There’s money in micro-blogging. Twitter has made an astounding $25 million (roughly about 15.5 million pounds) just from deals made with Google and Microsoft.

More than half of it is from Google ($15 million), says BusinessWeek, which interviewed two insiders who are familiar with Twitter’s finances — and apparently, the deals made in the boardroom. “The deals were huge,” one says, of the contract signed just two months ago, in October.

And if the numbers are to be believed, he wasn’t exaggerating. With $25 million in just two months it will be interesting how much revenue the company will rake in 2010. Especially since, as Twitter co-founder Biz Stone one said, things are just starting to come together. He’s put a team dedicated to finetuning the site’s “search and discovery perspective.”

The success of Twitter is how it’s turned micro-blogs into an instant feedback system. “Twitter is earning a reputation for delivering real-time results to queries about things that are happening right now.”

Too bad the execs won’t be Twittering if the revenue results are true. The company’s had prior financial struggles, and as recently as November Stone mentioned in his blog that it may use stocks to raise funds.

College Blog Network recently announced that it has transitioned into its new site CollegeBlender.com.

According to CollegeBlender’s Spencer March, the new site will still have all of the blogs visitors have come to love and are faithfully following in College Blog Network. But the blogs have also undergone major improvements in terms of tagging, advance comments, and an iframe toolbar. Other improvements include new ranking algorithms. The blogs have also shifted focus to enable it to grow into an online community, especially with the addition of updated profile settings and other features.

The guys at CollegeBlender hope that the new site will evolve more from College Blog Network’s initial objective of being a home for college bloggers. The goal for CollegeBlender is to become the online home for all things connected to college media.

CollegeBlender still maintains a strict registration process. Only real students can register in the site and this is enforced by requiring registrants to provide a .EDU email.

Facebook has become such a big phenomenon that even the deceased are finding a home within its pages.

Facebook recently announced it has implemented a new privacy setting that will allow family and friends to turn the online Facebook profiles of their departed loved ones in to some kind of memorial.

The idea for the memorialized Facebook profile had its beginnings when the friend of a Facebook employee was tragically killed in an accident. The deceased also happens to be a Facebook employee. One of the natural directions of the conversations among the officemates was what to do with the deceased Facebook profile.

The memorialized Facebook profile has some features removed. Basically, what is deeemd as sensitive information like contact information and status updates are removed. The profile is also removed from the public search. Only the people who were already accepted as friends before will be able to view the memorialized profile.

Despite some claims of commercialization of the dead, I actually like this idea. It’s a great way of remembering the people that we love who have passed away.

Geocities was one of those free internet services that, to my mind, really contributed to the explosive growth of the internet. It was also instrumental for many kids learning how to build their own websites.

But as with all things electronic or internet-based — its existence is fleeting even though its impact was undeniably massive. Yahoo!, who acquired the service in 1999 for $3.57 billion in stock, has announced that it will be closing the web hosting service on October 26, 2009 — and with it another chapter in the still morphing life of the internet.

The sobering note said that by the aforementioned date “your GeoCities site will no longer appear on the Web, and you will no longer be able to access your GeoCities account and files.

“If you’d like to move your web site, or save the images and other files you’ve posted online, please act now by downloading your files or upgrading to Yahoo! Web Hosting.”

It’s really quite sad to see another pioneer shutting down. Geocities, at its height, was THE place to be. AEveryone wanted to build their own websites and Geocities was the place to put them in. Geocities was also considered the first online community (remember those webrings?) — the larval stage of what will eventually become the social networking phenomenon that we see today.

Goodbye, Geocities.

Michael Jackson’s death last Thursday shocked the world. And despite the general consensus that Jackson is a has-been, his death proved that he has made an indelible mark on the world. In fact, the outpouring of sentiments on his death almost bogged down all of the social media sites.

Twitters from thousands of people reporting or giving their opinions on Jackson’s death slowed down the popular micro blogging service to a near crawl. It got so bad that Twitter had to temporarily disable its home page search field. Imagine seeing the number of tweets doubling per second! That could be a record of sorts.

