After all, if someone were to tell me that they used Google, I think they’d get a raised eyebrow and a silent stare.  If they told me that they drove an Aston Martin, well, I can pretty much guarantee a positive reaction.  So you’ll see no complaints in this article about Aston Martin earning a name as the absolute coolest brand.

You will, however, see a bit of whining about Ferrari coming in eleventh and Lamborghini placing seventeenth.  I accuse Superbrands and about 2,000 voters of not loving cars enough.

Anyway, a name that was in more direct competition with Google (in terms of ranking) was “iPod” – this term ranked second.  The number four spot went to Bang & Olufsen, which, out of the top five, leaves just the third coolest brand unidentified.  And Google shouldn’t complain much about having this brand ahead of it, since YouTube, which nabbed third place, is actually owned by Google.

The rest of the top 20 is available at The Independent, but, just to cover the search-related bases, I’ll say that neither Yahoo nor Microsoft made that cutoff.

“We are excited to offer our advertisers the opportunity to expand their online presence through Google AdWords,” stated Glenn Goad, Network Communications’s executive vice president of consumer strategy, in a press release.

He then continued, “The model for how consumers search for and sell homes continues to change and the Internet has been a driving force behind this evolution.  Our partnership with Google allows us to provide even more highly effective and targeted online real estate marketing services and products to our customers.”

Online real estate has been a pretty hot field lately; just in the past couple of weeks, Yahoo Real Estate partnered with NewHomeSource.com and Redfin secured $12 million in funding.  That’s one competitor and a lot of cash on the move, from Google’s perspective (although I suppose it’s me, not Google, that regards $12 million as “a lot”).

So the arrangement with Network Communications shouldn’t come as a huge surprise.  But as the official release notes, “The signed deal makes NCI the first company in the real estate marketplace that Google has partnered with in this way.”

Hat tip to the Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal.

iPh-owned: Apple Device Vulnerable To Attack

That expensive, gorgeous phone/Internet device/media player sitting in thousands of pockets and purses could be a gateway to tears, at least until Apple fixes a problem that will be the talk of the Black Hat conference starting later this week.

Researchers at Independent Security Evaluators discovered a hole in the iPhone’s security. The New York Times cited Charles A. Miller, principal security analyst for the company, who said, “Once you did manage to find a hole, you were in complete control.”

Miller demonstrated how the injection of code from visiting a specially crafted website would affect the iPhone. The device responded to the test by transmitting text messages, contacts, and emails upon infection.

Until Apple patches the problem, Miller recommended on their website that iPhone users only visit sites and use WiFi networks that they trust. He also warned against opening links delivered by email to the iPhone, as viruses send links to malicious sites in emails that appear to come from trusted contacts.

British Man Pushes Google On Defamation

If this case were in the US, where search engines and other websites generally can claim no responsibility over third party content, Retkin’s case probably wouldn’t make it out of a lawyer’s office. British law works a little differently.

A report in The Independent said that in Britain, the same legal protection is conditional. If a company does not have notice of a complaint and time to act upon it, they have some insulation from these claims.

Retkin has complained about online postings accusing him of running a fraudulent business appearing in Google’s search results. Though the report said Google claimed to have removed material and blacklisted links to it, a query for ‘Dotworlds registrar’ at press time turned up a mailing list post with those accusations as the top result.

Google’s response made the usual claim that the company is not responsible for the results of a query. "Google has absolutely no connection, control or ability to direct or influence the content of web pages which may be shown as links within any given set of search results," Google’s legal counsel Harjinder Obhi said in the report.

UPDATE: For commentary from Retkin, see our chat with him here.

The goal for the show is to engage young adults in politics. “Independent” is slated to “air” on MySpace News next year, after MySpace’s presidential primaries.

Fortunately, this news doesn’t end there. The producer is Mark Burnett, aka the father of reality TV. What does that mean for “Independent”? From what I’ve pieced together, viewers will vote on the best campaigners—not the candidates themselves, but MySpacers who upload videos about their campaign efforts on behalf of one of the candidates, but I’m not sure. Deduce for yourself:

MySpace users and TV viewers will select from a pool of candidates who have uploaded audition videos to the site.

