Rupert Murdoch, chief executive of News Corporation, told Sky News Australia (which belongs to News Corporation) last week that he thinks they will start charging for their newspaper content online. He also said that they are considering disallowing Google to index the pages, so that the news stories will only be found by subscribers and won’t come up in organic searches. Free online newspapers indexed by Google have been attributed to the ‘death of the traditional newspaper’ and it seems that Murdoch is declaring war on Google News’ dominance of the industry. He also told Sky News that he doesn’t believe offline newspapers will disappear in the next twenty years but it is possible that they will eventually die out.

Earlier this year, CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, told Fortune magazine that he wishes he could save the traditional newspaper. He told Fortune that Google would like to offer newspapers tools to monetise their customer base online and traditional newspapers are disappearing as a result of printing costs. In response to Murdoch’s controversial statement on Sky News, an unnamed spokesperson for Google said, “Google News and web search are a tremendous source of promotion for news organisations, sending them about 100, 000 clicks every minute”. The spokesperson added that very few news organisations choose not to include their material in Google search results but if they tell Google not to index the pages, Google will comply.

Murdoch said he doesn’t believe that leads from Google searches are of much value to their newspapers but instead allow people to take advantage of the free information. “…People…simply just pick up everything and run with it – steal our stories, we say they steal our stories – they just take them. That’s Google, that’s Microsoft, that’s Ask.com, a whole lot of people … they shouldn’t have had it free all the time, and I think we’ve been asleep,” he added. Murdoch emphasises the fact that the News Corporation won’t charge a great deal of money for subscribing online and the price is likely to be in line with the price of traditional newspapers.

Responses to Murdoch’s statement have been heated: many people believe that being invisible on Google will kill the newspapers, while others think that advertising will be unable to sustain high quality online news sites. But does this mean that online newspaper subscriptions are the way of the future? Watch this space because this is definitely not the end of the debate.

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2. Google Labs unveils the News timeline
3. Google has not killed the future of journalism

Should newspapers charge for news online or buy into the Google dream?

Getting started

If you go onto your Twitter home page, you’ll see the List option on the right sidebar, near the middle. Click on ‘New list’.

A pop up box appears and you can add your list’s name and opt to make it public or keep it private. Public lists are ideal if you want to promote your own Twitter profile with a cleverly compiled list. Private lists, on the other hand, are great for simply organising your Twitter followers, for example colleagues, family member etc. As Mashable points out, they are also perfect for creating a list of competitors and keeping tabs on them without their knowledge.

Adding people/companies onto your list

The next step is the fun part. You can start adding people onto your list by visiting their profile pages and clicking on the ‘lists’ tab. The dropdown lists all your groups so you can tick the groups you want to add the person to.

Search Engine Reputation Management and privacy on Twitter lists

At any stage, if a list becomes unnecessary or you feel it is negatively impacting on your reputation, you can delete the list. And if you are worried about being on someone else’s negative or ‘hate list’, you can simply view the creators profile and use the block function to remove yourself from the list.

Uses for Twitter lists

Organising your mass following

Instead of following various individuals at a company, why not follow the entire company list which follows all its employees? Alternatively, you can create lists of industry experts or the funniest tweeters you know and then share the list with your friends or fans.

Enhancing enjoyment

Follow celeb lists, food lists, news site lists and charity organisation lists and you can keep abreast of the latest development in your areas of interest on a wider scale. Or perhaps, you can compile your own creative list and see how it takes hold.

Promoting your partners or clients

Many companies don’t like publishing lists of their clients on Twitter but you can find creative ways of including them in a listing of your choice. You could also create lists of your industry partners or charity endeavors you support.

Twitter lists have not been around for very long but as with all things Twitter they’ve already earned mass appeal. They’re easy to use and really do streamline the Twitter process, so there’s no reason not to start adding your own original lists to the network.

For ideas on some great lists, follow @listorious on Twitter or visit their website: http://listorious.com.

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3. Why Twitter?

