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News
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Google won't censor site after China hack attack
In a surprising about-face, Google announced in a blog post by chief legal officer David Drummond that it would no longer censor its Google.cn search site after a series of cyber-attacks on Gmail. The attacks were focused on Chinese dissidents and human rights advocates, and Drummond says it resulted in "theft of intellectual property of Google." Drummond said Google would talk with the Chinese government about running an unfiltered, uncensored site in China, or shut it down, if necessary. The reaction to Google's move was swift, with many American politicians, the Obama Administration and human rights groups lauding the search giant for taking a courageous stand for freedom of expression. The Chinese government shot back that it did not censor the Internet, but that companies that did business there had to comply with local laws. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Google's allegations "raise very serious concerns and questions."
So why would Google hastily exit the growing Chinese market? Many observers believe that Google was simply giving up after playing second fiddle to China's own Baidu search site, which has double the share of the Chinese search market. "Google’s market share climbed from 15% in mid-2006 to 31% today," wrote Rebecca Fannin on Silicon Dragon. "But Baidu gained from 47% in mid-2006 to 64%, towering over Google with more than double the search giant's share in China." Fannin says Google had a stake in Baidu and probably should have partnered with it, the same way Yahoo partnered with Alibaba. But others are less cynical about Google's move. Silicon Alley Insider's Henry Blodget says that Google now has more leverage to bring real change in China now that it has a foothold there than if it had boycotted China from the start. "How will the situation resolve itself? The parties will likely bluster for a while, negotiate, and then reach a compromise," Blodget wrote.
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Marketers, text-to-give shine in Haiti disaster
The scene was horrific in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck last Tuesday. Tens of thousands were feared dead and aid was slow in arriving at this already-poor Caribbean country. One bright spot has been the response by marketers to donate money, services and waive fees for others who wanted to help. MediaPost noted that Coca-Cola, GM and ConAgra all made donations to disaster relief, while even PR Newswire waived fees for disaster-related releases through Jan. 17. Perhaps most astonishing is the success of the text-to-donate campaigns by the Red Cross and Wyclef Jean's Yele Haiti foundation, which raised more than $7 million in the first few days after the earthquake. People can donate $10 to the Red Cross by texting "Haiti" to 90999, and donate $5 to Yele Haiti by texting "Yele" to 501501. Cell carriers waived their fees for billing people for those donations, while also not counting those text messages toward service plans. Even credit card companies got into the act by waiving their fees for donations.
The only sour note among marketers was when false memes started spreading on Twitter and other social networks. AdAge reported that a UPS offer for "in-kind services" somehow turned into people thinking they could send UPS packages to Haiti for free. And an American Airlines offer for free miles earned for donations turned into people thinking they could get free flights for making donations. Luckily, American and UPS both responded on social networks to counter the misinformation. Meanwhile, CNN dominated coverage of the disaster on cable TV and online with its iReports from people on the ground in Haiti. The day after the earthquake, CNN's iReport served 1.4 million page views, nearly triple their usual traffic, as some of the earliest images and video from the disaster zone came in through eyewitnesses. Plus, various sites sprung up to help connect loved ones to relatives in Haiti, and publishers provided some of the most trustworthy sites listing ways for people to help.
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paidContent 2010
February 19, 2010
TheTimesCenter, NYC
Join us for a forward-looking discussion on the future of paid content. We will be focusing on the business strategies and models that are working across news, information and entertainment, and hearing from the people behind them as we examine cross-platform approaches to developing diverse revenue streams.
Network with your industry colleagues from largest media companies to the most innovative startups.
Whether you create, distribute, facilitate, service, supply, market or analyze content and digital media, you’ll want to attend.
Register today!
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Mobile Roundup: Apple nabs Quattro; Google's Nexus One
It's a good thing Google honcho Eric Schmidt is no longer on Apple's board, as the two companies have become heated rivals, especially in the mobile space. Google snapped up mobile ad company AdMob last year for $750 million after a bidding war with Apple. Now Apple has responded by buying a similar firm, Quattro Wireless, marking Apple's first move into serving or selling interactive ads. ClickZ's Zachary Rodgers says Quattro could help Apple control data on how mobile users are interacting with iPhone apps, "which in turn could hamper Google's competing smartphone ambitions as it seeks to build an app ecosystem for phones built on its Android platform." Apple reportedly paid $275 million for Quatto, a startup that had raised $28 million in funding, and was bringing in about $50 million in annual revenues, according to the Boston Globe's Scott Kirsner.
Meanwhile, Google unveiled its own mobile phone, the Nexus One, which will be sold directly through Google's website, and was priced at $529 unlocked. While reviews of the Android phone were decent, sales were a disappointing 20,000 in the first week. That compares to 1.6 million units sold of the iPhone 3GS in its first week, 250,000 units sold for the Motorola Droid and 60,000 for the T-Mobile MyTouch, according to BusinessWeek. Google also made waves by testing a new "click-to-call" mobile ad where advertisers would pay for mobile ads depending on how many calls were generated by the ad. ClickZ's Jack Marshall said the ads were a good deal for advertisers because "receiving a lead by phone for the same price as a click is likely to be welcomed by most as pretty good value for the money." Google also released "Near Me Now" functionality on iPhones and Android phones so that you can search reviews of restaurants and bars that are near you -- possibly angering competing app makers such as Yelp and Urbanspoon.
NY Times, CNET, Fox fight fake iPhone apps
The New York Times has two of the most popular paid apps on the iPhone. The only problem is that the Times didn't develop those apps, a third party developer did and is raking in the money without paying the Times. That's the finding of Time's Josh Quittner, who said that "this is more evidence that big publishers can't keep up with how rapidly the world is changing." AdAge reported that unauthorized paid apps ripped content from CNET, Fox News, the BBC and CNN -- and many of those apps were developed by RIV Creations. Fox asked Apple to remove the Fox News app, but Apple has moved slowly to remove many of the unauthorized apps, MediaWeek reported. The app remained, but just changed its branding to remove the Fox name, AllThingsD's Peter Kafka said. Kafka notes that anyone trying to launch a website with NY Times content would be shut down in an instant, and he wonders why publishers have been slow to protect their content on iPhones.
Research
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Gartner: Mobile web will surpass desktop use by '13
Just how important is the mobile web becoming for publishers? Gartner spells out various ways in its "Top Predictions for IT Organizations and Users, 2010 and Beyond." The boldest prediction is that "by 2013, mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common web access device worldwide." Gartner believes that the number of smartphones or phones with web access will surpass 1.82 billion by '13, outnumbering the 1.78 billion PCs. The research firm warns publishers to be sure their sites are optimized for the mobile web or frustrated users will go elsewhere. Along with the growing power of mobile is the growing ability to pay electronically. Gartner says that by 2014, 3 billion adults globally will "be able to conduct transactions via mobile or Internet technology." Plus, by 2015, Gartner believes that context will be as key to mobile services as search engines are to the web. "Context will center on observing patterns, particularly location, presence and social interactions," the report stated.
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Of Note
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 People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people. That social norm is just something that has evolved over time...Doing a privacy change for 350 million users is not the kind of thing that a lot of companies would do. But we viewed that as a really important thing, to always keep a beginner's mind and what would we do if we were starting the company now and we decided that these would be the social norms now and we just went for it.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg
Facebook's Zuckerberg Says The Age of Privacy is Over (ReadWriteWeb)
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