EVDB is live
Events as a platform is a very compelling concept (I've been thinking about this since '99 and my 'all occasion gift registry' play)... but I wonder what unique algorithms the EVDB crew has built to better hearvest, winnow and validate the data... and how they'll do it without inviting competition from the likes of (newspaper held) Topix and Feedster, let alone Google and Yahoo. I'll be watching this closely. If they've got the goods, I've got a meta play on the cheap. Congrats to the team and their investors.
The Value of Search Marketing Relationships
Greg Sterling notes that Microsoft's $150MM advertising campaign has increased their share of the search market share by 1.4% (from 12.8% to 14.2%), and states (more than asks): "Is that any kind of ROI?" A somewhat difficult question to answer, outside of the right context... If Microsoft could continue to buy market share at that rate, it would acquire 100% of the search market for a lowly cost of $10.7B. But of course, things aren't that simple. A one month change in habit (as is the case here) doesn't mean long term success. And more importantly, that first percentage point is going to be (I'd wager) an order of magnitude (or two) cheaper than the last percentage point, unless you have a clearly superior offering. (The fact that Microsoft doesn't have a superior offering may well be evidenced by the fact that they didn't take share from Yahoo! or Google.) Clearly a bad buy then, right? Not so fast. Remember, also, that Microsoft is building its own paid listing bidded marketplace (which will lead to further first-tier fragmentation). At some point (soon), they are going to need to seed that marketplace with active advertisers and drive individual marketplaces to a liquid state (defined as all served bidded listings being separated by a $0.01 increment). No problem, right? Heck, I've often said that any rational marketer would buy any ROI positive flow that meets her hurdle rate and which she can service, advertising "budget" be damned. Unfortunately, not everyone "gets" this yet. There are a lot of advertisers who advertise with either Google or Overture, citing level of effort, ease of use, etc as reasons not to use both. So, if you're a (potential) marketplace owner, you're very concerned about offering a critical mass of search volume to your search advertisers, lest they not make the effort to bid in your marketplace. In that case, $150MM for a 1.4% gain (or, said another way, a 10% increase in volume) looks cheap. Hmm, now that I've come this far, let's dig a bit deeper together, eh? SiliconBeat broke the story last night that Google is buying Urchin, a marketing analytics company. On the surface, the play here is obvious: if you hold ROI constant and increase conversion rates, CPC prices will rise (proportionally). Said another way, as long as all of the ROI doesn't go into the advertiser's pocket -- and it won't, because their competition will eventually wise up and use the same solution, thereby increasing competition -- Google will profit. Said yet another way... what Google giveth, Google taketh. But again, that's easy and obvious... so let's return to that notion of fragmentation and the problem of managing listings and bids across marketplaces... then add an ever increasing variety of advertising options, channels (platforms), formats, etc. If you can imagine such a scenario (not hard, because it's happening right now)... wouldn't it make sense to want to control the interface through which all of that data is reported... and ultimately, the interface through which many of the decisions on that data are acted upon? You betcha. Update: As if all of the above isn't reason enough, this forum thread says that Urchin has one issued patent and one assigned: System and method for monitoring and analyzing internet traffic ( earlier version here) and System and method for tracking unique visitors to a website. Interesting. Can't imagine there aren't prior art claims for this stuff.
Need a Yahoo 360 Invite?
Well, after 45 minutes, Blogger has finally decided to let me post (the irony)... I'm guessing everyone already has their Yahoo! 360 invite by now, but if not, feel free to leave a comment (or email me at --removed--) and I'll get one out to you as quickly as possible... Update: 100+ requests later, and I've got to move on, so no more open invites. If I know you, and you need in, you know how to reach me.
This Weekend in Advertising...
Lots of interesting buzz this weekend: Rafat at PaidContent digs through job listings and determines that Yahoo! is hiring with plans of taking paid listings mobile. If you've read my bit on thinking about search advertising abstractly, you're not surprised to hear this. Greg Linden ( Findory) surfaces a NY Times piece on personalized TV ads, and rightly draws a critical distinction that people continually forget; highly relevant advertising is valued by potential customers. (Psst: all those "listings' on Craigslist... they're ads!) Speaking of Craigslist (and classified ads)... Greg Sterling (Kelsey) points out a new service named oodle.com, that aims to be the "Google of Classifieds". YAAP -- Yet Another Aggregation Play -- or something special? John Battelle calls out the success story of one of his blog's sponsors... and likely sends him far more traffic with the link than the guy got from the sponsorship (and certainly for less than $2.30 a click). Last but not least, Feedster's Scott Rafer [ disclosure] is (rightly) bent about a questionable Google AdSense (contextual advertising) ad on his personal blog site. While a moral argument may well be called for (along with an update to the 'ol relevancy algorithm), you can also always update your AdSense Filter List to block those buggers.
4000 hours of development for $75
Are you an entreprenuer? Looking to bootstrap your latest start-up? Need cheap -- cheaper than offshoring! -- development help? No problem. Just take out an ad for $75 on Craigslist, and convince 100 out of 2000 applicants to spend 40 hours developing new algorithms for you as an "employment test". According to SiliconBeat, that's what Become.com did. And, they're gloating about it (emphasis mine): "About 100 of the applicants took the challenge, which required about 40 hours of coding. Yang says that many of the concepts that came out of that process ended up in the Become.com algorithm." Clever hiring practice, or, a new low in employer-employee (err, candidate!) relations? Decide for yourself. UPDATE: - Om Malik is thinking along the same lines. If anyone has a copy of the "test instructions", please post them and drop a link: moreinfo [AT] buzzhit [DOT] com
- Michael Yang of Become.com just posted over at SiliconBeat, saying:
"I would like to make two clarifications on this posting.One, it is true that we
ask candidates to take a programming test as a screening mechanism. One of the
questions requires the candidate to demonstrate an understanding of hypertext
link analysis algorithms such as PageRank. Two, we do not use any of the
submitted code for our internal development purposes." Hopefully SiliconBeat will post confirmation of their original notes, or, a correction based on Yang's comments...
