Net

Outsourcing My Life Part 3 - The RunCast

Here's the 3rd episode of Outsourcing my life. This time in RunCast formate. Very shaky but not stirred. Unfortunately the battery died halfway through in parallel with me reaching 90% of my heart capacity. Now I'm off to Rhodes and the greek island called Symi to focus and get things done. I'll be back with a new episode (GreekCast ?) later this week and some more thoughts about global entrepreneurship & ideas for Loic's Le Web 3.1.

Technorati Tags: Outsourcing, loiclemeur, netaneljacobsson, runcast, leweb3

Outsourcing My Life 2 - Loic's RunCast Comments

This is becoming funnier and funnier. Loic just posted his RunCast with comments and and a new challenge to me as a follow-up from my previous Outsourcing My Life 2. Now I have been challenged to comment on Le Web 3 in RunCast format too! Don't worry. A RunCast with Outsourcing My Life 3 will come too now with comments on Le Web 3. And Loic, what about turning peoples VideoCast on Le Web 3 into an actual Advisory Cast Board? Stay tuned to the RunCast, SwimCast and PoolCast too.. Technorati Tags: loiclemeur , leweb3 , netanel , outsourcing, entrepreneurs, video

Traditional Media Dead? Not Yet - 10 New Uses For Newspaper

With the advent of citizen journalism, blogging, twitters, youtubers and the overall fragmentation of news, traditional media is trying hard to find new ways or not being irrelevant. Here are 10 new uses for newspaper:

1. Deodorize food containers. Stuff a balled-up piece of newspaper into a lunch box or thermos, seal it, and let sit overnight.
2. Ripen tomatoes. Wrap them individually and leave them out at room temperature.
3. Pack delicate items. Wrap frames and figurines with several pieces of newspaper, then crumple the remaining sections to fill extra space in the box.
4. Wipe away tough streaks on glass. Use newspaper with cleaning fluid to clean mirrors and windows.
5. Preserve antique glass. Some older frames have finishes on the glass that can be damaged by cleaning solutions. Remove smudges by rubbing with newspaper dipped in a solution of one part white vinegar and one part warm water. Let air-dry.
6. Dry shoes. Place crumpled paper in them overnight.
7. Wrap gifts. Use the comics to wrap a child’s birthday gift, or try the wedding announcements for an engagement gift.
8. Create a home for slushy snow boots. During the winter, keep a pile of newspaper near the entryway. When your little snowmen and -women come home, they can toss their winter wear onto the newspaper instead of creating puddles on the floor.
9. Prepare a garden. In the fall, mow a patch of lawn to make room for a dedicated bed. Cover it with four layers of newspaper, then a four-inch layer of shredded leaves or bark mulch. Hose it down. Come spring, the compost blanket will have smothered the grass roots, and the bed will be primed for planting.
10. Keep the refrigerator vegetable drawer dry and free of smells. Line the bottom with newspaper.

Who said that newspapers are dead? The above proves that they can be really useful in daily life. Soon coming : 10 New users for TV and Radio.

The above 10 points were found here but in a totally different context...

Technorati Tags: Lifehacks, Media, New Media, Newspaper, 10 new uses, puppy, TV

New Research:The User Revolution

Piper Jaffray just published a fat report called "The User Revolution: The New Advertising Ecosystem and The Rise of the Internet as a Mass Medium". Here are some of its key findings:

• We expect global online advertising revenue to reach $81.1 billion by 2011, representing a 21% CAGR (2006-2011).

• The User Revolution. The advertising world is going through a revolution, one that we call the "User Revolution" as it is happening primarily with the consumers, who are taking control of content consumption and branding. We believe this trend will cause a significant rise in prominence of the Internet as a major content consumption and marketing medium.

• "Communitainment." The Internet has increasingly become a principal medium for community, communication, and entertainment--three areas that have collided together and are impacting each other's growth--generating a new type of activity that we call communitainment.

• The Internet Is Mainstream. The Internet has become a mainstream media outlet that now rivals traditional media for reach and advertising dollars.

• Media Fragmentation. The proliferation of online and offline media outlets has resulted in shrinking television audiences and an increasingly fragmented media landscape.

• The Golden Search. We believe search continues to gain ground, driven by the rise of search as the New Portal, the increasing use of search in branding campaigns, and the local search opportunity.

