Israeli Claims Patent Over Adding .com To The End Of The Address Bar

from the yup,-that-patent-system-functions-just-great dept

TechCrunch points us to a story about an Israeli company by the name of Netex who is claiming a patent over "www.addressing." What's that? Well, apparently it's the process of simply adding a ".com" to the end of a word you put in a browser address bar. There are all sorts of questions raised by this, and the reporting at the Israeli site Ynetnews leaves a lot to be desired. First, neither Ynetnews nor TechCrunch point to the actual patent. I've been searching on both the supposed inventor's name (Aviv Refuah) and his company's name and I can't find it. If anyone out there can find the actual patent, please post a link in the comments.

The next problem with the article is the claim that this patent is "worth millions" and that Google, Microsoft and Yahoo "will have to pay royalties." It remains to be seen if that's true (and given what's stated, it seems quite doubtful).

Next problem? The article claims that this patent is about the address bar in the browser -- not a search engine box -- though, the reporter doesn't seem to understand the difference between the two. Admittedly, Google now offers a browser in Chrome, but the article keeps referring to the patent as a "search option." Yahoo doesn't offer a browser.

Then there's the issue of claiming that Google and Yahoo "use" this technology:

Refuah says various internet giants such as Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo have been using the program for years, and now they will have to pay royalties to Netex.

That implies -- falsely -- that Google, Microsoft and Yahoo have somehow been using some technology that they got from Netex. It's a common trick used in reporting about patents, but its highly misleading. Much, much, much more likely is that Google, Microsoft and Yahoo simply added a useful and obvious feature, that Netex is now showing up and claiming ownership years later.

Finally, it's tough to say much about the actual patent claims in question -- seeing as we haven't seen them -- but from the Ynetnews description, it's difficult to see how such a thing could possibly be considered patentable (and one would think that Netscape would have some prior art, though I can't remember exactly when Netscape added the ability to add .com to the end of something put in the browser bar). But, honestly, can anyone with a straight face explain why such a thing should be patentable?

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Latest Unsubstantiated Claim: Twitter Makes You Immoral

from the oh,-please... dept

What is it with these bizarre exaggerated claims about the "harms" associated with modern social networking tools? There was just a totally exaggerated report claiming that social networking was harmful to your health, but when you looked at the details, it didn't actually say that at all. The latest, is the claim that new research says that Twitter can make you "immoral." Really? Well, if you actually read the details that doesn't seem to be what the report says at all. Instead, it seems to note that if you only interact with people through short bursts of information, it may take you longer to recognize the emotional impact of what's being said because it's harder to spend the time to reflect. It's difficult to see how that finding is really all that new or surprising. But it says nothing about Twitter somehow turning moral people into immoral people, as the original story suggests.

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Apparently, Cybercrime Isn't Actually A Trillion-Dollar Business

from the maybe-it-needs-a-bailout-too dept

While online scams and cybercrime are growing, the claim made recently that cybercrime is a trillion-dollar business simply isn't true, says The Register. As Gary Stiennon points out, if it were, it would be bigger than global IT business itself, as well as the GDP of several industrialized nations. AT&T's chief security officer threw out the figure in front of a Senate committee; he also said that cybercrime was a bigger business than the global drug trade, another claim Stiennon disputes. He dug into where the myth was started, and how it's evolved, and traced it back to a single comment made by a consultant to the US Treasury Department in 2005. It's then been so commonly cited -- often by security companies looking to advance their own agendas -- and repeated that it's become widely accepted. Certainly cybercrime is a problem, and a growing one, but overstating its true impact won't make fighting it any easier.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Is eBay Warming Up The Skype Billion-Dollar Buyout Plan?

from the round-two dept

Back in 2005, we marveled at the success that Skype backers had in talking up the price of the company, eventually suckering convincing eBay to put together a $4 billion deal for it. This was what we dubbed the "Skype Billion-Dollar Buyout Plan" in which companies used press hype to create valuations far above their actual worth (see YouTube and Facebook for a couple of examples). Of course, what eBay was never really clear on was how it planned to make money from Skype, and it later went back and forth on whether it had given up on looking for the mythical "synergies" between Skype and its core auction business. Last week, eBay's CEO conceded that those synergies were "minimal" -- leading to more speculation that eBay might spin Skype off.

