We all think a differently thanks to Steve Jobs.

Apple just announced the passing of  Co-Founder Steve Jobs.

As I write this post on one of my many Mac computers and dismiss a call on my iPhone – I draw breath at the sheer impact he has had on millions of lives.

We are a wired society thanks in large part to his vision, his demands for nothing less than perfection and because he always believed he could do better.

Before you send out that tweet from your new iPhone 4s . . . remember back just a few years when a cell phone was the size of your grandmothers purse and be grateful for a man like Steve Jobs who demanded better.

As my husband so aptly tweeted : “Steve Jobs passing marks the capstone of an era of innovation. Design such as Apple has revolutionized more than just the computer industry.”

The world of technology is a bit dimmer today from the loss of this master of innovation.

Jobs loved what he did. And pursued that love with a passion. In a 2005 Stanford commencement speech, Jobs said:

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma–which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

[EDIT 9:51 PM OCT. 5, 2011]
The White House just posted President Barack Obama‘s statement on the passing of Steve Jobs – I think this says it best . . . .

“there may be no greater tribute to Steve’s success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented.”

The man changed virtually every American citizen’s daily life with the ipod and iphone, that is a rare occurrence in today’s world. He was a genius and a revolutionary inventor. R.I.P. Steve.  You were amazing.  Thank you for all that you have done to advance technology and design.

Read Steve Jobs Tributes

Read Tribute at NPR.

Read Time.com’s thoughts on Steve Jobs.

Boston.com: Key dates from the life and work of Steve Jobs

LA Times: Steve Jobs mourned by Apple workers, Cupertino residents

Cult of Mac: Mike Elgan’s What Steve Jobs Means to Silicon Valley

NY Times: Remembering Steve Jobs – Send in your Pictures

Wall Street Journal: Apple Chairman, Former CEO Steve Jobs Has Died

Cupertino City Council: Steve Jobs Presentation to Cupertino City Council about Apple’s New Headquarters in June 2011

A simple and fitting tribute on Apple.com's home page.

Related Steve Jobs Stories When He Stepped Down as CEO in August:

• As Apple’s Steve Jobs Steps Down, Tim Cook Steps Up Aug. 25, 2011
• How Steve JobsChanged The Way We Listen Aug. 25, 2011
• Steve Jobs And The Cultural Apple Aug. 25, 2011
• A Story About Steve Jobs And Attention To Detail Aug. 25, 2011
• With A Spotlight On Jobs, Time To Talk About Cancer Aug. 25, 2011
• Can Apple Fly As High Without Steve Jobs? Aug. 25, 2011
• Apple CEO Steve Jobs Stepping Down Aug. 24, 2011
• Will Jobs’ Departure Take A Bite Out Of Apple? Jan. 18, 2011
• Is Steve Jobs Irreplaceable As Apple’s CEO? Jan. 18, 2011
• Steve Jobs Takes Another Medical Leave Jan. 18, 2011

Does your branding kick ass?

If your branding doesn’t kick ass, then guess what… people may not connect with your company. If you don’t “speak” to your targeted demographic, then your company is going to have a hard time maximizing it’s potential, until this issue is solved. Maybe your brand needs a refresh? Go to a crowdsourcer site like 99Designs or Crowdspring

Does your product kick ass?

Now, your product doesn’t have to be 100% at launch, but you still want it to kick ass. Hear me out. When Apple launched the first Macintosh computer in 1984, it was 100% what they wanted. They were able to fix issues and make it better. But it worked. Launch quick and see if it has wings before you put 100s or 1000s of hours into a product that may have legs. You don’t know if the legs are gonna crawl or run, until you test. But, the main idea has to kick ass. It can eventually get to 100%, but it has to kick ass, and it has to grab people by the balls. If your product doesn’t kick ass… then it’s a fail.

Does your marketing kick ass?

