Graeme's

Are newspapers content farms?

Posted by Graeme in Internet,Media at 2:37 pm on Wednesday, 9 February 2011

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…)

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The Huffington Post and AOL

Posted by Graeme in Internet,Media,Shares at 9:14 am on Tuesday, 8 February 2011

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…)

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The internet as an instrument of control

Posted by Graeme in Internet,Media,Politics at 12:46 pm on Tuesday, 7 December 2010

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…)

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Demand Media IPO

Posted by Graeme in Internet,Shares at 7:37 am on Sunday, 15 August 2010

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…)

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Google’s “concession” to Murdoch

Posted by Graeme in Business & Investment,Internet at 10:12 pm on Wednesday, 2 December 2009

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…)

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Peak Google?

Posted by Graeme in Business & Investment,Internet at 11:34 am on Monday, 23 November 2009

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…)

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LA Times false accusation of Facebook

Posted by Graeme in Internet,Wrong at 6:49 am on Sunday, 26 July 2009

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

Posted by Graeme in Economics,Internet,Wrong at 6:37 am on Wednesday, 29 April 2009

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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The Wall Street Journal gets spun

Posted by Graeme in Internet,Wrong at 5:29 am on Tuesday, 16 December 2008

The Wall Street Journal seems to have been completely fooled by telecoms spin-doctors into claiming that Google, and other prominent advocates of net neutrality, have changed their views.

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The internet is easy to censor

Posted by Graeme in Internet,Politics at 4:56 pm on Wednesday, 10 December 2008

It has often been said that the internet is hard to censor because “it treats censorship as a defect and routes around it”. This could not be more wrong, the internet is the easiest medium to censor. (more…)

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