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	<title>WebProNews » Danny Sullivan</title>
	
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		<title>Google’s New Privacy Policy: Danny Sullivan Provides Insight</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/1t243SohV-E/googles-new-privacy-policy-danny-sullivan-provides-insight-2012-02</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/googles-new-privacy-policy-danny-sullivan-provides-insight-2012-02#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:06:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Abby Johnson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ad targeting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Consumer Watchdog]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[Privacy Policy]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=100407</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[In January, Google announced that it was overhauling its more than 60 privacy policies and replacing them with one. As Alma Whitten, Google's Director of Privacy in Product and Engineering, wrote in the announcement, the idea is to create a "beautifully simple, intuitive user experience across Google."]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>In January, Google announced that it was overhauling its more than 60 privacy policies and replacing them with one. As Alma Whitten, Google&#8217;s Director of Privacy in Product and Engineering, wrote in the <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/updating-our-privacy-policies-and-terms.html">announcement</a>, the idea is to create a &#8220;beautifully simple, intuitive user experience across Google.&#8221;</p>
<p>The search giant said the main change for users would be that it could combine information from one service with its other services, thus providing a more fluid user experience. For example, if you conduct several searches on Google on a particular item, Google could assume that you want a video on that item if you then visit YouTube.<br />
<strong><br />
What do you think of Google&#8217;s new privacy policy? Does it affect you at all? <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/googles-new-privacy-policy-danny-sullivan-provides-insight-2012-02#comments">We&#8217;d love to hear your thoughts.</a></strong></p>
<p><img src= "http://cdn.ientry.com/sites/webpronews/article_pics/danny-sullivan.jpg" align= "right" alt= "Danny Sullivan, Executive Editor of Search Engine Land" style="margin: 0px 0px 15px 15px;"/> According to <a href="http://searchengineland.com/author/danny-sullivan">Danny Sullivan</a>, the Executive Editor of <a href="http://searchengineland.com/">Search Engine Land</a>, the new policy will provide users with more personalized results. He told us that it really wasn&#8217;t surprising that Google made the change since most other tech and Internet companies have one privacy policy for all their products and services.</p>
<p>&#8220;Google, which kind of has come from privacy policies on a per product basis, is kind of playing catch up, so that they have the ability to be more flexible both in what they may do with the information and how they may use the information to improve products and services,&#8221; he said.</p>
<p>This flexibility is what has some people worried, however. Under the new policy, Google could potentially take the information it gathers when users search to target them with ads. Although Google says it will not do this, the new policy gives it the right if it so chooses.</p>
<p>&#8220;Potentially, it gives Google a lot of new rights,&#8221; said Sullivan. </p>
<p>Privacy groups have voiced numerous concerns over what the new policy could mean. Specifically, the <a href="http://epic.org/">Electronic Privacy and Information Center</a> (EPIC) has even <a href="http://cdn.ientry.com/sites/webpronews/pdf/EPIC-Complaint-Final.pdf">sued</a> the FTC, saying that Google&#8217;s new policy <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/privacy-watchdog-epic-sues-to-block-googles-new-privacy-policy-2012-02">violates the settlement</a> the company and the agency reached last year over Google Buzz. The group is asking the FTC to take action that will prevent Google from combining user data &#8220;without user content&#8221; before the company puts its new policy into effect next month.</p>
<p>Due to the timing of the matter, <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/epic-google-privacy-suit-expedited-2012-02">a federal district judge ordered</a> the FTC to have its response to EPIC ready today. In return, EPIC is supposed to have its counter response ready by February 21. </p>
<p>EPIC also filed <a href="http://epic.org/2012/02/google-report-raises-new-quest.html">another complaint this week</a> over the privacy assessments the FTC required Google to take. Google said it was complying with the audits but has, up to this point, kept them closed.</p>
<p>&#8220;I thought that if you&#8217;re going to be audited on privacy, then perhaps you ought to release the privacy audits so that&#8230; the public could see it,&#8221; said Sullivan.</p>
<p>EPIC claims that the <a href="http://cdn.ientry.com/sites/webpronews/pdf/FTC-Consent-Order.pdf">FTC Consent Order</a> required Google to answer detailed questions about privacy and user information but that the search giant did not answer them.</p>
<p>Interestingly, Forbes featured a <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/wlf/2012/02/15/court-should-dismiss-privacy-groups-suit-vs-ftc-over-google-buzz-settlement/">report</a> this week stating that the court should dismiss the lawsuit between EPIC and the FTC. According to the report, the privacy group is overstepping its third party right under administrative law. </p>
<p>Glenn G. Lammi wrote:</p>
<blockquote><p><em>Washington Legal Foundation would be the last one to argue that federal agency actions should be immune from judicial review as a general principle. But once a settlement agreement has been reached between an agency and a private entity, the agency should not be compelled to embrace an outside party&#8217;s view that the agreement has been breached. EPIC is welcome to communicate its general views to FTC (which they do so quite often) on the Google Buzz settlement, just as Google might avail FTC of its thoughts on whether a competitor like Facebook or Twitter violated its respective privacy agreement with the Commission. But empowering activists or competitors to imprint their views of consent agreement breach on the Commission would be a dangerous and easily abused tool. If Congress wanted such third parties to inject themselves into FTC&#8217;s process on such agreements more formally and authoritatively, it would have said so.</em></p></blockquote>
<p>Sullivan told us that, although he has yet to look closely at EPIC&#8217;s case, he doubted the FTC would find Google in any violation. </p>
<p>Unfortunately for Google though, that&#8217;s not where its problems stop. The European Union has also asked it to delay the roll out of the new privacy policy. In a <a href="http://cdn.ientry.com/sites/webpronews/pdf/EU-Letter-to-Larry-Page.pdf">letter</a> to Google&#8217;s CEO Larry Page, Jacob Kohnstamm, a European privacy regulator, wrote:</p>
<blockquote><p><em>We wish to check the possible consequences for the protection of the personal data of these citizens in a coordinated procedure. We have therefore asked the French data protection authority, the CNIL, to take the lead. The CNIL has kindly accepted this task and will be your point of contact for the data protection authorities in the EU.</p>
<p>In light of the above, we call for a pause in the interests of ensuring that there can be no misunderstanding about Google&#8217;s commitments to information rights of their users and EU citizens, until we have completed our analysis.</em></p></blockquote>
<p>In a <a href="http://googlepolicyeurope.blogspot.com/2012/02/more-information-on-our-privacy-policy.html">post</a> on its European Public Policy Blog, Google responded to the letter saying it had met with several officials prior to its announcement and briefed them of the changes. It said that no one had any objections at that time and indicated that it would proceed with its plans to implement its new policy in March.</p>
