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Like This: Google Acquires Like.com (InformationWeek)
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Posted: 09/30/2010
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In an effort to fortify Google’s search and e-commerce capabilities, the mega-search company recently purchased visual search company Like.com. Like.com’s computer vision and machine learning technology allows users to search and conduct visual comparisons for goods as they shop, making it particularly user friendly for mobile devices. Like.com CEO Munjal Shah confirmed the deal, stating, "We were the first to bring visual search to shopping, the first to build an automated cross-matching system for clothing, and more. We see joining Google as a way to supersize our vision and supercharge our passion." Google’s likely goal in the purchase is to beef up it core search products and image recognition services (Google Goggles), as well as intensify its social capabilities (Jambool and Slide.com) to make search more “social and more deeply integrated with e-commerce.”
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Industry:
Technology, Consulting, & Professional Services,
Telecommunications
Topic:
Experience & Interaction,
Technology Implementation
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Consumer
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Legally Broadband: Finland Declares High-Speed Internet Access a Legal Right (CNN)
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Posted: 11/19/2009
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Finland recently declared broadband Internet access a legal right. While it is a view shared by the United Nations, Finland is the first country to actually make it legally required for telecommunication providers to supply connection speeds of at least 1 megabit per second for all 5.2 million Finnish citizens by July 2010. The mandate is an intermediary step to reach Finland’s real goal of reaching speeds 100 times faster–100mbps–by 2015. "We think it's something you cannot live without in modern society,” said Laura Vilkkonen, the legislative counselor for the Ministry of Transport and Communications. While the majority of the Finnish population (95%) is currently wired, the new law aims to stretch the Web to internet deprived rural areas.
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Industry:
Technology, Consulting, & Professional Services,
Telecommunications
Topic:
Technology Implementation
Region:
Europe
Audience:
Business to Consumer
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Latinos Make Up Huge Piece Of Mobile Marketing Pie (ClickZ)
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Posted: 03/31/2011
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Mobile phone use is on the upswing among the Latino population, rising 26 percent from 2006 to 2010 compared to 18 percent of the general population. Three key markers indicate that the Hispanic population will continue to drive mobile marketing: they care about social connectivity, they are actively seeking fun experiences and they are open to innovation. The proof is in the pudding: 82 percent of the market has been penetrated; mobile phones are outpacing landlines among this demographic as the primary source of communication; this group is more interested in mobile web browsing than the average population; 24 percent of mobile users have downloaded at least one app; and the group has demonstrated that enhancing their lives through social connectivity is a priority.
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Industry:
Marketing, Design, & Interactive Communications,
Telecommunications
Topic:
Content Strategy,
Creative & Design,
Experience & Interaction,
Marketing Communications
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Consumer
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Kitty Crowdsourcing? New Service Helps Businesses Collect And Rank Innovative Ideas (Fast Company)
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Posted: 09/02/2010
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When Princeton sociology professor Matthew Salganik came across KittenWars.com, he knew he found a valuable model for his own crowdsourcing website, All Our Ideas, which merges sociology and computer science techniques to enable organizations to collect ideas and rank them more effectively. A virtual idea factory, the service allows users to launch their own question and answer websites. If neither answer presented is acceptable to visitors, they can simply add their new ideas to the mix. Those new ideas then get filtered into the voting pool. Salganik explains, “If you ask for suggestions, especially online, you may get thousands of ideas that can take weeks to sort through. On the other hand, if you use a survey with preset questions and answers, you can get lots of data but few new ideas." The service is already gaining traction with organizations like Princeton’s class of 2008 student government, which used the tool to pinpoint the most pressing issues on undergrads minds.
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Industry:
Marketing, Design, & Interactive Communications,
Technology, Consulting, & Professional Services
Topic:
Business Intelligence,
Content Strategy
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Business,
Business to Consumer,
Peer Groups & Communities
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Karmaloop’s Online Roots Run Deeper Than Facebook And Twitter (DIRECT Marketing Online)
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Posted: 03/17/2011
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Long before Facebook became synonymous with social marketing, Karmaloop’s rep program was successfully hawking its line of streetwear to its audience of teens and young adults. Nearly a quarter of its $100 million in annual sales is generated by 6,500 reps across the globe. Assigned a customized code to track sales and earn points, reps essentially build their own customer base by promoting the brand via personal blogs, Websites, Facebook pages, and other social networks. “We have our built-in audience and the trust and loyalty of millions of 18- to 24-year-old kids, and they’re going to follow us, because peer-to-peer is how we do that,” director of lifestyle marketing Giovannah Chiu said. The same philosophy led to the creation of KarmaloopTV.com in 2008, which has since expanded to include channels devoted to specific brands and regularly scheduled programs.