• We believe Google's wide variety of non-search-related products creates a virtuous cycle of brand affinity that drives incremental search volume.

• Video Ads Could Drive The Next Wave. We believe Internet video ads could become a game changer for large brand advertisers, who are used to the 15- or 30-second TV commercial

• Internet Usage Patterns Are Changing. Portals maintain the highest reach, but the fastest growing category of destinations is communitainment sites such as MySpace and Facebook.

• Ad networks are experiencing increased demand due to increasing Internet fragmentation, desire for more targeted inventory, increasing usage of networks for branding, and increased site visibility.

• Agencies are rapidly evolving into more sophisticated, technology-savvy entities that combine best of breed offerings.

• Companies to watch: Google (and YouTube), Yahoo!, Disney, News Corp, Time Warner, Microsoft, InterActive, Facebook, Craigslist, Brightcove, Yelp, SINA Corp., Baidu, aQuantive, ValueClick, 24/7 Media, Netflix, Wikipedia, MobiTV, Digg, and Hakia to be the most important players to watch.

Like my good friend Kaiser Kuo, Group Director for Digital Strategy, for Ogilvy China, mentions in this new (and great) blog " Ich bin ein Beijinger" : none of this should come as a surprise, but the report is full of eye-opening finding regarding the decline of TV viewing, changing viewing and decline of broadcast TV ad as percentage of total ad spend.

Kaiser who has a unique insight to China (and was very much responsible for Maxthon getting discovered and funded..) is confident that advertisers will flock to video ads and all the opportunities that are opening up for digital media advertising in China .However, he wonders how ready people really are for pre-roll commercials stuffed in to things they want to watch.

I tend to agree with Kaiser, although there is a fantastic opportunity for advertisers, the Internet savvy users might very well prefer to block ads if possible. This is something we have learned at Maxthon and seems to be especially true for Chinese Internet users. Al the sophisticated ad-blockers and filters that come pre-installed in Maxthon has definitely been one of the key driving factors for Maxthon success in China.

Anyway, next week I am flying down to Beijing again to talk on Piper Jaffrays Annual China Growth Conference on behalf of Maxthon. I will then have a chance not only to meet up with Safa and rest of the Piper Jaffray gang, but also to meet with Kaiser again and plot how we can deliver some interesting advertising opportunities together in China.

 

Thanks to Mark Pols for sending me this fat report!

Bonus: Video Interview with Kaiser I made just before he left the Red Herring.

On Media NYC Wrap Up

I am sitting on the plane between JFK and San Francisco after having attended On Media NYC and am trying to summerize my thoughts about the conference. My overall impression is that its was a great event in terms of networking, speaker line ups and of course the reception. I had a chance to re-connect with old friends, business partners and make new contacts.

Having said that, I felt like in many other conferences: "heard it before, been there, said that and know that". Most of the panelist were all too predictive and didn't really contribute with anything new and refreshing. However, Tony Perkins and Bill Cleary and did a great job setting it all up and with the fantastic backdrop of Central Park and Colombia Circle ! Tony & Bill also showcased their home made videos that triggered many laughs.

A few speakers and panelist sticked out though:

• Peter Hirshberg, Technorati's Chairman did a great and entertaining presentation.

• Can Brands Get Away with "Buzz Marketing" in the Blogosphere? With Jeff Jarvis, David Weinberger, Rich Murray, Gordon Gould and  Barry Reicherter. Funny enough the only thing I can remember from this panel was Davids' attach on Pay Per Post, and the word "lubricant..".

• Workshop: Venture and Angel Financing for Private Companies with Sam Angus, partner Fenwick & West, Ron Conway, Angel Investors, Garry Kitchen, CEO Skyworks,  Howard Morgan Idealab (very funny guy) and Mark Stevens, partner, Fenwick & West. It was the first time I attended a workshop at a conference and really felt that I learned something new and useful. Compared to other lame workshops (especially the one on how to become a power blogger - most bloggers are better Online than Offline..). This workshop was well prepared, provided the audience with a great hands on advice, very helpful hand outs out and really offered some very valueable advice to start ups about raising angel/seed or venture capital and what a kind of template for how a well balanced deal should look like.. What I didn't understand is why Mark Steves several times ditched CRV's Quick  Start program. Do I sense some kind of fear of loosing fees...?

  Oh, and there were some great CEO Showcase presentations as well. Anyway, it was a great event in terms of networking I will definatly come next time too.

