Happy New Year!

Social Media Case Study

This Sphinn thread is a case study in social media...with lots of brilliant analysis / advice in it from SugarRae, John Andrews, and Fantomaster.

Microsoft Search = Tragic Fail

Danny Sullivan wrote in depth about why Microsoft Search has failed to take off. Not good for them considering mounting competition on the browser and OS fronts.

Search Police Disclaimer

Google, which invests millions into public relations and quirky attention-grabbing marketing, does not like people manipulating social media with artificial votes. And yet Google spends millions a year on public relations. How can one invest heavily in manipulating the press and then say manipulating social media is bad?

The Ultimate Salesman

The Industry Standard put together about a decade worth of Steve Jobs video clips. I wish I was 1% of the salesman that Steve Jobs is!!!

Ad Rates to Fall?

In 2006 Jakob Nielson wrote "Over the last several years, Yahoo! has made between 0.2 and 0.4 cents per non-search pageview. However, I believe that Internet advertising is over-hyped and that advertisers are deluding themselves into overpaying. In the long term, non-search advertising's value will drop to 0.1 cents or less per page."

If prices drop too low this year could be a great time to buy exposure to build links and an audience. There is always opportunity in the market...you just have to position yourself to take advantage of it.

Society as a Ponzi Scheme?

Tim O'Reilly offers this great quote "just maybe, we are getting the first signs that our society as a whole (and not just our financial system) is a kind of gigantic Ponzi scheme that will one day run out of room for growth, with disastrous consequences."

The U.S. is in a world of hurt, and that is putting a squeeze on China - reversing the flow of farmers to the cities back to the farms. Our leading export is debt, and some countries may be willing to take a loss on it. A Japanese credit rating agency is suggesting that Japan should write off some of its US debt!

The dollar may lose as much as 40 percent of its value to 50 yen or 60 yen from the current spot rate of 90.40 today in Tokyo unless Japan takes “drastic measures” to help bail out the U.S. economy, Mikuni said. Treasury yields, which are near record lows, may fall further without debt relief, making it difficult for the U.S. to borrow elsewhere, Mikuni said.

“It’s difficult for the U.S. to borrow its way out of this problem,” Mikuni, 69, said in an interview with Bloomberg Television broadcast today. “Japan can help by extending debt cancellations.”

The US stock market went up 3% today, but I think anything based in US Dollars is a bit scary after reading the above quote. What exactly is backing the dollar if those holding federal debt consider writing it down? How many more companies and industries can the US government bail out?

Paul Kedrosky offers his scenarios for the economy in 2009. What do you think will happen? What are you investing in and planning for this year?