When Facebook filed to go public earlier this week, you can be sure that the excitement in the halls of Facebook’s offices was palpable. After all, the company’s wild ride is going to make a lot of people very wealthy.

But the excitement around Facebook’s IPO isn’t just being felt amongst Facebook’s employees. It’s creating increased excitement for technology entrepreneurs, some of whom hope their startups could be the next Facebook.

There’s certainly reason to believe that Facebook’s public debut will help the startup community. After all, Facebook is probably going to be the largest technology IPO ever.

But it’s about more than that. Consider the following:

• A company that was started in a university dorm room has quite literally changed the world in less than a decade. From culture to marketing, even if you don’t ‘like’ the world’s largest social network, it’s hard to deny its impact.
• In eight years, Facebook has not only grown into a multi-billion dollar business, it has spurred the creation of other multi-billion dollar businesses.
• It came through the Great Recession unscathed, and just a few short years after the world’s financial markets collapsed, could be valued by investors at as much as $100bn.
• Facebook’s CEO is a 27 year-old Harvard dropout who, for all intents and purposes, never had a ‘real job’ before he started Facebook with his university buddies.

Facebook may not be perfect, and it could very well be significantly overvalued when its stock begins trading, but make no mistake about it: it’s perhaps the strongest case study for ‘Internet FTW!’ and should help convince investors who still need convincing that few markets today offer the opportunities that technology does. That, logically, should promote more investment in technology, an apparent boon for startups.

But will all of that investment really go to startups? And of the portion that does, which startups will capture the greatest amount? The answers to these questions aren’t really clear.

On both, it’s worth considering that the Facebook IPO could actually take some money out of the startup ecosystem. While some of the funds that invested in the company will certainly take their IPO gains and put them into new companies, a publicly-traded Facebook could gobble up investment of its own. Case in point: in the run-up to the company’s IPO, we saw numerous funds purchasing Facebook stock on secondary markets. Without those secondary markets, at least some of that that capital might have gone to younger startups.

With that in mind, it’s worth considering that a successful public debut may push some investors to focus on mature startups with the potential to follow Facebook into the public markets in the next couple of years. That would benefit large, already well-funded startups like Box.net, Dropbox and AirBnB, but not necessarily younger startups whose futures are still far from certain.

Finally, some are pointing out that, flush with newly-liquid and highly-valuable stock, Facebook could help push the acquihire craze to new heights. In acquihires, larger companies like Facebook and Google buy small, young startups not for their products, but rather for their people. That’s good for the well-connected investors who sometimes put in as little as five-figures for a stake in these companies, but it isn’t necessarily good for entrepreneurs and the startup economy. After all, the entrepreneurs go to work for the acquirer and promising products which could be the next Facebooks usually die, leaving fewer and fewer ‘good’ startups to invest in.

Which brings us back to the original question: is Facebook good for the startup economy or not? As Facebook itself would say, “It’s complicated.”

Yesterday, Budweiser released a video on YouTube of two amature hockey teams surprised with pro treatment as screaming fans, cheerleaders and mascots attended their pick up game. This two minute spot is the extended version of their new ad premiering in Canada during the Super Bowl.

Compared to the other Super Bowl ad promos bouncing around the internet, this one seemly created an emotional connection with consumers that the other more gimmicky and “clever” ads, aren’t delivering. But is this just another tired use of flash mobs in advertising?

Budweiser’s marketing manager, Ben Seaton, says no.

“I’m not concerned that it will be labelled as another flash mob. That’s not why we made it and that’s not what it is. It’s not the theme that makes it relatable and relevant. It’s the fact that it is so touching and it’s a great story.”

As flash mobs are mainly considered the thing of the past, why this approach? According to Seaton, Budweiser are big fans of hockey and part of its marketing strategy is to help provide more excitement and give more guys the opportunity to experience the game. The team behind the ad asked themselves how they could go and honour those guys who dedicate their lives to recreational hockey and give them an experience they’ll never forget. This is the result:

Ameer Khan was one of the players on the ice.

Some guy shows up to watch one of our regular League games and later calls our team rep to say they would like to do a documentary about beer league hockey and if we would be interested in playing an exhibition game. So we show up at Port Credit Arena still not sure what’s going on. The producer says just play and enjoy the game.

After the 1st period we notice the Budweiser Zamboni. Then by the 2nd period there are mascots, play by play announcers and 500 screaming fans wearing our jerseys. The noise was insane, couldn’t even hear the refs whistle.