Technorati Tags: Alwayson, Media, OnMedia

Off to New York & San Francisco

I am off to AlwaysOn Media New York, 28-31 to meet with the disrupters of marketing, advertising, branding and PR. Will definitely be fun.  Not that I expect to hear anything new, but it looks like a great event and and a good place to catch up with friends, acquaintances and potential Maxthon partners. After that I continue to Palo Alto for partner meetings and some potential hires @ CRV. Finally finishing off with Tomas Wiesel Venture partners Tech2007 conference in San Francisco Feb 6-7. If you want to meet up please feel free to drop me a line or call me on my US cell 650 862 46 56.

Technorati Tags: AlwaysOn, AlwaysOn Media, CRV, Maxthon, Maxthon, Events, puppy, puppy, TWVP

911 & 311 Lines To Accept Digital Images

The New York Times have a good story today about how emergency numbers 911 and non-emergency number 311 will start accepting digital photos and images from callers. Mayor Bloomberg calls it 'a revolutionary innovation in crime fighting" and I couldn't agree more. Pictures definately speaks louder than words.

The question is just how 911 and other services will be able to process all the images? The need for a very smart image and video search engine just keeps growing stronger..


Technorati Tags: 911, 311, emergency numbers, digital images, images, crime prevention, technolgy

Person of the Year Is YOU! Me?

Love this take on the person of the year after Time Magazine chose YOU as the person of the year (something we all already knew...)

Via Rogel Love the Daily Show!

Technorati Tags: person of the year, Comedy, puppy, The Daily Show, Time, Time Magazine, You

What I Will Not Post About in 2007

In order to reduce the noise, clutter and meaningless posts, I have decided not cover or post anything in 2007 related to:

• Google
• Yahoo
• YouTube
• MySpace
• Facebook
• Digg
• Microsoft
• Apple
• News Corp
• Any newly launched services already discussed else where in BlogLand

The reason for this is that I am getting so tired so read the same old story over and over again all over the blogoshpere. Really. How interesting is it to read that Google launched a new service 50 times the same day? Or about which company will acquire Facebook. Vista this and Vista that. Zune here and Ipod there. Alexa this and Digg that? Put a couple of these companies to John Lennon's "Give Peace A Chance" and you''ll get the spirit in which I am writing this ;)

Although I do not believe in New Year resolutions (I'm Jewish) I will try to be more selective about what I am writing from now on, less clutter and try to be more original rather that mirroring all the noise out there.

Disclaimer. I will only write about any of the above if the have anything directly to do with my business or changed something dramatically in my or other peoples life...

Digg it?

Technorati Tags: Blogging, Digg, Facebook, Google, MySpace, Microsoft, Yahoo, YouTube

Bloggers for a Better World?

A few weeks ago at the closing note of  Le Web 3 , Yossi Vardi and Loic called for the creation of a new movement, "bloggers for a better world". The idea was that every blogger that joined this new movement would commit themselves to write at least one post on social responsibility and change per week. David Sifry bought the domain and it would be tagged bfbw or b4bw. Every blog part of  this Bloggers for a better world movement, would carry a special badge. Shimon Peres also accepted to be on the Board for this movement which obviously added extra weight to it.

Now, I am all for everything that is positive and that would make this world a better place for us all. However, the following questions come to my mind:

• Is Yossi Vardi blogging?
• Is Shimon Peres blogging?
• Doesn't that say something?
• Will writing a post on social responsibility lead to that you take social responsibility?
• Isn't the real issue to work for a better world in general regardless of "platform" ?
• Are bloggers who badmouth, lynch, attach each other and wash their dirty laundry in public up for the challenge?
• In the light of the mob-like blog lynch of Loic in true Medieval spirit after Le Web 3, are bloggers mature enough to be a part of bloggers for a better world?
• Is this the blog version of "We are the world" and Live Aid?" were money for charity has been replaced by blog posts and rock stars with A-list bloggers?

I just say like Michael Jackson sings in "The Man in the Mirror":

"If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change" (nana na naa...;)

Technorati Tags: b4bw, bfbw, bloggers for a better world, Leweb3, Loic lemeur, Social responsibiliy, Shimon Peres, Yossi Vardi

The Dragon's web: what can we learn from Internet in China?

