After failing in their US$47.5-billion bid for Yahoo, the giant Microsoft is looking more closely at Facebook. While the Wall Street Journal reported that Microsoft bankers have begun to look into a Facebook purchase, neither side has commented on the story (a sure sign that something is afoot).

Facebook in itself is a giant… one that could make Yahoo blush one day. With more than 70 million active users its value was pegged at US$15-billion last October when Microsoft bought a minority stake for a mere US$240-million.

What makes Facebook an even greater value than its investment price a mere 8 months ago is its growing popularity – and growing platform. There are only 7 websites on the planet that receive more monthly traffic than Facebook – and Facebook only opened to the public 18 months ago after starting as a college only niche. Of the sites that get more traffic (Yahoo is 1st, Google 2nd, YouTube is 3rd), Microsoft’s flagship portal sits in fifth (according to the industry benchmark, Alexa.com). Its viral power is far stronger than MySpace (notwithstanding the music scene), and its growing at a faster clip. I don’t know of anyone that uses MySpace, and yet virtually everyone I know under the age of 45 has a Facebook account. According to ZincResearch.com, 90% of Canadians between the ages of 18 and 34 are Facebook members (9 million).

Of perhaps greater interest is the ever-expanding “Facebook Platform” and its potential as a platform service inside the corporation (for example, intranet platform). Facebook Platform is the place where all of those creative nerds build and add those cute little applications that are optional add ons to your Facebook profile. Popular applications include “Fun Wall” (2.5 million active users), “Scrabulous” and that dam vampire biting ‘game’.

All of these are nice, viral tools with little or no business value (more than 23,000 have been created in one short year of existence), but the platform has the opportunity to be expanded to host “intranet” type functionality and collaboration tools. Create an invite-only Facebook site, sprinkle in some applications and voila – you have the semblance of a corporate intranet. Of course, I said “semblance.”

According to Facebook, some 1000 business applications have been created. One application, Feedheads, allows the users to “share the feed items you like with your different friends and networks while also displaying your shared items on your profile.” It also works with Google Reader and NewsGator. So, in other words, think of the collaborative calendar offered by Lotus Notes (or Outlook) where the user can see the schedules of others. Feedheads allows you to see a lot more than their schedule depending on what that user or colleague wants to share (e.g. interesting articles, reports on the competition, meeting reminders, etc.).

Notwithstanding the security challenges of a hosted platform, and those security holes that Facebook has worked feverishly to close (or prevent), the Platform is not a real substitute for the intranet which must feature among other things, federated search, application integration, robust security, etc. (At Prescient Digital Media we’re using it as a networking tool -- feel free to join us on the Facebook community Intranet Global Forum).

“The problem for any business considering Facebook is that it’s a determinedly consumer play, to the extent that I don’t think it can ever seriously fly in the enterprise,” says analyst and ZDnet writer Phil Wainewright. “Facebook trades free functionality in return for attention and relationship data — and users give up a lot of their control over that data. Businesses aren’t willing to make that trade-off.

Google is far ahead of Facebook in this respect with the Google App Engine (Google Gadgets), and already has made impressive inroads in the enterprise software business with the Google Mini and Google Enterprise Search. And now you can see why Microsoft is particularly interested in Facebook (more than just acquiring those eyeballs).

The Facebook Platform is not a legitimate enterprise or intranet platform… yet. But it’s only a year old and continuing to evolve; don’t think for a second that Facebook’s management isn’t looking at your business and the revenue potential of becoming the host of collaborative employee applications – or the entire intranet. Microsoft knows it too, and wants a bigger slice of that multi-billion dollar pie.

Have you noticed a lack of formal grammar or punctuation in your kids’ homework? How about in correspondence with friends?

Informal communications and writing styles adopted in text messages, email, and new social media tools like blogs have begun to creep into the world of print.

A new study by Pew Internet reveals that nearly two-thirds of surveyed students (700) say their Web communications style sometimes bleeds into school assignments.

Roughly 50% admit to omitting proper punctuation and capitalization, and, shockingly, a quarter of them admit to using emoticons such as smiley faces.

“The state of writing among teens today is marked by an interesting paradox: While teens are heavily embedded in a tech-rich world and craft a significant amount of electronic text, they see a fundamental distinction between their electronic social communications and the more formal writing they do for school or for personal reasons,” says the reports authors.

I’ve been saying for about 8 years that the Internet would spawn a writing revolution. I must admit however that I didn’t forsee a possible re-writing of our English language :) LOL! IMO!

Continue reading "Print content resembling lazy web content" »

I have a profound respect for charities with great vision and execution. However, I possess a monstrous disdain for those that manipulate the disadvantaged, use them as a platform to further their own personal goals, and take for granted, or even abuse their patrons.

When I heard about One Laptop Per Child (OLPC), I immediately stepped-up and supported it. I immediately wrote about and promoted the campaign to encourage the world to buy one of their computers, so that a like computer could be donated to a child or classroom in a third world country.

In fact, the Internet and its denizen of bloggers have helped turn this charity into a massive darling that has received heaps of wonderful, international praise. I encouraged friends, colleagues and readers to support it, and instructed my company, Prescient Digital Media, to spend thousands of dollars on the program.

In fact, we were a relatively early contributor during the Christmas campaign of 2007. At the time, OLPC promised the delivery of their computers before Christmas. Four months later, and five months after they took our money, no computers have been delivered.

