Booze, WiFi, ATMs, and Email
June 29, 2009
When Google introduced the equivalent of an email breath-a-lyzer, I could not figure out who would want to have a cooling off period between writing an email and sending it. The addled goose’s only beverage is mine run off water which can be a potent drink. However, most of the goose’s email is consistently incoherent. No cooling off period needed, thank you. Google, on the other hand, presumably has big data that suggested lots of Gmail users would write emails about which regret would germinate.
Now I know that Google was once again ahead of the addled goose.
Read TechRadar’s “Pub ATMs Set to Offer WiFi Internet Access”. The idea is that a Web surfer can knock back some booze, fire up a mobile computing device, and obtain wireless connectivity from the cash machine located in the tavern, bar, or shot house.
Now Google’s cooling off period makes sense. What changes will Google make in its search interface to accomodate surfers under the influence? Will some clever person figure out a way to integrate fraud with the ATM, online connectivity, and liquor? The social implications are interesting to ponder?
Quite a “blend” of services.
Stephen Arnold, June 29, 2009
SEO Mavens Embarassing Themselves
June 29, 2009
I am not sure if search engine optimization is as fraught with risks as hooking up with Nigerian email scammers, but SEO may be getting close. I am not sure what business www.absoluteSEO.net is in, but the addled goose plans to steer clear. Two reasons:
First, navigate (at your own risk, please) to Prudent Press Agency (great name that). Read the story “Addition of Advanced SEO Services in AbsoluteSEO.net”. The article was stuff with silly generalizations and claims that struck this addled goose as wacky. But, hey, that is what makes SEO such a tasty sector for those with a good nose for an easy buck, euro, or eek. Consider this passage:
In AbsoluteSeo there has been made addition of advanced SEO Services to beat up the competitors. In this era of stiff competition every big or small company wish to have a website of its own which helps in boosting up the business. But only having the website does not solve the purpose, but it need to be perfect in every aspect as only then it will top in the search engines and consumer will be able to reach the site easily. For this, AbsoluteSeo has introduced the latest SEO Services which will help to optimize the website in each and every way.
Well reasoned for some but not the addled goose.
Second, the browser I am using flaged www.AbsoluteSEO.com as a reported attack site. Here’s the message I saw when I poked around this online offering:
I received a call from a journalist working on an SEO story. I mentined that I thought SEO was mostly baloney sold to those who could not create substantive content or who lacked the insight needed to provide surfers with useful services. He thought I was in the minority because some of the high profile “search experts” were on board with various methods, statistical tools, and proprietary techniques.
Baloney. In this goose’s opinion, as the economy declines, the cream of the scammers rises like the nasties in the Harrod’s Creek mine run off pond.
Stephen Arnold, June 29, 2009
Struggling Ziff Davis Bids Farewell to Newspapers
June 29, 2009
One deep breathing publishing company has gone out for a long swim. Tom Forenski’s “Disruptive Technologies Disrupt – Goodbye Newspaper Companies” has a simple message for newspapers:
“What could the newspapers have done to survive this disruption?” Even if newspapers had done everything right: started blogging five years ago, offered free classified online advertising as Craigslist, etc. It would not have been enough to avoid the continued disruption of their business models. This is an important point. What’s happening to newspapers, and other media companies, is not a business cycle. It’s not their fault. When an industry faces a disruptive trend there is nothing that can be done — except a complete reinvention of your business. You can’t just tweak a few things here or there. Newspapers cannot survive in the online digital world because the economics of the new world can only support the disruptors — the companies in the forefront of disrupting the old business model.
Keep in mind that ZD has killed its print publication PC Magazine. eWeek is thin. You know the old adage, “You can never be too thin or too rich.” It doesn’t apply to publishing. A few days ago I received a message that Ziff Davis’s Extreme Tech Web site was shutting down. Whoops. I learned a day later. Extreme Tech will be repositioned.
