It's no secret that many marketers and content creators rely on YouTube for their online video strategies, and superficially it makes sense: it's free, it's relatively easy, consumer awareness of the platform is high, and it has huge reach. But directing customers (or rather, viewers) to YouTube is ultimately self-defeating, because marketers and content creators are turning over their hard-earned audiences over to YouTube - and everything else that goes with them, including valuable data.

Google is shuttering one of its few successful forays into social networks, Orkut, effective September 30, the company announced in blog post published Monday. Fortunately for Orkut users, they can export their profile data, community posts and photos to other networks using Google Takeout.