Having the title Ex-Googler is probably a good thing if you’re in the startup business. Twitter, after all, is run by ex-Googlers. That credibility worked the old hype machine for Cuil, too, until it couldn’t perform. Bindu Reddy and Arvind Sundararajan, ex-Googlers, suggest it’s a bad idea to take on Google where Google is strong—like Cuil did with search—but taking it to Google where it is weak can work.

And so they’ve fairly quietly launched Likaholix in private beta.

Likaholix is a recommendation site where people can, very simply, makes lists of stuff they like. Products, businesses, websites, people, music, movies, whatever. In order to “like” something, a person can enter a link or search for it, and the search engine there will bring back sites, photos, videos, product reviews, etc., regarding the subject, and the person can choose things to add to the file they create for their liked thing, along with their own commentary.

Our ex-Googlers have been smart to make this a standalone, closed off service, and have made it very social, very interoperable with other sites. Users can invite friends from their email contacts and social networking lists, they can share their likes with Facebook, Twitter, and FriendFeed, and they can also import 4 and 5 star reviews from sites like Amazon and Yelp.

What Bindu and Arvind have created here essentially is a user-generated walled garden. And that may be very exciting for people. In the same way Google rolled out Gmail, Likaholix is in private beta and will rely on invites for a while for testing.

Jennifer

There’s a fascinating article at Mashable by Jennifer Van Grove (hot) :) exploring why Googlers like Bindu and Arvind are leaving the company and starting their own sites. The most interesting takeaways:

1. Google’s too big, rigid and slow for good ideas outside of their core to get traction. That’s why creative, innovative Googlers leave.

2. Search is a bad idea if you want to threaten Google. (Right, Microsoft?) Google is weakest, because of number one, in the social and real time search arenas.

3. Bindu Reddy says Facebook and Twitter, not Microsoft or Yahoo, are Google’s biggest threats.

The new gold rush is on! Developing and selling i-Phone apps is turning into a multi-million dollar business that just about anyone with a little computer knowledge and desire can break into.

Have you heard the story of the 9 year old boy Lim Ding Wen from Singapore who created an iPhone drawing game call Doodle Kids has racked up to more than 4000 uploads in just two weeks. That’s about $4000 in a weeks time, not a bad paycheck at all.

Doodle Kids which he wrote for his sister, who loves to draw, lets the player sketch with their finger on the i-Phone screen and shake it, Etch-A-Sketch-style, to clear, has already racked up a healthy three-and-a-half star rating on the App Store.
So what does this news mean to you?

The mobile phone app gold rush is on - and if you’re quick, you can get a massive
piece of it for yourself!

See, there are so many other overnight-success stories turning up in every corner of the web - and you could be next! Just imagine the possibilities…

Imagine how it would feel to develop the Ocarina app, which recently passed 400,000 customers… and put over a quarter of a million dollars in the seller’s pocket!
Or imagine yourself selling the i-Fart mobile, which sat on the top of the sales charts and pulled in $27,249 in a single day!

Imagine if you created the WeatherEye app, which racked up 150,000 downloads fast!

Ethan Nicholas who recently quit his job so he could spend all his time developing i-Phone apps. Ethan makes more in a day or two than the average U.S. household makes in an entire year!

Pretty staggering right? And get this: The mobile phone apps business is exploding right now because it’s just getting started! And that means you’re in a great position to create a massive financial windfall for yourself if you jump on this opportunity fast…

How to get started: Sign up for a free development account at the iPhone Dev Center There are some great videos at the development center that will help you get started developing your apps in no time,and make money online selling iphone apps !

Suppose that, just in order to get an idea of how much money you're making, you had to look up an ever-changing conversion rate and multiply a pair of numbers on a daily basis. Well, overseas AdSense publishers (including me) have been doing this for some time, but thanks to a new move on Google's part, the process is getting much simpler.

Publishers in Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, France, and Spain can now view their AdSense reports in euros after just agreeing to a new set of terms and conditions. Their prior payment histories will still be available in dollars, too, which should alleviate concerns about records matching not up.

And Elodie Bodet outlined one other benefit on the Google AdSense Blog, writing, "With earnings converted daily, you'll avoid the risk of currency exchange fluctuations between USD and the Euro."

This is pretty big news for affected individuals, and may help Google's reputation internationally. Responses to Darren Rowse's post on the subject are mostly positive, for example, and sources in Germany and France are already relaying the story.

The one thing that remains unclear is what will happen from here. Bodet gave no clues, only stating, "If we're able to offer this to publishers in other countries,i we'll provide details here on Inside AdSense."