What decade is your marketing stuck in? Are you still paying for dumb marketing? It’s 2011. You should be spending at least 25% of your marketing budget on interactive. And if you get a few key salaried people to do it for you, perhaps it is more. But you have to really think about Inbound Marketing, instead of Outbound Marketing. Are you trying to contact them with radio ads, or TV ads… or yellow pages? Maybe a die-cut piece of shit brochure or direct mail piece that sucks and wastes money and doesn’t kick ass. Read this: The State of Inbound Marketing 2011 PDF from Hubspot. Learn to kick ass.

Do your sales kick ass?

If not, you are missing some of these other principles of ass kicking. And your sales team needs these in their tool set. Now, if you kick ass at all of these other things… and if you have hired competent sales people and given them training on your products… and they are excited about it… then they will be more kick ass. So, do some testing, figure out where your weakest links are… and try to turn those into a strength, by hiring the right candidate for the culture that you are hiring for.

Does your SEO kick ass?

How are you doing your marketing? Do you know the most popular keyword or phrase that people type into Google to find your type of business? Have you claimed your Google Places / Maps listing for your business? Is your business information connected accurately with the main local search ecosystem? Have your researched your industry and competitor keywords? Do you know about your competitors backlinks? How many do they have? How many do YOU have? Have you checked your Mozrank? How is your page rank or domain authority scores looking? Have you ran a website grader report on your site?

Does your social media kick ass?

Do you own all of your usernames for your business? If not, you need to. Go to KnowEm and type in your business name and have them mass register all of your social channels. Take care of that. Do you monitor your online reputation? Do you hear who is talking to you on Twitter or Facebook? Do you interact with them? Do you engage them? Also, do you track your interactions with key influencers? Here is a pretty handy tool out there to help you manage social, Sprout Social and here is one that helps you manage your tweets, BufferApp. It finds the optimal times for you to send out your message, so you get more retweets. It kicks ass.

Does your culture kick ass?

Do your employees want to stick around and kick ass? Or do they go home as soon as 5pm goes off… are they gone? Do people hate coming to your work? Do they complain a lot? Is your boss becoming a curmudgeon? If so, that doesn’t kick ass. You want to have a place where people love coming to work, where they are happy and proud to work. A place with a big ideas. A place that focuses on adding value and finding ways to make things mo’ betta.

Does your team kick ass?

If you hire great people, and continue to hire more brilliant people, you will eventually win. Can they execute on the strategies? Do you need to hire smarter engineers? Do you need to hire more entrepreneurial minded people? The really, really good talent is hard to pay for, at times. So, figure it out. Quit bitching and start doing. If you have to, get some motivated interns in, if you can’t afford to pay top dollar. Do your best to assemble a team that has such passion for technology, knowledge and a love for continual education. Shit changes quick in tech. Do you have a team hungry enough to learn how to maximize the tools to make the products kick more ass?

Does your CEO kick ass?

Do you have a solid leader at the helm of your company? This is important. You need to have someone with vision and insight. They need to love the company and have passion for the ideas. I think what happens to a lot of companies that have too many investors, you have to worry about how much profit you are going to make, and then the consumers end up getting fucked over because of corporate greed. Is your CEO a greedy bastard? Do they make $18 million dollar bonuses and golden parachutes? That doesn’t kick ass. Not for the people, who are the cogs that make the engine work. A good CEO has the best interest of the company, but also has the best interest for the consumers and clients. Make things better. Don’t suck. Kick ass. Your CEO has to kick ass. When you CEO stops kicking ass, it may be time to freshen up the resume.

Do your finances kick ass?

It’s my belief that if you can build something that kicks ass, that has decent sales, that has fully optimized SEO and a great presence on social media it can kick ass. Does your company have kick ass culture and does your CEO kick ass… well, if your product kicks ass… and the other stuff kicks ass, finding an investor will be easy as shit.

There are many ways that your business can kick ass or suck ass, and you have to a plan of action in play to make sure that you stay at the top of your game. If things aren’t where they need to be, now is the time to move the rudder towards kickassness. If you wait to long to make these changes, then one of your competitors may kick your ass!

As U2 never actually said, “In the name of kicking ass… ♪♫ one more, in the name of kicking ass.”

