An interesting rumination from Joe, who first wrote this on his blog… We all know that targeting is important, but the core of what Google provides is relevancy–namely, relevancy of search results and relevancy of advertisements. There are infinite reasons why Google has been successful, but the most basic…
We all know that targeting is important, but the core of what Google provides is relevancy–namely, relevancy of search results and relevancy of advertisements.
There are infinite reasons why Google has been successful, but the most basic is that it has always focused first on relevancy.
Google's on the cover of Fortune again, this time with the come on that the company is in chaos! No, wait, maybe that's a good thing…yeah, in fact, it is a good thing! Fortune turns it into a cover package on "managing chaos" that might well have been a…
I dunno, but after reading the piece, which was reported as well as is possible given the access given, I felt like I had read the same story I’ve been reading about Google for the past three years – the piece turns on the interesting question of “Do They Have a Plan?” and then fails to answer it definitively (Marissa says Google has a plan, but the evidence ain’t overwhelming). I’m starting to think that maybe we are all asking the wrong question. I’ve been asking that one for some time now, and now I’m thinking there are more interesting ones out there. (There are good tidbits in the piece, for more see Read/Write Web’s write up…)
With that in mind, Eric Schmidt has agreed to be the first keynote interview at this year’s Web 2 conference. I’ll be interviewing him, and I’d love all of your input on what you think I should ask him. What are the interesting questions to ask Google these days?
Top stories: Nokia Adds Microsoft Live Search Search Engine Bias and the Demise of Search Engine Utopianism BusinessWeek Cover Story and Investigation on Click Fraud Over 30 Domain Names Transferred to Google Inc. FORBES: 400 Richest American$ , Their Details New AOL Search Beta Test Available Save the Forbes…
Literally – it's the cover story this week. Gary has a great round up here….
Clickstreams – the essential building blocks of the Database of Intentions – may have characteristics unique to each person – a "Clickprint", as this report from Wharton calls it. From Gary's post excerpting the paper: “We address the question of whether humans have unique signatures – or clickprints -…
Clickstreams – the essential building blocks of the Database of Intentions – may have characteristics unique to each person – a “Clickprint”, as this report from Wharton calls it. From Gary’s post excerpting the paper:
“We address the question of whether humans have unique signatures – or clickprints – when they browse the Web. The importance of being able to answer this can be significant given applications to electronic commerce in general and in particular online fraud detection, a major problem in electronic commerce costing the economy billions of dollars annually. In this paper we present a data mining approach to answer this ‘unique clickprint determination problem.”
The paper is reviewed in Wharton’s online publication. What I find rather irritating in the coverage (I have not read the paper yet) is there is precious little discussion of privacy issues, and none of government abuse. It strikes me that at the end of the day, these are the two most important issues facing the deployment of such a technology. Who knew your keyboard and mouse, in essence, are transferring your fingerprints across the web?
Bruce Sterling, a prolific sci-fi author who I've had the honor to know since the birth of Wired, has a great riff on being a teenager in a rather dim future in the current print edition of New Scientist. It's online, but only for a while, as the magazine…
It’s not that we can’t do it: it’s that all our social relations have been reified with a clunky intensity. They’re digitized! And the networking hardware and software that pervasively surround us are built and owned by evil, old, rich corporate people! Social-networking systems aren’t teenagers! These machines are METHODICALLY KILLING OUR SOULS! If you don’t count wall-graffiti (good old spray paint), we have no means to spontaneously express ourselves. We can’t “find ourselves” – the market’s already found us and filled us with map pins.
At our local mall, events-management sub-engines emit floods of locative data. So if Debbie and me sneak in there, looking for some private place to get horizontal, all the vidcams swivel our way. Then a rent-a-cop shows up. What next?
Read MoreA new feature at the Web 2 conference this year will be "Shorts" – I'll be showing off videos that are emblematic of where our culture's video grammar seems to be headed. I've been writing about the idea of video as cultural grammar off and on here, and I…
To that end we’ve issued a call for submissions. From the submissions page:
Have you seen a video clip or short film that you think is Web 2.0 worthy? We’re looking for fun and telling viral videos (less than 3 minutes in length) to feature at the conference in November. Submit your nominations below. Submitters of the chosen shorts will be thanked from stage.
A portion of NYTimes.com inline links will now serve Answers.com's reference content. With a single Alt-key selection, Answers will allow online NYT readers to stay on page while accessing a pop-up of contextual material on key terms, selected by NYT editors. Answers will also now feed a reference search…
A portion of NYTimes.com inline links will now serve Answers.com’s reference content. With a single Alt-key selection, Answers will allow online NYT readers to stay on page while accessing a pop-up of contextual material on key terms, selected by NYT editors. Answers will also now feed a reference search box on the NYT homepage. The goal of the integration is to help online Times readers “understand current events in historical perspective.”
Google Registers Political Action Committee Domains The Oldest Websites Still Alive Big News Join Mobile Web Growth Interview with Google Webmasters on Sitemap conception and Recruiting Women Zillow Home Database Opens to User Data…
TiVo launches a new research service, called the IRI TiVo Consumer Insights Suite(TM), to help marketers enter the mind of the ad-free viewing audience. TiVo boxes will become a passive data sponge for user viewing habits–opt-in Nelson Ratings-style–offering advertisers unprecedented insight into this group of serious TV viewers who…
The goal? “making it possible for brand purchase results to be traced and compared to the actual viewership of commercials.” But how many homes with a digital video recorder will willingly enable auto-monitoring equipment to feed information directly back to the advertisers who they’ve bought the TiVo precisely in order to escape?
