From ClickZ News:

According to "Home Broadband Adoption 2006," a report published by the Pew Internet & American Life Project ... 48 million American adults have contributed some form of user-generated content on the Internet... That's 35 percent of Internet users. Of those adults who have posted content on the Web, 73 percent, or 31 million, have a broadband connection at home...

"There is an element of the Internet being the medium for creativity and the Internet being an outlet for creativity people bring to the Worldwide Web," according to the report. It considers blogging, Web site creation, contribution of work on Web pages or blogs and submissions of artwork, photos, stories or videos as user-generated online content.

You're all geeks. Buy your key chain here.

True is an Internet dating service. If you spend much time online, you've probably seen the Dallas-based company's ads before.

What you might not know is that True was founded by an old boss of ours, Herb Vest.

You might find it surprising that Herb is a CPA by training. He was a tax accountant until the age of 39, in fact, when he had an idea for a new business -- H.D. Vest Financial Services. H.D. Vest specialized in selling mutual funds through a network of tax preparers -- people like Herb.

The business was a huge success, became a public company, and eventually was purchased by Wells Fargo.

So now Herb has started True. Does he know as much about Internet dating as he knows about accountants? No. But we wouldn't bet against him; he has the passion of an entrepreneur.

Note: If anyone's wondering, Herb's not currently a client. He's using Milly over at Ogilvy.

Technorati tags: Herb, Marketing

In Month 1 of Operation OSSTE (Obnoxious, Self-Serving Technorati Experiment), the following linkers were picked up by Technorati:

Susan Getgood
Bill Green
Brian Clark
Luke Armour
Antony Mayfield
Sherrilynne Starkie
Nick Douglas
Steve Field

Which, as far as we can tell from referrals, represents 100 percent of those who linked to us. (If you linked to us and are not referenced above, let us know and we'll amend our findings.)

After all our indignant complaining, some might think that this perfect performance by Technorati might make us look like a complete jackass.

We prefer to believe that our belly-aching spurred Technorati's panicked engineering team to work through the night to solve its link-recognition problems. They know an eight-pound gorilla when they see one.

We'll be back at the end of June for Month 2.

Update: Uh-oh. We're hearing rumblings that at least two other blogs linked, pinged, but are not on the Technorati big board. As Drudge would say, "Developing..."

First we had the Dallas pot brownie case. You know, pot brownies -- those infamous "weapons of mass destruction."

Now we have this:

WALDO, FL -- Detectives say it's an act of local terrorism. An adult bookstore is cleaning up after a chemical attack by a homemade device that investigators are calling a "weapon of mass destruction."

In Waldo, people have held prayer vigils and protests aimed at an adult bookstore along US 301, trying to keep the "Cafe Risque" from opening its doors on time.

Those efforts have all failed, so investigators say it looks like someone has turned to what they're calling a clear act of terrorism to keep the store's owner from opening up shop. The device, discovered Sunday morning, was made of two gallon-size sports drink jugs connected by hoses. Someone set it on top of the store's window air conditioning unit.

Detectives say that person then strung one hose from a water spigot on the outside of the building, and pushed another hose into the building through a gap above the air conditioner.

"That water hose would churn it up, mix it up in the gallon jug, and enter it into the building," said Alachua County Sheriff's Sergeant Keith Faulk..."We haven't identified what was actually in the bottle, in the system that delivered it into the building. We do know that it was caustic, it was corrosive, it had a high pH level."...

Investigators say the state Department of Environmental Protection will test the contraption in its labs Tuesday to figure out exactly what was inside.

(Via Fark)

No -- not Disney. Whitman.

(That's what we get for writing for eighth-graders.)

A few of our favorite Whitman quotes, pulled especially for professional communicators:

"All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor."

"Be curious, not judgmental."

"Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes."

"To have great poets, there must be great audiences."

"If you done it, it ain't bragging."

Joe Lieberman & the Hostile Takeover of "Centrism" (Daily Kos)

"Coed Bikini Strangulation"? Fox News Is There (Fox News)

Billy Joel's daughter launches music career with MySpace site

A spokesperson moment (DerekHail.com)

Burger King: Heart attacks are manly

Technorati tags: Web 2.0, PR, Blogs, Websites, Public Relations, Marketing, Advertising, Media

A while back, we showed you footage from David Spade's Showbiz Show demonstrating that those conversations celebs have on talk shows are highly rehearsed -- often to the word. The previous example featured Vin Diesel.

