Owner: Canadian Internet Marketing Blog URL:http://www.newmediaist.com Join Date: Sun, 27 May 2007 12:02:19 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: NewMediaist.com is an Internet Marketing blog regularly updated with cutting edge development in the new media business and online marketing world. Site statistics:Click here
New Mediaist has been slashdotted! 2007-05-14 20:20:49 Yes, that is the smell of geek in the air - welcome slashdot brethren!
I was able to survive the traffic jump even though I’m on a cheap Godaddy hosting account. The reason? Cache!
The reason why many websites crash when bombarded by traffic is because most websites aren’t actually “static” - but rather are created on-the-fly from a series of records in a database. In other words, each time you visit the website, you are in fact asking the website to query a database and retrieve some information. Therefore, if too many people visit the website at once, the database receives to many queries, and everything just crashes.
The solution to this problem is a caching layer: a system which detects which web pages are being regularly accessed, and creates a copy of the information requested from the database for these web pages, so the database doesn’t have to be called each time a user arrives.
For word press, the software which runs this blog, caching layer is
When the economics of open source don’t work 2007-05-13 21:44:33 Most open source
zealots (no offense intended; I use many open source software packages daily, and am currently experimenting with Ubuntu) push their cause with two supporting factors:
1) Open Source software is free of influence from “The Man” (unless his name is Linus, that is)
2) Open Source software can better than closed source software (in some cases)
But what about in countries where intellectual property protection doesn’t exist? The fact that open source is legally free wouldn’t make any difference, as its commercial counterparts (I.e. Microsoft Windows/Office/Etc…) are equally free. In fact, the argument can be made that in a world with high bandwidth costs and no intellectual property protection open source is actually more expensive than closed source, as you can buy pirated copies of closed-source software off the street, but need to spend days (weeks?) on an expensive Internet connection to download open source equivalents.
When Bill Gates w
Not another article on the Facebook Platform 2007-05-31 19:11:11 As covered in every major tech/business news source over the last week, Facebook
recently opened up their user base to external companies via their Facebook platform program.
Enter iLike, a music recommendation engine and one of the first Facebook Platform
applications. As of May 31st, 7:56 PM, iLike has 981,222 users on Facebook. The Facebook Platform has been live since May 24th. Therefore, Facebook users became iLike members at the rate of ~122,650 / Day.
The implications of this are significant to say the least, and I’ll try not to delve into the obvious ones here.
What I find interesting about this case is it is further proof of the immense power a small number of companies have over North American Internet Users. It almost seems as though as the Internet grows larger and larger, power is consolidating into the hands of a small number of players: Google has search, Facebook has social networking, eBay auctions, craiglist classifieds, etc…
While this shouldn’t b
Guangzhou Global Telecom - Stock Spam 2.0? 2007-06-05 20:17:41 In previous articles, I spoke about some research which established that stock spam works, as well as mentioned a report about how stock spam works.
A quick reminder: Stock
Spam are those image-based emails pumping small chinese firms. Buy Today! This stock is reaching for the stars!
Today, I discovered Stock Spam 2.0 over at Kiplinger.com: Meet GuangzhouGlobalTelecom
.
Rather than send out millions of emails like other small Chinese firms, Guangzhou Global Telecom took a different approach: Buy media (seemingly indirectly) in some of the most read business publications around the world talking about how great their company is.
Ok, now I know this technically isn’t spam, but rather stock pumping (or “marketing”, depending on what you do for a living), but it does awake an interesting point:
As society becomes more wary of online scams, will it “give back” authority to traditional media?
How would this situation played out twenty years ago, if a company
Canadian Web Hosting 2007-06-03 14:00:49 I’m in need of a new web hosting provider, and being Canadian
thought I might examine some local providers first. Unlike in the US, there really aren’t that many large Canadian hosting providers. For whatever reason (population size, availability of cheap American hosting, etc…), there also seem to be very few affordable web hosting firms in Canada.
