todaytest 06/30/2007

WeblogMatrix - Compare them all

• eine sehr schoene uebersicht von blog_anbietern und dessen services
   - post by pierro

Online Journalism Review's Blog Software Comparison Chart  Annotated

• (tags: blogs comparison) - post by pfflyer
• compare and contrast. - post by daveforhan
• Blog software comparison chart This chart is a companion to the article  - post by aaronkurtz
• Blog software comparison chart - post by groper
• This chart is a companion to the article "Time to check: Are you using the right blogging tool?," published July 14, 2005 - post by ycc2106
• (tags: blogs comparison)  - post by ycc2106

Blog software comparison chart

Updated May 18, 2006: This chart is a companion to the article "Time to check: Are you using the right blogging tool?," published July 14, 2005 in the USC Annenberg Online Journalism Review. Do note that this chart reflects only standard features of the tools' installation, and not every possible extension, plug-in modification... or hack.

Functionality

Blogger

TypePad Basic

TypePad Plus

TypePad Pro

Blogware

WordPress

Movable Type

Expression Engine

iMedia Connection: Dissecting 3 Kick-Ass Emails  Annotated

Many companies flood you with communications as soon as you give them your email address, but that new relationship is easy to damage.

In this article:
Award-winning emails
A fundraising email from WBFO
Occasional emails from Innocentdrinks.co.uk 
A follow-up email from Rentalo.com 

Award-winning emails
Before I talk about the three emails I have chosen for this article, let me just say how hard it was to unearth any really good emails. I went through emails of all kinds, from a variety of sources, including lists of so-called "award-winning" emails. I looked at promotional emails, customer service emails, retention emails and more. Some were B2B, others were B2C.

I found it a depressing search.

The underlying weakness I saw was that almost every email I read failed to take advantage of the very personal, one-on-one potential of email as a medium.

I saw too many emails that simply thrust their message into the reader's face, as if email were some kind of mass, broadcast medium.

iMedia Connection: Chicken Soup for the Confused Mobile Marketer  Annotated

In This Article: 
So what's so great about mobile anyway? 
What would Sprite do? 
What would Google do? 
What would Yahoo! do?  
Finally, some agreement 

So what's so great about mobile anyway?
Here's a guarantee you can take to the bank: Some of the mobile players that are all the rage today won't even be a memory a few years from now. How do I know? Because nobody knows for certain what the mobile market holds.

If you're an advertiser or a brand that has tried to engage mobile users, you've doubtless been beset by an array of business models, confusing jargon and mobile firms that insist they know how to turn your campaign into gold.

But if you confused a sales pitch with mobile wisdom, shame on you. There's a reason why mobile is classified as an emerging ad platform: The answers are still in the embryonic stage.

One thing is true about mobile, it's small. Very small. But mobile isn't just a smaller interactive world, it's a different planet altogether.

Door Is Open to High-Tech Offerings That Meet Thresholds - New York Times  Annotated

VC Nation

Door Is Open to High-Tech Offerings That Meet Thresholds

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By BRAD STONE

Published: June 29, 2007

DAN NYE is perhaps the most publicly accessible chief executive on the planet. Anyone can contact the head of LinkedIn, a social network based in Mountain View, Calif., simply by visiting his personal profile page on the service and sending him a message.

todaytest 06/21/2007

Method Arts | A Consortium | How to Plan a Party in Five Minutes  Annotated

Back in August, Mark and I were chatting via IM and he asked if I was going to An Event Apart. I told him I wasn’t sure. I hadn’t quit my job yet, so there were

todaytest 06/20/2007

Digital Digressions: What Marketeers Forget When Thinking of Web 2.0  Annotated

No longer is it about 'what do we want to communicate - it's about 'what do we want to facilitate!'
Web 2.0 is a dialogue, it's a start of a love-affair, it's a discussion that takes twists and turns depending on who is having the conversation and what the topic is. It's fun to talk to someone if they show they listen to what you have to say and respond accordingly. It's even better when they can put you in touch with other people just like you. It's extremely boring when you feel like you are talking to a wall. It's really that simple - but what it means is that smokescreens become harder to maintain. After all, not everyone is David Copperfield and besides, if everyone's rating everything and all views are public - you don't even want to be David Copperfield, you have to be you and be good, because what goes around comes around.

todaytest 06/16/2007

J-Board - a Job Board for Everyone  Annotated

SmartSheet Raises $2.69M in Funding  Annotated

, the web-based spreadsheet creation service, has raised $2.69 million in a Series A-4 of funding, led by Madrona Venture Group.

