The build a platform and squeeze business model
A business model that excludes competition, reduces consumer choice, and creates monopolies is the anti-thesis for free markets, but this is exactly what threatens both software and the distribution of media (ebooks, video, and music) over the internet, and much more. (more…)
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The website owners guide
It is an unfortunate fact that many websites work badly, from individuals’ blogs to small organisations’ simple sites to expensive sites belonging to large enterprises. The problem is that the managers of the organisation do not understand the web. This is my attempt to provide what they need to know without getting too technical. (more…)
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Are newspapers content farms?
I disagreed with a recent blog post by Alan Patrick which described the Huffington Post as a content farm. I do not think that the alleged lack of original content at the Huffpo is any worse than at many newspapers: so I concluded that it is not a content farm. It could be interpreted the other way: newspapers are content farms too. (more…)
The Huffington Post and AOL
The Huffington Post may not be a bad buy at the price AOL is paying, but that does not mean that AOL is right to buy it. (more…)
The internet as an instrument of control
Conventional wisdom has long been that the internet (and IT and modern telecommunications) are hard for governments to control and empower anyone willing to use them — activists and protesters in particular. I have long been sceptical, but I think its now clear I was right. (more…)
Demand Media IPO
I usually comment only on British companies (as investments, that is), but I also like to keep an eye on tech and internet companies, and on anything that illustrates a point. Demand Media falls in to both categories. (more…)
Google’s “concession” to Murdoch
Everyone seems to be interpreting the changes made by Google News as a victory for Murdoch and others who are trying t extract payments from Google in return for making their content searchable through Google. I disagree, and think it is designed to make life more difficult for those putting up pay walls. (more…)
Peak Google?
Alan Patrick is sticking his neck out and calling the top on Google’s growth. I am not convinced, and there are specific points that I have comments on. (more…)
LA Times false accusation of Facebook
Yet more examples of the wonderful fact checking that we can rely on journalists to do, the LA Times has a story that relies entirely on the authority of “someone’s blog said so”, accusing Facebook of using user’s photos in ads without permission. It was soon convincingly re-butted by Facebook. (more…)
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Google hatred
The usually intelligent Willem Buiter has written a great example of the irrational hatred that Google seems to sporadically evoke. He attacks them with a list of charges, all of which are easily refuted.
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