Category: Geek Stuff

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Geek Stuff SEO and Paid Search The Marketeer

More on Click Fraud and Sausage

A couple weeks back I wrote a post about The Sausage Manifesto, a great piece by Jeffrey Rohrs talking about click fraud. Mr. Rohrs did a fantastic job summing up some complaints advertisers have with pay per click. My perspective was not as promising as his; I saw a number of reasons why the search engines have no reason to address click fraud and tried to be clever with my Bratwurst Defense.

I was kind of bummed that it didn’t generate any further conversation (pretty heavy on the geek factor, I know), so I was very happy to get an email today that it had been picked up in The Scotland SEO Blog. How cool is that! I may have to swing by there on the upcoming UK tour!

As far the conversation – ASM’s post is saying “suck it up” fraud is a cost of doing business, and I have to agree. There was a speaker at SES Chicago and I’ll have to dig through my notes to find her name, but she had a great point – the problem is not click fraud, it’s click crap – the clicks from the wrong people that your creative is bringing in that are not really leads. My gut is that’s where the real savings are to be generated.

Hooray for Scotland!

Categories
Gaming Geek Stuff

Boston WebInnovators

Tonight I went to the latest Boston WebInnovators session. The cat is out of the bag on this one, I think there may have been more than 200 people there. A bunch of social media folk were in the house including Steve Garfield, C.C. Chapman, Bryan Person, Chris Brogan and Dan Gorgone. There was also staff from EmergePR including the principal, Mara Bartucca who I always enjoy catching up with.

But most important were the concepts!

  • Guild Cafe – Jon Radoff showed off their Social Network for Gamers. Pretty cool for that niche, but I imagine competition is going to get fierce in this space between established players like Gamespot and existing networks such as XBox Live. However I can see it making money if it can build a critical mass and allow it to become a marketing vehicle for new games without an established base. Something like Diablo 3 could stand on its own. I wanted to ask what they thought about the social stigma of being a gamer but decided to shut the hell up.
  • MyPunchbowl – Matt Douglas showed evite on Web 2.0. Lots of cool AJAX… no, lots and lots. I’m not sure how hot this spot will be, but the guys that can set up that many partnerships and integrations that fast will make it big. It’s not a matter of how, but when.
  • Goombah – Diane Sammer showed off their client app that enables a social network based around what’s in your iTunes library. Also very cool but there’s a lot of fighting in that space. I don’t follow it close but I can think of iCueMix and Pandora right off the top of my head. This is also a space that iTunes could take if it wanted to (although maybe that would include buying Goombah….)

It’s all about the social networks. I get the feeling these will all be dogfights, I didn’t see anything that I would consider new, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be able to make a lot of money but they’ll have to be more persistent than the guy next to them on the web.

Categories
Geek Stuff Graphic Design

Pimp your XP and Listen to The Show

The latest M Show is going up right now. One other cool thing, if you want to give your Windows XP a cool new look without upgrading to Vista, check out this theme. I’ve been using it for the past week and really like it…

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Geek Stuff Podcasting Productivity Booster

Understanding HD

Long time podcaster Aaron has just launched a new cast all about HD. I’m started to get 720p and composite cables, I still have a lot to learn, but I do know that HD movies and games look incredible compared to standard TV.

You can check out The HD Podcast here, or subscribe to the CAPOW channel on Gigadial and you can get all the cool podcasts I stumble onto.

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Daily Life Geek Stuff

Media Download

So I’ve been running like crazy for the past couple of days, but I have seen some good stuff:

Ali Rap is a DVD by ESPN showcasing the poetic talent of Muhammed Ali, only an hour and even the lovely Carin found it fascinating to watch.

24 – I downloaded the latest episode to watch at the gym this morning. My vedict is still out on this season, but I’m still watching.

Galactica – Got this off the Tivo waiting for Carin to come home

Dr. Who – An episode before bed off DVD

3 Media formats – no commercials.

That’s all I’ve got for today, we have an all hands company kickoff tomorrow, and the Sales Kickoff that started today continues.

I’m also doing a session on Podcasting for Non-profits in April, anybody know of any good ones?

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Podcasting

5 Podcasts You Should Be Listening To

Just a few from my list that I hold in high regard:

365 Tao – God forbid, I actually take five minutes to put down the machine gun and reflect. (FEED)
The Ethicist – Around 5 minutes, always good for a laugh (FEED) you can also get David Pogue there.
On Digital Media – This has pushed other marketing casts out of my queue (FEED)
On the Record Online – I had heard Eric on FIR but only checked out his show recently – fantastic guests. (FEED)
Steve Wright – Ask Elvis – another short one for a laugh that easily fits in (FEED)
Please share any casts you feel are undervalued…

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Daily Life Podcasting

Audiophile Weekend

This weekend was all about the sound. I upgraded the speakers in the car via Crutchfield, the stock ones had no midrange and I was starting to think that my hearing was going, the new speakers show that not to be the case.

More later this week about a test drive of the new Bose Tri-port in-ear earphones.

And I’m rebuilding my work laptop but took a break from that to roll out the latest M Show, sync it to your iPod and listen during your commute. Anybody up for recording something new this weekend?

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Brain Buster Geek Stuff

The New iPod

My brainbuster for the day – with all of the hype over the iPhone I kind of forgot about the iPod. Today in the car I was thinking “How long will it be before the next generation iPod?” Then it hit me – what’s holding them back from putting most of the cool UI stuff from the phone into the next gen iPod? How sweet will that be if I can watch 24 at the gym and turn the player sideways for a mini widescreen?

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Daily Life Podcasting

What the hell is up with Canada?

Why is it that it seems there’s 10x the social media stuff coming out of people from Canada? Is there something special in the beer there? I have an interesting relationship with Canada, every year we would drive through it on our annual family vacation from Massachusetts to visit my Mom’s family in Michigan. Hitting Ontario was always a special treat.

And why does this come up now? Because along with bryper we are leading the Boston crew up to Podcamp Toronto (actually just an excuse to hang out in Toronto). I’m even making it out for Friday geek dinner! Labatt’s Blue here I come!

Lots of other stuff going on – I mentioned to some CAPOW buddies that I was working on a Web 2.0 strategy, more on that tomorrow.

Categories
Lead Generation Podcasting The Marketeer

Podcasting – Not Across the Chasm Yet?

I ran a test recently to get a feel for the acceptance of podcast versus video. Readers were given the option of a link to a video clip or a link to a podcast and they chose the video clip at a ratio of almost 10 to 1.

Until the average user understands that a video clip is one item, whereas a podcast is subscribing to a channel, the true value of them goes unrecognized. Unfortunately with limited resources, that means a lot more web videos before podcasting becomes a core part of the marketing mix.

On the other hand – it will come. Being excited about podcasting now is like being hooked on TiVo 5 years ago, you know it’s good, and you know that eventually everyone else will come along. We’ve had a new car for a half a year now and I still haven’t listened to or set the presets for the radio.