PaidSpaces.com is a new social network that aspires to compete with MySpace by allowing people to put advertisements on their personal web pages so that they can share in the revenue that their traffic generates.

While allowing people to share in the wealth, that's not enough of a hook to get people to switch their loyalties and give up their current web profiles. PaidSpaces.com's press release says the company is considering allowing people to place AdSense ads on their personal pages to generate revenue. This will produce very little money for the individuals since AdSense pays so little per page view, and is enticement for people to throw any old content on their pages and participate in click fraud to increase their revenues. Also, if making money is the endgame, people will contact as many folks as possible, devaluing what a "friend" is supposed to be and promoting spam.

And maybe I'm not supposed to get the reference because I'm over 40 and married (and therefore not a MySpace user), but who the hell is Tom?

If PaidSpaces.com wants to succeed, they'll need to come up with a better hook (not to mention a better name). People are already finding ways to monetize their MySpace pages to bring them fame and fortune.

I like the idea of social search, and the advantages of "collective" intelligence could someday be incorporated into mainstream search.

Social search site Eurekster has added new features to its swicki building engine, which uses community input to rank search results and answer common questions. Swicki users can add thumbs up or thumbs down ratings to that search results can be moved based on reader approval.

One of the weaknesses in search engine ranking is the emphasis on quantity over quality. While including how many sites link to a page is somewhat an indication of the value of the content, the number of times a result is clicked on is not. Ratings systems like this (ala Digg) instantly improve the quality of the results.

The ability to post comments to results on a Eurekster swicki is also intriguing way to engage participants if websites don't allow commenting on their own. Eurekster also allows swicki authors to create instant polls and to allow users to post questions for members to answer.

I would like to see answers from wikis such as Wikipedia alongside standard search results. While user may not think that Wikipedia has an answer for every topic, I bet providing its relevant results for each query would generate considerable traffic.

If I were Google I'd be paying close attention to social search services like Eurekster.

Advertisers who like to control the Google partner sites where their display ads run can now choose to pay per thousand or per click. Google is giving more flexibility to advertisers, according to MediaPost.

Google has been notorious for allowing click fraud to thrive on its network partners sites, so allowing advertisers to choose which sites their CPC ads run on is not an option but a requirement. I wouldn't have a lot of faith in Google's oversight of a CPC display network.

Advertisers will have to take a hard look at the economics to see if CPM or CPC is the best way to spend their money. Display advertising is often more about branding that spurring user action, but since the cost is lower, you can accept that not everyone will get your message.

Is it better to pay $10 for each 1,000 people who probably saw your ad, or $50 per thousand for clicks that may or many not be genuine? That's a serious questions for marketers to ask before they start a campaign.

Many folks feel producing more video content is the fastest way to grow advertising dollars. Unlike search there is no clear leader in video advertising, and video could be Yahoo's best chance at taking market share from Google.

This month's OMMA magazine rates the best website, and all of them are making significant use of video. While YouTube is the dominant attraction, it will have a smaller audience and will be much less desirable site to advertise on once the copyrighted video is removed.

Yahoo might be the sleeper in video advertising. The company disclosed that it is redesigning its video search site and is developing a streamlined media player.

While user-generated video can attract a lot of younger viewers, professionally developed content and a smart advertising platforms are what makes marketers happy. If Yahoo develops the ad technology and finds the right partners, positioning itself as a "media portal" could carve out an important niche for the company.

Video search is still in its infancy, but whoever can "channel" that excitement into an organized interface will rule the day.

I'm having a real hard time not saying "I told you so" but as I was doing a wee bit of maintenance around mshift I came across an old post about how one entrepreneur (Robert May) thought he could build a business based on the wisdom of crowds. Some call this democracy but democracy belongs in government (cause noone wants it anywhere else) and the business world operates much like a monarchy (not a dictatorship). There has to be a single person at the top responsible for creating the vision and that person must have a strong team that firmly believes in that leaders vision... A lot of pastors get this right when they say "...Where there is no vision, the people perish". Applying that thought to the open source input business model and you'll get the same result. Just like I predicted in July of 2005. Here was my original prediction.

Personally, I don't think this business experiment has a chance of succeeding because of the lack of ownership a crowd presents. The inability to issue responsibility to a specific person in the business [crowd] will bring it down.

Now if we check the site where it all started we find this message.

The Business Experiment is currently unavailable while we make some site upgrades.

Thank you for you continued support. We'll be back online soon.

Are they down for the count? Maybe Robert May will ping me with an update, I hope so.

Interestingly enough, Robert posted last week on his blog (BusinessPundit) about the Madness of E-Crowds. Think he's a changed man? Even if he hasn't switched polarity I have to give him credit for trying something new... failure is highly underrated, often it's byproduct is success. Good luck Robert.

Bill Gates is one of many Internet TV (IPTV) backers who say broadcast TV is doomed and that the Internet will revolutionize the industry. While he's partially right, let us not forget that TV and then VCRs were supposed to make the cinema experience obsolete, and the Internet was going to kill off newspapers.

Both those industries while wounded are still bigger than the IPTV industry likely will ever be. The problems with IPTV will include an overabundance of choice, the lack of easy navigation, and inferior quality when compared to broadcast. I'm sure I could find 24 hours worth of interesting shows on YouTube et al, but it would take a month's worth of filtering through garbage.

Most folks today haven't mastered the art of finding quality shows amongst the 300 channels on their cable or satellite system. IPTV will put tens of thousands of programs at your fingertips, but without a TiVo-type guide to sort through the multitudes. IPTV will be composed of niche (ie vertical) programming, and connecting the tulip gardening enthusiast with appropriate programming will be a challenge. The most likely way to find these customers is to partner with the existing online brands today for verticals (such as cars and gardening), and through TV aggregation services that tag content to match your interest. Organizing TV through personalized RSS feeds are the best way to make sense of what will be a tidal wave of video content.