Rhys Howell, who saw the video as it made its rounds yesterday, said “When I first saw the Budweiser video I was choked up because I instantly thought about how awesome those guys must have felt. How awesome would I have felt if I was on that rink when it happened? I guess that’s what Budweiser want me to think and they want me to love Budweiser for changing my life if only for a moment.”

“One of the powers of this spot is that everyone dreams about playing in front of fans,” comments Seaton. “So this has legs around the world. We’ve left it to the consumer and it is travelling quite well. We will drive traffic to see it during the Super Bowl and then put out new content, including a 4 minute behind the scene piece, every two or three days. The campaign will be supported through Facebook, Twitter and traditional digital marketing.”

Though there is growing attention around this video (which is at nearly half a million views in less than 2 days), not everyone is convinced of this approach. Leigh Caldwell of Inon states:

If they’d done it eight years ago it would have been original, heart-warming and surprising. We’d have watched it over and over on that new “YouTube” thing and emailed it to our friends on AIM. In 2012, it’s trite, obvious and more likely to lead to a bunch of quickly-edited parodies on YouTube than to any genuine affection. Anyone who doesn’t already love hockey isn’t going to be swept up in a magical storm of teary manly joy by this fluff.

Howell isn’t convinced he will change his mind about the brand but believes by sharing the video, “some people could be converted to the Bud side and really that’s all that was required of me.”

For Khan, being a part of this moment will become a central part of his own story. “Budweiser has made an emotional connection with me that will last a lifetime. Everyone on twitter is saying it brought them to tears and cheers. From now on every Budweiser I have will have a story.”

This is exactly what Seaton and the Budweiser team were hoping for. “I would love if every person who watched it would feel the same way. We created a bond with those guys on the ice. Hopefully, their story has created the bond with the consumer. If that’s what they take away, it’s a positive view of the brand. And that’s all that we wanted.”

Budweiser has never seen the type of media and consumer interest as they’ve had so far through this video. Internally this is already being touted as best practise for them and they credit the story, rather than the delivery.

The big question is did it work for you? Do you think marketers need to focus more on the story in their campaigns? Or was this execution better left for the 2009 marketing vaults?

You thought they were gone. Those pesky, annoying, experience-destroying things. Yes, I’m talking about iFrames.

Popular a decade ago, they’ve made a few appearances in the past several years. The once-popular Digg, for instance, turned to them to implement its DiggBar.

But now they’re back.

As detailed by Brent Csutoras on Search Engine Land, the company responsible for bringing them back is popular social discovery service StumbleUpon:

…on all content pages within StumbleUpon, you have a single button saying ‘Stumble This’, which when clicked takes you to an iframed version of the content.

Not only are they now iframing all content from the site, but if your logged into StumbleUpon, they are not even offering a way to remove the iframed toolbar, leaving you in stuck in the iframed version of the site. If you are not logged in, then there is an option to click X in the right side of the toolbar to remove it.

Csutoras observes that there hasn’t yet been an uproar about StumbleUpon’s change, despite the fact that iFrames have caused so much angst before. In the case of the DiggBar, to placate angry users, Digg founder Kevin Rose was forced to backtrack and admitted, “Framing content with an iFrame is bad for the Internet.”

Is the lack of widespread anger here an indication that StumbleUpon’s relevance has declined? Perhaps, even though unique visitors are apparently way up year-over-year. But regardless, there are more than a few publishers who still get a meaningful amount of traffic and link love from StumbleUpon. And they can’t be too happy about this.

At the end of the day, you have to hand it to the iFrame. While it does have uses, it has arguably been one of the most abused ‘features’ of HTML. But you can count on companies ignoring internet history and using it in the worst ways imaginable.

With the introduction of payment via mobile and a new and updated app, is this a new mobile era for Starbucks?

What opportunities are there for other retailers to follow suit?

I love Starbucks and am a regular down at my local Starbucks(s) (note the plural).

I was very impressed to see this month that the company has embraced mobile technology throughout its stores with gusto.

As the New Year rolled in, Starbucks rolled out a new app which allowed people to register their Starbucks card and then, with some new mobile scanners installed, pay in-store with their mobile phones.
 
Starbucks has clearly decided that mobile is the way forward with what must have been a large infrastructure investment, although it has decided not to bother with near field communication (NFC) as yet.

Whether this is because a large number of their customers are IOS users which doesn’t currently have this built in, time will tell.
 
Already, one in five of Starbucks customers pay for their purchases using their reward card, enticed by the offers of free Wi-Fi and a free drink as a reward for 15 in-store visits. 

