Thinkful

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

LinkedIn starts "Yahoo! Answers" like service

LinkedIn starts "Yahoo! Answers" like service.

Rent a protester

Young, good-looking, and available for around 150 euros (£100), more than 300 would-be protesters are marketing themselves on a German rental website.

Via BBC

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Boo Box: Is Pay-Per-Post getting increasingly popular?

My friend Guy forwarded me this post from What'snext on Boo Box , knowing that it will upset me. A "boo box" is a button you place on your blog in or next to your reviews. If your readers decide to buy the product you describe, you get a share of the sale. BL Ochman thinks it's "a cool idea, as long as bloggers behave ethically with this tool". I am going to bang my old drum here. As a blogger, I am suddenly incentivised to write positive reviews that sell so I can generate more income... Therefore as a review seeker, I am suddenly incentivised to look elsewhere for genuine unskewed reviews. Ethics v. economics.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

France's second largest TV channel partners with Google video

France 2 partners with Google video on a dedicated website to cover the 2007 French presidential election.

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Mel Gibson's Apocalypto is a cinematographic triumph

I saw Apocalypto last Sunday with my wife. It is one of the best movies I have seen in ages (and I am a movie buff). Apocalypto is a phenomenon: it has a very simple story, it is a different setting to what you are used to, you really care for the characters (no A, B or C-lists actors here but real local casting), it has superb pictures and you are glued to your seat for 138 mins wondering what is going to happen next. This is story telling at its best. And Mel Gibson got a #1 in the US with a movie in Mayan… Amazing achievement. Mel Gibson is establishing himself as The Director to watch. We will watch it a second time this week-end. Go and see it, you won't be disapointed.

Second Life Open Source

Liden Labs is releasing some of SL's code to the open source community. Via BBC. Very smart.

Can web 2.0 companies build competitive advantage?

Can they create it and sustain it? How?

That's what I am trying to find out in my management report (final year Executive MBA "thesis" at London Business School).

I would like to interview marketing or management executives from the likes of Bebo, Myspace, Facebook, Kaboodle, Linkedin, Match.com, Friendster or start-ups in the field (relying on attracting and maintaining a critical mass of members to succeed).

I am keen to get a better understanding of the industry; the strategies used by major players and identify the golden rules for success. Interviews will be highly confidential and all data will be presented in aggregated format.

Benefits for executives are:

Instant feedback/ideas from social media / online PR expert (and MBA student).
Receive a copy of strategic overview when report is compiled.
Open up a contact with London Business School (useful for future recruitment, interns and so on...)
Doing a good deed

I can provide further details and my research tutor's contacts and references. Any help is much appreciated.

Thank you!

Thursday, January 04, 2007

Counting the real Second Life population

As of today, Second Life counts 2,341,910 residents, as defined as "uniquely named avatars with the right to log in to Second Life, trade currency and visit the community pages". Critics make the distinction between registered users and active users, using a 10% conversion rate (confirmed by Linden Labs). This puts the number of Second-Lifers in the 200,000 to 230,000 range only. See CNet article.

GigaOm commented on the topic a while ago. Read the comments.

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

French protest against 2007

Hundreds of protesters in Nantes (France) marched in the New Year waving banners reading: "No to 2007" and "Now is better!". Give it a few more days guys, the government will cave in and roll back the year.

Via BBC.

PS: Happy New Year to all my readers. Thank you for keeping up with my erratic posting schedule.

Thursday, December 21, 2006

'Paris Syndrome' strikes Japanese

Dozen or so Japanese tourists a year have to be repatriated from the French capital, after falling prey to what's become known as "Paris syndrome"...

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Pay per post is a no go

My friend Farhan forwarded me a link to Rockstartup (web 2.0. reality TV…). They are following up “the Internet's next monster company” payperpost.com “from its initial concept to international fame.”

I do not like the concept of pay-per-post at all.

If you are a business, you cannot win. A blogger can trash your product and get paid for it. A blogger can rave about your product but who will believe what he/she says? They are being paid after all. There is an irreconcilable conflict between providing independent opinions about a product and being paid to talk about a product. You just cannot be independent if you are paid by the company those products you are reviewing. As a customer, who are you going to trust? If there is no trust, what is the point to get bloggers talking about your product? The whole think sounds desperate. Are your products so bad or insignificant that you need to pay people to talk about them? If you want to be seen on blogs, join a blog advertising network or Adsense.

The only upside is that you get nice text links in context to your site, thus boost your search engines ranking. Other than that: avoid.

Monday, December 18, 2006

Skype to launch Web TV service

Quality TV programmes for free to consumers who have a broadband Internet connection. Next year. Reuters.

Time Magazine person of the year: You

Article.

Saturday, December 16, 2006

Sony PSP: All I want for Xmas is a real blog

Sony America has admitted that a blog from "real life PSP fans" was in fact part of a marketing campaign. Sony: "Guess we were trying to be just a little too clever. From this point forward, we will just stick to making cool products, and use this site to give you nothing but the facts on the PSP."

Via GamesIndustry.biz

Friday, December 08, 2006

Children swap music via phones

A survey of almost 1,500 eight to 13-year-olds found almost a third shared music via their mobiles. via BBC
Will the music industry push for a tax on mobile phones or children?

YouTube? You Leave!

StarHub employees fired and disciplined for " misconduct in our office premise" after posting funny video clips on YouTube. Via ChannelNewsAsia.

Thursday, December 07, 2006

BBC: My science fiction life

The BBC is running a special feature on Science Fiction on its website. You can submit your favourite book, comic, film, TV series... The highlight is a science fiction Flash timeline from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein to "Children of Men". You are invited to contribute and send your recollections/comments on science fiction classics. I cannot get the Flash version to work in Firefox or Explorer so here is a link to the static timeline, organised by decades.

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

France 24, a French CNN?

Just launched: http://www.france24.com/live/ exclusively online now (in English, French and Arabic).

Monday, December 04, 2006

NY Times: The Future of Online Advertising Is in the UK

I am in the Big Apple today for a workshop on Marcomms/Netcoms integration. Just read this in the NY Times: "Online advertising is racing ahead in Britain, growing at a roughly 40 percent annual rate, and is expected to account for as much as 14 percent of overall ad spending this year, according to media buying agencies. That is the highest level in the world, and more than double the percentage in the United States". See NY Times article which has more interesting data comparisons.

Friday, December 01, 2006

Need help with UK regional accents?

Listen in to the diverse voices of the British Isles: 1,200 people talking about language – slang, dialect, taboo words, accents and all sorts of subjects. Only on the BBC.