What is a browser?

Before you read on, ask yourself the question in the title of this post, agree on an answer and then you can carry on.

Google recently conducted some research on web browsers, which has delivered some pretty interesting results in the video below. They were doing this research as part of the marketing push for their new web browser - Chrome. They went out to locations across the States - in this example Time Square, to ask people what a browser was, which browser they used and so on. 

You might be surprised (or not - depending on your answer to the question) to find out that fewer than 8% of the people questioned knew what a browser is. 

It acts as a reminder that your average Joe Bloggs probably thinks about this stuff a little bit less than us... 

Cheers

Nic

Will Bing change the way you think?

Image from Don't touch my moleskin.

Are you excited about Bing too?

There is a lot of chat about Bing this week.

If you haven't already heard of it...

Bing is a new product designed by the Microsoft team.

It is branded and designed as a decision making engine, not just a content aggregator based on content relevance which is essentially what search engines do... find the most appropriate info you queried by scanning all corners of the web and if people refer to your pages on the info your ranking will also be higher on the search results (proven credibility).

The Bing Teaser video has not gotten a whole lot of views, but it still illustrates how the product can be used to make your search on the web a little more intuitive and social (referral marketing at work).

What does this mean for the future of Google?

At this stage, probably not a lot since the technology is still at its infancy and there are question marks over whether the product is suitably different (one doubts it is)

It would be interesting to see how the users from different countries adopt Bing and whether the design of the search algorithm will continue to evolve into a social phenomenon like Google had in the 90s but only time will tell.

There is a lot of heat from the business community on what Microsoft's search engine prospects are despite its attempt to aggressively advertise and differentiate its market position.

Personally I do not want to be dismissive about Bing, I am excited that there is something that can move the attention from Google for a little while. Hopefully Bing will make search more dynamic and socially inspired to help us make better decisions about what others think of the content we are looking at.

Bing is also supposed to be localised for the Au market soon as well, so keep an eye out and give it a go.

- jeff

Being eaten by our own statistics

I thought we’d have some fun with a few stats. Ok I admit, we’re busy and this is kind of easy to send ;-)

Cheers

Nic

 

20 hours of video are uploaded to You Tube every single minute.

The word Google is Googled on average 68 million times every month

It would take you over 457 years to watch all of the content on You Tube.

346 million people read blogs across the world.

Over 11 million Tweets are sent a day. Check out this counter for the live counter… if you really want to. http://popacular.com/gigatweet/

700 million photos are added to Facebook every month.

The average Australian Facebook user has 107 friends.

40 billion songs were downloaded illegally in 2008, and 95% of all music downloaded is illegal.

Talking is all good as long as it is purposeful

Photo by Pong

My friend Ash constantly talks about social media and human interaction which inspired me to write about the impact Twitter has on our lives (not just GEN-Y) and beyond the TV talk show's coverage on the technology...

I am not the most hardcore fan of the technology but I do acknowledge it is very much part of my life as it is Facebook and Myspace for totall different reasons. Social tools have become part of my way of connecting with different friends...

On Myspace I still find heaps of unknown bands which is hugely important to me.

Facebook is technically my secondary email, arguably my first.

Twitter has become my recreational newsfeed and a place for me to share my current interest to friends... and the beauty of it is, it won't let me write more than 140 characters!

First of all I would like to dispute the idea the more followers you have the better you are. This is simply misguided and not true. It is worthwhile to inspect how one uses their Twitter account. For me @jefske it is just an extension of me to my friends and people I have met thru work, and it is just a small update service on what I find interesting and to stay in touch with a subgroup of friends who have also embraced Twitter. I think people follow others for social curiosity at a very basic level of interest, for the more serious Twitters, it literally is a new source of information from people they find valuable to know.

A lot of people still don't see the value in Twitter and it is perfectly normal, because a lot of tweets are inspired bya lot of nothing really but some people/brands have used the technology to really engage their audience to become more loyal followers/customers. The food outlets are a good example, they can really use this as a killer App as this AdAge piece has suggested.

The ability to tweet has revolutionalised the way to distribute info and essentially sharing content. Like the video below, normally it might take a few scans on my RSS reader to find some new obscure music for kicks. Now I am just a tweet away thanks to my music loving friends.

One thing to take away from this brief shout on Twitter is.... don't discard it if you haven't tried it and if you have tried it but don't really get it, there are LOADS of info on Twitter and how brands and Joe blogger are using it... people never seem to be bored of writing about it (at least yet). There are also some really useful applications that integrate Twitter as a greater communication channel, you can usually find a load of them on Mashable. So don't be shy.... give it a go and see whether you still want to sit in front of TV for news stories...

