BizWeek Says It All

• Posted by John Battelle at 7:12 AM
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Health: Watch This Space

No. Really. Watch this space.

• Posted by John Battelle at 10:37 PM
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More on GoogleClick: It Will Be Free, And Partners Worry

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From a source who is in a position to know, news that Google's DoubleClick competitor will be ... free for all to use. Like Analytics. Think about that for a moment. How did Microsoft kill Netscape? Yup, made the browser free. How will Google try to own the entire ad serving biz? Make it free. Why would they do this? Because the most valuable thing in the world of advertising is not the commodity , it's the information the commodity will provide.

Providing a scaled ad serving solution? Free. Knowing the margins of every media and marketing company in the world? Priceless.

And who figured this out? Why, Google's partners, who have been nervous ever since the YouTube acquisition. Think about it. Newscorp was ready to sign a deal with Google for their ad server, sources tell me, but they got nervous about "the fox in the hen house." And then, what happened? Newcorp went and bought SDC, an ad serving technology and inventory optimization company. Sure makes sense now.

Hmmmmm. It just gets more and more innaresting. Note Barry Diller on Google today in an FT interview:

FT: Do you think Google has taken the right approach, has had the right attitude in its negotiations with the content creators?

MR DILLER: I don’t know. They’re an impossible situation.

FT: Why?

MR DILLER: Because they bought a company and paid fair value for it. They paid what they paid.

FT: Did they pay too much?

MR DILLER: I’m just saying, they paid what they paid. It is too early to tell, and they’ve got this wonderful site with a huge amount of traffic, and that traffic primarily is dependent upon things other people own. So, you go to them and you say, Okay, let’s make a deal. And they look at what you’ve just paid for the service itself, and say, Well, you know, we actually deserve some of that. And Google says, Well, no you don’t. So it is a very difficult tug between what is now an every hour mention, Google, in everything it does, and these people who actually own the stuff, so I’m not saying they handled it well or badly. I think it is a very tough negotiation, handled by Henry Kissinger.

My advice to Google? Don't make it free. Make it better, make it cheaper, and let those who use it own the data. Ah, hell, make it free, but let those who use it own the data and guarantee them you won't use it to your advantage. But then....why do it at all?

Hmmm.

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:30 PM
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Revisionist History at IDG

I have a lot of respect for Pat McGovern, he backed me when I was young (at the Industry Standard ) and he let me make mistakes, but we butted heads more than we agreed, and unfortunately, we could not see our way to making that business work.

I had pretty much left it at that till I read this interview on MediaShift. Asked why the Standard died, McGovern claims that management (er, that'd be me) refused to sell and blindly pursued an IPO. For the record, he has this entirely backwards. I tried for all of 2000 to get Mr. McGovern to let us sell the company to a stronger buyer, one who believed in our vision of the Internet Economy. He refused, and pushed us to go public instead. It was this very conflict that led to our differences and, partially, to our demise. I had three very real offers on the table that I took to McGovern, and three times he refused them, telling me that instead, we'd make more taking the company public or, at the very least, telling the potential buyer to double the price. Given that the price was between $250mm and $750mm, such a response was, to my mind, non sensical. But he owned the majority of the shares, and his word was what mattered.

McGovern taught me a lot, and I'd wager he may have learned a thing or two from me as well. But while not many things get me upset, this attempt at revisionist history requires it's own revision. Now, onwards....

• Posted by John Battelle at 5:56 PM
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Searchmob Roundup

Will Social Networks and Vertical Search Combine to Challenge Google?

TripSync: Streamlines Travel Plans

Playing Nice with Google

New Service Creates Custom News Sites

Another Day and Another Video Search Service Announced, This Time from TV Guide

Will Social Networks and Vertical Search Combine to Challenge Google?

• Posted by Melanie Colburn at 3:52 PM
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Flickr-like Tube?

BeetTV says so:

Beet.TV has learned that You Tube will introduce new functionality to its platform tonight which will allow users to organize clips around specific categories.

Up to now, clips saved to an account or uploaded to dedicated channel are organized in what often seems a random process -- usually arranged chronologically, but not always.

The new interface will allow users to organize clips according to designated categories.

I can't imagine that such a feature was anything but "long time coming...."

Related: Gary has a list of YouTube like mobile apps...

