Gearheads: The Sterling Communications Blog

Video and advertising, the new frontier

I'm sure many of you have heard about the growth of video advertising on the Internet or have experienced the ads first hand to your annoyance when watching news and entertainment videos. According to eMarketer, video ads are not going away. In fact, spending by advertisers on online video ads is expected to nearly quadruple by 2011 -- rising to $1.9 billion from $505 million this year. Thanks to YouTube, more people are watching videos online than ever before -- 154.2 million this year, compared with 114.3 million in 2006.

Clean energy, both a technology and a public policy

Interesting article on CNN Money by Todd Woody regarding Google's and GE's involvement in developing green energy technology. I was happy to read that someone finally understands what needs to happen in order for the U.S. to assist with ending the climate change crisis. According to GE's chief Immelt, “Sometimes we think the free market is whatever the price of oil is today. In the end, clean energy is both a technology and a public policy.”

This is how you do it...

Interesting article from IDG's Grant Gross on major ISPs endorsing an "opt-in" approach to Web tracking. This is how a lot privacy issues are going to have to solved, because the technology to track behavior, applications and performance is not going away...

"It's the ROI stupid..."

Google's 10 year anniversary comes at an opportune time and demonstrates to the world that if you follow your dreams, you will attain them regardless of the condition of the market. As Craig Silverstein, Google's technology director and the first employee hired by Page and Brin, says "I think what keeps us humble is realizing how much further we have to go."

Google was founded and survived during what we thought were the most difficult economic times with the dotcom and telecom bust. I personally think Google's success story (and they are not alone) along with eBay and Amazon, demonstrate, that smart companies are the ones that don't stick their heads in the sand, but instead, continue to invest in marketing and follow their vision when the going gets tough.

Is your email safe?

In my last blog post, I wrote about a new technology that I think crosses the line of ethics. I really don’t see how anyone in good faith would need a service like Slydial. However, the technology Ben Worthen covered in his Wall Street Journal Business Technology blog really takes the cake.

I truly cannot believe there are services (plural!) that enable people to steal other people’s passwords, go into their email, read through their private things, and, worse, send out emails pretending to be them. Apparently it’s legal for these services to exist, but not so legal to use them (go figure).

We’re really getting hit from all angles here — spam from Nigeria, phishing Web sites masked as a financial institution, Paris Hilton getting her SideKick hacked a few years ago...and now for $100 someone can gain access to another person’s Web mail account… What’s next?

Life Gets Tougher for Yahoo! Shareholders...and Jerry

It's been a few months since I brought up the subject of Yahoo, but I still think there's more to come in this particular soap opera. Yahoo's stock continues to drop like a stone, and more than one really, really rich guy has been publicly lamenting management. Jerry held onto his position as CEO, but he racked up $36M in advisory fees fighting the MSFT deal and now that the stock once is hovering around $19/share and business is down, the $64,000 question is: how much longer can he hang onto it?

Making matters even worse, there are rumblings that Google may be having second thoughts about its recent deal with Yahoo. Ugh. I definitely wouldn't want to be Jerry right now.

Jerry and Bill: The right fit for Windows' Future?

Since its NFL opening-day debut, the new Microsoft ad has certainly "stirred up a blogstorm," as noted by Rob Hof in BusinessWeek last week. As a Public Relations professional, I have to admit that despite the deluge of questions, head scratching, and Geek-supported brouhaha, it seems to be an outright success! After all, isn't widespread attention and conversation exactly what advertising attempts to create?

Michael Arrington had his say in a recent TechCrunch blog post, wherein he included the actual email notification from Microsoft SVP, Bill Veghte, to all Microsoft employees, explaining the new $300 million ad campaign's goal to "engage consumers and spark a new conversation about Windows." Even though the exorbitant ad barely mentions Microsoft or its technology, it seems to have achieved its charter. Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates were -- in my opinion -- such an oil-and-water combination that it was off-the-wall and hilarious. (Come on folks, who didn't enjoy seeing the now-infamous Bill-wiggle?)  The result is that people are talking about it. It's an attention-getting first ad in the campaign and it certainly made consumers ask the question: "OK, so what is the future of Windows going to be like? Other than delicious, of course."

Patience is a virtue

Regardless of who wins the U.S. elections this year, one thing is clear, the job will be extremely tough. According to 51 economists surveyed by the Wall Street Journal, the next U.S. president will have to deal with many difficult issues, such as a slow growth economy, high unemployment, reforming healthcare, fighting global warming and the ongoing Iraq war.

Undoubtedly,  the list is long and whatever changes will be made, the results won't be felt until the next president's term. I don't mean to sound negative, but I do think we all need to be realistic and realize that although change is imminent, the rewards won't be reaped immediately. As Confucius says, "Patience is a virtue."

Politics & Tech: Not-So-Strange Bedfellows

A few months ago, in my self-appointed role as Sterling’s in-house Andy Rooney, I growled about the need for greater leadership on tech issues at the highest levels of government.

Change is on the horizon — change we can believe in, apparently. Bridget Carey of McClatchy Newspapers provides an interesting overview of the geek factor of the presidential and veep candidates.

Earlier this summer, at the annual Personal Democracy Forum, bloggers and tech experts came together to discuss the increasingly entwined relationship between politics and technology. While they grumbled about the fact that the U.S. has dropped several notches down the worldwide ranking for broadband adoption, they recognized the amazing impact that the Internet is having on the current election. Online donations, citizen journalism, blogosphere gossip, campaign announcements via text messaging – these examples of “e-politics” barely existed four years ago, if at all. The result is a(n) endless campaign that has people more fired up than we’ve seen in 40 years.

Perhaps as the candidates see the positive impact of the Internet on their own fortunes, they’ll realize how crucial it is that the U.S. not stand idly by as its leadership role in IT evaporates.

The slow, sad demise of local tech media

As traditional newspapers fight for their survival, one of the consequences is a precipitous decline in the amount of original local reporting they do on the technology beat. Here in Seattle, one of the city's two main newspapers, the Seattle Times, has been systematically cutting staff to cope with declining revenues. Seeing the writing on the wall, many other reporters, including some friends of mine, have left or are leaving for greener pastures.

In years past, the Times' TechTracks blog, along with the Venture Blog, written by the Seattle Post Intelligencer's John Cook, was a must-read for the Seattle tech community. It covered a wide range of companies and kept decent tabs on the area's vibrant and well-funded start-up community. While Cook continues to provide solid coverage of local venture activities, TechTracks recently became Pri0, a geeky name that signifies the blog's new focus on all things Microsoft. That's a sad, but not unsurprising development. For months now, it's been apparent that the Times has been cutting back on its tech reporting and focusing its limited resources almost entirely on Microsoft (and to a lesser extent Amazon). Getting the attention of either of the local papers has become an increasingly difficult challenge for just about every other tech company.