SmartSheet, which won Business 2.0’s Best of Show award earlier this year, has a good management team, some members hailing from Onyx Software. The edge that SmartSheet is looking to develop is its interactive capabilities, and auto-tracking tools that are beneficial for team projects and collaborative efforts. The social aspect of SmartSheet includes its wiki, which furthers the ability for the

todaytest 06/14/2007

B2B Lead Generation Blog: 10 Lead Generation (Prospecting) Tips for Sales People  Annotated

their own lead generation. 

1. Build an ideal customer profile – Focus your energy on leads that best fit your ideal customer profile. Both the companies and the individuals you covet as customers.  What separates your best and worst customers? What are their attributes and demographics? What organizations/associations do they belong to? 

2. Talk to your best customers – How much do you really know about your customers?  A simple phone call can generate plenty of useful information.  Ask your customers why they chose to work with you?  Is that the same reason they keep doing business with you?  How has working with you helped their business?  Would they refer you to other people?  Use this information to refine your message to identify more leads just like your best custom

Press Releases - DoubleClick Inc.  Annotated

DOUBLECLICK’S RESEARCH DEMONSTRATES THE BENEFITS OF ONLINE VIDEO ADVERTISING
Consumers Interact with Video Ads More Than with Image Ads; Video Click Rates Are Higher than Image Format Ads
New York, NY, 3/20/2007 - DoubleClick Inc., the premier provider of digital marketing technology and services, today announced the results of its recent research of online video ad placements, illustrating that video is a highly effective format for online advertising. Findings show that audiences have high interaction rates with video ads, users click the "Play" button more than they click on image ads, video ads are typically played two-thirds of the way through and video ad click rates are far higher than those of image format ads.



DoubleClick conducted its analysis of more than 300 online video ad campaigns that were placed by more than 130 advertisers over a four-month period in 2006. The objective was to identify major trends in the performance metrics of online video ad campaigns according to campaign features, such as vertical industry sector, ad format, ad size and ad length.



"Online video ads are quickly becoming the medium of choice to drive both brand awareness and sales," said Rick Bruner, research director at DoubleClick. "The results show that there are clear ROI advantages to placing video ads. We expect to see strong growth in the number of companies reaping the benefits of online video adv

todaytest 06/09/2007

Casual Games Muscling in on Traditional TV Time news from 1UP.com  Annotated

Casual Games Muscling in on Traditional TV Time

Study shows your mom likes Bejeweled more than Survivor.

By Mark Whiting, 08/18/2006

Remember RealNetworks? Well, for some reason they've recently become curious as to why people aren't watching Extreme Home Makeover anymore.

The culprit? Casual games.

The study, conducted by by Harris Interactive, sought to suss out the viewing habits of the American household. Once the numbers were in, executives were shocked... shocked... to find that the boob tube just isn't pulling in the eyeballs like it used to.

The short answer is that more and more American adults now prefer to waste their time playing Bejeweled than waste it watching CSI. How many, exactly? Answer: a "substantial minority" -- 31 percent.

"Watching movies at home" is apparently a slightly more compelling activity compared to television -- only 21% of the population prefers Zuma over a DVD. Actually going to a theatre? -- the big loser, with 35% of you preferring a quiet evening with PopCap instead.

Real's big discovery however was the significant spike in casual gaming in a very traditionally 'un-gamer' demographic... older women.

The numbers for the "women over 40" category clearly illustrate a dramatic ascendency in casual gaming nationwide. Nearly half of mothers in America (49%) prefer a quiet night with TextTwist to a wild night with Snakes on a Plane. Numbers are similarly huge for TV and DVD rejection: 37 and 32 percent, respectively.

This is news? Obviously they haven't met my mother-in-law -- the Zuma Champeen.

Unsurprisingly, all the fuss boils down to advertising dollars. "Advergames" i.e. games which contain "strongly branded" content -- are a big thumbs-down from players across the board. Throwing a banner or two in between level loads? Still apparently OK.