With this new app, my debit card is linked to my reward card, which is linked to my phone, so when I am in desperate need of a coffee, or a calming half hour in Starbucks, all I need is my phone, which I’m never without.
 
Why would I now pay for my Starbucks any other way?
 
The additional data capture possibilities for Starbucks are endless…

•    Data such as favourite drinks, date of birth.
•    Frequently visited stores and number of visits.
•    Purchase trends and segmented customers.
•    Dynamic offers, promotions and communications. 

I’m sure mobile will be a success for Starbucks, and will pave the way for more retailers to invest in mobile technologies, which ultimately, make purchasing easier for customers.
 
But what could this mean for other retailers, both on our streets and off?
 
Here’s just some of our more immediate predictions:

• Clothes retailers marketing accessories and additional pieces to create a capsule wardrobe depending on previous purchase history via mobile connection?
• Lunch chains to develop mobile ordering, with instore collection and payment via mobile.
• Development of webcam technology to allow e-commerce purchases by showing a mobile screen to your webcam.

Starbucks has really set the mobile commerce bar high for 2012.

My prediction? This is the year that retailers and the public will embrace mobile for mutual satisfaction.

Few CEOs have it as good as Apple’s Tim Cook. Just look at his company’s performance in the first quarter of his tenure.

But as strong as Apple is currently, Cook can’t sit back and hope that the company Steve Jobs took to new heights will run itself. He’ll have to make tough decisions, and put his mark on the company’s operations.

He’s doing just that with his first big hire.

Today, Apple announced that it has recruited John Browett away from his position as CEO of technology retailer Dixons Retail to join the company as its new SVP of Retail. Browett will start in April, and he’ll report directly to Cook.

While Browett’s title may be shrinking from the C-suite to SVP, his responsibilities are arguably growing. According to Apple’s press release, “he will be responsible for [the company's] retail strategy and the continued expansion of Apple retail stores around the world.” As GigaOm’s Bobbie Johnson notes, that retail strategy produced some $14bn in sales last year.

Those retail stores are, of course, very important to Apple’s success. They’re not just storefronts for selling Apple products; they’ve become an important part of the Apple brand. And Browett may be just the person to oversee them.

Prior to Dixons Retail, Browett was an executive at Tesco and had served as CEO of Tesco.com for a time. He did consulting for retailers and CPG brands at Boston Consulting Group. And it appears he has book smarts as well, having graduated from Wharton Business School’s prestigious MBA program.

So how might Browett might influence Apple’s retail strategy going forward? GigaOm’s Johnson points out that initial reaction to Browett’s appointment has been mixed. On one hand, Browett’s credentials are hard to beat. On the other, some aren’t impressed with his work at Dixons:

…for those who know Dixons as it exists in the real world, the reaction was somewhat different: the most common refrain I saw was “Has Tim Cook ever been in a Dixons store?”.

Dixons operates two major store brands — Currys and PC World — and a number of online outlets, and their approach probably puts them somewhere in the region of Radio Shack and Best Buy. They are not widely loved by the public. And while it’s fair to say that Browett inherited a troubled company and improved its offerings to ordinary shoppers, he has also presided over a calamitous 90 percent fall in its share price over the last five years.

One thing is certain: there are few stores like the Apple Store. For that reason, it would not be surprising to see Browett take a measured approach as he gets comfortable in his new role. Apple’s retail strategy is in a good place, and so long as Browett respects its current positioning, less is probably more.

Interesting, that raises perhaps the biggest question: is less more for Apple long-term? Perhaps not. Steve Jobs and the people he surrounded himself with frequently made bold bets, and the bets that paid off helped put Apple where it is today.

With this in mind, it’s worth noting that Browett is replacing Ron Johnson, who left Apple to become CEO of retailer JC Penney. Johnson had presided over the growth of the Apple Store, so his shoes are big ones to fill. For Browett to succeed him successfully, he probably can’t take a ‘don’t mess things up‘ approach for too long.

The shifting digital econony is something I’ve written about in depth previously, with the main focus of my thoughts being mostly towards the BRIC countries and other parts of Asia.

Recently, though I’m seeing growing evidence pointing towards the fact that Australia should probably be given an equal amount of due care and attention as these other countries in the coming few years, by marketers both inside and outside the country.

There’s rapidly growing opinion within the financial markets that the strength of Australian currency is going to be long-term, as is the country’s healthy overall economy, which forms a key factor behind my change of perspective. 

