China's information potential is too delicious to resist. Even for Google

Turns out that Google is now diverting Chinese users' search through Hong Kong is a telling statement of how lucrative the Chinese search industry is and how reluctant the internet giant is to close its business prospects here.
In the middle of January 2010, the internet giant said it was considering pulling its operations out of China after it alleged that it was a victim of a "sophisticated and targeted" cyber attack originating from the country.
At that time Google said on its blog that the cyber attack which targeted information on Chinese human rights activists, resulted in a loss of its intellectual property. And China responded saying foreign internet companies may do business there "according to the law".
However, immediately reacting to the alleged attack, Google threatened to leave Chinese market completely and experts said its competitors including Microsoft and China's local search giant Baidu.com are set to benefit from Google's back-out plan.
Perhaps Google imagined other American technology companies including Microsoft to follow suit but as that did not happen on a mass scale, Google has sought a perfectly legal way of diverting traffic to its servers in Hong Kong.
Its latest plan comes just days after advertisers wanted clarity on Google's business plans in China.
When Google launched in China in 2006, it agreed to abide by China's regulations and to operate a censored site. Besides the company abides by the rules in different countries within the EU too where it operates.
That's why Google's decision seems to be far from being a true stand against Chinese censorship but instead a smart and legal move to hook on to China's vast potential of internet users by adopting a middle ground. It demonstrates Google's aspiration of having its cake and eating it too. An information business decision one can only empathise with.
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On a different note altogether, can't wait to see how Britons reacts to News Corporation's plan of erecting a pay-wall this June on the digital version of UK national daily The Times and sister publication The Sunday Times. Under this move, readers will have to pay £1 for a day's access and £2 for a week's access to Times newspaper online.

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Twitter's ad plans bold but boring

It is no surprise that Twitter is considering to introduce advertising into its service. But why has it adopted the traditional model of advertising - an umbrella model affecting all of its half a million users?
In 2009, just three years since its launch, Twitter was valued at $1bn (£630m). Even before it had made any substantial revenue strategy, it was close to securing $100m funding from a consortium of investors. We knew advertising plans would soon follow.
The micro-blogging site has started addressing the issues that stopped it from accessing advertising revenue which is derived out of data on its site. The company's tweet said it is developing its own tools to provide features on the site that are currently provided by third party desktop clients.
Third party services include features such as geolocations- crucial to advertising and is now offered by service providers such as Tweetdeck, Seesmic Desktop and Echofon .
Twitter has decided to go down the Google way of displaying ads with its search results and not by incorporating them into actual feeds. This means for instance if you do a search on laptops, it would feature Sony or Dell deals ads. The adverts will follow general Twitter principle of 140 characters.
What is surprising is its choice of traditional advertising model. Before securing funding, in May last year, the site said banner advertising was not of interest. Later on, it said it was open to advertising.
While, it is a relief to know that the actual feeds would be free of ads as of now, it is likely that its investors could put further pressure on the site to generate more revenue through banners, user feed-based ads and even meaning-based behaviour-targeted ads. What worked for Google may not work for Twitter- people used Google primarily for search hence, its advertising on search was spot on.
It could have subjected advertising to specific product enquiry tweets. It could have accessed revenue from large businesses by allowing them to post their updates- for instance a Lufthansa tweet that a London-Frankfurt flight is delayed. Followers get their information and Lufthansa communicates effectively but pays a price. Or even a product inquiry tweet by a user asking whether Virgin is better or Sky? There can be a million ways rather than going down the Google lane.
The beauty of Twitter was its neutrality and the ability to post data real time using mobile devices. The popularity and use of the site was so overwhelming that the US has allowed army troops to use the feature and it is now used by corporations and businesses for corporate communications, e-learning through social web and even raising help for natural disasters.
Move towards traditional advertising may have come a bit too soon even before the service is fully explored and exploited. Some enterprises and sensitive groups are likely to back out while it is mulling advertising plans and Twitter for information's sake would be a thing of past.
-Archana Venkatraman