<p>Most recently, nonprofit <a href="http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/">Consumer Watchdog</a> wrote a <a href="http://cdn.ientry.com/sites/webpronews/pdf/Consumer-Watchdog-Letter-to-_House.pdf ">letter</a> to the <a href="http://democrats.energycommerce.house.gov/index.php?q=subcommittee/subcommittee-on-commerce-manufacturing-and-trade">U.S. House of Representatives&#8217; Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade Subcommittee</a> requesting that Larry Page explain Google&#8217;s &#8220;disingenuous statements about its supposed commitment to users&#8217; privacy.&#8221;</p>
<p>In this letter, Privacy Project Director John Simpson wrote:</p>
<blockquote><p><em>&#8220;If Google were truly committed to &#8220;user control,&#8221; it would ask users to &#8220;opt in&#8221; to these substantive changes in its data handling, rather than imposing them across the board&#8230; Google&#8217;s practices affect millions of Americans. Google is so dominant on the Internet that for many people Google is the Internet.</p>
<p>You must not allow Google to escape legitimate privacy concerns by sending underlings whose high-sounding pledges prove to be empty or whose answers prove insufficient in closed-door meetings. It is the chief executive who is ultimately responsible for the company&#8217;s behavior.&#8221;</em></p></blockquote>
<p>What&#8217;s more, a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-user-polls/post/will-you-cancel-your-google-account/2012/01/24/gIQAOdVHOQ_blog.html">Washington Post poll</a> found that 65 percent of users said they would cancel their Google accounts over the privacy changes. </p>
<p><img alt="" src="http://cdn.ientry.com/sites/webpronews/article_pics/WP-Poll.png  " title="Washington Post Poll" class="aligncenter" width="442" height="205" /></p>
<p>Sullivan, however, told us that he believes this poll is &#8220;99 percent inaccurate.&#8221; As he explained, users reacted in this same way when Facebook made changes in 2010. In the end, Facebook grew instead.</p>
<p>&#8220;If they&#8217;re that concerned about it, then their alternative is to go to another company that is doing exactly the same thing,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It really doesn&#8217;t come down to what these privacy policies say, it comes down to the kind of controls that you&#8217;re provided and given, and ultimately, I think, your trust in the company overall.&#8221;</p>
<p>Ironically, as <a href="http://searchengineland.com/google-screenwise-panel-open-110716">Matt McGee pointed out</a>, Google quietly launched a new program that allows users to get paid if they use the Chrome browser and share their data with the search engine. It&#8217;s called <a href="http://www.google.com/landing/screenwisepanel/">Screenwise</a> and pays users in Amazon gift cards. Although many other companies conduct similar practices in order to learn how they can improve their services, Sullivan told us that the timing of this program was very bad for Google.</p>
<p>In spite of the backlash, it appears that Google will roll out its new privacy policy March 1. The company currently has an ad campaign to help to alleviate concerns, but Sullivan believes that Google will need to begin doing extensive PR outreach in D.C. as well.</p>
<p><strong>Does Google&#8217;s privacy policy go too far, or is it what you would expect from a company of its size? <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/googles-new-privacy-policy-danny-sullivan-provides-insight-2012-02#comments">Let us know what you think in the comments.</a></strong></p>
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		<title>Google’s Privacy Approach With Danny Sullivan and NPR</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/ySo9m0kjYSk/googles-privacy-approach-with-danny-sullivan-and-npr-2012-01</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/googles-privacy-approach-with-danny-sullivan-and-npr-2012-01#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:08:56 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Richardson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google Privacy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[marketplace]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[NPR]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=92833</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Google&#8217;s new privacy policy has been the topic of some discussion &#8212; although, perhaps not as much as expected &#8212; as their new multi-platform approach resulted in the creation of one privacy policy to rule them all, much like Sauron&#8217;s &#8230;]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Google&#8217;s new privacy policy has been the topic of some discussion &#8212; although, perhaps not as much as expected &#8212; as their new multi-platform approach resulted in the creation of one privacy policy to rule them all, much like Sauron&#8217;s ring, but this time, without the overt use of the all-seeing Tower eye.  </p>
<p>While Google may in fact be omniscient, at least in relation to the web, at least they aren&#8217;t in your face about it like the Eye of Sauron was.  Geek-addled facetiousness aside, while the backlash may not have been what some expected, any time the words &#8220;Google&#8221; and &#8220;privacy&#8221; come together, it makes for an interesting topic.  From Google&#8217;s perspective, it&#8217;s all about consolidation and personalization, something their disclaimer states quite clearly:</p>
<blockquote><p><em>If you’re signed into Google, we can do things like suggest search queries – or tailor your search results – based on the interests you’ve expressed in Google+, Gmail, and YouTube. We’ll better understand which version of Pink or Jaguar you’re searching for and get you those results faster.</em></p></blockquote>
<p>The privacy concerns about the sharing of this personal information across multiple platforms seemed to be addressed with the confirmation that Google users <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/can-consumers-opt-out-of-googles-new-privacy-policy-2012-01">can indeed opt out</a>, something <a href="http://www.marketplace.org/topics/tech/googles-new-privacy-policy-means-more-sharing">Danny Sullivan discussed with Marketplace</a>, which was broadcasted over NPR&#8217;s airwaves.  Sullivan explains what Google&#8217;s privacy changes to the everyday user:</p>
<blockquote><p><em>&#8220;&#8230;YouTube can see maybe what you&#8217;ve been searching on on Google web search and say, oh, you&#8217;re really interested in skateboarding so I&#8217;m going to prepopulate the YouTube homepage perhaps with a lot of skateboard videos.&#8221;</em></p></blockquote>
<p>The full audio of Sullivan&#8217;s Marketplace appearance is also available:</p>
<p><center><iframe  src="http://www.marketplace.org/node/50383/player/popout" width="600" height="300" ></iframe></center><br />
As indicated, the opt out option appears to have taken the sting out of the privacy complaints, although, the opt out option does put the responsibility in the hands of the user.  Does anyone else find it weird that Google&#8217;s new privacy policy is something of a consolidation effort, but if you don&#8217;t want to have information collected, you have to opt out of each individual Google property?  While one policy may indeed rule them all, getting out from under it is site-by-site undertaking.</p>