Organise and Promote your Profile with Twitter lists

In an endeavour to once again be an educator, I will ask you to do a small task for me and take note of which particular learning style you prefer and I will then explain what relevance they have to the internet. Educational experts tell us there are seven distinctive learning styles (which category do you fall into?):

• Visual or spatial where you learn with images, pictures or graphs
• Aural or musical where you learn from listening to sounds or music
• Verbal/linguistic (my particular learning style of choice) where you learn with words, whether it is in speech or writing
• Physical or kinesthetic where you learn by using your body and the sense of touch
• Logical or mathematical where you learn with logic, reason and systems
People also fall into two broader categories depending on the study setting they prefer:
• Social or interpersonal learners: where they learn best in a social setting or a group; or,
• Solitary learners, where they learn best on their own.

Your next task is to go back and browse through a few online articles and websites and determine what learning style they are trying to evoke, because whether we know it or not, the internet is all about educating people: educating people about a product, a service, a bit of history or a recipe.

Here is a rundown of the learning styles that some very popular sites rely on.

• You tube: uses both visual and aural learning which shows that this must be a very common learning style among the general populace as videos are The Next Big Thing. A personal note here: I don’t quite understand the obsession with videos because I would much rather spend five minutes reading an article than bothering to download a video but that’s just my particular learning style coming to the fore.
• Facebook: uses a combination of verbal, visual and (obviously) social learning. Again, the popularity of social media shows us that many people, particularly youngsters, are social learners.
• Slide share: uses visual, verbal and, often, logical learning depending on the content.

Educators have recently discovered that they can use a combination of learning styles to deliver best results. For example, the latest methods for teaching foreigners English combine all learning styles: students are asked to read, listen to tapes, look at pictures, play games and work both independently and in groups.

But what does this have to do with online marketing?

Blended search results show us that now even IT gurus and online marketers have realised that people require a varied approach to keep them interested. Marketers also need to realise that every individual in their target market will approach their website from a different point of view. Some will be enticed by videos, others by compelling copy and another group may be enticed by something more tangible like the promise of a free T-shirt or the chance to have a conversation. And many people will love a clever combination of different media to keep them coming back for more.

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Internet learning styles: what they can tell you about your target market

Fashion social media sites, however, have a strongly sales driven focus. If you register on one of these sites you can rate outfits, get in touch with fashion designers (or display your wares if you are a designer) and ultimately shop for those ‘must-have’ fashion items online.

But it’s not only the small fry of the fashion industry who take social media seriously: it was recently reported that Top Shop has ploughed a lot of money into their social media strategy to improve sales. Social media provides something which the high street can only dream of providing: it provides a virtual walk-in closet. It provides a place where girls can assemble outfits they had, up-until-then, only dreamt of. It provides a space for teenagers to salivate over the latest designs and chat to each other while doing so. It provides a place to indulge a severe fashion addiction without having to leave your front door.

With these reasons making fashion social media irresistible, it’s no wonder it’s so successful. Why not have a look for yourself and see how you feel about it? It may be glorified Barbie dressing, but it’s fun and you can still do it and be socially accepted as an adult. In fact, you’ll be MORE socially acceptable if you indulge in fashion social media. Some of the top social media fashion sites are: Style Hop, Sense of Fashion and Shopflick but there are plenty of others.

So far, it all seems well and good. There aren’t any drawbacks are there? The one objection I do have to these sites is exactly the same objection I have to fashion magazines: these sites will tell teenagers they need clothing they really don’t, it will teach them to want to look like stick insects and it will show them how to be superficial and love it. But, hey, perhaps it will teach them how to develop a unique style and enjoy the artistry of fashion too…

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2. Are we being too hard on Google’s attempt at social media?
3. Are your social media monitoring tools giving you the information you need?

Social Media has infiltrated EVERYTHING, even fashion.

