LooseSuits Clips

Google: Our AOL investment is ‘impaired’

Tyme — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 14:33:17

Google in an SEC filing on Thursday said that its $1 billion investment in AOL is “impaired.” That’s short hand for saying Google bought a lemon.

Getting your Own Data out of Google Servers - How Easy is that ?

Tyme — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 23:06:01

I was looking at the export options available in various Google services that would let me save data out of Google data centers on to the local hard drive and here’s a quick summary of how things stand so far...

Google Won’t Let Search Startups Grow Too Large

Tyme — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 23:07:25

Czech search engine, Seznam is on the block for $1 billion, according to reports, and Google may be in the hunt for that country’s most popular search engine. And while it wouldn’t surprise me if Google did acquire Seznam to shore up its international influence, it points to a key issue that shouldn’t be overlooked: Google is so powerful and so rich that the chances of a small search engine growing to challenge its prowess are becoming smaller with each passing day.

MySpace Fills Out Advertising, Marketing Ranks

Tyme — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 18:49:23

MySpace today announced a spate of appointments among its senior advertising and marketing ranks designed to shore up engineering, business development, advertising, marketing and customer-care divisions.

What Marketers Can Learn From Twitter's Stumbles

Tyme — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 18:50:17

Any fast-growing brand that's seen its infrastructure quiver under the weight of widespread customer demand should look for a lesson on how not to do things in Web 2.0 darling Twitter.

The Service Is a Victim of Its Popularity -- and Its Unresponsiveness Is Costing It Fans.

Restaurant tipping law to change

Tyme — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 18:56:52

Employers are to be banned from using tips and service charges to "top up" staff pay to meet the minimum wage, under government plans.

Time Warner steps closer to AOL split

Tyme — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 20:44:46

Time Warner has taken a step closer to splitting up AOL's business, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday.

Time Warner is expected to announce Wednesday that it has completed the internal process of separating AOL's dial-up Internet access business from its advertising business, the newspaper said.

Bait and switch

Tyme — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:24:46

You can have whatever rules you want, even if they're only designed to help defensemen. The problems with bait and switch are:

1. You have to be very careful to apply them equally, because people hate being treated worse than everyone else.
2. You have to be prepared for anger, resentment and brand disintegration.

12 proven ways to get your post to the top of digg

Tyme — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:27:43

One difference between creating something you believe in and creating something that's popular is that popularity seekers follow established steps. Do this, do that, do the other thing... lots of traffic. Do this, do that, do the other thing, a quick boost in Google. DT, DT DTOT and get a standing ovation...

The problem with this, that and the other thing is that you end up with a career filled with it. Instead of creating long-lasting art, ideas that matter and things that spread organically, you end up with a bunch of calculated mini-hits.

Apple Makes People iGroan with Cash Only Policy on iPhone 3G

Tyme — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:30:02

Boy was my brother mad. He waited in line at the AT&T store for hours to buy the new iPhone 3G only to discover two maddening things.

1. AT&T didn't actually have any of the phones in stock. It turns out he was waiting merely for the privilege of ordering one that would arrive more than a week later--the sort of thing he could have easily done at home via the Internet while sipping an ice tea.

2. They wouldn't accept cash. What?! Right, hard, cold, American green backs, that are "legal tender for all debts, public charges, taxes, and dues" aren't worth squat if you're trying to buy an iPhone. And, of course, cash was all he brought.

$80 Billion? Online Display Market Is Being Overhyped

Tyme — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:34:34

But amid the frenzy, it might be worth taking a look at whether today's economic and marketing developments are shrinking that pot of gold they're all after. Because guess what: The trough of ad dollars flowing from places such as TV and print to the web isn't bottomless after all.

Sure, the CBS-CNET Deal Seems Crazy–But Maybe in a Good Way

Tyme — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 00:00:08

A lot of people have been piling on CBS for its deal to buy Web site operator CNET Networks for $1.8 billion in cash.

Not BoomTown.

Google Deliberately Sells Fewer Ads — and May Have Gone Too Far

Tyme — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 00:07:22

Even though its second-quarter results disappointed Wall Street, Google insisted it is doing well. Part of the reason for the decline: Google is deliberately reducing the percentage of search pages with ads.

25 Visionaries Who Created Empires From Virtually Nothing

Scrivs — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 22:26:39

Some of the greatest fortunes and empires in history were created by people who started with nothing. Today, we celebrate 25 of these iconic figures - businessmen, technology entrepreneurs, even celebrities and athletes - by recalling the tales of their rise to glory. Don’t feel bad if your favorites aren’t on the list, this is just a glimpse of the many visionaries we’ve seen throughout history and there are countless others who also deserve attention. While each of them took a slightly different path to financial greatness, virtually all of them started from very humble beginnings

Economy Down, PC Sales Up

Tyme — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 23:54:46

The worldwide economy may be faltering, but PC sales are in growth mode, according to numbers released Tuesday by Gartner and IDC, two information technology research firms. Revenues are not.

Spam King escapes prison, kills self and family.

