Internet » Facebook Rips a Page From Google+

Facebook may be way ahead in terms of membership, but it's been lagging in usability. Its latest design tweak is the ability to organize friends into lists -- a lot like Google+'s vaunted Circles. Actually, the list feature isn't new, but Facebook is now kickstarting the process, automatically organizing friends according to a few basic criteria, and enabling separate news feeds for each list.

Facebook has been rolling out a slew of changes and new options, one of the latest being its so-called smart friend lists. This feature creates lists of a user's friends, automatically based on such criteria as work, school, family and city. Users do have some control -- they can opt out entirely. Or they can use the automatically generated lists to add friends -- without, Facebook promises, a lot of effort.

Each of the lists has its own News Feed, where the user can see photos, status updates and other posts from the people on the list. Facebook has placed the Lists section on the left side of the homepage.

Users can also share items with their specific lists, leaving out the wider audience. This is done by clicking on the dropdown audience selector in the sharing tool and selecting a list.

Other niceties: Users can continue using lists they may already have created. Also, no one is able to see list titles.

Facebook did not respond to TechNewsWorld's request to comment for this story.

Sincerest Form of Flattery

If this sounds awfully like the functionality in Google+, that's because it is. Facebook is widely acknowledged to finally have met a competitor in the social networking space in the form of Google's (Nasdaq: GOOG) social networking product rolled out earlier this summer.

"Facebook's new smart lists are a shot across the bow of Google+'s Circles -- make no mistake about that," Ron Schott, a strategist at Spring Creek Group, told TechNewsWorld.

"Ever since Google has introduced Plus, it is obvious that it was a wake-up call to Facebook in the context of usability design," said Hyun-Yeul Lee, an assistant professor at Boston University.

"Certainly, Facebook's recent add-on features are copying design or user interface features from Plus that they missed out on," she told TechNewsWorld.

The Bigger Picture

However, to boil the new feature down to merely competitive fear on the part of Facebook would be too simplistic.

"What Facebook seems to be doing here is creating opportunities for average users to share more content," Schott said.

Facebook's Heavy Hand

One possible drawback to smart friends is the automatic creation of the lists. Facebook has gotten a reputation for having a tyrannical attitude toward its user base -- implementing changes with little or no notice, and rarely requesting feedback. It has been lambasted repeatedly for playing fast and loose with users' privacy.

Some of this was just clumsiness on Facebook's part, according to Schott.

"Facebook does seem to come with a 'better to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission' way of doing things on almost all fronts -- and that's by design," he said. "When you're dealing with 700 million users, it's not plausible to make everyone happy, so Facebook has pushed updates that simplify the user experience for the majority of its users."

Also, there is something to the argument Facebook is making with its introduction of smart lists, Jonathan Kopp, partner and global director at Ketchum Digital.

"Facebook used to enable users to sort their friends into lists, but adoption hovered at about 5 percent or less. The simple reason is, it was a tedious chore to manually sort your contacts," he told TechNewsWorld.

Already Behind?

With Facebook inching closer to the Google+ model, it is fair to ask if newbie Google+ has already seen its day.

Not hardly, said Lee. While Facebook's strength is its massive user base, it still needs to think bigger in terms of how social connectivity will look in the near future.

"Facebook is giving an aesthetic facelift to usability," she said, "but lacks the long-term vision that Plus has."

Internet » Flash's World Gets a Little Lonelier

When Microsoft's upcoming Windows 8 appears on tablet devices, the Metro version of its browser won't be doing so in the company of plug-ins -- not even Flash, one of the most popular browser plug-ins ever. While Flash will still have a home in other parts of the OS, Metro IE's shunning follows moves from companies like Apple, which has also banished Flash from its mobile platform.

Adobe (Nasdaq: ADBE) is putting on a brave face in the wake of Microsoft's (Nasdaq: MSFT) announcement Tuesday that the Metro version of Internet Explorer in Windows 8 -- the one intended for tablets -- will eschew plug-ins like Flash and instead use HTML 5.

"We are excited about the innovation and opportunities that are available to our customers and Adobe as the Web and platforms evolve across devices, including Windows 8 and Metro," Adobe's Danny Winokur, vice president and general manager for platform, told TechNewsWorld.

"We expect Windows desktop to continue to be extremely popular for years to come and that it will support Flash just fine, including rich Web-based games and premium videos that require Flash," Winokur said.

"In addition, we expect Flash-based apps will come to Metro via Adobe AIR, much the way they are on Android, iOS and BlackBerry Tablet OS today," Winokur added.

However, "with mobile form factors now exceeding sales of desktops and laptops and Flash not being widely embraced within mobile, it certainly doesn't paint a rosy picture for the future of Flash," remarked Mike Ricci, vice president of mobile at Webtrends.

"I just don't see a viable scenario whereby Flash survives in the long run," Ricci told TechNewsWorld.

"Flash is trending out," Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group, said. "Apple doesn't like it, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) doesn't like it, and now Microsoft doesn't like it."

The problem with Flash, as Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) has discovered, is that it makes too many demands on both processor power and battery power to work well on mobile devices, said Carl Howe, a research director at the Yankee Group.

"Using Flash on a mobile device is a bit like putting a snowplow on your Prius. It's good in theory, but without a more powerful platform, you spend all your time spinning your wheels," Howe told TechNewsWorld.

So what will happen to existing websites and Web apps? Will their developers have to scramble to make changes?

The Race Goes to the Swift

"Standards-based Web developers have for years been telling commercial sites using Flash that they were breaking the Internet," the Yankee Group's Howe pointed out.

"Flash violates many of the fundamental principles of today's open Web, including searchability, structuring of content, and the ability to bookmark where you are," Howe added.

In other words, the move toward Web 2.0 is at least partly to blame for Flash's troubles.

Developers, at least in the mobile area, have apparently heeded the warning signs.

"Mobile developers have largely stayed away from Flash, so they are likely feeling validated by what's happened recently," Webtrends' Ricci said.

Microsoft's move away from Flash toward HTML 5 in Windows 8 should not have surprised Windows devs either.

Back in August, Microsoft indicated it would move away from browser plug-ins and toward HTML 5, and it named Adobe Flash as one of the most common plug-ins.

The Impact on Flash Fans

Companies that adopted Flash "will have to rebuild their sites in different ways or buy Adobe tools that convert them to a more Web-friendly environment," Howe remarked.

There's "a pretty good installed base of websites out there that use Flash, and they're going to move to HTML 5," William Stofega, a program director at IDC, told TechNewsWorld. "They're not going to switch overnight, but they will switch."

Adobe has introduced tools that provide a workaround to this problem.

For example, last week, Adobe announced Flash Media Server 4.5, which lets publishers create HTTP content with Flash Media Server 4.5 and push it to iDevices.

Flash Media Server 4.5 renders the stream instead of relying on a device's processor to do this work, reducing demands on battery and processor power.

Back in July, Adobe released Adobe Edge in preview. Edge is a Web motion and interaction design tool that lets designers bring animated content to websites using HTML 5, JavaScript and CSS3.

Further, the company is working closely with Microsoft, Google, Apple and others to drive innovation in HTML 5, Adobe's Winokur said.

Keeping the Hope Alive

That cooperation is essential if Adobe is to remain a player.

"Flash is looking like a legacy technology, and unless it gets support from Google, Apple and Microsoft, it's hard to see how they'll hold the line," Enderle told TechNewsWorld.

"Adobe's premise is based on the fact that they own and control Flash, but they don't own and control HTML 5," Enderle added.

Internet » Behind the Pay Wall, Part 1: Fan Sites Play Ball

While Internet users have been staunchly frugal about paying for online content, at least one breed of website, the fan site, has thrived using pay walls. Peddling hyper-specific information about high school athletic prospects, fan sites appeal to a particularly zealous audience. And with media companies like Yahoo and Fox investing tens of millions into these sites, the subscriptions -- and the revenues -- continue to grow.

The University of Florida coaching staff was short on selling points when it set out to recruit high school football players in early 1990. For starters, the head coach was brand new, his predecessor having been unceremoniously dismissed in the middle of the '89 season because of rule infractions.

What's more, one of the best players in school history, Emmitt Smith, decided to forgo the 1990 season and enter the NFL -- hardly a vote of confidence for the new coach, Steve Spurrier. Spurrier was a legend in his own right when he played at Florida in the '60s, but Smith's departure cast doubt on how much that resonated with kids who weren't yet born at the time.

Further complicating things was the rise of in-state rivals Miami and Florida State. Miami had won two of the previous three national championships, and Florida State had finished in the top three for three straight seasons. The Gators, meanwhile, finished the '89 season 7-5, capping a muddling 26-21 four-year stretch.

Spurrier's first task, to assemble a recruiting class in 1990, was hamstrung by a cocktail of mediocrity, turmoil and regional inferiority. As such, if Florida was going to catch up with its in-state brethren, it would likely take a little while.

Gators Can't Wait

Gator fans, however, weren't keen on waiting, and they seemed to vent their impatience on David Stirt, publisher of a weekly UF sports magazine called "Gator Bait." In the weeks before the 1990 National Signing Day -- the day when the nation's top high school players declared where they would be attending college -- Gators were so rabid that Stirt couldn't pick up the phone.

"As we tried to gather information, we couldn't make any calls," Stirt told TechNewsWorld. "All the lines were tied up with people calling looking for recruiting news. It was crazy."

