2005, the year of the digital citizen

From the tsunami to the London bombings, the BBC reviews the rise of citizen journalism.

Happy New Year (while it lasts)

According to Wikipedia, 2006 will be:

- The International Year of Deserts,
- The Rembrandt Year,
- The Mozart Year,
- The Tesla Year,
- The International Asperger's Year,
- The year of the dog in Chinese Astrology.

Many psychics, pundits and forecasters predict that 2006 will also be:

- The year when action movie hero Arnold is re-elected as governor of California and military draft is re-established in the United States (no connection here I hope),
- The year when phone calls will be free (a one in three chance that is happens),
- The year when a 9-mile-long asteroid will strike the earth (after the world cup, fortunately)

See USA Today.

I cannot wait, especially for the asteroid part. I already missed the beginning of the world, I wouldn't want to miss the end.

Happy New Year by the way :-)

Citizen journalism at 30,000 feet

Jeremy Hermanns talks about his terrifying experience on an Alaska flight when the plane suddenly nose dived and decompressed because of a hole in the fuselage. He posted some pictures of the event. Amazingly, his account of the incident attracted loads of critics (trolls) questionning the story, his credibility and so on. Talk about the wisdom of crowds...

My 2006 Predictions (Not)

2005 is coming to a close and I predict a rise in champagne hangover, soon-to-be-forgotten resolutions and an endless supply of mystics, psychics and punters (also known as "analysts" or "experts") sharing their vision of the future with less enlightened mortals. (See Fred Wilson's delicious tag on this).

Will Ajax finally make the transition from kitchen sink to popular web design technology? Will we ever trust Wikipedia? Will we soon run out of buzzwords combining the word"blog" with less fortunate technology related words? (vlog?, splog? ...).

I planned to articulate a clear vision for 2006 in this post through proper research, talking to industry players, looking at tech and marketing budget trends, sampling consumers... but then I realised that it was a substantial amount of work to do, all before the end of this year. Instead, I used Mcalister's 2006 tech prediction generator:

Last year I made several predictions that now seem ridiculously too ahead of times... But a few ideas were pretty close. I've got a feeling that 2006 will be a big year, and here are some of the reasons why:

A Los Altos startup is going to open our eyes to some new ways that social RSS tagging can influence culture. Business 2.0. will pick up on this and run several cover stories on the founders.
Jorma Ollila (NOKIA) will be in the spotlight for his decision to support AFLAX remote scripting. This will upset Robert Scoble, and the blogosphere will react "mainstream media like"... The noise will quiet before the end of the year and it will all be forgotten soon after the shock.

Amazon will see their stock skyrocket after their Podcasting business starts taking off. We've seen it coming for a while now, but 2006 will be the year it really kicks into gear.

Either Yahoo! or Google will seek to expand their social networking business by acquiring Linkedin. AOL will be overlooked in the process, and they will see a management shakeout later in the year.

One of the big leaders in the entertainment industry will wake up to the opportunity in the Internet and the Web 2.0 trends. After months of speculation, they will make a key acquisition that will shake up the landscape for years to come.

Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, and all of that.

Finally, I finished my first term exams but for one assignment due on the 4th of January. I feel shattered. For the next week, I will swap blogging for skiing. I wish all of you who have been reading Beyond PR, despite the irregular posting frequency a happy holiday season. I'll be back after the 26th.

Science in Wikipedia as accurate as Encyclopaedia Britannica

The British scientific journal Nature reviewed science entries in Wikipedia and the Encyclopaedia Britannica (E.B). Results: few differences in accuracy.

8 serious errors were found, 4 in each encyclopaedia. Slightly more factual errors were found in Wikipedia (163 v 132 for E.B).

See article on BBC

It is pretty remarkable given than Wikipedia is entirely edited by volunteers. It also brings some faith back into the value and quality of open source knowledge, given the recent issues with Adam Curry (The original podcaster :-) and John Seigenthaler Sr.

Martell Cognac Blog: Conversation NOT Flowing!

