iViu Technologies has created a location-based mobile app that talks to an intelligent identification tag similar to radio frequency identification or near field communication technologies -- but this tag relies on Wi-Fi. The person downloads the app, opts in, and the platform sends a digital signature to the app on their phone.The app's dashboard allows consumers to access multiple retail stores.

There are 7 billion people in the world, with about 2 billion connected to the Internet. Some 1 billion have smartphones. Suzanne Mumford, Google product marketing manager, cited those numbers from a recent presentation by Eric Schmidt. She said Android activates 850,000 phones daily running the operating system, and one-third of mobile searches have local intent, meaning people searching for nearby businesses.

About 229 people follow the average Pinterest user, who spends approximately 89 minutes on the site connecting board visitors to brand Web pages with a click of a button. This person has 3 boards, 171 pins, and 28 likes. Worldwide, 83% are female, and the remainder male, according to a study released this week.

On average, 70% of content above the fold relates to breaking news rather than ranked results, according to a study released Tuesday. Search engine marketers don't typically think of breaking news as an opportunity to serve up paid-search ads or rank higher in search queries. It's difficult to plan for news that marketers can't control, and text ads do not typically serve up alongside breaking news stories.

The Rockstar Consortium (Rockstar) made up of Apple, Microsoft, Research In Motion (RIM), Ericsson and Sony received approval from the U.S. Department of Justice to acquire a "substantial majority" of a portfolio of patents owned by Nortel Networks. The portfolio includes a variety of Internet technologies, networking, wireless 4G, and voice communications -- about 4,000 patents.

Have you ever created a startup in three days? Alexandra Askot did. The art director at MRM Worldwide, a digital advertising agency in Manhattan, rode the StartupBus this week with about 30 entrepreneurs from Boston to Austin on her way to South by Southwest (SXSW). Her team created the company Yeah Super, which promotes one local company daily by offering a t-shirt and feature profile on its Web site.

Digging into the Forbes 2012 billionaire list released Wednesday for search engine execs and their friends, I found a few surprises. Bill Gates, however, isn't one of them.

Google rolled up apps, ebooks, music, and movies into one service offering Tuesday, renaming the Android Market as Google Play. The move unifies a fragmented approach to digital content, and gives advertisers an outlet to reach more consumers, cross-sell apps, and serve up ads. For consumers, it offers a one-stop shop to purchase, stream or download digital products. And for Wall Street analysts, it combines revenue numbers that could put the Mountain View, Calif. company more in line with Apple.

Measuring digital marketing results doesn't always come easy. It takes the ability to track performance across multiple media. Marketers may know when a consumer makes a purchase or downloads a white paper, but might not have the tools to monitor the length of time spent on a Web site page to where the ad lead the user -- or how many times the consumer had to visit that page before making the purchase. Does your company's site make the "A" grade?

A Siri-like voice search experience from Google seems long overdue, although the Mountain View, Calif. tech company has been testing voice search on its desktop and mobile engines for more than a year. Reports indicate that Google Assistant will debut sometime this year. Well, of course. Voice and gesture commands will change the way search marketers launch and run campaigns.