To accommodate the interest, Stirt started a 900 number. At the time, 900 numbers were synonymous with porn, but Stirt replaced seductive whispers with football banter. Every day, he recorded a three- to five-minute message about prospects, about who might be the next Florida Gator.

Each call was US$2.00 to connect, and about a buck per minute after that.

Having been launched just a few weeks prior, Stirt's 900 number received more than 10,000 calls on Signing Day, netting him something like $35,000. All because people couldn't wait until the nightly news or -- god forbid! -- the morning paper to know that Terry Dean and Lateef Travis had decided on Florida.

"There was this time sensitivity that, for some reason, mattered to the fans," Stirt said. "And it wasn't even really that great of a [recruiting] class. Spurrier had come in at the end of the season, and it's hard to establish recruiting roots that first year. So his first recruiting class really wasn't even that great, but it didn't matter. People just wanted to know who was signing."

Recruiting News and Revenues

Stirt's 900 number is now defunct, but in its stead are hundreds of websites -- "fan sites" -- pedaling the same kind of recruiting information. And despite the migration from phone lines to the Internet, people are still eager to pay.

Thus far in Internet history, the idea of paying for content has been met with incessant complaints and closed wallets. But when it comes to the latest info on America's top high school athletes -- mostly football, but basketball as well -- tens of thousands of people are ponying up. University-specific fan sites have teamed up to create networks such as Rivals.com, Scout.com and 247sports.com, each of which makes Stirt's five-figure bounty look like pocket change.

For example, there are numerous Rivals.com sites, according to Jeffrey Lee, an Auburn University grad who publishes his alma mater's page for Rivals.com, that have more than 6,000 paid subscribers, and a handful that have more than 10,000. Subscribers pay about $100 annually, so a site with, say, 5,000 subscribers can generate something like a half-million bucks a year.

All in the name of recruiting.

"The lifeblood of these sites is recruiting information," Lee told TechNewsWorld. "All the football stuff -- post-practice interviews, game stories -- people can read that stuff online for free. But what they can't read about is what recruits were at that game, and what those recruits had to say about Auburn. Our subscriber base is recruiting junkies."

As the managing editor of Florida's Scout.com site, Bob Redman is something of an heir to Stirt. Redman has never dabbled in hotlines, but his site has thousands of paid subscribers, each a varying degree of Florida recruiting addict.

Perhaps more impressive than the 3,000-plus people who scoured his page on Signing Day last spring is that his is but one of four sites that specialize in Gator recruiting.

"You're diluting the fan base when you have that many sites," Redman told TechNewsWorld, "but there are plenty of people who will join every one. Recruiting is the core -- that's our main thing. Honestly, that's what sells."

Recruitniks: Deep Roots and Deep Pockets

Networks like Rivals.com and Scout.com are so lucrative that they have been gobbled up by media giants. In 2007, Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) acquired Rivals.com for a reported $100 million, and in 2005 Fox acquired Scout.com for a reported $60 million. It turns out that football recruits are literally worth millions of dollars. (Insert Miami Hurricanes joke here.)

That Rivals and Scout and others have turned "recruitniks" into millions of dollars is in a way confounding. This business model -- generate content, and then barricade it behind a pay wall -- is something that media outlets have been almost universally unable (or unwilling) to implement. And that figures: Internet users have a well-documented Scrooge streak when it comes to paying for anything online, be it music, movies or news.

Then again, maybe the success of these sites is a no-brainer. After all, Stirt's phone rang to the tune of $35,000 in one day back in 1990, with people calling in to get the scoop on what figured to be, and indeed was, an average recruiting class.

Stirt didn't invent the market for recruiting news. There were a number of recruiting newsletters being published before his number went live. But he did meld recruiting fanaticism with fans' borderline irrational need to get information rightnow. And the market, for a variety of reasons, has swelled ever since.

Internet » Behind the Pay Wall, Part 2: You Gotta Have a Gimmick

"There is no mass market in pay journalism online," said Washington Post reporter Paul Farhi. "There is so much information on the Internet. The minute you put something behind a pay wall, you give an opportunity for someone else to do it for free. Human nature is that if I can get it for free, I'm going to get it for free. If a pay wall is going to work, you have to have some extremely specialized information."

Behind the Pay Wall, Part 1: Fan Sites Play Ball

If recruiting followed porn's lead into the world of 900 numbers, it did the same on the Internet. Porn was among the first and most successful industries to charge for content online, supplying a different type of fix for an equally zealous audience.

However, like so many others, the porn industry's ability to charge for content has eroded over time. The sites that charged eventually lost their monopoly on the product, and with that monopoly went the money.

News is another commodity that people have been devoutly unwilling to pay for. Even The New York Times, which touts its journalists as the best in the world, didn't dare charge for content until last spring, when it put up an exceptionally porous pay wall that can be traversed for free in about two seconds. Readers can amend the URL, punch a headline into Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) News, enter via Twitter and so on. The Times' pay wall is as much of a barricade to traffic as a twig in the road.

The failure of pay walls is simply endemic to the Internet, according to Paul Farhi, a reporter for The Washington Post, who has chronicled their plight.

"There is no mass market in pay journalism online," Farhi told TechNewsWorld. "There is so much information on the Internet. The minute you put something behind a pay wall, you give an opportunity for someone else to do it for free. Human nature is that if I can get it for free, I'm going to get it for free.

"If a pay wall is going to work," he added, "you have to have some extremely specialized information."

Specialize and Monetize

If fan sites are anything, they are specialized. In addition to himself, Jeffrey Lee's Auburn site employs two full-time writers, a photographer, a sideline reporter, and a pair of in-season columnists who deal with nothing but Auburn football and Auburn recruiting. By contrast, The Birmingham News, the largest newspaper in Alabama, has but one Auburn beat writer and one college football columnist.

Sheer logistics make the Rivals site the eminent source of information about Auburn football.

"We're going to go deeper than the paper," Lee said. "We're going to go behind the scenes, we're going to go talk to people off the record, we're going to get scoops on what recruits are saying. That's what you're going to get that you won't get elsewhere."

Getting that information is no cinch. Recruiting experts have to sweet-talk parents, spend Friday nights planted on metal bleachers, and psychoanalyze 18-year-olds whose stories are often contingent upon whom they're talking to.

What's more, college coaches are prohibited by rule from uttering a single word about recruits. So while a beat writer can indeed cover a team, covering the future -- the prospects -- is a whole other story.

"It takes a lot of legwork, a lot of manpower," said Gator Bait publisher David Stirt. "There are some newspapers who have picked up on it, but it takes manpower, and newspapers are shrinking. It's such specialized information, you have to have really strong contacts. It's something that not everybody can do."

As a writer for Counterparties, a Reuters aggregation and media analysis blog, Nick Rizzo has dissected what does -- and more often, what doesn't -- work in the world of pay walls.

While he himself is not a recruitnik, he told TechNewsWorld, fan sites comply with the tenets of lucrative pay walls.

"You need to be offering some kind of original reporting if you're going to have a prayer of having a successful pay wall," Rizzo said. "And if you don't work in a front office or on a coaching staff, there is very little information about prospects. So there is absolutely a market for it."

Hordes on the Boards

Just as the content on fan sties is hyper-specialized, so too is the community that congeals around the content.

The Birmingham News website is chock full of news about all things Alabama -- the recent Homewood City Council ruling, the closing of the Lucky Duck Bingo Hall, and so on -- and its audience is accordingly diversified.

However, sites like auburn.rivals.com have a razor-sharp focus. And while this does nothing for Alabamans who want to know about the Jefferson Country budget crisis, it is a haven for football nuts.

"It's about being part of a community," Lee said. "It's about escaping to our own little world where it's nothing but Auburn football and recruiting."

Members of this community -- Lee likens it to a fraternity -- are a social lot. When they read about a sought-after prospect from Georgia, they aren't apt to hum the fight song and shut down the computer. Instead, they take to the message boards by the thousand to discuss, to opine, and to fantasize about what this might mean for the future.

Interest is so intense that fans from the University of Alabama are loath to miss out. There are hundreds of people who pay for access to the Auburn message boards, Lee said, just so they can keep tabs on -- and throw mud at -- their cross-state foes.

Internet » Amazon Redesign: Limbering Up for Tablet Action?

Amazon has slowly begun rolling out a homepage redesign. The new look comes alongside rumors that the e-commerce giant is just about ready to unveil its own tablet device, and the revamped Amazon layout may fit more neatly into a mobile device's touchscreen. "This is a significant departure," noted analyst Rob Enderle.

The next time you make a shopping trip to Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN), you may be in for a surprise. The Net's largest retailer will be rolling out significant design changes to its online store -- changes that some say make the site more tablet friendly.

The new design is airier than the old one. There's more white space on the home page. The navigation bar on the right side of the page is gone. The search bar on the page is larger, too, making it easier to poke with a finger on a tablet. And product photos are clickable links. Click on a pic and you're taken to its product page.

Amazon did not respond to phone calls from TechNewsWorld for comment on the redesign, but a spokesperson for the company told The Wall Street Journal that the changes would be rolled out in the coming weeks and for now was limited to a small number of users.

Redesign Overdue

According to some observers, Amazon's redesign will make it more friendly to tablet computers. Rumors of an Amazon tablet have been circulating for months, and for some, the redesign -- which resembles the design of Amazon's shopping app for the iPad, Windowshop -- is Amazon's way of making it easier to shop at the site with its future tablet.