• Posted by John Battelle at 7:54 PM
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CUban v. EFF on YouTube

A good roundup of the etech debate over YouTube's use of the DMCA can be found at NewTeeVee:

Cuban used the the evening to shed some light on his position. He thinks Google should be held liable for copyright infringements because YouTube doesn’t establish commercial relations with its users, in effect allowing them to upload videos with fake accounts and without any verification of their identity. This distinguishes the site, in his eyes, from traditional web hosters, who are protected from the misdeeds of their users through the “safe harbor provisions” of the DMCA. Says Cuban: “If you are a web host it should be natural to know who your customers are.”

Von Lohmann disagreed with the notion that there is a clear line between YouTube-like sites and traditional web hosting businesses. He illustrated his point by bringing up other companies that are also offering their services for free. “What about Hotmail? What about free web hosters? What about Six Apart?” he kept asking. “What about Pando? Should they be held liable too?”

• Posted by John Battelle at 10:01 AM
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GoogleClick

Google does not take third party ad tags. That means that if you want to advertise on Google, you have to run your creative through Google. But a huge portion of the advertising world that Google is now going after - graphical CPM ads - runs through third party ad servers like DoubleClick.

Now, DoubleClick is for sale, the WSJ reports. Actually, I've heard it's been shopped since early last year, but anyway....Microsoft is seen as an interested suitor.

Google can't let this stand. It's a major risk to its business to force advertisers to change behavior - it needs a third party ad serving solution.

So it will, without a doubt, build one. More soon.

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:51 AM
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Reader Hercule DB Writes...

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:15 PM
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And In Other Reading...

GigaOm on Google and its video problem...

Google's giving bikes out to employees, G B'scoped says. What, the Segway isn't enough?

With respect, I disagree with #6 here. See this post.

Man, I wish I was at etech. I am missing it for the first time in three years. A roundup...

More Google focus on mobile...and mobile ads are hot...

Microsoft has a new search head.... (more)

Oh, via SEL, Timesearch. I love the concept.

More Panama good news.

So Yahoo is feeling generous, unlimited mail storage, TechCrunch reports...

Wow, Best Buy bought my ISP. Huh.

The Microsoft iPhone.

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:12 PM
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Rich Speaks Again

Every so often, Rich gets up and rips one off. His most recent is called "How to beat Google, part 1."

From it:

Our entire industry is scared witless by Google's dominance in search and advertising. Microsoft and Yahoo have been unsuccessful at staunching the bleeding of their search market share. VCs parrot the Google PR FUD machine that you need giant datacenters next to hydroelectric dams to compete. They spout nonsense about how startups should just use Alexa's crawl and put some ajax on top of it. Ye gods.

Grow a spine people! You have a giant growing market with just one dominant competitor, not even any real #2. You're going to do clean-tech energy saving software to shut off lightbulbs in high-rises instead? Pfft. Get a stick and try to knock G's crown off.

• Posted by John Battelle at 8:54 PM
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It's Trench Warfare Now

Google, Microsoft, Yahoo... It's now a war of distribution as much as innovation. Why do I say this? Read on, a release from Google:

LG ELECTRONICS AND GOOGLE TEAM UP TO ENHANCE THE MOBILE EXPERIENCE

LG Handsets to integrate Google Search, Google Maps for mobile, Blogger Mobile and Gmail for mobile

Seoul, Korea, and Orlando, Florida March 28, 2007 - LG Electronics (LG), a leading worldwide provider of advanced wireless handsets and accessories, and Google today announced a global collaboration to pre-install Google's services on millions of LG mobile phones. Mobile users around the world will now be able to easily search for information, find locations, update blogs and manage email while on the move.

"Building on our efforts to set new standards for wireless handsets, we are excited to partner with Google to offer extra value to consumers with enhanced mobile Internet experiences,” said Mr. Paul Bae, Vice President of the Product Planning Team at LG Electronics Mobile Communications Company. "LG's mobile devices, combined with Google, will provide consumers with easy access to their favorite Internet services even without a PC and make it easy for them to stay connected while in motion.”

Say it with me: Distribution Distribution Distribution Distribution Distribution Distribution Distribution Distribution Distribution!

Previously in the distribution wars: Dell, Facebook, AOL, Pack....