Today, I read in New Media Age (the paper version) that Pernod Ricard is sponsoring a "blog" on Guardian Unlimited. In that instance, blog is more of a concept. It's just a website with an online competition, tips on serving cognac and two supposedly controversial articles: "xmas shopping, online or high streets?" and "Modern art: love it or loathe it?". Should you care, you are invited to give your opinion. The blog is called "let the conversation flow" but there is no flow in the conversation since you have to email your entries, for them to be selected and posted on the site (there is no conversation either as no one responds to your opinions). A complete let-down for what could have been a great blogging/advertising combination.

Seth Godin on e-marketing

E-Consultancy features an interview with permission marketing guru Seth Godin. Among other things, Seth talks about RSS being the future of email marketing and greater usage of the web for retention and CRM rather than acquisition.

I have been a convert of Seth's marketing philosophy for years but with hindsight, I am now casting a more critical eye on his assertions. Seth predicted that banner ads will disappear in 2000… While paid search is attracting more online marketing budget, "interruptive advertising", be it banners, pop-ups or eyeblasters is still a major eyesore on the internet landscape. Why? Because it works. It gets you noticed and it delivers click through. And conceptually, I don’t see the difference between displaying a banner about the new Jeep on an online automotive magazine, and pushing an announcement about that same car in a subscribed automotive RSS feed...

Opinmind : mostly positive sentiments

Opinmind is not another blog search engine since it helps you "discover and connect with people with similar hobbies and interests". (although it walks and quacks like a blog search engine ;-)

One interesting feature is how it categorises results between positive and negative opinions with a "sentimeter". I typed "bird flu" and the positive results came up with "love", "good" or "awesome" in the sentence while the negative have "hate" or "sucks" or "stupid". It looks like the sentimeter matches keywords according to their proximity in a sentence. Probably pulling from a dictionary of negative and positive qualifiers. This works well for opinions which are expressed “directly” but could miss more subtle comments. There is also a risk that one whole post will be judged based on one sentence. i.e. the whole post is positive but there is one sentence containing "hate" and the term you search for too close together).

Nonetheless, I think that it is great to have a tool like Opinmind freely available. I am sure it will grow and improve with time.

You can read the Opinmind blog here.

via Micropersuasion

Nabaztag, the smartest rabbit on the Internet

Nabaztag should top your Xmas list. It's a rabbit that talks, sings, moves its ears and pulsate with colours. And it is connected to the Internet 24/7 via your WiFi network so you can program it to track and react to stock prices, the weather, your email inbox, SMS ... You can even send messages to Nabaztag owners too via the Nabaztag website.

The Consumerist

PR Week US runs an interview with Joel Johnson re: new consumer watchdog blog "The Consumerist". The site is titled "Shoppers bite back" and hope to channel customers' frustation with poor products/services. So far there are takes on BMW, Walmart and Best Buy. It looks like the blog is still finding its editorial line, not knowing whether to become an archive of lame company promotions or the official voice of countless pissed-off customers turned online activists. I wish it was more like Fuckedcompany.com

Worth keeping an eye on anyway.

The Phelps Group Adds Cedarlane Natural Foods And Whatever To Its Roster And I Am Fed Up With Receiving Your Press Releases

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (December 6, 2005) The Phelps Group, one of the nation's leading integrated marketing communications (IMC) firms, was recently selected by PSI, a leading provider of workforce testing services, and Cedarlane Natural Foods, maker of all-natural frozen foods, to carry out IMC campaigns consisting of advertising and public relations services.Public relations veteran Bill Krenn will lead both accounts. The combined capitalized billings for the two accounts are approximately $3MM... whatever!

This is the kind of email I receive almost daily in my mailbox. No message, just a copy and paste of a press release in an email. This one is from Bahareh Ramin, media contact for the Phelps Group. I was close to put his email address here on the spur of the moment...