A simplified definition of semantic markup is as follows:

But let’s take a step back and think of semantics in a more general context. Semantics was originally a linguistics term and dictionary.com gives the following definition:

Now that we’ve covered that definition, you ask, ‘what do linguistics and coding have in common’? That’s an easy one. Like you and me, algorithms are all about interpreting meaning. But, like with you and me, if you don’t write in a language they can understand, they will be unable to perform the function you ultimately require from them (which is to rank, rank, rank for SEO). To give an oversimplified example, if you order something from a restaurant where they don’t speak English, you may end up eating something you didn’t want to.

This takes us to semantic markup in a coding context. Web semantics is really about using your code well to speak to the algos in a language they understand, i.e HTML. Some of us right-brain dominated copywriters like to use our enter keys when uploading content on the web, or even bolding headings so that the reader’s attention is drawn to them. This may have worked for school projects, but less so for the net.

The algos aren’t going to know that if you bold a piece of text you intend it to be the heading. They’ll simply treat your heading like the rest of your content and what will happen then is that your article won’t get indexed as it should because, hang on, there’s no heading!

This is so easily fixed that it’s almost a crime not to do it like this in the first place: simply add heading tags (H1 and H2 tags) to your headline so that both your human and machine readers will understand you perfectly.

Similarly, don’t simply press ‘enter’ between paragraphs but use ‘p’ elements to open and close a paragraph and indicate that there is, indeed, a paragraph present.

There are several more examples, such as lists and emphasising texts where using the correct elements is imperative.

Now that you understand how it works, what’s in it for you?

It makes your life and the life of your colleagues easier. Optimising your website is a doddle if the correct coding is already in place; furthermore, editing your content is now a walk in the park as you don’t have paragraphs sitting oddly on top each other and lists going haywire. Lastly, it makes the algos happy and ultimately makes your boss happy too, because you’re doing it the right way and the results will shine through.

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Semantic Markup for SEO Friendly Websites

I read somewhere that you should be able to write a blog or online article in fifteen minutes. That includes doing research, thinking about the topic, coming up with a headline, checking your grammar, writing a good introduction and conclusion, organising your ideas and optimising for keywords. Jim Estill said on copy blogger that he can do it in 20. And I like his writing, it’s concise, engaging and accessible but, with all due respect to Mr. Estill, I would still never spend less than an hour or two on a blog or article.

When I think about churning out the written word like a newspaper printing press, I think about one of my least favourite, and one the world’s most loved, writers. Barbara Cartland churned out a massive amount of pulp fiction during her long life: on her deathbed she had 664 novels to her name and when you read them you know why: they lack depth and the characters are not believable. J.K Rowling on the other hand, spent 12 years carefully crafting her popular Harry Potter series and took a few years to conceptualise the stories before putting pen to paper (or rather paper to typewriter) in earnest. Literary experts may criticise her style but my response to this is that when someone has become so unbelievably famous and rich from her written word, it transcends criticism. The extra time J.K Rowling spent on her books served to make her a far superior writer.

Having said that, everyone is different and how you write a blog depends on who you are. Jim Estill, for example, will turn over a topic in his head for a few days to allow the free flow of new ideas before he commits to anything. He also says that he is most productive when he works on several articles as the same time and I know from experience that this is the exception rather than the rule. What works for Jim, may or may not work for you or me. What I like to do is commit a few hours solely to one article and spend that time toying with various ideas and words and reading up on all sides of the story and even looking beyond my core ideas and reading around the topic. It may sound self-indulgent but it works for me.

It also depends on your subject choice. If you’re writing a technical blog and you’re a ‘how to’ girl, the fifteen minute rule could induce a nervous breakdown. On the other hand, if you have a massive general knowledge, are a veteran of the written word and concentrate intensively on the topic at hand, then I admit, it’s possible to write a good blog in 15 minutes. However, I have yet to do so.

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Writing a blog or article in 15 minutes: it’s possible but is it wise?

As we’ve grown, the internet has matched our every step. So much so that China now has hundreds of web addiction boot camps to (literally) beat the youth-based obsession. But what about the older generations — the generations who remember someone who died in the war (as in one of the world wars, not the gulf wars) and watched a plethora of new technologies develop from the sidelines? Are they completely excluded from the internet revolution? On the contrary, statistics reveal that over-50s also enjoy the odd indulgence in a web-type addiction.

