You know there’s a holiday weekend coming up when the top news story is Google changing its logo design.
There’s no way I can pad this post out to 400 words, so let’s just take a look at a typical Google logo circa 2008:
Now let’s look at what the new logos will look like:
I like the font change for the service name, what say you?
*If you only read one story! 
An article over at CNN Money ran the headline “Oprah’s Skypefest draws backlash” while the page title included Twitter as well so I decided 
to take a look. Now honestly, outside of my mom, I don’t know anyone that is part of “Oprah Nation” and I like it that way. It’s the numbers attached to her every move that are at once intriguing and disturbing. Now with her supposed love affair with social media, marketers have to at least keep an eye out to see what happens through this highly influential channel.
Well, according to the article, if you are Twitter, the initial press was pretty cool but as Oprah’s first tweet of
“HI TWITTERS . THANK YOU FOR A WARM WELCOME. FEELING REALLY 21st CENTURY.”
I know it sounds like a feature that designed to predict whether your friends will email (“Reply hazy try again”), or possibly to tell you to switch email clients (“Outlook not so good”—an actual Magic 8-Ball response. Man, I’m hilarious). However, Gmail’s pending project, nicknamed the Magic Inbox, is designed to prioritize your mail by sender—with your best friends’ missives listed first.
Hey, that’s kinda neat, isn’t it? Yeah, it is—until we remember Google’s penchant for declaring anyone you’ve ever emailed a “friend.” However, this might change. Google Operating System highlights the two-year-old technology that might help Google identify your real friends (now there’s a useful app!) from a RarePlay post:
For Yahoo it appears as if the good ship “Search Business” has left the dock and Yahoo is just waving as it goes 
merrily off into the horizon. In other words, they missed the boat. We all pretty much know and accept that. Well, according to The Business Insider there is talk at Yahoo that they better get on the USS Social Networking vessel before it sets sail for good as well.
Is all the water and ship imagery making you a little nauseous? Imagine how the people at Yahoo have felt considering the rough ride they have had for quite some time now. In an effort to settle down and actually put together a strategy it appears as if social networking will be the focus moving forward. Yahoo’s CTO Ari Balogh stated yesterday that it could happen in a number of ways and untying the purse strings is one of them.
Google has announced a number of changes to its Google Suggest technology. The search engine starts its post with the most user beneficial additions, but lets start ours with what’s really behind these changes, shall we?
Yep, that’s a sponsored result you’re seeing at the bottom of Google Suggest. Now, you might think I’m about to go on a rant, but I’m not. I think it’s actually a pretty smart move by Google. After all, there’s only so much "screen estate" that the company can monetize and here it is, squeezing an itty bitty ad into a small box.
It is curious that the most recognizable brand in the world, Google, seems to be afraid to truly step out into the real world in many instances. As pointed out by Michael Arrington at Tech Crunch, 4 out of the 5 core Google apps offerings are still in Beta. The very recognizable names are Gmail, Google Docs, Google Talk and Google Calendar with Google sites being the only one that does not carry the Beta label.
NBC17 asked me to share some tips for a couple of TV segments they aired today. The first looks at how your personal online reputation can have an effect on your career goals. The second discusses what to in the event of an impostor “brand jacking” your name on a social network.
Both segments were posted online, so I thought I’d share them with you.
by 
by 
by 