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		<title>Google Talks More About Keeping Ranking Factors Secret</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/TZPYxfYN7B4/google-talks-more-about-keeping-ranking-factors-secret-2010-09</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/google-talks-more-about-keeping-ranking-factors-secret-2010-09#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 18 Sep 2010 19:08:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Eric Schmidt]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[search engines]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=55554</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p>Yesterday, we looked at a video Danny Sullivan <a href="http://searchengineland.com/schmidt-listing-googles-200-ranking-factors-would-reveal-business-secrets-51065">posted</a> at Search Engine Land, in which he grilled Google CEO Eric Schmidt about listing Google's 200 ranking signals.&#160; <br />
]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Yesterday, we looked at a video Danny Sullivan <a href="http://searchengineland.com/schmidt-listing-googles-200-ranking-factors-would-reveal-business-secrets-51065">posted</a> at Search Engine Land, in which he grilled Google CEO Eric Schmidt about listing Google&#8217;s 200 ranking signals.&nbsp; </p>
<p>Clearly <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2010/09/17/eric-schmidt-tired-of-being-asked-about-googles-ranking-factors">tired of being asked about the subject</a>, Schmidt responded with comments like, &quot;Because we change them. What would happen is, you&#8217;ve asked me this question for the eight years I&#8217;ve worked with you, so it&#8217;s the same question. Why don&#8217;t we publish these things. And the fundamental answer is we&#8217;re always changing. We&#8217;re always changing, and if we started saying here&#8217;s how the black box works, then all of a sudden huge incumbencies would come out about this change and that change, and we just don&rsquo;t want that pressure.&quot;&nbsp; </p>
<p>&#8230; and that it would be revealing business secrets.&nbsp;</p>
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<p>
The company posted an article from Google Fellow and Engineer Amit Singhal <a href="http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2010/09/competition-in-instant.html">on its public policy blog</a>. It stemmed from &ldquo;a debate&rdquo; about fairness in search <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703466704575489582364177978.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop">published by the Wall Street Journal</a>. Singhal talks a bit more about Google&#8217;s secrets and competition:&nbsp; </p>
<p><em>&quot;Making our systems 100% transparent would not help users, but it would help the bad guys and spammers who try game the system. When you type &quot;Nigeria&quot; you probably want to learn about the country. You probably don&#8217;t want to see a bunch of sites from folks offering to send you money . . . if you would only give them your bank account number!&quot;</em> </p>
<p><em>&quot;We may be the world&#8217;s most popular search engine, but at the end of the day our competition is literally just one click away. If we messed with results in a way that didn&#8217;t serve our users&#8217; interests, they would and should simply go elsewhere&mdash;not just to other search engines like Bing, but to specialized sites like Amazon, eBay or Zillow. People are increasingly experiencing the Web through social networks like Facebook. And mobile and tablet apps are a newer alternative for accessing information.&quot;</em> </p>
<p>Singhal also says that Google reveals more about its ranking factors than any other search engine, and offers more tools to webmasters to take advantage.&nbsp; </p>
<p>Sullivan appears to think the list should be published, without revealing how factors are actually measured, but Schmidt says even the list would reveal too much.</p>
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		<title>Eric Schmidt Tired of Being Asked About Google’s Ranking Factors</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/QqUexQOFjKI/eric-schmidt-tired-of-being-asked-about-googles-ranking-factors-2010-09</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/eric-schmidt-tired-of-being-asked-about-googles-ranking-factors-2010-09#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 17 Sep 2010 19:23:21 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Eric Schmidt]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[search engines]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=55542</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p>Danny Sullivan has posted a few videos from Google's Zeitgeist event, and one of them is a fairly entertaining banter between Sullivan and Google CEO Eric Schmidt.&#160; Sullivan &#160;asks why Google doesn't list its 200 ranking factors. Schmidt's response: <br />
]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Danny Sullivan has posted a few videos from Google&#8217;s Zeitgeist event, and one of them is a fairly entertaining banter between Sullivan and Google CEO Eric Schmidt.&nbsp; Sullivan &nbsp;asks why Google doesn&#8217;t list its 200 ranking factors. Schmidt&#8217;s response: </p>
<p><em>&quot;Because we change them. What would happen is, you&#8217;ve asked me this question for the eight years I&#8217;ve worked with you, so it&#8217;s the same question. Why don&#8217;t we publish these things. And the fundamental answer is we&#8217;re always changing. We&#8217;re always changing, and if we started saying here&#8217;s how the black box works, then all of a sudden huge incumbencies would come out about this change and that change, and we just don&rsquo;t want that pressure.&quot; </em></p>
<p>He also says it&#8217;s a &quot;business secret&quot;.</p>
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<p>&quot;I agree, Google&#8217;s exact ranking formula is a business secret,&quot; writes Sullivan at Search Engine Land. &quot;But I wasn&rsquo;t asking for the secret recipe, exactly how all the things are mixed to create Google&rsquo;s special sauce. I was asking what harm there was in listing the 200 various ingredients that are in the sauce.&quot; </p>
<p>He provides more perspective <a href="http://searchengineland.com/schmidt-listing-googles-200-ranking-factors-would-reveal-business-secrets-51065">here</a>.&nbsp; </p>
<p>We do know one thing. People <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2010/03/03/google-may-start-calling-pagerank-something-else">obsess over PageRank too much</a>. There are 200 factors.</p>
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		<title>Should Mainstream Media Be Held to Different Standards Than Bloggers?</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/92F0SYWIBYM/should-mainstream-media-be-held-to-different-standards-than-bloggers-2010-06</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/should-mainstream-media-be-held-to-different-standards-than-bloggers-2010-06#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 08 Jun 2010 21:24:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bloggers]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Blogs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[FTC]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Jeff Jarvis]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[journalism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mainstream media]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=54202</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p>Should mainstream media be held to different standards than bloggers when it comes to crediting sources? Mainstream media agencies have frequently turned their noses up at bloggers, essentially claiming that they steal and repurpose the work of their hard working journalists. While this may be true in some cases, it is hardly fair to say that this is true in general. In fact, this week, we've seen a clear example of the hypocrisy of this notion, because mainstream media publications are clearly just as guilty as blogs when it comes to improper crediting of sources. <br />