Often, we think of the older generation as technically challenged and with good reason. The cell phone you gave your mother last Christmas is either still lying in the drawer or, if she’s started texting, she takes so long that you can make a Sunday roast and do all the dishes before she’s sent the text. Yet, a study done by web watch reported on what they called a rising number of ‘silver surfers’ (in other words older people active on the internet).

Europe, Sweden, the UK, Spain and Italy were shown to have internet users in the over-50 age group numbering in the millions and rising each year. The study showed that older people frequent banking and online mapping sites, but, despite this, online marketers are still not taking the older demographic into account.

Tom Ewing, market analyst at Nielsen, said that the growing interest of older people in the web provides an opportunity for “Site owners…to promote their products and services to this growing audience, many of whom are already organising their finances and booking holidays online. However, they do need to research their audience in order to tailor their sites, products and services more carefully”.

If you think about it for a minute, the web is the perfect medium for people who are house bound: it takes away the necessity to stand in bank queues or even catch the bus to the grocery store and for people with children and grandchildren residing overseas, it is a good way to keep in touch without walking to the post office.

And for those older people out there who love to surf the web with the best, a recent study done by the University of California reveals that the internet is good for the brain especially for older people facing the threat of Alzheimer’s. Like every part of our bodies, the brain ages and there is a reduction in cell activity. But activities like cross-words and surfing the internet, engage complicated brain activity which exercise the brain. The study showed that the internet sparks more brain activity than reading a book because the wealth of decisions on the web demands the use of complex reasoning by the net surfer.

So, next time you want to laugh at your nan because she doesn’t know how to create an email account, step back, show some respect and teach her how to do it. She will, in turn, teach you a thing or two about how it should be done.

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A revelation for the internet marketer: Older people like the web and it’s good for them too

The weather was idyllic for a Cape winter’s day and we took off from Simonstown yacht club at a gentle pace eventually finding some light wind quite a way out at sea. The deckhands were roped in to take some of the slack and learnt some of the nautical lingo, such as ‘guy’ and ‘cleat’ in the process.

On nearing the False Bay lighthouse, Zeke prepared to open the brand spanking new spinnaker and make up some speed. The black spinnaker branded with the Media Vision logo was opened to general murmurs of approval and everyone took a turn to explore the bow and admire the spinnaker.

AJ directed Brett around the lighthouse and a lone seal was spotted making a quick getaway from the yacht and, not much later, one of the peninsula’s trademark penguins followed suit and paddled away from our fast approaching vessel. A whale spotting was hoped for but to no avail. However, the sea mammal no-show was more than made up for by the exquisite crimson sun which was setting over the Silvermine hills.

Nightfall set in and the only minor disaster was when deckhand David took over from Brett to steer for awhile and steered the boat neatly into a stationary buoy. But the buoy was quickly unhooked from the side of the boat and disaster averted.

The wind had died down a bit by this time and the yacht bobbed gently in the swell as the team soaked up the peace and quiet of the deserted bay and the pleasant evening weather. But the smoking engine was brought out again when Zeke concluded that we were possibly going backwards and Lauren started looking a little green around the gills. After docking, the team hopped regrettably off the faithful vessel with just a few cases of dock rock and promises to return for a longer sail.

drinking and driving...

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Team building: False bay sailing and a brand new spinnaker

We’ve all seen pictures of the moon landing, and while it looks like it may be fun for a half-day excursion on a school trip, quite frankly, I think exploring the moon extensively would be rather dull. The low gravity factor will hold you enthralled for all of fifteen minutes, but after that there are only so many rock formations and craters you can point out before you’ll need to bump into the man on the moon and discover something made of cheese to alleviate the boredom. And exploring the moon virtually can’t be much better, can it?