And thus the cycle begins again, with a figure of $900 million to $1.2 billion tossed out there as a potential starting point for the second version of the Skype Billion-Dollar Buyout Plan. What's interesting is that just like four years ago, Skype's financials are murky, as Om Malik points out. The company also still faces the same big problem: monetization. As Skype gets bigger, that problem could become even more difficult. After all, if Skype continues to garner more and more users, more and more calls will shift from the paid SkypeOut service to free Skype-to-Skype calls. Skype is said to be profitable (although there's no indication of how profitable), but it seems pretty clear that it hasn't been the runaway success that would have justified its $4 billion price tag. While it's possible that any current sale could carry a more realistic price, somehow we imagine that eBay will try to use the same tactic that drove up its price for Skype to drive up the next buyer's price.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Woman "Murdered For Facebook Status" -- Or Because Her Estranged Husband Was Nuts

from the when-reality-isn't-as-interesting-as-your-headline dept

"Wife murdered for Facebook status," screams the headline on the BBC News site. "A man murdered his estranged wife after becoming 'enraged' when she changed her marital status on Facebook to 'single'," it goes on to say, after a man in England was convicted of killing his estranged wife who wouldn't respond to any of his attempts to contact her. Apparently changing the Facebook status was the final straw, but to say she was murdered because of it seems like little more than an overly ambitious attempt to craft a really juicy headline. This woman was murdered because her estranged husband went nuts; Facebook was hardly an accessory. While this may not seem like a huge deal, it's these sorts of stories that spring politicians into action against technology, blaming it for society's ills while ignoring the real underlying problems. I mean, if people are getting killed for their Facebook status, surely we need to ban Facebook statuses, right? To protect the children?

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Fuel Cell Hype Back Again

from the and-it'll-disappear-again-as-well dept

Every few years the press gets excited about the potential for fuel cell-powered laptops. And then the concept goes away. We wrote about in 2003, explaining why it wasn't a big deal, and again in 2005. So here we are in 2008 and, once again, we're hearing stories about new fuel cells for laptops that are going to be demoed (not, of course, actually put into production). The benefits of a fuel cell-powered laptop are that on a single cell, a laptop can last a lot longer (usually the estimate is about 10 hours). That sure beats the 3 to 5 hours most laptops get on traditional lithium-ion batteries today.

But... there's a huge problem with fuel cells that almost never gets discussed in the press: you need to keep buying replacements and then you need to carry those replacement fuel cell cartridges with you. It's like back to the bad old days when your consumer electronics products all had non-rechargeable, disposable batteries. It was a huge pain. That's why everyone switched to rechargeable batteries. When you switch to disposable fuel cells, then you're adding an ongoing expense (much greater than electricity) and forcing users to keep carrying around spares. Yes, for some folks that ability to go for a longer time without plugging in will be worth it -- but for plenty of people it seems like the "cost" is a lot worse than the benefit.

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Don't You Feel Safer Now That Google Added A Link To Its Privacy Policy?

from the phew! dept

One of the more idiotic accusations thrown at Google of late was this idea that it was somehow a problem that it didn't link directly to its privacy policy from its home page. It had a privacy policy. That privacy policy was easy to find. Almost no one actually reads its privacy policy -- but a bunch of privacy groups who surely had more important things to spend their time on got all upset that Google refused to link from its front page. It appears that Google has now given in and agreed to link to the privacy policy, oddly removing the word "Google" from its copyright notice and replacing it with a link to the privacy policy.

Perhaps more idiotic is the response from a bunch of privacy groups claiming that this somehow makes a difference. It doesn't. It's privacy theater. It looks good, but it means nothing. People still won't read the privacy policy -- and even if they did, they probably wouldn't even remember what it said. Where a privacy policy is linked from a website is meaningless compared to what a company actually does to take the privacy of its users seriously. Getting up in arms over whether or not Google links to the privacy policy from its front page is a joke. And, oh yeah, some are noticing that just linking to the privacy policy probably does not fulfill the legal obligation required by California's law on linking to privacy policies. Perhaps these "privacy advocate" groups have something else to complain about now.

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Everyone Be Afraid! Predators Move To Game Consoles

from the fear-fear-fear! dept

There's a neat little rule in press coverage: three stories makes a "trend" even if there's not much more to it. This works particularly well on stories where you're trying to scare people into worrying about something "bad" happening out there. Of course, rather than explore how widespread the problem is, the report usually just quotes a few biased individuals and spreads the message of "fear, fear, fear!" Witness this story in USA Today claiming that sexual predators are using gaming consoles to target kids. It hits all the points: scary situation, lists out three cases, quotes a few police officers claiming it's a big deal -- but doesn't provide any evidence or stats on how widespread this really is.