]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Should mainstream media be held to different standards than bloggers when it comes to crediting sources? Mainstream media agencies have frequently turned their noses up at bloggers, essentially claiming that they steal and repurpose the work of their hard working journalists. While this may be true in some cases, it is hardly fair to say that this is true in general. In fact, this week, we&#8217;ve seen a clear example of the hypocrisy of this notion, because mainstream media publications are clearly just as guilty as blogs when it comes to improper crediting of sources. </p>
<p><span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"><strong>Do traditional media publications have less of an obligation to credit sources than bloggers do?</strong></span><strong> <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/54503/talk"><u>Tell us what you think</u></a>. </strong></p>
<p>This example came in the form of Search Engine Land Editor-in-Chief Danny Sullivan <a href="http://searchengineland.com/woman-follows-google-maps-walking-directions-gets-hit-sues-43212">breaking a story</a>, and then numerous publications running with it, without mentioning Danny&#8217;s piece as a source, which it clearly was in the instances he points out. He makes his case <a href="http://daggle.com/mainstream-media-stole-news-story-credit-1906">here</a>, and we discussed it further, with some additional commentary from Danny <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2010/06/02/would-traditional-media-steal-from-blogs-nonever">here</a>. </p>
<p>We asked Danny, who says he is a traditionally trained reporter, and worked for daily newspapers for five years, how often he thinks mainstream media outlets are taking stories from bloggers, twitterers, etc. &quot;I think a substantial amount of news is coming off tips seen on forums, blog posts and elsewhere on the web. Not a majority. But a noticeable amount, I&#8217;d wager.&quot;</p>
<p>The AP is one organization that has famously expressed disdain with blogs in the past (ones that quoted AP stories and <em>gave </em>credit), and the AP stands out as an example Danny points to as a possible offender in his case. <em>Note: after Danny called them out, a number of the publications (not including the AP) apologized and/or added links to their stories.</em></p>
<p>Out of the mainstream stories that do take from blogs, you have to wonder what percentage of them link to the source material, and how that stacks up to the percentage of bloggers linking to the mainstream sources.&nbsp; While certainly not <em>always</em> the case, bloggers are traditionally not shy about linking, because most serious bloggers appreciate the value of a link, and know that <strong>not acknowledging sources can be damning to their reputations.</strong> Perhaps the offending parties in the mainstream assume that their reputations are already too great to worry about such things. </p>
<p><strong>Government Involvement?</strong></p>
<p>The FTC is considering whether or not it can step in and save journalism. Jeff Jarvis, <a href="http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/how_not_to_save_news_2g7IgzaZNuwuZU80CVcQ7M">writing for the New York Post</a>, points to a &quot;<a href="http://www.ftc.gov/opp/workshops/news/jun15/docs/new-staff-discussion.pdf">staff discussion</a>&quot; document from the Federal Trade Commission that proposes some ideas for &quot;Potential Policy Recommendations to Support the Reinvention of Journalism&quot;. You might think that such a document would greatly acknowledge the impact of blogs on modern journalism, but as Jarvis notes, blogs are hardly mentioned. </p>
<p>&quot;If the FTC wants to reinvent journalism, perhaps it should align with news&#8217; disruptors,&quot; he writes. &quot;But there&#8217;s none of that in this report. The word blog is used but once in 35 pages of text&#8211;and then only in a parenthetical mention of soccer blogs.&quot; In all fairness, the report does say:</p>
<p><em>&quot;Studies have shown that newspapers typically provide the largest quantity of original news to consumers over any given period of time. We include within the term &#8216;newspapers&#8217; online news websites run either by an existing newspaper or <strong>by an online-only news organization</strong>.&quot; </em>(emphasis added)</p>
<p>It doesn&#8217;t define online-only news organization, and the line between online-only news organization and blog is anything but black and white. <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/09/17/google-news-trying-to-differentiate-between-blogs-and-news">Google News tries to differentiate</a> (though they&#8217;re all lumped together within the service). </p>
<p><a href="http://news.google.com/"><img title="Google News tries to differentiate blogs from other news sources, while still keeping them together" alt="Google News tries to differentiate blogs from other news sources, while still keeping them together" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/blogs-in-google-news.jpg" /></a></p>
<p>An important note at the beginning of the document reminds us, &quot;This draft does not represent final conclusions or recommendations by the Commission or FTC staff; it is solely for purposes of discussion,&quot; but remember, these <em>are</em> potential policy recommendations. </p>
<p><strong>Blogs Report (Not Just Regurgitate) News.<br />
</strong><br />
Blogs are press. Go to major events, and you will find bloggers with press passes. Companies and organizations view blogs as press. They give them information to report on &#8211; not only at events, but they send press releases and tips via email, and they call influential bloggers. On the flipside, bloggers hunt down facts. They research. They ask questions. They email and make phone calls. They even go on location. In many cases, especially within niches like the tech industry, blogs will <strong>break</strong> not only <em>some</em> of the news, but maybe most of it. </p>
<p>Jarvis put it well, when he said that &quot;the barrier to entry into the media business has never been lower &#8212; and that means news can grow.&quot;</p>
<p>That low barrier may be looked upon too often as a negative, when in fact, it means there is room for more news, and <strong>more competition</strong> for breaking news. Yes, some of this material comes in the form of discussion around existing stories (and sure, regurgitation sometimes), but it also comes in the form of fresh news. As we&#8217;ve seen (with Danny&#8217;s example painting a pretty good illustration), <strong>mainstream media is also guilty of regurgitation</strong>, and can sometimes even be stingier about acknowledging sources. </p>
<p><em><strong>So the real question is, why should mainstream media be held to a lesser standard for attribution than a blogger? </strong><u><strong><a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/54503/talk">Sound off in the comments</a>.</strong></u></em></p>
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		<title>Would Traditional Media Steal from Blogs? No…Never.</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/V940m6YUM0Q/would-traditional-media-steal-from-blogs-nonever-2010-06</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/would-traditional-media-steal-from-blogs-nonever-2010-06#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 02 Jun 2010 23:05:02 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[AP]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bloggers]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Blogs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[journalism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=54146</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p>Lots of bloggers and online reporters have experienced this at one time or another. We've certainly had it happen to us here at WebProNews more than a few times. You break a story, then it's all over the web, but you don't get the credit. <br />
]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Lots of bloggers and online reporters have experienced this at one time or another. We&#8217;ve certainly had it happen to us here at WebProNews more than a few times. You break a story, then it&#8217;s all over the web, but you don&#8217;t get the credit. </p>
