Archive for October, 2006

Wal-Mart blogs revealed to be done by PR firm’s employees

Wal-Mart blogs revealed to be done by PR firm’s employees - Oct. 20, 2006

The blogs Working Families for Wal-mart and subsidiary site Paid Critics are written by three employees of PR firm Edelman, for whom Wal-Mart is a paid client, according to information posted on the sites Thursday.
walmart_store_front.03.jpgBefore Thursday, the authors of the blogs were not disclosed. But Web critics had been skeptical of claims that the blogs were grass-roots efforts, and pushed for greater transparency.

An interesting development to say the least. But did anyone doubt this was not happening? I wonder how many other sites will be found out?

20 October, 2006 | No comments

The online book: team authors, and its never finished

The online book: team authors, and its never finished | csmonitor.com

A cutting-edge online author in New York, Mr. Wark invites perfect strangers to interrupt his ideas with their own scribbling in the digital margins.If they make a good point, Wark amends his book. In the spring, the evolving text will be published on paper, weaving in the Web comments. Then, the author plans the ultimate surrender: Anyone will be allowed into the online version to dabble and delete at will.

Wark may be offering a glimpse into the future, where books - particularly nonfiction - become destinations for discussion rather than dog-eared possessions, and authors take on a more gregarious role akin to Oprah Winfrey or Terry Gross.

Very cool. Sort of wikis on steroids, but will it take hold?

20 October, 2006 | No comments

Words of Wisdom vs. Words From Our Sponsor

Words of Wisdom vs. Words From Our Sponsor - New York Times

A $4 billion-a-year business cannot change fundamentally overnight; the shift from printed to electronic textbook will take years. In the meantime, a small publisher of college textbooks, Freeload Press of St. Paul, seeks to take advantage of this flux with a new concept: providing free e-textbooks to students. The catch? Ads are inserted within the text.

You may need a username and password to access this NYT article, but you should have one anyway My kids talk about Channel 1 all the time, so there is no doubt that given time this model could work.

17 October, 2006 | No comments

A real reporter in a virtual world

A real reporter in a virtual world / Second Life gamers can read ‘news’ of online goings-on

If it all sounds like the third sequel to “The Matrix,” count Pasick among the crowd who was initially taken aback by the prospect of augmenting his laminated press pass with the cartoonish one his character wears in Second Life.

This is just fascinating and shows us just how much the world is changing. Soon virtuial assets might be taxed. Just check out this article to see how the lines are being blured and stakeholder relationships blur as well.

The numbers are just amazing!

From: Second Life Reuters:

For example, in Second Life up to US$500,000 in user-to-user transactions take place every day, and the economy is growing by 10 to 15 percent a month.

17 October, 2006 | No comments

India, IBM Set Out To Build Billion-Person Web Portal

India, IBM Set Out To Build Billion-Person Web Portal - Outsourcing News by InformationWeek

In a country with more than 1 billion people, public infrastructure projects tend to come in two sizes: large and frighteningly large. India’s e-government initiatives are no exception. With help from IBM, the country’s central government last week unveiled ambitious plans to build a Web portal for citizens to access thousands of services, ranging from business permits to housing subsidies and tax advice.

It’s pretty amzing really, I was reading over at a friends page about developments in Africa and have cell phones are making an impact. Technology has evolved to such a point that if we can get around governmental bloackades we can see substantial imrovements in developing countries very quickly. That’s very exciting!

11 October, 2006 | No comments

Mysterious blog scooped media on Foley messages

CNN.com - Mysterious blog scooped media on Foley messages - Oct 4, 2006

One of the more curious angles to emerge from the scandal surrounding Foley is the creation of a little-known Web site called Stop Sex Predators. It was at that site on September 24, four days before ABC News reported Foley’s e-mails with a 16-year-old page, that the Florida congressman’s correspondence first appeared.

As if we didn’t know it already. Blogs are making a serious impact. They provide an easy way to get the message out quickly as well as a way to make a bad impressions (see Courics recent Blog post that got Bill O’Reily going).

5 October, 2006 | No comments