- jeff 

Twaddle?

The Apple rumour mill was hot again this morning as word spread the ‘blogosphere’ and the ‘Twitterati’ that Apple had lodged a $700m bid to acquire Twitter.

Twitter, the media ‘darling’ of the digital world has rejected previous bids, most notably a $500m bid from Facebook last year, and another tickle from Google .

Few people are actually expecting a deal to go through however. Twitter is in a pretty strong position right now with traffic going through the roof globally, with thanks to Oprah and gang (although I recognize that it could peak), and the reasons for Apple to buy aren’t blindingly obvious (as opposed to say, a Facebook or a Google).

It might be that they want to beef up their web development expertise, in much the same way they have mobile but that’s not particularly convincing. Maybe they want to get even cooler? (is that possible?) Who knows.

The clearest reason why this won’t happen is that Apple are always involved in some of the most ridiculous buy out rumours. In the last few years Apple have been “at advanced stages” with no other than: Adobe, EA, Disney, Nintendo and now Twitter.

This one will pass like the rest of them I’m sure. Twaddle.

Nic

My, we love an Internet phenomenon

This is all rather old news now and it’s only 5 days old...

Anyway, if you’ve not been on the planet since Saturday, you won’t know that a 40 something single woman from deepest, darkest  Scotland called Susan Boyle appeared on UK show Britain’s got Talent’ at the weekend.

And much to the judges and audience surprise she pulled off the performance of a lifetime. Take a look at the video if you haven't already seen it, it's worth watching right to the end.

Her 15 minutes of fame beckon, and boy she deserves it after an emotional and performance for the true underdog, 'battler' to use the local parlance.

It’s the speed at which the Susan Boyle story has erupted that is interesting to us, and shows how news – good or bad can spread in an instant online. Susan has to date:

- 20m views on You Tube, traffic to the ITV website that broadcast the show has risen 300% since it aired.

- Had interviews with the BBC, ITV, Fox America, CNN, CBS. And an invite to appear on Oprah.

- Has a fan website at www.susan-boyle.com, which is already serving advertising. Oh and it had the small matter of 500,000 page views on Wednesday alone.

- T-shirts and badges being sold on eBay “I might be ugly, but I can sing like Susan Boyle”. Pleasant stuff.

- Demi Moore "oh it was so emotional"... and millions of other tweeters talking about her on Twitter. Her name is being mentioned in approximately 30 tweets a minute this morning, that’ll be 43,000 today alone. A Twitter account in her name is underway too, not that she'll be behind it.

In a marketing sense, it shows what we already know – that social and digital media, with the help of broadcast can bring tens of millions of eyeballs to rich content in an instant.

Cheers

Nic

Smartphones changing the game

If you didn't think Smartphones (led by the iPhone, but soon followed by Android and Blackberry) were changing business then think again. And it is applications that is the real game changer.

There are now over 30m iPhones in use across the world, and over 25,000 applications available to download, a mere 18 months since launch. Developers across the world are spying big income if they can get the product right... As an example, I have a free GPS store locater app for a Canadian coffee chain (Tim Hortons), and on that app the developer is advertising the same app for Starbucks (works across the world). He’s selling that for $1 so it won’t take him long to earn some big dollars there. 

The iPhone has seemingly has its sights firmly set on the handheld gaming market, with new gaming titles being introduced by the day. Over 60% of the top 100 applications are games, and this is bound to rise as software companies rush to create iphone versions from traditional gaming platforms. iPhone sales are far outweighing sales of handheld devices DS and PSP so it is inevitable that it has quickly become a major player. Nintendo and Sony have recently opened up their platform to game operators in a direct response to the iPhone threat... 

The long running battle about music, copyright and digital is old news but smartphone applications could change the game again. US band - The Presidents of the USA have created an app for $3 that has 4 of their albums on it (4 albums, $3!). Users can download the app and enjoy the albums and access new unheard content from the band. If you want to buy a song and add it to another MP3 player you can do so. Incidentally, they give Apple 30%, which is the same deal as selling through iTunes.

Pink has recently launched a free app with previews from her upcoming album, and Snow Patrol, Nine Inch Nails are reported to be doing the same thing. Users will then be directed back to the iTunes music store to buy – winner. 

The beauty of the app route is that the band can update users with new content so they have a totally captive audience for the next album/tour/promotion/whatever. The next stage of course, is for users pay top dollar for brand new music, photos and news – straight to their handheld. Interesting developments.

Thanks for reading.

Nic