Google Releases Alabama Tornado Destruction Images & Maps Of Tornadoes

Google has posted before-and-after images of the terrible devastation left behind by the tornadoes that hit the South earlier this week, with close-up views particularly of Tuscaloosa, Alabama. The easiest way to see the images is through a Picasa album that the company has posted. It explains more about these here. Below is a montage photo of befor ..read more.. 

via #smartr - my personalized newspaper

Convenience Trumps Social Features for Online Video Viewers - eMarketer

Quick, easy viewing more important than social experience. Online video viewing is on the rise around the world. In the US, eMarketer estimates 158.1 million internet users will watch video online at

via emarketer.com

Facebook Is Latest Rival to Groupon and LivingSocial

Facebook introduced Deals late Monday, an effort by the social network giant to tap into the consumer frenzy over online discounts. With Deals, which had long been expected, Facebook is entering a crowded market led by overnight sensations like Groupon and LivingSocial. For now, Facebook is releasing Deals as a “test” in five cities: Atlanta, Au ..read more.. 

via #smartr - my personalized newspaper

NPR launches monthlong series on public relations, starting with evisceration of BP

“Public relations is very big business, and in the next month we’re going to look at the PR industry. Who does it? How it works? And the extent of its influence?” It began with a report on BP—titled “BP: A Textbook Example Of How Not To Handle PR”—in which several PR pros eviscerated the oil company’s response to last year’s massiv ..read more..

via #smartr - my personalized newspaper

A Google-a-Day Puzzle for Monday, April 25th

As we’ve reported before, our good friends over at Google are starting up a daily puzzle challenge. Each day’s puzzle will task your googling skills a little more, leading you to Google mastery.

And much to our enjoyment, they’ve decided to share the puzzles with us at GeekDad (hmm… Google a Day? GD? GeekDad?), so each morning at 12:01am ET you’ll see a new puzzle, and the previous day’s answer (in invisitext) posted here.

SPOILER WARNING: As a test, we’re going to leave the comments on so people can work together to find the answer. As such, if you want to figure it out all by yourself, DON’T READ THE COMMENTS!

Also, with the knowledge that because others may publish their answers before you do, if you want to be able to search for information without accidentally seeing the answer somewhere, you can use the Google-a-Day site’s search tool, which will automatically filter out published answers, to give you a spoiler-free experience.

And now, without further ado…

TODAY’S PUZZLE:

In the century following Columbus’ trip to the New World, people began playing an organized sport on a frozen surface. Where did that sport begin?

YESTERDAY’S ANSWER (HIGHLIGHT TO SEE):

No answer for today, as we did not carry a puzzle yesterday.As we’ve reported before, our good friends over at Google are starting up a daily puzzle challenge. Each day’s puzzle will task your googling skills a little more, leading you to Google mastery.

And much to our enjoyment, they’ve decided to share the puzzles with us at GeekDad (hmm… Google a Day? GD? GeekDad?), so each morning at 12:01am ET you’ll see a new puzzle, and the previous day’s answer (in invisitext) posted here.

SPOILER WARNING: As a test, we’re going to leave the comments on so people can work together to find the answer. As such, if you want to figure it out all by yourself, DON’T READ THE COMMENTS!

Also, with the knowledge that because others may publish their answers before you do, if you want to be able to search for information without accidentally seeing the answer somewhere, you can use the Google-a-Day site’s search tool

Original Link: http://feeds.wired.com/~r/wiredgeekdad/~3/fr2_MtpfN5w/

via my6sense

Digital Marketing: How to Justify Investments & Quantify Returns

View more presentations from Carpathia

U2 and Muse Cover Talking Heads, David Bowie and Rolling Stones at Brazil Nightclub

U2 and Muse officially wrapped up their South American stadium tour on Wednesday night but hours after the show ended they headed over to the Sao Paulo nightclub Bar Secreto and continued  playing on a considerably smaller stage You'd think anything that happens super late night at  Bar Secreto remains...

Original Link: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/u2-and-muse-cover-talking-heads-david-bowie-and-rolling-stones-at-brazil-nightclub-20110415

via my6sense

Advertising gangs up on editorial! @gadler @jacklail @tinynic @ckrapp at #SoSlam

Taken at Social Slam 2011

@jacklail @tinynic @ckrapp at Social Media - Knoxville's SoSlam. #soslam

Taken at Knoxville Convention Center

Preparing for the start of Social Slam - Knoxville #SoSlam

Taken at Knoxville Convention Center

Winklevosses to Seek Another Hearing in Facebook Case

Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss plan to ask for an additional review of the latest judgment against them in their case against Facebook, their lawyer said today.
Winklevoss lawyer Jerome B. Falk, Jr., of Howard Rice in San Francisco, said the case merits further review by the entire Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, so he plans to file a Petition for Rehearing En Banc in the next 15 days.
I am no legal expert, but here’s what that means: “En Banc” is a hearing where all the judges on a court take part, rather than a three-judge panel, as is standard. It is the only way to overturn a decision–unless they appeal to the Supreme Court. Since the Ninth Circuit has so many many judges–currently 26–it requires only eleven of them for an en banc hearing.
Read the full stroy at: Winklevoss Twins Seek Another Hearing.

