Buzz Friday for June 22, 2007

Here is a look at what is happening across a couple of sites I keep an eye on. I am refining this post over time, so if there is anything you would like me to add just email me or leave a comment. Similarly, if you have something you think is Buzz Friday worthy let me know and I'll look it over for inclusion.

[Note: The audio this week should be noticeably better for you. Let me know if anybody has trouble hearing it.]

Feed readers can see the video here.

Here are all of the items that I think are interesting this week:

• One week until iPhone drops. Prepare for the madness and get in line now.
  
• YouTube will launch on the iPhone. Like to see their data plan rates before I get too excited about this one.
  
• Yahoo had a leadership change this week as they keep falling further behind Google. Will it help?
  
• I love this post from Seth Godin. He shifts our thinking of most people about blogging. What if you had just one post, but refined it until you were the expert on your subject?
  
• Microsoft is paying attention to social media. A Zune fan got two tattoos promoting the device and MS is having him out to Redmond to meet the Zune team. Nice job MS.

  
  

• Pier 1 is dropping e-commerce from its site to turn it into a corporate marketing piece. WHAT?! They were doing around $18.9 million, but managed to lose money. Sounds like bad implementation to me.
  
• Steve Rubel has a great piece about the future of PR. It's participating, not pitching.
  
• Mark Goren has a great post about what we make. The video he uses is a must see if you are or know of a teacher of anything.
  
• Cool things always happen in London. Here are a couple of shopping examples. Ralph Lauren has a touch-sensitive window and the music group The Chemical Brothers took over a storefront to promote a new album.
  
• More Yahoo rumors in the wake of the CEO switch. Will they buy Bebo? Somebody will and the other major viable option seems to be cost-prohibitive.
  
• Want to know how big YouTube is getting? They're about to pass the BBC in visits in the UK. That's huge!
  
• crayon is hosting a virtual branding summit in Second Life. Check out this post if you are interested.
  
• Person-to-person lending is taking off as the user base of sites like MySpace and Facebook grow. Prosper and Lending Club are getting investment dollars and having some success.
  
• Vodaphone created a media roadblock the other day in the UK as it took over web, cable, satellite and terrestrial channels to run their ad. That had to cost a pretty penny.
  
• Patrick at Lonely Marketer has a great look at what analytics you should be looking at and why. This is a great post as it clarifies what you need to know.
  
• Ning lets you embed a social network in another social network. There is lots of potential here and you can expect to see this happen more and more.
  

Quick look at iPhone blog buzz

iPhone has taken over the buzz from most other mobile devices. Here is a graph tracking blog mentions between iPhone, Razr and Blackberry.

Top 10 Technorati Searches

1. youtube
   
2. ron paul
   
3. myspace
   
4. noelia
   
5. dailymotion
   
6. bebo
   
7. iphone
   
8. paris hilton
   
9. facebook
   
10. videos
    

Top Five Web2.0 Movers of the Week (using Alexa data)

1. Kaboodle
   
2. Fotolia
   
3. Wikia
   
4. Snap
   
5. CrazyEgg
   

More

Top Ten Marketing Blogs from Viral Garden - No changes this week

1. Seth's Blog
   
2. Creating Passionate Users
   
3. Gaping Void
   
4. Logic + Emotion
   
5. Duct Tape Marketing
   
6. Daily Fix
   
7. Converstations
   
8. Drew's Marketing Minute
   
9. The Viral Garden
   
10. Jaffe Juice
    

View the top full top 25

Top Ten Marketing Blogs from Todd And - New to Buzz Friday

1. Seth Godin
   
2. tompeters!
   
3. Micro Persuasion
   
4. Online Marketing Blog
   
5. Adrants
   
6. Pronet Advertising
   
7. SEOMoz Blog
   
8. Duct Tape Marketing
   
9. Marketing Pilgrim
   
10. adgoodness
    

View the full list here

Top 5 "Viral" Videos This Week

1. Paul singing opera
   
2. Prometeus - the media revolution
   
3. Britain's got talent - Conny
   
4. Microsoft surface parody
   
5. Dramatic look
   

More

Technorati Tags:
trends, buzz, buzzfriday, matt dickman, Techno//Marketer

Comments

[Patrick Schaber]

Hey Matt,
Another great Buzz! I'm not going to be the first to jump on the iPhone, but I'd sure like to have it for a hours to check it out. It sounds like a very cool toy. Like you though, I'll be curious about how much the data plans will run.

Thanks also for the analytics post mention! I appreciate that.

-Pat

[Roger Anderson]

Matt,
I just found your blog as one of the top blogs that makes Becky of Customers Rock! think. I can see why.

I appreciate your thoughts on Seth's "everyone should blog" post but as I said there - I disagree. I think of the saying about it being best to keep one's mouth shut and be thought a fool that to open it and remove all doubt. Your exception, and his that I felt was understated, is that it can be great if done well. You have noted, in your Pier 1 comment, that it is entirely possible for a very large company to screw-up something as simple as this. My case is made.
I look forward to visiting your blog often. You are in my a-list of blogs. I keep an A, B, C, & D list in my RSS reader. I try very hard to review the A list every morning. The B list during the afternoon or evening if I have time. The C & D lists get random visits here and there. There is so much that is great but there is not enough time for all of it.

[Matt Dickman]

Patrick -- Glad you like these, I'm trying to keep them really focused yet cover a lot of ground. Per your comment on the iPhone, I agree with you in that I won't be standing in the queue this Friday. Mostly that's because I am on Verizon, but I would rather have the 2nd or 3rd generation device.

[Matt Dickman]

Roger -- First, thank you for the add and I hope to keep you thinking along the way. I also love the way you have your feeds organized, I may have to borrow your setup. Makes a lot of sense.

You're definitely correct re: Seth's post. If you don't have something remarkable, you should probably not say anything. I do think, however, that this medium is *really* good at allowing people to float out an incomplete idea, get feedback over time and come out on the other end with a really solid idea. It's a laboratory for me for sure.

Thank you again for the comment!

[Linus Kendall]

Great review of what's happening! I think that the iPhone over the last couple of days is starting to dominate the media completely, hard to find many blogs that don't at least comment on it or give their view... Soon it'll come to Europe - not that I'll get one unless they open it up a lot more (coupling it with AT&T like that seems a bit absurd to me!).

-linus

[Matt Dickman]

Linus -- Welcome and thank you for the comment! It's hard to escape the iPhone in any medium. My Google Reader is inundated with iPhone posts. It will come to Europe soon and I've seen rumor of a Vodaphone pairing over there to be announced as early as this week. We'll see how that goes.

One thing I find interesting on this is if I were Apple, I would have new devices ready to roll out to other carriers ASAP. Think about this in the light of Motorola. They supply slightly different, but exclusive versions of the RAZR to all of the carriers. I would assume Apple would have new product in the queue for the other major carriers. If they did that, they could make a major dent in the wireless device industry. Keeping it on at&t isn't going to get the share they would need.