Tablet considerations aside, a redesign of the site has been long overdue, according to Brad Cerenzia, director of consumer innovation at RichRelevance, an e-commerce services firm. Cerenzia, who has 15 years experience in the e-commerce space, used to work at Amazon, where he led an engineering team that launched dozens of new stores and features at that company's website.

Although Amazon has a history of experimenting with homepage designs with different objectives in mind, he told TechNewsWorld, "overall, the design hasn't changed much since I left seven years ago."

Rise Of Mobile Devices

Since that time, mobile devices have grown in importance for retail sales, which is something Amazon is recognizing in its redesign. "Amazon's new design is about enabling product discovery on smaller, interactive screens, such as tablets," Cerenzia said.

The redesign has definitely enhanced discovery for one user. "It takes some getting used to, but it gives me more products on the first page, and I found more things that I might not have found had I had the old interface because it gives me more to see at a glance," Rob Enderle, avid Amazon shopper and president and principal analyst of the Enderle Group, told TechNewsWorld.

"It looks like it's anticipating a tablet. This is the kind of thing you would do if you were going to do a touch interface," he added.

"This is a significant departure," he said. "It recognizes that Amazon may be bringing out a tablet shortly, and that tablet will be focused on selling product so the interface is reflecting the move to a tablet as a primary shopping device, as opposed to a secondary shopping device."

Perfect for Tablet Jockeys

Mobile devices not only allow shoppers to discover products online, but to access information about products in brick and mortar outlets as well.

"When you're standing in front of a product in a store, you've got this tablet in your hand that can tell you a heck of a lot more than the marketing materials on the box or that tiny shelf tag that tells you three important points that someone pulled out of a spec sheet to stick on the shelf," Cerenzia observed.

While the redesign may upset some users, it will be a boon for tablet jocks, he opined.

"This radical redesign is exactly what was needed to make tablet shopping accessible to people who own tablets," he reasoned.

"It really has a catalog feel -- more emphasis on primary images, more editorial. It's a more elegant shopping experience for me on a tablet," he said of the redesign.

"The old way of shopping on a flat monitor is stale for someone who has an iPad and is looking for an experience that matches the technology," he added.

Internet » Few Doors Remain Open for Yahoo

Yahoo may be in a ditch, but it still could haul itself out -- it has a strong brand and a lot of assets. It wouldn't be easy to accomplish, though. At this point, the best bet for Yahoo would be to get acquired by a company like Microsoft, which would integrate Yahoo's assets with its own, suggested tech analyst Charles King. "If they get acquired, the company and its employees would have a chance to survive."

After the firing of Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) CEO Carol Bartz this week, the board is exploring a possibility of a sale, according to The Wall Street Journal, and intends to hire bankers for advice.

In coming months, there may be a sale of Yahoo's Asian investments, a purchase of a social media or content company, or partnerships that could help Yahoo get more money from its Web properties, the paper reported.

The once-prosperous company has had trouble competing for ad revenue with Internet giants Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) and Facebook in recent years. Yahoo's second-quarter results were its worst since 2005. Still, Yahoo has accumulated numerous assets and Internet properties since its founding in 1995 that could make it a rewarding purchase for the right buyer.

Yahoo's search engine market share sits at around 15 percent, according to Searchengineland.com. This compares with Google's 67 percent market share and Bing's 28 percent.

Three years ago, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) was interested in buying Yahoo for its search business. A purchase today could bounce Bing's search market share up 15 percent and give it a better chance to compete against Google.

Asian Assets

Yahoo's home page functions as a portal to provide access to the latest news and other Yahoo products, such as Flickr, an online photo album and sharing service. Yahoo Mail has been up and running since 1997. It is one of the few Web-based email services to provide unlimited storage.

Yahoo partners with content providers in a broad range of areas including Yahoo Sports, Finance, Music, Movies, News, Answers and Games. Yahoo Mobile offers access to various Yahoo products over mobile devices.

Yahoo is also known for its international and multilingual presence. The site is available in more than 20 languages. Yahoo's Asian assets include a 40 percent stake in the privately held Alibaba Group and 40 percent in Yahoo Japan. Investors hope that an eventual IPO from Alibaba's Taobao unit would provide a barrel of cash. Yahoo's Asian assets are estimated to be worth between US$9 and $13 billion.

Good Traffic for a Web 1.0 Company

Yahoo's difficulties go back several years. The company has tried to reinvent itself a number of times with at least two different rescue CEOs.

"Two failed turnarounds under a company's belt is about as much as a shareholder can take," Charles King, principal analyst at Pund-IT, told the E-Commerce Times. First it was Jerry Yang and then Carol Bartz. Yet Yahoo remains one of the Internet's best known brands."

Yahoo has a sizable number of portals -- news, sports, finance -- that drive a lot of traffic, King noted. Even so, Yahoo has to fight an uphill image battle.

"On the good side, they're still drawing a lot of traffic," said King. "One of the problems is, they're considered -- like AOL -- to be an old-fogey site when compared to Facebook and other sites that are driving traffic."

Three years ago, Microsoft made a move to buy Yahoo, which was then worth considerably more than it is today.

"Microsoft offered 45 billion in 2008. That was $31 per share," said King. "Now Yahoo's stock price is just over $14 per share. A fair value now would be roughly half of what Microsoft offered."

Yahoo's assets are said to be worth about $17 billion, he noted, and "with the value of their brand added in, Yahoo could argue its value is over $20 billion."

Can a new CEO come to the rescue? It's not that simple, suggested King.

"The turnaround at this point would be really difficult. Things have changed so radically over the last couple years in how people interact with online content, it's not going to be just a reorganization to save Yahoo," he explained. "They would have to change their DNA, and they would still come up against Facebook and Twitter."

At this point, the best possible option for Yahoo would be to get acquired by a company like Microsoft, which would integrate Yahoo's assets with its own, according to King. "If they get acquired, the company and its employees would have a chance to survive."

Anybody Want Yahoo?

While Yahoo's value has slipped, the company is still a major presence on the Internet. It is very well known. It may be like the once-bruised Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) -- which was suffering before Jobs returned to leadership -- still full of promise.

"Yahoo still has brand recognition and eyes viewing it. Maybe not as many as before, but they still have eyes," Jim McGregor, chief technology strategist at In-Stat, told the E-Commerce Times.

As for buyers, does Yahoo have the potential to be spiffed up and set right as a standalone brand?

"From an acquisition perspective, there are many things to consider," said McGregor. "Do you want to invest a boatload of money to compete with Microsoft and Google? Or, can you combine the assets with a complementary solution, such as an e-commerce solution?"

The latter could make more sense, reasoned McGregor, because Yahoo needs to have something distinctive going for it in order to do more than just survive.

"I think another industry powerhouse or IT service provider would find value in Yahoo," he said.

Internet » Facebook Rakes In Mountains of Megabucks

Though Facebook hasn't disclosed its official revenue figures, a recent report indicates the privately held social media giant took in $1.6 billion in revenue for the first half of 2011. The company's power to draw advertiser dollars has long kept it on Wall Street's list of hot IPO possibilities, but recent market volatility may delay the company's plans to go public -- if they even exist.

Despite growing competition from Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), social network kingpin Facebook doubled its revenue in the first half of 2011, raking in US$1.6 billion to bolster company growth before its rumored IPO, according to a Reuters report.

Earnings from the privately held company aren't confirmed, but the world's largest social network reportedly posted a net income of nearly $500 million to start off 2011.

The company that started in CEO Mark Zuckerburg's college dorm room in 2004 doesn't show any signs of stopping. Its latest competitor, Google's attempt at a social network called "Google+," saw unprecedented growth in its first month, but the initial buzz surrounding the search engine's endeavor seems to have died down.

Even though Google+ brought in around 25 million users relatively quickly after its inception, it's nowhere near the 750 million Facebook can claim. Smaller and older competitors like LinkedIn and MySpace don't come close either, making Facebook highly attractive in the eyes of display advertisers and leading to more questions about just how much the company is worth.

Facebook didn't respond to the E-Commerce Times' requests for comment.

Ahead of the Curve

Though social network competitors have crept up as online contact becomes a primary form of communication for more people, none have had the lasting impact or widespread user base that Facebook has, thanks in part to its ability to keep updating its features and capabilities.

After opening the network to anyone with an e-mail account -- instead of limiting itself college students or faculty -- the site saw steady growth in domestic and overseas users. Facebook also began adding interactive elements like photo sharing and games to the user experience.

The company is expected to launch an interactive music playing feature on the site in a partnership with music provider Spotify. It's also never stopped aggressively recruiting talent from all over the tech world, as evidenced when Facebook picked up innovative e-book designers Push Pop Press, presumably to continue improving the interface.

Raising the level of engagement with features, the interface and apps also increases the amount of time the users stay on the site and the frequency at which they visit, making Facebook a prime spot for ads. It's estimated that the social network takes in more in display ad revenue than Google, Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) combined.

Still, the social networking phenomenon is a new one, and like other sectors of the blooming tech industry, it has room to grow.

"Social networking as a whole is still in its infancy compared to what we could possibly do with it. As this moves from being a communication tool to something more integrated in our lives, maybe combined with e-commerce, mobile devices or an augmented reality, then you can never really predict what's coming next," Jim McGregor, research director at In-Stat, told the E-Commerce Times.

Even Facebook can continue to grow. Although it's added plenty of global users, worldwide Internet usage is still sitting at just about 30 percent, so there is room for growth abroad, especially considering its loyal user base and notoriety.