A photoshopped picture of a shark swimming on a Puerto Rico street from (Reddit)

From the Virginia Earthquake to Hurricane Irene – this past week we all have seen a flurry of activity on our own social networks . . . whether it’s Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Quora or even Linkedin, inevitably someone you know has shared a photo of what was happening around them. It’s citizen journalism at it’s best.

Take this twitpic of Atlantic City Beach taken by @Nathaly_Michele – It’s been one day and already it has had 62,104 views. 62,104!

But along with the honest citizen journalists that simply share where they are and what’s going on (sometimes in a fun and funny way) – there also are those who choose to have a bit of fun with photo shop – Like the case with the photo of a shark swimming down a Puerto Rico street flooded by Hurricane Irene posted to Reddit a few days ago . . . many who retweet or share these photo’s often don’t know they are faked from a real photo and created simply to get attention.

When it comes to natural disasters and social media it is easy to get caught up in the moment and not check our sources. A quick Google search in the case of the Puerto Rico Shark would have given you these results and saved you the embarrassment of explaining to your friends that the link you just shared in shock and horror . . . was a fake.

Natural disasters can impact our social networks in various ways. From getting over 62,000 views on Twitpic to having over 100 people retweet a fake photo of a shark swimming alongside a truck in Puerto Rico . . . it all comes down to how we choose to use our networks and how we protect them from false information.

Be sure that what you are sharing, liking, commenting on and tweeting is the real deal. It’s your credibility.

—

What photo’s have you seen over the last week that you had to share?

Personally, I’ve been doing SEO since the late 90′s and many iterations of what’s good practice and bad practice have changed as the industry has evolved. The industry is about to evolve once again.

How will Google+ affect SEO? Well, Google will know have social data from you and all of your friends. They will be able to see who you like, what interests you like and what content you most share. Once they take this information into account, your search results will begin to certainly change. To keep track of all of the implications of Google+ and all of the new ways this could affect the SEO industry, it is a good idea to follow all of the top thought-leaders in SEO.

These are the brightest minds in SEO, currently, that are currently on Google+. [it will periodically updated as more SEOs get their butts on Plus.]

