August 12, 1999
Site note: A new URL! Tomalak's Realm can now be reached at http://www.tomalak.org along with the current URL. The domain was registered yesterday so it might take another day or two before it's accessible to everyone.
ClickZ: Transferring Your Brand To The Web.
Many businesses see potential new revenue as the main reason to go online. Transferring an organization's brand to the web is not a guarantee to greater economic benefit. Web sites need to be well-managed and consumer-oriented.
TechWeb: In The Driver's Seat With GM.
Q&A with Mark Hogan and Rick Lee of eGM. I'm going to be a sponge and hopefully bring the message that GM is serious about being an Internet company. We want to create a broad array of partnerships that should be a win-win for the partners we select.
Salon: Don't link or I'll sue!
Scott Rosenberg. That isn't stopping a still small but growing list of companies from contending that certain kinds of links are actually illegal. Go ahead and link to our sites, they're saying, but only if you link the way we tell you to. Otherwise, you'll hear from our lawyers.
DaveNet: InfoWorld and Deep Linking.
I received an email from an InfoWorld insider, a friend, who said that the policy is serious. My correspondent asked not to be identified, and I'm respecting that.
SF Chronicle: Information Superhypeway.
On the Web, press releases and news stories sit cheek by jowl, with similar headlines in the same font and type size.
Wired News: Firefly's Dim Light Snuffed Out.
Five years and several new paradigms later -- and following the company's 1998 buyout by Microsoft -- the light is going out for good on the forums. The underlying technology will live on, however, powering Redmond's e-commerce efforts.
MSNBC: Online ad spending is expected to more than triple by year 2004.
The report notes that growing numbers of advertisers are likely to insist on paying content providers and ad agencies based on the number of people who actually click on an ad or buy a product, rather than the widely used current system of paying a flat rate per 1,000 banner ads...
MSNBC: Broadcast group threatens to sue makers of personal video recorders.
...the consortium of media companies is worried that the PVR could radically alter the habits of viewers once they achieve sufficient penetration by essentially empowering viewers to set their own program schedules and how they want to watch TV.
Wired News: TV Execs Protect Their Turf.
Industry analysts predict PVRs could eventually become as popular as VCRs, but the fast-forwarding and filtering capabilities could decimate TV advertising. Forrester Research projects that PVRs will lead to a 50 percent decline in TV ad watching over the next 10 years.
Information Week: Personal Business.
Levi Strauss' Knowles sums up the appeal of personalization: "When we can leverage our most valuable customers, it gets financially interesting for us."
RCFoC: The New Winners.
...that's exactly why the Internet has been able to generate so many innovative services (Email, Instant Messaging, video, audio, telephony, collaboration, etc.) so quickly -- it never has to wait for a central authority to enable a service!
TechWeb: Group Puts 3D-Capable Browser On Fast Track.
The X3D technology will enable small, lightweight Web clients to support advanced 3-D capabilities, and to integrate high-performance 3-D into broadcast and embedded devices.
Industry Standard: What Wins Web Popularity Contests?
Why do some products get adopted and spread like wildfire over the Internet while others fail to take off at all? Why do some, like PointCast, take off only to fizzle out?
Salon: The burger machine.
It's a weird devolution of Age of Industry automation: The manual work continues to be done by humans, who are carefully hidden away, while the job of meeting and greeting the customers is taken over by machines.
SJ Mercury: How do AT&T, Excite@Home fit together?
Excite@Home has said it envisions a media network that will provide home and business customers with access to personalized services at different speeds on a variety of devices, including PCs, pagers, wireless phones and televisions.
Boston Globe: Lycos to pay for its search icons on sites.
Users will receive two or three cents each time third-party visitors click on the icons to launch Lycos searches over the rest of the Web.
Wired News: PrivaSeek Seeks Attention.
In beta since May, Persona Valet is just one of a gaggle of offerings from companies that are seeking to gain a foothold in world of privacy self-regulation.
ZDNN: Sprint dashes into Web-over-wireless.
The new services, clumped together under the moniker Sprint PCS Wireless Web will allow users to surf special text-only Web pages on newer phones, using a browser provided by software-for-phones maker Phone.com.
Interactive Week: Your Serve.
I agree with Jim Hake: Online order confirmation shouldn't be a customer nicety. It should be a must-have of doing business with consumers on the Web.
NY Times: Defunct Keys and Odd Commands Still Bedevil Today's PC User.
It has not remained that way because the design is optimal -- quite the contrary. Many designers criticize the keyboard for serving a befuddling mix of obsolete needs.
| 