Blogging from Crowne Plaza – looking forward to meet Michael Champlin and attend the Google Apps Event.
Archive for October, 2007
New Media is a book written by Dorina Gutu and starting today it’s available in bookshops. The book is about politics, blogs, blogging, web 2.0, Terrorism 2.0, podcasting, YouTube, Second Life, etc. – you know the list 
The book is in my wish list and I want to read it as soon as I get my hands on it.
Continue reading ‘New media, blogs, terrorism 2.0′
Man is blessed by his own curiosity
AlJazeera produced another extraordinary documentary about the AK47 (short for Russian: Автомат Калашникова образца 1947 года, Avtomat Kalashnikova 1947). See how proud is Lt. General Mikhail Timofeyevich Kalashnikov about his product and probably the most powerful brand in the arms and funerals industry:
Second part:
In the movie you could see The Kalashnikov Vodka.
Here is a challenge for my readers: do you consider the brand “Kalashnikov” more powerful than “Coca-Cola”, “Google” or “Nokia”?
Related links:
- ‘I sleep soundly’ – Interview with and article on Mikhail Kalashnikov at the age of 83
- AK-47’s military and social effects on history – Larry Kahaner
Mikhail Kalashnikov did no evil. He was just a designer.
His product kills 250,000 people every year – this is not a design error.
Alex Patriquin wrote an article about the top Video Players: Facebook Emerges, MySpace Stumbles, YouTube Continues to Lead (YouTube’s share of Attention has climbed 154%).
I guess implementing YouTube video results in Google Search pays off.
If you find useful Compete’s ranking, I also recommend reading this post on page view performance. That’s it for the moment!
Rachad El Jisr stepped down from the management of iMedia (Automarket, BizCity, Bumerang, Business Romania, CineMagia, Eva, Jocuri 24, Metropolis, Program 24, Stiri 24, Top Sanatate, Toplinks) leaving Adrian Cernescu in charge. Continue reading ‘Rachad El Jisr no longer iMedia manager’
Orlando wrote today that my presentation scared him. He also thinks that the 2 clients we had in the audience were stroke with sudden fear
My presentation focused on business competitiveness, mainly on using the information on the Internet for your company (OSINT). Although we sell advertising on websites, we should realize that the Internet was an application developed by the army and comes with several bonus packs
I think that presenting the risks and the opportunities you meet online in the public space (conferences, workshops, etc) can and will help the business community and I feel that sharing this type of information is something I should do. After all, business is nothing without information.
PS: if you want to read my presentation and see what scared Orlando, give me an e-mail. For everything else, there’s Mastercard 
Iulian Comanescu writes about a contest in Moldova (Eastern region of Romania) – five Romanian journalists will have the chance to cover a story for 4 days in Moldova.
If you are a journalist and if you want to visit this part of Romania, here is what you’ll have to do:
- know the mainstream subjects in Moldova;
- motivate your desire to visit Moldova;
Send your CV and a “motivational” letter to dlazur@api.md or call Dumitru Lazur, tel.: (+373 22) 22-09-96.
Good luck!
South African wines are fascinating. Today I had the chance to taste a Sauvignon Blanc with a floral and fruity flavor (a great wine for a long night with your friends) and a great Cabernet Sauvignon (Manor House), a full-bodied wine with ripe fruit and oak spices.
I totally enjoyed the a wine tasting organized by vinul.ro and I’m happy that I had some good friends to share some great wines. After all, It’s a long way from South Africa to Romania and discovering a Pinotage (lots of berries with cherries in background) was quite an experience
Business is nothing if you don’t have the right wine
Claudiu Gamulescu (Online Business Developer, Underclick.ro) together with Nona Serbanescu (Media Development Manager, Hanson Marketing) and Daniel Enescu (Managing Partner, Daedalus Consulting) will speak today at Strategic Marketing starting at 1400.
Claudiu Gamulescu started his online business in 1998 and since then he developed different e-marketing, e-commerce and online branding projects. Lecturer at the Academy of Economics in Bucharest and President of the SGGC Businessman Association, Claudiu Gamulescu is one of the first Romanian Evangelists (although he’s very modest) and promotes new media technologies in Eastern Europe.