New SoGoPlay Label Courts Casual Market news from 1UP.com  Annotated

"Traditional videogames have alienated potential customers."

So says Lou Fawcett, the recently-appointed head of SoGoPlay: SCi Interactive's newly-formed "casual games" label -- born from the recent acquisition of casual-gaming sister company Rockpool Games.

Fawcett made the comment during a larger speech at the Northern Exposure games conference, held last week in the United Kingdom. GamesIndustry.biz is covering the announcement of the new studio with a brace of articles centered on Eidos' aggressive new approach to the emergent casual games market.

The message seems to be clear: A savvy studio overlooks casual gamers at its own peril. For this reason, Eidos (a subcell of SCi Interactive) has charged SoGoPlay with an unusual mission: the promotion and marketing of casual games with intensity equal to the big name AAA titles of modern hardcore-dom. Says Fawcett: "We're aiming to establish SoGoPlay as THE flagship casual games brand."

EA Jumps on Casual Games Bandwagon news from 1UP.com  Annotated

EA Jumps on Casual Games Bandwagon

New division to focus entirely on pick up 'n play.

By Mark Whiting, 06/06/2007

Say what you like about casual games; your derision won't change the fact that investments in cellphone, handheld and Xbox Live Arcade-style downloads are currently paying out like one-armed bandits for the big developers.

Exhibit A came a few weeks ago with the announcement of SCi Interactive's SoGoPlay "casual games only" development label. Today, further evidence comes in the form of a another triple-A challenger deciding to step into the ring of "hardcore" casual games development. The publisher: Electronic Arts. Their newly formed label: EA Casual Entertainment.

The new company will be headed up by former Activision exec. Kathy Vrabeck, who will take the helm as President. "All over the world", she says, "consumers are playing games that don't require hours of intense concentration. Whether it will be playing Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on the Wii with the family or downloading Madden NFL 08 on a phone, quick-to-the-fun games are bringing new players and new demographics to interactive entertainment."

We wrote to EA to see if they were interested in explaining how the EA Casual brand intends to differentiate itself from competitors like SoGoPlay.

"EA Casual Entertainment is a new group dedicated to the global and rapidly growing market for easy access games on all platforms. The inspiration for the creation of the division is the recognition that many consumers want to play games that don't require hours of commitment, intense concentration and deep skills. EA has the talent, the ideas and the franchises to compete in this genre. This division is modeled after The Sims -- with studios and publishing working side-by-side on a broad array of easy-access games for all platforms."

EA told 1UP that EA Casual will leverage the success of their "Pogo" casual gaming brand as a means to attract and retain fans. Pogo (according to EA, at least) is the "stickiest site on the Internet," with 18 million people playing every month, and 1.5 million paid subscribers.

The last few years have seen an incredible rise in the visibility and significance of the casual gaming dollar in the overall business of video games. "Quick and easy fun" comes complete with a quick and easy development price tag -- one that conveniently sidesteps the inherent risks associated with costly next-gen development. More and more, the big publishers are regarding the popularity of cellphone, download and internet-based games as a no-brainer low-risk, high-return business model.

By way of example, last January saw casual gaming studio Mumbo Jumbo expand to a size large enough to flat-out purchase Relic Entertainment (the guys behind SiN). With the growing ubiquity of Wii and popularity of download services like Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network, expect to see this trend continue. Each copy of Catan sold moves that almighty development dollar further and further away from a business model based on servicing a notoriously fickle "hardcore" demographic.

todaytest 06/08/2007

BeyondVC:  Annotated

As an early stage investor and board member of several companies, I am fortunate to get the opportunity to work with some great entrepreneurs and also pattern match and observe trends, both good and bad, in early stage companies.  I am not here to throw platitudes at you but simply to share an observation of the differences between some of the better run companies and the ones that have less than stellar execution.   In one portfolio company, we had some of the standard issues of coordinating product management with engineering and balancing sales requirements with engineering priorities.  Having a company operate solely in departmental silos is like having each body part with a different brain-sure it is your body but it is also hard to move fluidly if each body part is moving in a di

Sprint adds local product search via GPS - New York Times  Annotated

Sprint adds local product search via GPS

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Marguerite Reardon, for News.com

Published: June 7, 2007

Sprint Nextel said Thursday it is offering a new application that will let subscribers search for products in nearby retail stores directly from their handsets.