But even non-social media sites were also affected. The web sites of Time Warner, Walt Disney, ABC, CBS and the Los Angeles Times, all experienced slowdowns.

So what is the significance of this? It puts into question how different networks — social media, blog networks, corporate sites — and its respective servers are addressing the growing number of internet users. Is there really a proper scaling strategy to account for the continued explosive growth of the internet, especially when we consider that social media sites are actually enticing more and more people to go online? Heck, even my wife’s 70 year old aunt just opened a Facebook account.

As expected, the recent elections have sparked anger over the blatant disregard of personal freedom for supporters of the opposition leader Moussavi who say they have been cheated. As expected, the closed state tries to silence protests and other forms of civil disobedience by blocking or interrupting mobile phone services and of all internet-based services Twitter which has been one of the best sources of information, responsible for the organization of protests in the capital Tehran that has managed to go through the information blockade. The portability and effectivity of Twitter to bring instantaneous news out to the rest of the world has put supposedly elected President Ahmadinejad mad as hell at attempts of what he calls are Western powers who have been giving the Iranian political system a shaking it should not have been subjected to.
Twitter being one of the fastest and only available links to the outside world, along with scant video from mobiles that have managed to go through the extensive information black-out has heeded requests by protesters from the opposition party to halt scheduled maintenance to allow a continuance of use of their services that apparently was used to organize the protest movement. Techcrunch and Gawker both have features on the developing story, most of which happens outside of the field of sight of the rest of the world in what is well known to be a suppressive society.
Even the religious leaders of Iran who have always resisted influence from the outside world has been forced to reconsider demands for a re-count of the votes, many of which have been rigged according to the opposition’s supporters.
The tides may be turning in a country that has just recently enjoyed a solid stance against the rest of the world, holding on to their ways of old. Change as President Obama has says, is a question of when rather than a question of how, the use of social media being one of the holes the government may have failed to plug, getting news (real news from the streets) out of the country where none should have ever gone through. This might be one of the most significant roles, social media has played since it was launched as WEB 2.0, and as we see, it is a flood that cannot be dammed by any walls nor blockades, linking humans to others like him with the same thoughts and feelings.

The network discusses the growing rift between Steve Jobs and his former CFO regarding and issue that surfaces regarding Jobs landing in hot water with the SEC over some stock options that were seemingly over the edge. Stock options to major companies have always been part of corporate culture and the same is with Apple, one of the biggest earners in today’s technology driven world. The scandal has some millions of dollars in question regarding the value and amounts of shares the former colleagues used to share that some accuse the former CFO of blowing the whistle out on which led to his eviction from the board of directors in 2006. After all the finger pointing and accusations, Steve lands in the sights of the SEC more and more who are interested at the matter due to taxes and other financial issues and so does the long gone Apple executive.
Apple elevates the matter by hiring a former competitor from Palm and the other party hires another top Apple executive and the battle continues between the two principal characters. The events at Apple is no nothing new and anybody in the Valley accepts the fact that this is no coincidence. Technology driven firms fighting out each other, slinging mud left and right is a battle for control or at least a part of the market shares in the ever growing smart-phone market which has boomed in the last few years with Apple at the helm of course with their show stealing iPhone.
Seems corporate life will remain as cut-throat as it always is for all over the industry the same events happen over and over with much documentation on the net with the millions of people, experts and analysts each having their own views. So what do we make of all the fuss? Cash people and lots of it, for these companies make millions if not billions and even such lowly incidents brings publicity which in turn brings in more cash as people become interested in the events and products in question. That is the norm of corporate life, where what you know or don’t know can indeed make or break the bank, figuratively of course or not.

