Web Sales Inch up on Black Friday
Autor admin | 01.12.2008 | Category SEO
NEW YORK — U.S. retail sales online rose 1 percent on Black Friday, the traditional start to the holiday shopping season, to $534 million, tracking firm comScore said on Sunday.
Combined with Web sales on Thanksgiving the previous day, the figure rose 2 percent, but sales are down 4 percent to date in November from a year ago, comScore said. The firm has forecast total web holiday sales to be flat this year at $29.2 billion, compared with a 19 percent rise in 2007.
Retailers and their investors are closely watching results from the weekend’s sales as consumers cut spending in a shrinking U.S. economy.
Store sales rose 3 percent on Black Friday, according to ShopperTrak, which measures customer traffic.
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Are You Searching Yourself Sick?
Autor admin | 28.11.2008 | Category SEO
Googling for what ails you? You might want to think again.
According to a new study, human nature prevails when it comes to searching for health-related information, with users often jumping to conclusions and assuming the worst.
Microsoft researchers Ryen White and Eric Horvitz said their investigation of online medical search behavior found that it can often lead to “cyberchondria,” an eight-year-old term describing the online equivalent of hypochondria, a psychological ailment in which people view minor medical symptoms as evidence of a serious illness.
“We use the term ‘cyberchondria’ to refer to the unfounded escalation of concerns about common symptoms based on the review of search results,” the researchers wrote.
(Read the full post about ‘Are You Searching Yourself Sick?’…)
Why a Sun/EMC Match Might Work
Autor admin | 28.11.2008 | Category SEO
Our world is never static, but as I write this, we are going through a particularly nasty period of upheaval.
Print publications are dying left and right. The latest examples are US News & World Report and The Christian Science Monitor, which have thrown in the towel on their print editions. Forbes magazine just merged its print and online divisions, resulting in 43 more journalists looking for work. Happy holidays.
Likewise, the tech industry is working through some wrenching change, some more than others in the difficult economy.
Take Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA), which recently announced that it would cut its workforce by 6,000 people, or 15 to 18 percent.
(Read the full post about ‘Why a Sun/EMC Match Might Work’…)
Bloggers on Front Lines in Mumbai Attacks
Autor admin | 28.11.2008 | Category SEO
SINGAPORE — Bloggers across Mumbai fed live updates of the action after Islamist gunmen launched waves of attacks in the heart of India’s financial capital, highlighting the emergence of citizen journalism in news coverage.
Some, including a blogger named Vinu, were furiously uploading photos of damage from the attacks that killed at least 101 people and injured 287, with scores of foreigners, including Westerners trapped in luxury hotels.
Images of the attacks also surfaced on photo-sharing website Flickr.
Some bloggers provided running descriptions and commentaries from near the action, while others vented emotions.
“I’ve been tweeting almost all night, too, from Mumbai.
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Happy Thanksgiving, from All of Us at Search Engine Watch
Autor admin | 28.11.2008 | Category SEO
Happy Thanksgiving, from All of Us at Search Engine Watch
We will not be publishing on Thursday, November 27, or Friday, November 28, in observation of Thanksgiving Day. I hope those of you that are celebrating the holiday can stay off the Internet and spend some time with those you love.
For those of you that aren’t celebrating Thanksgiving, or have had enough quality time with your family, here are a few things you might find interesting:
* If you haven’t checked it out lately, I suggest looking over the articles in our Search 101 section. It’s been updated with articles covering the basics of search engine optimization, search advertising, and several other topics.
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$50 Billion Bell Canada Deal in Trouble
Autor admin | 27.11.2008 | Category SEO
The largest leveraged buyout on record for a telecom vendor may not happen after all.
Bell Canada Enterprise (BCE) has revealed that its plans to be acquired may not pass muster on a key provision after its auditing firm KPMG said it does not believe that BCE will pass a required solvency test for the deal to be completed.
The deal, valued at US $48.5 billion when it was announced in July of 2007, was set to close on December 11th. The acquisition would take the company private and off the Toronto and New York Stock Exchanges.
BCE was set to be acquired by a consortium of investment firms led by the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan, Providence Equity Partners, Madison Dearborn Partners, LLC and Merrill Lynch Global Private Equity.
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Walsh to Tout CA’s ‘Most Wanted’ Malware
Autor admin | 27.11.2008 | Category SEO
Question: What does John Walsh, host of America’s Most Wanted crime-fighting television program have to do with an anti-malware software suite?
Answer: They are both fighting crime. Up until now, Walsh, who is also co-founder of the Center for Missing and Exploited Children, focused on criminals in the physical world. Now, by teaming up with CA, (NASDAQ: CA) he is going after cybercriminals.
Walsh will become the public face for CA’s Internet Security products and education program, which earlier this week unveiled the latest version of CA’s consumer anti-malware product, the Internet Security Suite Plus 2009.
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A Networking Idea That’s Out of This World
Autor admin | 27.11.2008 | Category SEO
Millions of miles above us, a new networking technology is taking shape that could one day help improve how applications are networked on Earth. NASA is testing a network layer technology that can withstand the rigorous demands of space communication better than the standard TCP/IP (define) protocol, which dominates terrestrial (non-space) networking technologies. Officially called Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN), the technology went through testing earlier this month with a space probe that is currently more than 20 million miles from Earth. RELATED ARTICLES WAN Optimization Market Booming For more stories on this topic: DTN uses a different kind of approach than TCP/IP for packet delivery that is less cumbersome and more resilient to disruption than TCP/IP. (Read the full post about ‘A Networking Idea That’s Out of This World’…)
Happy Together: Smartphones and Mobile Apps
Autor admin | 26.11.2008 | Category SEO
Touchscreen phone users are discovering that much of the fun in their devices stems from applications — those little nuggets of convenience, amusement and distraction available for download on the slightest whim.
A good example is Google’s newly updated Mobile App for Apple’s iPhone, which has been generating a lot of buzz for one main reason: voice search.
Want to find the nearest pizza place, showtimes for the James Bond movie “Quantum of Solace,” or the latest Bruce Springsteen video? Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) voice search is uncannily accurate.
But it has obvious limitations, particularly with names. Say “Barack Obama” and you get a full page of data.
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Is Your Site Browser-Ready for the Holidays?
Autor admin | 26.11.2008 | Category SEO
Is Your Site Browser-Ready for the Holidays?
Does your site maintain its usability across many browsers? If not, you could end up leaving money on the table this holiday season. Browsers such as Firefox, Chrome, and Safari (which comes standard on Macs) now make up about 30% of the browser market. Firefox alone enjoys 20% of the overall market share.
Matt Poepsel, vice president of Gomez, Inc., whose services test and monitor the performance of websites says that the increase of non-Internet Explorer browsers could cause some e-tailers grief.
“This year more than ever, websites can look and function differently from one browser to another.
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