Today you’ll have the chance to see Claudiu Gamulescu live at World Trade Center in Bucharest, Romania and on November 21st at Internnet CEE in Warsaw, Poland.
A great day for the Ferrari fans all over the world!
Iceman is the new World Champion!
Drinks are on me: Magda, Cristi, Ionut, Tzavarlaw, and for all the true red fans out there!
- Le prix du baril de pétrole a atteint un nouveau record historique, mercredi 17 octobre 2007, après que le Parlement turc a autorisé des opérations militaires en Irak – comentée par Tzavarlaw ici
- Dan Balan – Crazy Loop: Il est né en République de Moldova, dans un petit village appelé Trebujeni. Son père était un chanteur de mariage et sa mère travaille dans une ferme. Son véritable nom était Grigorie Armasaru mais tout le monde lui a demandé Grisha… jusqu’à ce qu’un jour…
- Michael Schumacher – un film sur la saison de Formule 1 en 2006 – publié par Ionut.
- Casa Iancului, restaurant recommandé par Gabi
Ce message a été écrit en francais parce que Tzavarlaw ne répond tres bien pas à l’anglais
A) The exiled Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama accepted the Congressional Gold Medal, lawmakers’ highest civilian honor, in a formal ceremony in the US Capitol’s ornate Rotunda -> panic in Beijing.
B) Crises management -> local propaganda plan, Internet Censorship, etc
C) Redirecting all Chinese users trying to search on Google, Yahoo and Microsoft websites to a local, safer Chinese search engine.
Baidu looks nice. Do no evil (because the truth hurts)
Walt Disney Co, Microsoft Corp, Viacom Inc, News Corp’s Fox and MySpace, CBS Corp, General Electric Co’s NBC Universal, and online video services such as Veoh Networks and Dailymotion plus other media companies gathered in peace and have agreed to a set of guidelines to protect copyrights online.
Google Inc, YouTube owner, is absent from the pact and is sending an important signal. On the other hand, the copyright pact is just a symbolic gesture as the companies agreed to eliminate copyright-infringing content uploaded by web users and to block any pirated material before it is publicly accessible (things already applied by YouTube).
Interesting quote – Forrester’s McQuivey: “The pressure on Google to go along with this cooperative initiative will be intense, as the fate of existing lawsuits will likely hinge on Google’s acceptance of the common solution”.
CAPITAL has a contract with SMI but I see that they use the same ad server as ARBOmedia so I don’t know who really serves this ad:
Something really strange goes on at ARBOmedia/SMI since they started to serve 2 leaderboards on Capital. The second leaderboard just pops out of thin air but the first one (also overlayer) and when is rolled, it covers up to 70% of the second leaderboard (different client).
Of course, I started to wonder what’s going on (maybe the new bb adserver has a problem) but I discovered that CAPITAL is overbooked and the client really wanted to display the campaign on this website. This is how SMI/ARBOmedia made a compromise against all the standards used all over the web and my guess is thay they head towards a 3 leaderboard/2 overlayer campaign quite soon
IAB has standards but do we understand them?
LATER EDIT: on IAB standards – Gabriel Boaca, Magda Zander…
Google is the most complex search engine available for public use but very few know how to use its full potential. 99% of the Google users use just the classic keyword search. Sometimes you need to unlock the full power Google is offering and find specific files as word, power point or excel documents, mp3, exe files, hidden movies or simple source files as cdr, psd or zip. Below is a query you can use when you’re in a desperate need for a certain file.
Let’s say you need to find out a specific doc or xls file called “prices” – here is the syntax you need to use (type it in Google Search):
-inurl:(htm|html|php) intitle:”index of” +”last modified” +”parent directory” +description +size +(doc|xls) “prices”
If you love the music and want to listen to Pavarotti before you buy the CD here is how you can find a song:
-inurl:(htm|html|php) intitle:”index of” +”last modified” +”parent directory” +description +size +(wma|mp3) “pavarotti”
If you like to collect propaganda, and want to search for CIA movies, here is a suggestion:
-inurl:(htm|html|php) intitle:”index of” +”last modified” +”parent directory” +description +size +(avi|mpg) “CIA”
Enjoy and remember: do no evil!
