Disqus - Latest Comments for Owen

Re: Hulu Has Fewer Eyeballs, More Room for Advertisers

Owen — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 08:21:15 -0000

Can't see the clip as I'm not in the US. Maybe that's one reason they have so few people watching?

Re: The Future of Twitter: Social CRM

Owen — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 07:35:53 -0000

It's the perennial horizonal vs vertical strategy discussion I guess. Social CRM may be a great idea, but I somehow don't see Twitter locking themselves into a relatively small segment when their platform can be used for so much more.

Re: The Future of Twitter: Social CRM

Owen — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 06:20:58 -0000

Hmm .. I wonder if Twitter are paralysed trying to decide which is the best route for them.

On one hand, there's provision of service described above, an area where they would have to start competiting with other services that are using their API.

On the other hand, their core competancy is providing a scalable many-to-many communication networks with an open API that other service providers can leverage.

The question is, which of those should they be focusing on? My gut feel is that the ecosystem they have built around their API is what's driving the value of their network, so they should be working with development teams to improve, streamline and eventually charge for their network; rather than trying to get into a new space which is already being encroached by other parties.

Will be fun to watch though.

Re: My Top 5 Wordpress Plugin Recommendations

Owen — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 07:37:17 -0000

Hi Erika, Just wanted to drop a quick note to say thanks for recommending "Comment Email Responder" to your readers. It's due a refresh one of these days .. and it certainly needs a better name.

So pleased I've managed to make it on your list of recommendations ;)

Re: http://www.rev2.org/2007/04/14/10-most-successful-web-20-startups-to-date/

Owen — Sat, 14 Apr 2007 18:49:38 -0000

*chuckle* .. The problem with top 10 lists is that people tend to have their own opinion of what companies need to get in there and in which order they should be ranked.

Re: Comment System Changed – No More Cookies

Owen — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 19:00:58 -0000

Hi Andy,

Well, this commenting system seems to work fine now. Pity about the problems with the cookie-system. It sounded like a good idea, but didn't seem to work well.

Good luck with the spam filtering

Owen

Re: Comment System Changed – No More Cookies

Owen — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 19:00:58 -0000

Re: Related Posts with UTW

Owen — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 17:24:06 -0000

Cheers for that. Was looking for some info and came across your blog again on Google ;)

Re: Related Posts with UTW

Owen — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 17:24:06 -0000

Cheers for that. Was looking for some info and came across your blog again on Google ;)

Re: Is PayPerPost The Only Subject Nick Denton and Jason Calacanis Agree On?

Owen — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 17:36:02 -0000

I've been a Postie for some time now, but I only take opportunities that meld well with one of my blogs. I believe that as long as I'm being honest in my review/post, then there's value both for the advertiser and for my readers. That might mean not posting on certain days (even though PayPerPost allows up to 3 posts a day per blog), but if it's of no longer term value to me I prefer to avoid it.

Take a look at this post: http://www.u-g-h.com/index.php/2007/03/03/freeb... It's a review of another website's promotion. I was paid for the post, but it was a fair and unbiased view of what I think about it. It's more material for my blog and I reckon the advertiser got some mileage out of it.

I suppose I'm lucky in a way, blogging is just a hobby for me, so I can afford to be picky. Not sure what others who depend on blogging revenue would have to say about it.

Re: Is PayPerPost The Only Subject Nick Denton and Jason Calacanis Agree On?

Owen — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 17:36:02 -0000

Re: Best Wordpress Plugins – Nominations and Results

Owen — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 18:56:09 -0000

Great idea, I'd like to nominate Askimet and Semiologic's DoFollow

Re: Best Wordpress Plugins – Nominations and Results

Owen — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 18:56:09 -0000

Great idea, I'd like to nominate Askimet and Semiologic's DoFollow

Re: Wordpress Plugin: Antisocial

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 13:45:45 -0000

Thanks for that Andy! Implemented your plugin and I'm adding you to my blogroll so instead of wasting my GoogleJuice, I'll send some your way ;)

Re: Wordpress Plugin: Antisocial

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 13:45:45 -0000

Thanks for that Andy! Implemented your plugin and I'm adding you to my blogroll so instead of wasting my GoogleJuice, I'll send some your way ;)

Re: Best Wordpress Plugins (March 2007) | Poll

Owen — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 12:20:20 -0000

Have to go for UTW

Bit difficult to decide though, as each plugin is strong in a particuar field, but UTW is so comprehensive it's scary.

Oh .. and I like Pi too ...

Re: Best Wordpress Plugins (March 2007) | Poll

Owen — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 12:20:20 -0000

Have to go for UTW

Bit difficult to decide though, as each plugin is strong in a particuar field, but UTW is so comprehensive it's scary.

Oh .. and I like Pi too ...

Re: Blogcatalog Slam Dunks MyBlogLog?

Owen — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 10:13:35 -0000

Nice review Andy.

The biggest problem I have, as a user is that this really presents fragmentation in the market. My blog now has MyBlogLog, BlogCatalog and SpicyPage widgets with faces on them .. and I'm sure this is just the crest of a new wave of similar services

Would have been nice to just have 1 service that everyone uses, but unfortunately that's not the way the market works ...

Re: Blogcatalog Slam Dunks MyBlogLog?

Owen — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 10:13:35 -0000

Re: Bloggers Choice Awards – Blog Awards Go Social

Owen — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 16:53:19 -0000

Hmm .. I normally find that having to register for anything tends to put people off the voting process. Having said that, it's one way to make the voting process more honest .. or at least harder for someone to create loads of accounts to vote for their own website ... not that anyone would ever do that ...

Re: Bloggers Choice Awards – Blog Awards Go Social

Owen — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 16:53:19 -0000

Re: The Ultimate Way To Show Reader Appreciation

Owen — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 18:13:28 -0000

Nice update. I'm an ardent believer in the increase in value comments bring to a blog. After all the Web is all about conversation, not monologue.

Re: The Ultimate Way To Show Reader Appreciation

Owen — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 18:13:28 -0000

Nice update. I'm an ardent believer in the increase in value comments bring to a blog. After all the Web is all about conversation, not monologue.

Re: Mike Sansone Cracks The Secret Code to Removing Nofollow From Typepad

Owen — Sat, 14 Apr 2007 09:44:31 -0000

Dugg

keke .. I love the "Don't be an idiot" buttn ;)

Re: Mike Sansone Cracks The Secret Code to Removing Nofollow From Typepad

Owen — Sat, 14 Apr 2007 09:44:31 -0000

Dugg

keke .. I love the "Don't be an idiot" buttn ;)

Re: Exclusive – Pay Per Post Direct Changes The Paid Review Landscape

Owen — Sat, 26 May 2007 18:19:46 -0000

Great post Andy. Wow 25k bloggers is a pretty substantial chunk of internet estate, especially when you consider that quite a few of those bloggers have 3 or 4 blogs !

Re: Exclusive – Pay Per Post Direct Changes The Paid Review Landscape

Owen — Sat, 26 May 2007 18:19:46 -0000

Great post Andy. Wow 25k bloggers is a pretty substantial chunk of internet estate, especially when you consider that quite a few of those bloggers have 3 or 4 blogs !

Re: Truemors – More Successful Than Most People Realise

Owen — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 11:36:21 -0000

I like that Firefox plugin you're using (http://tools.seobook.com/firefox/seo-for-firefo...) .. went ahead and installed it. Thanks for the pointer.

Re: Truemors – More Successful Than Most People Realise

Owen — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 11:36:21 -0000

I like that Firefox plugin you're using (http://tools.seobook.com/firefox/seo-for-firefo...) .. went ahead and installed it. Thanks for the pointer.

Re: OpenAds Preview

Owen — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 06:55:41 -0000

Oh .. hadn't heard of OpenAds. Will check them out. Thanks for the pointer

Re: OpenAds Preview

Owen — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 06:55:41 -0000

Oh .. hadn't heard of OpenAds. Will check them out. Thanks for the pointer

Re: Wordpress SEO Masterclass For Competitive Niches

Owen — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 07:29:33 -0000

Excellent review, Andy. There are some great pointers in there .. and a lot of work for Tim (and all of us)

Re: Lunar Pages – The Worst Mistake A Webhost Can Make…

Owen — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 03:12:18 -0000

Hi Andy,

Don't know much about dedicated hosting, because I've always been on shared hosting. Most providers seem to be pretty good, but it might be worth looking for one with a money back guarantee if you feel they do not provide the goods.