<p>Or maybe it&#8217;s not as dramatic as that. Maybe you cover an event that others are covering simultaneously, but later coverage uses a particular spin, image, or assessment that was unique to yours until that later piece, but no credit is given. Sure, there is the occasional coincidental instance, but often that is clearly not the case. It happens all the time on the web. We can whine about it, or we can carry on with our lives. We usually go the latter route. </p>
<p>Mainstream news publications have pointed the finger at &quot;bloggers&quot; many times in the past, claiming that they are &quot;stealing&quot; their content, but as Search Engine Land Editor-in-Chief Danny Sullivan illustrates in a <a href="http://daggle.com/mainstream-media-stole-news-story-credit-1906#comments">post on his personal blog Daggle</a>, it goes both ways. We spoke with him about how the &quot;traditional media&quot; engages in some of the same practices it has accused blogs of engaging in. </p>
<p>For all intents and purposes, <a href="http://www.searchengineland.com">Search Engine Land</a> is a blog. While to many of us, blogs can be considered just as reputable (if not more so) than mainstream news outlets, the site is generally looked upon as a blog (Google News, for example, has it listed as such). If you ask me, the lines between blogs and other news sources are anything but black and white, but some traditional media agencies clearly look down upon blogs. Internally, maybe it&#8217;s a different story. </p>
<p>This past Friday, <a href="http://searchengineland.com/woman-follows-google-maps-walking-directions-gets-hit-sues-43212">Sullivan posted an article</a> about a Utah woman suing Google after getting hit by a vehicle while following walking directions on Google Maps. According to Sullivan, nobody had written about this until he did, and his source was a tip from Gary Price of <a href="http://www.resourceshelf.com/">ResourceShelf</a>). Then after his post had been live for a while, more publications began to report the news, and some as if they had broken it themselves. Some even went so far as to include Danny&#8217;s own modified screenshots, or the Scribd document of the lawsuit that he had uploaded, but without linking to Danny&#8217;s article or acknowledging that these materials came from this to begin with. </p>
<p>Some of these publications likely got a great deal of traffic from aggregators that picked up their stories as well. Traffic that could have sent more to Search Engine Land. It&#8217;s not that it isn&#8217;t fine for these publications to get picked up by the aggregators and get some traffic of their own, but if they had linked back to the original source, they could&#8217;ve sent some of that same traffic back where it belonged as well. For example, Drudge Report linked to a NYDailyNews.com article, which linked to AOL News, which as Sullivan points out, just links to the Scribd document.</p>
<p>As I said, this kind of thing happens all the time on the web, and it&#8217;s pretty much unavoidable, as long as you are creating content and sharing it with people. <a href="http://daggle.com/mainstream-media-stole-news-story-credit-1906#comments">Danny&#8217;s rant</a> about the subject, which is quite interesting, is less a whining session, and more finger pointing at &quot;traditional&quot; media hypocrisy. </p>
<p><img align="right" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/danny-sullivan-small3.jpg" style="margin: 10px;" title="Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Land talks credit in journalism" alt="Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Land talks credit in journalism" /> &quot;I&#8217;d like to see a lot less finger-pointing and much more acknowledgment that the origin of news is a messy business,&quot; says Sullivan in his post. &quot;So why point fingers in this case? To help keep things even. I think it&rsquo;s very well known how traditional sources get cited by alternative ones. But while the opposite is true, that&#8217;s a story that&#8217;s rarely illustrated.&quot;</p>
<p>We asked Danny how greatly the public&#8217;s perception is skewed when it comes to where news stories originate. &quot;I think the public has no idea where news comes from, but to the degree they think about it, they assume big outlets have reporters that hunt it all down,&quot; Sullivan tells WebProNews.</p>
<p>He does have experience working in traditional media. Sullivan says he worked for daily newspapers for about five years, and that he was trained to cite any fact that wasn&#8217;t commonly known. &quot;If the fact only could come from a rival publication, then my job was to try and independently source the fact, so you didn&#8217;t have to mention the competition,&quot; he tells us.</p>
<p>Do readers generally care about the sources of information as long as they don&#8217;t have reason to question accuracy? &quot;I think readers don&#8217;t care about sourcing but instead put trust in the publication itself,&quot; he says.</p>
<p>You have to wonder if there isn&#8217;t a larger percentage of stories being lifted from blogs, Twitter, etc. by mainstream media outlets without credit than there are being lifted from traditional sources by bloggers without credit. While it is certainly not always the case, bloggers are traditionally not shy about linking. </p>
<p>In fact, Sullivan touches on this in the comments of his post: &quot;Bloggers tend to cite mainstream sources more than those sources cite bloggers, that&rsquo;s my gut feel. It&#8217;s something I hope begins to change.&quot;</p>
<p>The AP has famously expressed disdain with blogs in the past (ones that quoted AP stories and gave credit), and the AP example (as one of many) that Danny <a href="http://daggle.com/mainstream-media-stole-news-story-credit-1906">displays</a> certainly stands out, representing the other side of things. </p>
<p>&quot;I think a substantial amount of news is coming off tips seen on forums, blog posts and elsewhere on the web,&quot; he tells us, when asked how often he thinks mainstream media outlets are taking stories from bloggers, Twitterers, etc. without acknowledging the sources. &quot;Not a majority. But a noticeable amount, I&#8217;d wager.&quot;</p>
<p>What do you think?&nbsp;</p>
<p>I&#8217;ve contacted some of the publications Danny calls out in his post for comment, but have yet to receive a response. He did get a couple apologies in <a href="http://daggle.com/mainstream-media-stole-news-story-credit-1906/comment-page-2#comments">his comments section</a> though. </p>
<p><em><strong>Should traditional media be held to different standards than those publications they think bloggers should be held to?&nbsp;<a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/54481/talk"><u>Share your thoughts</u></a>. </strong></em></p>
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		<title>Google Now Showing Suggestions for “Islam Is”</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/xInG44XpkVg/google-has-no-suggestions-on-what-islam-is-2010-01</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/google-has-no-suggestions-on-what-islam-is-2010-01#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 27 Jan 2010 21:43:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google Suggest]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Islam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[religion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Suggestions]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=52882</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p><strong>Update:</strong>&#160;Google is now showing suggestions for &#34;Islam is&#34;. They can be seen in the screenshot below.</p>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>Update:</strong>&nbsp;Google is now showing suggestions for &quot;Islam is&quot;. They can be seen in the screenshot below.</p>
<p><center><img title="Google - Islam is..." alt="Google - Islam is..." src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/google-islam-is.jpg" /></center></p>
<p>