This time, Spade shows that even a celeb with a reputation for spontaneity, like Robin Williams, carefully plans what he's going to say. Watch the video.

Technorati tags: Robin

We're embarrassed to be doing this -- really. But we're afraid we have no choice.

After watching Technorati bat about .300 in noticing links recently (good in baseball, bad for "the authority on what's going on in the world of weblogs"), we've decided to begin running a monthly test of Technorati's link recognition capabilities.

Here's how it will work (this is the obnoxious and self-serving part):

Once a month, we will implore everyone who reads this blog to link to a specific post. Then, after 24 hours, we will report which blogs have linked, and what percentage of these were picked up by Technorati. By doing this once a month over the next, say, six months, we hope to get a better sense of whether Technorati's capabilities are improving, deteriorating or remaining steady during the test period.

Is this scientific? Not exactly -- but then again, we're not exactly investigating the melting of the ice caps here, either.

OK, so here we go: Please link to this post.

We'll report back tomorrow on Technorati's success rate.

Technorati tags: Technorati

OK, OK...no lining up to say, "You already are one" will be necessary.

Seriously, though: Facts are such a hassle.

From the U.K.'s Daily Mirror:

On Monday, February 27, 2006 in a report under the headlines: "RATS TRAPPED" "Bungling gang gets stuck in lift", we stated that eight people who were trapped in a lift at Dundalk Greyhound Stadium were criminally involved in a botched raid on the stadium on Saturday, February 25 last.

We fully accept that the above-recited allegations made about these persons were totally false and without foundation. We wish to retract the entirety of the false statements made concerning them.

We accept that although they were not named or pictured, some readers would have understood the article as referring to the eight persons named above and we accept that the article was defamatory of them.

Accordingly we apologise to each of them for the embarrassment and hurt caused to them by the publication of our report. We have agreed to pay a sum in damages to each of them and their appropriate legal costs.

Poor Mirror. Lo how the mighty have fallen.

From the Richmond Times-Dispatch:

A Times-Dispatch article published May 17 about the reaction in Herndon to President Bush's speech on immigration reported a fabricated interview ...

Northern Virginia bureau reporter Paul Bradley did not interview Bill Threlkeld, site director for Project Hope and Harmony, as reported in the article...

Bradley was dismissed yesterday as a Times-Dispatch employee.

That's the equivalent of the burglar who gets stuck in the chimney.

Here's the background, from Wikipedia:

In 2006, WTWO aired a controversial 1 minute promotion criticizing WTHI over its weather coverage. The commercial claimed that WTHI's Doppler radar was inferior to WTWO's because WTHI's doppler was located within downtown Terre Haute, thus its "dead zone" was over thousands of residents instead of WTWO's whose "dead zone" was over a corn field.

The ad also mentioned that the combined experience of WTWO's weather team was more than that of WTHI's staff, and that WTHI's power had multiple points of failure in contrast to WTWO's. The promotion became a source of amusement on Comedy Central's The Daily Show because of its use of hyperbole and techniques reminscent of political attack ads.

You can watch WTWO's promo, and Jon Stewart's reaction, here.

Now WTWO has produced another attack video -- this one targeting Stewart.

Yes, it's supposed to be funny, we guess -- but in the same way that your obnoxious cousin is at Thanksgiving: He's kidding, but he's also not kidding.

Apparently the video was made for internal use only, but was leaked to YouTube. Watch it here.

From Financial Times, hat tip to Bill Green:

The internet will this year overtake national newspapers to become the third biggest advertising medium by spend, according to authoritative forecasts.

By the end of 2007, internet advertising will close the gap on regional newspapers, the number two medium, but will still be well short of television, the biggest outlet in the £12bn-a-year media advertising market.

The projection, seen exclusively by the FT, underlines the pace of growth in internet advertising and the challenge to businesses reliant on traditional advertising revenue.

More reason for U.S. newspapers to listen to unhappy customers like Mark.

Technorati tags: Newspapers

Technorati is growing in influence, but is not without its problems. Will they be addressed?

Our guess is you won't be seeing much criticism of the company among bloggers from Edelman, which has partnered with Technorati, or the mainstream press, which has its own problems right now.

For the moment, Technorati's issues are at a level where they should be highlighted by bloggers like you, so that Technorati will put aside deal-making long enough to fix its engine.