Here’s a list I have researched of Canadian web hosting firms. I didn’t include any hosting providers which don’t provide a physical mailing address, as I interpret that as sign of a hosting re-seller – someone who has rented a server at a hosting company and is reselling space.
The hosting companies are organized alphabetically – no recommendations as to quality, service or price are being given by their positioning.
Blacksun | http://www.blacksun.ca | | Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
Bravenet | http://www.bravenet.com | Since 1997 | P.O. Box in Parksville, British Columbia
Canaca | http://www.canaca.com/ | 1999 | Mississauga, On Read more:Hosting
Cognitive Lock-in : Why your neighbor loves their mac 2007-06-06 21:50:50 The Journal of Consumer Research recently released a report on the topic of “cognitive lock-in”. In business school, this is more commonly referred to as “switching costs”.
The report basically goes out to prove that when someone is familiar with something, they will generally remain liking that thing even if a “better” alternative is available, due to a psychological attachment to the familiar.
Hence, when Facebook announces a new display format for their website, hundreds of thousands of its users complain, even if the new format is in fact better than their old one. Similarly, there is the mac/windows/linux argument, which seems to be raging strong as ever, even though the three systems are as similar to each other as they have ever been.
The “cognitive lock-in” theory introduces a difficult paradox when entering established markets: if users are more likely to think the products they are familiar with are higher quality, how do you i Read more:Cognitive
The most popular blog on the Internet 2007-06-10 21:25:45 Back in 2000 I started what would later be called a blog (the term hadn’t been fully adopted by the general population yet) dedicated to gadgets and technology called Hippievan.com (Click here to view the website at archive.org). My website actually got quite a bit of traffic, so much so that I was interviewed by the Wall Street Journal as a result of it.
After operating the website for about two years I decided to shut it down, as it was consuming quite a bit of free time and wasn’t making me any money. I (stupidly) let the domain names expire, and forgot about the idea of a daily updated news source dedicated to new gadgets and technology.
Today, a report was released that says Gizmodo.com is the world’s most popular
blog. According to a whois search, Gizmodo.com was created in July of 2002, two years after Hippievan.
Ouch.
So what can I learn from this experience?
1) Timing is just as important (if not more important) than the idea
2) Implementation is also more Read more:Internet
How to manipulate Wikipedia Entries 2007-06-27 19:38:04 Searchengineland has an interesting article today about different methods one could hypothetically use to manipulate a wikipedia entry.
Manipulate may actually be too strong a word, as you can’t really manipulate a wiki for an extended period of time (as another member of the community will undo your edits). Instead, you can make subtle changes to a wiki entry to influence the readers impression of its content.
For example, as suggested by searchengineland.com:
1. Add content to the top of the entry, pushing content you don’t want people to read below the fold.
2. Change the organization method (i.e. lettering/numbering) to influence what people focus on. If volume numbers are quoted without sources, erase them with an explanation that they have no reference.
3. Manufacture paragraphs which hide negative content. People rarely read full paragraphs - make sure the first and last sentence of each is positive.
4. Super-extend a post: Internet users are lazy - the length of a w Read more:Wikipedia
Switched Server 2007-07-01 13:25:50 Newmediaist switched servers earlier this morning - if you see any bugs pop up, please report them. We also utilized this opportunity to upgrade to the newest version of our content manager software. The upgrade broke our theme - hence the temporary new theme. Read more:Switched
Crocodile Eats Dog 2007-06-30 08:11:09 Another great example of immersive advertising, from Scholz & Friends, Berlin, Germany for the Neunkircher Zoo:
According to numerous articles on this campaign, the agency claimed a ~15% increase in attendance compared to an average month.