UPDATE 2: Over in the comments section of the SiliconBeat piece, I asked Michael Yang: "Michael Yang: When you say... "we do not use any of the submitted code for our internal development purposes"
... does that include any of the ideas or inventions included in that code, or just the code itself? No difference in my mind if you're just re-writing what they submitted.
Looking forward to your definitive statement." He replied: "We have never used any code or ideas from the programming test. The programming test is focused on candidate's programming proficiency rather than new ideas or inventions." Interestingly... SiliconBeat has posted an update (but not a retraction), saying (emphasis mine): "Be sure to see Michael Yang's remarks in the comments section about the controversial notion that some of the programmers' ideas may have contributed to the Become.com code-base. Yang says now that his company "never used any code or ideas from the programming test." Alright, enough rumors and non-sense for the week. More analysis next week. ;)
More market data on Blog reading and writing
Building on the recent data releases by BlogAds and Technorati (part 2 here), Feedster's corporate blog (Disclosure: I've done consulting work for Feedster in the past) points to two 'new' studies. From a recent CNN, USA Today and Gallup study, we learn: - Just 7% of US Adults are very familiar with blogs
- Blog readership highest among younger people
- Older people are a receptive audience since they have the highest propensity for news consumption
- 33% over age 65 use the Net
- 28% of Net users over 65 read blogs
- 95% of adults 18 to 29 years old use the Net
- 44% of these young adults read blogs
And, from a study by Slashdot (of its own early adopter readership): - 73% will increase RSS feed usage in the next year
- Many use non-traditional methods to read feeds such as mobile devices
- Getting feeds through cell phones, SMS messaging, and other portable audio players will increase
- Technology will improve as usage increases making RSS feeds easier to read and deliver
No major new so-what's for you here; I think they've all been said (i.e., blogs and Feeds are steadily progressing across the chasm and onto alternative platforms, which will only accelerate as the major players complete and refine their micro-content stacks).
Danah's Initial Impressions of Yahoo 360
Well, unlike yours truly, it looks like Danah Boyd is an "influencer" in Yahoo!'s eyes, and therefore got a sneek peek at Yahoo! 360 (nope, I'm not bitter...). Her comments are posted over at the Many-to-Many blog at Corante, in an article entitled initial impression of Yahoo 360From a quick read, it sounds like: - She wasn't blown away - Believes it won't satisfy geek bloggers (sounds like they went the MSN Spaces route) - Believes it will overwhelm neophytes In short, she seems pretty down on it, but throws Yahoo! a bone at the end saying that, despite being "wary", and "not for me", it will be "nice for the heavily integrated Yahoo user". It seems like we're going in circles. From the walled garden of old (keep non-members out) to the walled garden of the new (entrenching customers by feeding them only your stack of apps & services). I hope that's not the case (or if it is, they grow out of it in time). More when I get my own invite... UPDATE: Charlene Li gets her own look at the soon-to-be-released publishing platform and has a much more upbeat report, including two screen shots ( Shot 1 Shot 2). Is it just me, or does Shot 1 remind you of Tribe?
Topix Valuation Conundrum
Questions around the valuation that Topix received continue to swirl in the absence of hard data. Jeff Clavier takes a smart look at the "facts" we do have, and speculates on the meaning of the deal (and valuation) vis-a-vis the venture capital community. The later is extremely interesting to me (vs. just having fun passing rumors around), as it speaks to the likelihood of entreprenuers/start-ups contining to successfully participate in the build-out of RSS products and services. To that end, Jeff, I'll add this, again from a source in-the-know (but not involved in the deal, so get the salt lick out): it sounds like there are significant, multi-year earn-outs. This makes sense to me, as it allows the newspapers to make a small upfront investment ($5MM split 3 ways), and pay the rest based on performance. It's also nice for the Topix crew, as it gets them working capital now, upside down the line (without an additional exit event) and clarifies upfront what resources the papers will commit to helping Topix succeed. I suspect these earn-outs are being built into the valuation, which is what's making the pre/post valuation math funky.
Ourmedia.org Launches
Well, I'm late to the party, but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention it. JD Lassica emailed me (via mailing list) on Monday to inform me that his brain child (along with partner Marc Canter and a dedicated cast of hundreds of volunteers), Ourmedia.org, has launched. JD has a write up here. I've previously written about Ourmedia here. The trend toward increased self-expression continues to grow as new tools and technologies make creation and distribution easier, richer and more cost-effective. ( Here's an example -- via Scoble). Ourmedia plays to the heart of this trend, and does so with what seem like the best of intentions. Congrats again to all involve.
Knight Ridder, Gannett, and Tribune buy Topix.net
I called Rich Skrenta at Topix.net a few minutes after I posted the rumor about them being acquired by Knight Ridder. Rich was kind enough to disclose the high level details (and I've been sweating out the embargo since... agony!): Knight Ridder, Gannett and Tribune have formed a new JV to buy 75% of Topix; the founding/managing team holds the remaining 25%. Topix will operate independently, and will have its own editorial voice. (Full press release below my... commentary...) The JV structure is the same approach these three Newspaper Co's already use to share ownership and operate CareerBuilder, ShopLocal, and Classified Ventures, which includes Cars.com, Apartments.com and Homescape. I'm thrilled for all involved. More importantly, I'm very interested to see where they take things. Here's a quick thought: Marry the concept of Structured Blogging ( which I and many others have been thinking about for some time) and Topix's current geographic and topical categorization: you get classified listings (jobs, cars, houses, etc), reviews, etc. binned, routed and flowing into local newspaper sites, Tribe.net (which Knight Ridder owns a chunk of), and of course, Feed aggregators. (A darker scenario would have the papers using only their proprietary content from the aforementioned existing JV classified sources...) Well, that's the obvious stuff. More broadly: - Topix's algorithmic manipulation and analysis of the corpus can be used in an unimaginable number of ways; I suspect, like me, you can immediately think of a few lucrative ones (Topix's noted ability to improve Contextual Advertising yield is down the path)...
