[sounds like a hard sell]

received this odd e-mail this morning...looks to be trying either to market myspace or vois or is an attempt to get some extra *friends* hrm...:

"I just wanted to tell you I really love your blog, but I don't always get a chance to come to this site and read it. Most of my time is spent vois.com and also on myspace. I think if you would put your blog on vois.com as well I would read it more often. You would get a huge boost of even more people to read your blog! It is a very good
group of bloggers just like us. If you want to get back to me and talk, here is my profile on vois: http://www.vois.com/user/**** and here is my profile on myspace: http://www.myspace.com/****"

"people like us"....I dunno 'bout that

nb: **** indicates my editing.

[do you think google has too much power]

Well, if you believe that google is ruling the internet world and would like to thwart their hold, try out these steps from the Internet Strategy Blog:

"Marketing your website:

1. Article marketing – Submit articles to article directories is a surefire way to attract traffic. Not only can you establish your expert status, your articles will also be reprinted in various blogs or ezines, thereby increasing the number of links back to your site.
2. Syndicate content – Syndicate your content and increase your traffic with RSS feed
3. Publish a Press Release – particularly if you have an important announcement
4. Social networking – Build social communities in the various social networking sites. More details here.
5. Video marketing – Create a video on anything related to your niche and upload it to Youtube, Metacafe, Veoh, Dailymotion etc.
6. Participate in specific forums – Establish your expert status by providing help and support in forums specific to your niche.
7. Joint Venture – The best way to generate traffic is to leverage on other people traffic. Create a joint venture with the top marketers in your niche.
8. Create free stuff and give it away – Serve as a teaser for your product. Everyone just can’t resist free stuff.
9. Classified Ad– put up an classified ad at Craigslist, USFreeAds, Yahoo Classified, Oodle
10. Submit to directories – Another place to increase exposure to your site

Marketing your blog

1. Blog actively, consistently and constructively – This is really the only way to attract readers.
2. Read other blogs and give comments – You’ll be surprised how much traffic it will bring you, especially when you leave a good comment on the popular blogs.
3. Link actively to other blogs – The rule of reciprocal. People tend to link back to you when you link to them.
4. Guest blog - Invite some big names to write a post for your blog and request him to link back to your blog. It always works.
5. MyBlogLog – Register an account with MyBlogLog and start to visit other blog with the MyBlogLog widget. Your face will start to appear on their blogs. Nice traffic puller.
6. Submit to blog directories – Just another place to increase the exposure of your blog
7. Interviews other bloggers – Especially useful when there are newsworthy topic. For example, during this pagerank event, you can interview Darren of Problogger on how he feels about the drop in pagerank and ways he has come up to counter it. It is definitely newsworthy and link-worthy.
8. Accept interview by other bloggers – This only work when you have established your expert status in the field.
9. Establish good relationship with your reader – Comment on your reader’s comment and if there is any doubts, go the extra mile and provide the solution for them.
10. Pay per post – Get people to review your post.

Social Media Marketing

1. Facebook / MySpace – Invite friends, start a group, join groups, comment on friends space.
2. Yahoo Answers – Help others solve their problem and put a link back to your site in the sources field
3. Digg / Netscape / reddit / stumbleupon – Only submit your best article, do not spam.
4. Helium – Share your expertise and make money at the same time
5. Youtube – As mentioned above in video marketing
6. Wiki marketing – Start a wiki on a topic related to your niche and invite contribution from the public. Include your links in one of the contribution.
7. Flickr – take a screenshot of your site (with the url fully visible) and upload to Flickr.
8. Squidoo – Start a Squidoo lens and participate in the Squidoo community. You could easily drive traffic to your site.

Offline marketing

1. Advertise in local newspaper
2. Publish news in local newspaper
3. Get interviewed in local newspaper
4. Print your website url in namecard
5. Include signature in all outgoing mails
6. Become a sponsor in public events and activities

From Internet Strategy Blog.

[business+social networking]

Thinking about our current plan for NLab (tracking social networking in business) this video seems to give a good background on what businesses need and how social networking can help:

(of course there's ecademy linked in - with 11 million members and the more recent jump up etc...)

[women, business & blogging conference]

I can't believe it's over...already! Yesterday was an amazing day and we were very lucky to have stimulating speakers: Meg Pickard (I am so copying her ppt style!), Eileen Brown (good use of cartoons! and she's already blogged about it), and Jory des Jardins (lots of hints and tips and helped a few of us win that buzzword bingo!) - they were all excellent!

