Hugh Durkin, Irish Internet Guy

Google share price back on the up

I previously had a bit of a rant about traders and how they can sometimes lose faith in great shares when the going gets bad.  One that I particularly had issue with was the half price drop in the Google share price from within on year.  Now, thankfully, the price seems to be recovering - again.  It still amazes me though, for the last three years Google have been increasing annual revenues and profits by around 30%+ but, in the last year at least, their share price has tumbled.  It’d be interesting to see the combined values that have been knocked off pension funds and government investments because of this.  Hmmm.

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Do customer satisfaction surveys by phone really work?

I just got off the phone from a very, very interesting and entertaining customer satisfaction survey phone call - not.  It was initiated on behalf of a service I use most days (I won’t get into specifics), and i’ve had a few problems with them in the past, so I said i’d oblige.  My god was it boring.  It was based on the multiple-choice, 1 for bad 7 for good formula, and I feel very sorry for the poor woman whose job it is to make those calls every day.  My head would be wrecked, and my friends would notice a change in my behaviour over time from human to robot.  So, do these surveys work or not, and if not, why?

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Will Nicky O’Callaghan win The Apprentice?

The Apprentice has been going on for what seems like ages, but at this stage who will win?  In fairness, the standard has been fairly poor throughout - in terms of overall entertainment value, the quality of the tasks, and the execution of tasks by the contestants.  No offence to Bill Cullen (sure I even have his ‘Golden Apples’ book which is great), but what relevance does selling Garmin satnavs on Grafton Street have to do with the overall scheme of things.  I know he’s trying to get each competitor to prove they can sell, but i’m sure neither Jackie Lavin (who used to be a model) or Brian Purcell (PR legend) had to flog stuff on Grafton Street on their way to the top.  All that aside, one candidate is showing better traits than most of them, the very easy on the eyes Nicky O’Callaghan.

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Kelkoo sold by Yahoo! - bit of a dumb move?

News has been circulating over the weekend about the Yahoo! disposal of Kelkoo, and now some of the finer details are starting to seep through.  Seems that Yahoo! got rid of their price comparison shopping site for around €100 million - quite a hit on the €475 million they paid for it in 2004 (but surely they made some profits from it in the meantime?).  But why sell now?  Bit of bad timing, no?

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Youtube goes widescreen - another move towards having d’telly on d’interweb?

If you look at Youtube, you’ll notice it’s gotten wiiiiiiiiiiiiider! As mentioned on their blog, Youtube have proclaimed:

“We’re expanding the width of the page to 960 pixels to better reflect the quality of the videos you create and the screens that you use to watch them. This new, wider player is in a widescreen aspect ratio which we hope will provide you with a cleaner, more powerful viewing experience. And don’t worry, your 4:3 aspect ratio videos will play just fine in this new player.”

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Why PPC, CPA, and display advertising can live happily ever after

There is increased, heated debate about the future of advertising online.  Each and every time I get my copy of NMA delivered through the door, I read articles by ‘experts’ who say PPC is the next big thing, display advertising is dead, and affiliate marketing is a dirty game packed full of dodgy coupon code site owners, and inexperienced buffoons.  Everyone seems to be fighting their own corner, and forgetting the reality of digital advertising - PPC, CPA, and display advertising compliment each other, and always will.

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Female Herald journo takes issue with Ryanair 2009 Calendar

Last year, for the craic, I bought a mate of mine the 2008 Ryanair Charity Calendar.  Printed in aid of charities like the Simon Community, the 2009 Ryanair Calendar is ready for ordering and is sure to sell out again.  What a great idea for a great cause - my mate loved his last year, but truth be told I bought it just to have a peek myself.  I’ve ordered a 2009 one for the office already.  Bleedin deadly.  However, some females are up in arms against the thought of such objectification of women, notably Aoife Finneran from the Herald.

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Ryanair have a birdy bloodbath during emergency landing in Rome

Whoops!  Incidents of an accidental nature are few and far between at Ryanair, especially seeing as they carry around 60 million passengers a year.  However it all went a bit tits up today at Rome - Ciampino, as a 737 coming in to land suffered multiple bird strikes.  Totally unavoidable, and a freak accident.  Pilot managed to get the plane back on the ground, but here’s a piccy of the bloodied aircraft.  Messy!  I wonder if O’Leary has issued orders to scoop up the dead birds remains for their inflight meals?

Some stupid emails I get…

When you have a network of websites, and a contact form on each one, it’s inevitable that you’ll get some total crap now and again.  Todays stonker came in the form of an email from an American dude whose name and contact details i’ll keep private for his dignity, but i’ll post the contents of his pointless email here.  For the record, he emailed Fashion.ie, a website we have with a female readership.

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Bebo being hacked to shite

In the last two days i’ve had several of my friends on Bebo send me excellent messages saying that i’m appearing in loads of funny videos from a url that looks not unlike youtube, but totally isn’t.  Seems that some hacker / spammer types have managed to break through the security threshold at Bebo and wreak havoc on some users accounts.  Yet another reason to move my interweb social activity to Facebook methinks…