The second element is the emerging state of the digital industry in Australia. Fuelled by readily available technology and Government initiatives, consumer digital adoption is at an all-time high, and arguably the digital industry is struggling somewhat to keep up. 

During the creation of Econsultancy’s State of Digital Marketing in Australia report (in association with Marketing Magazine), identifies various complexities in the current digital environment of the country, but at the core of this, one theme in particular emerges. 

This is the predominate fact that although consumers are increasingly becoming highly active online, but digital marketers in the region are finding a challenging marketplace.

This is due to a number of reasons which are explored in the report itself, such as a lack of leadership from senior management and widespread digital skills knowledge gaps. 

Consequently, this forms into two two different areas of opportunity, as in any emerging digital economy:

1. The need for internal marketers to adopt a rapid “do-or-die” approach to the marketplace to take advantage of online adoption among consumers.

2. The opening for external marketers to take advantage of a relatively insular marketplace, where hisorical barriers of entry are being lowered by associated technologies. 

The first point is pressing, especially in relation to second. Without national organisations in the local online space, consumers are turning to international sites. 

This in turn is resulting in these companies identifying gaps in the market and to start moving quickly to secure their place, often using other independent platforms such as eBay to establish themselves. 

Currently, there are a  number of recognised brands tactically moving sights of Australian consumers and even Amazon is rumoured to be eyeing the possibility of setting up a fixed base, which potentially could strike a huge blow to national retailers. 

As one respondent to the survey succinctly put it: 

It doesn’t help that the Australian dollar is so strong, as this is encouraging international online shopping behaviour.

I realise that these points are broad generalisations, but the evidence does currently point towards these factors and is equally apparent in the Australian State of Digital Marketing report. 

However, it looks like any international marketers wanting to cut a slice of the pie in the country will increasingly have their work cut out, as the marketplace appears to have reached a tipping point, where digital is climbing to the top of the agenda.

When asked if they were planning to increase marketing budgets over the coming year, a massive 70% of client-side marketers intend to up their digital budgets, comapred to less than a quarter (24%) who cited the same for traditional, offline budgets.  

Supply-side respondents also demonstrate a similar picture, with 81% saying that their client’s digital budgets will increase, contrasted with 14% who say that the offline budgets of clients will rise this year. 

Findings in the report also show that the digital landscape in Australia is rapidly shifting, as local marketers are aggressively planning to seize the low-hanging fruit that can be found, again meaning that outside organisations may struggle in the future to find their footholds. 

Overall, the emerging digital economy in the country won’t be on the same kind of scale as is visible in the likes of China, Russia and India, nor will it follow the same pattern of development. But it is full of opportunity and promise, and given various factors, should certainly be an area for digital marketers around the world to watch closely, at the very least. 

In the world of social media, many brands are doubling down on their investments. And when it comes to those investments, much is being focused on a few popular services.

One of those popular services: Twitter.

There is no doubt that Twitter has been a boon to brands looking for ways to engage with consumers online. But up to now, the modes brands can engage with consumers on Twitter has been fairly limited given Twitter’s simple structure.

That could be changing, however, as rumors are circulating that Twitter will be rolling out enhanced brand pages as early as February 1.

According to Business Insider, the enhanced pages will allow brands to add additional interactivity to their Twitter accounts. The enhanced pages may even include iFrame support, which would allow “users to play games or shop on a brand’s site without actually leaving the Twitter environment.”

If the Business Insider’s sources are correct, it would appear that Twitter is taking a page from Facebook’s playbook. Facebook Pages have been a big hit with brands, although in many cases the ROI isn’t immediately apparent.

The big question for Twitter, of course, is whether or not going the route of Facebook would enhance the user experience. While it’s easy to see brands getting excited about the ability to extend what can be done on a Twitter page, it’s not quite clear that users will be pleased.

Part of Twitter’s appeal is its simplicity. If brands clutter up their pages with iFrame-based shopping experiences, games and the like, Twitter could be fundamentally changed. And not necessarily for the better.

After years of waiting, one of the most widely-discussed IPOs ever — that of social networking giant Facebook — is all but certain to happen this year as the company is forced to make public disclosures in the coming months.

The exact timing of Facebook’s IPO has been the source of much speculation, but according to the Wall Street Journal, the wait may be over next week.

