Scotsman Makes Lemonade from Google Revenues
April 18, 2009
The UK newspapers have a chip on their shoulder when it comes to the GOOG. I shook my beak at this headline in Scotland’s leading newspaper: “Google ‘Slow Growth’ and ‘Falling Sales’. You may want to read the story here. I thought the GOOG did well, certainly better than most of the dead tree outfits. The Scotsman wrote:
It is also the first time that year-on-year growth has dropped to single digits since Google’s stock market launch in August 2004.
What made the sentence notable was that the story was broken by a pulsing eBay ad for local classifieds. I found this juxtaposition which was probably accidental amusing.
Stephen Arnold, April 18, 2009
Custom Publishing The Time Warner Way
April 18, 2009
Custom publishing is tricky business. First, there’s the database that contains the customer particulars. Then there is the input file that contains the customer preferences. And there are algorithms that take customer preferences and match them with content that is “ready” for the publication. Then there are pesky variables such as an advertiser who pulls out creating a copy hole which may be filled with a public service ad or a bit of scintillating prose that was chopped to fit text around the paying customers’ messages. You have arts and crafts people poking around. You have some legal eagles getting worry lines over rights. The fact checkers scurry about fretting that the inevitable errors are not going to slip through their 20 something fingers. And so on.
Lots of moving parts.
According to Fast Company here, Time Warner had a vision of cranking out customized magazines. Now there are companies who have the work flow and the systems to deliver this type of service. Most of my readers will be uninterested in companies like InfoPrint, Exstream Software, and StreamServe, among others. There are the outfits who put in a car payment, a reminder for a coupon, info about your model’s most recent recall, and other items intended to make you believe that the financial institution holding your loan cares about you and your vehicle. Dead tree outfits don’t use these types of systems. A whole ecosystem of publishing software companies create custom publishing systems that deliver personalized content to whizzy digital presses.
“Time’s Printed RSS Feed Magazine Needs Debugging, Ad Blocking” by Ariel Schwartz wrote:
A number of the magazine’s 31,000 subscribers received content intended for other subscribers (i.e. In Style fans ended up with Sports Illustrated content). Time Inc. spokespeople say that the glitch was the result of a computer error. To make matters worse, many of the stories picked by the project’s editors were up to two years old–something that Time Inc. claims was done on purpose since it “was never the intent for this to be a breaking news vehicle,” and that future issues will have more recent content.
So what went wrong? Many slips twixt cup and lip. I would wager a crust of bread on the margin of my mine run off pond that the Time Warner managers have convinced themselves that the problem was an anomaly and won’t happen again. Life was easier when content was cast in lead and legions of specialists created the weekly. Those bits and bytes are tricky beasts.
Stephen Arnold, April 18, 2009
Copyright: I Told You So Twice from Techdirt
April 17, 2009
Short honk: If you have been following the copyright guerilla skirmishes, you will want to read Techdirt’s “A Look Back At Some Prescient Predictions On Copyright” here via Michael Scott from Thomas O’Toole (a provenance chain that makes clear online is not the same as a high school term paper with footnotes). The article points to two documents that presaged the murky nature of copyright in a pervasive network and the difficult of getting money for digital content when copying is a basic system function. Worth reading. Download the referenced papers if you don’t have them in your repository now. The dead tree crowd may have a liquid lunch after revisiting these documents, one of which is almost 20 years young.
Stephen Arnold, April 17, 2009
Google and Guha: The Semantic Steamroller
April 17, 2009
I hear quite a lot about semantic search. I try to provide some color on selected players. By now, you know that I recycle in this Web log, and this article is no exception. The difference is that few people pay much attention to patent documents. In general, these are less popular than a printed dead tree daily paper, but in my opinion quite a bit more exciting. But that’s what makes me an addled goose, and you a reader of free Web log posts.
You will want to snag a copy of US20090100036 from our ever efficient USPTO. Please, read the instructions for running a query on the USPTO system. I don’t provide for free support to public facing, easy to use, elegant interfaces such as that available from the Federal government.
The “eyes” of Googzilla. From US20090100036, Figure 21, Cyrus, in case you want to see what your employer is doing these days.