The New Google Analytics: Events Goals

This is part of our series of posts highlighting the new Google Analytics. The new version of Google Analytics is currently available in beta to a number of Analytics users. We’ll be giving access to even more users soon. Sign up for early access. And follow Google Analytics on Twitter for the latest updates.
Real Analytics ninjas use goals. Google Analytics has always had URL Goals (when a visitor reaches a specific page). In 2009, we added Engagement Goals to track success metrics around visit depth and time on site. With the new version of Google Analytics, we’ve added one more: Event Goals. This was one of our most requested features, and it gives you even more reason to use event tracking.
A brief intro to Event TrackingYou can use Event Tracking in Google Analytics to track visitor actions that don't correspond directly to pageviews. It's a great fit for tracking things like:
* Downloads of a PDF or other file
* Interaction with dynamic or AJAX sites
* Interaction with Adobe Flash objects, embedded videos, and other media
* Number of errors users get when attempting to checkout
* How long a video was watched on your site

Events are defined using a set of Categories, Actions, Labels, and Values. Here’s how you might set up event tracking for tracking downloads of whitepapers and presentations.

These interactions all have potential business impact, but until now you couldn’t track them as goals in Google Analytics. Let’s look at three ways you might use Event Goals on your site.
Tracking DownloadsSuppose you run a business to business (B2B) website and offer whitepapers (as a PDF download) in order to attract leads. You drive traffic to this page through advertising. You can track the number of downloads using event tracking. For example, we can use the category to designate the click was of type “download”. We can use the action to designate the download was a “whitepaper” and we can use the label to identify the actual whitepaper that was downloaded.
With the new Google Analytics, configuring this as a goal is easy. We simply match any event with the category of “download” and the action of “whitepaper”. Finally we set the goal value as 20.

Tracking Time SpentEvent tracking is powerful because you can track values, along with the category, action, and label. Going back to our B2B website, suppose you have a embedded product demo video on your page. With a little JavaScript, you can track the time a user spends watching the video and send that number back to Google Analytics as an event value.
With Event Goals, you can now set up a goal based on this value. In this example, we’ve configured a goal when a user spends over 180 seconds watching the product demo.

Using The Event Value As The Conversion ValueTraditionally, the only way to set goal values was when creating the goal in Google Analytics, or from the tracking code using ecommerce tracking. With Event Goals, you have another option: using the event value as the goal value.
Again putting yourself in the shoes of a B2B website owner, you realize not all your whitepapers bring in the same quality of lead. The lead value associated with downloading a certain whitepaper is $20, but the lead value from a different whitepaper is $35. Rather than creating a separate goal for each, you can pass the values 20 and 35 as the Event Value, and then set up the goal to use the actual Event Value:

Now when a goal is matched, the value passed in the event will be used as the goal value.
These are just a few examples of how you can take advantage of Event Goals in the new Google Analytics. You can read more on how to implement Event Tracking on Google Code and how to set up goals in the new Analytics. We’re constantly giving more of you access to the new version. If you don’t have the new version yet, you can sign up for earlier access.
Posted by Nick Mihailovski, Google Analytics TeamThis is part of our series of posts highlighting the new Google Analytics. The new version of Google Analytics is currently available in beta to a number of Analytics users. We’ll be giving access to even more users soon. Sign up for early access. And follow Google Analytics on Twitter for the latest updates.
Real Analytics ninjas use goals. Google Analytics has always had URL Goals (when a visitor reaches a specific page). In 2009, we added Engagement Goals to track success metrics around visit depth and time on site. With the new version of Google Analytics, we’ve added one more: Event Goals. This was one of our most requested features, and it gives you even more reason to use event tracking.
A brief intro to Event TrackingYou can use Event Tracking in Google Analytics to track visitor actions that don't correspond directly to pageviews. It's a great fit for tracking things like:
* Downloads of a PDF or other file
* Interaction with dynamic or AJAX sites
* Interaction with Adobe Flash objects, embedded videos, and other media
* Number of errors users get when attempting to checkout
* How long a video was watched on your site

Events are defined using a set of Categories, Actions, Labels, and Values. Here’s how you might set up event tracking for tracking downloads of whitepapers and presentations.

These interactions all have potential business impact, but until now you couldn’t track them as goals in Google Analytics. Let’s look at three ways you might use Event Goals on your site.
Tracking DownloadsSuppose you run a business to business (B2B) website and offer whitepapers (as a PDF download) in order to attract leads. You drive traffic to this page through advertising. You can track the number of downloads using event tracking. For example, we can use the category to designate the click was of type “download”. We can use the action to designate the download was a “whitepaper” and we can use the label to identify the actual whitepaper that was downloaded.
With the new Google Analytics, configuring this as a goal is easy. We simply match any event with the category of “download” and the action of “whitepaper”. Finally we set the goal value as 20.

