(ORIGINAL image via Wicked Halo – more on this below)

The source of the image (because it’s proper to cite sources) was Geekologie, meaning Cory Doctorow probably reads Geekologie, probably saw this post and decided to share it with his readers. BB gets some content, Geekologie gets a link, all is right with the internets.

But, wait a tick, Geekologie has a source for the image that points to Geeks are Sexy. On examination though, I see that BB actually credits GAS for the image/pic, so they’re spreading the link juice around.

But, wait a tick.

Geeks are Sexy points back to SFX, who credits Neatorama (who credits the photo to Wicked Halo, whom we’ll get to in a sec). Neatorama credits Great White Snark, who credits Star Wars and Wine (on Tumblr, eesh), who credits Wicked Halo (finally), who points to the original Plato’s Atlantis source on Show Studio.

Linking, heck, the internet is supposed to work thusly. Create great content, and people will link to you.

But it didn’t work at all for Wicked Halo, who posted the amazing photos in the first place (or at least, as far back as can be traced). All they got was a link from a Tumblr site, which is likely not worth the paper it’s printed on (compared to a link from BoingBoing).  In the end, Wicked Halo got one lousy link credit (so far as I can tell, two – counting mine) when they should have gotten the credit all the way up the food chain.

So, why didn’t they?

Good question, I don’t have the answer, not a good one – I’ve never really thought about citing original sources until now, so I’m guilty too. Maybe Cory felt it was more relevant to link to Geekologie. Maybe he didn’t see the via. Maybe Geekologie links to him and he wants to share the love. Maybe, like me, it’s never crossed his mind. It’s not like there are rules, or best practices, one just does whatever one wants to do.

I think I want to start linking to original source content though, because as little as it helps, it still helps.

The commissions are right to be concerned, Google trimmed the once-hefty 70+ page policy collection into a single document, to go into effect March 1st 2012. The new agreement makes some broad strokes about sharing information across Google services.

Regarding the FTC decision, and whether Google is violating the decision in the Google Buzz case, I don’t think so. There are no third parties involved (information is being shared across Google services, not third party networks), and users are being given plenty of notice to understand how their information is being collected and used. But what Google hasn’t really done, is provide a clear definition of consent – one of the two core tenets of privacy (the other being a reasonable excuse for collecting information).

Google is firing back, however, stating that there are several ways user can protect their information or, “opt out”. They can disable their search history, for example, or they can use multiple accounts to help compartmentalize data. Director of public policy, Pablo Chavez, spells it out.

“The main change in the updated privacy policy is for users signed into Google Accounts,” Pablo Chavez, director of public policy for Google, said in the letter. “Individuals don’t need to sign in to use many of our services including Search, Maps, and YouTube. If a user is signed in, she can still edit or turn off her search history, switch Gmail chat to off the record, control the way Google tailors ads to her interests using our Ads Preferences Manager, use Incognito mode on Chrome, or use any of the other privacy tools we offer.”

The safeguards are there, but one wonders if they’re adequate.

What could Google be doing?

Well, in plain language, ask for consent at every opportunity and clearly explain the consequences. If I consent to be advertised to on YouTube, will that mean I consent to being advertised to on other Google sites? I don’t mind, just tell me up front.  But steps like that could cut into Google’s 28 billion dollar ad revenues, as could clear and prominent opt out language. In those cases, Google isn’t being reasonable. Opting out should be easy, like in newsletter subscriptions. But neither Facebook or Google make it easy to opt out of all their services, certainly not easy enough for my Mom to figure it out.

Increased pressure from the EU, from Canada and organizations in the US, might push both companies to make radical shifts in how they interact with, and especially how they advertise to people.

Related content

The FTC ruling for Google Buzz
Europeans, EPIC Bring More Scrutiny To Google Privacy Changes
Google responds to privacy policy concerns

The new privacy policy, which is available for preview now, is short and wonderfully free of legalese. That’s not to say that there’s nothing troubling in the new policy, there’s a couple of sections that have me concerned. The first (not necessarily in order of appearance) talks about how Google is moving to track your behaviour across all of their services. As a Google fan (and I am), I think this is a good move for personalized search. However:

We may use the name you provide for your Google Profile across all of the services we offer that require a Google Account. In addition, we may replace past names associated with your Google Account so that you are represented consistently across all our services. If other users already have your email, or other information that identifies you, we may show them your publicly visible Google Profile information, such as your name and photo.

