This tickled my funny bone when I read it.
via @LilPecan
Don’t hate the regurgitation
One of the constant complaints you will hear about blogging, especially within the tech world, is that we are constantly repeating .. and repeating .. and repeating .. the same old stories that first get published by the top tier blogs. To be clear this doesn’t include things like splogs and scrapers since those can’t be classified as blogs of any value the charge to a very large degree is justified.
It’s also a charge that the mainstream media likes to lord over us lowly bloggers. Ya, like we don’t know that they all use Associated Press or Reuters sanitized articles to fill out the blank spaces thereby justifying their advertising rates. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.
As irritating as this constant regurgitation of the same news is, there is really no escaping it. After all, consider the incredible amount of information a typical blogger takes in during the course of a day (and it only increases the further up the food chain they go). Myself, I currently have close to 300 RSS feeds I monitor in a day of which I would estimate that some 70% of those feeds update multiple times a day.
This might seem like a lot, but I know of bloggers who would consider that just scratching the surface of what they read. Now toss in Twitter streams, Google Reader Shared Items, Facebook pages and God knows how many other incidental sources of information. All this has to be processed at some level and decisions made about what to write something on plus the fact that we have to make sure that it is current and interesting.
Shades of Beacon – Facebook on dangerous ground
I just saw this come through from the team over at The Next Web. It appears that Facebook might have figured out it’s next avenue to increase their advertising revenue.
Your web history.
Alex Wilhelm puts it this way:
Facebook wants to improve their advertising targeting, but needs more information to do so. Where will this new information come from? Your web history.
[....]
This week, at Facebook’s F8 developer event, Facebook is expected to roll out a new advertising system and series of social buttons. These buttons will mimic Twitter and Digg buttons that are ubiquitous online.
Users can click the Facebook button while off-Facebook, signaling the giant with new information about their preferences that will then be fed into algorithms for advanced, and dead-on, advert targeting. More and better information will allow Facebook to boost its CPM and CPC rates significantly.
Regardless of whether Alex thinks that this could be done well I’m more inclined to go with his point that this could land Facebook in court if not done right
From what we understand, Facebook will note when a user makes an action on a third-party website, and use that information. That makes the collection of data very active, not passive. If instead Facebook sets up the buttons to note any logged in Facebook user, and save that data hit without alerting them, we are going to see class-action lawsuits.
If history is any indicator I wouldn’t trust Facebook further than I can spit in a headwind and wouldn’t be surprised if they go with the second option and risk the lawsuits.
Well Facebook I have just gotten one step closer to deleting my account.
Anyone else?
You just had to know this kind of crap was coming
One of the more interesting arguments I have heard lately comes from Charles Arthur at the Guardian where he suggests that the closed system typified by Apple and its recently released iPad is the way that the web should be going. His reasoning of course is because of all the badness that the openness of the Windows platform has caused us.
In short, closed proprietary systems are good. Open inexpensive systems are bad. The iPad is the answer to our security concerns. Windows is to blame for everything that is going wrong (never mind the people using it).
WTF?
Look I agree that Windows has been a major weakness with web security but that has to be looked at with the understanding that the Windows platform has the largest user base in the world. Anything with the kind of attention that Windows has is bound to be attacked.
But to suggest that we should all give up the openness that comes with that platform in favor of using computers and other electronic gadgets from Apple just because it is ruled with an iron fist is … well .. brain dead and to suggest it as a viable alternative is just plain stupid.
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