Tracking Time SpentEvent tracking is powerful because you can track values, along with the category, action, and label. Going back to our B2B website, suppose you have a embedded product demo video on your page. With a little JavaScript, you can track the time a user spends watching the video and send that number back to Google Analytics as an event value.
With Event Goals, you can now set up a goal based on this value. In this example, we’ve configured a goal when a user spends over 180 seconds watching the product demo.

Using The Event Value As The Conversion ValueTraditionally, the only way to set goal values was when creating the goal in Google Analytics, or from the tracking code using ecommerce tracking. With Event Goals, you have another option: using the event value as the goal value.
Again putting yourself in the shoes of a B2B website owner, you realize not all your whitepapers bring in the same quality of lead. The lead value associated with downloading a certain whitepaper is $20, but the lead value from a different whitepaper is $35. Rather than creating a separate goal for each, you can pass the values 20 and 35 as the Event Value, and then set up the goal to use the actual Event Value:

Now when a goal is matched, the value passed in the event will be used as the goal value.
These are just a few examples of how you can take advantage of Event Goals in the new Google Analytics. You can read more on how to implement Event Tracking on Google Code and how to set up goals in the new Analytics. We’re constantly giving more of you access to the new version. If you don’t have the new version yet, you can sign up for earlier access

Original Link: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/tRaA/~3/BU8O3XvOPI0/new-google-analytics-events-goals.html

via my6sense

Glenn Beck to 'transition off' Fox

Gerald Adler Wrote:
Good riddance...

---

Glenn Beck will end his daily Fox News Channel program later this year.
His departure was jointly announced in a statement on Wednesday by Fox and Mr. Beck’s company, Mercury Radio Arts. The statement did not specify an end date for the show, called “Glenn Beck,” which has been telecast at 5 p.m. on Fox News since early 2009. Mr. Beck’s contract with Fox ends in December.
According to to a joint statement from from Fox and Beck, Beck's production company will continue to produce content for Fox and its website, but Beck himself will "transition off" his regular show by the end of the year.
Beck's ratings have dropped recently, and thanks to Color Of Change's "Stop Glenn Beck" campaign, 300 advertisers have refused to run commercials during his broadcasts. In addition, Beck has found it increasingly difficult to find guests willing to appear on his program, forcing him to air what amounts to hour-long rants about conspiracy theories that never seem to pan out.
As Ben Smith said on Twitter "'transitioning off' is the new euphemism for "fired/quit," but nobody can accuse Fox of not doing its best to make Beck's program a success. Bill O'Reilly gives Beck a regular segment each week on The O'Reilly Factor and actually went on tour with him last year. And after Beck's "rally" on the Washington Mall last August, Fox News Sunday featured him as an exclusive guest, even though his rally had generated far fewer attendees than he had hoped.
So while I imagine Beck's fans will think Fox conspired to take him off the air, the truth is that Fox did its best to make his program a success, even as he accused President Obama of hating white people and said that the only way to stop him would be to drive a stake through his heart.
It wasn't just Fox—don't forget that CPAC tapped Beck to be their keynote speaker in 2010. So even if conservatives try to rinse their hands clean of Glenn Beck taint, just one year ago, the most important conservative gathering in the country gave him the most prominent spot in the their program.
In the end though, people just weren't buying
Original Link: http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/SSXK7z8_zwQ/-Glenn-Beck-to-transition-off-Fox

via my6sense

Report: 1.4% of Consumers Have Cut the Cord, But 7% Think About It

While only 1.4% of consumers have cut the cord in the last two years, 7% of current pay-television subscribers are considering canceling their service, according to a survey in the May 2011 issue of...

Original Link: http://feeds.mediabuyerplanner.com/~r/mbp/~3/D_htp0rjVqU/

via my6sense

Mission impossible

A spy is trying to send a secret message,I`m trying to decode it,,can you help me?
He sent these messages:
Lado Mado Bado
Nado Sado Mado
Kado Bado Fado
One of these messages(not as in above order) means:Plan excuted successfully.
other message means:Mission dangerously excuted.
and the third message means:Abort mission immediately.
Now....what does "Lado" mean?

Original Link: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Braindencom-NewPuzzles/~3/Ych08GlpNTQ/index.php

via my6sense

Weekend Rock Question: What Was the Best Song of the Sixties?

Gerald Adler Wrote:
HELP, ...Hold Your Hand, or something by the Beatles?...

---

Last week we asked Rolling Stone readers to name their favorite bassist of all time – and we compiled the votes into an official top 10 list Photos Random Notes Now it's time for a new weekend rock question What was the best song of the Sixties? Contest Choose the Cover of Rolling...

Original Link: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/weekend-rock-question-what-was-the-best-song-of-the-sixties-20110401

via my6sense

App keeps Smokies' fans in game » Knoxville News Sentinel

As the Tennessee Smokies baseball season prepares to get under way, Sharon Clowers is already planning to stay up to date on her favorite pasttime through her cellphone. That's because the East Tennessee minor league baseball team has officially launched its own mobile app, which can be downloaded for free from the iTunes App Store and The Android M ..read more..

via #smartr - Brilliant news reader for twitter+iphone