LeWeb3 conference, 11-12 December 2006, Paris, France Here is the video from the China panel I participated in at Le Web 3 last week together with Bo Y. Shao, and Pierre Haski. As I have mentioned earlier, to my disappointed the panel never really discussed "what we can learn from Internet in China", but became to focused on freedom of speech and democracy (which would have been fine if that would have been the scope of the panel but it was not). Unfortunately we ran out of time just as we started to discuss that subject, which I really regret. Going forward, I will try to share my experiences and thoughts about what we can learn from Internet in China here instead. Anyway, I want to thank Loic and Ouriel for inviting me and wish them all the best for the next year.

Technorati Tags: China, Entreprenurs, Leweb3

Le Web 3, Politics & The Truth About Censorship

In the aftermath of the storm surrounding Le Web 3 it cannot be easy to be Loic Le Meur... More than 1000 bloggers, media people and techies looked forward to the follow-up of last years Les Blogs 2. After having survived a relatively good day 1, the menu being serviced on day two swept us all away. Or what do you say about Shimon Peres for breakfast, François Bayrou for dinner and finally Nicolas Sarkosy for dessert.... As an Israeli, I cannot say I was over excited about Peres sudden appearance. I cannot say I really share his political views but I have tremendous respect for the person. Anyway, it was a nice chit chat and words of wisdom was spoken. Peres even came forward and said hello to me (see image below with David Sifry, Simon Peres and me) and asked who I was which was a nice unexpected surprise. He asked if I was related to the Jacobsson's from Rechovot...;) It seems that the audience liked the fact that Peres appeared, although we all seemed confused about the relevance for the conference. Then is seemed to get out of hand with the presidential candidate François Bayrou and current minister presidential candidate, Nicolas Sarkosy. TV, radio and journalists were all over the place and it looked more like a presidential campaign.

A lot of people got really upset it seems. I personally didn't mind since it spiced up the other would-have-been-predicted conference. It is true that the schedule was totally re-arranged, speakers were interrupted and the panelist got too little time. So what? Big deal. I can understand that people felt like Loic went to far, and I can to a certain degree agree with that. However, the following public lynch was really an over reaction in my view. I know Loic and the team had worked really heard and I think they deserve better.

Having said that, I must add that I feel these type of conferences has lost their momentum (read: web 2.0 conference etc). Even the so-called unconferences have failed. Does this prove that blogs, Vlogs and the social media bag are already passe' ? Or perhaps everything that can be said about it has already been said?

I personally just regret that the China panel (once more like last year) never got passed the discussion about democracy and censorship. I know that there were people in the audience that really wanted to hear about what we can learn from the Internet in China. Talking about freedom of speech and censorship - I just learned that Sam Sethi was fired from Techcrunch UK for expressing his point of view. Shame!

Conclusion: you don't have to be a government to exercise censorship...Serves us all as a good lesson about freedom of speech in the "free" world.

My five cent for next event would be to hold a separate Les Politics - a focused event on social media and its role in politics (not joking). I also believe that the true place for discussions about blogs are on the Net alone. Perhaps some spontaneous gathering there and there for the social side. Personally I prefer to move these type of events to a much smaller bistro like setting. Good wine has the unique capacity to feed conversations - or at least make them more interesting..

Anyway, hang on in there Loic and ride out the storm. You are a nice guy and I enjoyed the show. Politicians and mainstream media disrupting the disruptors ;) It certainly added some spice to the soup. There are more important things in life....I think people really have over reacted. Good thing that we don't live in the Middle Ages anymore - I guess you would have been on your way to the guillotine by now then...One thing is sure, this Blogosphere is an uncontrolable animal...

Technorati Tags: puppy

CRV Entrepreneur Idol @ Stanford

There certainly was lot's of laughter and energy today at the Stanford Campus when 60 Stanford MBA students made their pitches to CRV on the CRV Entrepreneur Idol contest. As yet another creative idea from the guys at CRV. George, Bill and Susan let 56 Standford MBA students and potential entrepreneurs-to-be, pitch in 60 seconds. I watched in the background as George, Bill, Susan and Matt Marshall from VentureBeat listened to 56 pitches in 60 minutes...

Afterwards, George made a short presentation of CRV and its' new exciting initiative - QuickStart. Maxthon and Skyrider, was presented as two very exciting and promising companies in the CRV portofolio with a particularily explosive growth and potential.