Rising use of social web amid disasters

The communication, collaboration, networking and coming together of people after the unprecedented and devastating earthquake in Haiti has once again illustrated the importance of social web.
As the traditional channels of communications collapsed in the area and as rescue professionals were stuck away for a while before getting to the scene of disaster to help victims, Tweeters, Facebookers, charity organisations and users of other social media tools collaborated to share information, raise cash and check whereabouts of the loved ones.
Immediately after the disaster struck, social web was full of minute-by-minute updates, appeal for help, witness accounts and some stomach curdling pictures from the scene.
Even now, thousands of web users from around the world are continuing to come to social networking sites for sharing news in the aftermath of the earthquake and are searching for news about missed relatives.
Twitter's "Trending Topics" today focus around- "Help Haiti" and "Yele"- posts that are raising funds for the victims. It was reported that major media channels connected with aid workers through Skype as phone lines were dead and redundant.
This latest disaster highlights the way social media sites have evolved and used as a means of raising global awareness and even for campaigning. In the past we have seen the effective use of social web in environmental campaigning, Iran elections, Hudson bay plane landing and more recently in the support shown towards Google's exit from China.
The first pictures of the Hudson bay plane incident was out on Twitter and then on terrestrial news channels where as in Iran, the authorities could not control the expression of displeasure through Twitter by Iranians.
More recently, social web has given people an alternative medium to be heard and be heard effectively.
The opinion of people and their information in these websites are so binding and hard to ignore that it helps not just raise awareness and bring transparency but force the authorities to act in favour of the emotions and views expressed through the web.
How social networking sites and the web in general have proactively played their roles in enabling loved ones get in touch with or know the whereabouts of the victims of the unprecedented earthquake in Haiti will go a long way in calming their critics.

This Christmas is all about turkey and yes Twitter

It's Christmas time and most information professionals are wrapping up their data projects to spend time with their loved ones.
But professionals may still have their nerves on the market, thanks to the rise and adoption of social web and mobile computing devices and impressive broadband promises in 2009 alone.
Info pros can pat themselves on their back for helping their organisations sail through the tough economic conditions after being entrusted the task of maintaining their organisation's data management capabilities, communication activities and keeping up with technology all on a shoestring budget.
As we look to come out of this deep recession at the start of the next year, their roles will become more exciting yet crucial and challenging. It will be in the next twelve months that info pros can demonstrate how their organisations gained after allowing these professionals to integrate social media in their professional activities; how their digitisation process has helped their companies to be in sync with technological advancements and how investing in right information solutions and subscribing to the right products have given their companies an edge over competition.
But it is also in the next twelve months that businesses would fail to see impact of projects initiated by info pros. If info pros cannot tangibly showcase how much, for instance Twitter has helped their marketing and communications arm in reaching out to the public, their traditional colleagues will get only further cynical. Experts have said that social media can do wonders to businesses, but info pros must be able to quantify the benefits and have the facts and figures ready.
Likewise, if research and academic info pros are not able to justify investing in information technologies, cash-strapped institutions will feel they have "wasted" money. Also if professionals have released exclusive data and products online for free which has backfired, their organisations will feel betrayed.
Amid increased pressure in 2010 when their initiatives will start showing results, info pros need confidence and conviction to justify themselves and assure their slightly-wary organisations that all steps have indeed been in the right direction.
Gathering such information may not be daunting with today's information feeds, measuring technologies and social media.
Happy holidays and of course, happy holiday tweeting!