Its sources say that papers could be filed with the SEC as early as next Wednesday, with the company seeking to raise as much as $10bn at a valuation of $75bn to $100bn. In raising $10bn, Facebook would be the richest technology IPO ever. As the Wall Street Journal notes, the largest tech IPO ever to date was that of Infineon Technologies, which raised $5.9bn at the height of the .com bubble in 2000.

Obviously, there’s a huge difference between $75bn and $100bn, and industry observers will be closely following just how high a valuation Facebook can command. But one thing is certain: Facebook will go public with a valuation few could have imagined a few short years ago.

The big question, of course, is whether Facebook’s IPO marks a momentous event in the company’s rise, or whether it represents the company’s peak. Skeptics of social networking’s importance are hard to come by; today there’s a broad consensus that social networking is here to stay. But that doesn’t mean questions don’t linger about Facebook’s future.

The massive growth of the company’s user base can’t continue forever, and there’s always the risk that large portions of its user base will eventually tire of the service, particularly as it evolves. Furthermore, while Facebook does have revenue and profit, current revenue and profit alone doesn’t seem to justify a valuation of even $50bn. Clearly, for the company to sustain the valuation it will have when it goes public, it will need to monetize at a level far greater than it is doing now.

For many in the tech community, Techmeme is one of the top places to turn when you want to discover the latest news. Launched in 2005, Techmeme was at first automated, but since 2008, it has employed human editors to curate the best tech news on the web.

The idea: human involvement is necessary to filter the wheat from the chaff. Which seems like a good idea given just how much chaff there is on the web.

But is it working for Techmeme?

Recently, former TechCrunch writer Sarah Lacy launched a new blog, PandoDaily. She raised money from a cadre of some of Silicon Valley’s most influential investors, and brought with her as contributors some of her former TechCrunch colleagues, including TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington.

Lacy’s goal: “to be the site-of-record for that startup root-system and everything that springs up from it, cycle-after-cycle.” And not to sell her blog, unless there’s a $1bn offer on the table.

One of the PandoDaily’s ‘features’: the PandoTicker, which is nothing more than an aggregator of news from other sites, with titles, excerpts and URL slugs designed, obviously, for SEO. Good or bad? I won’t judge, as these PandoTicker items may arguably be of interest to PandoDaily’s readers.

But are they of interest to Techmeme’s readers?

Here’s what happens when aggregators aggregate aggregators:

The PandoDaily link above takes you to:

Loop de loop, anyone?

Needless to say, aggregating the PandoTicker SEO-bait, which has little more than a link to the source you could have clicked on directly through Techmeme, is completely unnecessary. When I first noticed that this was happening, I didn’t think much of it. Once Techmeme’s human editors noticed that they were aggregating an aggregator, they’d fix the issue. But day after day, Techmeme keeps linking to PandoDaily pages which offer no value to Techmeme’s readers.

I won’t speculate as to why, but given the importance, popularity and prolificacy of services that aggregate and curate content, this should serve as a good reminder to other aggregators and curators that providing a quality service depends on a lot more than being less ugly than the Drudge Report.

Since businesses discovered the revenue potential of fans and followers, they have been clamouring to acquire them. But what gives greater value? Those you acquire through good social media strategy and engaging content, or those you buy.

Another fan buying enterprise, Bird Bird Fans, has recently launched its service of buying high volumes of fans to boost the Facebook pages of small and medium sized businesses (SMBs) new to the market.

According to Mark Macias, Founder & Managing Partner of 3M Media Group, the company behind Big Bird Fans, multinationals spend “$100k a month on social media fan acquisition.” He claims Big Bird Fans will bring this technology and acquisition techniques only used by large brands to SMBs.

Macias believes some people just want fans from anywhere and organic fans have too high a cost. For him, targeting is something that large companies are looking to do, not SMBs.  “Most companies starting out don’t need a customised approach. It’s more about the image. Sheer numbers count first.”

“We’re in the beginning stages of power marketing with Facebook,” Macias continues. “Until someone figures it out, and I hope it takes them a decade, [Big Bird Fans] will help separate my PR firm from any other PR firm.”

But is this ethical?

A number of PR managers and small businesses would seem to disagree with Macias’s fan buying ethos.

“The line from services like this is that “thousands of fans will make any restaurant or lounge look like the hottest spot in town,” said Max Tatton-Brown, account manager at PR firm, EML Wildfire.

“In truth, this is like saying you should hire a fleet of actors to fill up your restaurant on week nights. Generating the veneer of popularity is no replacement for actually looking into who your advocates are and giving them a reason to express their support online. While you’re busy paying to fake it, you risk competitors increasing their lead in doing the hard work of creating true communities online.”