<strong>Original Article:</strong>&nbsp;Every now and then, someone spots an oddity in Google&#8217;s suggestions. Some are funny. Some are <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/12/02/google-offers-some-disturbing-suggestions">disturbing</a>, and some are just weird. Alex Wilhelm at The Next Web has <a href="http://thenextweb.com/2010/01/05/google-blocking-negative-search-recommendations-islam/">discovered</a> an interesting behavior in Google Suggest involving religion. </p>
<p>With most major religions, you will get suggestions from Google when you type in a query like &quot;example is&quot;. If you type &quot;christianity is&quot;, or &quot;judaism is&quot; you will get suggestions (which some will no doubt find controversial in themselves), but when you type &quot;islam is&quot;, you get nothing. </p>
<p><strong>Here are a few screenshots for different examples of such queries:</strong></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><center><img alt="Google - Hinduism is" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/google-hinduism.jpg" /></p>
<p><img title="Google - Judaism is" alt="Google - Judaism is" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/google-judaism.jpg" /></p>
<p><img title="Google - Buddhism is" alt="Google - Buddhism is" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/google-buddhism.jpg" /></p>
<p><img title="Google - Christianity is" alt="Google - Christianity is" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/google-christianity.jpg" /></p>
<p><img title="Google - Atheism is" alt="Google - Atheism is" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/google-atheism.jpg" /></p>
<p><img title="Google - Islam is" alt="Google - Islam is" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/google-islam.jpg" /></center></p>
<p>
To be fair, there are other religions that don&#8217;t yield suggestions, but all of the biggest ones besides Islam do. </p>
<p>The phenomenon has raised a few eyebrows. Wilhem himself says, &quot;Google is systematically blocking, it seems, all search suggestions for Islam. Why? To remove the chance of an adherent of the faith from being offended by a perhaps severe search suggestion? Why not treat all search terms equally?&quot;</p>
<p>He thinks that either &quot;A: Google is horribly broken and this is evidence of that or B: They seem to be tampering with results.&quot;</p>
<p>Danny Sullivan, one of the most influential voices in the search industry <a href="http://thenextweb.com/2010/01/05/google-blocking-negative-search-recommendations-islam/comment-page-1/#comment-209079">weighed in</a> on the conversation, saying, &quot;Google is horribly broken. That&rsquo;s my call. And they do such a piss poor job explaining why these types of things happen (sometimes not even trying at all) that it&rsquo;s easier to believe B, that they&rsquo;re tampering with search suggestions.&quot;</p>
<p>He points to <a href="http://searchengineland.com/climategate-just-how-popular-is-it-according-to-google-31211">a piece</a> he wrote about Google Suggest and <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/12/01/the-internet-is-all-over-climategate-while-the-msm-sleeps">Climategate</a>, &quot;Many people are convinced that Google messed with the suggestions for that,&quot; says Sullivan. &quot;Google was adamant they did not. I still believe they didn&rsquo;t. I also can only tell you from covering Google over the years that things like this are far more likely to be because they are indeed screw ups than that they are intentionally aiming to do so.&quot;</p>
<p>A <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=%22islam+is%22">query for &quot;islam is&quot;</a> returns about 3,140,000 results. Others have pointed out that there are no suggestions for queries like &quot;Larry Page is&quot; or &quot;Sergey Brin is&quot;, although Sullivan is careful to point out that there are plenty for &quot;Google is,&quot; and they&#8217;re not all the most positive things in the world. </p>
<p><em><strong>What do you make of Google&#8217;s suggestions or lack thereof? <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/52960/talk"><u>Share your thoughts here</u></a>.</strong></em></p>
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		<title>Just How Real-Time is Google’s Real-Time Search?</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/7EkQtL17two/just-how-real-time-is-googles-real-time-search-2010-01</link>
		<comments>http://www.webpronews.com/just-how-real-time-is-googles-real-time-search-2010-01#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:08:19 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Brittany Murphy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Matt Cutts]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[real time search]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=52643</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p><strong>Update:</strong>&#160;According to <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-10428590-264.html">reports</a>, it took Google about six minutes to gather it's &#34;real-time&#34; search results for a San Franciso earthquake.<br />
]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>Update:</strong>&nbsp;According to <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-10428590-264.html">reports</a>, it took Google about six minutes to gather it&#8217;s &quot;real-time&quot; search results for a San Franciso earthquake.</p>
<p><strong>Original Article:</strong>&nbsp;As you have no doubt heard by now, actress <a href="http://www.famousdead.com/brittany-murphy/">Brittany Murphy tragically passed away</a> over the weekend. As saddening as that news was for many, people wanted information about it. As with any other celebrity death or big news event, people scrambled to find updates. This need for fresh info is really where real-time search has its greatest potential. </p>
<p>Google has only recently begun <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/12/07/showtime-for-real-time-with-google">showing &quot;real-time&quot; results</a> in its search results, pulling tweets from Twitter, updates from Facebook fan pages, blogs, news, outlets, etc. The idea behind Google showing such results, is that people can find the freshest info possible that relates to their query. </p>
<p><span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"><strong>Have you found Google&#8217;s real-time search results useful for finding fresh information?</strong></span><strong> <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/52870/talk"><u>Discuss here</u></a>. </strong></p>
<p>Real-time search is generally thought of as providing results as they are posted online. In its truest sense, that&#8217;s what it is, but Google&#8217;s so-called real-time search may not be as real-time as initially thought. It&#8217;s close, but not quite there. </p>
<p><img align="right" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/danny-sullivan4.jpg" alt="Danny Sullivan" title="Danny Sullivan" style="margin: 10px;" />Search industry expert Danny Sullivan <a href="http://searchengineland.com/brittany-murphy-death-googles-real-time-search-results-32247">followed Google&#8217;s real-time search coverage of Murphy&#8217;s death</a> closely. He found that Google&#8217;s real-time results were &quot;wildly out of sync&quot; with the results on Twitter itself. He noted that while Google&#8217;s most recent result would say that it was 2 minutes old, Twitter would have 700 more results rolling in.</p>
<p>&quot;In fact, I found that Google&rsquo;s real time results often simply stopped scrolling for minutes at a time,&quot; says Sullivan. &quot;To get them to restart, I&rsquo;d have to reload the page.&quot;</p>
<p><strong>But is Google&#8217;s &quot;real-time&quot; results being slightly behind real-time necessarily a bad thing?</strong> As Sullivan says, a lot of this no doubt has to do with Google&rsquo;s own filtering, and he didn&#8217;t notice any spam getting through. There is a pretty good chance that those 700 Twitter results contained plenty of spam and/or redundancies (although Sullivan did find a few redundancies in Google&#8217;s results too). </p>