I don't know who the Phelps Group is. I bet I am not alone. What on earth is "workforce testing services?". May be Phelps Groups or PSI are famous in the US. But I am based in London. Why should I care? OK, my blog talks about marketing and PR, but mostly from an online perspective. Why emailing me this press release? Does the Phelps Group get the email addresses of all bloggers remotely related to marketing and bombard them blindly with emails in the hope that one of them will say: "wow! how did I live without knowing that! I must post the entire press release at once on my blog and that will certainly attract millions of readers who will join me and the prestigious Phelps Group in celebrating that glorious account win."

If you want to engage me, at least make an effort of being relevant. And a note saying "hi, this is why I am sending you this" will be appreciated as well.

Blogging the shoposphere

Business Week carries a short story on how online retailers try to tap into social networks and blogs. It features Shoposphere, a new Yahoo! Beta feature where members can display their shopping wish lists. When creating a list, you can search and pick products from a list of suppliers selected by Yahoo! These “pick lists” can even be accessed by RSS feeds.

Million dollar homepage: why didn’t I think of that!

The Wall Street Journal is running an article on Alex Tew, the British student behind the million dollar homepage. If you are unfamiliar with the concept: he divided a webpage into 1 million pixels, and sells them for $1 each. Through clever PR and marketing, he has so far sold $716,900 worth of pixels since August. Advertisers range from online casinos, online communities, discount CDs, domain name hosting and even the Times.

There are now hundreds of copycat websites, some of them with interesting twists on the concepts, other just simple rip-offs. Someone is even selling a script to “create your own million dollar homepage”…

Hats-off to Alex. It is a one-off but will definitely be part of Internet advertising history. On a personal level, AdRants summarises my feeling well in true “Onion” style: “Million dollar homepage causes entrepreneurial depression".

We are human, after all.

I love this Korean blog featuring a collection of pictures of people from all over the world covering one of their eyes. It is as if they are responding to a signal sent by this Korean artist. A silent hello, a token of acknowledgement, saying: "we are part of it". It is so simple yet so powerful. Seth mentioned about the impact of seeing these half covered faces. These pictures do carry a strong emotional charge. The sum and variety of them gives a feeling of connectedness. People-to-People.

via Seth Godin

Ikea blog: better do it yourself

Great blog from an Ikea "positive fanatic". Nice example of a consumer turned advocate and how blogs can help spread consumer generated brand messages online. It's fun reading too. And there are more like him: Ikea fan in Ohio, Ikea fans website, Ikea Lovemark...

I also found a "boycott Ikea" in Italian to counter balance that.

via Micropersuasion... again... (yes, I do read other blogs!)

Google: click to call adwords

Remember call back buttons on websites... Google is testing "click-to-call" on its search results to connect people and companies automatically. And Google foots the bill too.

via Micropersuasion

Mashups: XBOX 360 inventory google map locator

Chris Lambert has developed a XBOX 360 inventory locator for Best Buy stores. This is a good example of a growing trend of building up applications on top of Google free applications or integrating different online applications and content together (mashups).

See more Google maps mashups on Googlemapsmania.

Can you be sued because of what you say in your blog?

You betcha! The Media Law Resources Centre published a list of current US lawsuit against bloggers. (Via Whatsnextblog). There are been some cases too in France (in French) and Singapore (with a happy ending).

Based on my limited legal knowledge, these are the common blogging legal pitfalls I identified:

- Breach of copyright: reproducing someone else content without permission. Grey area since bloggers often reproduce articles to comment on...
- Breach of employer's contract, especially releasing proprietary or confidential information.
- Libel: you are insulting and causing prejudice to someone (the plaintiff must show that he/she occured damages).
- Publishing false or malicious information (for example to get a share price to rise or spreading false rumours about a product being defective to kill a competitor's sales...)

Apparently, you could be sued because of the comments posted on your blog too...

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has a legal guide for bloggers (this is based on US law only).

Advertisers to sponsor podcasts

Following from my post on iPod children stories yesterday and how advertisers could sponsor them, I read that Dixie, a US manufacturer of disposable tableware goods (cups, plates… whatever you don’t fancy washing-up) signed-up a 12 months agreement to sponsor Mommycast, a podcast show targeting young mums and parents. Way to go.

Via Tech based marketing