After the presentation, 5 lucky pitchers where chosen by the panel. Two received honorary mention and collected $100 each. The remaining 3 pitched again in front of the whole audience, and the audience then voted for the best pitch by applause volume...(and it was high :)

The winner (image below) won $2000 and the other two each $1000 - not back for a 60 minutes appearance...Needless to say it was very funny, sort of Ido-meets-stand-up-meets-VC. You could really feel the excitement among the MBA students and you could see that George, Bill and Susan really enjoyed it too.

John Furrier and Valerie Cunningham from Podtech.Net made sure that it was all documented so tune into Podtech.Net for full video coverage on the event.

CRV is definitely disrupting the traditional VC business model and seem to be enjoying the ride too.

For me it was all clear after having watching 60 pitches. It is the way you frame your pitch that makes the big difference. Energy and
presence is king - just like in IDOL - but it obviously has to be accompanied by a good ideas too of course.

Thanks to George, Bill and Susan for dragging me along. You guys are winners!

See my Flickr for more pics of the event and others here. Susan Wu and Matt Marshall should soon have some posts up covering the event with more details.

Now I'm off to Mayfiels Holiday Party and tomorrow I will talking at Asian Ventures. Man I am jet lagged and the week has only just begun...

Technorati Tags: Bill Tai, Charles River Ventures, CRV, George Zachary, Podtechnet, Stanford, Susan Wu, Valerie Cunningham, VC, Venture Capital

Upcoming Events: Asian Ventures & Le Web 3

I have just barely been home for a week but it's time again for yet another trip. This time in the other direction, but under the same theme - China. I'm off to San Jose on Sunday to talk about Maxthon at Dow Jones Asian Ventures on Dec. 5th. It will be a good opportunity to meet with Chinese entrepreneurs and exchange experiences. Time permitting I will try to make some Vlogs with interesting companies.

After that I will be working out of Palo Alto for the rest of the week (we will probably be making a major announcement next week..) until Sunday, and then directly off to Paris to participate in a panel at Le Web 3, named " The Dragon's Web - What can we learn from the Internet in China?" Dec 11-12. Man I'm slowly turning slightly yellow...

Le Web 3 is going to be jammed packed with bloggers, media people, entrepreneurs and VCs. Many are old friends and familiar faces so its going to be a great opportunity to catch up. I must say I have neglected Europe lately...Looks like its going to be a great event. I will also keep an eye open for new interesting start-ups looking for funding and potential Maxthon partners.

BTW, if you are Chinese and read this, what do you think we can learn from the Internet in China?

If you want to meet up in Palo Alto 4–9 or in Paris 11-13, feel free to ping me.

After this trip I am going to take a break. Chanukah is knocking on the door..

Technorati Tags: Asian Ventures 2006, Blogging, China, CRV, Israel, Leweb3, Maxthon, Social Media, Venture Capital, Web 2.0

Second Chinese Blogger Conference

The second Chinese Blogger Conference will be held on 28th and 29th October in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province.

The Chinese Blogger Conference is an annual event sponsored by Social Brain Foundation, and organized by volunteers online, for weblog enthusiasts and entrepreneurs. To bad I cannot be there, I will be in California during that time.

China Web2.0 Review has more.
 

Spreading Zecco

Last week I broke the news about Zecco - the finanical community that is going head-to-head with brokerage industry giants like E*trade and Charles Schwab by offering zero commission trading.

It created quite a buzz and according to my tools I could see that the financial guys really did pay attention and it sparked quite a debate. It' got picked up by Om , Techcrunch (see what some thought about Techcrunch first not covering the story , to finally cover it with quite a dry/negative review)  Market Watch and many others.

Stay tuned for some more interesting coverage ahead (and not only from Zecco ;).

Become A One-Man Movie Studio

Randall Rosenberg tries his luck as a YouTube Auteur, buys a new Mac, makes a movie and uploads it to YouTube.  Funny, I am buying a MacBook Pro this week in Hong Kong. And I am picking up a new Digicam as well to start my career as a Vlogger..

I will now start living in parallell worlds with my IBM ThinkPad in one hand and the MacBook Pro in the other - wish me luck.  If any of you have any good tips and advices for how to handle this double life - please let me know.