Marcias professed that Big Bird Fans was just the service for restaurants and bars in major centers across the US. Jesse Alexander, owner of family run EN Japanese Brasserie in New York’s West Village, has had slow and steady growth on Facebook but it was all done organically.

“Restaurants have a small profit margin. Very low profit. So I have to be super picky on choices. $2000? I could never imagine that $2000 coming back to me so I don’t see advantage as a business owner.

More important than cost, is how I run my business. A lot of the decisions I make are based on my principals and philosophy of how to handle business. And that’s all about honesty. If I’m dishonest, I believe it will come back to me.

If something goes bad, I won’t sell it. I won’t tell one customer one thing and another something else. And I wouldn’t buy fans as it’s dishonest and it’s dishonest to the rest of my Facebook fans. I’m not a dodgy business man.”

Charles Powne, owner of Portland-based Soleilmoon Recordings, had never heard of businesses buying fans especially a service like Big Bird Fans where a base package costs $1500 for 2000 fans.

“My business has 1352 fans (I just looked), and certainly having fans brings in sales for me, but I’d never pay that much to get 2000 more fans, especially since its 100% certain that they’d never convert to paying customers. It wouldn’t be cost effective, in other words. The best way to grow your social media community is to employ methods that work organically and authentically. Growth for its own sake may look good, but if it’s faked then it’s not terribly meaningful.”

Pinball Publishing’s Laura Whipple thinks buying fans is a bad investment.

“It’s fake, and it’s really easy for people to detect false sentiment in social media realms. I think it would be better for small to medium businesses to find creative ways to build a true fan base on their social media sites. It will take longer, but it’s a more lasting strategy. Fans are another name for potential customers, so if your social media network is just flooded with fake potential customers, it will be much harder to communicate with the real ones.”

“Fan falsification is a big problem in the US and globally for social networks,” says Phil Sheard, Associate Director of Hotwire’s specialist digital agency, 33 Digital.  “These ‘get rich quick’ style schemes undermine the hard work of those brands that put in work to get real results – and these brands pay the bills through advertising so they’ll get looked after. Don’t be surprised when fan purchasing schemes get stamped out, by the social networks themselves or if not through rules like the Federal Trade Commission policy on blog disclosure. People surely flock towards popular places but this isn’t real popularity so companies could face a backlash when they get found out.”

Is it true that how you get fans doesn’t matter?

The Emerging Media Research Council report on “Facebook and Twitter: Measuring the value of the Web’s most powerful communities” believes organically grown fans and followers will yield more return. “The consumer who opts-in to an organization’s Facebook or Twitter presence is far more likely to engage with that organization’s content than the fan who is delivered for a fee just as repeat donors are far more valuable to fundraisers than people who have never given before.”

What about the numbers?

On Quora, users are discussing the worth of fans. Christopher Tuff, Director of Earned and Emerging Media at 22squared, is seeing efficient buys with the new “sponsored stories” ad units. “Users that click through to the landing page for non-fans, we see a conversion rate of about 50% (as opposed to 25% without a like-gate).” Once you have fans that are interested in your brand, you could see 20 times more visits to your site verses those from non-fans.

Costs can range. Socialbakers has compiled a list of average advertising costs on Facebook by country. The average cost per click (CPC) in the US is $.68 and the average cost of cost per impression (CPM) is $0.29. This varies by how popular your target area is (a little like bidding on Google ad words) but you can choose who you are aiming for.

If you still want to get into the pay for play game…

Big Bird Fans is an expensive service at $1.33 per fan. As it doesn’t look for fans that are relevant to your brand, it can be even more costly. Any old fan will do in their eyes, even if they are half way around the globe and your restaurant is in Brooklyn.

You could gain more targeted fans yourself for less, or you could go with companies such as uSocial, who offers fans starting at $0.14. Do keep in mind that this company has been served with cease and desist orders before. Not ideal when you’re trying to build a credible brand.

That’s not the brands Alexander thinks Big Bird Fans are marketing to. “If I was out of touch and was trying for a way to get in “with the kids”, it may appeal to me.  But this product is not for people with a head on their shoulders.”

If that doesn’t turn you off, then buy to your heart’s content. Hopefully your true fans don’t find out. As Shread deftly commented, “What’s the point in having 2,000 fake fans if your restaurant is still empty on Saturday night? Is that a risk worth paying for?”

