Tags: ipad, kindle, nook, socialmediameasurement

Tags: tigerwoods

In the nineteenth-century newspaper, the relationship between observer and observed was reciprocal: the newspaper described the city; the newspaper, in turn, was sustained by readers who were curious about the strangers that circumstance had placed proximate to them ... We no longer imagine the newspaper as a city or the city as a newspaper. Whatever I may say in the rant that follows, I do not believe the decline of newspapers has been the result solely of computer technology or of the Internet. The forces working against newspapers are probably as varied and foregone as the Model-T Ford and the birth-control pill. We like to say that the invention of the internal-combustion engine changed us, changed the way we live. In truth, we built the Model-T Ford because we had changed; we wanted to remake the world to accommodate our restlessness. We might now say: Newspapers will be lost because technology will force us to acquire information in new ways. In that case, who will tell us what it means to live as citizens of Seattle or Denver or Ann Arbor? The truth is we no longer want to live in Seattle or Denver or Ann Arbor. Our inclination has led us to invent a digital cosmopolitanism that begins and ends with “I.” Careening down Geary Boulevard on the 38 bus, I can talk to my my dear Auntie in Delhi or I can view snapshots of my cousin’s wedding in Recife or I can listen to girl punk from Glasgow. The cost of my cyber-urban experience is disconnection from body, from presence, from city.

We will end up with one and a half cities in America—Washington, D.C., and American Idol. We will all live in Washington, D.C., where the conversation is a droning, never advancing, debate between “conservatives” and “liberals.” We will not read about newlyweds. We will not read about the death of salesmen. We will not read about prize Holsteins or new novels. We are a nation dismantling the structures of intellectual property and all critical apparatus. We are without professional book reviewers and art critics and essays about what it might mean that our local newspaper has died. We are a nation of Amazon reader responses (Moby Dick is “not a really good piece of fiction”—Feb. 14, 2009, by Donald J. Bingle, Saint Charles, Ill.—two stars out of five). We are without obituaries, but the famous will achieve immortality by a Wikipedia entry.

Tags: newspapers

This fall, Twitter turned its popularity into dollars, inking lucrative deals to allow its users' tweets to be broadcast via search algorithms on Google and Bing. Soon, Facebook followed suit with deals to distribute certain real-time data to Google and Bing. (Recall that despite being the fifth most popular Web site in the world, Facebook is barely profitable.) ... Just one catch: Facebook had just "exchanged" to Google and Microsoft something that didn't exist. The vast majority of Facebook users restrict updates to their friends, and do not expect those updates to appear in public search results. (In fact, many people restrict their Facebook profile from appearing at all in search results.) So Facebook had little content to provide to Google's and Bing's real-time search results. When Google's real-time search launched earlier this month, its results were primarily filled with Twitter updates.

But those who want a private experience on Facebook will have to work harder at it: if you inadvertently post a comment on a friend's profile page that has been opened to the public, your comment will be public too.

Tags: facebook

We excluded USA Today, because we don't care about it. If you're in a hotel? You're reading it now. That's nice.

Tags: newspapers

There does seem to be a new sense of optimism in the startup and venture community. August was one of the busier months I can remember, though my brain is turning to mush with all of the news to cover, so take that for what it is worth.

I know some are concerned about a double dip recession. I have no idea whether that will occur or not, but my general sense is  that we didn't experience all of the pain we needed to given the radical shift in the economy that started last fall. The dot com bust of 2001-2003 actually caused much more pain in the tech sector as the Internet bubble deflated, and tens of thousands of jobs were lost in the Seattle area. We haven't seen anything that severe this time, at least in tech.

As to your question about "too many neophyte entrepreneurs" starting companies, I don't think that is necessarily a bad thing. Bill Gates and Paul Allen were neophyte entrepreneurs, as were Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Sometimes it takes a fresh set of entrepreneurial eyes to really figure out a problem, and the great thing about covering this beat is that entrepreneurs can come out of nowhere to really dominate a market. Still, at the end of the day, most will fail as you know.