The title of the document is “Methods and Systems for Classifying Search Results to Determine Page Elements” by a gaggle of Googlers, one of whom is Ramanathan Guha. If you read my Google Version 2.0 or the semantic white paper I wrote for Bear Stearns when it was respected and in business, you know that Dr. Guha is a bit of a superstar in my corner of the world. The founder of Epinions.com and a blue chip wizard with credentials (Semantic Web RDF, Babelfish, Open Directory, etc.) that will take away the puffery of newly minted search consultants, Dr. Guha invented, wrote up, and filed five major inventions. These five set forth the Programmable Search Engine. You will have to chase down one of my for fee writings to get more detail about how the PSE meshes with Google’s data management inventions. If you are IBM or Microsoft, you will remind me that patents are products and that Google is not doing anything particularly new. I love those old eight track tapes, don’t you.
The new invention is the work of Tania Bedrax-Weiss, Patrick Riley, Corin Anderson, and Ramanathan Guha. His name is spelled “Ramanthan” in the patent snippet I have. Fish & Richardson, Google’s go-to search patent attorney may have submitted it correctly in October 2007 but it emerged from the USPTO on April 16, 2009, with the spelling error.
The application is a 33 page long document, which is beefy by Google’s standard. Google dearly loves brevity so the invention is pushing into Gone with the Wind length for the GOOG. The Fish & Richardson synopsis said:
This invention relates to determining page elements to display in response to a search. A method embodiment of this invention determines a page element based on a search result. The method includes: (1) determining a set of result classifications based on the search result, wherein each result classification includes a result category and a result score; and (2) determining the page element based on the set of result classifications. In this way, a classification is determined based on a search result and page elements are generated based on the classification. By using the search result, as opposed to just the query, page elements are generated that corresponds to a predominant interpretation of the user’s query within the search results. As result, the page elements may, in most cases, accurately reflect the user’s intent.
Got that? If you did not, you are not alone. The invention makes sense in the context of a number of other Google technical initiatives ranging from the non hierarchical clustering methods to the data management innovations you can spot if you poke around Google Base. I noted classification refinement, snippets, and “signal” weighting. If you are in the health biz, you might want to check out the labels in the figures in the patent application. If you were at my lecture for Houston Wellness, I described some of Google’s health related activities.
On the surface, you may think, “Page parsing. No big deal.” You are not exactly right. Page parsing at Google scale, the method, and the scores complement Google’s “dossier” function about which Sue Feldman and I wrote in our September 2008 IDC client only report. This is IDC paper 213562.
What does a medical information publisher need with those human editors anyway?
Stephen Arnold, April 17, 2009
Reading News: Amazing Math Equals Falling Revenues
April 17, 2009
If you are an MBA looking for work, you may want to check out the fancy math here. The article sports a remarkable title: “Print Is Still King: Only 3 Percent of Newspaper Reading Happens Online”. The author is Martin Langeveld. If an MBA finds the assumptions acceptable, that person may want to apply for a job at the Nieman Journalism Lab. I did not feel comfortable with the assumptions, so I resisted the main thrust of the write up. In my opinion, the numbers indicate that print newspapers have more reach and other goodness that online news does not. I think that online news has some major flaws, but traditional newspapers are not setting the world on fire. The other thought that crossed my mind is that those younger than I are into digital info and don’t see paper documents quite as old geese like me.
One final comment: if those eyeballs had value, the local newspaper would not have had to double the forced time off for certain staff. Gannett and other newspaper companies would be cashing checks, not riffing staff. With MBAs somewhat discredited, their math skills might mesh with analyses for the newspaper industry. Who knows? Fancy math might work and the media giants will once again rule the information universe.
Stephen Arnold, April 16, 2009
Gatekeepers’ Last Gasp: Journalists Know Information
April 17, 2009
The Guardian (a UK dead tree publication) ran Seth Finkelstein’s “Shutdown of Wikia Search Proves Empty Rhetoric of Collaboration” here. I enjoyed the idea, the argument, and the writing. On the surface, the failure of the collaborative, people-fueled search system Wikia is a news story. In fact, in appropriate journalistic garb, the guts of the argument could be used in a first year writing class:
This strategy of mining user-generated discontent foundered in trying to monetise those sentiments. As anyone in politics can attest, it’s easy to have a crowd rant about dangers and to generate press coverage, but harder to turn those feelings into something vaguely useful. And, contrary to many pundits who have sought to find some way that Wikia Search could be said to have affected Google, there is no evidence it had any effect whatsoever. While Google’s “SearchWiki” interface has an obviously similar name, beyond that possible bit of marketing the underlying system is much more about personalisation than presenting results to others.
How delicious! “Vaguely useful.”
