Big Surprise Revealed, Pandora adds Ads, Google’s “Favorite Sites,” Digg and Twitter Gain (Even More) Popularity – Free Line 1/21/09
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Wednesday, January 21st, 2009Today’s action-packed episode of the Free Line will be a bit abbreviated, due to the “birthday festivities” that were discussed yesterday. The big news? Free Line associate Andy Mancini will be interviewing a team member of Slacker on Friday. For those unaware, Slacker is an Internet radio service, similar Last.fm and iLike. In addition to the standard social network/website/iPhone app combination that is offered by everyone, users can access the service through a proprietary player. The actual Slacker service is offered in two forms: a free version and a $6 a month subscription plan. The free version gives you access to the entire music library, but puts limits on how many songs you can favorite or ban. Simply put, Slacker is the Free Line at its very, very best. Speaking of which…
Slacker is not the only Internet radio service that has people talking. Pandora, long considered to be Slacker’s main rival due to its incredibly popular iPhone app, has recently added audio advertising to their broadcasts. These audio ads will replace the service’s slate of overlay ads, which were introduced last summer. Adept users will immediately notice that other services, including the aforementioned Slacker, have been using ads to subsidize royalties for a while now. As per the norm, the ads apply to users of the free service only.
Elsewhere folks at Google are trying something a bit different with their beloved search engine. In an effort to inject a bit of customization into the mix, users are now able to designate a certain page or domain a “favorite site.” Information found on said “favorite sites” will then be given preferential treatment during searches, often appearing ahead of what normally would be at the top of the page. While many within the industry welcome the change, some wonder what it will do to SEO. By allowing users to dictate what goes where and why, they argue, Google is essentially recreating the search engine optimization concept. An official release date for the new tool has not been announced at this time.
And finally, Twitter is just about ready to overtake Digg in popularity, according to pollster Hitwise. Both sites have a 0.021% percent user share, putting the sites at #84 (Twitter) and #85 (Digg) on the popularity charts. Twitter has the edge with 25 to 34 year olds and those over 55, while Digg easily takes the other demographic. Despite making huge gains, neither are even close to cracking to the top five. Google, the clear number one, has a 9.23% share of the market. Even number five (Yahoo Mail) has a share vastly superior to both services. That being said, any upward movement is always a good thing.
Thanks for the report Brad, As a matter a fact I have been reading you for a while now and just wanted to comment about the Google favoritism allegedly happening. reading through the reports for the last year there have been numerous allegations that Google is going to do something to favor or disfavor various entities.
Don’t you think Google would loose credibility if they extremely favored one group? That would show extreme disregard for another group, its simple logic that this would happen.
These are major concerns of mine because I am starting over totally from scratch. when I mean starting over I mean everything, except my wife’s blog. I am just afraid that just as the government is doing to the country,the people that rule the internet will be doing the same. by only having two classes of people and very few will make it from the lower class to the high class.
I have been on the high road, and had enough of the low one. I guess all it takes is cash.
Maybe I am venting a little, but the reports about what Google is supposedly doing is a major concern.
Thanks
May your prosperity be more abundant than your wants or desires.
Brad West ~ onomoney
Interesting that twitter is becoming more popular than digg. It seems like all the social media sites are fads. They all die down after a while. Interestingly enough, Google is still around…and more popular then ever.