This can be painful – index of doc:
The Ministry of Internal Affairs – documents
The Ministry of Environment – documents
The Ministry of Development – documents
Romanian Auto Authority – documents
Institute of Cardiovascular Medicine – documents
Veterinary Inspection – documents
Faculty of Political Sciences – documents
And the list can go on…
My presentation for Strategic Marketing is finally ready and it’s called “Blogs – Competitive through information”.
I wanted to add value for the business men attending the event and I believe this will be for the first time in Romania we’ll have the chance to talk about business blogs as sources of competitive information, raw intelligence or OSINT (Open Source Intelligence) – friends tell me the latest blogging events in Romania shared the same old/sometimes lame themes/ideas.
Guest speakers:
Antonio Eram – Manager, Netopia
Razvan David – Interaction Coordinator, Mediaedge CIA
Orlando Nicoara – General Manager, MediaPro Interactiv
Bogdan Gavrila – Core Target
Madalin Matica – CEO, DotCommerce
Razvan Varabiescu – Managing director, Media Direction
A South-African wine producer released a wine for Microsoft. Stormhoek, (owned by Orbital Wines) launched this special wine for Microsoft having on the label the Windows Vista, “Blue Monster” mascot.
“Blue Monster Sauvignon Blanc Reserve” got its name after the animated character made by Hugh MacLeod, (marketing director at Stormhoek).
I wonder if Bill Gates likes it
The first SATI numbers are available here and they look similar to the stats provided by Google Analytics. This means that trafic.ro (because of its strong anti-fraud policy) displays lower figures (~10-15% variation).
I wonder if trafic.ro will modify its anti-fraud policy and how will the market react to the new figures.
Since I’m dependent on advertising I found this article written by Paul Thomasch (Reuters) quite representative also for the Romanian Internet market:
Increasingly, they say, too much media depends on advertising as the only source of revenue. With new players from software makers to cable operators also trying to cash in, the dollars simply may not stretch far enough.
“I’m getting to the point where I feel like every answer to every business development pitch is ‘We’re going to be advertiser supported’,” said Beth Comstock, president of Integrated Media at NBC Universal | more…
A $31 billion market dependent on advertising with 10 websites sharing 70% of the revenues is not very healthy and maybe It’s high time to look for alternative business models.
Here is a movie about media failing to report important issues. I’ve decided to post this movie because it presents some important points of view although skeptics could rate it as subversive low-profile leftist propaganda. If so, try to hear the rational ideas expressed by Chris Crames – CNN:
The most important news for Romania this week was the release regarding the budget for 2008. The media failed to cover this and the whole focus went to a scandal regarding a bribery.
0 – 1
Don’t know, don’t ask.
It was for the first time to step in a TAROM aircraft (a big Airbus) but I had a very pleasant experience. The food was fine, the drinks were ok, the chairs were comfortable and the fun thing is that we had an in flight display showing speed/altitude and other cool things. Now, there was a video channel in the plane and I was surprised to see that they broadcasted promotional clips of Romania (not very inspired ones but that’s another story), advertising and some videoclips. I was amazed to se that they promoted Romanian singers like Cleopatra Stratan and Hi-Q and I told to myself that it was a good idea.
If you’re coming to Romania, TAROM can be the right choice but since then, here is the latest HI-Q Video:
PS: check out also Florin’s blog
While some people try to copy YouTube, they already seem to be old fashion because they don’t know what to copy
The next big thing is Viddler!!!
- You can use your web camera to record directly to the website. No third-party software required!
- HIGH QUALITY VIDEO allowed
- you can tag specific moments within a video
- you can post comments to specific moments inside the video
- you can find what you’re looking for by searching inside videos themselves:
Since we already work with Boom and ARBOmedia (CPM sales) and Neogen (Referrals, CPC) and we want to keep up with the market, we started to test Google AdSense on our websites. The decision was triggered by Google’s decision to improve the payment methods for Romania and also by the large number of local publishers choosing this service.