"Facebook has a lot going for it. It has millions in investments from heavyweights like Goldman Sachs, it has amazing user growth and revenue growth, and it's got room for more," Lee Simmons, industry specialist at Hoover's (Nasdaq: HOOV), told the E-Commerce Times.

But it's also not too early in the networking game to count out competitors or even someone new willing to throw their hat in the ring.

"Could anybody ever top Yahoo? Could anybody top Netscape? Absolutely someone could top Facebook. That comes with transitions in the market. Maybe it would be in the form of a partnership. I wouldn't even say Google's out of it, although I don't think they or anyone else has found the ultimate formula yet," said McGregor.

IPO Whispers

Facebook's reported revenues once again raise a question Wall Street has asked many times before -- whether or not the company will go public, and if so, when.

"Facebook is interesting. It's sort of the 800-pound gorilla that hasn't come to the market yet. Other tech companies going public are the leaders in their fields but don't have the impact that Facebook does," said Simmons.

A recent market trend with tech stocks is to set sky-high valuations, even for unprofitable start-ups, but the volatile market of late and sometimes questionable business models have led to a few delays and lower valuations for tech stocks.

If Facebook's numbers are as high as reports indicate, however, its solid user base and advertising revenues should guarantee the company a huge dollar amount.

"My suspicion is that when they do decide to file, the valuation is going to be very high. If you look at some of the investments in Facebook just over the last two years, such as Goldman Sachs, that valued it at $50 billion right there. I suspect when it does decide to file, it's probably going to see at least $50 billion. It's hard to say if it will go as high as the [estimated] $75 billion, but it definitely won't be less than [$50 billion]," said Simmons.

What time frame Facebook may select to enter the market, however, is still very much up in the air.

"Right now everyone is playing it by ear. Everyone is kind of waiting to see how the market pans out, and right now it's being driven more by news and we're in for a lot more volatility. I wouldn't be surprised if the IPO gets delayed at least a year," said McGregor.

Internet » Behind the Pay Wall, Part 3: A Breed Apart

Is it more than exclusivity that distinguishes fan sites from their failed pay wall peers? Any number of movie review pages or restaurant reviews have interesting and indeed exclusive content. But sports, and recruiting in particular, appeal to something more emotional than, say, the latest dirt out of Hollywood.

Behind the Pay Wall, Part 2: You Gotta Have a Gimmick

Fan sites are immune from many of the Achilles' heels that plague other media outlets.

Indeed, people don't need fan sites to be in the know. When news breaks about a player, it will within moments be splattered all over the Web. But even if fans don't need these sites for news, they need them for camaraderie.

This is one of the things that insulates fan sites from the pay wall pitfalls that have ravaged other media outlets, according to Eric Winter, senior director of sports and entertainment at Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO).

"That's where the passion comes through," Winter said. "Once you read a thousand-word article about a player, you want to talk with people about it, share your thoughts about it. That's where those boards become so important, and that's one of the reasons why these sites will continue to thrive."

Model of Success

As with most nooks of the media industry, it's no sure thing what will happen to fan sites in the future. Maybe a wave of free message boards, coupled with ever-easier dissemination of information via Twitter or some as yet unborn medium, will conspire to overwhelm this business model.

That said, these sites are thriving behind their pay walls. While Scout and 247Sports declined to comment for this story, Yahoo's Winter said that Rivals has grown each year since it partnered with Yahoo. As if to prove its vitality, Rivals recently launched a fan site for the lowly Arkansas State Red Wolves. Texas State, best known as the snake-bitten program in the 1991 film "Necessary Roughness," is launching next.

All of which makes you wonder if it's more than exclusivity that distinguishes fan sites from their failed pay wall peers. Any number of movie review pages or restaurant reviews have interesting and indeed exclusive content.

But sports, and recruiting in particular, appeal to something more emotional than, say, the latest dirt out of Hollywood.

To wit, Gator Bait publisher David Stirt once received a call from a Florida alum who was working for an oil company and wanted to get the latest recruiting news. That's not striking, but this is: The guy was calling from Saudi Arabia.

"Fans have such an intensity of interest, and it means so much for them," Stirt said. "And that's been the culture of sports in this country forever. People are gung-ho about the teams they follow, and crazy as it sounds, it means more to some of them who will be playing in the future than who is playing now.

"It's always this looking forward," he said. "'Who's the next guy? Who's the next big thing?'"

Investing in the Future

Maybe that's why Gator Bait was falling over itself to get scoops on recruiting back in 1990. Sure, things weren't going all that well at the time; Miami and FSU owned the state, and Spurrier wasn't yet a known coaching commodity (his only head coaching stints had been with Duke and the Tampa Bay Bandits).

But instead of tempering interest, these might have been the very reasons that Stirt couldn't make an outgoing call, or that people were phoning up from the Persian Gulf. Because even if things aren't going well in the now, there is always the future, and recruiting is all about the future.

Indeed, the future was bright down in Florida. Spurrier spearheaded a football renaissance, leading the Gators to conference championships in six of his 11 seasons in Gainesville, including a national championship in 1996.

The members of the 1990 recruiting class were the foundation for all of this, the first building blocks. And the people who called Stirt's 900 number were, in a vicarious way, part of the construction. They were architects bound by football and optimism. That, and a willingness to fork over money to see what Terry Dean and Lateef Travis had decided.

Internet » What's NOT in a Domain Name

The early domain name launch was a disaster. There were no trademark rules followed. It was nothing but anarchy, with domains handed out on a first-come, first-serve basis while intellectual properties were looted in broad daylight. Soon there were 1 million domain registrations per day and a thriving worldwide cybersquatting industry. The confusion created a boom in reckless advertising and led to huge branding and trademark fights.

Esther Dyson, the Great Dame of Silicon Valley, at times matriarch to Bill Gates and many other lads on the innovation circuit, wrote a harsh column Aug. 26 about ICANN's gTLD system, titled "What's in a Domain Name?"

I like and respect Esther, especially for her technical background -- we have shared the podium. However, as this topic deals with the centrality of global corporate nomenclature, it demands an authoritative analysis, and I feel it's my responsibility to clarify a few points.

Dyson begins by asserting that "a name is just a sound or sequence of letters. It carries no value or meaning other than as a pointer to something in people's minds."

On the contrary, a name carries all the value. Without a name identity, a brand is no different than unlabeled goods stacked in warehouses, or global commercial services gasping and dying without being identified.

Imagine eBay, Gucci, Rolex or Google without a name; they would become penny stocks. It's the power of the name -- the perception of value that it creates. Without a name identity, big or small, you have nothing. Only the big branding mentality is logo-slogan centric and looks to a name just as a pointer.

Fruit-Inspired Folly

Dyson goes on to say that it's a trait of modern economies that people are able to distinguish between generic terms -- she gives fruit as an example -- and trademarks, which "refer to specific goods or services around which someone has built value."

Trademark law explained a century ago that generic words cannot be trademarked. Naive entrepreneurs often use them nevertheless, at great risk. Apple was dragged into courts over the conflict with the Beatles' Apple Corps, which eventually resulted in the largest settlement of the period.

Despite all the problems, Apple survived and acquired a worldwide "secondary meaning." Its common use is now quickly associated with the computer company and not the fruit. Orange, Banana, Apricot and many other fruity-named enterprises keep drowning and are often kept alive only via rebranding life support. Despite all the so-called glory attached to a few successes, it is wrong to adopt a moniker that's a commonly used generic name, even though it may be trademarked under a specific "ware" of classification.

In a case when a generic main name is attached to another word to describe its service, the secondary word attached to the name is hardly ever used, and the naked usage of the first word only becomes awkward -- and eventually a big trademark liability. In modern economies, Watermelon Systems and Strawberry Securities are doomed from the start, and only heavy advertising can keep them alive.

Dyson recalls her days as founding chairman of ICANN, when "we more or less followed the rules of trademarks, with an overlay of 'first come, first served.' If you could show that you owned a trademark, you could get the '.com' domain for that name, unless someone else with a similar claim had gotten there first."

Reflecting back on the early domain name launch, I recall that it was a disaster. There were no trademark rules followed. It was nothing but anarchy, with domains handed out on a first-come, first-serve basis while intellectual properties were looted in broad daylight.

Soon there were 1 million domain registrations per day and a thriving worldwide cybersquatting industry. The confusion created a boom in reckless advertising and led to huge branding and trademark fights.

The Necessary Work Ahead

"The value is in people's heads -- in the meanings of the words and the brand associations," insists Dyson, "not in the expanded namespace."

Expanding the namespace does increase value. The value in people's heads comes from a name's accessibility and usability, which in turn add to increased visibility. This visibility increases the value of the brand, as visible brands are chosen over obscure brands. gTLD creates new layers of usability.

The visibility that domain names brought to IBM and Xerox are as significant as the effect TV broadcasting had on name identity.

Apple will have added usage with unlimited dot-apple applications. It can control and allocate at wish creative digital sub-name branding services. Back to the fruity example, which now seems to be attached to products, thanks to its generic disposition. "Apple phone," "Apple iPod" and "Apple computer" are all common phrases because "Apple" is not distinct enough. It isn't necessary to point out that a Rolex is a watch. Pointers are signs of weak names.