Personally, I host with a company called ServerGrid ( http://www.servergrid.com ) and have always been amazed at how quick they respond to any tickets I raise. I usually have a reply within minutes and if that's not good enough, they also provide a "live chat" where you can literally speak to one of their staff within seconds.

Would recomend them based on my experience.

Re: Lunar Pages – The Worst Mistake A Webhost Can Make…

Owen — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 03:12:18 -0000

Re: 60 Free Ads

Owen — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 14:12:05 -0000

Me Me .. pick Me !

Re: Do You Have To Touch Every Conversation

Owen — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 14:44:00 -0000

There's something to be said for focusing on your core strengths and, more often than not, spreading yourself thinly over as many social networks as you can does nothing to help further your objectives.

Better to build a bastion of strength on your preferred medium (whether it's blogging, Twitter or Social Network X) and build your community around yourself.

Re: Joost … deleted instantly here

Owen — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 08:58:59 -0000

I installed Microsoft Office. It took over 500Mb on my hard disk. I couldn’t figure out how to get out. Or get back to Google Reader and Outlook and my other apps.

Well, I’m lying. I know how to get back to other apps. Alt-Tab.

Or Ctrl-Alt-Delete, which pulls up task manager and I can kill that process.

I did that and promptly deleted it.

What a rude app. I don’t care how cool it is. You don’t take over that much space if you want me to use you.

Re: Misreading Scoble on Microsoft cry

Owen — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 09:51:43 -0000

I agree with Jeff above .. until the market (early adopters really) samples, tests and finds value in whatever it is .. it's not really important to the man in the street ..

Re: Twitter Client War: Twhirl vs. TweetDeck

Owen — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 10:44:58 -0000

Has to be Twhirl for me. Twitter is something I do alongside the rest of my life .. it's NOT the whole of my life ..

Re: Cisco at It Again: Acquires WebEx

Owen — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 17:54:30 -0000

Sounds like a good mood. I've used WebEx before and was quite impressed with the functionality. And buying a profitable company can't be all that bad right?

Re: This blog made possible by…

Owen — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 17:56:25 -0000

Ditto. I've only just subscribed to your feed, and I'm finding that there's lots of interesting information.

Keep it up guys!

Re: Google Confirms Acquisition of Adscape

Owen — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 18:48:07 -0000

Seems like we'll be seeing lots more in-game advertising with something like this.

Re: Comcast May Dump Google for Microsoft

Owen — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 13:59:43 -0000

I think it would be dangerous for Google to give in to this sort of pressure, as it sends the message that it's flexible on advertising deals. Still, an account that size must have some sort of leverage on Google. Will be fun to watch

Re: Google’s Job Ads Reveal Likely New Products

Owen — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 11:50:30 -0000

*chuckle* .. that's a good premise, and I can see where it's come from. Today's employees are tomorrow's products huh?

Re: Google to Offer Skins for Personalized Users

Owen — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 11:53:08 -0000

Is it me .. or is this starting to smell like MySpace?

Re: Google to Offer Skins for Personalized Users

Owen — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 11:53:44 -0000

Doh ... Kelvin beat me to it !

Re: I Want Your RSS Feed!

Owen — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 07:13:03 -0000

Hi Andy,

Count me in:

Business Tech Blog: http://feeds.feedburner.com/u-g-h
Personal Blog: http://feeds.feedburner.com/botbot
Hobby Blog: http://feeds.feedburner.com/OnlyNetwork

Enjoy!

Re: comScore vs Hitwise vs Nielsen vs Compete: Who Wins?

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 09:33:57 -0000

The question is whether the results have any sort of bias in them.

For example, our household is part of the Neilsen panel for Internet activity. The way they monitor our browsing patterns is through a small program that lives on your PC and reports back on what sites you visits. HOWEVER .. I'm only aware of a Windows version of this program which begs this question .. is this really representative of the Internet at a whole?

Re: Microsoft Suspends Video Site

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 09:37:30 -0000

The problem remains that piracy (intellectual sharing?) has always been around, ever since the first caveman uttered a word and the second caveman copied it. Regulation has tried to keep up with this, but has done a pretty poor job in my opinion. Unless media companies learn to embrace this model, I think they're in for a rough ride.

Re: Podcasting on the Rise

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 09:41:44 -0000

I think the biggest challenge podcasting faces is making itself accessible to the masses. It's still not as straightfoward as it could be to subscribe to a feed and find it available when you have time to listen to it. There's still an amount of planning for pod-casting-savvy users to go through and the reality is that most people out there jut aren't bothered.

For podcasting to be a success it needs to be as available as listening to the radio - available at the touch of a single button - whenever and wherever the listener wants it.

Re: Microsoft Loses Nearly 5% Search Share in Two Years

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 09:51:31 -0000

I can well believe that Microsoft's search is losing ground. As an Internet user I have occasionally stumbled across it (like using the default search on a new machine), but there's nothing compelling there and the search results (albeit more relevant than they used to be) are still nowhere as useful as Google's.

If Microsoft wasn't a dominant player in the software market, their search engine wouldn't have got anywhere near the use it gets today.

Re: Microsoft Suspends Video Site

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 12:35:45 -0000

I wonder what sociologists argue about piracy. There are probably motives more powerful than greed at play here; certainly there's an element of competitiveness, ego-boosting and a good old-fashioned dose of "Let's give it to the Man" that comes into play in these scenarios

Re: Microsoft Suspends Video Site

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 12:59:12 -0000

*chuckle* .. keep us posted

Re: Podcasting on the Rise

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 13:07:04 -0000

I'm pretty tech-savvy and a bit of a gadget freak. My main reason for buying an MP3 player wasn't to listen to music, but to listen to podcasts. I haven't listened to a podcast in ages, mainly because I can't get Juice to run on Vista, and I haven't found the time .. or motivation to hunt around for a different feed aggregator .

I might pick it up in the future, but i can't be bothered messing around just to listen to Adam Curry waffle along ....

Re: Podcasting on the Rise

Owen — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 19:19:56 -0000

I'll stick it in my favourites for the next time I start listening to podcasts again ...

Re: Will Mobile Phone Networks Realize Their Future is Tied to Social Networks?

Owen — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 11:41:40 -0000

Interesting idea. However this is prone to dilution in that given a multitude of social networks there's no guarantee that all your friends live on the same one. I'm currently running MSN Messegner, Google Talk and Skype on my desktop because I have friends who exclusively use one of these. I wouldn't like to have to carry 3 mobile phones with me because of that reason ...

Re: PayPal Deluding Themselves Over Google Checkout Threat?

Owen — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 10:49:31 -0000

Hmm, hadn't used Google Checkout before, but decided to give it a spin after reading your post. Unfortunately it only seems to be available for sellers in the U.S. so not much use to me just yet. Maybe in the future ...

Re: Twitter Got the Message

Owen — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 05:42:23 -0000

Hey .. that sounds like a good idea *pulls coding hat on*

Seriously, something like that could break Twitter. I suspect that short, sharp "conversations" are quite prone to breaking down under the weight of advertising messages

Re: Why PayPerPost When You Can BegForPost?

Owen — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 13:28:06 -0000

Apparently, and this is where it gets interesting, the website was set up from somone who wanted Arrington to link to his website.

Have a read:
http://www.businesspundit.com/50226711/begforpo...

Re: Microsoft’s Live Search Shutsdown Advanced Search Queries

Owen — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 18:03:06 -0000

My question is this. Google seems to be handling the load just fine. Are they just throwing more hardware at the problem, or is their engine just more performant?

Re: Free Guide to Paid Search in the UK

Owen — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 17:37:54 -0000

Andy, another great post. I just had to leech that link off you

Re: Free Guide to Paid Search in the UK

Owen — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 03:37:41 -0000

WP should have given you a pingback by now ...

Re: Technorati Looking to Sell?

