Advertising and marketing industry experts have begun scratching their heads, trying to figure out what's in it for them after Twitter reported that it would let app developers pull geo-location information through an application programming interface (API). Some believe the move -- which enables users to share their location with every tweet -- could bring Twitter a little revenue, but a lot of controversy and security issues. Local SEO Guide Andrew Shotland suggests in a blog post that Twitter might become the "Trojan horse (or bird) of local search." He writes that this could lead to all sorts of funky services, such as a site that tracks the locations of Twitter spammers for people to drop nukes on ... if they are dumb enough to opt in. Conrad Sheehan, founder and CEO at mPayy, which supports mobile payments, does not consider Twitter a marketing tool -- at least "not to any extent that we've observed," but does call it "a technology ahead of consumer behavior." The only clear path to conversion through longitude and latitude coordinates that Sheehan sees could occur through companies such as mPayy. For example, the company could process mobile ecommerce transactions for Wrigley Field, which might want to tweet a message to consumers within a two-mile radius about extra tickets just before a Chicago Cubs game. Targeting consumers within a specific radius would cut advertising costs and lead to higher return on investments (ROI). Sheehan doesn't believe people who take exception to this type of predatory marketing would have an issue if the service remains opt-in. But privacy issues cut across all types of online media, according to Mike Blumenthal, partner at Blumenthal.com, Olean, N.Y. "At some level even benign privacy issues are worse than explicit ones," he says. "I see this Twitter service falling into that category. Ultimately, I see us forgoing all of our privacy. Google proved it the other day by giving up the name of the blogger that called the woman a 'skank.'" Blumenthal, which specializes in SEO services related to Google Maps, says it's not clear how Twitter will handle latitude and longitude, and that the technology typically works better in cities like Los Angeles and New York, compared with rural areas. It also depends on the ISP. An interface that integrates intelligent location-based features, such as the map, has been a big part of what has made Apple's iPhone powerful. The same could also ring true for Twitter, according to Paul Verna, senior analyst at eMarketer, who sees a "significant upside" both for marketers and Twitterers. "It's easy to envision retailers, event marketers, sports teams, concert promoters and other marketers making use of location-specific features," Verna says. "On the consumer side, those who opt in can narrow their focus to target regionally relevant groups. This could be a benefit in many types of scenarios, from everyday socializing to emergency situations." It could, however, overwhelm consumers and invade their privacy with aggressive geo-targeted marketing, especially if they have an option to turn on or off the opt-in feature, says Dave Gwozdz, CEO at Mojiva, a mobile advertising platform. The ramifications or opportunities between linking twitter and geo-location are many, and will surface over time. Location-based services are incredibly interesting, but the problem is, how do you find enough users in that two-mile radius to make it worth the effort? Gwozdz says. If Twitter decides to arrange its business model to aggregate tweet themes with location, then it could, in theory, send targeted ad messages to those whose tweets and geo-location fit the target to advertisers, he says. Industry executives agree that Twitter's open feeds that let GPS-enabled devises access information are interesting, but not many GPS-enabled devices exist today. A snapshot from analyst firm iSuppli of global GPS-enabled navigation device shipments for 2008 and 2009 reveals and forecasts 22.2 million units and 31.7 million units for mobile phone navigation devices, and 19.3 million units and 25.5 million units for smartphone navigation devices, respectively. For marketers, it boils down to finding the correct integration between marketing and technology. If someone demonstrates that sending Twitter messages improved click-through rates and sales, the company could charge for it, and you would see budgets move from banner ads to targeted Twitter feeds. Citing June stats from a Harvard Business school professor, Sheehan says, "that's not likely -- at least not now, because 10% of Twitter users account for more than 90% of tweets."
Facebook has added a new feature that will let brands and other Facebook Page owners automatically syndicate updates to their Twitter feeds. Through the new application, users can have status updates, links, photos, notes and events linked directly to the microblogging service. "Twitter was a natural next step to link to Facebook Pages because it's a powerful tool for broadcasting short messages widely. Posts from Facebook Pages are already public to everyone on Facebook and with this feature, now will be public to everyone on Twitter," said the company in a statement. The new syndication tool, however, does not extend to exporting posts from personal profiles on Facebook to Twitter. The move follows other efforts by Facebook this year to allow users to make updates and the stream of profile information more widely and quickly available. Recent steps include letting people share status updates with everyone rather than just friends, and launching real-time search to help keep pace with Twitter. Until now, Facebook users have been able to import Twitter updates to the site, but not vice versa. Now Facebook could potentially become one of the biggest outside sources of updates flowing into Twitter. In addition to being able to control the types of content sent to Twitter with the new feature, Facebook Page owners can also decide whether to share each update and link to different Twitter accounts, if they have more than one. "Public figures, musicians, businesses and organizations of all types who've created Facebook Pages often want to share a status update, a photo or an event with as many of their supporters as possible," wrote Facebook's Michael Gummelt on the company blog Thursday evening. "Celebrities may want to share personal news or charities may want to put out calls for help to both their Facebook fans and their Twitter followers, all at the same time." The company did not indicate in its announcement when -- or if -- the new Twitter tool will be extended to all Facebook users. A Facebook spokesperson on Friday did not rule out the feature being expanded to personal Facebook profiles. But to date, only Facebook Page administrators had pushed for the ability to syndicate updates to Twitter, since they are already sharing information broadly. Depending on how things go with the Twitter app on Facebook fan pages, the company may consider opening it up to individual users.