Technorati Tags Dominate Yahoo! Search Results (Search Engine Journal)

Technorati, AP in Blog Deal (WebProNews)

Technorati, Edelman in global deal (WebProNews)

Technorati troubles (Open)

Technorati tags: Web 2.0, PR, Blogs, Websites, Public Relations, Marketing, Advertising, Technorati

Mark Cuban, who's turned his attention to the challenges of the newspaper industry lately, issues pointed advice in a recent post:

Ive spent a lot of time thinking about the Newspaper and Magazine businesses lately. Not because I want to buy a company in either industry. I dont. Im spending the time because Im looking for the best possible ways to promote the movies we distribute and HDNet programming.

Its expensive to advertise movies or TV shows in either newspapers or magazines. Very expensive Where entertainment is traditionally advertised, you guys know you got us, and it shows in your pricing. The pricing in the Movie and TV sections of print media is outrageous.

Which means that every single company in the entertainment business is looking for a way to never ever have to spend a nickel with you again ... So its time to buck up. You either squeeze what you can and cry when it happens, or you step up and create cost effective alternatives... [C]ome up with new ideas, or a new version of your resume...

Mark's right. In fact, his comments remind me of those of a friend of mine -- a small-business owner whose company has about 150 employees.

Back in early 2001, my friend was reassessing his strategies for recruiting. After costing it out, and looking at the bang he got for his buck, he moved all his recruitment advertising out of the newspaper and onto Monster.

"I can't believe that they don't realize that what they're offering is no longer competitive," he told me at the time.

Since then, newspapers have worked very hard at making their classified offerings more competitive -- enhancing their online capabilities and adding direct mail to target non-subscribers, among other things. But it took a cratering of classified dollars before newspapers took the hint.

We hope newspapers won't wait so long to implement new ideas for the rest of their product.

By the way, Mark, you really should buy a newspaper company. That would be an even bigger challenge than turning the Mavs around.

(Image from chrisfoley484)

Technorati tags: Mark

The History Channel's Memorial Day documentary, Washington the Warrior, features an all-Lithuanian cast of 1,500 re-enactors. This is possible because their scenes feature no dialogue.

Technorati tags: Memorial Day, George Washington

We're a little worried about Technorati.

Here's just a recent example of the system's current problems:

Technorati recognizes three links to a post we wrote on Friday ("Which Media, Marketing or PR Blog Is the Most Readable?")

It catches links from

Desirable Roasted Coffee
A PR Guru's Musings
Strive Notes

It does not catch links from

Mike's Points
paidContent.org
Jaffe Juice
My Catholic Blog
Student PR
Charles on ... anything that comes along

Who knows -- maybe other blogs linked to it, too. Those are just some that tracked back to the post or referred a number of visitors.

This is one post on one blog. What else is going on out there?

Update: Technorati also missed a link from The One That's Not About Music.

Did you link, too? Let us know.

Technorati tags: Technorati

How embarrassing.

An Independent Sources investigation reveals that "Google Trends data shows a stronger than expected following [for French newsbabe Melissa Theuriau] in the Lone Star state."


Richardson, Texas. International headquarters of the Idea Grove.

Busted.

Meanwhile, in actual Melissa Theuriau news, France's No. 1 Melissa fan site has been redesigned on WordPress. Check it out.

Technorati tags: Melissa

Memorial Day weekend brings yard sales [We included this because it reminds us -- a little too much -- of the stories we were forced to write at the Lynchburg (Va.) News & Advance.] (Hornell [NY] Evening Tribune)

D.C. Comics: Batwoman now a "lesbian socialite" (UPI)

Mea Culpa!: A Course in Public Apology (Working Knowledge)

Technorati tags: Web 2.0, PR, Blogs, Websites, Public Relations, Marketing, Advertising, Media

Unfair Park is a blog by the folks at the Dallas Observer, our city's New Times weekly. In a past life, we worked (briefly and unhappily) at the Observer. We formed friendships in our Dallas Times Herald days with the Observer's two current top dogs, Julie Lyons and Robert Wilonsky. We even helped Julie get her first freelance gig at the Observer; today, she's the editor.

(Interestingly, we also got to know Dallas' current mayor, Laura Miller, in our short Observer stint.)

Since then, we've lost touch with Julie and Robert -- but both are highly talented writers who contribute frequently to Unfair Park. Check it out.

Technorati tags: Unfair Park, Dallas, New Times

Famed academic Dr. O.R. Chard has kindly agreed to analyze the following poem:

Remembrance of Who I Am, by Britney Spears

No more chains
That you gave me.
Enough of pain
Now I'm craving
Something sweet, so delight
How do you stand sleeping at night?