• Posted by John Battelle at 8:41 PM
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COPA Is Struck Down

Remember when the DOJ went on that enormous fishing exercise under the guise of defending/resurrecting COPA, the Child Online Protection Act? Well, a Ed Felten tell us that the Federal judge just killed the act dead. We hope.

This is the end of a long legal process that started with the passage of COPA in 1999. The ACLU, along with various authors and publishers, immediately filed suit challenging COPA, and Judge Reed struck down the law. The case was appealed up to the Supreme Court, which generally supported Judge Reed’s ruling but remanded the case back to him for further proceedings because enough time had passed that the technological facts might have changed. Judge Reed held another trial last fall, at which I testified. Now he has ruled, again, that COPA is unconstitutional.

• Posted by John Battelle at 1:36 PM
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Note On the New West Summit, Special Discount

My pal Jonathan Weber emailed me with a special code for any Searchblog readers who might want to register for the conference I referenced here. Use code SPK0607 for $150 off!

• Posted by John Battelle at 2:54 PM
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Searchmob Roundup

Playing Nice with Google

New Service Creates Custom New Sites

Another Day and Another Video Search Service Announced, This Time from TV Guide

Will Social Networks and Vertical Search Combine to Challenge Google?

Real Estate Search Stats: March 2007 Trulia Trends Report

• Posted by Melanie Colburn at 11:07 AM
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Do You Trust The Govt. To Not Abuse Patriot Act? Really?

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I've covered how uncomfortable I am with the Patriot Act since the dawn of this blog in 2003, but this post from Mary really drove it home. It covers a Washington Post story that details how, in just two years, the FBI issued more than 140,000 - yes that's 140 THOUSAND - "national security letters," in essence, requests for detailed information on the Database of Intentions that have no requirement of probable cause or judicial review.

Last Friday the Post ran a story from an anonymous but verified source. Read this story. From it:

Three years ago, I received a national security letter (NSL) in my capacity as the president of a small Internet access and consulting business. The letter ordered me to provide sensitive information about one of my clients. There was no indication that a judge had reviewed or approved the letter, and it turned out that none had. The letter came with a gag provision that prohibited me from telling anyone, including my client, that the FBI was seeking this information. Based on the context of the demand -- a context that the FBI still won't let me discuss publicly -- I suspected that the FBI was abusing its power and that the letter sought information to which the FBI was not entitled.

Rather than turn over the information, I contacted lawyers at the American Civil Liberties Union, and in April 2004 I filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the NSL power. I never released the information the FBI sought, and last November the FBI decided that it no longer needs the information anyway. But the FBI still hasn't abandoned the gag order that prevents me from disclosing my experience and concerns with the law or the national security letter that was served on my company. In fact, the government will return to court in the next few weeks to defend the gag orders that are imposed on recipients of these letters.

The piece concludes:

...At some point -- a point we passed long ago -- the secrecy itself becomes a threat to our democracy. In the wake of the recent revelations, I believe more strongly than ever that the secrecy surrounding the government's use of the national security letters power is unwarranted and dangerous. I hope that Congress will at last recognize the same thing.

I completely agree.

• Posted by John Battelle at 7:47 PM
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RIP, InfoWorld

It's set to become a web site only soon, Matt tells us. InfoWorld has been around for three decades, but IT ad spending is clearly moving online, and it's hard to justify a weekly trade covering a space that lives online.

When I was running the Standard, InfoWorld was a sister publication, and a good one at that. I really hope the publication thrives online, but its owner, IDG, will have to take painful measures to make it relevant in a world where coverage is owned by online pubs and blogs already deep in the flow. The transition to online only means losing 70-80 percent of operating costs. Good luck, guys.

• Posted by John Battelle at 7:39 PM
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Ozzie's Working On It

Microsoft's Ray Ozzie gave a speech last month that is worth pondering. In it he said that there is "a sea change going on in the industry" and "one of the things I've been working on is driving a services vision throughout the company."

So what's he working on? LiveSide has some thoughts:

While Ray Ozzie has been keeping details of his Software as a Service platform quiet, some small bits of information are emerging from other members on his team. Two of his direct reports, David Treadwell and Amitabh Srivastava are both listed as working on developing the next generation Live services platform known as Windows Live Core:

"This start-up effort will define the vision and create the implementation for cloud-based platform services that will allow the creation of compelling applications that make deep use of network-based information."