News that all major players in the electric car race have standardized their plugs for a combined effort is welcome news indeed. but is it really a question of feasibility and inter-cooperation? Nope, it’s about dominance in a rising green car market that rivals the likes of events in the IT industry where profits is a direct result of dominance of a budding market worth billions. From Europe to the US, these auto makers have seemingly agreed to take up the cause and band together to come up with products that would work all over the globe. Electric cars in their many forms and shapes are sen to become the transport industry’s future for our most popular mode of conveyance the lowly automobile is the major source of one of the most damaging greenhouse gasses the world over. Electric cars are clean and more efficient that their oil-based counter parts yet they are indeed having to deal with such trivial issues as a standardized plug that would allow a European made car to work in the US.
Imagine a simple issue as a PLUG becoming the nagging point in the industry who claims to be aiming to provide a better world for the rest of us. The auto industry has been the major and is one of the most polluting industries in the history of this earth and it’s about time they took up the cause. Or simply put, it might be a simple way of avoiding the fate of the many other automakers who have already succumbed to the economic crisis that have come and gone, sending them into oblivion as history’s unsuccessful companies.
It’s about time these people placed profits behind the main and ultimate goal of the drive to come up with feasible electric vehicles and that is to lower their impact on the world. Imagine an issue as simple as a plu which you can in theory change with ample know how or can you? The issues plaguing the auto industry is far beyond helping the earth and is more on the profits they will be making, for they are businesses after all and the main goal of businesses is to make money!

Years back when the industry was still in infancy and Microsoft has been ruling most of the IT industry in terms of profits or should we say overall dominance, Yahoo and Google came up with the bright idea of a system that would allow subscribers of their free web-based email service to do lots of nifty stuff with contacts and friends who also had accounts with the same email services. Microsoft has introduced the same functionality to their long standing HotMail web-based messaging service which many have been waiting decades for. Yahoo and Google have long been in the fray of web-based systems and it seems Microsoft, the former dominant software maker of days gone by is finally realizing the benefit of such additional services for their many HotMail users.
Many say it’s about time and others say they shouldn’t have bothered but anyway, it is up and it’s getting better. Hotmail has long been the free email system of choice in the UK and in the US but when Microsoft introduced the infamous Ms Messenger which like their other software products can be compared to an old clunker against Yahoo and Google’s Corvette’s. The many errors, requirements on the hardware and software side, just for you to properly access the Messenger service dissuades people from using it and add to that the ever invasive WGA that installed itself whether you like it or not many began to shun away from MS Messenger and Microsoft’s overall image in the industry.
They might be a fledgling in that arena but they will surely catch up, this may sound crazy but it adds more options for users on the already congested Yahoo and Google servers. Maybe Microsoft is getting more life out of super-computers in their data centers that used to be the best, trying to get more out of them int he face of stiff competition that has steadily nibbled at their profits. Or whatever the reason for the late introduction, we might never know (ask Gates ?!????).

Blorge is watching the move by iTunes to give iTunes attitude with a push from the many music labels like EMI, Sony, Warner and many more to implement an adaptive pricing policy that can have you getting a hot new song for as much as a $1.50. That’s what the proposal was for they were trying to find a way of getting more cash from the ever popular store where Apple has been getting tons of cash and of course, they say they should be getting their fair share.
The move has dissuaded many from downloading music for the pro-rated pricing of music download prices add to that the current recession and well you know the outcome. Just wish they could do simple math so people can continue to enjoy legal music which should have been a solution to their DRM issues and many other failures to breathe new life into the music industry. Nice Goin’ People!
Also on Blorge and anywhere else on the planet for that matter, the record setting iTunes apps store is selling hotter than pancakes at more than 1,000 apps sales for every 12 seconds the AppsStore is fast approaching it’s 1 billionth download, a record for the most application sales of an online store ever. Which goes to show the growing interest of the public in the iPhone and the iPod Touch, has out-paced, out-gunned and gone over any other site on the world, but that was kinda’ expected for the store is the only legal way to get stuff into your iPod and iPhone (legally we mean).
The online store has done this amazing task in more or less two months which has prompted the company to advertise a rewards promo which is open to any country that allows you to purchase from the iTunes store and you only need to be 14 to qualify (you get to win a $10,000 worth of iTunes in the form of a gift card, an iPod Touch, a Macbook Pro and a Time Capsule). Goes to show that if you can’t beat the computing giants, you just outsell them in some other way, for they may have failed to beat the all popular PC with their Mac’s but they out did the industry in their own crafty and of course profitable way!