The Google software update has been marketed to pay tribute to the revolutionary NASA landing which changed the way we think about space exploration and even science fiction, but will it be useful in the long run? The moon is quite a large landmass being similar in size to North America and Russia combined, but in relation to Earth, and even the ocean floors, there is not all that much to see, mostly as a result of the absence of life and geographical variety.

Despite my criticisms, the new update has the backing of the first female private space explorer, Anousheh Ansari, who wrote in her blog:

“Moon in Google Earth enables you to explore lunar imagery as well as informational content about the Apollo landing sites, panoramic images shot by the Apollo astronauts, narrated tours and much more. I believe that this educational tool is a critical step into the future, a way to both develop the dreams of young people globally, and inspire new audacious goals”.

I must admit that Google Earth: Moon can be a valuable educational tool for school reports and interesting snippets, but how is it different from any interactive online encyclopedia already in existence?

The project is in line with Google and NASA’s Space Act agreement, and Japan’s space agency, Jaxa, has also helped out by donating some of their space data. In this way it will allow people access to images and tours which they normally wouldn’t have unless they flew to the United States and visited NASA. Having said that, NASA has its own interactive webpage, with a ‘kid’s club page’ that offers various animated space games and the latest space imagery.

Not everyone subscribes to my criticism of Google Earth: Moon. A colleague of mine, David Bailey, has the following positive viewpoint:

“If Google backs something on this scale, it is usually for a very good reason. I believe they are looking towards the future, and they realise that the potential for space exploration, and consequent space colonisation, is still in its infancy and has great potential. I firmly believe space exploration is inevitable, and Google is trying to get an early jump onto the bandwagon.”

But my comment on that is ‘what a waste of money!’ What about poverty relief and job creation? Aren’t the problems (and delights) on earth enough for us? Are our God complexes so overpowering that we have to start mapping and ultimately colonising the rest of space too? Or is it simply our avid inner-explorers who refuse to be silenced; after all they are the reason the human race is so successful (and destructive).

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of the moon, which looks beautiful in the night sky and it has its place in fantasy and fiction (with werewolves and the rest), but I’m quite happy just to appreciate it as a glowing and changing orb in the sky, and know the basic science behind it (i.e. made of rock, low gravity, not ideal for life etc.). Still, for those budding space explorers out there, I would put aside my skepticism and say, ‘well it’s actually pretty cool’, even if it is just a sort of anniversary edition of Google Moon, which was released four years ago. As for further moon exploration and space mapping, I will be an unashamed socialist (on this count) and say, ‘feed your people first’.

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Google Earth expands to the moon but why?

Mark Zuckerberg is a 25 year-old billionaire and the creator of Facebook. He started programming before he was in high school and set up the social media site from his college room in Harvard with the help of another student, Eduardo Saverin. Columbia Pictures have the movie rights for Aaron Sorkin’s (the creator of West Wing) bestselling book called “The Accidental Billionaires” which tells the story of how Zuckerberg started Facebook.

At the moment producers, who include Kevin Spacey, are calling the movie, “The Social Network” and have enlisted the services of the director of “Fight Club” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” David Fincher, to direct the film.

CNET says that the movie will portray Zuckerberg as an ‘obnoxious nerd’ and Facebook has reportedly warned employees not to talk to anyone who is involved in the movie.

A source working on the movie said that casting searches are under way and that both Shia LaBeouf of Transformer’s fame and Michael Cera, whose film credits include Arrested Development, are being considered for the role of Zuckerberg.

Kevin Spacey, who initially reviewed Sorkin’s book, wrote, “Mark (Zuckerberg) used his computer skills (to hack) into Harvard’s computers, pulling up all the pictures of every girl on campus to create a sort of ‘hot-or-not’ site exclusive to Harvard. Though the prank nearly got Mark kicked out of college, he and Eduardo realised that they were onto something big; what happened next, however, was right out of a Hollywood thriller”.

People may not be queuing around the block to watch the premier, but “The Social Network” is sure to be followed by much media hype.

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Facebook ‘the movie’, what next?