Fans of pioneering online sports writer/pop-culture critic Bill Simmons have been bugging the ESPN.com columnist to join the increasing number of journalists tweeting on Twitter. His thoughtful response:

...Twitter and Facebook reflect where our writing is going thanks to the Internet. In 15 years, writing went from "reflecting on what happened and putting together some coherent thoughts" to "reflecting on what happened as quickly as possible" to "reflecting on what's happening as it's happening" to "here are my half-baked thoughts about absolutely anything and I'm not even going to attempt to entertain you," or as I like to call it, Twitter/Facebook Syndrome.

I've long maintained that social media enthusiasts who claim Twitter and Facebook are communication devices for networking and sharing are off base. The driving force behind Web 2.0 is exhibitionism and expression. This is particularly evident if you take a look at Facebook’s application directory sorted by “Most Active Users:”

• Super Wall - The best way to find and share entertaining videos, pictures, graffiti, and more with your friends!
• Causes - Make a difference, on Facebook!
• Top Friends - Own your profile with Top Friends! Now you can CUSTOMIZE your Top Friends Profile! Choose your skin, add music and more. Give and receive exclusive awards, show off your mood and keep tabs on the people you really care about with Top Friends News!

Each app allows the user to essentially shout out to other users, “HERE I AM, I AM WRITING ON YOUR PROFILE WALL, I AM CONCERNED ABOUT THESE THINGS, I AM BEST FRIENDS WITH ALL THESE WONDERFULY ATTRACTIVE HIPSTERS!”

It is the exhibitionist quality of Twitter is what makes it a success with users (though not a money maker, as I may have mentioned), because everyone tweeting wants to be heard -- or read. Unfortunately, as Bill Simmons observes, many of them have nothing interesting to say.

For proof, check out Twit or Not, an addictive take on the infamous Hot or Not which allows users to vote which tweets are the most boring. Go ahead and kill a couple hours. I just did.

The New York Times reported Thursday that Google has begun running relevant text ads on Google News, a practice the search giant avoided for nearly six years.

So why is this news? Because initially, newspaper publishers were weary of Google’s news aggregator (a service that collected headlines and clips of major – and minor – newspapers, linking users to the online story’s respective site), thinking that Google was essentially building a competing news site using the newspaper’s existing content. To help ease publishers’ fears that Google was stealing money from the newspapers, big G refrained from placing ads on Google News search results.

And that just changed, owing to what Google claims, via the New York Times, was an approach that delivered contextually relevant ads. I’m guessing they also thought it would turn a profit.

Google long maintained that its use of headline and snippets were in accordance with fair use copyright laws. Do they undercut that claim once they start making money through their “fair use” of the content? Will they share a piece of the profit with the ailing newspaper industry? After all, Google depends on a thriving newspaper industry to keep Google News viable.

That all leads to the confounding and circular chicken/egg logic behind the issue. To be a success, Google News needs fresh content from newspapers that in turn need pageviews via aggregators like Google News because no one is buying the print product that ultimately feeds the beast.

The fact is that both Google and the news industry is trying to make money off of something the news industry is giving away for free. Only now, Google may have figured out a way to do it.

AdWeek runs a story titled, There's Still Room for Google Killers, Study Says. CNET News counters with the commentary piece 'Google killers?' I don't think so. So, which is it?

AdWeek bases its claim on the fact that general search-engine brand loyalty is almost non-existent, and the cost of switching brands (or search engines) is low (in fact, free). Meaning that Google has not yet cemented #1 search engine status. AdWeek quotes a survey by Forrester Research revealing that only 20 percent of respondents use Google exclusively, with a full 80 percent of Web surfers either tied to other search engines or brand disloyal.

CNET counters that the survey doesn’t exactly show an open playing field. 59 percent of searchers use Google most often (up from 41 percent in 2006). Also:

…while 53 percent of consumers who set Yahoo as their home page most frequently select Yahoo for search, 91 percent of consumers who set Google as their home page most frequently use Google for search.

Finally, the analyst who wrote the study didn’t draw the same conclusion AdWeek trumpeted. In an email exchange with CNET’s Charles Cooper, Shar VanBoskirk claimed, “I'm definitely not trying to say that the 'nascent search field is wide open.” Her point was that marketers should concentrate on more than just Google, as users may turn to different search engines for specific types of content. For example, Google may provide the best sites related to information, but MSN is better for news content.

Funny how AdWeek completely missed the survey’s marketing spin.

(Credit: Forrester Research, via CNET)

Of course, the same could have been said four or five years ago about MySpace, which has many obits pending:

Is MySpace Over?