Other members of the Windows Live Core team that we've tracked down include David Cutler, who led the development of Windows, Abolade Gbadegesin, former architect of networking in Windows Vista and Elissa Murphy, Principal PM for Windows Live Core. This team has "joined Ray Ozzie to focus on next generation cloud services; to build an highly efficient computing fabric for Microsoft data centers and a services platform for agile development of high-quality cloud services."

I am encouraged by the idea that Ray is out there trying to boil the Microsoft ocean. More fuel, Bill!

• Posted by John Battelle at 7:31 PM
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The Blogosphere - Academic Cornucopia?

Well, Gary has found a conference and related papers that start to build a body of academic work around this here place. I must say, I'd sure like to be in Colorado about now, thinking about the implications of the blog world.

• Posted by John Battelle at 6:51 PM
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Searchmob Roundup

Will Social Networks and Vertical Search Combine to Challenge Google?

Real Estate Search Stats: March 2007 Trulia Trends

50K+ Full Text & Image "Historic" Articles About College Hoops, Free via NewspaperArchive.com

Hoover's Archive of CEO and Analyst Video Interviews

Yahoo Unveils Widgets 4

• Posted by Melanie Colburn at 2:18 PM
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Searchblog JobBoard Test

I'm testing a service with Simply Hired that allows you all to post jobs on Searchblog. Currently, there are no jobs in the service, but perhaps you folks might need to hire some folks, and you'll give it a whirl. I'll highlight cool jobs every now and again. In fact, I think I might post a few FM open recs here. Check it out.

Also, if any of you are interested in flat rate or text sponsorships, I'm testing these as well via the FM engine. Check it all out on the right below the tower ad unit.

• Posted by John Battelle at 7:00 AM
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If There Was Nothing But Time...

...I'd write long, overly analytical posts on these issues:

Metaweb. I spent some time with Danny Hillis today. What he's trying to do is deeply important in terms of how the web is going to work - or not. I will write something soon, I promise.

YouTube. Man, this one is not going away, and there's a lot to say about the new NBC/Newscorp thing. First, don't pay attention to the content. I don't think it matters. Pay attention to two things: One, the community - will it show up? And two, pay attention to the distribution they struck. Note how it's all the folks on the web who are worried/terrified of Google? Uh huh.

Vista. I spent the day with a lot of technology folks, it almost felt like a day back in 2004 when I was interviewing sources for the book (it just ended up that way, no idea why). Anyway, almost universally folks were wondering what Microsoft is going to do about Vista being a disappointment. There was a vague sense of concern here - it seems the technology cycle we all understood is over - but we don't understand the next one quite yet. It can't just be Google...can it?

Two Fridays ago I took a day to write. I plan to do it again soon. I really, really miss it.

• Posted by John Battelle at 7:18 PM
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Yahoo Gets A Click Fraud Czar

Thanks to Gary and SEL, news that Yahoo has appointed Reggie Davis, a lawyer (bio thanks to Gary), to focus on click fraud. From the release:

Davis will serve as the company’s first senior executive dedicated to continually enhancing the quality of Yahoo!’s display and search listings marketplaces.

As vice president of marketplace quality, Davis is responsible for developing and executing a strategy aimed at driving more rapid innovation, greater transparency and faster delivery of product and service enhancements to build an even higher quality advertising network for Yahoo!’s customers. Davis will hire a dedicated staff to manage across all of Yahoo!’s cross-functional quality teams and ensure that customer input is integrated into all efforts to address click fraud, traffic quality, network placement and other marketplace quality issues. Davis and his team will also be responsible for increasing Yahoo!’s dialogue with advertisers and publishers on quality related matters.

• Posted by John Battelle at 6:40 AM
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NBC and NewsCorp To Unveil NewsTube, Er, Name TBD

This just in from the LA Times:

News Corp. and NBC Universal plan to announce as soon as today that they are creating an online video site stocked with TV shows and movies, plus clips that users can modify and share with friends, according to people close to the negotiations.

The two companies enlisted help from some of Google's biggest Internet rivals. The News Corp.-NBC Universal partnership has deals with Yahoo Inc., Microsoft Corp., Time Warner Inc.'s AOL and News Corp.'s MySpace to place videos in front of their collective audience of hundreds of millions.