<p><img align="left" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/matt-cutts6.jpg" alt="Matt Cutts" title="Matt Cutts" style="margin: 10px;" />Google&#8217;s <a href="http://searchengineland.com/brittany-murphy-death-googles-real-time-search-results-32247#comment-8144">Matt Cutts commented on Sullivan&#8217;s report</a>, weighing in on the search engine&#8217;s handling of alleged real-time results. According to him, the news of Murphy&#8217;s death was broken at 1:37 PM, and first tweeted about at 1:40 PM. He says Google&#8217;s real-time results began two and a half minutes later, noting tht this was &quot;entirely algorithmic.&quot;</p>
<p>&quot;I think Danny makes fair points about better tools being needed to search the real-time stream and to highlight the important links/stories,&quot; says Cutts. &quot;At the same time, the real-time stream worked as intended to highlight a breaking story and to show the flavor of how people are reacting to the event. The rest of the search results are also there to help give important news and context. And even the Google real-time results did a fair job of highlighting news articles, not just tweets.&quot;</p>
<p>That said, Cutts does acknowledge that Google can do better, but thinks they&#8217;re doing a pretty good job for a first-time test of real-time search. Would you agree with him? <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/52870/talk"><u><strong>Share your thoughts here</strong></u></a>.</p>
<p><strong>Related Articles:</strong></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">&gt; </span></span><a href="../../../../../../topnews/2009/09/02/tips-for-getting-found-in-real-time-searches" style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Tips for Getting Found in Real-Time Searches</span></span></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">&gt; </span></span><a href="../../../../../../topnews/2009/12/10/google-makes-a-second-real-time-search-announcement" style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Google Makes a Second Real-Time Search Announcement</span></span></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">&gt; </span></span><a href="../../../../../../topnews/2009/12/10/yahoo-rolling-out-something-kind-of-like-real-time-search" style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Yahoo Rolling Out Something Kind of Like Real-Time Search</span></span></a></p>
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		<title>You May Get More Traffic from Twitter Than You Realize</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/nWbT89-E9r4/you-may-get-more-traffic-from-twitter-than-you-realize-2009-12</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 04 Dec 2009 22:28:21 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Social Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social networks]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[stan pugsley]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[traffic]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Web analytics]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=52308</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p>If you use Twitter or create content, you have probably figured out by now that it can be a great tool for driving traffic to your site. There are measures you can take to expand this if your content is not bringing in the Twitter traffic on its own. <br />
<strong><br />
<span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">Is Twitter a significant traffic source for your site?</span> <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/52536/talk"><u>Comment here</u></a>.</strong><br />
]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>If you use Twitter or create content, you have probably figured out by now that it can be a great tool for driving traffic to your site. There are measures you can take to expand this if your content is not bringing in the Twitter traffic on its own. <br />
<strong><br />
<span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">Is Twitter a significant traffic source for your site?</span> <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/52536/talk"><u>Comment here</u></a>.</strong></p>
<p>If you&#8217;re not seeing much traffic from Twitter, there is a chance it&#8217;s coming in anyway, and you&#8217;re just not aware of it. For that matter, if you are getting a lot of traffic from Twitter, you may be getting even more than you thought. </p>
<p>Stan Pugsley, director of business intelligence for iCrossing says that nearly 70% of referral traffic from Twitter goes unmeasured, particularly if you are using web analytics tools like Google Analytics or Omniture.</p>
<p>&quot;The problem is not with the web analytics tools, but with the Twitter applications like Tweetdeck and Twhirl that are not based in an Internet Browser,&quot; <a href="http://greatfinds.icrossing.com/web-analytics-and-the-case-of-the-missing-twitter-traffic/">explains</a> Pugsley. &quot;When a user clicks through a link in a tweet, those applications do not register a referring URL that can be picked up by the destination website. It appears that they are coming directly to the site. According to TweetStats, only 31.7% of tweets originate from twitter.com, and those are the visitors that can be tracked back to tweets.&quot;</p>
<p>Pugsley suggests testing this for yourself, by installing a Twitter app like Tweetdeck, installing the <a href="https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3829">Live HTTP headers</a> plug-in for Firefox, and clicking through the URL in a tweet, then looking at the referrer.<br />
<img align="right" alt="Danny Sullivan" title="Danny Sullivan" style="margin: 10px;" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/danny-sullivan.jpg" /><br />
His observation about missing Twitter traffic stats is not a new one, but probably still a topic that gets overlooked frequently. Back in the summer, Danny Sullivan wrote a <a href="http://searchengineland.com/how-twitter-might-send-far-more-traffic-than-you-think-21482">couple</a> <a href="http://searchengineland.com/is-twitter-sending-you-500-to-1600-more-traffic-than-you-might-think-22696">of articles</a> for Search Engine Land tackling the subject. These dig in quite a bit further. If you feel like you are being shortchanged on your Twitter traffic, these are required reading. </p>
<p><strong>As far as simply increasing your traffic from Twitter, here are a few tips:</strong></p>
<blockquote><p>1. Include some kind of Twitter/tweet button on your content.</p>
<p>2. Abide by <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/09/29/an-equation-for-getting-retweets-and-traffic">this equation</a>, or at least the principle behind it. </p>
<p>3. Make your Twitter presence known throughout your site</p>
<p>4. Use your Twitter presence along with your site on business cards, signatures, etc. </p>
<p>5. Actively engage on Twitter.</p>
<p>6. Tweet your own content. If they&#8217;re following you, they must be interested in what you have to say (that doesn&#8217;t mean to just tweet ads and sales pitches. Tweet useful information.). </p>
<p>7. Include ways to share your content on other social networks. It will often find its way to Twitter by other people.</p>
<p>8. Integrate Twitter into your other marketing channels (<a href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/07/31/twitter-most-linked-to-social-site-in-email-marketing">email for example</a>).</p></blockquote>
<p>I&#8217;m sure there are plenty of other tips that could go here. Feel free to <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/52536/talk"><u><strong>share some</strong></u></a> if you have them. </p>
<p>Twitter is much more than a way to drive traffic, but when traffic is the goal, it certainly holds a great deal of potential. If you were unaware that you may be getting Twitter traffic that is not being counted as such, perhaps you will see even more potential. </p>