Owen — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 12:09:10 -0000

I wish they were a bit more receptive to the developer community though. Their developer blog has a sum total of 4 posts last year and none this year, and I've been waiting for ages for a support question to get answered.

Re: Bloggers Have Birthdays Too!

Owen — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 12:16:54 -0000

Bah .. I missed this ..

Happy Birtday Jordan!

Re: Thailand Blocks YouTube

Owen — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 10:03:34 -0000

I suppose it's the age-old question of censorship at play again. It people find something offensive, they're perfectly free to avoid that material.

The question is, are the Thai people happy that their access to YouTube material, and potentially all the other streaming media sites has been cut off?

My bets are on Thailand lifting the restriction ...

You cannot stifle something as subversive as the Internet just by blocking one site.

Re: Yahoo’s Alpha Offers Customized Search Results

Owen — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 10:05:20 -0000

Looks pretty nifty. The technology I mean, not the skin, I suppose you can layer anything you want on it.

As EW says, nice to see someone giving one aspect of Google some sort of a challenge.

Re: Mozilla Launches Social Network for Firefox

Owen — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 10:06:52 -0000

@BC: 6 months? You must be joking! It will take them 6 months to raise it to executive level for someone to decide whether to "adopt" the feature or not.

Re: A TV Ad for just $39?

Owen — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 18:25:07 -0000

I'm not sure the two ideas really map onto each other. With the million dollar homepage you can take your time and see what attracts your attention. Video has a time element to it, if you miss something, it's gone forever. It might work for well-known brands (Coke, etc), but even I flash my URL up in front of an observer for an entire second ($1000 worth), I don't see what benefit this will bring to smaller advertisers.

Re: “M-marketing”

Owen — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 06:27:42 -0000

It's true that those hurdles exist, but every year we move one step closer to removing them. Phones are much more powerful today than they ever were, more and more bandwidth is available to them etc

Should be an interesting couple of years to come

Re: Second Batch of SEM Scholarship Entries Posted

Owen — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 12:18:18 -0000

Argh !! .. So many great posts .. so little time

*cry*

Re: Why is O’Reilly Hell-bent on a Code of Conduct for Bloggers?

Owen — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 09:40:33 -0000

Don't worry ... it will die a death. Noone will remember it in a couple of months time.

Re: Google Still Growing

Owen — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 09:43:47 -0000

The bottom line is .. Google just works! Whenever I try one of the other engines (sometimes by accident: like when you buy a new computer), I always have to switch back to find what I'm looking for.

You can hardly call it a level playing field. It's a market where one product works and the others don't.

Re: Sitemaps Autodiscovery

Owen — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 09:46:49 -0000

It's not surprising they can agree on something like that. There's no competitive advantage to be obtained (for the search engines) in agreeing/disagreeing. It's just nice to see a single standard emerge for a change.

Re: Microsoft’s Silverlight to Battle Adobe’s Flash Media Player

Owen — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 12:13:30 -0000

It's a pity to watch the marketplace split in two really, when both companies are trying to achieve the same thing (though I suppose that's what competition is all about)

Wouldn't it have been better for the consumer if they had decided to push an industry standard instead, say SVG in this case ?

Re: Can We Measure Visitor Attention?

Owen — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 20:50:34 -0000

There's lies, darned lies .. and statistics.

The problem (or not) with webstats is that they can be twisted in so many ways to prove something that it's hard to believe anything. "Time spent" usually means whatever is convenient at that time.

Re: Partial Feeds Don’t Draw Visitors

Owen — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 04:12:38 -0000

The biggest problem feeds have is that they are competing with other for a slice of your reader's attention. I scan through so many posts a day that partial feeds just don't work for me. I prefer to drop it and more on to something I can absorb more quickly.

Having a partial feed is the quickest way to get me to ubsubscribe to someone's feed.

Re: eBay Practices Damage Control with Virginia Tech Gunman Accusations

Owen — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 04:17:52 -0000

Do you really reckon that if it turns into an urban legend it will damage their brand? One could claim there's no such thing as bad PR and this could reinforce the "you can get anything on eBay" image.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trivialising the shootings. But trying to disassociate themselves in this way feels a bit like a publicity stunt to me.

Re: Joost Explores Video Advertising Alternatives

Owen — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 10:25:46 -0000

I'm looking forward to great things from Joost. I think they have great technology and there's great potential in the viewing/social networking model. The beauty about owning this platform is there's great scope to advertise with new ways of advertising nd I definetly prefer Ad Bugs to actual breaks in the programming.

Re: Google Gunning for Microsoft; Microsoft Gunning for Google

Owen — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 15:00:55 -0000

Well, advertising revenue is extremely good for your cash flow, which building an app suite is more of a capital investment, so you can see both facets complimenting each other quite nicely.

In truth, Google seems to run a tighter ship than Microsoft. This is just a humble opinion, but Google continues to amaze me with it's speed of innovation while Microsoft promises a vision then takes ages to deliver.

The next 5 years will tell ...

Re: Google Sells AdWords First, Asks Hacking Questions Later

Owen — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 18:18:56 -0000

In truth, it wouldn't be commercially viable to vet each and every advert that went through the system. The whole process is self-correcting however, people will report in any infractions and the system will correct itself.

Re: A Free Nintendo Wii for One Lucky Marketing Pilgrim Fan!

Owen — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 10:20:49 -0000

Oh, but you've been in my Technorati favourites for some time now ...

Re: Announcing Web 3.0

Owen — Thu, 03 May 2007 05:40:24 -0000

As Brian above says; the concept of software agents is anything but new. I haven't seen anything that's compelling enough for the industry to back yet. Will be fun to watch this space

Re: Del.icio.us Offers Better Search Results than Google?

Owen — Thu, 03 May 2007 05:46:19 -0000

I love what Del.icio.us has done with their FireFox plugin. It effectively replaces FireFox's Favourites and sucks in everything you bookmark.

The more they keep track of what people want to bookmark to visit later, the better their indication of how popular a site is. The question is .. will it be more effective than GoogleBot and PageRank ?

Re: Top 10 Business Mistakes Search Marketing Firms Make

Owen — Thu, 03 May 2007 05:50:59 -0000

@Scott: I'm surprised at your comment "In fact we would strip out all SEO on termination". If a client has paid you to optimise their website are you saying you would revert it to an older version if they stopped paying your retainer ?

Re: Exclusive - Technorati Launches New Display

Owen — Sat, 05 May 2007 18:10:58 -0000

Step in the right direction I think. I definetly like the way it's looking

Re: Cable Companies Playing Google and Yahoo at their Own Game

Owen — Mon, 07 May 2007 18:28:58 -0000

*grin* .. It used to be "Fear of IBM", then "Fear of Microsoft" .. amazing how when a company grows to a certain size it starts becoming "the enemy" ...

Re: First Look - Google Analytics Launches New Interface and Reporting

Owen — Tue, 08 May 2007 16:28:12 -0000

Oh .. looks nice. Google Analytics is a pretty amazing tool and I always set it up for every website I create, whether it's for myself or for 3rd parties

Re: Digg Founder Working on Instant Messenging Start-up?

Owen — Thu, 10 May 2007 11:17:24 -0000

Bah .. you had me till you mentioned you only wanted "substantiated rumours" ...

Re: More Rumors of eBay Purchasing Stumbleupon

Owen — Thu, 10 May 2007 11:20:18 -0000

Hmm .. they could build a "StumbleUpon whatever the contact you're speaking to on Skype has considered buying off eBay in the last few days" feature

Re: Selecting Your Baby’s Names Based Upon Google Vanity

Owen — Thu, 10 May 2007 11:23:08 -0000

I love the fact that when Google my name (and surname) all I get is pages of stuff with me in it ;)

Re: Yahoo’s Ultimate Connection Contest for Small Businesses

Owen — Thu, 10 May 2007 17:14:57 -0000

Bah .. I hate things that say "Everyone can enter" on the front page, then say "You must be a legal U.S. resident aged 21 years or older." in the small print.

Re: Yahoo’s Ultimate Connection Contest for Small Businesses

Owen — Thu, 10 May 2007 18:55:13 -0000

Don't mind me. I'm just sort as this is the second competition I as interested in this week that was open to the US and closed to the rest of the world.

