I’m on vacation, visiting an old friend and logged into her computer to wish everyone a Happy New Year! Some highlights of my year: –Going to work at Yahoo! –Building the team and Yahoo! Personals and working with them –Having a great boss who can really drive the business –Seeing blogging move totally into the… Continue Reading

Leeann Prescott at Hitwise says that Google Blog Search traffic is overtaking Technorati’s. She writes: “This week Hitwise data show that the market share of visits to Google Blog Search surpassed visits to Technorati for the week ending 12/23/06. Google Blog Search began catching up to Technorati in October, when Google placed a link to… Continue Reading

The sex blogging blogosphere is in a swirl because that darn Google algo’s recalibrated something–and it looks like a batch of sex-positive blogs are suddenly missing in action; Some of the coverage: Google “disappears” sex blogs? Something’s broken. (Boingboing) Will Google Kill Comstock Films? (Tony Comstock’s Blog) google is broken (violet blue) Chronicle Write disappears… Continue Reading

“Word-of-mouth marketing is more important today than it’s ever been. It’s not so much about traditional media anymore: print, radio or TV. The word of friends and family is valued 1.5 times more than it was in the 1970s. Consumers are more confident in taking decision in their own hands,” –Word of mouth marketing consultant… Continue Reading

“We believe there are several trends that could push either AOL or Yahoo towards a major transaction, with each other or with another competitor. Although not without its problems, we believe that an AOL-Yahoo combination is one of the more logical combinations in this arena.” and “Our models suggest purchasing AOL would be accretive for… Continue Reading

Saw the announcement tonight that McClatchy, the third-largest U.S. newspaper chain by circulation, is selling its flagship newspaper service–the (Minneapolis) Star-Tribune for $530 million dollars, almost half of the $1.2 billion they paid 8 years ago when they acquired it. Earlier this year, McClatchy bought and flipped many–but not all–of the Knight-Ridder papers, making a… Continue Reading

“The problem I have isn’t a presence problem, it’s an identity problem. I have too many identities! I know a larger subset of people that have that problem rather than a ‘presence managemen’ problem. And I think I have a solution: a single identity for all networks.” –Phoneboy, blogging on the need to develop standards… Continue Reading

“Playing princess is not the issue. The issue is 25,000 Princess products. When one thing is so dominant, then it’s no longer a choice: it’s a mandate, cannibalizing all other forms of play. There’s the illusion of more choices out there for girls, but if you look around, you’ll see their choices are steadily narrowing.”… Continue Reading

Merry Christmas and happy holidays, everyone! Enjoy this sweet drawing from the collection of the infatigable Swapatorium

“Bringing food to people for cash on the holidays is its own special level of hell. Nothing quite reminds you of the pure and unadulterated suckage of your life like the sound of other people having fun,or what appears to be fun, or even if it isn’t fun certainly isn’t running interference between people and… Continue Reading