So, if on Google Docs, you’re Sean Enns (as I am) and on YouTube you’re Harbour City SEO (as I am), they’ll replace one to make it synchronous with the other. That’s fine, so long as I have the choice. The troubling bit is here: “If other users already have your email, or other information that identifies you, we may show them your publicly visible Google Profile information, such as your name and photo.”

Emails are easy to get, most people have their email posted publicly somewhere (their Facebook page, for instance), so this represents a privacy nightmare and a goldmine for phishers and data miners. Google would be smart to dress this up a bit, perhaps by offering a link to some advanced privacy controls. I, for one, would like to be able to tell Google exactly how many connections someone should have with me before they’re able to see my personal profile.

The second bit needs some serious clarification, in my opinion. It reads:

We use the information we collect from all of our services to provide, maintain, protect and improve them, to develop new ones, and to protect Google and our users

The word that has me concerned is “protect”. It’s a powerful word, and it’s unclear (in this iteration) exactly whom Google is protecting their services from, and whom they’re protecting me from. Terrorists? Microsoft? Twitter? Google needs to clarify what they mean here.

The answer

I’ve always said this about Google. Because Google is a private company, their first responsibility is to the shareholders, not to the user. Based on my readings, Google seems to try quite hard to find the balance between the two, but their sole purpose is to increase market share. They don’t owe me anything, and anything they give me (such as free traffic from organic search results) is a gift, not a right.

If you don’t like the scope of what Google is doing with your info, while you can’t necessarily opt out, you can log out. When you’re finished checking your Gmail, log out. Surf anonymously, disable cookies on your browser. It’s the best tool you have to ensure that your personal information isn’t being collected and used across platforms. Your search results won’t be as relevant, or as rich, but your personal information will stay that way.

Related content:

Google’s New Privacy Policy Raising Questions in Washington

Feds launch Google Probe

Google’s New Terms Of Service & Privacy Policy: Anything You Do May Be Used To Target You?

The Stop Online Piracy Act has garnered massive attention over the last several months from privacy advocates, from free speech enthusiasts, from web giants and service providers, everybody is chiming in with their various cents’ worth. It’s gone so far as to launch an online rebuttal that’s going to go down in history (such as it is) as the day the Internet went black.

This isn’t a case of a few left-wing fringe elements going down, there are major players involved in the day long strike. Wikipedia, BoingBoing, WordPress, Reddit, Mozilla, ICanHasCheezburger and Failblog (etc., etc. and to name just a few) are going dark for the day to protest a bill that, while on its last legs, still has enough teeth to come back and bite us all in the pitoot.

So, it’s easy enough to not link to or host pirated content, but that’s not what has netizens in an uproar. It’s that the sweeping ambiguities of the bill imply that you could be penalized for who you link to, links to.

Let me give you an example. Let’s say I’m writing a piece (as I do) about file sharing, and let’s say I link to the infamous Pirate Bay as an example of how file sharing has been used to illegally share and distribute intellectual property.

According to SOPA, I could be tagged for violating the rights of any organization who’s intellectual property is being shared on the site I linked to. Under SOPA, my site would have to be pulled down, my ISP would be required to deny service and Google would be required to remove my site from the index.

There are other examples, less (that’s right, less) insidious in nature. The implications lead to a censored web, where content is controlled by the biggest holders of intellectual property (the film, television and music industry) and eliminates the “fair” internet.

While SOPA has essentially been shelved, the major opposition to the bill is still planning to speak out against it. This from the Sopa Strike website

On January 18th, 2012 the internet is going on strike to stop the web censorship bills in Congress! Now is our moment — we need you to do everything you can, whether you have a website or not.

If you, like me, want to support opposition to SOPA and PIPA, you can show your support by joining the Blackout SOPA movement. I’ve included a bunch of links below so you can get caught up on the issues.

BoingBoing’s take on SOPA

Reddit’s coverage of SOPA

SOPA for Canadians

WordPress plugin to participate in the SOPA Blackout

SOPA Blackout

SOPA Strike

I post my Facebook page posts to Twitter. Not so long ago, I wondered to myself “What would happen if I auto posted my Tweets to Facebook at the same time that the reverse was true? Would it create a sort of infinite social loop?”