I have loads to say (I'm sure conference delegates do too!) but I'm off to catch a flight now. I'll upload some photos to flickr of course and I hope all the delegates, (yes you! I know you're reading!) and anyone else interested, join our google group called "nlabwomen." MEN can join too!!

[the business of new media]

With less than two weeks to go until the Women, Business & Blogging conference I found this article timely:From Postcards, to Podcasts.

"According to the American Advertising Federation's Media Investment Survey 2007, 73% of nearly 1,000 organizations polled said they are allotting up to 20% of their budgets for 'experimentation and new media options.' Further, 78% of respondents said they are 'always open to new ways of using traditional media.'"

Blogging is important for business:

Have a look at what Lori Reed, Director of Marketing at InsureMe.com has to say about search engine optimization:

Some key points from the article, well worth bearing in mind:

[google is good for business]

from slashdot:

"News.com ran an article earlier in the week talking about the somewhat strained relationship between newspapers and Google. Google's stance is firm: 'We don't pay to index news content.' Just the same, newspapers with an online presence are starting to reconsider their relationship with Google, the value of linking, and the realities of internet economics. Talk of paying for content, as well as ongoing court cases, has observers considering both sides of the issue:
"While some in newspaper circles point to the Belgium court ruling and the content deals with AP and AFP as a sign Google may be willing to pay for content, Google fans and bloggers interpreted the news quite differently. To them, it was obvious that the Belgium group had agreed to settle--even after winning its court case--because they discovered that they needed Google's traffic more than the fees that could be generated from news snippets. Observers note that with newspapers receiving about 25 percent of their traffic from search engines, losing Google's traffic had to sting."

"Google's position about paying newspapers to index headlines has never wavered. "We don't pay to index news content."

[blogging is good]

Less than two weeks until the Women, Business & Blogging conference! There are a few bursaries left so go ahead and apply.

The aim of the conference, as the title suggests, is to talk about the role blogging can play in business and yup, the focus is on women. As I'm thinking about this I've come across Penelope Trunk's popular post "Blogging Essential for a Good Company." A few interesting bits:

"Employers regularly Google prospective employees to learn more about them. Blogging gives you a way to control what employers see, because Google’s system works in such a way that blogs that are heavily networked with others come up high in Google searches."

"And coming up high is good: “People who are more visible and have a reputation and stand for something do better than people who are invisible,” branding consultant Catherine Kaputa" says.

Here are Penelope's eight reasons on why exactly blogging is good:

1. Blogging creates a network.
A blogger puts himself out in the world as someone who is interesting and engaging — just the type of person everyone wants to meet. “A blog increases your network because a blog is about introducing yourself and sharing information,” says Kaputa.

2. Blogging can get you a job.
Dervala Hanley writes a quirky literary blog that got her a job is at Stone Yamashita Partners, a consulting firm that “tries to bring humanity to business.” Hanley told me that the firm was attracted to her ability to put her business experience into personal terms on the blog.

3. Blogging is great training.
To really get attention for your blog, you’re going to have to have daily entries for a while. At least a few months to get rolling, and then three or four times a week after that. So you will really get to know your topic well.

4. Blogging helps you move up quickly.
To escape the entry-level grind, you can either pay your dues, working up a ladder forever, or you can establish yourself as an expert in the world by launching a blog. High-level jobs are for people who specialize, and hiring managers look for specialists online. “Decision-makers respect Google-karma,” writes Tim Bray, director of Web technologies for Sun Microsystems — on his own blog, of course.

5. Blogging makes self-employment easier.
You can’t make it on your own unless you’re good at selling yourself. One of the most cost-effective and efficient ways of marketing yourself is with a blog. When someone searches for your product or service, make sure your blog comes up first.

Curt Rosengren, a career coach, periodically Googles “career passion” — words he thinks are most important to his business — just to make sure his blog, Occupational Adventure, comes up high on the list. He estimates that his blog generates at least half of his coaching business.

6. Blogging provides more opportunities.
Building brands, changing careers, launching a business — these endeavors are much easier once you’ve established yourself online. Rosengren told me, “My blog is a foundation. I’m building an awareness that I can leverage to do other fun things with my future, such as product development, or public speaking.”