I have no idea what it will take for the economy to get its footing again in Seattle. But I will say this: There's plenty of opportunity for entrepreneurs out there. The business world has been turned on its head -- everything from manufacturing to media to financial services --  and that actually plays to the advantage of entrepreneurial organizations and people.

Traditional businesses are getting blown up, and new models are emerging. There's certainly no shortage of problems that entrepreneurs can set out to solve. The key question is whether the capital will be there to support these new businesses? There's still money on the sidelines, and I am seeing some capital flowing. But it is tough to get cash to fuel new businesses. Entrepreneurs should bootstrap and treat every dollar in the business as if it were the last. But that's nothing new.

The iPhone has changed the game in mobile, the next big wave of innovation in the tech arena. So, no, I am not bored with the iPhone or the ecosystem forming around it. And it is just going to get more interesting as Google and Microsoft try to compete.

One thing that will be fascinating to watch is whether these iPhone app hobbyists actually can make a decent wage. Some will, some won't. But I have my doubts that big iPhone app businesses will form, since as readers on TechFlash have noted it is extremely difficult to build a business on the back of another company's platform.

Tags: johncook, techflash

I’ve come to the conclusion that there are four key parts to news stories, and we typically only get one of them, even though journalists possess all four, and the other three are arguably more important.... As long as the news is structured solely around what just happened, journalists are going to be fighting a rough battle... As news consumers, we should be demanding these [other] things as well. After all, right now we’re only getting the lamest part of the story.

Tags: newsless, journalism

Tags: wetpaint, altimetergroup, facebook, twitter

We're not suggesting that every CEO should participate in every aspect of social media. That's a decision each CEO needs to make as part of an overall company marketing strategy. But we are recommending that every CEO examines their online image and reputation.

Tags: facebook, twitter, linkedin

Tags: twitter, localtweeps, streetmavens

A department store is a retail establishment which specializes in satisfying a wide range of the consumer's personal and residential durable goods product needs; and at the same time offering the consumer a choice multiple merchandise lines, at variable price points, in all product categories.

What killed the department store? Malls. While malls were always anchored by one or more department stores (which had the name recognition and volume to draw consumers), the inside of the mall was filled with small specialty stores that exchanged breadth for extreme depth of offering. Suddenly consumers could visit a single location (the mall) and select from a variety of stores that specialized in music, or cooking, or clothing, or shoes or what have you. In the 1970s people visited the department store to peruse a limited selection of a broad variety of items. By the 1990s they visited a store in the mall for a huge selection of a particular good, then went next door for the next one. While the department store model is still thriving in certain instances, its sole remaining advantage is to use its volume buying power to drive down prices (see: Walmart).

The parallels to the media industry are likely clear. Your local newspaper has catered to a broad range of needs and interests in the community, offering a single and authoritative, albeit limited, source for news and entertainment. When production and logistics dictates that this is your only choice, a natural monopoly is created.

However, the rise of the Web has upended this model. Now it is possible to instantly get any story you want, but also find it from a source that takes interest in a particular subject to the level of obsession (we call these “bloggers”). And if this was the first body blow (driving down circulation), the other was clearly the rise of sites such as eBay and Craig’s List, which have decimated the newspaper industry’s safety net: the classified ad.

So what does the future hold for the industry? That is the $64,000 question. Journalism, as a profession that is distinct from the newspaper, which is merely a delivery vehicle (i.e., “store” to continue our analogy), will survive. As will certain premier brands (WSJ, NY Times, etc.) that offer a distinct value proposition to the reader/consumer. However, it is likely that most newspapers will go the way of Sears: years of struggle to survive, until they are eventually forced to either reinvent themselves or find a place on the Web as a mere shadow of their former selves.

-posted by Paul

Tags: twitter

Tags: facebook

Although men and women follow a similar number of Twitter users, men have 15% more followers than women. Men also have more reciprocated relationships, in which two users follow each other....Even more interesting is who follows whom. We found that an average man is almost twice more likely to follow another man than a woman. Similarly, an average woman is 25% more likely to follow a man than a woman. Finally, an average man is 40% more likely to be followed by another man than by a woman.

Tags: twitter

Tags: facebook, marismith, joelcomm

Tags: twitter

Tags: twitter, markcuban