1. Rand Fishkin of SEOMoz
2. Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineLand
3. Search Engine Land G+ page
4. Dev Basu of Powered by Search
5. Matt McGee of SearchEngineLand
6. Andrew Shotland of Local SEO Guide
7. Matt Cutts of Google
8. Mike Blumenthal of Blumenthals
9. Carter Maslan of Google Local / Places
10. John Heard of SearchEngineNews.com and Beyond Engineering
11. David Mihm of Get Listed
12. Andy Beal of Trackur
13. Bryson Meunier of Resolution Media
14. Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing
15. Dean Bairaktaris of TheDudeDean
16. William Slawski of SEO by the Sea
17. Ann Smarty of SEOSmarty.com
18. Jill Whalen of High Rankings
19. Travis Wright of Advangel Interactive & MobileLocalSocial
20. Greg Sterling of Screenwerk and SearchEngineLand
21. Barry Schwartz of Rusty Brick
22. Michael Gray of Atlas Web Service
23. Lisa Barone of Outspoken Media
24. Rae Hoffman-Dolan of Sugarrae and MFE Interactive
25. Don Campbell of Expand2Web
26. Bruce Clay of Bruce Clay, Inc.
27. Aaron Wall of SEOBook
28. Brian Carter of FanReach
29. Anne Haynes of Integrated Web Technologies Group
30. Martin Maybruck of LocalOnlineMarketingTips
31. Taylor Pratt of RavenTools
32. Melanie Nathan of CanadianSEO
33. Kate Morris of Distilled
34. Jeff Gold of Marriott Intl
35. Drew Hubbard of The Search Agency
36. Mitch Monsen of WhiteFireSEO
37. Joanna Butler of Search Engine Chocolate
38. Mark Murnahan of YourNew.com
39. Michelle Robbins of ThirdDoorMedia
40. S Evan Fishkin of Slingshot SEO
41. Ian Lurie an Internet Marketing Curmudgeon
42. Bryan Eisenberg of BryanEisenberg.com
43. Casey Markee of SearchEngineNews and MediaWyse
44. Michael Black of SEOMike
45. Dan Thies of SEO Braintrust
46. Bill Hartzer of StandingDog
47. Jon Henshaw of Raven Tools
48. Martijn Beijk of OnetoMarket
49. Gaby Flatt of Vero Group
50. Jon Maxson of iCrossing
51. Amit Singhal a Search Geek at Google
52. Brent Payne of The Tribune Company
53. David Harry of Reliable SEO
54. John Shehata of ABC News
55. Dana Lookadoo of Yo! Yo! SEO
56. Courtney Seiter of Raven Tools
57. Brent Csutoras of BlueGlass Interactive
58. Lisa Myers of Verve Search
59. Stacey Hood
60. Polyana Ferreira De Oliveira, a Brazilian SEO
61. Will Scott of Search Influence
62. Steve Plunkett of Rockfish
63. Kristi Hagen of PlanetOcean
64. Todd Mintz of SEMpdx
65. Joanna Lord of SEOMoz
66. Janet Driscoll Miller of Search Mojo
67. Neil Sargisian of Jedi Web
68. Mike Ramsey of Nifty Marketing
69. Robert Patterson of MMG Worldwide
70. Dan Shure of Evolving SEO
71. Elisabeth Osmeloski of SearchEngineLand
72. Christine Churchill of KeyRelevance
73. Steve Adkins of SteveAdkinsSEO
74. Greg Boser of GregBoser.com
75. Debra Mataler of Alliance-Link
76. Melanie Mitchell of Digitas
77. Pamela Lund of BlueGlass
78. CK Chung of WEBOSIS
79. Susan Esparza of Bruce Clay
80. Michael Dorausch Local Search Speaker
81. Aaron Chronister of JunkBoxx Media
82. Adam Audette of Audette Media
83. Vanessa Fox of Nine By Blue
84. Dennis Goedegebuure – SEO of eBay
85. Rhea Drysdale of Outspoken Media
86. Kimberly Krause Berg of Cre8pc
87. Eric Enge of Stone Temple Consulting
88. Ross Hudgens of MediaBoost
89. Mohit Maheshwari of NMG Interactive
90. Julie Joyce of Link Fish Media
91. Todd Nemet of Nine By Blue
92. Ross Dunn of StepForth Web Marketing
93. Dave Snyder of BlueGlass
94. Loren Baker of BlueGlass
95. Jordan Kastelar of BlueGlass
96. Marcus Tandler of MediaDonis
97. Bob Rains of Let’s Make it Awesome
98. Selena Narayanasamy of BlueGlass
99. Rebecca Kelley of SoMuchSmoke / This or That
100. Stacy Williams of Prominent Placement
101. Keri Morgret of SEOMoz
102. AJ Kohn of Sphinn & Blind Five Year Old
103. Rob Watts of RobWatts Inc
104. Matt Siltala of Dream Systems Media
105. David Wallace of SearchRank
106. Hugo Guzman of Zeta Marketing
107. Simon Heseltine, Director of Search at AOL
108. Jessica Bowman of SEOinHouse.com
109. Todd Malicoat of StuntDubl
110. Bill Hunt of Back Azimuth Consulting
111. Stoney deGeyter of Pole Position Marketing
112. Dixon Jones of MajesticSEO
113. Brett Tabke of Pubcon
114. Laura Thieme of Bizwatch Search
115. Kelena Jordan of Search Engine College
116. Joost de Valk of Yoost
117. Will Reynolds of SEER Interactive
118. Troy Reddington, SEO for FatWallet
119. Horia Neagu of SEO-Wolf

Add more below in the comments or in the Google+ Stream and they will get added.

Thanks!

Mine is https://plus.google.com/u/0/107496519574681170790/posts.

How in the hell is anyone going to remember that? Zero percent chance of remembering that. Ok? Sure, Google+ is still in beta, but a vanity URL would be quite handy. Et voilà! Here is the remedy for what ails you. Gplus.to, the unofficial short vanity URL for Google Plus.