Making Customers Aware of Your Presence

Researching this article, right off the bat it was pretty evident that many businesses around here (and I suspect most places) are slow to adopt social media marketing practices for their businesses. And if they are adopting them, there are some key elements missing. For example, many of the businesses I found on Twitter (through TwellowHood - a great way to find Twitterers by geographic location),i did not find any for my country Bosniaor they do not have any indication of their social media presences on their sites. If they do, they are not clearly visible. One thing to keep in mind is that people still go to company websites, so if you are looking for any kind of following or customer engagement via social media, it helps if they know where to go. I will use some towns like an example here.

One site that does do this well, however is a local radio station WUKY, which airs NPR broadcasts. You will find a section on the site's homepage that looks like this:

The size of this section might be a little overkill for some web designs, but it clearly points to where it wants you to go, and that is the main purpose. Basically what you want to take away from this is that they are prominently listing the social networks with which customers/fans can interact with them, and they do so by using recognizable logos that stand out. Someone going to this page wondering if they can follow WUKY on Twitter or if the station has a Facebook page has their answers quickly when they notice the familiar logos.

You can still make your social presence clear without logos. For example, Liquor Barn a chain with locations throughout the state, has a simple link to its Twitter page, but it is listed within the site's main navigation column, just under a link to the company blog.

How Businesses are Using Twitter

The greatest thing about Twitter as a marketing tool is that it is 100% opt-in, and your messages are clearly targeted toward interested parties. For example, when I choose to follow Liquor Barn's tweets, it's because I am interested in what promotions, new items, etc. the stores are offering.

Let's not forget about the human element, which applies not only to Twitter, but to social networks in general. This is what social media marketing enthusiasts have been saying for quite some time, but conversation and participation is very important. People like businesses when they feel like they know the people behind them. Talk about real stuff from time to time.

One way businesses can incorporate the human element into their Twitter lives is to organize or simply attend "Tweetups." This is where you get together with fellow Twitterers and meet in person. While I have personally never participated in one, I hear some of them turn into pretty fun parties. A local photographer Shaun Ring talks about attending a recent Tweetup on his blog. " I’ve been to my fair share of social events, but this might just have felt the most natural. Authentic. Relevant," he says. "If you’re not on Twitter yet, you might want to give it a shot. I met a ton of cool like-minded people tonight that I wouldn’t have met otherwise using Facebook (which I still love, btw)."

How Businesses are Using Facebook

Businesses have a variety of options when it comes to Facebook. There is much more breathing room for content than with the 140 character limit of a Tweet. If you set up a business page you can include photos, videos event listings, etc. A local Holiday Inn Express shows product photos as well as photos of the actual location:

A video section would be nice as another local business - Zoombug Photos, includes (although having more than one video could make it more interesting):

Lexington KY Punk and Hardcore Shows has event listings (again, more than one would be more useful, but you get the idea):

Businesses don't necessarily have to rely on business pages though. Papa John's Lexington for example has a regular Facebook profile. The profile is not great for customers looking for location/contact info, but it has 329 friends, so perhaps there is something to be said for that. That's not too shabby for just the Lexington-based incarnation of a national Pizza chain. Using the regular profile, again injects some of that human element.

For a more in-depth case study at how one local business has benefited simply from Facebook discussion, check out Jason Miller’s article on Al’s Bar .

How Businesses are Using YouTube

When it comes to using video in social media, the most obvious choice is YouTube. One aspect of this that is not mentioned enough is the inclusion of the "add to iGoogle" button on YouTube Channels. How many people do you think have iGoogle set as their homepage? I don't have a number for you, but I can pretty much guarantee that it is a lot. If you set up a YouTube channel for your business, that feature alone can open up the opportunity for you to get your videos right on customers' homepages - the first page they see when they open their browser.

I'm not going to get into all of the possibilities for what to include in your videos, but the local Ronald McDonald House has a good idea with a "YouTube Testimonials" link on its homepage, linking to its YouTube channel.

By All Means, Don't Stop With These

The options are certainly not limited to the social networks discussed in this article. These are some of the most popular ones, and I think you can use ideas touched upon here and integrate them with other networks. I will however also mention MySpace, because despite the media's love affair with the above-mentioned services, there are still a lot of people using MySpace.Its features like bulletins and blogs can be great for keeping interested customers up to date. Please feel free to discuss ways to use any of the networks mentioned in this article, or others that were not mentioned, to enhance your marketing efforts.

Google Analytics

Today Google announced a new online course that will help interested parties prepare to get a Google Analytics certification. It costs $50 to take the test to get certified, but to me the more interesting part is the course itself.

