| | | Google's Latitude Has Vast Mobile Marketing Potential
Google launched a new program called Google Latitude this week which is an extension of their popular mobile Google Maps application. Essentially the new system extends Mobile Google Maps to provide real time location information for friends that you have chosen to follow and in turn have allowed you to follow them. Images of friends you are following appear on the map so you can see where they are at any given moment. You can also quickly interact with anyone you are monitoring through GTalk, SMS or Gmail.
I know what you are probably thinking, that is a little creepy. Well there is no doubt that it could be a bit stalker'ish but since it is 100% opt-in it is not so bad in my opinion (at least one privacy group feels otherwise). To increase privacy options Google was smart enough to include the ability to broadly change privacy settings to either stop everyone's viewing of your location entirely or just provide the city you are in. You can even manually select the location you are at instead of having it show automatically - a great option if you need to be appear to be somewhere else or you simply don't have enough connectivity to show your location automatically.
Now Google Latitude is undeniably cool but it is far from unique; there are a few other programs that are location aware, more established and have greater functionality such as BrightKite and Dopplr. That said, now that Google has gotten involved the potential of the location-aware landscape has changed. After all, take a moment and consider just what a company with the reach of Google could do with the data it is undoubtedly collecting right now from the travel habits revealed by Latitude users. It sure gets my creative juices working.
Here are a few paths Google could take this technology in the very near future:
Continue reading this article at SearchEngineGuide.com
by Ross Dunn, CEO/Founder
| | Introducing Our Internet Radio Show!
Now you can learn all of the latest news and tactics on search engine optimization by tuning in to Ross Dunn's very own Internet radio show on WebmasterRadio.FM co-hosted with Jennifer Evans Laycock, Editor-in-Chief of Search Engine Guide. The show is called SEO 101 and it airs for free every Monday at 2pm PST, 5pm EST at www.webmasterradio.fm (the radio will play as soon as the home page loads!). 
If you would like to listen to past shows (we have done 2 so far) you can go to our SEO 101 archives page and either listen to them on the page or download them as podcasts for your mobile device.
The show features interviews with SEO professionals from all over the world and diverse specialties. We delve into the basics of SEO all of the way to the most advanced tactics.
If you have any ideas on subjects for our show or questions you would like us to answer please send them to Ross Dunn via email and he will try to get them on the air.
Welcome to a new level of reporting from your web marketing experts at StepForth! | | Google PowerMeter
Google is developing a service to try and impact electrical energy consumption by allowing users to easily track their energy usage.
PowerMeter software will tap into the information provided by "smart meters" installed currently on many homes. It will display to customers exactly how they are using power and relate it to specific appliances in the home to help them to pin point the biggest contributors to their consumption.
By having a clear idea where the electricity is being used up, it will allow for a much easier means to conserve energy and lower power bills. "If half of America's households cut their energy demand by 10 percent, it would be the equivalent of taking eight million cars off the road" noted Google Engineer Ed Lu on the Google Blog Monday.
While the project is still in the early stages, Google hopes that PowerMeter will be introduced publically within the next couple of months.
by Scott Van Achte, Senior SEO
| | Air Miles Offered for Yahoo Searches
For all our Canadian readers out there, if you find yourself collecting Air Miles, searching Yahoo may help you get that free flight just a little bit quicker. The Air Miles Yahoo Toolbar was recently launched, and for every 50 searches performed using the Air Miles toolbar you will earn 5 Air Miles, up to a maximum of 30 Air Miles per month. For card holders who do not have enough Miles to redeem their rewards, Air Miles offers the option to  purchase additional miles at 30 cents each. When we break down the math, that means that for every Yahoo search preformed using this toolbar, you will get a $0.03 value in return - (5 Air Miles * $0.30 / 50 searches = $0.03) - getting paid to search, it's about time! As a search marketer I tend to search Yahoo fairly often, not as much as Google, but still, enough to get a little extra padding on my Air Miles Account. by Scott Van Achte, Senior SEO
| | You Tube Yanks Audio
Last night I was looking through some of my favourite You Tube videos and stumbled across something of which I was completely unaware. You Tube is muting sound from a lot of user's videos.