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The service, which uses embedded GPS (Global Positioning System) chips in phones, allows shoppers to use their cell phones to find any of 85 million products available at 30,000 stores across the country. People type in a keyword, product name, model number or UPC number to search for the product.

Raph’s Website » NYT looks at kids’ worlds AGAIN  Annotated

“Doll Web Sites Drive Girls to Stay Home and Play”, says the New York Times. Among the games covered are ones I hadn’t really paid attention to before, like Stardoll and Cartoon Doll Emporium.

Over at Virtual Worlds News they give this handy table summarizing the growth rates of some of these; I added to the table with additional unique user stats elsewhere in the article:

Site                                         Users in April 2006     Users in April 2007

Club Penguin                         794,000                                 4,073,000

Webkinz                                 325,000                                 3,879,000

Cartoon Doll Emporium                                                      ~3,000,000

Stardoll                                  367,000                                  1,241,000

WeeWorld                                                                             ~900,000

The NYT mentions that the category has grown 68% in the last year alone; some of the sites report 20% growth monthly.

My list of “the biggest MMOs in the West” is evolving rapidly. With Habbo Hotel and Runescape also clocking in with multiple millions of unique users every month, it may be possible that World of Warcraft is actually sitting around #4 or #5 in the top MMOs in NA and Europe.

Of course, by and large, the gamers and gaming industry will likely blow these off as “not counting” or “shallow” or something. I get that pretty regularly, particularly from folks who are hoping that I am not making something like these games myself. (I’m not — I just find it fascinating).

Eve Online - Video Games - New York Times  Annotated

In a Virtual Universe, the Politics Turn Real

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By SETH SCHIESEL

Published: June 7, 2007

The kingdom is in crisis. After pledging to treat its citizens equally, the government stands accused of unfairly favoring one powerful, well-connected political faction. Many citizens have taken to open dissent, even revolt, and some are threatening to emigrate permanently.

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Enlarge This Image

A scene from the multiplayer Internet game Eve Online.

This specter of corruption has emerged most recently not in some post-colonial trouble spot but in the virtual nation of

Promoting a Thirst for Sprite in Teenage Cellphone Users - New York Times  Annotated

The Coca-Cola Company is hoping its new mobile site for social networking, Sprite Yard, will become the MySpace of the cellphone world.

But some marketing executives say the plan could instead become the BudTV of the soda world — a failed effort to build a community around a brand.

Sprite Yard, to be introduced in the United States this month, will look a lot like the social networking sites that have become popular on the Internet. Consumers will be able to set up personal profiles, share photos and

‘omg my mom joined facebook!!’ - New York Times  Annotated

Cyberfamilias

‘omg my mom joined facebook!!’

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By MICHELLE SLATALLA

Published: June 7, 2007

I HAVE reached a curious point in life. Although I feel like the same precocious know-it-all cynic I always was, I suddenly am surrounded by younger precocious know-it-all cynics whose main purpose appears to be to remind me that I’ve lost my edge.

He’s 9 Years Old and a Video-Game Circuit Star - New York Times  Annotated

OLBROOK, N.Y., June 5 — Victor M. De Leon III has been playing video games on the professional circuit for five years now, racking up thousands of dollars in prizes and endorsements at tournaments around the country. He has a national corporate sponsor, a publicist and a Web site, with 531 photos chronicling his career. A documentary filmmaker has been following him for months.

Victor weighs 56 pounds and likes to watch SpongeBob SquarePants at his home here on Long Island. He celebrated his 9th birthday last month with a trip to a carnival and a vanilla cake. He gets above-average marks in the third grade, where he recently drew a dragon for art c

VentureBeat » Bubble Motion, trying to bring voice SMS to U.S.  Annotated

ubble Motion is a texting (SMS) service that eliminates the need to type out message on that tiny keypad, and lets you leave voice message instead.

Many of us are texting, but we aren’t leaving voice messages via SMS — because carriers aren’t letting us.

Bubble Motion, of Singapore, wants to change that, and is negotiating with U.S carriers to provide the service here. Leaving a voice message is convenient. There are many times I’m feeling asocial, for example, and would much prefer to leave a voice message for someone without risking actually talking with them.