You would think that the press would have learned to be careful about this, given that a whole bunch of studies came out in the last year showing that the press greatly exaggerated the "threat" of predators on social networks, as they're really not that widespread and the actual threat is minimal. But I guess reality and facts don't sell as many newspapers as blind fear mongering. So, while I'm sure that this is happening in a few isolated cases, it's hard to believe that this is particularly widespread. If it's not really happening much on social networks (where this sort of "grooming" would be easier), it seems unlikely that it's widespread on gaming consoles. And, of course, most kids know better than to engage with such strangers online, anyway.

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Powerset Turns Out To Not Be All That Powerful

from the powering-down dept

We never understood the hype around Powerset. It was the latest in an extremely long line of startups that claimed to focus on "natural language search" -- which is one of those holy grails for computer scientists who never stop to ask whether or not there's actually any market demand for it. As Google has shown, people don't need to use natural language to search. They're just fine doing keyword search. Yet, for some unclear reason, Powerset was able to raise a ton of money at a ridiculous valuation, and did so using all sorts of buzzwords (and vague patent threats). But when it finally released a product (just to search Wikipedia) it proved to be rather ho hum. Searching Wikipedia via other means was still more effective.

Now comes the news (first leaked last week) that Microsoft has bought Powerset. While both sides will present this as a big win, the numbers being tossed about ($100 million) are not a big win at all for Powerset's investors, and the exit certainly falls well short of the hype around Powerset. If Powerset was actually seeing any traction at all it never would have agreed to sell at that price. Basically, Powerset discovered what was widely known by industry watchers for years: natural language search is a neat challenge, but it's not something the market is demanding. It will be interesting to see if Microsoft actually does anything with the technology, but my guess is that it will slowly fade away. If anything, Microsoft may do a little saber-rattling over the patents Powerset hyped up, but little else.

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Privacy Groups Miss The Point: It's Not Where Google's Privacy Policy Is, It's What It Does

from the focusing-on-the-wrong-thing dept

Last week, we wrote about the ridiculous concerns being raised by a few privacy advocates that (gasp!) Google doesn't include a link to its privacy policy on the front page. This seemed like a really pointless concern since almost no one reads these privacy policies anyway, and those who do often misunderstand the policy anyway. Besides, there are plenty of companies out there that don't even abide by their own privacy policies. In other words, the real issue isn't where the privacy policy is, but whether or not the company actually keeps its promises and treats its users' data properly.

And yet... a bunch of consumer and privacy groups, including ones I respect like the EFF and the ACLU are now trying to turn this into a big deal by publicly demanding that Google add a link to its privacy policy on its home page. This isn't about privacy. This is "privacy theater." It's about putting on a good show that has nothing to do with whether or not Google is doing right by its users. If there's a link to Google's privacy policy on its front page or not, it won't change what Google does with users' info, and it almost certainly won't change the way anyone (other than maybe these groups) view Google. It's all a big show for no reason. There are plenty of important causes that these groups should be working on. Worrying whether or not Google links to its privacy policy from its front page or one page deep is silly pandering.

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Hype And Reality For Joost -- No, Joost Does Not Lead The Way With Web Video

from the i-can't-believe-what-I-just-read dept

The online video company Joost gets a ton of attention, but mainly for the fact that its two founders were the guys behind Kazaa and Skype -- and the fact that it's raised a lot of money. However, what amazed me this weekend was two separate media reports suggesting that Joost was some sort of huge success, when almost every other indication was that it had stumbled massively. First, there was Crain's New York suggesting that it was a huge deal that Joost had chosen to locate its US headquarters in New York rather than Silicon Valley, calling the company "a top online video company." Ok. Perhaps -- though it seems like a stretch. In the online video world, there's basically YouTube and then everyone else. However, the real kicker was Information Week, which bizarrely declares: "Joost is still a leader in high-quality video by any measure" under a headline declaring "Joost Leads The Way With Web Video."

Well, first of all, Joost doesn't lead the way in web video because it still hasn't released a web version. Second, the claim of it leading "by any measure" seems hard to square up with nearly a dozen reports about Joost's prospects. In fact, about the only "measure" by which Joost may be leading the internet video space is in hype (or, possibly, bandwidth consumption). By nearly all other reports out there, Joost has been in serious trouble this year, with people not finding its limited content (and need for a download) all that compelling. In response, the company has ditched most of its ambitious plans to focus much more narrowly on a short-term strategy to help the company survive. The company has also had tremendous downtime and layoffs. Even Joost's own investors don't have much nice to say about the company. In other words, it's difficult to see how Information Week can declare in any way that Joost is somehow leading the market.