Global corporate nomenclature became complex with little room for overly creative, easy-access domain naming, while over-friendly generic use made the branding sector the beneficiary, to the tune of US$500 billion yearly. Weak names need constant oxygen to survive. It's not the complexity; it's the simplicity of the issue that's missing.

Dyson maintains that the new gTLD naming will "create jobs, but little extra value. To me, useless jobs are, well, useless."

It's another myth that gTLD will result in extra work with no value. Has the Internet been good to our society? Have 200 million domain names served our commerce well? With a billion-plus new users coming online, what's useless is to think that extra work is unnecessary.

"One Internet, one world thinking" demands global naming systems that will manage billions of domain names of all sorts and types on a multilingual format for the global population. This is a formidable task that requires continuous expansion on all fronts. It's not a question of useless work -- it's all about facing the future boldly and dealing with the exponential reality of 5 billion Internet users by 2020.

Dyson invites us to imagine owning a valuable patch of land that someone wants to divide into smaller parcels and then charge a fee to protect each one of them.

In fact, the "agrarian" cybersquatter activity originated and thrived under the cheap, no-questions-asked domain name system. It provided more than 10,000 UDRP cases, with lawyers sorting out the disputes at many thousands of dollars each.

From the standpoint of business costs, well-structured and protectable names win their cases with ease. That's not the case with loosely composed generic names that flew out of a dictionary.

"Coca-Cola is that farmer," Dyson continues. "It and other trademark holders are now implicitly being asked to register Coca-Cola in each new TLD -- as well as to buy its own new TLDs."

Famous brands routinely defend against trespassing and win. The bigger question is in the gTLD process, as complicated as getting a city to host the Olympics. How likely is it that brand names -- say, dot-Deloitte or dot-Sony -- would trespass and secure, say, "Coke.Deloitte" or "Coke.Sony" and then offer those domains to the general public, as is done with the current system? To do what -- raise enough money to cover one hour of their electricity bill?

This fear mongering is based purely on the old domain name mentality and is proof of a lack of understanding of the new system among marketers of the world. The old system was designed for easy and free access that enabled widespread stealth of identities. This gTLD system is far too expensive and complicated to encourage petty theft. It will not end the trademark-protection problem, but it will certainly put a sober new face on it.

"The only shortage," maintains Dyson, "is a shortage of space in people's heads."

The only shortage in people's heads comes from poor recall-ability of generic and diluted names. Which United? Which National? Which First? Weak and borderline brands are threatened for many reasons. Primarily, Western brands are facing the brands of emerging economies that are being bolstered through digital compression and portability; they clearly have the cyberbranding edge.

The gTLD is not subdividing any cultivated name space; it will only provide tools to create more customer touchpoints. What exactly did the early domain name bring to our society? Fast-forward change, where unfit name identities broke down and collapsed along the way.

A Serious Game

Dyson refers to a Twitter conversation she had with Annalisa Roger, founder of DotGreen.org, who told her "about the value her group will be adding to .green: marketing, brand identity, raising money for NGOs. But I couldn't help wondering why she can't just add the same value to DotGreen.org."

The $500,000 average cost of a gTLD for any reasonable project is highly affordable in comparison to the production cost of a single TV commercial, or a few full-page ads in major cities, or a logo-slogan, rebranding exercise -- without the launch cost, of course.

A gTLD is not expensive; it is highly justifiable against its components of power and subnamebranding architecture. It's a sophisticated game that demands special maneuvers.

The dot-branded generic names are a high risk entrepreneurial heaven of high risks and high returns. Getting a gTLD for the purpose of cybersquatting someone else's brand is ridiculous. Only cheap, dime-a-dozen domain names make this option look attractive and lucrative.

The bigger challenges are corporate nomenclature-based. Is "Green" really better than "Eco"? Why? Which would sell more? "Tel," "Cell" or "Mobile"? "Car," "Auto" or "Moto"? What's the difference between "Ucar," "Mycar," "iDrive" or "Udrive" from a usability and marketing suitability point of view, and which combination will create more dilution in the long run?

This clearly points to the fear among global advertising agencies and branding services that the centrality of the gTLD application gets extremely intricate at the core of nomenclature. To admit this would be to admit that names do matter. This is where the "names as a pointer" school of thought collapses. One Internet, one world demands one name, one owner thinking.

"Suppose, for example," argues Dyson, "that a cheese maker buys .cheese (as was suggested by one person at a new-TLD meeting recently) and uses it to favor only its own brands?"

Contrary to general perception, generic gTLDs cannot be trademarked. They are licenses to drive a master name identity on cyberhighways and create unlimited subnames to join the race.

The issuance of dot-cheese to Kraft or Bata simply gives them a communication and customer contact point advantage. By no means does it stop others from producing cheese or branding other types of cheeses or creating name brands.

This is an open race for serious marketers -- no different than Walmart buying TV spots during the Super Bowl to maintain its dominance. It's an open market, and all are free to play -- if they know the rules.

"The real innovation has been in companies such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Foursquare, which are creating their own new namespaces rather than hijacking the DNS," Dyson insists.

The social chatter is not name-branding but rather noise creation. The Facebook, LinkedIn types did not add any new nomenclature platform, but offered free usage of registration.

Building a name identity with the intention of commercializing an expandable base can only be achieved when the name management organization is fully committed to deliver such tangibles.

The gTLD is a formidable exercise in this pursuit, and it would be very naive to assume that filling out a customer service card at McDonald's or e-voting creates a namespace. The gTLD, by virtue of its seriousness and size, will be open to a lot of innovative applications along the way. There will be spectacular successes and catastrophic failures on most major new fronts.

"Most of the people active in setting ICANN's policies are involved somehow in the domain-name business, and they would be in control of the new TLDs as well," asserts Dyson.

The Internet without domain names is basically useless. If ICANN is the mother operator of the Internet, obviously apart from security and hard wiring, global naming systems are its prime responsibilities. Success in the creation of domain name devices is the only key to open the hidden universe behind the website.

"Of course, if I am right," Dyson suggests, "the DNS will lose its value over time, and most people will get to Web sites and content via social networks and apps, or via Google (or whatever supersedes it in the competitive marketplace)."

Names have provided eternal longevity to ideas and brands. Social media are a novelty that will run their course in time. Bad names kill good brands. No matter how it's chatted, typed, whispered, called, yelled or found on search, the fact remains: Without a name, there is no brand.

The more unique and powerful the name, the more it climbs to the top; the more diluted, the more it sinks. Social media are just another place where good names can swim. Advertising provides flotation to sinking names. How well a name identity secures global mindshare will forecast the continuation of its success.

Internet » Goodbye TV Show Rentals - and Goodbye External Hard Drives

I don't particularly like the fact that Apple has killed TV show rentals. But I think I can at least understand why it did it. Apple says it was all about popularity, and TV networks may have played a role behind the scenes, but really the elimination of rentals is just part of a broader plan that will simplify media consumption and free us from having to constantly act as our own data micromanagers.

My unhappiness with Apple's (Nasdaq: AAPL) decision to cancel iTunes TV show rentals for 99 US cents led me to get a glimpse of Apple's new iCloud-related world. As it was widely reported, Apple decided to ditch the rental program because consumers overwhelmingly prefer to buy their TV shows.

I don't have the data in front of me, the hard numbers that Apple has showing how many TV shows customers were renting vs. how many shows they were buying. But I can't say I believe Apple on this one.

If Apple showed a pie graph with tiny slice of rental pie, OK, I would take them at their word. But I think two other factors are at play that are much more telling.

First, I don't think the major television networks were ever all that pleased with the Apple iTunes TV show rental program. Basically, I could rent an HD TV show for one-third of the cost to buy the HD version outright at $2.99. So I could watch a great season finale twice, for example, and still come out ahead as a consumer with a big-screen TV in my living room.

And I did.

But Back to the Other Reason Apple Canceled TV Rentals

Regardless of whether or not the economics of Apple and the TV networks were a factor, I think Apple's iCloud direction is a much bigger factor.

When iCloud launches, consumers will be able to download and essentially stream their purchased content from iCloud to all of their Apple and iOS devices, like iPhones and iPads. And if you buy something from one device, it will automatically download to another device over WiFi. For e-books, for example, this would be pretty handy because I might buy an e-book from my iPhone ... and then want to read it later on my iPad. Having it automatically be ready for me is a fantastic consumer-friendly feature.

The same goes for music. Buying something on my iPhone and needing to sync with my MacBook and then get my iPad to my MacBook to sync yet again is all a big pain in the butt. It's not always that much of a pain, of course; for example, if I buy an app on my iPhone all I have to do is find the app on the App Store through my iPad and then I can install it, usually for free if it's an app that supports both the iPhone and iPad.

iCloud, though, seeks to erase these distinctions and make content consumption easy for everyday consumers. If you buy, whatever you bought will be just there for you, easy for you to consume in the Apple universe.

A Glimpse of iCloud Power Today

When I first heard about iCloud, I can't say that I was overly excited, partly because its actual launch date was so far out. It was also partially because I wasn't sure some of the features were particularly compelling. But now that Apple killed iTunes TV show rentals, I noticed a cool new feature that became available in the most recent Apple TV update: streaming TV shows.

Basically, any TV show that you bought through iTunes is now available for instant streaming directly from your Apple TV. Your iTunes account knows your purchase history, and consequently it lets you access the TV show again and again. It's pretty easy to use, and it's awesome. On my Apple TV, I now have access to TV shows that I forgot I ever purchased, even ones that I purchased years ago and subsequently deleted to save hard drive space.