All you need is your Google+ ID, which is the long string of numbers that currently makes the URLs so ugly, to get your short URL. This ID is located when you click on your profile picture or username. Go to GPlus.to and plug in your desired username, and you’re good to go.

If you don’t have you G+ invite, yet…

If you do, hit me up! http://gplus.to/teedubya

Performics’ Nicola Smith started the session with some stats that served as a good reminder for search marketers about their need to enter the mobile space. For instance, there has been a 400 percent increase in mobile searches in the past year. She shared that 63 percent of people use mobile search before purchasing, one in three mobile searches are local and 59 percent of mobile users share content with their friends.

Together, this data points to the rise in social, local and mobile convergence. All of the panelists agreed that brands need to engage in mobile friendly social content marketing to increase the likelihood that they will reach the right person in the right place at the right time with compelling reasons to click. Smith offered her theory that loyalty (via social advocacy) combined with proximity would translate into marketing power to drive nearby leads and sales.

Read more at Brafton.

Mobile, Local and Social is even getting its own conference, SMX SoLoMo. I’m telling you guys, MobLoSo, sounds SOOO much better. But I digress. This is a conference that I am going to have to attend!

It’s becoming clearer and clearer to more businesses, that they need to have strategies in place for mobile, local, social, search and email. For those that do this, they find they make more online sales, grow influence and create more loyalty. They will have a better shot at long term business success.

For those that don’t… well, don’t be surprised to see this sign on those businesses windows.

Adiqus was birthed out of the idea that we need to give people deals and discounts based on proximity and location. A Groupon meets Foursquare… 2-3 months BEFORE the iPhone came out. So, we worked diligently on our project. Having a daily deal program where everyone would see ads based on where they log in from. And… having local agents in each market called Advangelists.

This is what Groupon and Living Social in some ways now actually do. Being in Kansas City, it is a small market that tends to get few investment dollars. So, we didn’t get to build the vision. It pisses me off and disappoints me… but, I realize that I am on the right track. Having a solid idea that you don’t capitalize is my own fault and there is lots of lessons to be learned. And I keep getting on the horseand will continue to do so. But for now, let’s marvel at the millions that I have lost. lol.

Here are some of the numbers that Groupon through out in 2010. The Wall Street Journal says that the CEO mentioned $760 Million in revenue in 2010. So, this chart I’m about to show you is about 8 months worth of data.

Read More: What $480 Million Looks Like to Groupon

Paul Butler a student of math and visual design badassness. He had collected approximated data from Groupon by monitoring deals at the end of each day. He then put this data into a large database and began to map it out. Each box is a deal. He used height to represent number sold, and width to represent the price. Area is therefore gross revenue, and color is city for the top 20 cities.

Click for a larger, interactive version. Only works in browsers that support SVG, i.e. not IE.

This is seriously bad ass and shows which types of businesses succeed in the daily deal market.

From an android smart phone or an Apple iPhone rather than the punch your zip code or locale name onto the personalized landing page. It doesn’t appear to work on iPad, as of yet.

Google has allowed users to have location-based news by entering their zip codes on the web since 2008, and today is the next leap into mobile local news dominance. There is a lot of money in hyperlocal advertising and Google is setting itself up as the real player in the space.

If you visit Google News from your phone will prompt you for your location in going to show you all types of news categories that interest you. Pick and choose a few that you’re passionate about , and Google will start delivering those news stories to your smartphone device.

Google isn’t doing this just for the hell of it. You know what comes next, right? Hyperlocal advertising. So, be prepared for new ads on the horizon.

Why would Microsoft want Skype? Actually my estimation, it makes perfect sense. They have Xbox Live, in which members can communicate/talk shit on the games. What about adding a Skype element to it? They already have Kinect which allows members to use gestures instead of controllers. It seems to me, that is adding a VOIP telephone with video conferencing and Kinect gesture recognition, the way we use our computers could change.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, has mentioned, he views the Internet as an essential battleground for Microsoftwhich traditionally earns the majority of its money from Windows and office software suite. They have to figure out a way to stay as profitable as Google and Apple in the coming years.