Paid Content gets props for early coverage.

• Posted by John Battelle at 6:30 AM
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Book Search and Inklings of The Future

Tim has a nice post on how access to a vast corpus of books is changing academics. And how that is just the beginning...

• Posted by John Battelle at 6:29 AM
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MSFT Reorgs Search and Ads

Nah, they're not spinning out a newco with Yahoo, but it's a start. According to LiveSide:

Microsoft today announced the creation of a new group spun out of Windows Live, the Live Search and Ad Platform. Live Search (formerly Windows Live Search, formerly MSN Search) will join adCenter in a new group that will not report to Steven Sinofsky and Windows Live, but will be headed by Satya Nadella, and report directly to Kevin Johnson, the Platform and Systems division head.

• Posted by John Battelle at 6:27 AM
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The Map of Science

Who doesn't love a good data visualization? This one's a doozy. From the writeup on Seed:

This map was constructed by sorting roughly 800,000 published papers into 776 different scientific paradigms (shown as pale circular nodes) based on how often the papers were cited together by authors of other papers. Links (curved black lines) were made between the paradigms that shared papers, then treated as rubber bands, holding similar paradigms nearer one another when a physical simulation forced every paradigm to repel every other; thus the layout derives directly from the data.

Link to the big map. Thanks, Bill!

• Posted by John Battelle at 6:19 AM
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Semel The Chesire Cat

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Terry Semel knows he needs a win, and it sounds like he's got one. He told an AdAge audience that Panama would "some very exciting numbers" this quarter, according to Reuters. "I'm totally all smiles," Semel said. "We are very excited and very happy and I'm smiling broadly."

• Posted by John Battelle at 8:35 PM
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Worth the Read

Wow, a lot in the feeds today. What I found particularly worthy:

Digesting Google's PPA ads, from TechCrunch. I am still digesting. This is good analysis. I am ambivalent about the new text link ad unit, so is Mike. "They’ve crossed a hazy ethical line here" he says. The NYT covers it but does not dwell on the link ad unit.

Yahoo, Google Revs are similiar from SEW. Yahoo is in no way out of this game. It's two ends to the middle, CPA/C to CPM.

Scoble continues to beat on his old employer's search results.

Kedrosky is a robot spammer, Google says! Slow down, Paul!

is Web 2.0 Over? from Venturebeat. Analysis of venture funding.

Google unveils the Plus Box. Click on the "plus sign" and you get more data. Innaresting.

The Kinderstart case is dismissed, Matt reports. Earlier coverage.

Where the ad growth is, from Lost Remote. Er...surprised?

Clarification from Google on net neutrality via GigaOm. This is not an easy issue to clarify...

Digg on Google clarifying its plan with phones. No hardware, folks.

• Posted by John Battelle at 5:51 PM
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Spammin'

Craig alerts me to a days old NYT search spam piece and related research from MSFT. From the Times:

Tens of thousands of junk Web pages, created only to lure search-engine users to advertisements, are proliferating like billboards strung along freeways. Now Microsoft researchers say they have traced the companies and techniques behind them.

A technical paper published by the researchers says the links promoting such pages are generated by a small group of shadowy operators apparently with the acquiescence of some major advertisers, Web page hosts and advertising syndicators. ...

....Surprisingly, the researchers noted that the vast bulk of the junk listings was created from just two Web hosting companies and that as many as 68 percent of the advertisements sampled were placed by just three advertising syndicators.

I'm not surprised, actually. It makes a lot of sense. The folks who are the best at this are the ones "winning," so to speak. Just like the big engines....

More:

The researchers found that for some keywords like “drugs” and “ring tone,” more than 30 percent of the results from major search engines were fake pages created by spammers.

They discovered that the average spam density — a measure of the percentage of Web pages that contain only advertisements — was 11 percent for 1,000 keywords they used in their research.

The researchers said large advertisers were to blame for a significant share of the spam problem.

• Posted by John Battelle at 5:31 PM
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The New West Summit

As many of you know, in a previous life I ran the Industry Standard. My partner in editorial pursuits was Jonathan Weber, a man I hold in very high regard. He's running New West now, an innovative regional newssite based in Montana. He asked me to come to his New West Summit, and I certainly couldn't refuse. It looks like a great event. If you have an interest in how the economy of the Rocky Mountain region is changing, I highly recommend it. And it's not a bad place to be in June, I can attest to that. Jonathan is a consummate host!