- Topix is already part of the local search ecosystem of folks like AOL, CitySearch, Ask Jeeves, The NY Times, My Yahoo... all folks I'm sure the News Co's would love to build/extend relationships with.
Promising stuff indeed. P.S. A shout-out to Elle for being one of the first to build something useful with the Wordpress Structured Blogging plug-in! UPDATE: Early coverage from: Susan Mernit Kelsey Group (Greg Sterling) SiliconBeat (Michael Bazeley) techdirt (Mike Masnick) NY Times ----- Press Release Follows ------
GANNETT, KNIGHT RIDDER AND TRIBUNE ACQUIRE A 75% STAKE IN TOPIX.NET
Combination of Technology, Media Assets and Reach
to Power Growth of Topix.net
CHICAGO, McLEAN, VA. and SAN JOSE, CALIF, March 23, 2005 .Topix.net announced today that Gannett Co., Inc. (NYSE: GCI), Knight-Ridder, Inc. (NYSE: KRI) and Tribune Company (NYSE: TRB) jointly have acquired a 75 percent stake in Topix.net. Ownership is split evenly, with each media company owning 25 percent and the Topix.net founders retaining a 25 percent stake. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
Topix.net continuously monitors breaking news from over 10,000 online sources and categorizes daily news content into over 300,000 topics, 24 hours a day. Topix.net will operate as an editorially independent, stand-alone company managed by Topix.net.s executive team. Topix.net will use content and funding from Gannett, Knight Ridder and Tribune to expand and refine its NewsRank. technology, services and operational infrastructure.
"This transaction provides us with the resources to be the best place to connect to a very wide range of news on the Web," said Rich Skrenta, CEO and co-founder of Topix.net. .We all serve the news enthusiast, so it.s a natural partnership. Gannett, Knight Ridder and Tribune generate valuable online content and Topix.net is dedicated to making that content easily found. By believing in the potential of our ideas and technology, they have made an investment in the future, and we.re thrilled to be a part of it..
Topix.net features links to news and information from more than 10,000 news sources including newspapers, magazines, radio, television stations and Web logs. Topix.net distributes news through its Web site, RSS feeds and email news alerts. It syndicates its content through partnerships and tens of thousands of Web sites that host news feeds from Topix.net.
Topix.net uses its NewsRank. technology to deliver highly relevant news, using concept, instead of simple keyword searches. It delivers published news stories organized by ZIP code, industry and hundreds of thousands of topics.
.People want the news that.s relevant to them . where they live, the business that they are in, the topics they care about. Topix.net.s technology will leverage the media assets and broad reach of our three companies in entirely new ways,. said Jack Williams,senior vice president diversified business and development at Gannett. .We are extremely pleased to partner with Topix.net to grow and develop its service and help audiences find the news they want online..
Collectively, Gannett, Knight Ridder and Tribune operate more than 140 newspaper Web sites with nearly 30 million unique visitors monthly. The companies have partnered together in other joint ventures such as ShopLocal.com and CareerBuilder.com.
About Topix.net:
Founded in 2002 with the specific mission of providing users with the ability to quickly and easily find targeted news on the Internet, Topix.net is a news aggregator with unique technology to find and categorize news into 300,000 topics, from Autos to ZIP code level local news. Topix.net distributes content via partnerships with Citysearch, Ask Jeeves, My Yahoo!, Bloglines, Metro Newspapers, Newsgator, Findory, Wondir, Infospace, Link Silicon Valley and HelloMetro.com.
Gannett Co., Inc. is a leading international news and information company that publishes 101 daily newspapers in the USA, including USA TODAY, the nation.s largest-selling daily newspaper. The company also owns in excess of 750 non-daily publications in the USA and USA WEEKEND, a weekly newspaper magazine. Gannett subsidiary Newsquest is the United Kingdom.s second largest regional newspaper company. Newsquest publishes more than 300 titles, including 17 daily newspapers, and a network of prize-winning Web sites. Gannett also operates 21 television stations in the United States and is an Internet leader with sites sponsored by its TV stations and newspapers including USATODAY.com, one of the most popular news sites on the Web.
Knight Ridder (NYSE: KRI) is the nation.s second-largest newspaper publisher, with products in print and online. The company publishes 31 daily newspapers in 28 U.S. markets, with a readership of 9.0 million daily and 12.7 million Sunday. Knight Ridder also has investments in a variety of Internet and technology companies and two newsprint companies. The company.s Internet operation, Knight Ridder Digital, develops and manages the company.s online properties. It is the founder and operator of Real Cities (http://www.blogger.com/www.RealCities.com), the largest national network of city and regional Web sites in more than 105 U.S. markets. Knight Ridder and Knight Ridder Digital are headquartered in San Jose, Calif.
Tribune (NYSE: TRB) is one of the country.s premier media companies, operating businesses in broadcasting and publishing. It reaches more than 80 percent of U.S. households and is the only media organization with television stations, newspapers and websites in the nation.s top three markets. In publishing, Tribune operates 14 leading daily newspapers including the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Newsday and Spanish-language Hoy, plus a wide range of targeted publications. The company.s broadcasting group operates 26 television stations; Superstation WGN on national cable; WGN-AM in Chicago; and the Chicago Cubs baseball team. Popular news and information websites complement Tribune.s print and broadcast properties and extend the company.s nationwide audience.
RUMOR: Knight Ridder buys Topix.net!
UPDATE: Rumor confirmed, my subsequent embargo ended. Full thoughts and details here. Just heard a second hand rumor (but from someone in-the-know) that Knight Ridder has acquired Topix.net. Given all the other acquisitions in the last week, and the fact that Ross and Hilary (amongst a hundred other media and tech execs) were at the Topix Christmas party, this one likely has legs. Kudos to Rich Skrenta and team (who I'm about to call) if this pans out!