$8 billion dollars would be the largest acquisition that Microsoft has ever done in their 36 year history.

It’s a ballsy move for Ballmer and the boys from Redmond to make buying Skype, but we could be looking at the future of communication. Merging video, audio and gestures/ motion to create a new communication experience.

This type of tool should help them integrate themselves with every operating system, because Apple and Android will most likely continue to use Skype on their OS. So, this is just another way for Microsoft to get screen space, along with Bing. I say kudos, and best of luck.

At SMX West last week, someone asked Carter Maslan, Director of Product Management for Google Local, about what to do if their business doesn’t have a physical location.

Carter sayssss: Don’t create a Places page if not. If people can call and visit you, do.

Okay Mr. Maslan, then what about if one of the most important keywords for my site brings not-so-helpful local results? Let’s say the keyword’s not necessarily local?

My company, a job classifieds site based out of Brazil on a “.com.br” domain, has been hard hit with these sort of results because for words where we’re in 3rd or 4th, we’ve been pushed down to below the fold, and therefore losing out on a lot of traffic! Granted Local doesn’t work 100% here yet, but, these sort of results have been around for quite a while now, so it looks like they’re here to stay.

To see if this sort of thing was universal, I ran a few tests to see what the results look like for the same word (direct and contextual translations of the word) on “.com” searches. I ran the test localled on my IP and asked a friend to run the tests on his IP in Danbury, CT (the same results I get because Google reads my “.com” searches as being from my hometown in CT).

Here’s what I got (please click on images for better viewing of images)

“empregos,” the word for “jobs,” our biggest local problem, in Brazil ranks local listings.

(Can someone tell me what Nestlé’s doing on there?)

“jobs,” – not so much:

Here are a couple of other examples where this happens:

saúde = health = WTF?

One search where “.com.br” brings relevant results and “.com” doesn’t, is for the word “escola técnica” which means, “technical school”

“shopping,” is the Brazilian term used for “mall” – here, the opposite happens – but it would make much more sense to have the local result for this keyword, am I right?

Taking companies that are both online and offline in Brazil and the U.S., you get the same bizarre patterns -

Walmart (.com.br)

Walmart (.com)

So where am I getting here? Some searches that SHOULD be local aren’t, and some that aren’t, are showing up as local. Or at least ranking non-relevant local results for the keyword. And Brazilian local results seem to be “off,” on local search results, whereas in general, US local results seem to be more true to their local nature, overall.

Okay, Google messes up sometimes. If they didn’t, then there would legit be religions starting venerating the Google gods.

But this still imposes a few problems for SEO departments everywhere that are losing ranking position.

So what will happen? A vicious circle will entail.

1. Sites that do not have physical locations “available” are going to start building Places pages to recover their visibility in SERP’s. Causing… SPAM and people showing up to office buildings wanting to buy services only offered online (I’m exagerating to make a point!)

2. Furthermore, these sites are going to start creating places pages all over the internet pointing to their Places page. Creating… more SPAM.

3. Users will be very confused.

4. Search Engines will be very upset.

5. Search Engines will punish said sites.

…. and we’re back to step 1 with yet another algorithm that makes our lives all the more exciting/frustrating/challenginig/fun.

What do you think? You think this study is valid at all? (Bearing in mind some local search results are, indeed, VERY useful) Do you have a non-local site suffering from local search results?

I’d love to hear others’ opinions on this!

Let’s start with why I’m writing a post on how Google and Bing got beef, because you’re probable thinking, “Um… duh.”

A couple of days ago, there was a live stream on BigThink of a “talk,” which was really a debate, between head search/SPAM guys at Google, Bing & Blekko (by the way, if you’re not using Blekko for English language searches yet, you should check it out!).  Earlier that day, Danny Sullivan, who’s all SEOs’ favorite expert, posted on how Google was asking if Bing was copying its search results.  This post went viral quickly, and after the debate, is hands down the post of the week.

In the post, Sullivan talks about how Google had been questioning Bing results for words that were misspelt or just bizarre spelling overall.  With this suspicion, Google ran a test, making up words and forcing random pages to rank for those words (forced and contrary to their algorithm).  Before the test, these words wouldn’t rank or there would be suggestions for them.  After the test, Bing started ranking the words for the same pages as Google! (Cue: Oh Snappp!)