Which brings up another key reason I'm starting to get amped up about iCloud: hard drive storage space. The MacBook Air, for example, just isn't a computer I can buy yet. The reason: The lack of available SSD-based hard drive space -- or rather, the steep cost for enough to keep me happy. To get just 256 GB of SSD space in the 13-inch MacBook Air, it'll cost me $1,600. If I upgraded to a third-party SSD option, it would still cost quite a bit.

The answer: Offload all my space-hungry movies and TV shows and photos to a back-up desktop hard drive, and if I'm lucky, maybe to a wicked-fast Thunderbolt RAID drive. While prices will inevitably come down on Thunderbolt options, using a desktop storage solution to hold my everyday content is not a tidy solution at all.

There's also the option for network-attached storage, too, but that's not particularly tidy either.

No, I very much prefer to have a large hard drive capable of holding all my movies, TV shows, home video, photos and music. Why? Instant and easy access, no matter where I'm located. If I travel for business or pleasure, I hate to leave something behind.

Irrational? You bet. But I'm a consumer, and I don't think anyone has ever accused consumers of being rational.

When it comes to the Apple universe, what's this mean? Take the new Apple TV, which doesn't have an on-board hard drive like the first-generation Apple TV. If you don't have an iTunes-running computer on your WiFi network, your second-generation Apple TV can't stream content from your Mac or PC. In a world where most computers being purchased are laptops, that model sucks! If I take my MacBook to a local coffee shop, no one in my household can access the movies that are on my MacBook. It's worse if a guy leaves for a week-long business trip.

So does a household have to have a Mac mini or iMac then, simply to stay at home all the time and be the central repository for content? Kind of. But that's not efficient either, nor is it particularly tidy. The last thing I have time for is managing a bunch of content, moving it around, making sure my Mac and PCs are authorized, etc.

By offering major types of content through an iTunes-account centered streaming model, and by extension an iCloud model, guys like me no longer have to pack around superfluous gigabytes of data. Just a few hours ago, I was deleting old TV shows to make space on a MacBook hard drive in order to back it up on a slightly smaller external hard drive before upgrading it to Lion. Odds are, most of those TV shows I'll never watch again, but I'll tell you, it was somewhat comforting knowing that I didn't have to track down another hard drive to save them to ... or trash them forever. Apple was keeping my purchase history available to me via my Apple TV, and in the future, via iCloud and my iOS devices.
Maybe a MacBook Air Is in My Future

So, what have I learned? First, by allowing people to rent TV shows via iTunes and their Apple TV, Apple ends up with a very confusing delivery model for consumers -- too many choices. I could rent a show and have access to it after I start watching it for 48 hours, but then it's gone forever ... or I can buy it once and have access to it forever, even if I delete it. Now how do you make that clear in a simply "buy now" interface? Not too hard. But how might that work with iCloud? With multiple devices? It just doesn't. The renting model never did work well between multiple devices because the DRM issues had to be satisfied -- a time-wasting pain.

So for the sake of clarity and easy portability, Apple is reducing a pricing option to make the overall experience better. I get that. I won't always like it, but I understand the basic premise.

Second, I'm learning that maybe I don't have to be so married to a large hard drive in the near future. If all my content purchases could be stored on Apple's servers in the sky, I don't have to worry about keeping that massive 3.35 GB HD version of the Pixar (Nasdaq: PIXR) movie "Up" on my MacBook hard drive. Right now, of course, Apple is only providing this sort of option for TV shows, not for purchased movies. I'm not sure why, but I'm guessing it has something to do with digital rights management and movie studios. Still, I'm hoping that iTunes-purchased movie iCloud storage will be a surprise announcement this fall.

All in all, this means that not only would I get super-easy access to all my cool media content on all my iOS and Mac devices, but I might also be able to enjoy a reasonably priced (and fast) SSD drive in a MacBook Air or even MacBook Pro.

Of course, none of this helps me with my 75 GB and growing iPhoto library -- but that's a personal problem, you might say.

Internet » The gTLD Metamorphosis

How fast will this cocoon hatch? How soon will gTLD spread its wings and show off its real colors? It all depends on the fast-track orientation that's now in the spotlight and, most importantly, on when gTLD-based models are able to demonstrate real global cyberbranding and image-expansion opportunities.

The cocooned gTLD has started to spread its wings, and soon it will show its colors and become a butterfly. Its well-guarded fuzzy and slow progress has finally propelled it to a much-anticipated metamorphosis, but the world still waits for some flying maneuvers. Mother ICANN has worked very hard to coax it along to this stage.

It seems that mainstream global brands, their leading ad agencies, major law firms protecting their complex intellectual property portfolios, and creative services need to come forward. So far the coy debates and borderline fear mongering have been mostly about floods of squatters and trademark defense posturing. Such mythical notions are destined for a head-on collision with factual issues of name identity marketability and suitability by gTLDs. The markets need point-by-point clarity to settle the confusion.

The conference events on gTLD have started, and that's excellent -- but they have to build momentum and higher frequency. The world is a very large stage, and few gatherings of often the same people and same topics will not make a dent. After the big announcement by ICANN in June, followed by a few thousand news items, the excitement has quieted down, leaving corporations and senior management worldwide wondering what just happened.

Corporate World Doesn't Get gTLD

A quick survey of top senior marketing executives in North America by AARM points to a mere 2 percent of executives "having some very limited or somewhat confusing ideas without any reasonable understanding of what a gTLD is all about."

The other current buzz in the Internet columns, blogs and media is that it's a US$187K money grab, a threat to mega trademarks, and an invitation for a flood of cybersquatters. How wrong.

On the legal front, IBLS also did some research and found that legal practitioners have been trying hard to find a simple approach to connect potential customers with highly suitable gTLD opportunities, but they haven't been getting any serious response. On the global naming complexities of branding, AZNA is also providing executive intelligence briefings on such matters.

The main problem is a lack of corporate world understanding as to what a gTLD is. By and large, domainers -- a very small group of Internet technocrats familiar with ICANN-related services -- are all positively engaged. They are playing with domain aftermarkets and domain name registries that deal with highly competitive pricing for basic domain name registrations.

Beware of Unhappy Surprises

The sum total of all these people, if measured in tens of thousands, is still an insignificant number. This is a serious global marketing issue poised to get the attention of hundreds of millions of businesses out there.

How fast will this cocoon hatch? How soon will gTLD spread its wings and show off its real colors? It all depends on the fast-track orientation that's now in the spotlight and, most importantly, on when gTLD-based models are able to demonstrate real global cyberbranding and image-expansion opportunities.

The biggest surprise for the corporate world will be the sudden realization that there is no more room to file -- or their dream names have been already taken -- as the window in the first round closes. For major players with the right combinations, these will be the biggest shocks, as well as very major marketing setbacks.

Internet » The Best Protector of Privacy Online: Market Competition

For at least the past two years, Facebook has been hammered from nearly every direction -- by consumer advocacy groups, the media and Congress -- about its seemingly cavalier attitude toward protecting user privacy. That was before Google+ debuted. After watching Google+ attract 20 million members in its first two months of operation, Facebook is now addressing many longstanding complaints regarding the lack of privacy on its network.

Online privacy was in the news again this week -- and Facebook, not surprisingly, figured prominently in many of the stories.

What was surprising, however, was that Facebook wasn't being castigated for implementing some new policy that made it appear the social networking giant was trampling users' privacy rights in its rush to tap new revenue streams.

The role of privacy-robbing villain was being played -- at least this week -- by comScore, a Web information broker. ComScore collects data on Web-browsing habits by getting users to agree to let the firm track their activity in exchange for free software or sweepstakes entries.

ComScore sells the data it collects to some of the world's largest businesses -- including high-tech companies like Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) and Facebook.

On its site, comScore acknowledges that it monitors all Internet activity of consumers who agree to participate in its data-collection programs -- including the acts of filling online shopping carts, completing application forms and checking online accounts.

Data-Collection Lawsuit

In the process of tracking this activity, a user's credit card or other account numbers may be collected, the firms warns, adding that "when this happens, we make commercially viable efforts to purge our database of such information."

Now, a lawsuit filed by Edelson McGuire alleges comScore is routinely collecting much more personal information that it admits to on its site, and maintains it does nothing to purge this information from its files. The suit, at least to my knowledge, does not say what comScore is doing with all this highly personal data.

For its part, comScore says the lawsuit is without merit and rife with factual errors in regard to its business, and that it intends to aggressively defend itself against this action.

ComScore -- as its customer list suggests -- is a highly regarded source of information on how the general public uses the Internet and related technology. I've relied on ComScore data on several occasions when doing research for articles related to social media usage, and I've never had reason to doubt the veracity of its findings.

I have no knowledge of the inner workings of ComScore, however. So, I have no way of knowing exactly what data it collects from users -- or what it does with the data it obtains.

An Ongoing Issue

I'm inclined to believe ComScore ultimately will be vindicated in this matter. But that won't stop us from hearing more about the issue of online privacy.

In fact, the subject of online privacy figures to become more contentious as the competition to identify and secure new sources of online revenue intensifies over time.

The good news for consumers is that marketplace competition -- not government regulation -- is the only thing that will offer users any sort of protection from truly abusive privacy practices on the part of Web companies.

If you doubt that, consider what Facebook did this week.

While ComScore was being accused of dirty data-collection tactics, Facebook was unveiling a host of new features that give its users more control over what information appears in their Facebook profiles.