Pragmatic Marketing's new blog
If you're a "product professional" (product management and/or marketing) and aren't already familiar with Pragmatic Marketing, Inc., I suggest you swing over to their site and check them out. (In particular, download one of their seminar PDF's so that you can get a look at their framework, which is an excellent device for Product Line Managers to remember all the general activity categories that are instrumental in building a quality product -- and a repeatable process for success.) If you're already familiar with them, or a fan, you'll be interested to know that they're now blogging. Feed here. Subscribed!
MSN Spaces Positioning
Mike Torres has an interesting spin on MSN Spaces' positioning. As I noted in my original review as the Beta was in the process of rolling out (literally), Spaces is a very consumer spin on blogging. Mike says (emphasis mine): "However, Dare's response is on the money as well. We don't intend to be the ultimate blogging tool, but what we can promise is that we are working towards becoming the ultimate self-expression tool. If you want to start a blog for your 10-person canoe shop, complete with your own domain and Exchange integration, MSN Spaces is not the right place for you right now. But if you want to share photos of your infant child with your family, or keep a journal for your classmates, or share your favorite movies, songs, and nightclubs with friends, we are going to do whatever we can to make sure MSN Spaces is the solution for you." While I don't want to get into an argument over semantics, it strikes me as more than a bit odd that "the ultimate self expression tool" in MSFT's eyes is appearantly one where you are restricted to the features, designs and tools that MSFT decides you need, vs. a completely open free-form solution like Blogger (which gives you hosted and un-hosted options, full HTML control, etc)... I'm anxious to see how Yahoo! tackles this with Yahoo! 360. I hope, if they have a play-pen mode like Spaces, they also give those of us with more technical aptitude the freedom to truly express ourselves.
Diller spends $1.85B for a bite of the search market
Plenty of people covering the Ask Jeeves acquisition and most of the sentiment seems to be supportive, but very cautious, given the fractured nature of both companies. Rafat at PaidContent says: "Some practical and conceptual problems with the deal: Barry Diller wants to build an Internet empire with search as the doorway to all of the online assets he's cobbled together. But, as Bambi writes, too many goals and too many differing approaches on how to reach them will lead to competing priorities. That typically results in relatively lagging performances across all business units." True. The company with a bazillion brands just bought a ton more. Diller's empire is already poorly integrated online -- I imagine there are internal issues as well as Bambi points out -- and this would seem to make matters (much) worse. The only real alternative, building his own -- not being a player is not an option for someone like Diller -- must look amazingly unattractive, seeing how long it's taking mighty Microsoft to field a full stack (with everything under concurrent development, and a core competency in scalable systems architecture and development, no less). Diller has looked at the cost of disintermediation, and the rapid buildout of competitive vertical search/transaction offerings, and decided that 6% of the general search market (add Ask + Excite) is worth $1.85B, or ~$308MM per point. ($1.2B of it in cash, one third the company's cash reserves.) While not a fair direct comparison, it's interesting to note that Google's 35% share would cost you $49.5B, or ~$1.4B per point, today... Brilliant if it works. Lots of soft-dollar introductions for his vertical search/transaction offerings and a tax on his competitors. Hmm, similar to the A9 strategy? Instead of beating the "can Diller pull it off" drum, here are some other thoughts to add to the conversation: - With all the money he's spent, it's still not clear Diller owns a bidded marketplace (let alone a vibrant one). CitySearch has something going on in that department, but it's been rumored to be FindWhat-powered for so long that I just assume it is. (Anyone know different?)
- With his eye already on travel and entertainment, how long do you think it'll take for Diller to move into digital goods and services (music, movies, etc)?
- A9, which made a strong meta play with OpenSearch (still need to write something about that...) last week feels even more like a cool science project after this buy. Strong third-party developer integration could drive A9 usage... but when?!
- It's long been rumored that the big Newspaper chains have considered a JV buyout of Ask Jeeves. Years of indecision has now cost them that opportunity. It seems almost certain now that they'll be relegated to the sidelines.
Yahoo! Blogging Tool To Integrate Social Networking
UPDATE: Yahoo 360 Product Page hereSo, a day early due to leaks, early word is just coming out on Yahoo!'s new blog publishing tool. Codename? "Mingle", an obvious tip of the hat to the integration of social networking functionality. As I said in Daithí Ó hAnluain's OJR article (wow, talk about serendipity!): "The question is ... is it already too late? Content distribution is gravitating toward feeds, and feed readers are integrating social networking. Newspaper sites might be able to integrate SN via FOAF, or similar open frameworks, but the likelihood of a consumer inviting 30 friends to a newspaper site seems... remote." The new tool, officially named Yahoo! 360 and due March 29th, 2005, takes the MSN Spaces approach of exposing existing data that Yahoo! members might already have on the platform, such as pictures from Yahoo! Photo (and my $10 says Flickr too), Messenger, Address Book and eventually MSFT Outlook. Will this move force smaller companies that don't have 165MM users, from sites like Tribe.net, to aggregator companies like Newsgator (and of course, SixApart) to cooperate via FOAF (even if Seth Godin doesn't get it), XFN, or some other standard? Pincus is calling for cooperation, just as he (and I) did at the last Kelsey conf. I'll be on a panel around social networking and local with the folks from Judy's Book and InsiderPages at the next show in April; should be timely and interesting. There's that other question in my mind too. You know, the one that asks just how much of our Attention.xml'esq data Yahoo! (et al.) will be motivated to share with us. (Let alone the Reviews, Lists, etc.) Perhaps this is an issue we can all come together on? Congratulations to all of the Yahoo! teams involved with this; and an even bigger congrats for being the first to complete the (first of a variety of) microcontent stack(s). Now, where's that Beta sign-up?!
SWM Blogger Seeks Same for Loads of Linking!