So I tried. Arranged it so my Tweets would auto-post to Facebook, and that my Facebook posts would auto-post to Twitter.

You would think that it would bring the system to a screeching halt. It didn’t. It didn’t do anything. It seems auto posting rules don’t apply to items that have been auto posted.

Segue. It’s 2012, and I’m tired of dealing with Facebook’s auto posting to Twitter. It’s fine in some circumstances, but I end up deleting half or more of my auto-posted Tweets because I don’t want to phrase things the same way on Twitter.

So auto-posting is fine, if you’re almost exclusively on one or the other (my friend Don Power is on Facebook so infrequently, if he didn’t auto-post from Twitter he likely wouldn’t post at all), but if you want to be on both and you like both, then I think it’s wise to commit and be on both.

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Personal results
Google+, “plus one”
It affects your SERPs

The intern looks over Dexter’s shoulder, and, well, here’s the dialogue.

Louis: “You know, Google’s kind of 5 minutes ago right? Try Eliot. It uses a targeted algorithm to aggregate content without getting tripped up by all that sneaky SEO bullshit.”

Ok. So, hurt feelings aside, (sneaky?), he’s kind of right.

Some SEO is sneaky, sure. Buying domains for their link profiles is sneaky. Using redirects, cloaking, also sneaky. Most SEO is hard work, research and creativity.

If it were easy, we’d all have #1 rankings after all.

Big picture, I remember when Google was a bit player to Yahoo, Microsoft, metacrawlers like Dogpile. Now they dominate the market, but they might not always. Companies like Wolfram offer a different kind of search. Social layers, mobile devices. All give reasons for Google to watch their sizable backs.

The cameo on Dexter should also give Google some motivation to stick to their mission of “don’t be evil”, because we know what Dexter does to evildoers, don’t we Google?

Every time I upload a profile photo to Facebook, and their system mangles it into a pixellated, colourless abomination. I take a moment and summon enough energy to hate Facebook.

Because, when I do it for a client’s Facebook page, it costs me money. I have to explain why the picture quality is terrible, and why their logo is getting mangled. That it’s not me, it’s Facebook.

Then I think, “What’s the point of sharing my photos? They just look like crap.”

And then, I think to myself, “But, Facebook knows that their photo uploader is crappy. They know that photos are getting mangled – and because it wasn’t always this way, they did something to make it this way.”

And then I wonder why they would do that.

And then I wonder why they wouldn’t tell us how to do it properly.

And it’s then that I think Facebook is playing checkers, not chess, and they have little hope of winning the long-game of internet domination. I used to think that it would be Apple and Google, but that was with Jobs at the helm. Now, I’m not so sure.

What do you think? How do you feel about Facebook mangling your photos?

In the US, these sources are well known. Yahoo and Bing Local, Angie’s List, Yelp, Localeze, Judy’s Book and Dex are among the top sources for local influence.

In Canada, it’s a very different story. None of the above accept submissions from Canadian companies.

For Canadian companies, the options are there – but they’re not as obvious.  For an example, let’s look at our friends over at Big Green Storage.

Big Green Storage is a small self-storage facility located in my home town of Nanaimo, BC. Like many small businesses, the owner – John – is busy running his business and wearing the half-dozen hats that small entrepreneurs wear.

The goal of setting something up for John is to rank, first and foremost, for the business name. I can’t say how important it is to have ownership of your content – when you have ownership, you have control of the user experience when people land on your site.

The first steps were a domain, hosting and a small, modest website. Those done, we needed to get some links going.

I won’t list all the sites I submit to (I don’t want to give it all away), but they include a mix of fast-acceptance and high crawl frequency (like Craigslist and Kijiji) with longer term, high authority (Google Places and Yelp). The fast acceptance is so the site gets crawled and indexed quickly, the high authority is to build ranks.

For icing on the cake, this post on my blog serves both me and my client well. I get to write about local search marketing, my client gets a contextual link from a decent source – one which I know will help his site get indexed.

It’s a shame that the sites said to have the most influence don’t have a great global presence, but it’s not unusual and, if you’re Canadian, it’s something you’ll have to get used to. The upside is that the sources are harder to find, so it’s easier to get an edge over the competition.