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Industry:
Marketing, Design, & Interactive Communications,
Retail & Products
Topic:
Content Strategy,
E-Commerce,
Experience & Interaction,
Marketing Communications
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Consumer,
Peer Groups & Communities
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Jruby is a Gem for Gilt.com (CNET News)
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Posted: 12/03/2009
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In a conversation with the Gilt Groupe’s CTO and co-founder Michael Bryzek, Software, Interrupted’s Dave Rosenberg unearths how Jruby powers the luxury shopping site. JRuby’s ability to seamlessly integrate and leverage mature libraries entices Java developers seeking additional productive frameworks to turn to the high-performance platform. Because Gilt.com deals with spikes in traffic when new items are released and items surge in popularity, the IT infrastructure must have the capability to scale and burst in order to meet customer demands. The company is gearing up to deploy Ruby on Rails 3.0, which offers great performance, scalability and the ability to write and expose elegant APIs written in the Ruby language.
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Industry:
Retail & Products,
Technology, Consulting, & Professional Services
Topic:
E-Commerce,
Technology Implementation
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Business,
Business to Consumer
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J.C. Penney Makes Mobile Holiday Move (Internet Retailer)
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Posted: 01/04/2011
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J.C. Penney Co. is initiating a major multichannel mobile push with holiday retail plans that include the launch of an m-commerce site, enhancements to its mobile applications, location-based app promotions and an iAd campaign. Along with the full suite of m-commerce functionality such as browsing, searching and buying—the mobile site also includes a Find Near Me button and updated applications for iPhone and Android users that lets shoppers browse the weekend sales circular; create portable shopping lists; find the nearest store to either their current GPS location or to a ZIP code or city name; and sign up for mobile coupons. Location-based services Foursquare, Brightkite and Facebook Deals also play a role, allowing shoppers to cash in for $10 off a $50 purchase when they check in at one of the retailer’s 1,100 stores. In addition to its ongoing mobile coupons program, the campaign will also include mobile display ads on Apple’s iAd network, featuring a treasure hunt through a variety of J.C. Penney gifts as shoppers search for a $10 off $50 coupon.
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Industry:
Marketing, Design, & Interactive Communications,
Retail & Products,
Technology, Consulting, & Professional Services,
Telecommunications
Topic:
Content Strategy,
Creative & Design,
E-Commerce,
Experience & Interaction,
Marketing Communications,
Technology Implementation
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Consumer,
Peer Groups & Communities
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It’s Super Bowl Sunday: “Time to Wear the Pants” (BrandWeek)
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Posted: 02/18/2010
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Watching the Super Bowl and wearing pants went hand in hand on February 7th. During the big game, Dockers presented a 30-second ad to promote its ongoing “Wear the Pants” campaign. The ad portrays childish men, marching and chanting “I Wear No Pants”, who are interrupted with the message “Calling all men, it’s time to wear the pants.” "We’re sending out a humorous call to manhood . . . The campaign celebrates the reemergence of the khaki... as an everyday way for men to convey masculine pride," said Jen Sey,VP of Dockers global marketing. The ad’s incorporation of Shazam mobile technology will allow consumers to use their smartphones for direct interaction with the ad’s content. Downloading the Shazam application and “tagging” the spot will direct consumers to the content page and its various offerings. "We’re on a mission to reinvent khakis and consumers’ relationship to the category, which has been passive in recent years," said Sey.
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Industry:
Marketing, Design, & Interactive Communications,
Retail & Products,
Telecommunications
Topic:
Creative & Design,
Experience & Interaction,
Marketing Communications
Region:
North America
Audience:
Business to Consumer
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Is Real-time Internet Worth All the Buzz? (New Media Knowledge)
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Posted: 08/27/2009
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You may be wondering what’s behind all the real-time Internet buzz. Before you determine the real worth of real-time Internet, consider Dell’s success with their @DellOutlet platform on Twitter, the front-runner in the real-time game. The company has experienced real financial gain (to the Tweet of $3 million dollars in revenue) from real-time marketing, “Tweeting” followers a
mixture of exclusive content and time specific discount incentives. According to Joe Hughes of Yomego there are two key elements to real-time Internet: (1) practically no delay between composition and publishing and (2) the ability for users to discover content in real-time. With an estimated three to four hundred million people currently using some version of real-time Internet (across platforms like Facebook, Friendfeed, Yauba and jabber), the numbers are too large to ignore as merely a fad.
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Industry:
Marketing, Design, & Interactive Communications,
Technology, Consulting, & Professional Services
Topic:
E-Commerce,
Experience & Interaction,
Marketing Communications,
Technology Implementation
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Business,
Business to Consumer,
Peer Groups & Communities
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iPhone App Enables Paying with Plastic (CNN Money)
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Posted: 03/18/2010
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Operating businesses remotely just got even better. While credit card transactions were standardized in traditional business settings long ago, paying with plastic was only a pipe dream for those conducting business on the road. Now, a host of software is on the market allowing mobile businesses to process credit card payments on their cell phones. From Apple's iPhone applications to Inner Fence, which developed the first iPhone app for processing credit cards, there are a slew of applications out there that allow proprietors to issue refunds, review sales, and email electronic receipts for transactions.
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Industry:
Retail & Products,
Technology, Consulting, & Professional Services,
Telecommunications
Topic:
E-Commerce,
Technology Implementation
Region:
Global
Audience:
Business to Business,
Business to Consumer
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We cut through the clutter of the web to highlight innovation and forward-thinking. The best stories from leading publications – hand selected and organized to provide you a single point of access.
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