Here’s what Yahoo Finance had to say:
Technophiles in search of reading material have a friend in Ziff Davis Holdings. Through its Ziff Davis Media unit, the firm is a magazine and online publisher targeting the technology and videogame markets. It publishes the print magazine EGM, which covers games and hardware platforms. On the Internet, Ziff Davis operates PCMag.com, along with popular game sites 1UP.com, GameVideos.com, and MyCheats.com. The company also offers consumer events and direct marketing services. Formed in 2000, Ziff David Media filed for Chapter 11 in 2008. It emerged from bankruptcy later that year. In 2008 the company ended the print publication of its 27-year-old flagship, PC Magazine, taking the title online only. [Emphasis added]
As a former laborer in the Ziff Communication cotton fields, I can tell you that the present line up publications does not look like big money to me. There are some weird podcast type of shows. There is the complexity of finding a story from the UK side of the ZD family. There are former Ziff stars who seem to be working for other folks and promoting their Web logs. There are quite a few signs that ZD has itself not been able to make an online business model work in a way that generates the type of cash that the Ziff of old relished.
When one publishing company wheezes that newspapers are losers, I hear the panting and wonder if oxygen starvation is an issue.
It is one thing for an addled goose in rural Kentucky to point out the problems with traditional publishing. It is quite another for a publisher that has tried to go digital to make the statement. When that company has emerged from bankruptcy, the write up by Tom Forenski becomes a message from some dimension to which I am blind.
Stephen Arnold, June 29, 2009
Wall Street Journal, Spam, and a Hint of Desperation
June 28, 2009
I have been running around for a week. I returned to dozens of spam emails from allegedly the Wall Street Journal. I clicked on the “don’t mail me these” link and learned that it takes the alleged Wall Street Journal 10 days to process an unsubscribe request. Odd, I thought software scripts executed more quickly. Well, maybe at more progressive outfits. Here’s the deal:
Now I must say that this graphic approach in the dozens of spam messages I have in my inbox is as catchy as anything from the Viagra vagrants, the PediPaws pushers, or the refinancing idiots.
I don’t like spam, and companies that mail me unsolicited baloney get laser sharp coverage in this Web log. Look at the howls from the Nstein crowd. Bad goose for objecting to multiple copies of meaningless to me email messages. I get lots of email, and I want to get only email directly germane to what I do to get antibiotic shots from the avian vet I frequent. Mine drainage is bad for a goose like me.
Quite professional is the alleged WSJ these days, and after the unsourced story about Steve Jobs’s liver transplant, I think the use of spam to get a person who is * already * a print subscriber to order another subscription is indicative of the desperation at the venerable newspaper.
I spoke yesterday to a former information technology professional about the alleged WSJ’s online service. I think the word he used was “clueless”. And – get this – I have a source too.
I set up a rule to put this enticing missives directly in the trash folder for autodeletion. Unless the WSJ finds a solution to its present troubles, I don’t think I will have to worry too much about this type of AOL-inspired marketing much longer. Nope, I can see the guys who have the Pitchmen TV show tackling subscriptions to the alleged WSJ. I wonder if the Slap Chop writer will be enlisted to explain why I would want to deal with an outfit who spams an existing customer. Oh, oh, I know why. The WSJ marketing manager and / or the alleged WSJ information technology people will say, “We’re sorry. We had no idea that we were sending these messages.” Yeah, I believe that. Perhaps I will dig into my files and recount the sequence of events surrounding the alleged WSJ’s online efforts, culminating with the Factiva fizzle, the direct mail spamming, and the abundance of alleged WSJ content that I can locate on various Web servers? On the other hand, why bother?
If you want this deal and email like I receive, click here. Careful. This outfit might not be the alleged WSJ. I wonder if the WSJ attorneys are checking into this nuisance. Probably not. It’s Saturday. Better things to do.
Stephen Arnold, June 28, 2009
Social Networks and Security
June 28, 2009
Short honk: An azure chip consultant took me to task because of my skepticism about the security of social networks in the enterprise. I direct said azure chip consultant to “Study Shows High Vulnerability of Social Networkers”. No study is definitive, but I find the results interesting. One example: “A third of those polled said they include at least three pieces of personally identifiable information in their profiles.” Great for best pals. Not so great for some enterprise tasks.
