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Blog Attacks Leading to Suicides?

posted on March 3, 2008

Both the NYT and TechCrunch weigh in on whether a scathing blog post–and subsequent comments–led to the suicide of ad exec Paul Tilley.

To bring you up to speed on what happened:

Before his death, Mr. Tilley had come under particularly harsh criticism on the advertising blogs. AgencySpy, which is written by an anonymous advertising industry employee, was perhaps the most biting.

In a Feb. 19 posting, the site quoted excerpts from an internal e-mail message Mr. Tilley had sent to subordinates, in which he wrote: “Too many of you are only doing good work. And some of you are doing work that simply isn’t good enough.”

AgencySpy wrote that Mr. Tilley “needs to go back to management 101,” adding: “At one point, Paul thought he could make it as a game show host. Doesn’t one need to be charming for that?”

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Nearly Half of Americans Get News from the Web

posted on March 3, 2008

A new poll from We Media/Zogby Interactive suggests more and more Americans are snubbing traditional news outlets and are instead relying on the internet for their news.

Of the 1,979 people polled, Reuters reports:

  • Nearly 70% believe traditional journalism is out of touch.
  • 64% are dissatisfied with the quality of their local news.
  • Less than a third get their news from TV.
  • 11% get their news from radio.
  • Just 10% pick up news from a newspaper.
  • Meanwhile, nearly 50% said their primary source for news was the internet.

I’d love to see more data as to why we’re switching to the web for our news. Could it be:

  • We can get news faster on the web.

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Monitor All SXSW 2008 News Thanks to Trackur.com

posted on March 1, 2008

Do you wish you were heading to SXSW 2008?

Would you like to keep track of all SXSW news, blog posts, photos, videos, and Twitter updates?

Now you can, thanks to Trackur.com!

Sure, Trackur is designed to help individuals and businesses keep track of their online reputation, but it’s also perfect for keeping a close eye on industry trends, vertical news, or kick-ass conferences in Austin!

The RSS feed is free to all and will ensure you don’t miss the hottest news out of SXSW!

Subscribe to the Trackur RSS feed for SXSW.

Want to customize this SXSW feed? Want to track another conference or industry? Sign-up for a free 14-day Trackur.com trial.

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Alan’s Angle – Google Perfect Enough for Ask.com?

posted on March 1, 2008

By Alan Johnson

I’m sure most of you have realized that things are not looking all that great for Yahoo!, and let’s just say that both management and investors are beginning to face the facts. To make matters worse, it seems that Google is, according to TechCrunch, close to securing yet another victory, with the folks over at Ask looking into switching to Google for search and abandoning or selling Teoma.

“Downhill” seems to be the best word for describing the way things stand as far as Yahoo! is concerned, and their situation is even close to being ridiculous, since, in their annual report, they have, as strange as it may sound, stated that their executives were somehow “distracted” by Microsoft’s bid. It’s fairly safe to assume that, when your executives start having a nervous breakdown as a result of a bid, be it a billion dollar one, you are not exactly giving the impression of a company which is on the right track.