A blog gives you a leg up when you meet someone new. Dylan Tweney, a freelance writer, told me his blog, the Tweney Review, gives him instant legitimacy with clients.

7. Blogging could be your big break.
Visually creative types can blog beyond just text. Mark Fearing has a cartoon blog. “Cartooning and illustration are very crowded fields,” he says. “My blog has gotten me more notice than any other publicity tool I’ve used. Plus, the blog gives me a way to have a new conversation with potential clients about other work.”

8. Blogging makes the world a better place.
“Blogging is about giving stuff away to a community,” says Day. “For years, as a junior developer, I would go to the Internet for solutions and I would always take, take, take. Now I am happy to be a contributor and give something back.”

[google says "no" to essay mills]

Google Bans Essay Writing Adverts
By Sean Coughlan
BBC News education reporter



Google is to ban adverts for essay writing services - following claims that plagiarism is threatening the integrity of university degrees.
There have been complaints from universities about students being sold customised essays on the internet.

The advert ban from the Google search engine has been "warmly welcomed" by university authorities.



But it has angered essay writing firms which say this will unfairly punish legitimate businesses.

From next month, Google will no longer take adverts from companies which sell essays and dissertations - and the internet company has written to advertisers to tell them about the policy.

Plagiarism software

Google's forthcoming ban on adverts for "academic paper-writing services and the sale of pre-written essays, theses, and dissertations" means that essay websites join a blacklist of "unacceptable content" including adverts for weapons, prostitution, drugs, tobacco, fake documents and "miracle cures".

The move has been applauded by universities which have struggled with the problem of students dishonestly submitting material copied from the internet.


"Making life harder for these cynical web 'essay mills' is a step in the right direction," says Professor Drummond Bone, president of Universities UK.

"We welcome this move. Essay writing sites claim that students pay hundreds of pounds for model answers - but do not then submit these as their own work. We all know this claim is absurd."

The universities organisation says that in particular there have been difficulties with essays bought by students from companies which sell tailor-made answers, where fees can be up to £5,000 for a single piece of extended work.

There have been reports of up to 12,000 essays being sold to students in a year, says Universities UK.

These essays and assignments can be written by freelance academics or other students - and it is less easy for plagiarism software used by universities to detect such work.

Google, commenting on the change, says its advertising policies are "developed and evaluated based on multiple factors, including legal and cultural considerations plus user and customer experience".

And a spokesperson said that the advert ban was expected to be applied across Google's global network.

Unfair ban?

But one of the UK companies fearing that it will be prevented from advertising, Essaywriter.co.uk, is angry at the threat to its business - with 80% of its customers coming through Google.

Managing director Matthew Wilson says this will punish the legitimate, transparent companies, which sell essays, but which warn students that they must not be used dishonestly.

Mr Wilson says that such a bespoke service, selling tailor-made essays at short notice, with prices around £70 and upwards, can be used as a guide for students wanting extra assistance.

Overseas students are frequently customers, he says - but the firm makes clear that essays should not be passed off as being written by the student.

And he says that such a blanket ban will not stop the search engine from generating links to rogue essay selling companies, which have been accused of scamming customers by providing poor quality material.

From BBC News

[semantic web failure?]

Two days ago I blogged about the negative reactions My Space elicits by limiting personalisation (specifically in the case of adding particular widgets to My Space profiles). Interestingly, Stephen Downes sees this kind of mentality as securing the downfall of the semantic web. "The Semantic Web will never work because it depends on businesses working together, on them cooperating."

Read on:

"And I'm saying the semantic web won't work. Can't work.But how do you explain that intuition?And I was thinking about the edgy things of Web 2.0, and where they're working, and more importantly, where they're beginning to show some cracks.A few of key things today:- Yahoo is forcing people to give up their Flickr identities and to join the mother ship, and- MySpace is blocking all the widgets that aren't supported by some sort of business deal with MySpace- the rumour that Google is turning off the search APIAnd that's when I realized:The Semantic Web will never work because it depends on businesses working together, on them cooperating.We are talking about the most conservative bunch of people in the world, people who believe in greed and cut-throat business ethics. People who would steal one another's property if it weren't nailed down. People like, well, Conrad Black and Rupert Murdoch.And they're all going to play nice and create one seamless Semantic Web that will work between companies - competing entities choreographing their responses so they can work together to grant you a seamless experience?Not a chance.Now - there are many technical reasons why I think the Semantic Web is a loser, along with some cultural and philosophical reasons. Namely: the people who designed the Semantic Web never read their epistemology texts.But the big problem is they believed everyone would work together:- would agree on web standards (hah!)- would adopt a common vocabulary (you don't say)- would reliably expose their APIs so anyone could use them (as if)Shall I go on?So...Maybe we won't be building clusters in Moncton, maybe we will. I don't know - I'd like to keep trying. Maybe people will listen to us or maybe (more likely) they won't.The future is not in the Semantic Web (or in Java, or in enterprise computing - all for the same reason). Careers based on that premise will founder. Because the people saying all the semantic-webbish things - speak the same language, standardize your work, orchestrate the services - are the people who will shut down the pipes, change the standards, and look out for their own interests (at the expense of yours)."

