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Tues News: 1/12 (A Little Bit Creepy Edition)
Michael Block | January 12th, 2010
Okay, Coach Z. You are still the captain of creepy!
The world of search marketing and the Internet in general is a diverse place. There are good guys (kiva.org), bad guys (swoopo.com) and ugly guys (dustindiamond.com). Still, the vast majority of the sites that you deal with fall somewhere in the grey areas**. The most helpful sites, such as Wikipedia, can often lead you astray with bad information. Google is an amazing tool for almost every aspect of your life but you know for a fact that Google probably knows more about you at this point than your Nana. Sure, Ebay no longer has the sketchy stigma it had a decade ago but that doesn’t mean that people have stopped getting ripped off.
The Internet may be a wonderful place but, when you really stop to think about it, it can be pretty creepy! This week, in the Tues News, I’ll address three sort of creepy developments in the search engine marketing world that might surprise you. Let’s get going!
- By now, you know that Google got the cold shoulder from Yelp when it offered half a billion dollars to purchase the restaurant-rating megasite. Well, as the old saying goes: Hell hath no fury like Sergey and Larry scorned. Keep in mind, all you innovators out there, that if Google offers to buy you out, what they are really saying is, “Don’t make us do what you do, only better!” Remember MapQuest? Yeah, neither do I. Google is responding to Yelp’s refusal to be bought by inventing their own Yelp called Near Me. No one knows where this is going but it sure is creepy to know that Google wasted less than a month trying to destroy the company that snubbed them. Yikes! [SearchEngineLand]
- So, speaking of things that Google completely replaced (i.e. MapQuest), let’s talk about a creepy new Google Maps feature! Have you ever seen a billboard on the Street View function? If not, check it out and you’ll notice billboards along the roads that you would expect; after all, it’s a just a photograph from a car. Well, those advertisements are likely out of date by now and there’s no reason for that space to go to waste, right? That’s just what Google was thinking! Google may be placing AdWords ads on photoshopped real-life billboards in Google Maps. Sounds crazy, right? Yeah, crazy like a fox. It might seem like a creepy idea now but I’ll bet we soon don’t even notice. After all, billboards themselves probably felt invasive originally; now they’re just part of the landscape. [Gizmodo]
- But hey, it’s not just Google that can be creepy! Facebook is doing a pretty darn good job as well! In an interview with TheRumpus.com, an anonymous Facebook employee tells us all not to trust our favorite social networking site with out data. It seems that Facebook doesn’t just remember your friend’s birthdays, it remembers every single click that you make. So, the next time you’re casually perusing photos from your ex-girlfriend’s birthday party in Vegas church’s ice cream social, remember, you’re not the only one in the room. [TheRumpus.com]
Yup, it can get pretty creepy out there. Many of us have convinced ourselves that the Internet is no more dangerous than our own kitchens. Well, to that I say, two things: 1) you may be right; creepy doesn’t necessarily mean dangerous and 2) MORE INJURIES HAPPEN IN THE KITCHEN THAN ANYWHERE ELSE! Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. Just stay on your toes and don’t be too trusting with your personal information, even with the most established of companies. Meanwhile, thanks for stopping by. Read up on and keep up with the online world; keep reading Tues News! Catch ya later!
** Isn’t it weird that the spelling of the color gray is, in and of itself, a bit of a grey area? Food for thought.
Related posts:
At least google finally decided to stop censoring search results in China.
Yes! Big news…lots of implications for Yahoo/Bing, too.
Google is awesome. If it could make me pop-tarts and water i’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have to leave its comfortable little cocoon it has created for everyone on the web.
If gray was a grey area then would “grey’s anatomy” show any gray anatomy of people.
I love Yelp, but that’s what they get for trying to hold out. When Google makes you an offer, its one you can’t refuse.
Creepy indeed. I’ve seen some speculation regarding the legitimacy of that Facebook article, but who knows… Seems believable to me, and nothing that was revealed comes as a surprise to me. It’s way too easy to get too comfortable with Facebook and forget about the fact that they retain crazy amounts of information about you. I’ve been wary ever since I saw this video back in the day – though admittedly it does have a bit of a conspiracy theory feel to it; still interesting nonetheless.
[...] about a month ago, I editorialized on the Wpromote blog about Google’s response to Yelp’s refusal to be purchased by [...]