Love the creativity and uniqueness of this campaign - nevertheless, I can’t help but feel this is one of those situations where the ad agency was more focused on winning agency awards than driving sales for the Zoo. Read more:Crocodile
Negative SEO: How to hurt your competitor’s rankings 2007-07-05 18:30:16 While at the Toronto Search Engine Strategies conference a few weeks ago I had the opportunity to attend a discussion about the potential for malicious SEO
practices, held by employees of the big 4 (Yahoo / Google / Ask / Microsoft).
There was a general consensus between the search engines that although malicious / negative search engine optimization could work in concept, they have never encountered a specific case of it. Furthermore, the representatives were sure to point out that there is always that chance that a negative SEO campaign could have the exact opposite of the desired effect, as building more links to site, even if they come from a “bad area”, could have a positive net effect on rankings.
So, what is negative search engine optimization? It’s the process of attempting to lower the search engine rankings of a site which you do not own / are not affiliated with (the assumption is your only able to do off-site actions).
Negative
SEO is also very hot right now - a recen Read more:competitor
You can’t avoid the Taxman 2007-07-02 22:29:21 The South Korean Government has stated they are going to begin taxing the real money made via virtual transactions: In American terms, that means such things as selling gold on World of Warcraft, or buying property at Secondlife. Taxes will be collected at the service provider level - an automatic VAT (Value Added Tax) will be deducted from seller’s monthly revenues.
Governments have been taxing the licensing and sale of intellectual property for a very long time; the real surprise here is they didn’t start taxing real money game transactions sooner!
[discovered at Slashdot]
Forum and CRM Search Engine Optimization (SEO) 2007-07-08 22:48:31 One of my current projects is optimizing a simple machines forum for search engine spiders. While researching what off-the-shelf SEO
plugins are available for the forum package, I came across an interesting executive-summary style article on SEO for CRM, which I highly recommend to anyone interested in getting a basic overview of the most common technical aspects of SEO. Read more:Forum
, Search
, Engine
, Optimization
, Search Engine Optimization
Forum and CRM Search Engine Optimization (SEO) 2007-07-08 22:48:31 One of my current projects is optimizing a simple machines forum for search engine spiders. While researching what off-the-shelf SEO
plugins are available for the forum package, I came across an interesting executive-summary style article on SEO for CRM, which I highly recommend to anyone interested in getting a basic overview of the most common technical aspects of SEO. Read more:Forum
, Search
, Engine
, Optimization
, Search Engine Optimization
Negative SEO: How to hurt your competitor’s rankings 2007-07-05 18:30:16 While at the Toronto Search Engine Strategies conference a few weeks ago I had the opportunity to attend a discussion about the potential for malicious SEO
practices, held by employees of the big 4 (Yahoo / Google / Ask / Microsoft).
There was a general consensus between the search engines that although malicious / negative search engine optimization could work in concept, they have never encountered a specific case of it. Furthermore, the representatives were sure to point out that there is always that chance that a negative SEO campaign could have the exact opposite of the desired effect, as building more links to site, even if they come from a "bad area", could have a positive net effect on rankings.
So, what is negative search engine optimization? It's the process of attempting to lower the search engine rankings of a site which you do not own / are not affiliated with (the assumption is your only able to do off-site actions).
Negative
SEO is also very hot right Read more:competitor
You can’t avoid the Taxman 2007-07-02 22:29:21 The South Korean Government has stated they are going to begin taxing the real money made via virtual transactions: In American terms, that means such things as selling gold on World of Warcraft, or buying property at Secondlife. Taxes will be collected at the service provider level - an automatic VAT (Value Added Tax) will be deducted from seller’s monthly revenues.
Governments have been taxing the licensing and sale of intellectual property for a very long time; the real surprise here is they didn’t start taxing real money game transactions sooner!
[discovered at Slashdot]
Switched Server 2007-07-01 13:25:50 Newmediaist switched servers earlier this morning - if you see any bugs pop up, please report them. We also utilized this opportunity to upgrade to the newest version of our content manager software. The upgrade broke our theme - hence the temporary new theme. Read more:Switched
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