It's an amazing thing really. In almost no time, a small handful of women (or is that ' chicks' ?) bloggers have taken a nugget and turned it into a national discussion (garnering a heck of a lot of links along the way). Will they see the irony? Or will they remain devisive? Better yet, will any of them start 10 more conversations that are equally as interesting... but without playing the victim card? I hope so; I'd love to hear more from many of them. BTW... This isn't a blow off. Absolutely have the conference. In fact, have it every freaking year until you no longer think it's necessary. Even better, set-up a tip jar, I'll pitch in. But, I suggest you call it... B-BloggerCon...and exclude anyone with more than, oh, 100 Bloglines subscribers. Welcome to the Tail. Escape Velocity from the Tail is a meritocracy, and you've now got liftoff. Update 246PM 3/15:Elle drops by and leaves a comment. Elle, I tell ya what. I'll spend an equal amount of time in the Day Care center as you do (provided we can get the liability issue you raised squared away). Whenever you're ready to join the conference, we'll both head on up. Equality, not exclusionary... right?
Butler: Backlash To Google's AutoLink Marches Forward
Google seems to be under the false impression that it decides what 'Do No Evil' means. As it turns out, we do. First, Zeldman gave us a way to block Autolink. Now, witness Butler, a Firefox script (requires greasemonkey) that, amongst other things, removes ads from Google pages and adds links to similar features/services from Google's competitors.
Speculating on Yahoo! YPN and the Microcontent Stack
Many outlets have been speculating about Yahoo!’s upcoming launch of YPN, and leaks abound. Here’s what we “know”: - Yahoo! will offer a self-serve model for its Content Match contextual advertising service to micro-content publishers
Here’s my speculation: - Yahoo! will release this offering not only for the web, but also for Feeds
- Yahoo! will offer some form of quid-pro-quo free/discounted/preferred MyYahoo Feed Directory placement for publisher's using its Contextual Advertising services
- Yahoo! will release a blog/Feed publishing platform for North America
I would be surprised if #1 wasn’t available at launch. Two and Three may come in a quarter or two… but I’d be shocked if it didn’t happen sooner rather than later. What’s driving the speculation? Analysis of the benefits of completing the micro-content stack. Completing the stack: - Maximizes the number of opportunities to monetize mico-content on your own platform
- Minimizes customer acquisition costs (at all points)
- Allows for proprietary extensions
- Allows for the collection of a variety of data that will directly drive yield across the network (i.e., beyond the stack itself)
(For those who aren't disciples of Porter, you can get similar results by reading between the lines at the YPN site.) With Google’s Marissa Mayer indicating that they won’t be adding RSS support to Google News, it’s not clear when Google will ship an aggregator to complete its stack…
Meanwhile, Microsoft announced today that they are launching a pilot program (perhaps to coincide with the launch of YPN?!) of their Pay-For-Performance (P4P) Search advertising marketplace and listings; they’ve also recently announced the development of IE 7 and launched a prototype of a web-based Feed Reader.
Funding around RSS is likely to get very interesting indeed. I suspect we’ll see several of the better known start-ups changing their positioning in the harsh light of the reality of three complete mass-market stacks by the end of the year.
And finally, in the usual suspects category... AOL appears to be running in super-slow-mo; don’t even get me started on the MSM players. UPDATE: Here's my coverage of the launch of Yahoo! 360, and what it means (vis-a-vis the above) now that we've seen the broad feature set.
State of The Blogosphere, March 2005, Part 1
David Sifry, CEO of Technorati, posts the first of a multi-part update on the State of The Blogosphere as of March 2005. Boiled down: lots of growth (doubling every 5 months -- still) and lots of spam/link farming. I'll be reading the series for insights to share...
Seth Godin Wants Sticky Posts
Seth Goodin writes about creating a "sticky blog post" (my wording) at the top of his newest blog, so that those dropping in on the middle of the conversation can get some context. He advocates that TypePad should support the feature 'out of the box'. This is a minor but highly useful feature in most Forum software packages, keeping every new person dropping in from asking the same dozen obvious questions that have been asked a million times over (i.e., FAQs). I'd love to have the option to have a sticky post at the top of my Feed, especially because my Feed isn't templated (there's an obvious FMS feature that someone will build...). Feed Readers could, in kind, give end users the option to turn-off sticky posts at the individual Feed level. My sticky post would likely have (text and or links to): 1. Who I am 2. What I do 3. What I blog about 4. Financial Interest/Employer/Etc Disclaimers 5. My content licensing stance (copyrighted, creative commons, etc) Of course, all this could be done as a namespace extension... and many elements of it are profile elements... but a sticky post seems elegant in a Craig Newmark kind of way. I wonder how loyal 'chronologicalists' would feel about such a thing?