Ozone42 — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 18:12:02

As horrible as it is, given what this guy did for a living it does not surprise me at all

The Real Issue About Steve Job's Health

Tyme — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:10:32

The concerns around his health have centered on two things: His thin appearance at the Worldwide Developer’s Conference, and published reports in Fortune that in late 2003 after he first learned he had cancer, word of his condition wasn’t disclosed to investors for nine months. Having consulted with two outside lawyers, the board of directors decided that it wasn’t under any obligation to disclose anything.

Are Facebook Ads Going to Zero? Lookery Lowers Its Guarantee to 7.5-Cent CPMs

Tyme — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 21:37:10

How worthless are these ads? Lookery, an ad network for social apps on Facebook and elsewhere, is renewing a promotion, guaranteeing 15 cents per thousand page impressions to app developers who sign up. With two ads per page, that comes to 7.5 cents per thousand ad impressions (CPMs). Back in January, Lookery was offering 12.5 cents per ad impression. So that means Lookery has cut its ad rates nearly in half.

Free is only good if someone else is paying for it

Xiarria — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 22:37:55

Everyone wants to give everything away for free. Thats the way the internet should work, right ? Wrong. Let me change the conventional wisdom a little bit with this:

Free is only good if someone else is paying for it.

10 Ways to Inspire Trust as a Leader

Xiarria — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 22:42:09

Most leaders would like to see themselves as basically trustworthy. To find out that people don’t trust us or question our integrity can be devastating and difficult to accept. If you’ve gotten this feedback, or suspect people do not trust you, here are some relatively simple things you can do to inspire trust.

Atari Creator Says Games Fertile Ground for Marketers

Xiarria — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 22:42:58

Nolan Bushnell, who as the father of Atari is considered by many to be the godfather of video games, believes every advertiser should have a significant amount of money targeted at the casual video-gaming space. Mr. Bushnell now serves as chairman of the board for NeoEdge, which created the NeoArm ad-enabling technology and the NeoAds advertising network.

Should you fire the voice mail guy?

Tyme — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 18:13:02

The CEO would notice the angry crowds in front of the store, she'd notice the police being called and the riot out front if the person in charge of the front doors was such a jester. But voice mail trees are invisible and the CEO doesn't notice them. She should.

Which comes first (why stories matter)

Tyme — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 18:14:36

Most of the time we do the work. The work is our initiative and our reactions and our responses and our output. The work is the decisions we make and the people we hire.

The work is what people talk about, because it's what we experience. In other words, the work tells a story.

But what if you haven't figured out a story yet?

OpenDNS Makes $20k/day Filtering Phishing And Porn Sites

Xiarria — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 18:19:55

The service resolves about 7 billion DNS queries per day and serves about 2 million search pages per day. Revenue from search pages brings in as much as $20,000 per day. They currently work exclusively with Yahoo, Ulevitch says.

Motorola sues iPhone sales executive over trade secrets

Xiarria — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 18:21:51

Motorola is suing a former executive now employed by Apple's iPhone sales division, charging him with the theft of trade secrets.

The New Flextime: Summers Off?

Tyme — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 15:57:15

In reporting this little ditty, I learned that more women at consulting shops like Deloitte and Touche and Ernst and Young were slicing and dicing their schedules so as to take the summers off to spend with their kids.

Google Sued For Selling Ads On Parked Domains

Tyme — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 16:16:45

A class-action lawsuit alleges that Google committed fraud, business code violations, and unjust enrichment by selling ads that were unlikely to generate conversions.

Scarcity

Tyme — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 17:20:49

One day, you may be lucky enough to have a scarcity problem. A product or a service or even a job that's in such high demand that people are clamoring for more than you can make.

First, understand that scarcity is a choice.

Japan's Killer Work Ethic

Scrivs — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 21:05:47

Death from too much work is so commonplace in Japan that there is a word for it -- karoshi.

Twitter buys Summize

Tyme — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 20:19:39

We’re excited to announce that Twitter has acquired Summize—an extraordinary search tool and an amazing group of engineers. All five Summize engineers will move to San Francisco, CA and take jobs at Twitter, Inc. This is an important step forward in the evolution of Twitter as a service and as a company.

Viacom and Google in Stalemate Over Shielding Identities in YouTube Data

Tyme — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 15:50:56

A week after Google and Viacom both said they hoped to agree to make YouTube viewing data anonymous before Google hands the information to Viacom, no agreement has been signed.

Yahoo Again Spurns a Microsoft Offer

Tyme — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 15:12:44

Yahoo said Saturday night that it had rejected a renewed proposal by Microsoft, together with the activist investor Carl C. Icahn, to buy the Internet company’s search business.

YouTube to Run Pre-Roll, Post-Roll Advertising

Tyme — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 16:03:42

Facing its failure to monetize the site, as well as a recent blow to site privacy in a lawsuit lost to Viacom, Google plans to launch pre- and post-roll advertising on YouTube.

The Law and Your Privacy

Tyme — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 17:13:32

We have to follow legal process. But since IP addresses and usernames aren't necessary to determine general viewing practices, our lawyers have asked their lawyers to let us remove that information before we hand over the data they're seeking.

Guardian Media Group Buys paidContent for $30 Million

Tyme — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 20:11:32

In what will be seen as a new media coup, sources tell BoomTown that Britain’s Guardian Media Group is set to announce this morning that it will buy the company that runs the high-profile digital media news site, paidContent, for a price “north of $30 million.”