Google+ on the Scene

For at least the past two years, Facebook has been hammered from nearly every direction -- by consumer advocacy groups, the media and Congress -- about its seemingly cavalier attitude toward protecting user privacy. It was obvious that Facebook needed its users to share as much information as possible so it could sell that information to potential advertisers. It also was evident that since Facebook had no real competition, it had no need to heed the calls for protecting user privacy.

That was before Google+ debuted. This new social network is geared toward allowing users to control exactly what information they share with specific individuals. By creating "circles" on Google+, users can separate their personal lives from their professional lives -- and even create tighter, private groups within those segments. Social networking no longer means automatically sharing your entire life with the global village.

After watching Google+ attract 20 million members in its first two months of operation, Facebook is now addressing many longstanding complaints regarding the lack of privacy on its network.

Your Home on the Web

"Your profile should feel like your home on the web -- you should never feel like stuff appears there that you don't want, and you should never wonder who sees what's there," said Richard Cox, Facebook's director of product, in a blog introducing new features the company started rolling out Tuesday.

"The profile is getting some new tools that give you clearer, more consistent controls over how photos and posts get added to it, and who can see everything that lives there," Cox added, before listing the new features, which mimic much of what's in Google+.

The major changes involve allowing users to set privacy settings as they are posting items on the site, rather than having to go to a separate page, as well as being able to change those settings after an item has been posted.

With the new features, for instance, a user can determine exactly who in their network can view a post rather than have it automatically go out to the world. Even more important, from a privacy standpoint, is a host of features that give users at least some control over what information other users are allowed to post about them.

These Should Be Standard Features

As I reviewed the new features, many of them struck me as no-brainers that should have been standard in the first place -- such as the ability to see how something you post appears on the actual Facebook site. Then again, there was no reason for Facebook to help users' manage their online image.

With only 20 million users, Google+ has a long way to go to offer any real competitive challenge to Facebook. Still, we're seeing how powerful even the threat of competition can be in changing a company's behavior.

Anyone who's concerned about online privacy should hope that Google+ can become a real social networking force.

Internet » SAS Social Media Analytics Keeps an Album of Performance Snapshots

"Consider how many people are generating tweets. The notion of compiling people who tweet about your brand in an A to Z directory has been difficult to develop," said SAS product marketing manager John Bastone. However, the SAS Social Media Analytics application does that, and also lets users rank the authors in terms of how influential they are, on what topic they tend to post, and so on.

SAS is beefing up its SAS Social Media Analytics application with new features that give users a better handle on their social media effectiveness: improved tracking of past versus present performance, and benchmarks to assess competitors' performance.

"A lot of this functionality seems as though it would be routine, but few companies on the market actually offer it," John Bastone, global product marketing manager for SAS Customer Intelligence, told CRM Buyer.

Keeping Social Progress Score

For example, the company's new social scorecard module lets managers view channel activity over a period time on such sites as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Flickr.

Essentially, it provides a snapshot of how a company did on, say, Facebook at a particular time.

SAS screen shot

"We find when we ask clients how many Facebook fans they have at the moment, they can answer," Bastone said, "but they cannot answer how many they had in, say, June or this time last year."

If a company can answer those questions, he continued, it is usually because there is a social media intern or employee manually logging in the data every day.

"That is what our application does now - it programmatically snaps every KPI (key performance indicator) that a firm may want for social media outreach," he said.

With this information in hand, a company has the necessary foundation to develop longer-term strategies.

"You can start to do things like correlate campaigns or certain actions, cross-reference them, and so on, to understand what is most effective," said Bastone.

Author Hubs

The author hub is another new module. It provides insight into online authors -- or people who post comments, in other words. The point is to give customer care departments information about who their biggest fans are and, conversely, who hates them the most.

It is another capability that is not easy to build in social applications, Bastone said.

"Consider how many people are generating tweets. The notion of compiling people who tweet about your brand in an A to Z directory has been difficult to develop," he noted.

However, this feature does that, Bastone continued, and also lets users rank the authors in terms of how influential they are, on what topic they tend to post, and so on.

In short, "it helps a company see who has the most influence on its brands," he said.

Comparing by Industry

The upgrade app also has new competitive intelligence functionality that compares what people are saying about your company in social media to what they're saying about a competitor. It serves as a microscope to examine how your brand and its competitors are perceived, Bastone said.

It can compare many different functions, such as public relations or research and development, he said. It can also delve into industry-specific issues, such as style and handling in the automotive sector.

The application has added industry-specific sentiment engines in several industries, in fact, including retail, telecommunications, hospitality, gaming, banking and automotive.

"Those taxonomies are essentially prefabricated environments," said Bastone.

Internet » Investors Dance to Pandora's Q2, but How Long Will the Music Last?

Pandora has reported on its first quarter as a public company, showing big year-over-year gains in revenue and listener hours. Wall Street responded possitively, but doubts remain about the Internet radio providers long-term viability. Meanwhile, other sites wait in the wings with IPO plans of their own.

Internet radio service Pandora announced its first results as a publicly traded company on Thursday.

Quarterly revenues totaled US$67 million, 117 percent up year over year (YoY), and listener hours hit a new high of 1.8 billion, up 125 percent YoY, Pandora said.

Advertising revenue more than doubled, from about $27 million to more than $58 million.

However, net losses also increased year over year, from $1.6 million in Q2, 2010, to $1.8 million in Q2, 2011.

Pandora's earnings figures are unaudited.

Investors seemed pleased -- the company's stock was up by 10 percent Friday afternoon. But with losses growing as revenue grows, could Pandora be selling its way to bankruptcy?

Pandora spokesperson Deborah Roth pointed the E-Commerce Times to the webcast of the earnings call when asked for comment.

And what about other companies in what's often been categorized as a group of social-oriented websites that have either gone public or may do so soon -- LinkedIn, Zynga and Groupon, for example? How are they faring?

Is Reaction to Pandora Overblown?

"There seems to have been a mildly euphoric reaction in the market because Pandora seems to be closer to profitability," Rick Summer, an analyst at Morningstar, told the E-Commerce Times.

"We would encourage folks to take a bit of a step back and look at this company," he added.

The cost of acquiring content, lack of support from the music industry, and the behemoths entering the music business -- Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) and Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) -- are all threats to Pandora's survival, Summer said.

Rising Costs

Over the course of the next four years, Pandora's content costs are going to rise, Summer warned.

At the end of 2010, Pandora's content costs were 49 percent of revenue; in Q2, 2011, they were 58 percent. If Pandora had to pay 2015 licensing rates for content, the cost of content would be 79 percent of revenue, Summer said.

"We have a business model that's only going to experience accelerating costs, so they're going to have to be able to get greater yield and utilization out of their existing advertising inventory," Summer pointed out.

However, moving more to mobile may not be that helpful, because "generally CPMs in the mobile world are less than in the Web world," Summer said.

CPM is the cost per 1,000 impressions, meaning how much advertisers will pay per 1,000 people accessing an ad.

With Apple, Google and Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) all offering music in the cloud, the squeeze on Pandora will intensify, Summer predicted.

"Simply saying you have a different model from them, as Pandora does, isn't enough," Summer said. "We have an unproven business model for Pandora."

Lack of support from the music industry may be the hardest obstacle for Pandora to overcome.

"The owners of the licensing rights want to ensure they get the best rates for their content, and it's not clear that they have an interest in supporting Pandora," Summer said.

The Other Social Bubble Babies

Like some others in the field, Summer considers shares of LinkedIn, a social network that also went public recently, as overpriced.

"LinkedIn is a great company, but we think it's overvalued," Summer said. "We're currently reevaluating where its value should lie."

Investors should keep a close eye on how LinkedIn spends money, Summer suggested.

"If it spends heavily in being a news and destination site, that would give us heartburn," Summer stated.

Zynga, which publishes social games such as "Farmville," filed in July for an IPO, and it's widely believed it will be valued at up to $20 billion, barring any unforeseen circumstances. However, the company's valuation could also take a beating after the IPO if investors begin to see it as a one-trick pony.

Groupon, which offers online coupons, has already seen its luster fade. In March, there were rumblings that it would seek a $2 billion IPO, but by June, analysts were questioning that valuation as well.

"We don't say Groupon has a bad business model, but we say it has an unproven and challenged business model," Summer said.

"We're not altogether thrilled at where the company is, and we tell our investors that this is not investing in anything that's proven yet," Summers added.

Internet » Slide CEO Slips Away as Google Pulls the Plug

A year after it purchased social media app and game maker Slide for a reported $200 million, Google has shut the company down. Meanwhile, Slide's CEO Max Levchin is walking out the door. Whatever the reasons, the developments suggest Google feels it has its social media sea legs and is now willing to bet on a single product: Google+.

After two months of basking in the accolades Google+ has received, Google's (Nasdaq: GOOG) social media strategy is again the cause of some head-scratching.

The search engine has decided to shut down Slide, a social media app and game maker that it bought about a year ago. Even more eyebrow-raising: Its founder and chief executive Max Levchin is leaving.

Levchin is pursuing other opportunities, Google said. Meanwhile, most of Slide's staff is remaining at Google to work on other ventures. Google did not return the E-Commerce Times' request for further comment in time for publication.

In a blog post, Slide warned its customers that a number of its products and applications will be retired, including its flagship Slideshow and SuperPoke Pets, as well as more recent products such as Photovine, Video Inbox and Pool Party.