There are a lot of words and phrases that could be used to describe Apple’s fiscal first quarter financial results. Amongst them: incredible, unbelievable, record-breaking and earth-shattering.

Strong (to put it modestly) sales of iPhones, iPads and Macs produced over $46bn in revenue and a mind-boggling net profit of more than $13bn.

When it came to the iPhone, the company’s latest, the iPhone 4S, proved to be a winner, with more than 37m units sold in the quarter, which covered the all-important holiday shopping season.

But it wasn’t just consumers snapping up shiny new iPhones. According to a report (PDF) by enterprise mobility company Good Technology, the iPhone 4S proved to be a hit in the enterprise as well.

The firm, whose customers include half of the Fortune 100, saw iPhone 4S activations account for 31% of all new phone activations across its customer base in the calendar fourth quarter of 2011. This is a significant number, as it represents “the highest Good has seen for a single iOS or Android device model since introducing support for those platforms in December 2009.”

The second-most popular smart phone device in the quarter was the iPhone 4, which accounted for just under 18% of all activations. And, not surprisingly, in the tablet category, another Apple product, the iPad, also dominated, with approximately 94% of all tablet activations being iOS devices.

All told, iOS-based products accounted for more than 70% of all smart phone and tablet activations in Q4, suggesting that one of the biggest questions facing Apple (can it succeed in the enterprise?) has been answered quite clearly. That seems to be in due in large party to BYOD (bring your own device) programs, which let employees select their own devices.

The question now is whether Google’s Android can play catch-up in the enterprise. According to Good Technology SVP John Herrema, it’s all about the smart phone for Android — at least for now. “Android continues to be driven by smartphone activations and we expect to see continued Android growth in 2012 as Good’s customers continue to ramp up their BYOD [bring your own device] programs,” he stated.

NBC News is jumping on the ebook bandwagon with the launch of a publishing arm, NBC Publishing.

It’s another indication that the ebook market is getting so big that media companies not traditionally involved in book publishing are deciding to become book publishers, or more accurately, ebook publishers.

As detailed by Deadline, NBC Publishing “will produce ebooks based on works from its shows including Dateline, Today, and the NBC Nightly News. It
also will tap products from other NBCUniversal units including Peacock
Productions, NBC Sports, Universal Pictures, Telemundo, and independent
authors who want to ‘create content that taps into NBC’s resources.’” It will partner with traditional trade publishers to produce certain titles.

According to NBC News SVP Cheryl Gould, who will be heading the initiative, now is the perfect time for NBC to expand its footprint into the ebook world. “As the tablet and e-reader markets continue to expand exponentially, and as the definition of ‘what is a ‘book?’ evolves, we see opportunities to bring readers a unique and immersive content experience. This business enables NBC to use video, audio, and current programming in creative new ways,” she said.

On the surface, it’s not surprising to see a media enterprise like NBC News looking at digital opportunities. Ebooks are hot, and the relative ease with which they can be produced makes it possible for companies that would have never likely published physical books to get into the book publishing business.

The big question, of course, is just how big a market there really is for new entrants like NBC Publishing. The most popular genres for ebooks are, not surprisingly, in the trade fiction category (think romance, mystery, etc.). Will there be consistent, high levels of demand for ebooks based on content from news outlet? Also, when NBC’s Gould speaks of an “immersive content experience” featuring “video [and] audio” it hints that NBC Publishing will be looking, at least in part, at some form of enhanced ebooks. These can be a lot costlier to produce, and while there’s a lot of hype around enhanced ebooks (and app-like ebooks), the reality is that this isn’t where the bulk of the ebook sales are.

The good news is that booming ebook market gives new players a market to experiment in, and at least some of them will certainly figure out a model that works, expanding the amount of content consumers can choose from in the process.

Some of the social networking companies feeling left out after Google’s Search, plus Your World launch may very well complain to regulators already gunning for Google, but they’re not going to wait for Washington D.C. or Brussels to tell Google how to manage its SERPs.

Instead, engineers at Facebook, Twitter and MySpace took matters into their own hands with focusontheuser.org and developed a bookmarklet for Firefox, Chrome and Safari that adds a “don’t be evil” button to the browser.

When performing a Google search, that button can be clicked to reveal what the “most relevant results” are — at least according to the Facebook, Twitter and MySpace engineers who built it.

The website from which the tool can be downloaded, focusontheuser.org, explains:

How much better would social search be if Google surfaced results from all across the web? The results speak for themselves. We created a tool that uses Google’s own relevance measure—the ranking of their organic search results—to determine what social content should appear in the areas where Google+ results are currently hardcoded.