NLA got aggregator to remove newspaper links but nobody sure of copyright

Newspaper publishers and NLA may have won the battle against content aggregators, but can they really claim victory?
Not until copyright laws define and cover online aggregation service.
NewsNow, the UK content aggregator is set to remove links to most national newspapers after a row with the Newspaper Licensing Agency (NLA).
The site will pull links out of its subscription service that relates to content from titles of eight major newspaper groups - including Guardian Media Group, News International, Telegraph Media Group, Associated Newspapers and Independent News & Media- who own the NLA.
NewsNow's move comes after a debate with NLA after the agency launched a crackdown aggregators, PR agencies and all organisations that recycle links for commercial purposes. It announced of plans to claim copyright fees against organisations which share press cuttings by emailing links to newspaper articles on an industrial scale starting from January 2010.
NLA also aimed at charging web-based news aggregators who collect news headlines, make their own feeds, tailor-make it and distribute it widely to businesses and then profit from it (the B2B service providers).
This crackdown is to ensure that a typical aggregator such as NewsNow, which links to content from newspapers and provides them to business on subscription, would be expected to pay up to £10,000 as "web database license fees".
It is clear that NLA has attempted to introduce a new revenue stream at a time when newspaper publishers are losing to freely accessible information on the internet.
NLA spokesman Andrew Hughes clarified that it will not charge backdated fees and will not charge users sharing news links for free. "Our new licences only to paid-for web aggregation services, free-to-use services are unaffected. Web aggregators copy and index website content. This requires the consent of the content owner, and charging those who use website content commercially is fair and reasonable. The reason NewsNow and most other aggregators have accepted our proposals is that detailed legal advice supports our position."
NLA said that all of the major paid-for UK web aggregators except Meltwater have agreed licenses. Meltwater's resistance and NewsNow's plans to remove links than agree to pay license-fees demonstrates the reluctance in the aggregation business to pay because, according to them, their service constitutes "content-search2.
In the last few months the debate between aggregators and publishers has been whether aggregation is a search service or content copying because existing copyright law does not cover aggregation.
While NLA thinks aggregators must pay, legal experts point that circulation of hyperlinks cannot be an infringement of copyright, and that the newspapers' own 'Print 'and 'Email a Friend' icons allow any user to access the article directly, without payment.
In a report, Robin Fry of Beachcroft said: "Most businesses have abandoned the circulation of physical press cuttings, leaving it to individuals to access stories direct from the newspaper websites. The broadsheets clearly allow this on their websites but the NLA still seem to be pursuing businesses for licences which are simply not needed.
"Our aim is to demystify the situation, as we have seen an increase in enquiries from clients on this issue, who are understandably baffled by the numerous and complicated rules and fees in this area. It's quite possible for organisations to access all their press cuttings at no cost whilst staying within the law.
"The NLA has a responsibility to explain the correct legal situation to those it seeks copyright fees from - but at the moment, many are entering into licences - and possibly paying backdated 'indemnity' fees - without really understanding if these are needed for their business."
The battle will only get bitter unless a legal framework is put in place soon.

Google's absence at OI '09 was conspicuous

As the three-day Online Information 2009 conference wrapped up in London yesterday [Thursday], most information professionals in public and private sector organisations as well as the information technology professionals left the premises a little wiser on how to deal with the emerging social technologies, knowledge management, information management in recession, digitisation and preservation and even hard engineered semantic web technology.
But some were left scratching their heads too- those reluctant to take the "risky" dive into the social web, those adopting the traditional digitisation and preservation technoques, those operating on tighter budgets and those wanting more technology democracy in their workplaces.
The message came stark and clear to these reluctant professionals - you have to do it now, you have to do it fast and you have to do it right.
The professionals attended the sessions in all their sincerity, aiming to take away something effective and useful to their institutions' boardrooms. We saw it all- experts presenting their information, offering case studies and juggling questions while the information audience absorbing the information and advice, counter-arguing, questioning, agreeing and collaborating.
The closing keynote session may have already set the agenda for next year- a "Google dominated" session where experts provided insights on how Google will shape the information landscape in 2010.
In addition to the final session, many questions and discussions in individual sessions for three days too were focused on Google and that's what I want to say- Google's absense at the event was conspicuous.
While we had panelists praise as well as critisise Google and predict its move next year, at the next Online Information conference, we want to hear from the search giant about its own plans. During the post-session discussions over a few glasses of wine, I could hear some professionals expressing their frustration over predictions and not hard facts about what Google will embark on in the coming year.
And another issue that struck me was the absence of professionals who chalk out the social web policy within their organisations. Some librarians were keen to understand ways to develop a social web strategy only to find themselves full of knowledge but helpless to implement as they were not directly responsible for these strategies.
An information-explosive event, I am already beginning to think about the next OI conference where we must question experts on trends they wrongly predicted, on questions we missed to ask, on failing to spot opportunities and see more experts from internet giants who are shaping the future of online information at a lightening speed.