So how’s Bing doing this?  Google suspects that they’re copying results through Internet Explorer 8′s suggested sites feature and Bing’s Toolbar.

And here’s the video of the debate so you can see a little more clearly how it all went down in the ring:

Google vs. Bing in the Ring

Note: Matt Cutts is PISSED!

And another hysterical video from the Colbert Report taking Google’s side even though he’s sponsored by Bing!

Another interesting point in the video which is semi-related is the use of Demand Media in the index.  Blekko says they’ve banned quite a few sites from their index because they’ve identified these sites as SPAM (if you don’t want to watch the video, more on TechCrunch)

Now instead of giving you all my opinion about all of this, I’ve decided to ask the MobLoSoc community about the recent beef with Google and Bing

1. Who Cares? Are you, reader, going to stop using Bing because of this?

2. Is this Illegal? Should Bing be penalized?

and

3. What about Demand Media? Do you think Blekko’s right in blocking “Content Farms” from their results?

Let’s start a discussion here on MobLoSoc! I’m looking forward to hear what you have to say!

So, what does this mean?  Well, for one, third party developers of such apps as, say, FarmVille, will have your address, email and phone number.

Facebook acknowledged it was dealing with “sensitive information” in the blog post making the announcement. For that reason, it created a special opt-in permission requirement for the phone number and address to be explicitly granted to the application developer through Facebook’s standard permissions dialog.  It has also pointed out that these permissions only provide access to a user’s address and mobile phone number — not to friends’ addresses or mobile phone numbers.

In essence, the changes are small.  From now on, users who accept the terms and conditions of a new Facebook app will grant that developer access to their mobile telephone number and address, if it is listed on their profile. Social commerce will be a big feature for Facebook in 2011, no doubt.  This privacy change helps them assimilate your data to benefit apps geared more toward e-commerce, one of the company’s largest initiatives for 2011.

It’s obvious that Facebook is beginning to capitalize on our personal information,  but the new privacy setting will also mean users run the greater risk of getting hacked, having information farmed by malicious rogue apps or identity’s stolen or the personal contents of their phones hacked.  Scams are monitored by Facebook, but the rogue apps can usually exist for a few days before they’re shut down, so be careful which Facebook apps that you give you authorization to.

The problem is a relatively easy fix by clicking “Don’t Allow” – the applications will still work just fine, in most cases.  Don’t give valuable information away needlessly.  It could come back and bite you in the ass.

Facebook has nearly 600 million members, so they really need to err on the side of caution.  I don’t want random people to have this data of mine, and I doubt you do either.  So be careful, it’s a Jungleville out there.

The LGNewsroom site has all of the press information about the new products being released here at CES.

The LG Press Conference began with a video of Jane Lynch from Glee telling us about the power of SMART. Check this, Jane was NOT wearing a jumpsuit.

Wayne Park, President and CEO of LG Electronics, talked about the products that LG is releasing here at CES. The main components of business they are focusing on are the Home Entertainment division, Home Appliance division and Mobile Phones division. They are dedicated to making all of their products “Smarter”.

According to Park, LG is developing technologies to gauge the future market landscape. Strengthening business competitiveness is a key area of focus for LG in 2011, as well as preparing for future business in the coming years. LG is making a strong push in investing in R&D and innovation.

Quality management is another key focus for 2011, LG is championing the mantra of quality, from the top of their organization to the lower ranks.

Face the challenges of 2011 to sustain growth and keep LG at a competitive edge in their core business division.

Next up, CTO, Dr. Skott Ahn, the former CEO of the Mobile Communications division. He was responsible for 20% growth year over year, every year in charge.

Smart TV is a product that LG is launching this year. In 2010, they launched broadband TV, in 2011, Smart TV is the reinvention. They will offer premium content providers such as Google Maps, Hulu, Youtube, Netflix and many others.

