Disqus - Latest Comments for michaeldowns

Re: The Aereo Ruling

michaeldowns — Wed, 25 Jun 2014 12:15:55 -0000

P2 of SCOTUS decision (http://nyti.ms/1sEZV5I) points to amended Transit Clause of '76 Copyright act concluding that to equip is to
perform. So, it's tough to see an "un-infringing" hardware solution if the ultimate performance does not have copyright holder's agreement.

Re: Audience: New King of the Hill?

michaeldowns — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 16:58:27 -0000

Taking Eric's second point a bit further, it sounds like we come up with temporary advertiser / intermediary gains. That is, we're in a relatively brief period in which audience-rich, but context-poor inventory can be arbitraged on exchanges. I suspect that, when the dust settles, we'll find that there is actually not a lot of conforming inventory. That is, the premium sites w/ premium contextual inventory also have the premium audiences. So, while you may occasionally catch high-value, in-segment consumers on lowCPMsite.com, like long-tail SEO the volumes won't be there. Like Doug, I think we end close to where we started. While these tools will offer publishers an additional dimension in which to sub-segment / price discriminate their inventory, it's their ability to program content that pulls audiences that remains king.

Re: Love It Or Hate It: The New Effort From Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos - AgencySpy

michaeldowns — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 15:06:34 -0000

Shows overwhelmed people feeling optimistic - I like it.

Re: A Derivative of Open Source: What is Crowdsourcing?

michaeldowns — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 12:14:17 -0000

Three inter-related points. 1. Per Sam Kleinman, posting a project or opening up product testing are only tangentially open source concepts as true open source would involve turning over the product, its use and "ownership". You may want to make this counterpoint clear when discussing crowdsourcing's "derivative" nature. 2. Example #1 and #2 above tend, as Caleb G points out, toward open spec development where one solicits external participation in exchange for financial compensation. While they do make a crowdsourcing point, they make a micro-contracting point even better. 3. Perhaps the best example of the "crowdsourcing" applied to non-software development may be blog comments where the product / concept is advanced, rounded-out and transmitted as a result of its publishing and subsequent user participation.

Re: Google Earnings Being Revised Down

michaeldowns — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 14:37:19 -0000

I would normally agree w/ you, but I bought GOOG last week which is a sure sign that everyone else should start selling.

Re: Display Advertising Works, But It Works Differently Than Search

michaeldowns — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:57:49 -0000

CPA (and some CPM) ad networks place cookies and negotiate a hold-over period to ensure that they get credit for sales generated up to 30 days after the initial impression(s). While each network tracks it's own follow-on purchase performance, it's rare to see such comprehensive information in public. Having said that, these numbers inflate the lift that I've seen by 25-50% raising questions about how the study was conducted. One variable that has a pronounced effect on follow-on purchases is the quality of the display inventory. Not surprisingly, there's a big difference between Yahoo's main page and Facebook's ROS.

Re: 10 Top New Web Services of 2008 and Their 2009 Forecast

michaeldowns — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 16:05:36 -0000

Solid list Louis. While each of these companies have built great, useful products, Summize, TweetDeck and BackType almost warrant their own class.

Re: And Now, A Note From Our Sponsors

michaeldowns — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:03:02 -0000

RIM needs your help. You may also consider partnering w/ the major agencies and networks like Federated to ensure BackType accounts are bundled into social media buys.

Aside, while I'm sure you've got your hands full, let's get AdAge, Economist and Business Week covered under BackType so I can stop poking around for old comments;)

Re: And Now, A Note From Our Sponsors

michaeldowns — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:25:36 -0000

May speak to bandwidth constraints major advertisers face when engaging in social media marketing. I'm not an expert. but it seems Blackberry is half-pregnant here. They chose Federated ostensibly to market their product on major blogs, but either didn't put systems in place to monitor response (a basic BackType account) or didn't allocate resources to follow-up. While it probably doesn't make sense for a product / marketing manager to weigh in, a Dell- or Zappos-like customer service response would have killed here. Further, nuggets like those contributed by John Miles above need to make their way back to product.

Re: And Now, A Note From Our Sponsors

michaeldowns — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 10:34:33 -0000

Good conversational marketing tutorial. Not because it overviews the concepts, but because the ad, the post and the comments present a reasoned, rational discussion of a highly visible product and how it is marketed. The only sad part, so far, is that a spare few enthusiasts are left to represent the product and the Federated pub manager is representing the placement. Would have been text book had the Storm product and marketing managers engaged on these two topics.

Re: Revenue search continues, as Facebook (and LinkedIn) employee stock sale begins

michaeldowns — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 23:53:48 -0000

You're right Ian. While FB page views are scaling, CPMs are falling. The net effect: disappointing ad revenues. Having said that, they're smart. I suspect they're looking for more revenue streams like gift referral that 1. Create value for users AND 2. Leverage FB's social nature.

What might that include:
1. Charging application developers for premium placement - Pay for traffic.
2. Providing volume discount programs for FB groups - I'd join a MacBook Pro buying group today.
3. Charging for value-added services that have few, if any, free substitutes - Their coming music program might be the best example. Match.com-like partnerships also come to mind.

More here: http://snurl.com/57gfq