Also, just as any idiot can blog (ahem), anyone can create a crude program with a camcorder, but they will look like crap compared to the high-production value that TV budgets allow. These programs will be delivered to the living room, but for the most part they won't stand up to today's slick broadcasts.

IPTV will be an extension of broadcast, just as SFGate.com and other publishers have created websites that are extension of newspapers by adding multimedia and social media components. So like it or not, NBC, ABC, and CBS will still be around in 5 years trotting out programs such as Wife Swap.

YellowPages.com is the latest business directory to add consumer reviews to its website. For businesses, consumer ratings can be an inexpensive "word of mouth" marketing tool, as long as the posts are authentic.

Yellowpages.com initiated a 1 to 5 star rating system and allows registered users (thereby collecting some valuable demographic info) to post comments. The company will filter comments (no profanity please) and enables the business owners to directly respond to comments. Requiring registration to make comments will hopefully discourage some people from posting bogus reviews to harm or help the advertiser.

User reviews are integral to consumers putting their trust in unknown companies, and companies should encourage their clients to contribute to add reviews in their marketing materials by providing links to the places where they advertise. Even if there is an occasional negative review, if the majority of customers give the thumbs up, people are more likely to choose a business that has been rated versus one that is completely unknown.

Look at this Google logo for Valentines Day 2007, what don't you see? Keep looking. Maybe its me, but I always thought it was spelled G-o-o-g-L-e. I've showed this to about 5 different people and no one even notice without me pointing it out. Seems like Google is too busy trying to sweet talk my pants off (probably to up my Adwords budget with more credit cards) with chocolate covered strawberries they forgot the "L".doh- didn't realize Techcrunch doesn't sleep and posted this early this AM.

Video startup Blip.TV has developed technology for vloggers to creative interactive ads starring themselves. The do-it-yourself advertising system offers technology for linking from within the video stream to product websites so that small budget videographers can make some cash pitching the products featured in their programs.

Maybe vloggers will lead the way in interactive advertising that will eventually catch on with mainstream advertisers. The biggest limitation is that small-time vloggers lack the credibility of the "professional" experts, and may be tempted to not draw a clear line between what editorial versus advertising content. It is going to be difficult to separate the shameless product whores from the reviewers who mention products that they feel are worthy.

Blip.tv is trying to become a player in the online video market by offering an auction-based advertising network that splits the revenue 50/50 with publishers. The company has a relationship with Amanda Congdon of Rocketboom fame, and is hosting presidential candidate Tom Vilsack's vlog.

Found via Adotas.

Publishers big and small are hoping that promoting video content will put them on the fast track to increase ad revenue.

Video hosting company Brightcove, which also runs its own ad network, is emerging as a leader in the category, and the company just scored deals with Time Inc., TV Guide and About.com to distribute their videos.

Brightcove limits the risk to publisher by distributing videos for free and splitting the ad revenue with publishers. The cost of producing videos continues to tumble, and the increase in broadband penetration to nearly half of all U.S. households by the end of the year are prompting primarily text publishers to incorporate video into their websites.

Video is an attractive compliment that breaks up text-heavy pages, offers higher CPMs, and can attract the younger generation that considers video as the primary source of news and entertainment. While today the market is wide open, very soon we'll have a half dozen leaders in the video distribution, search engine, and advertising categories as the next 18 months will be the "shakeout" season to separate the winners from also-rans.

Found via MediaPost.

Not surprisingly the music industry has not given a warm reception to Steve Jobs' call for an end to digital rights management. Warner Music Group CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr., rightly told the Washington Post that Jobs was misleading in his argument.

Bronfman attacked the assertion that anti-piracy technology was the reason that iTunes music will not play on anything but an iPod. "The issue is obscured by asserting that DRM and interoperability is the same thing. They are not. To suggest that they cannot co-exist is simply incorrect."

As I said, Jobs is reacting to Europe's call for Apple to license iTunes to other companies by calling for an end to DRM, which is a separate issue.

New media expert Brad King also points out that you can agree that ending DRM is a good thing without believing Jobs' rhetoric.

With his "Thoughts on Music" post, Jobs is deftly trying to switch the attention from his monopoly to the music industry's oligopoly.

King says Jobs could help put an end to DRM and grow his company by opening up iTunes.

When it comes to DRM, though, Jobs has the rare opportunity to inject actual change in the digital-media landscape while also promoting the financial well-being of his company, even if that means opening up the Apple architecture to allow competitors to play on the same landscape.

If Apple allowed iTunes tracks to be legally uploaded to car, portable and home stereo equipment from other manufacturers, the company would likely increase revenue and decrease piracy because it would be so easy to legitimately move music from place to place. But that would break Apple's "we control you" strategy, so it's not likely to happen.

Publishers looking to increase traffic through user-generated content are turning to wikis. The hard sell will be convincing advertisers that these sites are as worthy as professionally-authored pages.

For example, Meredith, which publishes Better Homes and Gardens and a few dozen other magazines, just launched a scrapbooking wiki. Since the site just launched, Meredith is displaying AdWords ads, which is the lowest hanging fruit available for publishers to monetize content.

But shouldn't advertisers be willing to pay higher CPMs for a focused audience where people are willing to donate their time to create a wiki? I mean, if you want people who are passionate about a subject (even scrapbooking), aren't these the experts that are your target audience? Vertical advertising is the future, and wikis are in the center of the action.

It will take some third-party auditors or adventurous advertisers to prove that wikis are worthwhile places for ads, but I'm guessing that people who take the plunge early are getting a bargain.