Andy Beal and I have both talked some about Network Solutions and their recent policy decisions as to how they manage their domain name purchasing services. Well TechCrunch is reporting that now Network Solutions has adopted the practice of “hijacking unassigned sub domains” by placing ads on these sub domains without notifying the site owners.

This “new” practice, and I call it new because this is the first we are really hearing of it, is already affecting hundreds of thousands of sub domains. How long this has been going on is hard to tell, but based on Network Solutions recent behavior closer scrutiny will most likely be applied to all of their business practices.

The comments on the original TechCrunch post have provided some highly interesting insight for all individuals who might be using the Network Solutions hosting services.

As I was roaming through the blogsphere, catching up on some of the news and notes I have missed in recent weeks, I read one of Jeremy Zawondy’s recent blog posts addressing a very similar topic. He poses the question does the convenience of having access to someone with answers inhibit people from thinking about and solving their own problems, when they know a quick email, twit, or IM will get them the answer without them having to make any real effort?

Many of the new Social Media websites seem to encourage this type of behavior. More specifically I am starting to see this type of behavior a lot on Twitter. I am not sure whether or not it is the law of averages or maybe even just the company I keep on the service? Maybe I interact with too many online marketers?

There are a lot of different ways to approach social media marketing. Still it seems many marketers are unwilling to engage with social media services while desiring the benefits the media represents. I was reading an article this weekend by Skellie, which I am not going to recap in its entirety, but you should go read it. Skellie’s article made me chuckle and in a way also made me sad because it really shows why so many internet marketing campaigns fail.

“The most common question I get from bloggers who want to know about getting Dugg is this: should I start using Digg — is that necessary?”

Sometimes the simplest solution is also the best solution. I was reading Marshall Kirkpatrick’s most recent blog post over at Read Write Web where he discusses turning useful lists into custom search engines. At first I thought it was a pretty cool idea and in fact I still do, but I also think it is a solution to a problem that didn’t exist in the first place.

Part of the value and effectiveness of a really good list is that a person unfamiliar with the contents of the list can quickly scan through the list and review the contents of the list in its entirety. Having that same list inside of a custom search engines, eliminates that value.

It is smart, it is witty and in some cases it is inane. Gabriel Goldenberg has a post up at seoroi.com that provides a lot of food for thought and in my opinion also gives some poor advice. His is one of those provocative posts that encourages everyone to start thinking about the way they do their online marketing but also reminds everyone to not to believe everything they read.

Gabriel believes webmasters need to become independent from search engines and offers up five tips to do just that. But what I believe Gabriel really means to say is he believes webmasters need to diversify so that they are no longer largely dependant on Google.

“It is time for webmasters to become independent from search engines.”

The publishers of Search Marketing Standard have taken on a new project, SEM Compare. SEM Compare proposes to provide visitors with an effective way of contributing and looking at user reviews and rating of SEM Companies.

With the site launch planned for March 17^th it appears that the project is ratcheting up its attempt to collect review data from anyone willing to take the time to fill out their questionnaire. If you would like to visit the site and share an opinion the site can be found at http://www.semcompare.com/share.php.

For years Marketing Sherpa has been the most well know reviewer in the SEM / SEO space. Right now Marketing Sherpa offers the information that they collect as a download for sale at their online store. A site like this might offer a different set of insights to complement that report.

Lately Twitter has become my preferred social media tool of choice. Howard Rheingold has written a thoughtful post highlighting the virtues of Twitter. He covers Openness, Immediacy, Variety, Reciprocity, Audience, Asymmetry, and multiple level of interactivity with various sources. Now I have shorted and combined a few of Howard’s reasons, but the two items that really struck a cord with me were the Immediacy and the Reciprocity. I think these are the reasons why Twitter has become my social medium of choice.

I interact with such a wide variety of people that regardless of the time of day or subject matter, someone is always around with an answer, opinion, or just thoughtful commentary and I believe that is what makes Twitter so immensely satisfying as a tool for communication. Why do you like Twitter so much or do you?