Re: Censorship Issues Continue for Digg

Owen — Tue, 15 May 2007 05:16:28 -0000

@MG Siegler: So, do you reckon Digg will turn into TechMeme?

Re: Leave Your Question for Tomorrow’s Podcast

Owen — Tue, 15 May 2007 05:19:26 -0000

No questions at the moment. Just wanted to congratulate you on the podcast (and your new microphone). Been catching up on my way to work in the morning and looking forward to the next one!

Re: WordPress Version 2.2 In Da House!

Owen — Wed, 16 May 2007 12:24:44 -0000

Good news. I love new versions of things! Only problem is I have so many sites running on WordPress now that it's going to be a substantial job to get them all upgraded !

Re: Marketing Pilgrim is Looking for Additional Contributors

Owen — Fri, 18 May 2007 06:59:23 -0000

Pity about the timing. I would have loved to do this, but I'm seriously running out of bandwidth at the moment. Will drop you a line if I can make some time in the future.

Re: Rumor Mill - Google to Launch UK Mobile Network?

Owen — Mon, 21 May 2007 17:08:20 -0000

That would be quite exciting to watch. The successful MVNOs have managed to make their mark thanks to the strength of their brands prior to entering the mobile market. Whether Google will manage to make a mark this way will be fun to watch.

Re: Price Still Most Important Factor for Retail Success, But Losing Ground

Owen — Tue, 22 May 2007 03:45:34 -0000

I think this is probably the market getting more mature. Price may seem an important differentiator at first, especially as online retailers are perceived to have a lower cost base than bricks and mortat ones. However cost is a short-term win for the customer and he/she may end up buying things off eBay, from a garage someone in the middle of Malaysia or off one-man and his dog who was changing tyres yesterday .. and the after-sales experience is nowhere near what the client expects and is used to.

Customer feedback is one way to start gaining customer confidence, however there is a always going to be a question of credibility around these comments. How does a reader know that these are fair and unbiased ?

Re: FeedBurner Acquired by Google?

Owen — Thu, 24 May 2007 07:03:05 -0000

@Andy: It will be interesting to see how other search giants will try and replicate this move. Based on their speed of development/innovation/acquisition it probably won't be happening anytime soon though

Re: Can Your Business Exist Without You?

Owen — Tue, 29 May 2007 06:57:34 -0000

Great post. I always take great pains to make sure my clients are self-sufficient and I don't become indispensable to their business. Don't think I've ever looked inward at my operation though! Maybe it's because I only do this part-time as a hobby, but if I ever intend to grow, your advice will be invaluable.

Re: Your Own Computer Can Spider the Web, Thanks to MyLiveSearch

Owen — Tue, 29 May 2007 11:48:55 -0000

Wow, can you imagine the power of this thing? I mean, if it were to report back to a central server as to what it found and what path the user took through the reported results (to guage relevance), this could take search to a whole new level!

Re: Google Privacy Debate Hits Australia

Owen — Thu, 31 May 2007 04:52:06 -0000

It's interesting how Google gets singled out in these cases. AFR's comment seems to indicate that all search engines may have this problem.

Re: eBay Confirms $75M StumbleUpon Acquisition

Owen — Thu, 31 May 2007 04:56:50 -0000

@Andy: There's might actually be some strategic value in getting Skype and StumbleUpon working together. Ebay seems to be getting more and more interesting in "building communities", something which auction doesn't really lend itself very well to (as it's usually a one-on-one transaction); Skype seems to be taking steps in that direction and acquiring StumbleUpon is a very strong step in that direction. This is all speculation, mind you, would be interesting to see how they see themselves 5 years from now.

Re: Google Maps Invading Your Privacy?

Owen — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 04:54:39 -0000

I'm with Daniel on this one. The concept of "privacy" is continually evolving and we need to steel ourselves that what we define as comfortable will have to change as time goes by

Re: Hear Me Speak in Hawaii on June 12th for Just $7!!!

Owen — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 07:18:57 -0000

Would be nice if $7 could get me to Hawaii to listen to you ;) Seriously, have a great time there!

Re: Go Ahead, Opt Out

Owen — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 06:56:37 -0000

Information is powerful, I would agree with Emrecan. However Google's business *is* the business of information and their growth just means that they become the repository for more and more data. Deal with it!

Re: iPhone May Present New Mobile Design Challenges

Owen — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 06:58:17 -0000

Wow. I hadn't realised the launch is so soon. Can't wait really! I wonder if it's still on schedule.

Re: iPhone May Present New Mobile Design Challenges

Owen — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 08:39:03 -0000

Just checked. According to Reuters, the selling date has been confirmed, especially as Apple is running ad campaigns with the date. Woohoo!

Re: SMX Photos - Images from SMX Advanced

Owen — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 08:35:59 -0000

I'm so jealous! .. Wish I was there.

Re: SMX Video - Does Google’s Algorithm Consider Your Domain Ownership?

Owen — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 08:39:26 -0000

Thing about domain ownership is that services like GoDaddy are pushing the whole "register your domain anonymously so people don't bug you with spam" idea. So there's no guarantee that domain ownership contains anything valuable. My money's on them not checking it.

Re: Internet Retailer 2007 Thoughts From First Day

Owen — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 08:53:16 -0000

Is this the whitepaper you mention above: http://www.marketlive.com/category/id/67.do?Kic...

Re: Internet Retailer 2007 Thoughts From First Day

Owen — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 10:33:27 -0000

Thanks for the tip. Makes for some good reading.

Re: More Thoughts from Internet Retailer 2007

Owen — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 17:43:36 -0000

Wow .. all that sounds exciting (I'm a big fan of retail sites). Non-linear navigation worries me though, mostly from a tracking point of view; but I'm sure toolsets will keep up

Re: Viral Marketing vs Idiot Marketing Experts

Owen — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 09:02:43 -0000

The problem with "experts" is that there's so many out there they can generate a substantial amount of noise (long tail effect anyone*). I don't claim to be an expert at anything ... there's always someone out there who knows more than I do about any particular subject.

*Came across a good line yesterday though: Not all SEO experts are bad. It's just that 95% of them give them a bad name.

Re: Tips for Increasing Retailing Results

Owen — Sat, 09 Jun 2007 03:49:26 -0000

Thanks for pointing us at the white paper, Greg. It is indeed a valuable resource

Re: Technorati Favorites Contest Winner

Owen — Sat, 09 Jun 2007 03:53:26 -0000

Congratulations Jason.

@imnotadoctor: and do you reckon Jason won't want it ?

Re: Technorati Favorites Contest Winner

Owen — Sat, 09 Jun 2007 17:55:29 -0000

@imnotadoctor: Nah .. I was just being obnoxious. Just watched Series 1 and Series 2 of House back-to-back. Don't mind me ;)

Re: SMX Notes - SEO, Meet SMM

Owen — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 09:44:41 -0000

Wow .. that's an amazing braindump. Thanks for taking notes and passing them on to us.

Re: SMX Notes - SEO, Meet SMM

Owen — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 10:13:45 -0000

I think it's great. I almost feel like I was there ;)

Re: Google Okays Hidden Text

Owen — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 11:25:13 -0000

Hmm .. this has always been a bit of a grey area. What about text that's hidden in one browser but shown in another? The whole idea of optimising your content for different channels implies that certain parts of the page may or may not be visible. This is perfectly legimitate and not for GoogleBot to decide.

Re: When Facing a Reputation Crisis Be Nice to The New York Times

Owen — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:10:32 -0000

That's such a shame really. It's true that it would have been hard to turn into a good news story, but it would have been quite easy to send out an "RC2 cares for out customers" message instead of "We don't really care about anyone, so we'll just hide under this rock".

Here's to an opportunity lost !

Re: BlogStorm - Bloggers Criticized for Microsoft "Spokesblogging" Ads

Owen — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 07:35:25 -0000

The whole idea of diclosure is a bit of a storm in a teacup. People's loyalties and beliefs will affect things they say, regardless if there's financial compensation involved. For example, I believe Marketing Pilgrim is a great resource, and I will point people in this direction to learn about the internet, promotion and marketing in general. If Andy decided he would give me $1 for every person I sent here, it wouldn't affect my advice, I still would send them here.