When I think about this article in the context of the fire fight now raging about online information and the traditional media (aka “dead tree outfits”), I chuckled. The article does a very good job of making clear that a gatekeeper has to step forward and impose order on the unruly crowd. Indeed. As civil disorder peppers cities from Athens to Zagreb, order is useful.
On one hand, Google seems to be the outfit best suited to manage the search side of the world. Whom do you suppose should handle the information side? Mr. Finkelstein’s approach left this addled goose with the idea that newspapers and publishers are the ideal candidates to tidy up the messy information businesses.
I have no idea who will craft “a representative trajectory of Web evangelism”. I do have a hunch that the dead tree crowd will have some ideas and expect to be paid to perform this valuable service.
Stephen Arnold, April 17, 2009
Publishers: Bet the Farm
April 16, 2009
Uncertain about the vagaries of digital products, publishers are doing what we call in Harrod’s Creek, “betting the farm.” The idea is simple. The person who plays poker looks at her hand. She decides that the cards are a sure bet. Instead of raising a dollar or two, she goes whole hog (another farm colloquialism) and bets the farm; that is, she puts the deed to her two acres of rocky ground on the pile of money and says, “Call.” If you are a gambler with a math background, you may suggest that she’s nuts. If you are a Kentucky lottery customer, you say, “That’s smart, lady.”
These down home images waddled though my goose brain when I read Lynn Neary’s “Publishers Gamble on Blockbuster Book Deals” on the NPR.org Web site. You can read her story here. (There’s probably a link to the audio somewhere on the page, but these tired eyes can’t spot gray links, sorry.) The idea is that publishers are opening their checkbooks to get their ink stained paws on “sure winner” authors. What’s a sure winner? How about books by female humorists such as Tina Fey and Sarah Silverman, among others?
The strengths and weaknesses of this approach to media was documented in a memorable book called Carnival Culture by James Twitchell. I am certain the economists from Stanford University who read this Web log will point to earlier and probably less readable analyses of this aspect of the media business. If you want to take my recommendation, grab a copy from Amazon here. The strength of the “blockbuster” is that when a media company gets one, money rains in torrents. The problem is that when the blockbuster flops, the advance and the effort goes to the remainder bin or direct to video. A publisher with a blockbuster that occurs with a textbook adoption cycle is in a pickle. The risk of losing the text adoption for an economics or psych book can plunge the publishing company into a sea of red ink. The narrowing margins mean that the costs of updating become more burdensome over time. Like I said, pickle.
Ms. Neary wrote:
Publishing has been always a gamble… no one really knows what will take off is part of the fun. But he thinks these days the stakes are getting too high, with the publishers taking all the risks and writers getting paid whether the book sells or not.
My conclusion: publishing companies’ business strategy is pretty similar to my Harrod’s Creek neighbor who bets the farm on the flip of a card. I don’t have the nerves for this type of business model. I prefer to float in my mine run off choked pond and watch the wizards of traditional media deal with the information opportunities from afar. My network connection feeds by addled goose brain. I am not sure what sustains the publishing companies with the blockbuster tactic.
Stephen Arnold, April 16, 2009
Monetizing Online: A Keeper for Newspaper CFOs
April 15, 2009
Please, click here to read “One Paper’s Online-Only Move Had Little Effect on Web Traffic, Study Says”, an article that appeared in the Wall Street Journal’s Web log. The article describes the impact of shifting to online from traditional print for a sample of one. You can read a summary of the case example by an academic here. The study reveals that the newspaper suffered a decline in traffic. The assumption of the dead tree crowd was that online traffic would increase because readers of print would become readers of online news. Wrongo. For me the most interesting comment in the WSJ article was this statement:
“It doesn’t make for very pleasant reading,” he [WSJ source] acknowledges. “The Web is a fundamentally different medium, and you have to completely revise your expectations of how your audience is going to use your content if you’re publishing exclusively online.”
For more analysis of online, run a query on this Beyond Search Web log for “mysteries of online”. I posted a series of write ups that bring together observations and findings I have compiled over the last 30 years based on my experience in online. Hint: demographics and habit come into play. MBAs thinking often goes off the rails, but my, oh my, are the mavens confident. A zippy search system doesn’t work without traffic. Come to think about it, neither does online advertising.
Stephen Arnold, April 15, 2009
Google: The Tapeworm
April 15, 2009
I enjoy the New York Times. I find the write ups a good mix of big city hipness and “we know more than you” information about major trends in the world. The editorials are fun too. Having worked at a daily paper and a big magazine publisher, I know how some of the ideas take shape. Outside contributions are useful as well. Getting a chunk of column inches can do wonders for a career or an idea.