(Dr. Chard: Criticism so far published has concentrated upon two areas in interpreting this poem. First, the conclusion that the poem is an experience shown from the point of view of a new mother who is frustrated with her choice of provider. Second, that the spacing and odd syntax are suggestive of Spears' harried life in the media spotlight. The effect here is to communicate hustle, bustle, and speed, but also the child-like noise of children playing, perhaps imitating a whistle.)

Silly patterns that we follow
You pull me in
I'm being swallowed.
By the ones you think you love
They pull you down
You can't see up above.

(Dr. Chard: A scatological semantic field begins to emerge from the poem. The poem contains a breathless quality, and the language is structured like a nursery rhyme. Unfortunately, it reflects a limited linguistic knowledge of children's songs and chants. The slang reference to "silly patterns," as I would interpret, means to defecate in one's pants.)

Manipulation is the key
They screw it in
Because you're naive.

You come to me now
Why do you bother?
Remember the Bible
The sins of the Father.
What you do
You pass down
No wonder why
I lost my crown.

(Dr. Chard: This passage serves merely to illustrate the propensity of the poem to contain multiple, and equally important, readings within itself. How can one define "evil" without recourse to "good"? The struggle to determine "truth" in this poem remains undecidable since neither one nor the other can assume the supremacy.)

You don't see me now
You ask yourself why
My crown is back
And it's way too high
For you to be in my presence
Especially my son
You should bow down
I've only just begun.

The guilt you fed me
Made me weak.
The voodoo you did
I couldn't speak.

(Dr. Chard: Sexual orgies, intoxication, deviant sexual practices, nature, and clear hints of pedophilia abound in every line of this poem.)

You're awakening
The phone is ringing.
Resurrection of my soul
The fear I'm bringing.

What will you say
And what will you do?
She's not the same person that you're used to.

(Dr. Chard: To return to the inside / outside dichotomy: the reader is first pulled inside the poem since the visual elements of the poem fail to convey direct, unimpeded access to the thing itself. The reader goes inside the poem -- the verbal / semantic -- to find meaning. However, because of the decomposition of the words in the poem, the multiple puns, allusions, and meanings, the reader is forced into other systems of signification outside the poem. Thus, the reader looks outward toward fields of French and numerical representation. This oscillation between inside / outside is one of the many undecided issues within the poem.)

You trick me one, twice, now it's three.
Look who's smiling now
Damn, it's good to be me!

*This is for everyone who thinks they know me...

(Dr. Chard: You got me. I have no idea what the hell this chick is talking about. The last line, in particular, is likely to remain a mysterious mystery for those who would attempt to interpret its mysterious mysteriousness.)

Thank you, Dr. Chard.

(And thanks to Iain Landles as well.)

Technorati tags: Britney

U.K. rapper denied U.S. visa because of song lyrics (AllHipHop)

No fun? Are you taking the Mickey, dad? (Guardian)

Technorati tags: Web 2.0, PR, Blogs, Websites, Public Relations, Marketing, Advertising, Media

For word geeks, it's brilliance.

(Via Nicole Stockdale.)

This is not a joke. (We mean -- it's a joke, but it's also a real movie.)

You would think that Tara would be the perfect poster girl for Budweiser.

Not so.

According to the June 5 US Weekly:

The hard-partying star dismayed officials by crashing a private X-Men soiree on the Bud yacht [at the Cannes Film Festival] ... "They don't want the brand associated with her," says a source.

Poor Tara -- like it's not enough to be compared to Sasquatch.

Technorati tags: Tara

We've always loved Technorati. In the 14 months that we've been blogging, we've discovered that it is -- by far -- the most reliable tool for measuring a blog's readership and influence.

PubSub, quite simply, doesn't work. IceRocket got off to a promising start but has fallen well behind. TTLB is obviously limited. Most of the other tools aren't worth mentioning.

And Google? Its ranking methodologies are a black box that today is valued mostly because of Google's market power; it's like saying Windows is the best OS because Microsoft dominates the PC market.

For these reasons, despite its flaws, we've trusted Technorati.

However, the past two months have been a real disappointment. After Technorati went a month without updating our blog link totals, we e-mailed David Sifry and asked if he could check on it. He was nice enough to do a manual update; that was in mid-April.

Since then, nothing. A few days ago, we e-mailed Dave again and he ran another manual update. The result: only four more links from new sites were added -- after a month. My traffic stats show that dozens of sites -- not four -- linked to Media Orchard during that period.