• Posted by John Battelle at 5:15 PM
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The Most Analyzed Company Ever

Google is endlessly fascinating for us, and Henry Blodget continues the speculation with talking points for a debate about whether Google will become "King of all Media." He makes the (accurate) observation that Google may conquer distribution, but it does not create content, so it doesn't threaten traditional media companies. Yes, save this one fact: Traditional media companies either owned distrubtion, or depended on it for the bulk of their revenues (ie advertising in scarce distribution markets). But the debate continues...

• Posted by John Battelle at 12:03 PM
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Searchmob Roundup

Google vrs KinderStart - Case Dismissed

Time to "Fetch" and other Federated Search Tools

Adobe Apollo Officially Launched

Who Created the First Blog?

iFilm Infringement Could Blut Viacom's YouTube

• Posted by Melanie Colburn at 10:54 AM
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Yahoo And YouTube

I've read this once, and want to read it again, but I think he gets the main point: Google knew what it was getting into when it bought YouTube - the battle for the future of video on the web. It might be a public, legal suit, it might be the threat of one which gets the parties to a business agreement. But it's far from over.

• Posted by John Battelle at 10:05 PM
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New Yahoo Mobile Search

News from Yahoo on mobile search:

Today we are launching Yahoo! oneSearch on our Yahoo! Mobile Web service, which is accessible to the more than 85 percent of you in the US who can use a browser on your mobile phones.

If you ever tried using mobile search before today, you’re familiar with the list of links you get as your search result, just like those you’re used to getting on your PC. But is that what you really want on your phone, where networks are not yet DSL-fast and some of you have to pay to load every page? All the consumers we’ve talked to back us up on this: You want instant answers, right on the results page — not a list of links. That’s just what Yahoo! oneSearch does — we give you the answers you want in just one search.

• Posted by John Battelle at 8:34 PM
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Tidbits

Eric Schmidt interviewed by students at Stanford.

Google offers "themes" for personalized home page. Cheesy, but, interesting. d

A meaning-based search launch, CognitionSearch.

Google introduces pay per action test. Huh.

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:24 AM
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Light Posting

I've got an all day non-work related commitment Tuesday, so posting will be light....

• Posted by John Battelle at 8:44 PM
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Searchmob Roundup

SEO Tests with StumbleUpon

WIRED Magazine ReDesigning Website

Google Invites Beta Testers for Radio Advertising

blinkx Launches Wiki & Handbook for Video Search

New From Microsoft Research: MyLifeBits Online

• Posted by Melanie Colburn at 3:00 PM
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Ballmer On Google - Uh Oh

Late last week Steve Ballmer gave an speech at Stanford in which he stated that Google is a "one trick pony" - that trick being search, of course. He also noted that Google's staff growth is "insane" and called Google, in short, "cute."

Lordy, Steve. That's simply baiting the bear, isn't it? Now, lemme think. For its first ten years (Google is nearly ten years old now), Microsoft was a "one trick pony" - that trick being DOS. IBM, the incumbent, most certainly saw you as "cute." And as you piled on staff up there in Redmond, handing out options like it was crack, I bet someone gave a speech claiming you were "insane."

I love the fire in the belly. But where's the plan of attack? I'm guessing you have one. No, I'm sure you do. Can we hear it?

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:38 PM
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Buy The Business, It's For Sale

Another sign that Microsoft, or someone else, could buy business from Google: Comcast is using the Wall St. Journal as a broadcast medium to potential partners that its deal with Google is up soon, and it's looking for someone to buy the business. Price tag? $100 million. From the non-public article:

Comcast Corp. is negotiating to use Microsoft Corp.'s Internet search services on its broadband portal, a sign the cable titan isn't happy about its current search deal with Google Inc., according to people familiar with the matter.

Comcast, the country's largest cable operator, also has been talking to Google about extending their relationship. Currently, Google provides search results when users of the Comcast.net portal enter queries into the search box on the site. But Comcast thinks it should get a larger share of the revenue generated by the arrangement. It also is unhappy about other terms of the deal, these people say.

Hmmm. Gotta love "these people."

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:24 PM
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