Typepad, Technorati, coComment in Maxthon

Maxthon has finally got a number of Blog-related Plugins:

• Technorati
• Typepad
• Co.comments

The Technorati Sidebar plugin functions similarly to the Technorati Mini . In addition you can:

• Search Blogs using the Technorati search engine
• Get information about the blog you are currently visiting
• Add sites to the Technorati favorites

With the Typepad Plugin, you can easily post about something you’ve read Online to your Typepad blog. Just select the text on a website, press the plugin button and post it to your blog. It works just like the “Quick Post” bookmarklet, but can also copy the full html-code from any selection.

The co.Comments Plugin allows you to:

• Track all the comments you make on blogs and other sites like Digg or forums etc. You can then view the follow-up comments on co.Comment.com .
• Besides working just like the coComment bookmarklet in Internet Explorer, it also includes links to the coComment homepage and "Your conversations".

Hope that you enjoy them!

 

Down With The A-Bloggers! Stop the link incest!

I have been blogging actively now for about 2 years, been schmoozing at blog events and have been advising media agencies on how to best utilise blogs to engage in conversations and created blog strategies for a leading mobile brand.

Although I know many of the so called A-bloggers, have benefited from their links and most of them are really nice people. I have really started to get enough of the A-listers. I want to emphazise that it is nothing personal. It is just that the great thing about blogging and the real power of blogging has been corrupted by these new gatekeepers.

Most of the so called A–list bloggers have very little to say besides reporting their latest parties, or their other fellow A-list bloggers latest links and posts. Very, very seldom you find any quality in their post – just an endless so called naked conversation. The word naked is really the perfect description here. Just like in the story of the Naked Emperor.

Don’t get me wrong, they have definitely led the “blog”revolution. But now they are becoming institutions, creating their own networks and actually becoming the NEW main stream media. I would even go so far as to say that they have become the blog counterpart to the old Communist Politburo– they are becoming the Blogburo.

They are now telling the rest of us, on how to pitch them, how to engage in a conversation with them and link to them and so on. And if you are lucky enough and have been kissing up enough time, they might consider you worthy and link back to you.

Let’s get this straight once and for all, the A-bloggers are all dependent on us other mortals bloggers to link to them.

Just like the Firefox slogan goes – Take back the Web. I would suggest that all ye bloggers out there unite and take back the blogosphere. After all this is the beauty with blogging anybody can publish and get their message through.

So stop linking to them, stop kissing up. Turn the Blog Pyramid upside down. Discover and link to new bloggers every day – and start looking outside of the US as well. Arise the Z–Bloggers! YOU MATTER!

I personally only read two so called A-blogger on a daily basis, namely Steve Rubel – because he is such a resource and Gapingvoid – since what Hugh does is so original, creative and because I love his ideas about global micro branding. 

Finally traffic & popularity does not equal quality. Traffic = traffic & popularity - nothing else.

Have I comitted Blogicide now?

Six Apart, MI6, Tomlinson & Censorship

I came across a very interesting post on how Richard Tomlinsons (the renegade MI6 agent) blog has been cancelled by Six Apart. Tomlinson has been battling MI6 for quite a while now and ran a blog on Typepad until he got this message from Six Apart:

Hi Richard,   

It has been brought to our attention that your weblog located at http://richardtomlinson.typepad.com is currently in violation of TypePad's Terms of Service, specifically of sections 7(a) and 7(e).

We have received this notification from the London Metropolitan Police and they have requested that the website be suspended and your access to the account discontinued per section 4(3) of the Terms of Service.

Unfortunately, when we receive a notification of this type, we have no choice but to comply. For this reason, we have suspended your account and suspended public access to the website.   

Obviously it didn't take long until Tomlinson re-published his blog and continued on Blogger.

I am in no way taking any side with any part, but it is quite interesting to see that a leading blog platform such as Typepad operated by Six Apart had to comply with the request from the London Metropolitan Police and close down Tomlinsons account. Especially since, so many bloggers using Six Apart's services have been writing so much about Chinese censorship...

What can one learn from this story?

1. Censorship and the prevention of freedom of speech is everywhere
2. Bloggers can be silenced and stopped
3. Bloggers cannot be stopped - only temporarily

Tomlinson himself now says on his new blog after new the Metropolitan Police again has threatened to close this Blogger account down:

If DS Pink does succeed in shutting this blog (though I hope Blogger will be more robust than feeble Typepad), then I have already prepared a back up blog. Please bookmark www.richardtomlinson.wordpress.com where I will carry on blogging if this blog is suspended.....

