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The real reason for Google's free 411 service

Tim O'Reilly speculated why Google is really doing a free 411 service . In short, I'm speculating that the 1-800-GOOG-411 service is designed to harvest voice data to build Google's own speech database, rather than licensing from Nuance or another player. Charlie confirmed this at the recent Google Developer...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 06-04-2007
How Microsoft can crush Google

Dare points to this insightful, if nefarious, post on how Microsoft could crush Google in one easy step . I've long made the argument that Google is not a technology company, but rather an advertising / media company. Clearly, the distinction between technology and media is at least blurring. In fact...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 04-10-2007
The UAC security flaw in Vista

User Account Control (UAC) is one of the key security mechanisms introduced in Vista. In the past, the default account as an administrator. Following the principle of least privilege , the default Vista account runs with limited access, and Vista detects when something requires "administrator prompts...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 03-03-2007
Another ironic Mac commercial

We already know some of the ads in the Get-A-Mac campaign don't exactly make sense . The latest, "Counselor", seems particularly ironic to me. In the ad, the Mac says that the PC "is a wizard with numbers and dresses like a gentleman". The PC is able to say that the Mac is "better with creative stuff...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 10-19-2006
More innovative advertising in a TiVO world

Honda previously launched 5-second ads to combat the effects of Tivo . Now Fox is embracing that model , "running a 30-second television spot with just one static image in an effort to reach viewers who fast forward through ads using digital video recorders like TiVos." "Viewers fast-forwarding through...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 10-11-2006
Prescription Drug Advertising

Ernie commented recently on the drug side effects in the commercials , and suggests that maybe this is a strategy to limit liability. At first blush it seems counter-productive. But, if you consider the inevitable litigation that will ensue, it's actually a very smart move. As we all know by now, people...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 10-10-2006
Most people pay for advertising, but EA wants to charge for it

Starting this Friday, EA and ESPN are making a behind-the-scenes preview of Madden NFL 07 available . Rather than give it away, they are planning on selling it on pay-per-view (yes, through your cable provider) and online for $20. In a recent Major Nelson podcast, they justified it because, apparently...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 08-03-2006
This Apple advertisement doesn't make any sense. Touche!

I love the new Get A Mac campaign . Very clever, and great casting. I'm willing to overlook some of the factual inaccuracies because, hey, this is advertising, right? One of the most recent ads ( mov ) doesn't make a lot of sense to me though. The ad in question is touting Boot Camp, OS X's ability to...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 06-19-2006
Advertising in RSS

Mike Gunderloy (Larkware News) points to an ad brokerage for RSS feeds . Interesting idea. How effective it is depends. I still think that, especially when it comes to personal weblogs, a personal endorsement is going to be infinitely more effective than a canned ad. I think the only way this is going...

Posted to Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled (Weblog) by Tim on 01-26-2004

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