All of the information in this demo comes from Google itself, and all of the ranking decisions are made by Google’s own algorithms. No other services or APIs are accessed.

The website’s call to action: “Try a More Relevant Google.”

Not surprisingly, the tool is creating a lot of buzz in the tech blogosphere, where Google’s Search, plus Your World has met with considerable skepticism and even outright disdain.

Obviously, Facebook, Twitter and MySpace are trying to use focusontheuser.org to make a point: Google could be and should be promoting our properties, but it isn’t because it’s too busy trying to promote its own. In the process, they imply, Google isn’t focusing on its users.

Time will tell if Google’s users agree, but the focusontheuser.org does serve as a powerful reminder that, amongst all the hype over Facebook’s ability to compete with Google, Google Search is still seen as being so important that it can make other companies focus on what (they think) is good for Google’s users.

Given the criticism that Facebook in particular always seems to generate when it rolls out new ‘features’, one might reasonably suggest that the social networking giant take its own advice and focus on the user too.

Google may be best-known as a search engine, but with more than 350m people actively using its Gmail service and more than 90m registered users on its Google+ social network, it’s clear that Google isn’t just a search engine.

Increasingly, that’s creating some tension as the Mountain View-based company uses search to promote its other offerings. Now, it appears that Google has turned to its signup form in its effort to boost usage of those offerings.

As reported by Alex Chitu at the Google Operating System blog, which is not affiliated with Google, it appears Google is testing a new version of its signup form that requires users to create Gmail and Google+ accounts at the time of signup.

While the old signup form is still available, and it appears that the new signup form is not in use universally, the mere fact that Google may be testing a form that requires new users to acquire a Gmail and Google+ account is sure to spark further debate about Google’s tactics, particularly with respect to how it’s seeking to grow its social network.

The EU’s antitrust probe was expanded to look at Google+, and the company’s Search, plus Your World roll-out caused some to suggest that Google was going too far in its effort to promote its own properties.

As a practical matter, Google naturally wants to maximize how many users interact with its products and experimenting with a signup form that ensures they their accounts include two of the most prominent and important makes sense. Needless to say, however, Google’s experiment may not pay off. A more involved signup process could reduce conversions, and it could also produce more inactive Gmail and Google+ accounts. Inactive accounts on the company’s social network might boost its registered user numbers, but they won’t help Google+ become a more vibrant, profitable Facebook competitor.

Welcome to our new weekly round up brought to you by the US Econsultancy team.

These are some of the stories and links we’ve tweeted, posted, and passed around the office. What were you sharing this week?

SOPA and PIPA Protest Takes It to the Streets in NYC [VIDEO]

With most eyes on SOPA, we took a great interest in what was happening in New York, the home of our US headquarters. More than 1500 members of the NY tech community turned up to protest outside the offices of SOPA supporters Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand.

Originally posted Jan-20-12

Best SOPA protest award has to go to The Oatmeal

As Wikipedia went black alongside with Reddit.com and others, The Oatmeal made an animated gif to explain what SOPA would mean to all of us. And it’s funny too.

Originally posted Jan-18-12

New York rising: Brooklyn gets its first VC fund

As things hot up in the New York tech scene, Brooklyn gets its first VC fund.

Originally posted Jan-17-12

Journalism, Media and Technology Predictions 2012

Nic Newman shares this Google doc of his media focused 2012 predictions and trends. Nice to see him sum up his 2011 in comparison to last year’s ones.

Twitter buys Summify, helps you automatically turn off the noise

Well Twitter has eaten Summify. Who’s next?

Originally posted Jan-20-12

The Bark Side: 2012 Volkswagen Game Day Commercial Teaser

The Superbowl is coming and it seems there’s more attention on the ads than the games. Already brands are touting teasers for their ads, including Volkswagen where a 
canine chorus barks a familiar tune…

Originally posted Jan-18-12

Not a Kodak Moment: Legendary Camera Maker Files for Bankruptcy Protection

Kodak is dead. We are nostalgically sad.

Originally posted Jan-18-12

Connect objects to the web with Twine

This is not really a post, but rather something cool we discovered from the MIT Media Lab. Twine connects the physical world to Twitter, SMS and email. It’s still being developed but we really feel one step closer to the future.

Facebook gives Politico deep access to users political sentiments

Facebook are partnering up with Politico to give them access to all of your public and private data to measure sentiment of presidential candidates. Not cool.

Originally posted Jan-12-12