[not myspace anymore]

From :

Some users of MySpace feel as if their space is being invaded.

MySpace, the Web’s largest social network, has gradually been imposing limits on the software tools that users can embed in their pages, like music and video players that also deliver advertising or enable transactions.


At stake is the ability of MySpace, which is owned by the News Corporation, to ensure that it alone can commercially capitalize on its 90 million visitors each month.

But to some formerly enthusiastic MySpace users, the new restrictions hamper their abilities to design their pages and promote new projects.

“The reason why I am so bummed out about MySpace now is because recently they have been cutting down our freedom and taking away our rights slowly,” wrote Tila Tequila, a singer who is one of MySpace’s most popular and visible users, in a blog posting over the weekend. “MySpace will now only allow you to use ‘MySpace’ things.”

Ms. Tequila, born Tila Nguyen, has attracted attention by linking to more than 1.7 million friends on her MySpace page. To promote her first album, she recently added to her MySpace page a new music player and music store, called the Hoooka, created by Indie911, a Los Angeles-based start-up company.

Users listened to her music and played the accompanying videos 20,000 times over the weekend. But the Hoooka disappeared on Sunday after a MySpace founder, Tom Anderson, personally contacted Ms. Tequila to object, according to someone with direct knowledge of the dispute. She then vented her thoughts on her personal blog.

MySpace says that it will block these pieces of third-party software — also called widgets — when they lend themselves to violations of its terms of service, like the spread of pornography or copyrighted material. But it also objects to widgets that enable users to sell items or advertise without authorization, or without entering into a direct partnership with the company.

A MySpace spokeswoman said yesterday that the service did not remove anything from Ms. Tequila’s page. “A MySpace representative contacted her and told her that she had violated our terms of service in regards to commercial activity,” the spokeswoman said. “She removed the material herself, after realizing it was not appropriate for MySpace.”

Ms. Tequila and her representatives would not comment.

But Justin Goldberg, chief executive of Indie911, said MySpace’s actions undercut the notion that the social networks’ users have complete creative freedom. “We find it incredibly ironic and frustrating that a company that has built its assets on the back of its users is turning around and telling people they can’t do anything that violates terms of service,” he said.

“Why shouldn’t they call it FoxSpace? Or RupertSpace?” Mr. Goldberg said, referring to the News Corporation’s chief, Rupert Murdoch.

The tussle between MySpace and Indie911 underscores tensions between established Internet companies and the latest generation of Web start-ups. Without a critical mass of visitors to their sites, many of these smaller companies are devising strategies that involve clamping on to sites like MySpace and Facebook and trying to make money off their traffic.

MySpace, meanwhile, is trying to show that it can generate stable revenue. Google will pay it at least $900 million over the next three years to serve ads to the site’s users. And last fall, MySpace announced a partnership with Snocap, a San Francisco-based company, to sell music.

Perhaps not coincidentally, this year, MySpace blocked widgets from Revver, a video-sharing site that embeds advertisements in its clips, and Imeem, a music buying service.

[...]

“We probably should have stopped YouTube,” Michael Barrett, chief revenue officer for Fox Interactive Media, a part of the News Corporation, said in an interview in late February. “YouTube wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for MySpace. We’ve created companies on our back.”

MySpace and its corporate parent say they want to find ways to support and exploit the growing widget economy. Last year, Fox Interactive Media introduced a service called Spring Widget. The service provides tools to help developers create widgets for use both on computer desktops and online networks like MySpace.

In a recent use of its technology, the studio behind the horror film “Dead Silence” used a Spring Widget tool on its promotional MySpace page to count down the minutes until the film’s release.


Continue reading the article here.

Links added by me.