I suppose the key issue would have to be honesty. If I was renumerated for sending people here and I did this even though I did't believe it would add any value, then yes, that is wrong. But if I recommended it, and added that I would get compensated for the advice; that wouldn't stop people who trusted me from checking out the site anyway.

Re: Does Gaming Teach Business Skills?

Owen — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 05:32:18 -0000

I must admit; I'm pretty sure that I have learnt things while gaming that have helped me in my business and adult life. Thing like the ability to multitask effectively, deal with stressful situations and team dynamics spring to mind.

However, I also think there are negative things that are acquired also. For example, I prefer to send someone an email than pick up a phone and speak to them, as this gives me more time to deliberate and phrase my sentences. I'm sure this is a fundamental personality trait, but online gaming has contributed to make this worse. (On an aside, I'm glad that that I recognise this flaw and can deal with it)

Re: Google Maps Gets Another "Wow" Factor

Owen — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 05:43:04 -0000

Cute .. pity Google Maps don't cover the Isle of Man at the moment (that's not an obscure reference, it's just where i'm living at the moment)

Re: Lorelle on WordPress Is Reading My Mind

Owen — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 05:47:27 -0000

Personally I feel that if your hobby can generate some sort of residual income, then so be it. If the monetisation changes the shape and tone of your blog, then yes, this is where it stops becoming a hobby and becomes a job. The acid test is asking yourself the question: If I had to stop this for a month, would it be a problem? If you miss it because you enjoy it, it's a hobby. If you worry about paying the bills, then it's not.

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for July 3

Owen — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 11:26:49 -0000

Ohh .. cool. I've found you on Facebook ;)

Re: Google Starts Giving Away FeedBurner Upgrades

Owen — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 11:33:07 -0000

Thanks for the tip. Off to request it.

Re: Spotting Negative Social Media Marketing

Owen — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 20:11:45 -0000

Excellent post. It seems that with each new wave of technology there are new issues and threats to contend with.

Re: Have You Set Standards for Using Your Brand Online?

Owen — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 12:44:32 -0000

I need to print these up and hand them on the wall, or make loads of copies to hand around the office!

Re: Google’s Gmail Faces Another Legal Blow in Germany

Owen — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 02:40:22 -0000

I'm with Google on this one. With a global brand there's always a chance of coming across someone who may have used it in a particular country before them. I'll leave it to their lawyers to sort out.

Re: Welcome New Advertiser - Search Engine Guide

Owen — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:18:05 -0000

Welcome SEG. Thanks for sponsoring the site!

Re: eBook Download - “The Marketing Pilgrim Essays”

Owen — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:19:57 -0000

Excellent idea. Thanks guys. It's always great for everyone to have such great resources available for free.

Re: Google Odyssey 2012 - "I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that"

Owen — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 10:26:33 -0000

I think we're still far away from that point.

Granted, Google does a reasonable job of crunching data and turning it into information, and is making inroads in turning that information into knowledge .. however the step of turning knowledge into wisdom is a pretty huge jump, and can't be attained purely by observation.

Just my 2p

Re: Who’s Spammier: Mahalo or Squidoo?

Owen — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 10:41:50 -0000

Once again, Calacanis takes off on some sort of crusade to generate media interest around whatever cause he's pushing today. And surprise, surprise, this time it's in the interest of an organisation he has a stake in.

At the end of the day Mahalo suffers from exactly the same fundamental failing of all user-generated content systems. It's all down to the community to govern itself and in the long run won't be able to scale it's quality control policies to encompass all it's human components. The only reason it might have less spam on it than it's counterparts is that it's current much smaller than it's competitors and hasn't really attracted the attention of people trying to take advantage of it.

Re: Google Odyssey 2012 - "I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that"

Owen — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 10:16:01 -0000

@Fitness Guy: Agreed, there's much more sophistication in systems nowadays, but it's still a far cry from being able to take decisions out of our hands. Would you trust your local retailer (who has all your shopping patterns) to provide you with what they think you need? Wouldn't you (and they) prefer that you headed down there and bought what YOU wanted?

Re: Facebook to Give Away Big Bucks

Owen — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 10:20:41 -0000

I like the way FaceBook is riding the wave at the moment, and it seems like they have the foresight and drive to stay up there with the best of them.

p.s. Jordan, just added you to my friends .. fancy a game of Scrabble ?

Re: Marketing Pilgrim Live - Tuesday 1pm EST

Owen — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 13:13:23 -0000

Any chance you can move things around so that the chat window is alongside the video instead of under it ?

Re: Google Integrates Google Notebook in SERPs

Owen — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 07:28:15 -0000

Thanks for that pointer. Hadn't actually seen it but it could be useful. I know I keep popping Notepad up every now and again just to keep note of things. I tried using different utilities including a post-it gadget for the Vista toolbar, but they never stuck. I wonder if Google Notebook will succeed where others have failed ....

Re: Facebook Considering an Offline Version?

Owen — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 10:43:28 -0000

Hmm .. an offline version of Facebook? I'm not sure how that would work, considering that the main thing Facebook lets you do is sift through the data they have about other users. You'd need to keep a heck of a lot of data offline to make it a reasonable experience.

Re: 62% Don’t Trust Search Engines

Owen — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 06:04:23 -0000

Hmm .. I would take those results with a pinch of salt. Not only is the sample size not statistically significant, but the audience is bound to have a skewed perception of the search engine market (as Jordan rightly points out)

I wonder how many people on the street actually know what "semantic precision" actually means ;)

Re: Be Careful When Visiting MySpace Mexico

Owen — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 09:07:04 -0000

Maybe they're being bought up by a Mexican company ;)

Re: Microsoft Takes Aim at Web Video with Silverlight

Owen — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 10:36:16 -0000

It's quite interesting to note that both Flash and Silverlight are really just wrappers for the actual video formats the movie is sent out in. It's funny how the industry suddenly perceives them as the actual format itself!

Re: Upgrading WordPress…

Owen — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 16:51:31 -0000

Looks as if upgrade was successful. Can't spot any problems. I hear the latest version has some perf improvements too ...

Re: Upgrading WordPress…

Owen — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 16:52:30 -0000

Whoopps .. on submitting a comment I get:

Warning: in_array(): Wrong datatype for second argument in /home/andybeal/marketingpilgrim.com/htdocs/wp-content/plugins/subscribe-to-comments.php on line 438

(and some other errors following that ...)

Re: Upgrading WordPress…

Owen — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 09:14:04 -0000

Wordpress 2.2.1 I would presume ...

Re: Cisco Acquires Social Networks Company, Why?

Owen — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 05:57:58 -0000

That's a bit of a tenuous link though really. Wouldn't some video broadcasting service generate more internet traffic than a social networking site? Why wouldn't they go for a YouTube clone ..

Re: Google Apps Adds New Language Support

Owen — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 12:30:04 -0000

It's an interesting way to penetrate new markets. Most English-speakers will tend to assume that most people speak English, but there are parts of the world that prefer to transact in their own langauge.

Re: Ahoy Me Mateys, Blog Pirates Ahead

Owen — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 12:33:05 -0000

There are a number of plugins to protect against content scraping. There's a good review of a couple (well 5 actually) here:

http://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2006/10/09/five-...

Re: Extra Extras, August 1

Owen — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 09:25:38 -0000

Hmm .. I find video ads really annoying! Have you come across the ones in MSN Messenger that blow up in size when you run your mouse over them?

Re: Battling the Blog Scrapers

Owen — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 18:51:29 -0000

In most cases, if you implement a certain level of protection, spammers tend to move off to an easier target. So it's worth putting some measures in place to avoid being scraped. Luckily there are plugin available to help.

Re: SEO Is Dead. Again.

Owen — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 18:33:25 -0000

A rose by any other name ...

Re: SEO Is Dead. Again.

Owen — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 19:01:46 -0000

@Boydie: That's the great thing about WordPress. It only take a couple of extra minutes to add the plugins that transform your site into what you want it to be. How much harder would it be if you were hand-crafting the site ?

