the acquisition of Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com and Reference.com that concept …

[URL="http://popacular.com/gigatweet/"]GigaTweet[/URL] has been counting the total number of messages posted to Twitter in real time, and the rolling count is almost hypnotic. Overnight the 5 billionth Tweet was posted. So what was it? Perhaps someone [URL="http://www.itwire.com/content/view/28479/53/"]speaking out[/URL] against corporates trying to gag freedom of the press again? Nope. Maybe another …

Twitter, Inc., has shut down 33 fake Twitter accounts created by Republicans using the names of Democratic state representatives, but fake websites using the Democrats' names are still up. The story was [URL="http://current.com/177fi4c"]reported[/URL] in the Hartford [I]Advocate[/I], an alternative newsweekly. State Republican Chairman Chris Healy told the paper that it …

A company that has been attempting to obtain licensing fees from adult companies, as well as other providers such as Internet radio stations and leading satellite and cable companies such Echostar, DirectTV, Time Warner Cable, and CSC Holdings, Inc., has had its [URL="http://www.eff.org/files/acacia-patent-invalidated.pdf"]patent thrown out[/URL] by the U.S. District Court …

I love Twitter, and post a lot of links to security related stories via my [URL="http://twitter.com/happygeek"]@happygeek[/URL] account. But now I am getting a little worried that I might suffer the same fate as a well known, and highly respected security expert. Mikko Hypponen is a familiar face around the security …

Once upon a time, Usenet newsgroups were the Twitter, Facebook and forums of the online world. All the early Internet community makers were there, and important announcements such as the arrival of Mosaic by Marc Andreesen broke there first. Then the inevitable happened, and Usenet slowly imploded. That could have …

It would appear that a political activist from New York has been arrested by the FBI in connection with helping orchestrate G20 summit protesters in Pittsburgh. According to [URL="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/04/man-arrested-twitter-g20-us"]The Guardian[/URL] the man, Eliot Madison from Queens, has been charged with hindering prosecution after helping G20 protesters evade police by using …

Apparently, women are more than twice as likely to go online and vent when stressed than speak to their partners. That's according to the results of a recent survey which also suggests that when stressed many women go and blog instead of turning to alcohol or chocolate. The survey, conducted …

The 2008 presidential election featured a new emphasis on using the Internet, ranging from raising money to [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/news/story219553.html"]advertising[/URL] to getting support. It's still going on. Facebook, in particular, due to the ease in which people can set up affinity groups, is proving to be a new source of online activism, …

UK broadcaster Channel 4 has signed a deal with YouTube to bring full TV programmes online, streamed for free. It's the first time that any broadcaster in the world has made such a comprehensive schedule of 'catch-up' programming available for free via YouTube. Of course, when I say free I …

In [URL="http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/20091007/live-from-new-york-google-cofounder-sergey-brin-meets-the-press/"]wide ranging interview[/URL] with Peter Kafka of the [URL="http://allthingsd.com/"]Digital Memo Blog,[/URL] Google CEO Eric Schmidt and co-founder Sergey Brinn did their best to give people the impression that Google was run by a couple of arrogant SoBs. Whether it was purchasing Android or suggesting that Google could never be …

GovLoop, an online social network for government workers that was started by a federal worker, has been sold to GovDelivery Inc., a venture-backed government communications platform, with GovLoop founder Steve Ressler as its head of social networking. Terms of the sale were not [URL="http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20090928_8720.php?oref=rss?zone=NGtoday"]disclosed[/URL]. The service currently has about 20,000 …

It's been known for a while that current and potential future [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry2555.html"]employers[/URL] look at people's profiles on social networking sites such as Facebook. And it's also been known that people are using social networking sites to announce the status of their relationship -- or [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry3874.html"]lack of one[/URL]. Now the two …

A poll on whether President Barack Obama should be assassinated, which was posted to Facebook on Saturday, has been taken down after an investigation by the Secret Service, according to [URL="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113282766&sc=fb&cc=fp"]NPR.[/URL] The poll consisted of a single question: 'should obama be killed? [sic]' with the choices yes, maybe, if he …

Another day, another [URL="http://www.gmail.com"]Gmail[/URL] outage - well, that's the way it can start to seem. [URL="http://www.twitter.com"]Twitter[/URL] was all a-quiver with how the system was down; people didn't know what to do about it and one wag put a note up saying the human species can last six days without water …

In an attempt to build support for a bill that would roll back a ban on Internet gambling enacted when Republicans led Congress, the online gambling industry is running online ads noting that legal online gambling could raise $48 billion for the deficit-plagued U.S. government. "At a time when the …

When a complaining consumer starts topping the Google search rankings for your company, perhaps it is time to start taking them seriously? Who says that blogging is a waste of time? Not me, but then I've been blogging for a while now, admittedly in a professional capacity as a technology …

Just how sick do you have to be to upload hundreds of porn videos, disguised as videos suitable for kids, to the most popular of video sharing sites? And how sick do you have to be to do so under the impression it is either funny or somehow exposing a …

[I]I'm special, so special. I got to have some of your attention, give it to me! ~Pretenders, Brass in Pocket [/I] Ah the games companies play trying so hard to get our attention. For the last 6 weeks or so Microsoft has done a fine job of turning the media …

The folks over at Gmail have been busy rolling out all sorts of new features in the last few months but the one they dropped on users today is by far my favorite -- [URL="http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2009/03/new-in-labs-undo-send.html"]Undo Send[/URL]. I don't know a single person who hasn't had the gut-wrenching experience of typing …

I think I must be turning into some sort of freak (fill in the kneejerk comment of your choice at the end of this blog, there are plenty to choose from). I've just read this interesting story that says Google is going to launch a microblogging search engine. It's [URL="http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2009/06/google-to-launch-microblogging-search.html"]here[/URL]. …

The wires are abuzz with stories of [URL="http://twitter.com"]Twitter[/URL] and [URL="http://www.facebook.com"]Facebook[/URL] customers being robbed. It's fairly simple; you Tweet or tell your Facebook friends that you're going on holiday and a thief reads it; they break into your house, knowing full well you're away, and you lose a load of stuff. …

In a wide-ranging [URL="http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/0,1518,644229,00.html"]interview with the German Magazine Der Spiegel [/URL]recently, the Head of Google Europe, Philipp Schindler, defended his company against the latest round of attacks from publishers who claim that Google is siphoning profits without creating content. Truth be told, this argument is getting old and it suggests …

[URL="http://www.facebook.com"]Facebook[/URL] is going on trial for an alleged breach of privacy it appears. The full story is [URL="http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2009/08/18/237366/privacy-lawsuit-filed-against-facebook.htm"]here[/URL]. I don't know American law at all but I'm writing in the UK and over here, if a case is coming to court, we have to be very careful about prejudicing the …