 I am a huge Lord of the Rings buff and avidly seek related content on You Tube. One of my all-time favourite videos is called Namarie, a recitation of Galadriel's lament. This is a poem taken from the Fellowship of the Ring book, recited in spoken Quenyan, an Elvish language created by J.R.R Tolkien. The original audio consisted of a reading by the person who posted the video, over a background sample of the Lothlorien track from the Fellowship of the Ring soundtrack.
This was one of the most hauntingly beautiful pieces I have ever seen on You Tube and I have watched it often. I say "was", because as I found out last night, You Tube has completely ruined it by removing the audio.
According to the person who created and uploaded this, she wasn't notified of this change and has no way of retrieving this even for her own personal collection.
I did some research to find out what this was all about and it didn't take long. There were over a million results for a "WMG and You Tube" search, including quite a few of them with some pretty explicit commentary from angry users who have had their own videos or a lot of their favourites ruined.
This started back in December of last year with this official post from You Tube, which seems a little vague on what was to follow. In that post they mention the options available upon receipt of a takedown notification. However, many of the complaints I viewed were from people upset at the fact that they weren't notified before or after this was done.
Perhaps they aren't getting takedown notifications because, rather than actually taking the content down, You Tube is just chopping out the audio.
Upon looking into this further, I came upon a more detailed reason for all this...money. Warner Music Group wants more money from You Tube for users viewing videos that contain any portion of music copyrighted under any of their many labels.
One would think they'd like having the free advertising. Do they really think having their music removed from You Tube is going to generate more sales?
I find it difficult to believe that I can't hear this video anymore because it contains a small part of the movie soundtrack, and yet I can watch the Lord of the Rings movies in their entirety on You Tube for free.
Ironically, it was this video that encouraged me to go out and buy a copy of the movie soundtrack, which is in fact owned by Reprise Records, a Warner owned label.
I checked out a lot of videos of many artists under WMG labels on You Tube and there are large numbers still unaffected by this. I suppose it's a lengthy process to effectively neuter so much content.
In the long run, I think this will hurt both You Tube and WMG. You Tube for the poor treatment to their users and the end result of having a ton of useless content when this is all done. And now, rather than receiving "too little" WMG will now receive zero revenue from this media.
Personally, I tend to agree with the headline of this post. This whole thing is ludicrous and it's too bad for WMG if the advent of technology is making them obsolete. Perhaps they should just accept the inevitable and fade away.
"Two thumbs down" to both Google-owned You Tube and the Warner Music Group on this one.
by Timothy Rule, PPC Specialist
| | The Net Reality
Fun at Work!
Need a break for a minute or two and can't leave the office? Think Geek has a wacky supply of office items and one of th ose is turning your sticky notes into Origami (the traditional Japanese art of paper folding), ergo taking a break from staring at the computer or focusing on a project. Not only do you let your creative juices flow for a few minutes, you will also have something constructive to show for it. Each pad comes with printed instruction for 10 different origami shapes.
And for those who have this insatiable thirst for gadgets, here is one of the newest and latest on the market. It is the Smart Pen which records and links audio to what you write, so you never miss a word. Although not a lover of gadgets, one of these handy dandy pens would definitely be useful for me; especially when taking notes or taking minutes at our staff meetings. Now what I need to do is convince my boss, a huge lover of gadgets, I should have one before he gets his.
Think this is all there is that is neat and funky on the market? Now you can have a custom keyboard from Datamancer. Way cool!
And just when you thought there wasn't anything else about fun stuff I could write about, Bill Stroll, our Sales and Marketing Manager, sends me this article where students at the MIT MediaLa b have 'developed a wearable computing system that turns any surface into an interactive display screen'. Once the students have perfected this prototype, it will hopefully not require the use of coloured finger bands and be less 'clunky'. This is an awesome idea especially when one device will eventually replace all the other multitouch devices most people have.
By Anita Sperrer, Office Manager
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