Stephen Arnold, June 28, 2009
Wall Street Journal Bleeds and Blames the Vampire Google
June 27, 2009
In 2007 I subtitled my Google Version 2.0 “the calculating predator.” The Wall Street Journal apparently found that metaphor too tame, preferring the more Ivy League “vampire” as the appropriate figure of speech. The argument in “WSJ Publisher Calls Google ‘Digital Vampire’ is a rehash of woulda, coulda, shoulda. What is different is the escalation of rhetoric. I used the word predator to emphasize Google’s patience and its knack for waiting for weaker food to wander into its territory. Vampire is in step with the pop trend of mysterious creatures who come out at night to suck the blood of their hapless victims. According to some novelists, the victims of a vampire fall in love with the beasts and willingly expose their soft, blood charged necks to the vampire’s incisors. Maybe vampire is a better metaphor. In my opinion, the victims either ignored the overtures of the Google or ignored the beastie for a decade or so. Now that the “surround and seep” strategy has become too big to ignore, the victims are wailing.
Matthew Flamm wrote:
Dow Jones is just at the end of developing a new platform from which to conduct business on the Web … Imagine this future: the Journal is one of the many newspapers you might buy in one place and with one payment… Watch for it. (The person quoted was Les Hinton.)
Excuse me, I don’t need to imagine this one stop shop. That’s what I have with my Overflight service. When that is not available to me, I have my trusty Chrome equipped with a container sucking info from hither and yon.
I am an addled goose, but I think Dow Jones has been struggling to make electronic information pay for a long time. I recall testing a version of Dow Jones’s desktop software in the late 1980s. Mistake after error took place until the Journal managed to find a formula that stemmed its losses, but the revenue is not likely to pay back the investment in the many tries the company made before it hit a single. Not only has Dow Jones tried to create a global news system in its Factiva unit, the company had to pull that entity back into the company because it was gasping for air. I heard that another high tech content processing unit of the company was on the ropes. The reason is that the methods and technologies of these initiatives were expensive, clunky, and tough to sell.
Like the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal has not attracted an audience that tops the Web traffic charts. I am a subscriber to the WSJ print edition and find the online edition too annoying to use. The WSJ has managed to equal the level of annoyance engendered for me in the online New York Times. So that is an achievement in my narrow view. The newspapers are too big to fail. Where have I heard that before. Other challenges include:
- News magazines like Time and Newsweek are in a tactical shift now horning in on the analysis territory that characterizes the features in the Wall Street Journal but these shifts have done little to blunt the shift to crunch news and analysis found easily on the Web
- The brutal costs inflicted by printing, shipping, and distributing hard copies are not going to be easily contained and online revenues are not likely to cover the cash needs of the online business and the revenue short fall in the traditional news paper business
- Google is only one player that is sucking oxygen, not blood, from the newspaper industry. Google is an easy target because it is lousy at PR, an exemplar of the new business models for some online companies, and rolling in dough that newspapers want to get for themselves.
In an effort to control essentially feature stories that could sit on a shelf for weeks and commoditized stock and bond tables, the Wall Street Journal convinced itself that it was a destination site that would pull a Web scale user base. Wrong. High traffic Web sites are not like the Wall Street Journal’s approach to online information. Nevertheless, the Wall Street Journal knows best. Unfortunately the revenue and business model have not gotten the message. Note: the Financial Times has followed a similar path so do not get the idea that this commentary is limited to the Wall Street Journal.
I like it when the old dinosaurs roar against the night sky as the snowflakes fall. I suppose the children of these newspaper executives fully embrace their parents’ views about online information. I wonder where the WSJ execs’ children obtained news and videos about celebrity deaths? I wonder how the kids found the info? I would wager one gallon of Harrod’s Creek pond water that the progeny used other services and never gave a thought to the Wall Street Journal.
Stephen Arnold, June 26, 2009
Kosmix and Its Positioning
June 26, 2009
I have been tracking Kosmix for two reasons. Its approach is in tune with certain demographic’s interest in having everything in one display, which is hard on the addled goose’s aging eyes. Second, the founder may be a fellow traveler with a Googler for a very interesting approach to information. Manifold opportunities perhaps? The two fellows live and work not too far from one another. And keep in mind that one person is a super wizard at the Google. Kosmix, therefore, is on my radar.