Re: Thanks to Our Advertisers

Owen — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 19:03:01 -0000

*sigh* .. everyone needs a rich uncle

Re: Rudy Giuliani’s Daughter Supporting Barack Obama?

Owen — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 09:51:30 -0000

*chuckle* .. A good illustration about just how private (NOT) a social network can be ..

Re: When Google AdWords Goes Wrong - Sexy Ads on Sexual Harassment Site

Owen — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 09:54:20 -0000

*chuckle* can see that raising a few eyebrows.

The question remains though, how do you solve this sort of issue? I suppose the answer would be to elevate the ad placement from keyword matching to some sort of sementic analysis ....
..
or maybe, just don't run AdWords on sensitive pages.

Re: ModX : The SEO Content Management Solution

Owen — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 09:56:48 -0000

Thanks Jeremy, I might actually give them a try.

I've been using WordPress as a CMS recently, with quite a good measure of success, but I've been keeping an eye on CMS offerings to see if there's something I could deploy. ModX's SEO features seem like a good reason to give it a whirl.

Re: Marketing Pilgrim Live - Jordan Hosts!

Owen — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 09:58:11 -0000

Bah! .. Andy and Jordan AREN'T the same person? That's one myth shattered! You'll soon be telling us the world is round .. or that it revolves around the sun!!

Re: Step One: Cut off Nose. Step Two: Spite Facebook.

Owen — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 10:06:23 -0000

I'm with Matt above. Most people realise that web advertising is far removed from any association with the content of the site. It's not like an iPhone kiosk showing a Windows logo (http://fakesteve.blogspot.com/2007/08/in-case-y...)

Do you associate the ads you see on TV with the show that it's shown with? There might be some synergy there, but that doesn't work that much online. The Marketing Pilgim page I'm looking at is showing me a job opening for Microsoft MSN, it doesn't follow that MP has any dealings with them though.

Re: Let SEMCheck Test Your Site for Search Friendliness

Owen — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 13:26:35 -0000

Thanks for the pointer. I've signed up for a report and am curious to see what they'll come back with ...

Re: Let SEMCheck Test Your Site for Search Friendliness

Owen — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 08:46:15 -0000

This is actually a really interesting example of how a blog can be used to facilitate communication between different parties. In this case Andy helped facilitate the discussion, but it's also great the Frank is monitoring comments and keeping the thread alive.

Just an observation.

Re: Perfect 10 Invites Microsoft to Join Google & Amazon in Copyright Claim

Owen — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 11:26:09 -0000

*chuckle* .. it really feels like a losing battle though, doesn't it. Especially with the precedents from the previous search engine.

The last argument doesn't really make sense though. The issue isn't around giving away free access to Perfect 10's protected areas, it's about indexing content on pirate websites. Are search engines responsible for where sites they point get their imagery from ?

Re: Company Blogs Bring Radical Transparency

Owen — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 12:04:24 -0000

Great post. Seth Godin always has brilliant posts about the subject and his take is that you should always take the bull by the horns, accept responsibility and start a dialogue with your customers. Corporate blogs provide a valuable tool which, if harnessed, can provide an unprecentended level of transparency in a company's doings, which translates directly to trust which affects the bottom-line.

Re: Why Did Google Pack Add StarOffice and Not OpenOffice?

Owen — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 11:04:07 -0000

I've heard that one reason Google went for StarOffice was that it included tools to help users migrate away from Microsoft Office.

Just a rumour though ..

Re: Upgrading WordPress…

Owen — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 12:50:34 -0000

Strange .. I'm running UTW on my blog (running 2.2.1), didn't have any issues. Thank goodness for that anyway ..

Re: Upgrading WordPress…

Owen — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 16:06:48 -0000

@Andy: Do you know what release of UTW you tried using? I'm on 3.14159265 and I haven't had the issue you mentioned.

I'll keep an eye out for it when I next upgrade WP

Re: 8 Tips for Avoiding an SEO Fraudster

Owen — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 10:16:42 -0000

Gregg, some great advice in there. SEO is not about "gaming" search engines, but a cohesive marketing strategy that aligns with industry trends and resonates with the target audience for a website. Thanks for sharing your learnings.

Re: 8 Tips for Avoiding an SEO Fraudster

Owen — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 09:46:37 -0000

Hmm .. been thinking about #3 and I'm not sure I agree. If I were a whizz mechanic; it doesn't necessarily imply that I would start up a car hire business, on the basis that I can fix my own cars. In the same way, an "SEO expert" can make a better career by managing websites from clients, rather than building websites he can earn residual income from. Does that make sense?

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for August 16

Owen — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 12:04:42 -0000

Re the Skype thing .. it's alwaysa good to have a backup strategy. Lots of VOIP providers around ...

Re: Twitter for Personal Branding

Owen — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 19:39:05 -0000

Twitter is great for a certain type of message. However, I would always recommend it's part of a cohesive strategy using multiply channels, rather than focusing on a pure Twitter channel

Re: Google Apps to a University near You

Owen — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 19:26:38 -0000

It's a pretty logical step for Google to approach the educational market. They do have the right product for the market and the audience provides an interesting conduit into professional and future markets .. as students finish their course and move into jobs are other countries.

Re: Mobile Document Service Has Hidden Agenda

Owen — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 05:39:42 -0000

*chuckle* .. there's no such thing as a free lunch is there? Still, it's a great service, especially if you're on the move.

Re: Eyetracking Shows Web Audience Ignores Ads

Owen — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 03:20:02 -0000

Great post, and some great comments. I'd have to agree with the ones that talk about how images have a greater impact that text. If you look at your ads in the top right hand corner, Andy's photo is one that sticks out most. Not because of the space invaders in the background, but because the simplicity of the image draws the eye away from the text.

Re: It’s Time to Take Blogs Seriously

Owen — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 17:01:01 -0000

It's interesting to see the statistic that there were more female bloggers than male in the sample.

Traditionally, IT has been a pretty male-dominated area; but I suppose blogging is less about IT and more about expressing yourself ...

Re: Google Goes Social on Facebook

Owen — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 17:12:59 -0000

Hmm .. might give it a whirl. But as you say, not much point in searching through FaceBook instead of using Firefox's Google Search ...

Re: YouTube Rival Finally Named: Hulu.com Almost in Beta

Owen — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 05:39:35 -0000

I think it's a silly name and open to all sorts of ways of getting the mickey taken out of it.

Question is, will it stick? We have a number of "silly" names which have become household names today.

Re: Pilgrim Updates: Digg, Facebook, Contest Winner

Owen — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 16:14:33 -0000

Darn, totally missed it. It's probably because I lurk on the website for some reason, rather than get here through the feed.

Must be because I have 300 feeds to scan and I'm just overloaded at the moment ...

Anyway, good on ya, Andrew !

Re: Email Marketers Need To Know SPF

Owen — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 16:20:08 -0000

SPF has been around for some time now. It's nice to see it becoming mainstream. Nothing better than technology solution to address a technology problem.

Re: Yahoo Social Network To Get KickStart

Owen — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 16:36:25 -0000

Social Networks are becoming just like standards. There's so many to choose from nowadays. It's nice to see they're trying to get their segmentation right before launching it, otherwise it will just be one of many

Re: Marketing Pilgrim Live - Hulu, Viacom, American Blinds & PayPerPost

Owen — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 06:54:28 -0000

Darn .. missed the live show. Good thing we can watch it offline !

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for September 4 - Birthday Edition

Owen — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 06:56:10 -0000

Happy Bithday! 2 years huh? Amazing how time flies, isn't it ?

Re: PayPerPost Secures $10M Prepares Launch of "Argus"

Owen — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 07:02:31 -0000

It's pretty impressive how far PayPerPost have come. There's something to be said about having the right mix at the right time, and having the guts to push ahead amidst negative publicity.

Anyway, you mention Argus, there's more on this on PayperPost's blog: http://community.payperpost.com/blog/2007/09/wh...

Is sounds like a ground-up rewrite of PayPerPost's blogger/advertiser marketplace based on what they've learnt over the last year. I could be wrong though ...

Re: Will Facebook Adhere to OSW Bill of Rights?