Plus, they are launching a Smart TV app store that looks pretty impressive. They are launching the Smart TV Upgrader, which will put LG App Store onto any TV with HDMI. This seems very similar to Apple TV.

Mobile Smartphones
Smartphone Roadmap, in 2011, LG is launching the Optimus 2x is the worlds first smartphone with a Dual Core processor, NVidia AP20h, plus it plays 1080p HD. It is also pretty small weighing in at 3.8oz and slim at a mere 0.36 inches. Very slim phone with an amazing display that is very bright. In fact, LG claims it to be the brightest display on smart phones.

Smart Appliances
So, LG has created some new amazing home appliances that can connect via wireless connectivity. The appliances contain what LG calls ThinQ technology, which allows for “smart access”, “smart diagnosis” “smart food management”, “smart adapt” and “smart grid.”

Smart access control allows users to monitor home appliances with their Smartphone / Tablet. You can also personalize your appliacance by downloading wash cycles, recipes, etc.

The Smart Grid function helps reduce electricity automatically.

LG is also have a smaller press event tomorrow where they are launching their line of Tablets.

All in all, I am very impressed with the new line of products by LG. They are launching over 30 new TVs and 14 new mobile devices.

January is quickly approaching. What does this mean for early adopters and lovers of cool tech gadgetry? Only one thing, CES is nigh. This will be a fun time to go to CES, as many companies are preparing to take on Apple iPad with tablets of their own. I expect internet TV to get some love at CES this year, as well. There will certainly be tons of new smartphones released. Also, I’m expecting solar gadgets to be prevalent as well as increased strength in batteries and in storage devices.

On January 6, Las Vegas will once again play host to the world’s largest gathering of consumer electronics makers. Drooling tech lovers and hordes of journalists will flock to the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) to see the what’s in store for 2011.

Last year’s four-day conference at the Las Vegas Convention Center attracted about 125,000 attendees and roughly 2,500 exhibitors. To put it in perspective, the first CES took place in New York City in June, 1967 with only 200 exhibitors and about 17,500 attendees. Since then, CES has grown more than ten-fold.

Obviously, I expect to see tablet’s galore. And it really only took 12 months for the iPad to FINALLY get some competition. Being an owner of an iPad, I can’t imagine not having a functional tablet anymore. My kids use this thing all of the time. The educational games are amazing and there are plenty of apps to keep you occupied. Again, Apple got a good head-start on competition, so it will be difficult for other consumer electronics companies to catch up… so their products better be top notch.

Sure there are many ways to make the iPad better, industry pundits have talked about them all year: no camera, no HDMI output, no USB, etc. etc… Apple will certainly fix most of these on iPad 2.0, I’m sure. Sure, Apple will have some competition being exhibited at CES, but, it won’t take long to steal back the thunder, as MacWorld Conference is January 26-29.

Apple likely sold more than 10 million iPads in 2010, with Samsung’s Galaxy emerging as the only real competition for holiday shopping dollars.

Several companies are looking to close the gap, and many are expected to unveil tablets running on Google’s popular Android operating system. Rumor has it that Samsung will respond with an updated Galaxy tablet, while Asus is prepping an ultra-thin 10-inch Android device. Motorola, Research in Motion, Toshiba and the Palm/HP combination are other key tablet players to watch in Vegas.

However, the biggest story in 2011 may be the delivery of Internet-based content to the television set, according to Shawn Dubrovac, CEA’s Chief Economist and Director of Research.

“This won’t be about the technical feasibility of bringing the Internet to the TV, this will be about the meaningfulness for the end-user of marrying the TV with the Internet,” said Dubrovac.

Because consumers do not replace TVs frequently, Dubrovac expects an increasing number of set-top boxes (and accompanying services) launch at the 2011 CES, even though there are rumors that Google is going to hold back releasing Google TV, until the software is ready for primetime.

LG Mobile contacted us and is sending us out to try their new releases, so Mobile Local Social will get to experience LG’s new product line first hand. I look forward to demoing the products and writing reviews on everything that we find at CES.

2011 should be an interesting year for new consumer electronics, and for networking with some of the industries most influential technologists.