12/31/2007 Top 10 Winners Predicted for 2008
1. Video
2. Healthy
3. Long Tail
4. Buy USA
5. Rich Internet / Interactive Web / Semantic
Web / Web Services
6. Aggregate and Attention Data
7. Power of the People
8. Going Green
9. Biometrics and Big Brother
10. Prosthetics / Bionic
Top 10 Losers Predicted for 2008
1. Lead
2. Squat Toilets
3. DRM
4. China
5. Skinny is Out
6. Blockbuster / Netflix
7. Orbo
8. MySpace fell to Facebook
9. Privacy
10. Piracy
Google is developing an online publishing
platform where people can write entries on subjects
they know, an idea that's close to Wikipedia's
user-contributed encyclopedia but with key differences.
The project, which is in an invitation-only
beta stage, lets users create clean-looking
Web pages with their photo and write entries
on, for example, insomnia. Those entries are
called knols for "unit
of knowledge," Google said. Google wants the
knols to develop into a deep repository of knowledge,
covering topics such as geography, history,
and entertainment.
:: Reputation Management
12/12/2007 The Internet is a bit like the old wild
west, and sadly, people often post material
about an individual, product, company, or service
that is inaccurate or simply nasty. Businesses
and individuals alike are struggling with how
to best deal with online inaccuracy and defamation.
The normal steps for dealing with defamation
typically involve litigation, but this is not
always realistic for Internet-based situations
since the Internet is global, and not managed
or governed by any single set of laws.
If you have the good fortune of being located
in the same legal jurisdiction as the offending
poster and their website hosting company, you
might be able to successfully prosecute them;
or at the very least, you might be able to get
the webpage with the offending material taken
down by the website host. Keep in mind that
most defamation court cases require that you
show that actual harm was done by the offending
material, which can often be difficult.
12/11/2007 Young Europeans prefer the Internet
over television, and nearly half say they watch
less TV because of surfing the web, a poll of
10 European countries showed Wednesday.
12/10/2007 Two national retail advocacy groups
are at odds with each other over whether Internet
sellers should collect sales tax from their
buyers.
The National Retail Federation and the Electronic
Retailers Association issued dueling statements
on Thursday asking Congress to consider with
extreme caution any legislation that would make
it easier to require Internet merchants, mail-order
houses and other remote sellers to collect
sales tax across state lines. The debate is
based around U.S. Representative William Delahunt's,
D-Mass., bill that would allow states that have
implemented the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax
Agreement to require out-of-state
sellers to collect sales tax on merchandise
sold their residents. The legislation is different
than the Internet Tax Freedom Act Amendment
Acts of 2007, which President Bush signed
into law on October 31, in that the SSUTA permits
states implementing the Streamlined Sales Tax
Project to collect sales and use taxes on catalog
and Internet purchases.