Owen — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 11:30:23 -0000

I think this is a bit of a storm in a teacup. I'm quite happy for people who search for my name on Google to come up with my FaceBook profile. If anything, the public profile is a bit limited, there are other bits I'd like to add, but Facebook wants to keep these closed off to the outside world. It's a step in the right direction I say.

Re: Google Website Optimizer Updates

Owen — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 06:22:00 -0000

This is true Google brilliance in my book.

The innovation they bring to the market is just staggering. Instead of sticking their head in the sand and watching their competitors overtake them, they just come up with new and better tools which keeps them ahead of the game.

Re: Apple Salvages Reputation with iPhone Consolation

Owen — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 08:05:04 -0000

I think Apple's move is excellent. It shows existing customers (who are really Apple's life blood) that Apple still cares and ensures that the next time Apple comes up with a new innovative device, they won't be apprehensive about jumping in.

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks, September 7

Owen — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 08:06:44 -0000

I wonder if all the other social networks will jump on the "redesign" bandwagon ...

Re: Lemonade Stand: The death of MLM and affiliate marketing as we know it?

Owen — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 08:15:37 -0000

Like with all things, I think this is just another step in a long journey. Things evolve, and online marketing is just one of those things.

Re: Apple Salvages Reputation with iPhone Consolation

Owen — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 08:17:56 -0000

@Joeychgo: I don't agree that it was too fast. If Apple had been thinking about their loyal following, they probably would have announced the deal for existing customers when announcing the new pricing. It's always a fine balance between being competitive and undercutting yourself ...

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks, September 6

Owen — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 08:20:06 -0000

@autospider: the article mentions nothing about the gPhone having been released. All it says is that: "New signals and speculation about Google's mobile initiatives emerge daily, but with no clear proclamations as yet from the Web search leader."

Re: Amazon $100k Quest To Find Hidden Gem

Owen — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 13:52:32 -0000

The U.S. residency is a strange requirement. You'd expect they would go to the ends of the earth (literally) to find the right person.

I suppose they can't portray this as a contest to obtain a green card huh?

Re: Yahoo Buys BuzzTracker, Preparing Digg Challenger?

Owen — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 11:22:47 -0000

Ohh .. YASBS (Yet Another Social Bookmarking Site)

Can't keep up with them all !

Re: BlogRush Offers Free Syndicated Blog Traffic

Owen — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 04:30:27 -0000

Thanks for the link/post, I'm off to give it a try.

As someone above said, the fact the the widget is Javascript based will make it less attractive to spammers. Doesn't mean that people won't submit splogs to it though. The nice thing is that you're still in control of your blog, so if you don't like what's going on, it's no hassle to remove it!

Re: Will the Net Remain Tax Free?

Owen — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 07:09:19 -0000

The U.S. can try and tax online business, but all this will do will be to force businesses to move to other jurisdications.

I wonder if this will then give rise to the same level of persecution the egaming community is feeling at the moment ...

Re: Eyetracking on Google Universal SERPs

Owen — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 18:05:04 -0000

Wow. That's some really interesting research. I wonder how long it will be before OSes include eye-tracking software that can be used for this sort of analysis.

Re: Is Facebook Doing Enough about Pervs?

Owen — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 05:05:42 -0000

The problem with FaceBook at the moment is that I don't believe they have scaled their organisation to handle the requirements of a social network of the size they are managing.

It's one of these cases where you send them an email and it gets assigned to a big black hole somewhere that nobody every monitors.

Babysitting people takes time, money and people. Are we saying the Facebook is responsible for the actions of everyone in the network?

Re: Google Fun: Birthdays and The Onion

Owen — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 05:18:46 -0000

Wow .. 9 years huh? I still remember the day a mate of mine told me about this "fantastic new search engine that actually returns what you're looking for"

Funny how 9 years have passed and other search engines have either died away or have only just started getting their head around the whole "relevance" issue!

Re: Tips for Getting Customer Feedback with Email

Owen — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 05:06:42 -0000

The biggest problem I find with emails is that, because of the large amount of unsolicited email we find in our mailbox, people are quick to dismiss things as spam or unwanted and not give them a second look.

Sending your customers a poll can quickly fall into this category, even if it's one of the hundred companies you've expressly given permission to contact you.

Re: Joost’s Low Key Opening Day

Owen — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 05:10:10 -0000

It might have been low key, but I picked up on it and blogged about it. Ok, I'm just a drop in the ocean, but Joost has always been exploiting the long-tail rather than hitting people between the eyes.

From an infrastructure point of view, it also means that your service doesn't get hit with an increased service requests a magnitude larger than what it's used to, but ramps up gradually as more people find out about the service.

Re: Adobe Launches New Media Player

Owen — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 05:12:49 -0000

Just what the world needed, another Media Player! Still, with Adobe's clout, this one may have more success that RealPlayer did!

Re: Googlism - Worshipping the Google god

Owen — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 04:38:46 -0000

*chuckle* .. that's got to be the funniest thing I've heard today so far !

Re: Alaska Airlines Testing In-Flight Internet Access

Owen — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 04:42:38 -0000

Can't wait for this to be ubiquitous! Still, I think price will be the major factor affecting general adoption. It might end up dividing the haves from the have-nots.

If it proves to be expensive, I'll just carry a battery powered hub and a bunch of network cables with me and try to leach off someone in business class ;)

Re: Radiohead’s Music Downloads - An Experiment

Owen — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 04:47:57 -0000

I suppose it's RadioHead's prerogative to want to sell the whole album rather than individual tracks. To them, the whole album may be a cohesive whole. I haven't heard it yet, but I remember albums like Queensrÿche's Operation Mindcrime, where the individual tracks were great, but most of them made more sense in the context of the album.

I for one think this experimentation is a great idea and am happy to back them up on this one.

*scurries off to see where to put his money*

Re: Confirmed: Marketing Pilgrim is Diggable!

Owen — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 06:52:35 -0000

The great thing about MP is that is has fantastic content. That's why people Digg your posts. Goes to show what the fundamental SEO principle should be. Focus on your content first. If you have great content, the world will beat a path to your door ;)

Re: 7.5 Rules of Selling Links - How Not to Get Penalized

Owen — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 16:28:56 -0000

Excellent post mate. It's funny how many people try to sell links without knowing what they're doing.

Re: Facebook Traffic Declines - Abandon Ship or Deja Vu?

Owen — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 18:29:57 -0000

It's a bit like the housing market. You'll get the occasional flutter when things appear to dip, but in the long run, the trend is always upwards ...

Re: Apple’s Reputation Sours

Owen — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 10:38:12 -0000

Ohhh .. a MP book! How did I miss that ?

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for October 11

Owen — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 10:41:31 -0000

*chuckle* We're a bit starved for meeting room space at this client I'm at presently. Don't think the whole Second Life thing will go down well though ...

Re: Apple’s Reputation Sours

Owen — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 11:16:14 -0000

Was wondering if you've ever mentioned it before or whether this was your first "stealth announcement".

Looks like it will be available end of Q1 next year. Is that right ?

Re: Shield Law Passes House, Includes “Non-Casual” Bloggers

Owen — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 06:28:01 -0000

Thanks for the post Jordan, very informative. It will be interesting to see how the rest of the world pick up on this and hopefully make this sort of protection global

Re: Gmail Adding IMAP Support

Owen — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 12:02:29 -0000

Wow .. that's excellent news. Must give it a try as soon as the option is available to me.

Re: Why Microsoft Needed Facebook & Google Didn’t

Owen — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 11:57:45 -0000

But I want my Google implant TODAY!

Good post Andy, nice to see an analysis of the situation.

Re: Why "Do Not Track" is Stupid

Owen — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 11:25:39 -0000

Thing about the "do not track" campaign is that there is already a solution for people who don't want to be tracked. Going through a proxy or an "anonymizer" service helps ensure your privacy. Thing is, my experience of people who use these services is that they are less concerned about privacy issues and more about the legality of what they are doing ...

Re: Update to Comment Policy

Owen — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 11:27:38 -0000

*chuckle* .. interesting how people always try to abuse what they are given huh?