A Sudden Decision

The decision to shutter Slide reportedly came on rather suddenly. Google reportedly paid US$200 million for Slide when it purchased the company. With Google and Slide silent on the matter, the rumor mill has gone into overdrive regarding the circumstances behind the move.

For instance, some believe that Slide's decision to release its more recent apps first on iOS instead of Android was the reason behind the move.

Another school of thought advocates the position that Levchin was the true target for Google when it acquired Slide, as it was floundering in its own attempts to roll out a viable social media strategy. As cofounder of PayPal, Levchin has significant cred in this area.

Then, Levchin was pushed out when Google+, headed by other executives at Google, proved to be the winning formula.

The news has also given rise to speculation that Levchin didn't fit in with the new Google as defined by recently anointed CEO Larry Page -- that is, a more focused Google less inclined to experiment and incubate new projects and technologies.

Of course, there is also the possibility that Levchin is, in fact, simply leaving to pursue other opportunities.

Wither Google+?

Whatever the reasons, the developments suggest Google feels it has its social media sea legs and is now willing to bet on a single product.

"Google has decided to place all of its social media efforts behind the development of Google+," William Weaver, a professor of Integrated Science, Business and Technology at La Salle University, told the E-Commerce Times.

"Technology and software elements from previous Google projects such as Google Buzz and Google Wave have been incorporated into Google+, and it is possible that various elements designed by Slide may find their way into Google+ as well," he said.

Also, Slide was not built solely on Levchin's expertise, he said.

"In addition to the code assets acquired with the purchase of Slide are the programmers experienced in the design of social applications such as FunWall, Fortune Cookie and SuperPoke, designed for use with Facebook," he noted. "It is expected that a majority of the former Slide employees will continue as Google employees assigned to projects throughout the company."

Barely a Blip?

In all likelihood, the shuttering of Slide won't rock Google's boat, according to Lawrence Knorr, a faculty member at Harrisburg University of Science and Technology.

"The closing of Slide will be met with questions like "What was Slide?", he told the E-Commerce Times.

"Google purchased Slide in order to tap the social media applications engineering expertise of its key people," he said. "Now Google is focused on rolling out Google+."

Internet » iTunes TV Show Rentals Canceled for Low Ratings

Ninety-nine-cent TV show rentals from iTunes are no more. Apple has pulled the offering from its online entertainment store, reportedly due to a lack of user interest. TV shows are still available for purchase on iTunes, and movies can still be rented through the service. This and the emergence of iCloud will likely further reshape Apple's approach to entertainment.

Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) has stopped offering 99-cent TV show rentals from iTunes. The decision comes about a year after the option debuted.

Movie rentals are still available. TV shows may still be purchased for download, usually for the price of US$1.99 to $2.99.

The move appears to be in response to user demand for owning a show rather than just using it for a short period of time. Apple did respond to MacNewsWorld's request for further comment, but in a statement to All Things D, the company confirmed customer demand for downloads over rentals was the reason for the switch.

"Experts were wrong. The consumer wants to own, not rent," Laura Martin, senior media analyst at Needham & Company, told MacNewsWorld.

As entertainment and content providers put together the first online media outlets, there was an overwhelming belief that since a tech-savvy generation had so many options -- everything from mainstream channels like Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX) and Hulu to illegal streaming websites, -- users would be content with simply streaming a TV show, or renting it on a temporary basis. iTunes rentals automatically delete themselves after a set time period.

Based on demand, however, it seems that if users are going to pay for a show, they prefer having it backed up to watch whenever they please, rather than just rent it.

"It didn't seem like the demand was really there for rentals. They tried it, but obviously the economics really weren't there," Michael Corty, an analyst at Morningstar, told MacNewsWorld.

"It seems to be a big point going against the prevailing content wisdom, and it seems as though a premier digital content player is going to be an ownership model," said Martin.

As the Interenet becomes a more mainstream way to watch television, content providers are jumping on board.

"Content companies are more than happy to provide their content online because the way they get paid now is through the TV ecosystem. They're doing everything they can to make it available, and from a content side they want you to be paying for a subscription, or getting advertising dollars," said Corty.

Apple TV Future

There is also speculation that Apple's move could be the first of many in another revamp of Apple TV, probably backed by the much-anticipated iCloud online service. The system would make it possible, among other things, for a TV show or movie to be downloaded on one device like an iPad and then stopped or started later on any other device, such as a PC or an iPhone.

As content providers come to believe that users want to watch TV on a variety of platforms anytime, anywhere, they may be more eager to jump on board with a company that can promise a streamlined digital experience.

"There is a definite trend for people wanting their content on multiple devices. All these companies are jockeying for that," said Corty.

Anyone's Game

The upcoming iCloud service is a way that Apple could have a leg up on companies like Netflix and Hulu, despite their large user bases of loyal, paying subscribers.

The hype about iCloud in tech circles is also an indication that the online entertainment business is still lacking a clear leader and could be anyone's for the taking.

"We're in the first inning of figuring out what the digital business model is for this," said Martin.

Even though the rental model didn't work for Apple, it's changed its approach in hopes of being a leader in digital entertainment as well.

"Netflix is going to have something like $3 billion in sales this year, but Apple has a balance sheet with over 70 billion in cash. They've got the means and wherewithal and the technology to compete in this business," said Corty.

Internet » New Facebook Privacy Tweaks Have a Googley Aftertaste

Facebook has given its users a new set of privacy controls, allowing them greater powers to select who sees what and approve tagged posts. The new features appear somewhat similar to those found in Google+, the social network that could prove to become a major Facebook rival. Facebook's changes have received a nod of approval from some privacy advocates.

In a nod to users who have complained about Facebook's privacy settings for years, the social network announced new, simplified settings Tuesday that allow users to exercise greater control over what information is shared across the network.

Going forward, users can choose a feature called "Profile Tag Review," which would allow them to approve a photo or post in which they're tagged before it hits their profile, or they could simply remove the tag.

The upgrades also make it easier to share tagged photos or posts with specific individuals or groups, much like the Circles feature in rival network Google+.

Those controls, and other privacy settings such as the option to see how a particular individual views your profile, will now appear in a drop-down menu next to the photos and posts for easier access to the security features.

Although users now have the option to refuse a tag, they may have to do so more often -- Facebook also announced that users can now tag anyone, even non-friends, in photos or posts. Early critics worried that option could be used in unintended ways, such as by advertisers or spammers looking for a new way to recruit customers, but Facebook doesn't think that's a concern.

"Something to note is that whenever you're tagged by a non-friend, it will always go into your Pending Posts section of your profile [regardless of whether you've turned on the Profile Tag Review or not]" Meredith Chin, product communications spokesperson at Facebook, told TechNewsWorld.

Facebook also expanded the location-based technology aspect of the site. Now, users will have the option to tag themselves from anywhere, not just a mobile device.

The changes will begin gradually rolling out on Thursday, and once it hits one's profile, the user can be guided through a tour to get a better feel for the updates.

Privacy Report Card

Due to the number of complaints and public relations headaches Facebook's privacy policies have caused it in the past, the company worked with technology privacy advocates to make sure the new settings would receive a warm welcome, and so far they seem to have made a positive impression.

"On the big picture we think these changes look very good. Facebook has been working to develop these for a while and made a real effort to make sure these are intuitive changes for users, that users understand how they work and don't accidentally overshare," Erica Newland, policy analyst at the Center for Democracy & Technology told TechNewsWorld.

One initial concern was the new ability to tag non-friends in photos. Facebook touted the feature as helpful when tagging a photo of a group of co-workers, for example, or acquaintances who may not necessarily be Facebook friends, though there was concern it would become just another way for spammers to work their way into the ecosystem. Since those photos or posts must be approved, though, the user is given a measure of control.

"I think there is some sense to allowing people to tag non-friends. It's Facebook's decision on how to optimize that experience for users, but it's important they're giving users the option to exercise control. That's something users have asked for a while and it's absolutely a step in the right direction," said Newland.

It's a direction many social networks are taking. Since the lines between what is appropriate to share online blur between generations, professions and lifestyles, networks are leaving it up to users to decide just how much of their info they want out there.

"We're happy Facebook is creating a forced choice. That's a very good model for privacy controls, rather than assuming you know what the user wants," said Newland.

Pressure From Plus?

Facebook's new controls are entering the scene around the same time as Google+, the search engine's attempt at a competitor to challenge Mark Zuckerberg's far-and-away leader in social networking 6 Ways to Use Social Media for Business. Free Guide..

After its debut in July, Google+ saw an unprecedented, almost immediate surge of users, and there was speculation it was because of the network's more personalized, controlled sense of privacy and security. In Google+, contacts are divided more naturally into groups, or what the site calls "Circles." Users choose from the onset who is a friend, family member, or co-worker, for instance, and with each post or photo must decide with which Circle they'll share.

The concept is similar to Facebook's changes, but the social network leader says it wasn't modeled after anything in particular.

"We've been working on these changes for the last several months. We're excited to be introducing a lot of changes that people have been requesting," Chin told TechNewsWorld.

The bigger question is not if this was a competitive response, but if all networks treat user information with the concern it deserves as online sharing becomes an inevitable part of the social scene.

"I can't speculate on how the two may have been connected, but what is really clear is that social networks see that privacy is a value for users. In order to attract and retain users, they have to offer controls. It's kind of a maturing of the social networking ecosystem," said Newland.