Is MySpace Dead?

Bank On It: Facebook Will Pass MySpace in US Popularity

... nothing, if you are Facebook.

According to Comscore via TechCruch, Facebook drew 222 million unique pageviews last month. Even more impressive, that translates to 80 billion pageviews and 22% of total Internet traffic. Yes, more than 1 in 5 internet users worldwide have been to Facebook. Still, Facebook has no real way to monetize that number... they just can't make money.

So, our eyes turn to MySpace. The much-maligned networker's traffic has held steady at approximately 100 million unique pagviews per month. And although it is still the nation's largest social network, it trails Facebook worldwide by about 100 million users. But, with the backing of the mighty News Corp, and its flexible ad streams, it outearns its more popular rival considerably. In a comment to TechCrunch, they said:

We are laser focused on building a sustainable global business which we measure by profits and revenue - not just eyeballs. In a tough economic climate, our international revenue is up 35 percent year over year and we continue to focus on those markets with the strong monetization opportunities. Additionally, MySpace continues to dominate the U.S. market–where the bulk of online advertising revenues reside–both in terms of monetization and user engagement with more than 76 million unique users and a 40% spike in engagement year over year.

Looks like MySpace is still ahead where it counts. With headlines like these, how can MySpace not make money?

Mom indicted in MySpace suicide case
Myspace murder trial turns graphic 
Man gets three months in MySpace sex case

(credit: ComScore)

CNET News staffer and social media commentator Caroline McCarthy had some interesting insight into “social media’s hidden bubble” this week. “As the recession rapidly sucks the momentum out of Web 2.0's heyday,” she writes, “with it may go one of the era's most defining terms: the job title ‘social media expert.’”

I certainly welcome a thinning of the social media expert herd, if not the outright extinction. Social media expert has become a meaningless title, as the only qualification one seemingly needs for the label is a Twitter account and Facebook profile.”

Judging from Caroline’s anecdote, that is enough to fool some companies.

One digital-strategies czar at a small media company told CNET News that a while back, before she was brought on board, her employer had enlisted a freelance "social media expert" to give the company a presence on Web 2.0's most buzzworthy communities. It was a disaster, she said. The consultant charged $200 an hour for what was effectively a bunch of Facebook fan pages and a Twitter account that most full-time staff wasn't particularly sure how to use. The final bill tallied almost $40,000.

Of course, the web is filled with hundreds of examples of companies using Facebook and Twitter effectively to get their message out to the masses. However, success takes an engaging product and a healthy respect for the community. After all, authenticity in the Web 2.0 world is and always will be key (see the migration of users from Friendster to MySpace to Facebook, as I commented here).”

There is also that little consideration if the product is geared toward the 2.0 world, as one astute observer opined:

Even now I read blogs on respected websites giving advise (sic) on how to make the most of social networking without any consideration for whether a company's market is even actually present on those social networks, let alone whether the effort helps achieve high level marketing goals.

I fear that social media experts are the new SEO experts, who, in turn, were the new snake oil salesmen...

I tend to agree with those who claim that Twitter is a feature, not a business (see my previous post, No Money in Web 2.0?), but you can't really put a dollar value on the adolescent-level giggles generated by a recent spate of Twitter hackings.

Apparently, some prank prone near-do-well attained access to multiple celebrity and news agency Twitter accounts and sent out (warning, PG13-rated content ahead!) charmingly immature tweets. For example, The Fox News feed "broke" the news that "Bill O Riley is gay." CNN's Rick Sanchez called in sick claiming, "I am high on crack right now and might not be coming into w ork today." And Britney Spears warned us of her unique anatomical features (see link above). In the end, Barack Obama, The Huffington Post, and, according to Twitter, more than 30 other high profile accounts were all penetrated.

The joker behind these misdeeds? An 18-year old hacker going by the handle GMZ. The method? An elaborate phishing scheme, perhaps? No, the kid attained access to Twitter's administrative controls by hacking into the account of a support staff member. It wasn't difficult, considering the member's password was "happiness," according to the Wired Blog network.

So the question now is, if Twitter really is a business, shouldn't its employees create better passwords?  

Is there anyone out there that can tell me what makes Google's search results so wonderful and relevant? I mean, could you tell the Google offering apart from Yahoo's or Ask's results in a blind test? I'm guessing not, and so is CNET Blog Network's Matt Asay, who opines: 

I've spent the last two days tinkering with searches on Microsoft Live Search, Google, and Yahoo, and on a pure quality basis it's hard to tell the three apart. I'm sure some objective science could be made of Google's superiority, but that's not how people search. If you're looking for "table salt" on Google, how do you know that the results returned are better than those on Yahoo? Answer: you don't.