<p><em><strong>Have you found Twitter traffic that wasn&#8217;t being counted by analytics services? <a href="http://www.webpronews.com/node/52536/talk"><u>Tell us about it</u>.</a> </strong></em></p>
<p><strong><br />
Related Articles:</strong></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">&gt; </span></span><a style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;" href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/03/09/the-influence-of-twitter"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Driving Traffic with Twitter</span></span></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">&gt; </span></span><a style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;" href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/09/29/an-equation-for-getting-retweets-and-traffic"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">An Equation for Getting More Traffic from Twitter</span></span></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">&gt; </span></span><a style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;" href="http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/03/25/where-social-media-fits-into-the-seo-equation"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Where Social Media Fits Into the SEO Equation</span></span></a></p>
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		<title>Minds of the Media Gather to Discuss Future of News</title>
		<link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Danny-Sullivan-WebProNews/~3/2RMus7iBpcM/minds-of-the-media-gather-to-discuss-future-of-news-2009-12</link>
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		<pubDate>Tue, 01 Dec 2009 22:16:07 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Chris Crum</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Search]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[aggregators]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Arianna Huffington]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Danny Sullivan]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[FTC]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Google]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Government]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News Aggregation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Online News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rupert Murdoch]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.webpronews.com/?p=52253</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[<p>The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is hosting <a href="http://www.ftc.gov/opp/workshops/news/index.shtml">a 2-day workshop</a> on &#34;Journalism and the Internet Age&#34; today and tomorrow. Featured at the event are a number of high profile media executives and gurus. The cast ranges from News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch to Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington. <br />
]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is hosting <a href="http://www.ftc.gov/opp/workshops/news/index.shtml">a 2-day workshop</a> on &quot;Journalism and the Internet Age&quot; today and tomorrow. Featured at the event are a number of high profile media executives and gurus. The cast ranges from News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch to Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington. </p>
<p>The event appears to be designed to present all possible angles regarding the state of the news industry and the web&#8217;s role, as well as the government&#8217;s role, if any. Danny Sullivan at Search Engine Land, who is appearing on a panel at the event himself, has <a href="http://searchengineland.com/live-blogging-the-ftc-workshop-on-journalism-the-internet-30835">a liveblog</a> running, covering much of the discussion (and there is a lot of it), providing a good source for actual quotes. </p>
<p>The newspaper industry is obviously struggling right now, and a common theme discussed throughout the workshop has been that the effects of the recession may be skewing the long term view. In other words, maybe it&#8217;s not really as bad as it seems right now. </p>
<p>That said, publications clearly have to adapt to the online lifestyles of readers, whether that means the death of print newspapers or not. Let&#8217;s look at comments made by Murdoch and Huffington, because they basically represent opposing sides of the spectrum on a number of sub-topics to this discussion (Although to be fair, it&#8217;s probably not as black and white as that. There is certainly a lot of gray area in the discussion, which has been going on for years). </p>
<p><img align="right" alt="Rupert Murdoch" title="Rupert Murdoch" style="margin: 10px;" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/rupert-murdoch.jpg" /><strong>Murdoch</strong> says three things have to happen: media companies have to deliver the news consumers want in ways that meet their lifestyles and must innovate like never before, they have to convince consumers that good journalism isn&#8217;t free, and the government needs to &quot;clear obstacles.&quot; </p>
<p>Murdoch goes on to discuss other related topics, including that of fair use. He rips aggregators, calling aggregation &quot;wholesale theft.&quot; </p>
<p><img align="left" alt="Arianna Huffington" title="Arianna Huffington" style="margin: 10px;" src="http://images.ientrymail.com/webpronews/article_pics/arianna-huffington.jpg" /><strong>Huffington</strong>, whose site is largely known for aggregating content, says Murdoch is confusing aggregation with theft, but says they link to the Wall Street Journal every day and never get a complaint. She says that if it was wrong, they&#8217;d have heard about it. She also says aggregation is part of the web&#8217;s &quot;DNA&quot; and that Murdoch plays both sides, noting that some of Murdoch&#8217;s own sites also aggregate or &quot;steal&quot; content. </p>
<p>Huffington also discusses things like social and collaborative news, and the concept of citizen journalism. </p>
<p>There are many other speakers and opinions being voiced at the FTC&#8217;s event, and Sullivan&#8217;s <a href="http://searchengineland.com/live-blogging-the-ftc-workshop-on-journalism-the-internet-30835">liveblog</a> captures a great deal of them. It will be interesting to see if the event leads to any significant progress in the ongoing discussion. </p>
<p>On a related note, Google has <a href="http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2009/12/ftc-looks-at-future-of-news.html">posted</a> about the ways it is focusing on helping news publishers gain traffic, engage audiences, and increase revenue. </p>
<p>
<strong>Related Articles:</strong></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">>&nbsp;</span></span><a style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;" href="../../../../../../topnews/2009/09/23/obvious-people-dont-want-to-pay-for-online-news"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Obvious: People Don&#8217;t Want to Pay for Online News</span></span></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">> </span></span><a style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;" href="../../../../../../topnews/2009/11/09/murdoch-on-blocking-search-engines-i-think-we-will"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Murdoch On Blocking Search Engines: &quot;I Think We Will&quot;</span></span></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">> </span></span><a style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;" href="../../../../../../topnews/2009/11/09/google-okay-with-blocking-news-corp"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Google Okay With Blocking News Corp.</span></span></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">> </span></span><a style="color: rgb(0, 105, 210); text-decoration: underline;" href="../../../../../../topnews/2009/11/24/is-the-murdock-bing-deal-really-just-about-the-wall-street-journal"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="font-size: larger;">Is it Really Crazy to Block Google?</span></span></a></p>
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