Wednesday 29 July 2009

Yahoo and Microsoft: search as a need, choice as a fact




Very basic:

With Microsoft and Yahoo operating independently, we had a choice of three top search engines and we used to choose Google. Basically because Google used to work better.

Now, people out there are saying that more choice will be available with the new deal between Microsoft and Yahoo. Sure, two is more than three.

And yes, I aggree... it will be easier to choose Google again. It keeps on working better and now there will be just one real alternative. Not 2. Keep it simple!


Monday 27 July 2009

Who's afraid of the big bad google? AdAge is!

Simon Dumenco, the media columnist for Advertising Age, writes about "The Coming Google Apocalypse" telling us that he's really scared about the cloud.
This is a negative article about the Cloud and the author talks only about Google. One should ask, is there really such a dark scenario to be afraid of? Is Google alone in the sky?

These questions are really important, but the main thesis on the AdAge article does not convice anyone:

"the larger reality is that more and more businesses and individuals are trusting their mission-critical data and applications to Google's cloud. And the problem with that: Google's cloud has the potential to blanket us -- smother us -- in ways much more systemic and potentially apocalyptic than Microsoft's desktop software monopoly ever did."

To dark for me:

"Now, what happens when 10% or 20% (or, heck, 75%) of, say, all U.S. small businesses come to depend on Google Apps and there's an outage of two hours or six hours or eight hours? What happens when 10% or 20% or 75% of U.S. small businesses effectively have an entire workday wiped out, thanks to Google cloud downtime?

Cascading ... flop sweat. Tears. Screaming. Desperation. Apocalypse."

This post was writen in the cloud. Powered by Google. It was posted at blogger, also from Google. Am I safe?

Make your conclusions after reading the full article, here.

Tuesday 7 July 2009

FREE: Two weeks for free

Chris Anderson's FREE Book is starting to spread in several free forms. Here is the e-book, available free ... for 2 weeks. Start reading now!

FREE (full book) by Chris Anderson

Saturday 4 July 2009

Free can be inevitable, but the debate has just started

John Gapper is the FT's chief business commentator and on his blog he writes about business, finance, media, technology and related matters. Last Thursday, Gapper published on FT a review of Chris Anderson's FREE book and then started in the blog a very interesting debate with Chris about FREE:


The posts sequence here:

An interactive review of Free by Chris Anderson

John has missed the essential point of Free

Freemium is another revenue shot in the dark

Free is not a digital choice, it is an inevitablity

Wednesday 1 July 2009

Free discutions on FREE

The discussion around Chris Anderson’s FREE has a new little bit of pepper: Seth Godin is simply saying that Malcom Gladwell “is wrong”. Gladwell published a salty (and free) review of FREE at The New Yorker web site, strongly disagreeing with the book main thesis. Anderson was forced to reply in his blog and number of pros and cons started to erupt in all kinds of comments, blogs and web sites.
FREE will be published next week: "FREE will be free, one way or another, in all digital forms" and hard-copies will be sold (also) here:



See a video of Chris Anderson presenting his new book, for free!