I liked “Dinosaur at the Gate” here. The author is Maureen Dowd. She summarizes big media’s view of the GOOG. The image of “tapeworm” was fresh and amusing. I never thought of math as having tapeworm qualities, but I am an addled goose.
The bottomline is that this write up will probably have quite a bit of influence in shaping the dialog about Googzilla, a term I coined when on a panel with a Googler in 2005. The Googler laughed at my image of a smiling Googzilla as did the audience. I used the term affectionately in 2005. Then Googzilla was at the gate. Today Googzilla is in the city, kicking back at TGIF, sipping a mojito.
More about its influence within the core of the information world appears in Google: The Digital Gutenberg here. By the way, Google definitely has some characteristics of middleware, but it is more. Much, much more. I think Google is a positive in today’s information world, and I urge readers to consider “surfing on Google”. If this phrase doesn’t make sense, check out my two Google monographs, dating from 2005 here.
Stephen Arnold, April 15, 2009
Beyond Search: Saying Again – Marketing Blog
April 14, 2009
One of my three or four readers sent me a link to a Tweet that reveals–gasp–the shocking truth that this Web log is a marketing vehicle. Oh, my what an insightful comment. I explain what the purpose of Beyond Search is in my editorial policy which you may read here if you wish.I haven’t changed it much since I started this blog in January 2008. I started the Web log to recycle information. I learned quickly that I am not a news goose and I don’t want to be one. If a company wants to hire me to describe their products and services, I will talk. I also promote aggressively my reports and studies. The reason is that this Web log now reaches more than 35,000 readers per month, so it has become a better marketing vehicle that some of my four publishers possess. I don’t include the for fee content in this Web log. I rather shamelessly point you to Information World Review, KMWorld, and the Smart Business Network where my published columns appear. I even cover search engine optimization. If you read this Web log you know that I am critical of those who are self appointed SEO experts. I am no expert, but I can describe functions that the GOOG explains are important to appearing at a reasonable point in a results list.
Summing up:
- I am not a journalist. I sell my opinion, and I pay people to write articles about companies and products. Some of these outfits pay for my writers’ time. Others dazzle us with their scintillating personalities. Don’t confuse what appears in Beyond Search with “journalism”, which seems to be in a bit of a pickle in my opinion. Whining, going out of business, and losing jobs I think applies in some cases.
- I write about my interests in an often futile attempt to generate inquiries about my patent analysis, expert witness, and management consulting business. The Web log “sort of” works, but it is a marketing vehicle. Let me repeat: marketing vehicle. Do you think? Doh?
- I write about my son’s business even though he is closely aligned with the GOOG, an outfit that wishes my goose were cooked. I take umbrage if someone criticizes my son, so if you get frisky with my progeny, expect to see some sparks from the senior Arnold in the clan.
- I am not interested in whether some of the companies and products survive, are wonderful, or are just me too products in a lousy financial climate.
- I tell PR people that I am not a journalist. I don’t respect their “leaks”. I don’t want to be briefed unless someone pays for my time. One jejune lass almost cried when I told her I wanted money to sit through a Webinar. Sensitive plant, she is.
I think that there are some folks who confuse Web logs (free) with confidential, for fee work. I opine that there are quite a few consulting firms trying to sell advice without having solid technical foundations and trying to create the impression that their Web logs are the equivalent of the Harvard Business Review or the output of second and third tier consulting firms.
Let me set the record straight. There are a handful of blue chip consulting firms and advisory services in the world. I worked for many years at Halliburton Nuclear (get it right or literally die), Booz Allen & Hamilton (before the disastrous break up), and a number of high profile outfits from intelligence agencies to the government of England. I been involved in successes and failures. I have learned from the best (Dr. William P. Sommers) and from the worst (a gambler in LA).
Working at blue chip firms where information is the key to success and writing a Web log are at different ends of the content spectrum. I don’t get confused. Some folks can’t figure out that Beyond Search is a marketing vehicle. Others can’t get the drift that when I argue against SEO, I am generating buzz.
I hope that’s clear. I am 65 years old and getting pretty tired of callow youth who find this Web log somehow offensive to their gentle spirits. Suck it up. Life gets worse and it will for the foreseeable future. When the chips are down, clients don’t want those who learn on the job. Clients want results. An MBA or a bit of work at a third tier firm won’t do the job in my opinion.
Stephen Arnold. April 14, 2009
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