You're looking at step-by-step visual walkthroughs of every feature that Google Analytics has to offer, and while taking the test costs a little money, the course itself is free.

Web analytics are extremely important to the success of any online business, and knowing your tools inside out will only help you act upon your findings better. With this course, you can go straight to any section you're a little hazy on or just go through the whole thing. You're bound to come out more knowledgeable afterward. Let's take a look at what the lessons cover:

The First Steps

- Introduction to Google Analytics
- Interface Navigation
- Installing the Google Analytics Tracking Code

Interpreting Reports

- Guidelines
- Pageviews, Visits, and Visitors
- Time Metrics
- Traffic sources
- Content Reports

Fundamentals

- Profiles in Google Analytics
- Campaign Tracking and AdWords Integration
- Analysis Focus - AdWords
- Goals in Google Analytics
- Analysis Focus - Funnel Visualization
- Filters in Google Analytics
- Regex and Google Analytics
- Cookies and Google Analytics
- eCommerce Tracking
- Analysis Focus - Revenue Metrics
- Domains and Subdomains

In-Depth Analysis

- Custom Reporting
- Advanced segmentation
- Motion Charts
- Internal Site Search
- Event Tracking and Virutal Pageviews
- The Custom Visior Segment Variable
- Additional Customizations

That's quite a bit of ground to cover, but ground that you will find more solid in terms of feeling comfortable in your web analytics skills, once you clear it. If you are looking to provide consulting to others, it probably wouldn't hurt to go after the certification either just so you have some credentials. You just need a 75% on the test to pass.

If you don't plan to do any consulting, the worst thing that happens is you get a lot smarter in your know-how of Google Analytics, and that can't be a bad thing either.Or can be? :P

In a heated bidding war, ToysRUs bought the domain name Toys.com at auction for $5.1 million. ToysRus

really wanted the domain, for obvious reasons. Everyone except ToysRUs and domain holding company National A-1 (owner of domains such as free.com, boys.com, girls.com, and divorce.com) bowed out of the auction at $3 million. The last $2 million was just those two companies going back and forth for hours.

ToysRUs really didn’t have much choice. If it wants to be the first thing people associate with toys it really couldn’t afford to allow anyone else to own that domain, even in this economy. Who says real estate is dead?

Microsoft has plans to launch an experimental search site called Viveri sometime this summer, the company announced at its TechFest event.

Viveri will allow researchers to test new concepts and receive public feedback without having to add features to Live Search.

The site will offer Live Search results and is being built using Silverlight, Microsoft's technology for developing online user interfaces.

Microsoft Research software architect, Robert Rounthwaite, expects the site to attract serious technology users because they will be interested in trying out the new search offerings.

"Most people are not going to want to have their lives interrupted by the latest wacky idea we have," Rounthwaite said. "But some people will, and their feedback will help us figure out which ones aren't so wacky."

The goal of Viveri is to offer better search results from vertical search engines. When a user does a search on Viveri they will see a normal list of results. On the right side of the results page they will see a number of boxes appear linking to Web sites related to the search term.

Some of the features being tested on Viveri could eventually make their way onto Live Search depending on how well they work and user feedback.Is it this great? :)

Why Google Deletes Some Blogger Posts,Even Whole Blog's Are Wiped Out

Ryan Spaulding is a music blogger from Boston who runs the blog Ryan's Smashing Life, which is hosted by Google's Blogger. For some reason Blogger has been deleting some of his posts.

This story was unearthed earlier this month in an LA Weekly article that found the same thing happening to a number of Blogger users. Ryan is answered some questions.

GM: First off, can I get a little background on the story in your words?

Ryan Spaulding: Beginning last summer, I slowly began to notice that several older posts were beginning to disappear. This didn’t come to my attention for some time since I wasn’t in the habit of reading old posts except when I pulled down the material. Sometimes I received emails from frustrated readers who were looking for a topic I had written on – only to find the post deleted.

I had no reason to think this was anything other than a software glitch at first. There were no takedown notices or emails in my inbox. Then the instances began stacking up – and I began comparing notices with other bloggers. What was initially a series of seemingly unconnected blog post disappearances – by fall, became the topic of discussion in blogger emails and chat rooms. The change of tactic of the industry and the poor handling of it by blog-host Blogger (Google) was being seen as a conspiracy.