Another Perpsective on Google's Death Throes
Pamela Parker points to a post by Tom Watson, entitled, " Google's Death Throes" that left me scratching my head. Tom believes Google and eBay are both screwed (my word), and points to a seemingly ill matched Contextual (i.e., AdSense) ad as proof. Tom, here are some counter points: 1. Contextual Advertising is new. It will improve over time as a) page analysis improves, b) more advertising inventory [keywords to match against] are added, c) additional meta data is fed into the targeting algo, and d) it is blended with other targeting mechanisms. 2. Comparitively little of Google's revenue is tied to AdSense. The vast majority of its revenue comes from AdWords. This is true for a number of reasons, the primary one being that Google keeps 100% of the revenue generated from clicks on its native search volume, whereas it shares revenues for non-native search and non-native Contextual. I don't know how many times I have to point this out, but just because Search and Contextual use the same advertising inventory doesn't mean that the two mechanisms are synonymous! 3. The ad in question wasn't $0.20 a click, it is (at the time of this writing) $0.06 a click And ironically, the last point is perhaps the most important. Tom's post implies that eBay would lose money paying for poorly targeted clicks (i.e., for an ad that returns no matching products) in the eBay marketplace. Let's think about that... A) A 1% click rate on a Contextual ad is pretty good. That would result in a $0.60 CPM B) That means that for $0.60, eBay gets 10 clicks and 990 no-action branding impressions C) Of the 10 clicks, how many simply look at the zero result set and leave? Or rather, how many 1) decide to do a search for something else, 2) decided to sell a product, or 3) have never been to eBay and decide to sign-up? D) Of the 990 impressions, how many trigger a sign-up, buy or sell action or the next few days, from a new or existing customer? Boiled down: - If only 1 of 1000 people sign's up as a new eBay member, eBay has acquired a customer for $0.60. I suspect the LTV of an eBay member is north of that number - If only 1 of 1000 people buys or sells a product, eBay has cleared a listing for $0.60. I suspect the average listing fee plus commission is north of $0.60 (not to mention the value of reactivating a member) In other words, eBay's business model has sufficient margin and conversion to buy cheap Tail terms all day long (or, more conservatively, as a non-trivial component of their overall online marketing spend). In reality, I believe we'll see far more of this behavior, now that companies like eBay can programatically create, manage, measure and refine P4P listings through Web Services, like the Overture AWS API (nee, Yahoo! Search Marketing Services). (I helped build the business and product strategy for the AWS API, co-sell and deploy $1MM+ licensees,etc... and now that it's fully public, I'll have more to say about it in future posts.) I believe the more interesting story is this: Goggle (i.e., search) is a critical customer acquisition and activtation channel for eBay, allowing Google, effectually, to tax eBay's business. Moreover, Amazon, whose margins (for goods they physically handle) are much more sensitive to this pressure, recognizes the threat and is busy building A9 (leveraging Google's R&D expenditure!) to a) create a no-cost search channel for themselves, that b) also enables them to tax competitors vying for the same customer. Wicked smart... assuming they can bootstrap usage and own a fair share of search volume. Of course, this tax applies across any industry that search impacts (and that's, well, pretty broad). Anyone that doesn't own a complete micro-content stack will be at the mercy of those who do (and certainly that of the marketplace owners). If you agree with this end state, you likely also understand why the NY Times purchase of About.com is questionable, as they paid $410MM to play the game, rather than be a player in the game. In my opinion, the only real threat to the Search Co's is viable multi-party competition that leads to significant fragmentation... which in turn would delay bidding pressure across the tail, thereyby slowing the rate of revenue growth, giving more competitors more time to innovate... creating a vicious cycle, indeed. Fortunately for Google et al, it appears that many companies, like the NY Times, would rather play it safe and leave the rules of the game in someone else's hands.
Blogads posts Blogger Demographic Data
Blogads.com has posted the results from their second annual Blogger survey. Needless to say, this is a fascinating read for anyone doing business (or participating) in this 'space'.
Press Hit - OJR.org on Newspapers and Social Networking
Daithí Ó hAnluain has posted a very interesting look into how Newspapers (and news) are and aren't being impacted by Social Networking, and, what Newspapers are, aren't and should be doing with SN. I'm quoted very liberally in the piece as a result of a multi-day, detailed and wide ranging email exchange with Daithí . For the most part, I think my views are presented in context; the one exception is that I'm not at all dour on the intersection of News and Social Networking, only in Newspaper sites establishing themselves as 'destination social networking sites', thus my references to FOAF, etc. (I probably could have been clearer in my reply.) I'm going to ask Daithí for permission to post the 'full transcript' of the email exchange (I wonder if I have to...), as there are some other bits that I'd like to toss out to the community for comment.
Motorola Announces iTunes Phone Details
According to this piece from Reuters (it'll link rot soon since it's up on Yahoo!), Motorola is starting to trickle out info on their new iTunes phones, and while details are scarce (look for more from Gizmodo later today), what's here looks promising (emphasis mine): "Motorola (NYSE:MOT - news) said on Thursday it is working on several mobile phones that are compatible with Apple's (Nasdaq:AAPL - news) iTunes music service and some of which can store eight hours of songs... The fact that some iTunes phones can store eight hours of music or more is different from initial announcements last year that Motorola phones would only carry a small number of songs. Motorola's E790 handset will work on second-generation mobile networks, and not the faster, third-generation (3G) systems. " This, on top of the earlier announcement of Nokia integrating Microsoft's music store, makes things very interesting. Will Yahoo! partner with Sony Ericson? If not, who? (I'll tie this into some broader concepts tomorrow or Friday, as time allows.)
Google News Gets Personal(ized)
I just dropped by Google News and noticed a big "Customize this Page" link in the upper right hand corner. Clicking the link, I'm able to do several new things: 1. Rearrange the order of news sections (e.g., Top Stories, World, Sports) by simply dragging and dropping them; the two column format can't be changed 2. Add a new 'standard section' (e.g., Top Stories, World, Sports) 3. Add a 'custom section'; specify the keywords, and Google News will be your clipping service 4. Modify a second (number of headlines to display by default, etc) 5. Delete a section There are a few obvious downsides: A. It's cookie vs. login based, so if you use more than one machine, you'll need to configure it everywhere you go B. You can specify keywords to clip, but you can't simply point to a Feed... I guess we'll have to wait a bit longer for Google Aggregator
Gawker, the Future Face of Backpacking Financing?
Susan Mernit points to an I Want Media interview with Lockhart Steele, managing editor of Nick Denton's Gawker Media. In it, Steele states that Gawker pays its bloggers $2500.00 USD/mth, with potential for additional upside based on traffic, for a minimum 12 posts a day. Very interesting. While that's not a trivial number of posts to commit to producing, it's not exactly insurmountable either. And, it's a heck of a lot more than... others... have offered moi in the past. While the Dollar isn't what it was a few years ago, and unlimited broadband connectivity at ~0.02% of an annualized Gawker salary is a state-side privilege, I have no doubt that an enterprising, hosteling and bandwidth thrifty highschool or college graduate could fairly comfortably finance a fair bit of globetrotting with relative ease. Hmm...