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Word Of Mouth Marketing Isn't Effective If Your Product Sucks

from the just-saying... dept

Way too many people seem to think that "word of mouth marketing" is about getting others to spread your marketing message. That is, they think it's about putting words into the mouths of others. But that's not true at all. Real word of mouth marketing is about building a great product, and then letting your customers pass on the news however they see fit. If there's anything to do on the "marketing" side, it's merely to enable the tools for your biggest fans to spread the word, and then get the hell out of the way. However, it appears many marketers still don't understand this concept.

Reader Aaron deOliveira writes in to point out a story about Hollywood studios apparently giving up on word of mouth marketing campaigns targeted at "faith-based" audiences promoting certain messages that the studios hoped would resonate with folks who are religious. In the article, they toss up all sorts of reasons why such campaigns haven't done all that well, but deOliveira points to a blog post by Ben McConnell where he makes a different assertion: perhaps all those word of mouth campaigns failed because the movies just weren't that good. It's just that the studios are so sure of their product that they never even noticed it. So, once again, it goes back to this: word of mouth marketing is never going to make a lick of difference if your product sucks. Rather than focusing on such things, concentrate on making a good product first -- and then worry about the marketing campaign. And if the campaign fails -- recognize that maybe it's got something to do with the product.

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Is LinkedIn The Latest To Play The Skype-Hype Valuation Bubble Game?

from the anyone-taking-bets-on-the-final-amount? dept

Over the past few years, we've noticed a pretty consistent pattern among startups trying to create huge valuations for themselves in a short period of time. While other companies have done it in the past, the latest cycle really kicked off with Skype confusing people into thinking it was worth billions. Despite having relatively low revenues, there suddenly leaked rumors that Skype was for sale. Skype denied it, and then had one of its investors say the company was worth well over a billion. Then the feeding frenzy began, until eBay came out the winner -- a move it later regretted. Facebook was the next to follow the Skype Hype Strategy, but may have been a bit too early to the game. It took an extra year, but the company may have outdone Skype in its $15 billion valuation (though, unlike Skype, Facebook hasn't turned that into real cash yet). In between, YouTube used a nearly identical strategy to pump up its valuation.

Here's what you do: get a little buzz. Leak a report to the press about a buyout offer. Deny the reports of the buyout offer and then have either an exec or an investor make an offhanded remark about how the company is actually worth billions, allow the feeding frenzy to begin and eventually pick an exit opportunity. It also doesn't hurt to have some sort of PayPal connection (which both Facebook and YouTube had). The latest to test out this strategy may be LinkedIn, which also has the PayPal connection. Last week the rumor broke that News Corp was trying to buy LinkedIn. The company's CEO quickly denied the report and said that the company would need to sell for "a lot more" than a billion dollars. Now, the latest reports are that News Corp isn't buying LinkedIn, but just like those other stories, the stage has now been set. Suddenly others may start thinking that perhaps LinkedIn is a good buy for over a billion dollars, and the feeding frenzy begins again. Anyone want to take guesses on the next startup to play this game?

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Bubble 1.0 Hype Ideas Brought Back To Life By 2.0 Companies

from the well,-look-at-that... dept

It's been amusing watching all of the ridiculous PR-generating gimmicks from the original dot com bubble come back to life over the last couple years from new companies who are either using the same playbook or too new at the game to know that it's been done before. For example, remember the online travel startup TravelZoo? In order to enter the already overcrowded online travel market and still get some traction, the company promised shares of stock to early users. While there were plenty of questions about the legality of this, it appears that the company played by the rules and didn't violate any kind of securities law (which seems surprising, since offering any kind of shares in a private company usually requires an awful lot of very specific hoops that you need to jump through) -- and it even paid off for some users of the site who were able to make some money. Unfortunately, the gimmick ended up costing Travelzoo a lot more than it expected. Either way, there's some random new company out there that's trying to do something similar, promising stock to users for performing certain actions within their site. Again, this should raise a number of legal questions, but the site's founders insist that it's okay because they're not actually issuing shares, just allocating them to be issued at the point of a liquidity event. It's not clear that a securities regulator would feel the same way about it. Publicly offering any kind of equity tends to require some very, very careful steps for any company to take, and you'd have to image that the potential risks from violating securities law could be a lot greater than any brief burst of (non-product-related) publicity this kind of gimmick generates.

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