Re: Radiohead Denies comScore’s Data

Owen — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 19:47:03 -0000

It would be great if Radiohead actually gave us some stats to see how they compare with the comScore ones ..

Re: Twittering Leo Laporte, Michael Arrington, Om Malik Live - NOW!

Owen — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 19:48:53 -0000

Thanks for the live-tweeting. It was good to see the micro-updates come in ..

Re: Which Blog Platform Do You Use?

Owen — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 12:08:23 -0000

I've become a massive WordPress fan.

My initial days of blogging were in dasBlog (still running at http://www.u-g-h.com/default.aspx), having come from the Microsoft camp and wanting a .Net solution, but after a few years of watching other blog grow and develop, I moved to WordPress. It's been a great way to teach myself PHP and MySQL and my CSS/Javascript skills have come a long way too, as has my appreciation of Open Source software.

WordPress itself is a magnificent piece of software, but I think one of it's strengths is the community that has evolved around it: users, theme designers, plugin authors etc.

It would be interesting to see similar figures for self-hosted blog platforms.

Re: Microsoft’s Dirty Santa

Owen — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 05:11:12 -0000

*Chuckle* .. that's the funniest thing I've read this week !

Re: Tracking Santa’s Sleigh with Google Earth

Owen — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 05:13:19 -0000

The question is: does Santa know he's being tracked? Couldn't this be construed as an invasion of his privacy?

Re: Zuckerberg on Beacon: “We’ve Made a Lot of Mistakes”

Owen — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 16:54:28 -0000

Hmm, the interesting thing is that you and I are aware of Beacon and it's impact on Facebook's users, but I suspect that the majority of my Facebook mates don't have any idea about this!

Re: Facebook Gets Another $60 Million

Owen — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 16:56:20 -0000

Must be nice to be a billionaire ...

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for January 11 - Readers’ Submissions

Owen — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 15:13:28 -0000

Thanks for the mention Andy. So this is what fame is all about huh?

Re: Back Door Arbitrage at Google?

Owen — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 07:18:13 -0000

The main question though is whether this drives visitors to your site or not. If the net result is still positive, then it may be acceptable.

Re: Will You Pownce on Twitter Alternative?

Owen — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 10:47:17 -0000

Looks like you have the right background for it, black .. just like treacle .. because that's what it feels like at the moment.

Looks like they've underestimated the resources they need to come out of their closed beta!

Re: Get off Twitter, Lay Off the Blogs, and Put Some Thought Back Into Your Email Campaigns

Owen — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 11:26:50 -0000

@Michelle: Not quite sure I agree with you. I delete as many spam emails as I used to before; if anything I delete them quicker nowadays so I can head back to Twitter/Facebook/Blogs. Granted, I'm not your usual audience, but people are getting more and more desensitized to email.

Also, I've been introduced to a new generation of teenagers and kids who simply do not use email, preferring to communicate amongst themselves with IM and Microblogging ...

Re: I Want Your RSS Feed, Again!

Owen — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:50:27 -0000

Wow .. it's been a year already huh?

Anyway, thanks for the mention

Owen (Ugh!!'s Greymatter Honeypot)

Owen Cutajar's last blog post..Announcing BizTalk Server R3

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for June 2

Owen — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 11:21:44 -0000

*chuckle* .. everyone wants to jump onto the microblogging bandwagon, but looks like people underestimate the sheer amount of computing power these "many-to-many" networks require .. Pity. I liked the look of Plurk

Owen Cutajar's last blog post..Time for a HoneyPot

Re: Link Juice: How to make people link to your website

Owen — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 11:25:09 -0000

Nice list, albeit not very original. I think probably the one with least value is number 5, sponsor a non-profit organisation. It's a lovely thing to do, but it all you're after is Link Juice, all the other options are cheaper and more effective.

Owen Cutajar's last blog post..Time for a HoneyPot

Re: 2005 Search Engine Blogs Awards

Owen — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 11:29:41 -0000

*grin* Came across this post using the "Random Post" option above. 3 months old huh? How things have changed ;)

Owen Cutajar's last blog post..Time for a HoneyPot

Re: Google Site Search Now Includes Custom Indexing; Will it Improve Your Google Rankings?

Owen — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 05:31:09 -0000

That's an interesting idea and it's not a stretch if Google had to use site searches as a distributed way of bolstering it's own search index.

Would be an interesting revenue stream for Google if every SEO "expert" and his dog started recommending to clients to get their own custom search ...

Owen Cutajar's last blog post..Time for a HoneyPot

Re: The Planet is Burning

Owen — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 05:35:48 -0000

There's an interesting lesson here for people who rely on suppliers for their disaster recovery. Most site owners (especially the smaller ones) expect sites to just live on forever, when there are scenarios like these which are just out of their control.

It's always good to have a plan B, regardless of how big or small you are.

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for June 3 - Late, Late Edition

Owen — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 17:37:58 -0000

A toolkit for custom 404 pages? How's that for spoon feeding!

Owen Cutajar's last blog post..Misleading headlines: Lies, darned lies, and misrepresented statistics

Re: Plurk Joins Twitter and Pownce on Train to Sucksville

Owen — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 21:07:18 -0000

I had started to switch towards Plurk, but today Plurk is having issues and Twitter is working reasonably well ... so I think it's back to Twitter being my micro-blogging platform of choice ..

It doesn't feel like there's a serious contender out there ..

Owen's last blog post..Misleading headlines: Lies, darned lies, and misrepresented statistics

Re: Linky Goodness, June 9

Owen — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 21:10:39 -0000

Ohh .. the article on duplicate content was most interesting to me too. This sentence pretty much sums it up: "To conclude, I'd like to point out that in the majority of cases, having duplicate content does not have negative effects on your site's presence in the Google index."

Owen's last blog post..Misleading headlines: Lies, darned lies, and misrepresented statistics

Re: New Apple iPhone Coming; Twitter Expects to Go Down?

Owen — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 21:12:13 -0000

Seems to have survived the onslaught. At least it was much better than it was last week !

Owen's last blog post..Misleading headlines: Lies, darned lies, and misrepresented statistics

Re: Pilgrim’s Picks for June 7 - Google Favicon Edition

Owen — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 21:14:05 -0000

I think I agree with the general consensus .. there are quite a few better favicons than the one they are using ...

Owen's last blog post..Misleading headlines: Lies, darned lies, and misrepresented statistics

Re: China in Tricky Get Bloggers*

Owen — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 12:29:11 -0000

The great thing about people is that they will always use their ingenuity and initiative to find ways around any constraints that are imposed on them.

The Chinese authorities need to realise that the illusion of control is probably more damaging than the control they think they have

Owen Cutajar's last blog post..The value of perks

Re: Big Media Publishers Want More from Google

Owen — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 12:38:04 -0000

In commercial markets a great many companies employ "SEO experts" to help manipulates Google's results giving them leverage over others. Why shouldn't prime content providers use the same techniques? Restricting search engine access to content based for copyright reasons is just the wrong thing to be doing in my opinion

Owen's last blog post..How about a mixer?

Re: What Music Helps You Write?

Owen — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 11:46:17 -0000

I'm usually fine with most types of music. I think classical probably helps me focus better, so I would go with Vivaldi's Four Seasons

Re: WordPress vs. Movable Type: Open Source Blogging Software Showdown

Owen — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 04:53:33 -0000

Great post Scott. I'm a big WordPress fan and have no exposure to MT. I moved to WordPress from dasBlog which I was using out of loyalty to the .Net platform and have never looked back since switching to WordPress. I think WP now has a critical mass that will make it pretty difficult for MT to gain ground. As you say, the wealth of plugins for WP is astounding and this is what makes WP such a formidable opponent for any other blog platform.

Re: Big Update for Vista Leaves Little Changed for Mainstream Users

Owen — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 04:35:51 -0000

@Dave: Your comment might be relevant if the post was written in Italian. You might notice it's written in English, where the plural of scenario is scenarios (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scenario)

@Walt: Great post! Have you noticed any problems that would prevent you from recommending installing SP1 at this stage?

Re: How not to do a 404 page – We’ve Failed You

Owen — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 19:03:06 -0000

You're probably right. The web devs were probably trying to be funny; but it does lower the tone of the site.