Tomlinson has repeatedly tried to get an detailed explanation from Six Apart of why his Typepad blog were in breach with their terms and conditions. So far he hasn’t got any. Tomlinson thinks Six Apart have something to feel ashamed about…

This story will definitely be interesting to follow - what do you say? To be continued on Wordpress?

War On Israel

I had enough, I am going to be political incorrect and say what I think even though I have tried to keep my opinion separated from this blog.

We went out of Lebanon a few years ago. A one sided action on our behalf to give peace on our norther border a chance. We then disengaged from Gaza (something I myself strongly objected), threw hundreds of families out from their homes that hade built their life there and turned the sand into an agricultural haven. Again, a once sided move.

The Sharon led government, argued that we had to make this painful concession since it would lead to peace. I never believed it for a second, but many wanted to.

As a sign of weakness on Israels side, Hamas gains significant popularity, wins the elections forming a terrorist government.

Since we left Gaza, there has almost not passed a day without us being attached by Kassam rockets from within Gaza. The situation got worse. Hamas brought even more poverty and corruption upon their own people. The people they claimed to fight for.

18 days ago they crossed the Gaza border into Israel, attached a tank, killed 2 soldier and kidnapped Gilad Shalit. The day after another group kidnaps and executed a young civilian.

Then yesterday, Hizballah crosses the Israeli border (see why we needed a security zone?) attacks two patrol viecles, kills 8 soldiers and kidnaps two. When Israel responds to the aggression - the Iran and Syria supported Hizballah terrorists, starts attacking all the north of Israel including Haifa.  And the world wants us to show constraints? Let's see what you would do if it happened to your country.

This is the psychology of the Middle East - give them a hand and they'll take an arm. We are being punished for showing more than goodwill, for making concessions for giving up land. And what do we receive in return - terror and war.

No more soft talk, no more concessions - the time has come to defend our existence (again) - we have no other choice - we simply have no other place to go.

This will be my only post on the subject.

technorati tags:Israel, Lebanon, Terror

Speed is the enemy of depth

Can a crowd really edit our daily paper? Asks Victor Keegan from the Guardian with the mushrooming of user contributed and edited news sites like: Reddit, Newsvine,Digg and even blogs:

The need to be the first blog on the block to spread a bit of regurgitated news, complete with your own spin, isn't obviously a way to become a trusted brand. Speed is the enemy of depth. Newspapers still have a vital role in generating trusted content.

I think he is right to a certain extent in terms of quality and trust, just see what is happening with Wikipedia. But the emergence of social media enables more people to participate and report at a speed that no paper or agency can keep up with anymore. It is the true democratization of media & journalism, however as with everything else in life, quantity popularity and success does not necessarily equal quality.

technorati tags:socialmedia, Media2.0, Web2.0, VictorKeegan, Guardian, citizenjournalism, wemedia, news, journalism, Reddit, Newsvine, Digg, Wikipedia

The Era of The Blockbuster - Niche Is King

Wired has this intersting story named "The rise and fall of the hit"  saying that:

The era of the blockbuster is so over. The niche is now king, and the entertainment industry – from music to movies to TV – will never be the same.

Long live the disruptive media revolution! Via Steve.

Tags: Media Tags: Longtail Tags: Disruptive

Media Chaos

NPR’s On the Media, recently aired an interesting piece on the current chaos in the world of media networks.  A year ago Bob Garfield predicted that 

Mainstream media, especially network TV, lose so much audience, they can no longer attract the advertising revenue they need to sustain their content, leading to still more audience defection, then more advertiser defection, and so on into the toilet, all before the online brave new world is ready to take over. In this past year, plenty has happened to add to the chaos. TiVo and DVR usage is rising, with Forrester Research estimating that by 2008, one in four households will be DVR'ing their favorite shows and skipping past commercials. ITunes has started selling hit TV shows for $1.99, and now all the networks are offering free streaming content on their websites. More options for us, and more jeopardy for the old model.

Talking to Jeff Jarvis, of Buzzmachine.com , it looks like things are getting even worse for mainstream media;

• Al Rusbridger, the editor of the Guardian, imagines a world without presses
• Tom Glocer, the head of Reuters, talks about a world where his consumers are now his editors
• The head of Gruner + Jahr says the role of the journalist in the future is to be a moderator

Click here for a full transcript of the show. BTW I love NPR, many of their shows are available as Podcasts and they also provide full transcripts for many of the show as well which is a great service.