Filed under: Censorship

I admire this young Alegrian rapper who is using the internet to defy his country’s censors that seek to stifle political and social discussion, be it through written word, blogs, music, or any other form of communication.

Rabah Donquishoot is a 30ish singer whose band  MBS (’Le Micro Brise le Silence’ – ‘The Microphone Breaks the Silence’) has played a role in political music conferences.  He’s also put out three solo albums.  

Based in Barcelona, he writes of the trials and tribulations of Alergian youth.  Alegerian is just one of many countries that uses its state powers to control thought.

No Comments » Posted on July 1st, 2008 by Jonathan Trenn

Filed under: Ad Budgets, Ad Buys, Ad Sales, Online Advertising, Online Video, Search Engine Marketing, Social Meda, search

Jupiter Research is reporting that online ad spending should grow about 20% this year from $19.9 billion in 2007 to $23.8 billion for 2008.

By 2013, it will increase to $43.4 billion, for an annual rate of 13%.  Offline advertising is expected to grow only 4% per year for the same period.

I never know how they come up with these numbers.  But they may well be right.

It’s my guess that search, video, and sponsored communities will see the greatest growth.  Search and video are what everyone says, but my guess is that with social media growing the way it is, we’ll see sponsored, semi-private networks emerged, composed of fans or product users.

This, of course, is happening now.  It will catch on as many of us transfer more and more of our lifestyle online.

No Comments » Posted on July 1st, 2008 by Jonathan Trenn

Filed under: Abraham Harrison LLC, Google, Robert Scoble, Twitter

Twitter’s become one of my favorite places to hang out when I’m online. But it’s become an increasingly frustrating place to be as there’s always something the matter with it. Part of it is down, the whole thing is down. Whatever.

This will eventually lead to a discussion as to whether Twitter will be able to maintain itself overtime or if it’s technical issues will cause enough problems for the service that it never creates the sense of critical mass that it may need to take it to the next level.

Scoble has a interesting take on Twitter’s viability. He says that the company’s lack of having a business model is unimportant at this point. In fact, he’s quite strong in his opinion.

In it he compares Twitter to Google of the late 1990’s. Google integrated itself into our lives and now is dominating the Internet.But I disagree. While I think that Twitter will be able to sustain itself, there are several differences between Google then and Twitter now.

No barrier to entry
All one has to do is head to google.com, plug in a term, and you’d get results. Click through and you were on your way. With Twitter, you have to sign up. And it can take weeks to figure out what it’s about. How to grow.

Amount of users
Googles users (or at least user sessions) went from thousands to millions to billions practically overnight. Twitter has less than 1,000,000 registered users.

User experience
In addition to the “in and out” aspect of Google, Google’s service is hardly ever down. Not so with Twitter. I’m starting to think that upside down birds and whales are my new best friends on Twitter. It’s happening to often and it may affect user loyalty.

Life integration
As much as the Internet was used by people in 1998-9, today it is that much more. The internet is no longer an essential tool, it’s part of people’s lifestyle. Twitter is one of may aspects of that and people will look to other similar services if it’s faltering, because…

Patience
may be a virtue, but its not as common as it used to be.

No Comments » Posted on July 1st, 2008 by Jonathan Trenn


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