After the first week, we figured out the greatest secret for Google AdSense and It’s related to psychology and not Internet . Continue reading ‘Google AdSense secrets, tests and hot tips’
Since Calin likes to keep secret the public info about the Romanian ARBOmedia sales, here are some notes on the latest ARBOmedia Half-year Report 2007 [PDF File/SAVE Target AS...] published by ARBOmedia München.
Before reading, please note that all the figures are unaudited:
In 2006, ARBOmedia had 2.949.0000 eur from Internet sales in the first half of the year in Eastern Europe. In 2007 they manage to bost their income and they reached 4.658.000 eur for the same period. This means that the profit went from 657.000 eur (2006) to 1.187.000 (first half of 2007).
The figures look good mainly because of the good evolution ARBOmedia has in Poland and Czech Republic.
You should also check out my previous post about ARBO since the general notes are still the same.
The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) released the IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report covering the second quarter and the first six months of 2007. Internet advertising revenues (U.S.) for the first six months of 2007 were nearly $10 billion, setting yet another new record and representing a nearly 27 percent increase over the first half of 2006. Internet advertising revenue totaled nearly $5.1 billion for the second quarter of 2007, exceeding the $5 billion mark for the first time in a quarter, a 25.4 percent increase over the same period in 2006.
Download and read the full raport here (PDF file)…
I guess we’re in the right business
Related links:
- Business Point – EUR 35 million from e-commerce in Romania this year.
- Mark Evans – The Slow Decline of CPM Advertising?
Across the oil and natural gas industry, 1.5 percent of the total outstanding shares of its public companies are owned by the officers and board members of those companies (“insiders”), compared to 29 percent owned by individual investors who manage their own holdings and who are not insiders, 42.7 percent owned or held by mutual funds and other asset management companies that have mutual funds, 18.1 percent owned or held by asset management companies that do not have mutual funds, and the remaining 8.7 percent owned or held and directly managed by pension funds, insurance companies, endowments and foundations, banks and other financial institutions:
Here is the full study (download PDF) (Robert J. Shapiro and Nam D. Pham)
Of course, you can always wonder who owns the asset management firms
Further reading and References: Continue reading ‘Who owns big oil?’
It’s a beautiful saturday and I just wanted to recommend a blog I read on daily basis: Sorin Tudor, a guru in political marketing.
By far, the most interesting online advertising displayed in Romania was today on Business Magazin.
I was surprised to find out that the MPI ad server could process such beautiful and complex overlayers.
Competitive Intelligence at work
a) ARBOmedia announced at the Annual Site-owners’ Meeting a new application for the Interactive Agencies. That was interesting but the announcement came in a crucial moment (the old staff was gone, so either they started this new project, either the new website was just a statement and a plan for the next 12 months). The answer is out there but it’s not important at this moment.
b) BRAT lacks the experience in the online environment and this is something to exploit (the first SATI traffic data will be released in October with one month delay) and probably the first figures about the audience will be released in February 2008 (very late):
Online Status
As we all know, after Orlando left the building, many websites migrated from Boom. The old website was out of order and right now there is only a guard page at boom.ro (and of course, the blog).
On the other hand in 2007 there is a thing we can notice at Netbridge: they seem to have second thoughts about BRAT and they are prepared to stand still. The decision making is “result oriented” and we can imagine why.
The cherry on the cake
eKontent is developing for Boom the new website and my guess is that they are almost ready to launch before ARBOmedia. Here are the new features (hope some will see it before the URL gets blocked):
- http://boomaplicatie.ekontent.ro/Home.aspx – The homepage: news, rate card download, last hour updates, banner examples
- http://boomaplicatie.ekontent.ro/Portfolio.aspx – Portfolio: this is the most powerful tool as they combine the rate card with the demographics and the advanced monitoring provided by trafic.ro. This means that they are prepared to face the first BRAT effect – here is a detail of what I’m blogging about.
The new website looks really good and more than sure will bring that extra spice in the online business. Because they managed to integrate all the marketing data, I’m more than sure that Boom will have the most impressive sales tool in the market.
New standards are about to be born