It appears that Microsoft has reached a deal to serve up on Bing some of the scientific and mathematical computational content that WolframAlpha generates, but neither company would confirm the news floating through the blogosphere. Declining to deny or confirm the buzz, John Ekizian, WolframAlpha spokesman, says, "We don't comment on deals that have not been signed." He further intimated that Wolfram would not be precluded from making licensing deals with other major search engines, such as Google. Theodore Gray, WolframAlpha's cofounder, told Online Media Daily in June that "It's not unrealistic to think WolframAlpha would integrate with Google." That goes for the other major search engines, too, he explained. WolframAlpha had been billed as the "Google killer," but during its launch in May it became clear the fledgling search engine had hurdles to overcome. During the past two months, the company's team has been working to improve the "computational knowledge engine." Engineers used the summer to make improvements. Those improvements equate to one code update per week, Stephen Wolfram writes in a post on the company's blog. The company has been expanding the WolframAlpha development team, adding people around the world. Wolfram points toward 54,233 bug reports and suggestions -- of which 31,006 are now in the implementation queue, boiled down to about 5,800 to-do items. The site has grown "by a staggering 52% -- adding well over 2 million lines of Mathematica code," Wolfram writes. "There have also been nearly 50,000 manual groups of changes to our data repositories over the past 3 months." WolframAlpha continues to build new versions of the system and conduct automated tests. During the summer, the company dramatically increased the number and types of tests, both custom-built and those that come from actual query streams. There have also been nearly 50,000 manual groups of changes to the data repositories during the past three months. "But based on new source files, and new underlying databases, I think it's been between 10% and 15%," he writes. WolframAlpha also has made infrastructure changes to make the search engine run well on more browsers. There are no longer URLs, such as www12.wolframalpha.com. Wolfram writes that minor change reflects a large engineering effort to optimize load balancing between numerous facilities that house Web servers. Perhaps that explains why the engineering team has been hard at work. Before integrating with engines, such as Google and Microsoft, WolframAlpha will have to serve up content without missing a beat.
A consumer protection agency in the UK said this week that it plans to conduct a new study of online advertising, including behavioral targeting. "The study will look at the application of consumer law to advertising and pricing, with a particular focus on the internet," the UK Office of Fair Trading said in an announcement posted on its Web site. "It will evaluate which online and offline pricing and advertising practices have potential to be most detrimental to consumers, and may also look at the use of personal information in advertising and pricing -- in particular, where information from a consumer's online activity is used to target the internet advertising he or she receives." While the investigation could potentially affect a range of ad companies, some press coverage surrounding the announcement has focused on the controversial company Phorm. Thursday, the Guardianreported that the ad company's stock fell 20% immediately after the announcement. Phorm is not currently working with any Internet service providers in the UK, but previously conducted three tests of its service with telecom BT Group. Like the now-defunct NebuAd, Phorm partners with Internet service providers to glean information about people's Web activity and then serve them targeted ads. The company says all targeting is anonymous, but privacy advocates object to the technology, which uses deep-packet inspection to garner data about broadband subscribers. Earlier this year, Web founder Tim Berners-Lee told the UK Houses of Parliament that he opposed such technology. BT previously conducted three tests of Phorm's system, including two secret tests in 2006 and 2007. UK authorities declined to take action against Phorm or BT. Last year, the British communications agency Ofcom touted behavioral targeting as a way to increase Internet service providers' revenue. But European regulators said in April they had commenced legal action regarding the UK's response to the tests. "The Commission has concerns that there are structural problems in the way the UK has implemented EU rules ensuring the confidentiality of communications," the authorities stated at the time.
AT&T said Friday that it had no responsibility for Apple's decision to block Google's voice app from the iPhone. "AT&T was not asked about the matter by Apple at any time, nor did it offer any view one way or the other," the telecom said in a letter to the Federal Communications Commission. Earlier this month, the FCC asked AT&T, Apple and Google for more information about why Apple blocked the Google Voice app -- which lets users send SMS messages and make cheap international phone calls -- from the iPhone app store. Apple said Friday that the decision to block the Google Voice app stemmed from concerns that it "appears to alter the iPhone's distinctive user experience." Specifically, Apple asserts that the app would disable the iPhone's visual voice mail and would also replace its text messaging feature. "Apple spent a lot of time and effort developing this distinct and innovative way to seamlessly deliver core functionality of the iPhone," the company said. In addition, Apple said it's concerned that the app would transfer users' contacts to Google's servers. "We have yet to obtain any assurances from Google that this data will only be used in appropriate ways," the company said. Apple, which currently offers 65,000 iPhone apps, told the FCC that the Google Voice app has not been definitively rejected. "We are continuing to study the Google Voice application and its potential impact on the iPhone user experience. Google is of course free to provide Google Voice on the iPhone as a web application through Apple's Safari browser, just as they do for desktop PCs," the company said. The FCC's investigation into Apple's disapproval of the Google Voice app comes as policymakers are increasingly interested in wireless competition. Among other issues, regulators and lawmakers are questioning whether exclusivity deals, such as Apple's deal with AT&T -- which makes the telecom the only authorized U.S. wireless provider for the iPhone -- harm consumers. The FCC will hold a hearing about wireless competition issues on Thursday.