Free Month of Netflix for Micro Persuasion Readers
Alright, since they still don't seem to get it (God love 'em anyway), let's show Netflix how this works... Steve Rubel, over at Micro Persuasion, got a scoop from Netflix; a free one month trial (vs. the usual two weeks). Click here to check it out. Oh yeah... tell a friend...
Xbox 2: The Irresistable Trojan Horse
Most have known it, or at least felt it for a long time... Microsoft understands that TVs are dead, High Definition monitors are the future, and XBOX is a channel play that gives them a choke point for high speed delivery of digital goods and services. And XBOX 2, the shiny new version of the console scheduled for a full reveal at this May's E3, with, and I quote, "over a teraflop of... computing performance"? It'll be interesting to see how the Cable companies, Apple/HP, and even companies like Netflix adjust their strategies in response.
Microsoft RSS aggregator
SiliconBeat's Michael Bazeley points to a "Labs" version of a Microsoft RSS Aggregator (aka Feed Reader). As we all know from our Google marketing conditioning: - If we put something out in Labs, we really really want opinion leaders to write about it - If we move something to Beta, we really really want the mainstream press to write about it - If we move something to Golden, we're ready for our final PR push So, I'll comply... The app is simple and slick. It's topic based tab metaphor (i.e., channels) reminds me of PointCast; it is also the basic information architecture structure of how I envisioned "DLA's" before I met Marc Canter. It'll be interesting to see if, like PointCast, branded tabs [channels] eventually appear... Adding content is easy and convient... but viewing content is a different matter. Appearantly there's supposed to be a mode where clicking a Feed headline will open a new window with the contents of the page... but on my machine (XP2, latest IE, etc) it always navigate in situ. Maybe my machine, maybe a bug, dunno. Either way, I'd rather the page content be framed by the aggregator interface, as I've become accustomed to in SharpReader. Which reminds me... There's no locking items, flagging items, etc as there is in Sharpreader, which is a must have for me (it's why I only use Bloglines when I have to). But then, this is just a Labs project, and we're just meant to talk and speculate about it! ;) Between this little gem and the buzz going on with Yahoo!'s YPN, it's clear that the race is now on to complete the microcontent stack. More on that later...
Do you read or run a managed feed?
Update: My gratitude to Jeff Clavier, Deeje Cooley, and my most frequent commentor, Anonymous, for their links and answers; immensely helpful. To the rest of you... don't make me beg... it won't be pretty. ;-pI'm currently doing some thinking about so-called Feed Management Services companies( FeedBurner, Pheedo, Moreover, Syndicate IQ, etc), a topic that I have touched on from time to time. I'm interested in hearing some honest feedback from both readers of managed Feeds and Feed Owners who are using Feed Management Services (FMS). Looking through my aggregator, I note that I read the following managed Feeds (many more than I thought, and all via FeedBurner): For the most part, the fact that these Feeds are managed is transparent to me (which I imagine, is by design). The minor exception to this is that many of the Feeds (above) embed a small, persistent image or logo to personalize their Feed; nice, but trivial. My questions to readers of managed Feeds are: - A) Does the fact that a Feed is being managed effect your willingness to subscribe to it?
- B) Does the fact that a Feed is managed impact your reading experience? If so, how?
- C) If the Feed Management Service were to go out of business, or if the Feed Owner decided to abandon the service, would you update your aggregator to reflect the new URL?
And, for Feed Owners: - Which FMS service(s) (e.g., measurement, free bandwidth, advertising, etc) motivated you to sign-up?
- What FMS services have you added on over time?
- How long has your Feed been managed?
- What would cause you to abandon the managed Feed approach?
- What would cause you to switch to a different FMS provider?
- What services do you wish your FMS offered?
- What difference has having your Feed managed made to you, from either (or both) an authoring or monetizing perspective?
- Anything else you'd care to share!
I'd really love to hear your thoughts on this, and would appreciate you leaving a comment (if you care to participate) so that the entire community can benefit from your thoughts. If, for whatever reason, you'd prefer to share your thoughts privately, please email me at: fms !@! buzzhit dot com (no spam version obviously: no exclamation points, one contiguous address, etc). While I've never asked for a link before, if you read this, and don't mind tossing a link this way, I'd greatly appreciate the support. (NOFOLLOWS are perfect; not looking for juice, just awareness.) Thanks! Tag: FeedManagementServiceAdoption
The Long Tail and Social Software
Barb Bydwad, a new addition to The Social Software Weblog, asks two interesting questions in her article entitled The long tail: how does it relate to social software?Here questions and my abstract(ed) answers: Q: How do you see social software relating to the long tail?As it pertains to the long tail, social software enables: 1. Awareness 2. Co-operative (inter)action 3. Confidence (i.e., confident (inter)action) Q: What benefits are to obtained from tapping in to the less popular end of the spectrum?1. Uniqueness/Differentiation 2. Information leading to Advanage (or alternative specific desired Benefit)
YellowPages.com to become a national network?
Over at the Local Media Blog, Greg Sterling asks, " Will YellowPages.com Become the New 'At Hand'?" Greg, the answer is an absolute 'Yes', if the industry has any hopes of competing with their Internet-centric brethern in the long term. Looking for more detail? Here's a comprehensive post I made four months ago (based on the questions I was able to ask directly to those heading up the JV, during the Kelsey Conference where the announcement took place). Four months out, I stand by all of it.
Blogger.com: SNAFU of the day
Just a quick FYI to those that read me via Feed... Blogger appears to be misbehaving in a new way today... every time I add a new post, it toggles all of the posts in my Feed from Summary mode to Full Text mode (resulting in all of my posts appearing to have been updated). At least, that's how my aggregator, Sharpreader 0.9.5.1, is displaying things... Apologies for the hassle if your aggregator is behaving the same way.
Inside The Store: A9 Local Search Future State?
ClickZ's Zachary Rodgers has an interview with (Amazon) A9's Barnaby Dorfman (who appearantly led development of A9's Yellow Pages offering). One question sticks out for me: "Q.Can you describe the development process?
