Saturday, February 26, 2005

2WW: "They were aware of podcasting before they read about it in the Times, the news was carried first by the blogging network, so they get to see a very clear A-B, they know what actually happened, and now they see how the reporters twist it up. They have the insiders' view that till now you had to be an insider to have." 

SJ Merc: "The Sports Podcast Network is among the first of what will likely be a plethora of networks that sprout up as podcasting gains popularity and entrepreneurs seek out business opportunities." 

Michael Gorman: "The piece was intended to be satirical, though I am certainly no fan of 'blogs,' having an old fashioned belief that, if one wishes to air one's views and be taken seriously, one should go through the publishing/editing process." Via Ed Cone. 

Another announcement I missed, Scoble and Israel have their book deal. The Red Couch will be published by Wiley. Can't wait to read it.  

John Battelle says AutoLink is just another feature, if you don't like it don't use it. Methinks perhaps John hasn't grokked the fullness of it. I can't not use it John. Google didn't give me, an author and publisher, the option to opt-out. Further, I want opt-in to be the rule, like Google ads; or even better, go back to the drawing board and figure out what they really are trying to accomplish, assuming it isn't as insidious as it appears.  

Battelle also has a pointer to an interesting article about Google in GQ. I didn't know that Bill Campbell got involved in Google management. 

Jonas Maurus: "Imagine a gay-community page linked to Pat Robertson... and the author wouldn't even know that his users see this." 

Sean McGrath: "In an ideal world I would put the following people into a room full of white boards and feed them coffee. Their task -- sort out the terminology guys!" 

iPodderSP is "the podcasting client for SmartPhones." 

Dan Gillmor meets with Google 

Dan Gillmor: "I have trouble with Search Engine Watch's Danny Sullivan's view that publishers of Web sites should be able to opt out of the toolbar changes. In theory, once I have content on my desktop it should be my right to 'remix' it in the way I choose."

I go a step further, authors and publishers should have to opt in, as we do for Google ads. I only put their ads on two of my pages, out of god knows how many. I'd be willing to try this feature out with my content, provided: 1. There was a financial incentive for me (this as advertising) and 2. I have control over which pages its on.

A question for Dan, suppose Google had the power to put ads on every page of yours, but didn't offer to pay you for it, and further it was hard to tell what was advertising and what was editorial. What happened to your ability to communicate with people who read your site? Never mind right and wrong, for a minute, or whether Google is good or evil, how do you communicate with any kind of integrity in that environment?

And as I asked in my essay, what happens when Google isn't satisfied to add links to our sites, suppose they were to change the actual words? I haven't heard Google say they would never do that, have you?

Marissa is saying something very important when she says she's providing features for users. She's telling you that Google doesn't see authors and publishers as a constituency they need to be concerned about. You're not even a third party, it may be your content they came to read, but only Google and the user matter. (And I suspect users don't really matter, except to the extent that Google can sell their attention to advertisers.)

I thought Danny's hypothetical question was right on the money. What if a larger company, say Microsoft, without asking for permission, offered Google searches to its users without Google's ads, or even better, with more informative ads, chosen by Microsoft? I assume Google would think this is okay because hey, it's the user's content to remix as he or she wants to, right?