I have come to love blogging and the integration of a myriad of software add-ons to the blog. Like the vast majority of bloggers, I am not paid for my time, creativity or passion. It is because of my passion for this thing that many of us have come to feel betrayed when we learn that the host of our websites is now in the business of deleting our posts without warning! (It’s an issue of respect. Blogger has proven that they do not respect their own users. Despite the merits of our prior good conduct and years of loyal use of their blogging platform and software – we are considered guilty before having a chance to demonstrate our innocence or at the very least have a chance to pull down the offending material.) Yes, it’s an issue of respect.

GM: How many other bloggers have you spoken with that have had similar experiences?

RS: About a dozen or more to start, but since the piece ran in LA Weekly, I have received email from dozens more vocalizing their support.

GM: Can you tell me exactly what the deleted posts consisted of?

RS: The types of posts removed break down into two basic groups:

The Deletion of Unsolicited Promotional Posts: A few of these missing posts were "unapproved" posts on signed bands. This means I promote a band’s project and use an mp3 I had seen given away in other locations on the web, and then wrote lengthy pieces, breaking down the songs into their themes and reviewed them based on merit. All pieces were positive and promotional in nature. I tend to not write negative reviews on music; it runs contrary to the underlying theme of the blog – to support musicians whose work I enjoy. While it hurt to see these posts disappear (why wasn’t I simply contacted to remove the material? ), ultimately I understood the rules about such things.

The Deletion of Solicited Promotional Posts (They Ask Me to Support the Band): What was truly upsetting was the loss of material that was approved by the labels and the bands themselves. Since I do very few Unsolicited Promo pieces, this is the lion’s share of posts that are deleted. This is at the core of the problem: More than a dozen of these at last count – each requiring four hours or more apiece – were deleted out of my account and without warning.

Google chooses it’s bed and makes bloggers lay in It. Blogger/Google had the opportunity to choose its tactic when receiving notices. First of all, they could have delineated between longstanding reputable bloggers and those suspected to be leakers. They chose not to do this. Blogger/Google treats everybody the same (the good and the bad!) –They also could have chose the tactic to notify the bloggers of the demand and let us comply. They chose to not take this tactic either and simply delete the posts. Later, they altered this tactic slightly by going ahead and deleting the post and then, later, sent an email explaining their position. The end result is the same. To illustrate how utterly frustrating this is, I will outline what takes place start-to-finish:

I’m a choosy blogger. Each month, I receive many, many albums – both in the mail and through digital. These are always accompanied by a press release asking to promote the band, their album project and tour. In the case when the bands/music labels/PR houses/publicists ask me to use a specific post when I publish the material then I comply. I use the material they request.

All of these steps serve to make me an authorized agent for the label. [I fully understand that I do not own the material and need to pull it down immediately if ever asked. This is implicitly understood.]

GM: Have you contacted Google about the issue, and if so, what kind of response did you receive?

RS: They never responded. An "opportunity" (in legalese, of course) offered a means to have the post restored – but like most bloggers, I didn’t have the knowledge or time to fight "city hall" on every post. Especially, since Blogger/Google didn’t even take five minutes to send a simple email response. Nothing professional, nothing courteous. Again, the tactic they choose belies their basic lack of respect for their users – which is why I took up the cause. They have a relative monopoly on blog hosting services and rule with an iron fist.

GM: Are you concerned that your blog's reputation might be hurt when people click through to it from other sites, only to find that the content they're looking for has been removed? How has the removal of these posts impacted your blog's traffic?

RS: This is very hard to detect and prove. New people are coming in every day. But if you take a page out of economic studies, the value of "Opportunity Costs" are difficult to measure. If you are a first-time reader and you receive a dead link – you may never return.

GM: Have you detected any loss in readership?

RS: Loyal readers were the ones to actually bring the deletions to my attention. I don’t think I could shake some of these people – they have truly become friends. But as with the prior example, some readers who have not been with the page long – predictably grow irritated at the absence of written material on the page when they repeatedly get dead links. And, they delete their bookmarks and go away.

GM: Did you contact the RIAA? If so, what kind of response did you get from them?

RS: Actually, I firmly believe the majority of the posts weren’t pulled down on RIAA requests – the majority of these came through miscommunication at the label-level. The EU branch of the label doesn’t talk to the US labels. Sometime after the post goes live (with complete approval of the US label) the European branch contacts their legal department when they find the post promoting the band on my site. They choose to not recognize (or simply do not have visibility to the arrangement) and send an email to the IFPI (the British version of the RIAA). This group demands takedown from Blogger/Google.

GG: I was thining that Bloggger is a free independent service that you can write what you think (NOT racisim hate or else)..just plain thoughts,but we all depend from Google....are we?