A.We don't get into our development process too deeply. We had some of those "wouldn't it be cool if we could..." conversations. And that's what Block View came out of. It started with a handheld video device and a handheld GPS. It evolved to a much more sophisticated system.
Nobody ever said you have to go out and take a bunch of pictures. Sometimes you have to go out on a limb. [We foresee a progression] similar to what happened with searching inside books. It started with just being able to see the cover. Then you could see a few more pages, then search inside the book. We're hoping for the same trajectory here. "
For the sake of brevity (there's so much I'd like to say), I'll add the following to the conversation: - As I wrote almost six months ago, "What local businesses who are using SEM [love] about the medium is its ability to allow them to fully express their businesses, at a price that provides substantially more value than Yellow Pages. An example: a local photographer put up his portfolio, references, schedule, etc. Even if the Yellow Pages could accomodate that much information (they can't), he'd be looking at $10s to $100s of thousands of dollars! Online, he pays a few bucks a month to host."
- There once was a start-up named Vyze.com (recently sold and converted into a holistic directory) that focused on the intersection of local search/yellow pages and video. In short, the idea was to allow service providers to upload video describing their services, showing the innards of their shop, etc. The idea is spot on (and follows logically from Dorfman's quote, above). Vyze 'failed' for the wrong reasons (too far ahead of the curve and, well, no funding).
- While #1, above, is focused on the provider's needs, the customer needs can be encapsulated in a single word: confidence.
I can't emphasize #3 enough. Yes yes, price, value, and convenience -- all the stuff we've been told over and over by various pundits -- matters. But, in my mind, it always comes back to one thing: confidence. Confidence that I'm buying the right product or service (reviews/referrals); confidence that I'm buying it at the right price (comparison shopping); confidence that I'll feel safe shopping their (Amazon A9 "block shot"). Confidence drives conversion. Period. And getting "Inside the Store" will add a ton of confidence for a slew of different product/service categories.
Analysts, Yahoo, RSS and my quest for snarkiness
Well, I was all geared up this weekend to squeeze some major snarkiness into my generally mild approach to convering the ever evolving tech scene... but alas... Susan Mernit beat me to it. Hey Susan, at least we know Wolk was paying attention during her b-school session on "vertical integration"...
Technorati gags Community Manager's voice...
Over at Niall Kennedy's blog: "Technorati would rather I did not express an opinion on issues such as corporate blogging policies that are affecting the world of weblogs. This post has been overwritten and my artwork posted to Flickr is now marked as private and available only to Flickr contacts marked as friends." Note: I'll update this when we know if it's a practical joke, an attempt to generate buzz, or yet more free speech being quashed by corporate overlords providing nothing more than at-will employment. Update 635PM: For those who don't read the comments to my posts, note that Niall dropped by (thanks Niall, sorry I'll miss you and the rest of the crew at tonight's Mobile Monday) and offered the following: "No, this post was not a joke and it was a post meant to generate buzz about a topic. Technorati executives are concerned about how employee weblogs expressing opinions may be interpreted as an official Technorati position. All Technorati employees have been asked to review weblog posts with staff members before posting. I reinstated my original post this morning and I am ready to willing to hear the community's response to my individual voice. I hope to continue to share my passion for the industry through my weblog without editorial oversight."
This prompted a reply from Jason Kotke: "For a company that relies on aggregating content by scraping full posts from almost 8 million blogs, vetting their employees' personal writing seems like a curious (not to mention ironic and hypocritical) position for Technorati to take." I agree, Jason. I'll add some additional thoughts here: - It's not clear from Niall's post if "...without editorial oversight" means that he'll be a) adding a Technorati disclaimer to the footer of every post, or, b) if he's decided to head for greener pastures;
- I'd like to know who'll be providing "editorial oversight" for David Sifry's posts (perhaps his Board of Directors?), and whether his blog will still be worth a read;
- Just how thrilled Andreas Stavropoulos of Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Ryan McIntyre of Mobius Venture Capital must be to know that their $6.5MM is being spent reviewing employee blog posts...
Update 1024PM: Niall's posted a heartfelt update on the situation in a new post entitled, "Whose voice is it anyway?" It sounds like Technorati's new 'policy' isn't censorship, but rather a recommendation "that Technorati employees seek the opinion of a coworker if they are unsure of how a post might be interpreted by others." This is certainly more reasonable (and more aligned with what we might expect from Technorati), but it's still not right. Niall's weblog is hosted at Niallkennedy.com, not niall.technorati.com. Whether or not he is a Technorati employee by day is irrelevant. Unless Technorati is paying him to be an employee 24 hours a day, he is first and foremost a private citizen. As such, Technorati (and any other corporation) must not sanction its employees for lawful, after hours views and/or actions. Just as Technorati could not sanction Niall for race, gender, or sexuality, it likewise can't sanction him for being a socialist, flag burning, porn watching, pro-choice vegan (not that Niall is or does any of those things). Yes, markets are conversations. But the conversation being had here is between Niall and his audience. Until Niall declares his blog an "official voice of Technorati" -- hosts it on a company provided server, and writes it with a company provided computer -- the company's stance is an insult to the intelligence of Niall's readers, who do know the difference between a private citizen and an on-the-clock company spokesperson. I'd like to hear what JD Lassica and Jeff Jarvis think about this (as it is unique from either the Google or Friendster blogger situations). P.S. No one at Technorati should read anything into any of this; I'm a regular user of (and commentator on) the company's offerings. Technorati just happens to be the company to stumble into this mess, which hopefully won't result in a blogging equivalent of the nonsense "invention clauses" so common in tech industry employment "contracts". Update 1015AM 3/8/05: CNET has a solid article this morning on the sad state of the rights of private citizen's to blog vs. 'safe' employment. I recommend a read if this topic is important to you. I've emailed the authors to get more details about the 'recently passed' California law they reference... but no reply as of yet. If Larry Lessig (or anyone with a legit legal background) stumbles upon | |