Continue reading "One Laptop Per Child abuses donors" »

Wow, now I've seen it all. The IRS has several video spots on YouTube talking about the rebates that are coming our way. I only hope the videos didn't cost $93,421 each to produce, thereby taking yet another bite out of my check.

Just goes to show how mainstream YouTube has become. My daughter has some videos she created melding photos, lyrics, and songs of bands like Boys Like Girls. A couple of hers have more than 9,000 page views.

I'm hoping the videos we are putting up there from Colgate do that well. And I can only hope the videos do better than IRS videos.

Check out one of the IRS vids here.

As part of an initiative for “transforming the Starbucks customer experience” the Seattle coffee maker has launched a new, social website for customers. MyStarbucksIdea.com is part of a greater strategic thrust for bettering their coffee business and engaging their customers.

The site actively engages customers for their ideas on improving Starbucks, allows customers to vote on and comment on the ideas, and serves as a vehicle for implementing those ideas at Starbucks coffee houses:

“What’s your Starbucks Idea? Revolutionary or simple—we want to hear it. Share your ideas, tell us what you think of other people’s ideas and join the discussion. We’re here, and we’re ready to make ideas happen. Let’s get started.”

My first reaction to learning about this new site: how bloody patronizing and pretentious! Who do they think they are, The Body Shop? Why not just launch a new website dedicated to “Going Green” in an effort to convince me that the millions of disposable cups they add to the landfills of the world somehow actually benefit our forests and drinking water (errr, coffee)?

Continue reading "MyStarbucksIdea.com – patronizing content… or really good idea?" »

My recent article Web 2.0 fails the grade, according to executives, republished on www.Ragan.com (membership required) drew a string of visceral responses. Most couldn’t agree more with my assertion that “Web 2.0 does not deliver the ROI, does not live up the hype, and is not even close to being a top priority for senior management (not all, but most).”

Supporting my assertion is a recent CIO study, Top Technology Priorities for 2008, that reveals that even techies don’t consider Web 2.0 as a priority. A couple of people disagree including a colleague of mine, Shel Holtz, who points to contrary research from CIO and Forrester.

Research is a big business. And there are so many forms and so many formats that it is in fact quite easy to develop a research study that produces just about whatever results you want. Genuine researchers, and there are many, will wince at the suggestion and leap to defend their industry and practices. They are right most of th time and their defense is well-based as most studies are astutely conducted with no smoke and mirrors, but understanding the research source, type and sample or target audience is the most critical part to understanding the study and its conclusions.

Continue reading "Can I really believe that research?" »

Known for its glitzy TV ads with star power (though they haven’t done much for Michael Jackson nor Britney Spear’s career) Pepsi-Cola is launching their new beverage line without traditional media.

Pepsi-Cola North America will market its new no-calorie, carbonated drinks named Tava without TV, newspaper and magazine advertising. New age drinks such as Brazilian Samba and Tahitian Tamure will rely on the web and free samples to create a ‘buzz’. Tava’s marketing is mostly contained to its website (www.Tava.com), banner ads, and free samples to movers and shakers at MTV and other ‘hot’ organizations crawling with mavens of cool.

Continue reading "Pepsi “Tava” fails initial web test" »

Very interesting to see that iTunes is now the second largest retailer of music in the country. Only the big box Wal-Mart sells more, and iTunes is expected to eclipse it later this year.

What a juggernaut. Who would have thought that Apple would be such a dominant force in a relatively short period of time.

This info, from market research company NPD Group, includes this tidbit: 48 percent of teens didn't buy a single compact disc last year, up from 38 percent the year before. The company also notes that a million people stopped buying CDs in 2007.

Talk about a favorable trend for iTunes and a not so favorable trend for music retailers.

Do you still buy CDs? The last one I bought was The Rising by Springsteen. I bought Magic, though, his latest, on iTunes and now have The Boss fully represented on my iPod nano.

Just makes so much more sense to use the iPod as my music source, especially since I bought an Altec Lansing dock, which I love. Great sound, recharges my iPod, five-hour battery, and an FM tuner, to boot.

So I read that Bill Gates, yes that Bill Gates, has joined LinkedIn. I jump on and hunt for Mr. Microsoft only to find a question that he posed but, alas, I can't access his profile. It seems he employed the privacy setting that limits his profile to folks who share a connection with him. That's not me, aparently; I'm obviously not connecting with the right people.

His question -- How can we do more to encourage young people to pursue careers in science and technology? -- spurred more than 3,000 replies. And it has helped LinkedIn advertise the fact that it will be offering its users ways to update their status through a new tool it's developed.

The whole idea of "status" is an interesting one.

Continue reading "Bill, where are you?" »

It is said that our ability to create Web content vastly outstrips our ability to digest it. Consistency in how content is structured, catalogued and managed is consistently inconsistent, to say the least. The problem also persists in the world of digital signage.

Digital signs are the electronic or digital signs that you find in elevators, in lobby kiosks, or even the billboards in Time Square. It is believed that China already has more than 100,000 of these digital signs.

Cisco® today announced the development of a new qualification program for those creating content for digital signage. The Cisco Academy of Digital Signage (ADS) will offer a specialized curriculum focusing on the three vital areas of digital signage:

• content creation
• content management
• content distribution

Continue reading "Content is the focus of new Academy of Digital Signage" »