Lately, sites that reliably popped up on our Technorati page when they linked to us -- like Mike's Points and paidContent.org -- aren't showing up at all. And of course, other sites, like Romenesko, have never showed up when they linked to us. We only know about the referrals from the traffic reports.

We know. Some people think we shouldn't pay attention to this stuff. We disagree.

Frankly, we think it matters that a company that presents itself -- and is widely recognized as -- the premier authority on the blogosphere follows through on its brand promise. We think it matters that they do what they say they do.

Dave Sifry has been incredibly responsive when we've contacted him. But there are systemic problems, obviously, and they need to be addressed.

The upside for Technorati is that a service like Technorati is very much needed, and will become even more valuable over time. But as its users depend upon it more and more, it's going to have to keep up with their expectations. The surest way to kill any growing company is to overpromise and underdeliver.

Technorati tags: Technorati

Pat Robertson leg presses 2,000 pounds (AP)

CSPI to sue 7UP over "all natural" claim (CSPI Newsroom)

Marketers Groom Metrosexuals (MarketingBlurb)

Advertising that actually makes me hungry (Slashfood)

Technorati tags: Web 2.0, PR, Blogs, Websites, Public Relations, Marketing, Advertising, Media

Neil Boorman, a U.K. journalist, will be setting all his branded possessions on fire on Aug. 26.

Why, you ask?

Two possibilities:

1. Quoting Neil,

Until recently, I thought I knew who Neil Boorman was. I felt sure how the outside world regarded me because I had spent a fair amount of time engineering an image. I found the best way to understand and articulate 'me' was through the owning and displaying of things made by brands. They provided a source of comfort, a reassurance of my own self-worth, they project my identity to others around me. Frustratingly, this attempt at branded self-identity has been accompanied with a numbed sense of dissatisfaction. Attempting to cure myself, I have sought comfort and reassurance by buying yet more branded goods, treating myself 'because I'm worth it.' I now understand that this behavior only made matters worse. For all the time and money I have devoted to collecting these brands, these symbols of self, I have absolutely no idea who I am. ... With every new emblem of identity I add to my collection, I lose a piece of myself to the brands. They cannot reciprocate the love I give. They cannot transport me to the places I'm promised exist. I am not, nor will I ever be remotely similar to the people that appear in their ads. It is a lie, a lie I have believed in for too long.

2. He's writing a book called Bonfire of the Brands.

Hmmm, let us ponder our choices for a moment.

OK -- we're ready; 2. We vote for 2.

(Via adfreak)

(Amanda K. is an occasional fictional contributor to Media Orchard.)

A bunch of PR bloggers, including my new crush Phil Gomes, along with Stephen, Mike and others, are being totally hounded by this mean, anonymous, gross troll-blogger, who keeps calling them "midgets" and "little people."

That's why it made me so happy today when I read this story on the Web about how the National Organization of Short Statured Adults is standing up for the little guy:

The sentence of probation for a man the judge said was too short to go to prison ... will be appealed by Attorney General Jon Bruning...

The case was drawing international attention, with crime victim advocates decrying the sentence and supporters of short people saying it's about time someone recognized the challenges they face.

"He would probably end up being somebody's woman," said Joe Mangano of New York City, secretary of the National Organization of Short Statured Adults.

I thought that was, like, so cool that he said that. But then it was like, sooooo weird -- because the anonymous, gross troll-blogger is actually a guy pretending to be a woman. Right?

That's like something from an episode of "Lost."

I totally forgot to TiVo the season finale, by the way. Ditz!

Technorati tags: Strumpette, Strumpette Webmaster Brian Connolly

Technically, the e-mail came from one "Naser Al Belooshi," but the parallels between "Belooshi's" story and Bill's made us wonder:

Though I am very rich, I was never generous, I was always hostile to people and only focused on my business as that was the only thing I cared for. But now I regret all this as I now know that there is more to life than just wanting to have or make all the money in the world.

See what we mean? The missive continues:

The last of my money which no one knows of is the huge cash deposit of four Million dollars ($4,000,000.00) that I have with finance House abroad. I will want you to help me collect this deposit and dispatch it to charity organizations.

Bill -- er, "Belooshi" -- had us till that last part.

Unless your idea of a good time is to pace the streets of L.A. wearing a sandwich board and hawking the "American Idol" reject's new CD. Watch the video.