In fact, the times that I can't find something with a search engine have much more to do with the quality of my search terms than with the quality of the algorithms informing the search, and no search engine really helps much with prodding quality search terms. How could they?

So why is Google the most dominate search engine with 63.5% of the search market, according to ChannelWeb? Asay thinks at this point, it is merely habit that Google geniusly fosters.

Ultimately, then, I think we use Google out of habit, not superior search. For most of us, it's the search engine to which our trusted computer adviser pointed us, and we've never looked back. Why would we? Because we don't have any way of independently verifying that a competitor would give us better search results, there really is no justification for switching.

So, Google is a habit. But it's not one that Google is willing to lackadaisically take for granted. Instead, it is building all sorts of ancillary value (Gmail, Picasa, etc.) which by themselves provide little add-on revenue opportunity but ensure that when we search, we never have reason to look beyond Google, its cash cow.

With Google so seemingly ingrained as a web routine, how can anyone hope to compete in the search space? I agree with Asay when he suggests that no one can compete with Google in the search space... competition will have to come in another form, a form that changes how we browse the internet and breaks our habits. There may be plenty of opportunity opening up in the mobile space, but I can't think of the next big thing to bring about that change. If I did, I'd be counting my money instead of writing this blog.

CNET’s News.com is reporting that New York City high-society rumormongers Cityfile today announced the gradual acquisition of domain names matching some of the movers and shakers it covers. Cityfile distinguishes itself from other gossip rags by exposing NYC’s powerful, behind-the-scenes business and media elite, making their run on domains a minimal investment.

Here is where it gets interesting: Instead of squatting on the site, preying on the insecurities of image conscious billionaires, and awaiting a selling opportunity, Cityfile is redirecting the URLs to Cityfile profile pages of the subject, presumably has a part of their SEO strategy.

And just to be jerks, in their announcement, Cityfile rubbed everyone’s noses in it:

Given the lengths to which prominent New Yorkers go to control their public profiles, you'd think they would have purchased their domain names by now. It's a $4 investment, which we're pretty sure billionaires like Jonathan Tisch, Steve Feinberg or Edgar Bronfman, Jr. can afford, even if this is the greatest depression ever.

"We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives." - The Amazing Criswell

By far, my favorite example of "go-to" journalism is the prediction piece (narrowly edging out the Thanksgiving-themed "Turkeys of the Year" and its cousin, the Yuletide "Naughty/Nice" list). At the end of every calendar year, journalists and commentators of various industries bang out 500 words of both bold and vague prophecies, all to inform the reader of the things to come in the new year.

BusinessWeek's Media Predictions for 2009 was the first such piece to catch my eye this year, and I'd like to share some of media critic Jon Fine's feckless forecasts.

Regarding media ad spending: It gets much worse before it gets better.
Regarding media ownership: Media ownership consolidates.
Regarding online advertising: Online advertising demonstrates it isn't immune to gravity.

And some of his gutsy guesses:

Radio rolls out a sort of hipster-lite format aimed at urban thirty- and forty-somethings consumed by jobs and parenting. It draws surprisingly good ratings in a few markets. (JC- Huh?)
New York Times Co. sells About.com to buy time for its flagship paper. (JC- Gawker spread that rumor around last month.)

Of course, Mr. Fine has probably forgotten more about media than I have ever known, so I am in no position to criticize. But, he was the man who claimed in his 2008 prediction column that "Amazon's Kindle e-book reader is stillborn."

Allow me debunk with a quote directly from Amazon's Kindle order page:

Due to heavy customer demand, Kindle is sold out. Please ORDER KINDLE NOW to reserve your place in line. We prioritize orders on a first come, first served basis. This item will arrive after December 24. Note that Kindles cannot currently be sold or shipped to customers living outside of the U.S.

Not to be outdone, another BusinessWeek writer opined two years ago in Seven Internet Prediction for 2007, "Facebook's efforts to expand beyond students and recent graduates will be largely unsuccessful. Moreover, the company won't sell itself to a large Internet company, especially if its asking price is $8 billion or more."

Just for the record, Facebook has more than 100 million active users, and as I stated in a previous blog post: judging by Microsoft's $240 million Facebook investment, Facebook is valued at about $15 billion.

All of this is to suggest that BusinessWeek an Criswell are in the same business. In Tim Burton's Ed Wood, Criswell claims, "If you look good, and you talk well, people will swallow anything."