The company is on the radar of the San Jose Mercury News too. “Kosmix Tries New Twist on Search to Avoid Google’s Dominance” by Scott Duke Harris explained Kosmix’ market positioning. Mr. Harris wrote:
But Kosmix founders Venky Harinarayan and Anand Rajaraman, say they know better than to take on Google or anyone else delivering those familiar lists of blue links. As the Web constantly adds information and images — and as smart-phones and social networks like Twitter and Facebook add new dimensions to search — Kosmix, based in Mountain View, is getting attention for its efforts to differentiate itself as a better way to navigate the growing online clutter. To look up, say, wonton soup on the search giants leads the user to a list of blue links, some with photos. Kosmix delivers a multimedia showcase. The page is topped by a Wikipedia summary, and a quick scroll leads to a sizable window for how-to videos, blog commentary and conversations, nutritional data and more. A column on the right includes items like Chinese cookbooks on eBay and 24-pack instant wonton shiitake soup from Amazon. There are also a few “sponsored links” — the advertising that is key to the Kosmix business model.
Kosmix has implemented in its service a number of the features and functions touched upon in various Google patent applications and technical papers. My hunch is that there is more than friendly competition between the Google and Kosmix. How will this dynamic duo party down in the months ahead? Good question.
Stephen Arnold, June 27, 2009
Two Countries Squabble — China and Google
June 26, 2009
In Google Version 2.0 (2007) I spelled out an argument that has been ignored. Now my analysis of Google’s options in China are playing out in real life. I asserted that Google had become a new type of company. In effect, it is operating as a supra national enterprise, which is tough to understand (particularly by regulators) and even tougher to define in terms of existing laws, guidelines and regulations. Few stop to consider that Google is not “anywhere”. To make a conceptual idea more clear, Google could plop floating barges outside a three mile limit and leave it up to its lawyers to explain where a particular computer function took place. You can follow the rest of my analysis if you snag a copy of Google Version 2.0.
Now a series of news stories highlights the squabble between China and a single commercial enterprise. The BBC’s story “Google Access Disrupted in China” makes it clear that Google is being given the digital equivalent of a shot across its bow. In addition to a service disruption, others are reporting that Google is distributing objectionable information.
Now Google has to figure out how to respond to the type of challenge that strikes me as like those issued at the outset of the 100 Years War. Google is not being handled like a mere company. Google is getting the equivalent of nation state treatment by China.
What is at stake? For starters, control of information. Another issue is the shaping of that information. In theory information is neutral. The reality is that information has mass, can be a catalyst, and behaves in weird uranium like ways. Will Google find a diplomatic solution to this problem, or will the company find itself engaged in a long cyberwar. Quite interesting to the addled goose I must say. The Google Microsoft battle pales in comparison with this first real test of a supra national digital entity against a modernizing nation state. How will Google respond? What steps will China take to make Google even more aware of the consequences of its actions within political boundaries? Will China attack Google in interesting ways? How will cultural factions line up? Exciting and new in my opinion.
Stephen Arnold, June 26, 2009
Microsoft Search Infrastructure
June 25, 2009
Short honk: Microsoft has hired some Yahoo wizards and now information popped into my RSS reader about Autopilot. You can read Codename Windows’ write up about this program and ask yourself, “How long will it take to complete this project?” and “What is its cost?” and “How much time will be needed to catch up, then pass Google in this engineering sector?” I don’t have answers but Google did plumbing then search. Microsoft seems to be approaching the problem the other way around if this information is on target. Just my opinion.
Stephen Arnold, June 25, 2009
Seeing Crime the Professional Way
June 25, 2009
Most visualization is gratuitous. Where graphic representations are useful is in law enforcement. Crimes are committed by people. People have to be someplace. Putting the data, the people, and the events together makes it possible to “see” patterns. Visualization of crime related information is often a short cut to resource deployment, anticipatory planning, and budget management. You can see some open source, no cost examples in the article “20 Visualizations to Understand Crime”.
Flowing Data did a good job on this write up. Recommended for those who wonder about the value of monitoring. Adding real time data to these visualizations is a very useful innovation that some organizations are now exploring.
Stephen Arnold, June 25, 2009
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