MySpace users who support specific candidates are encouraged to publicize or campaign for the candidate by creating online videos and by employing other online marketing tactics. . . .

Each week, Internet and TV viewers will vote on new missions that players must accomplish. The missions are related to issues raised by the MySpace community.

They can range from how to take action on issues such as whether a new Wal-Mart outlet should be welcomed to a small local town to whether a new factory or housing development could threaten the ecology of the local creek. . . .

One winner will earn $1 million to spend on launching a new political party, donating to a political cause or entering the U.S. presidential race.

(Reminder to potential contestants contemplating entering this contest to get the $1M for your own campaign: to be President of the United States, you have to be 35. Says so in the Constitution. Also, you must have been born in the US and lived in the US for the last 14 years.)

They’re still looking for a TV network for the television component. Yeah, MySpace is owned by News Corp, which also owns FOX broadcasting, which has more than a dozen cable and broadcast television channels, including FOX, where Burnett’s two latest creations run. I guess they’re holding out for a “real” broadcast network.

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The Ask Earthquake Search, and the ‘quake itself, should probably take precedence, though. The tool records the date, location, and magnitude of earthquakes, and plots the data on a map; according to it (and other independent sources), a magnitude 4.2 ‘quake hit the San Francisco Bay Area on March 1.

Since then, seven more instances of seismic activity have occurred in California. The Ask.com team claims to “check [the Ask Earthquake Search] every time there’s a ‘quake nearby. After running for cover, of course,” so the data should definitely be up-to-date.

Now we can move on to the story of the crushed writing utensil, which began about a month ago when a Google-branded pen ran out of ink. This “product failure” occurred while Ask’s Scott Grieder was writing, so Ask created an amusing little blog post about it.

The company’s competitors in Mountain View responded by sending a new, improved pen, and Ask has posted pics of the “old” pen, its replacement, and now, the pen that perished in the ‘quake. The thing is, even though the Ask.com team implies that the damaged pen is the newest one (“We just got the thing, too!”), it’s clearly not – the color and the style are quite different.

Did the Ask.com team make a simple goof? Did its members suffer head injuries in the earthquake? Does it even matter (not that I’m uninterested in the team’s welfare)? Perhaps not, but this is the latest development in the Google-Ask relationship.

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Just wanted to say a quick thanks to all the folks who took the time to let me know there was a problem (and to Mike for helping me get up and running quickly – it probably would have taken me weeks). To the folks who thought it was linkbait, I can appreciate skepticism, but you might want to tip your BS meters a bit further back towards “faith in humanity” – life is more enjoyable that way. Ironically enough, I was having lunch with Michael Gray when I got the news, so I’ll let him tell the story (or you can check out the blow-by-blow at threadwatch, so I can get back to work:)

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Todd Malicoat aka Stuntdubl made his first horrible looking website full of animated .gifs in 1997, and after fours years of failure and experimentation ended up in the world of SEO and internet marketing in early 2001. He is currently an independent marketing consultant from the SEO school of thought. Todd earned a bachelors of business adminstration from Northwood University in 2003 while running an web design and consulting firm Meta4creations, LLC. Todd is a speaker at both Webmasterworld and Search Engine Strategies conferences.

It’s a bit late notice – but we’ll be discussing how folks can dive into affiliate marketing, and take their efforts to the next level. I’ve always had a mindful eye for affiliate marketing – but done very little until the last year or so, and starting to get much heavier into it now. I’ll be talking a bit about the progression from consultant to affiliate, and the crossovers between the two, as well as grilling Jeremy on how to become a better affiliate. If you have any questions for me to ask Shoe – now’s the time.

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Todd Malicoat aka Stuntdubl made his first horrible looking website full of animated .gifs in 1997, and after fours years of failure and experimentation ended up in the world of SEO and internet marketing in early 2001. He is currently an independent marketing consultant from the SEO school of thought. Todd earned a bachelors of business adminstration from Northwood University in 2003 while running an web design and consulting firm Meta4creations, LLC. Todd is a speaker at both Webmasterworld and Search Engine Strategies conferences.

Learn to Launch your blog successfully. There are some fine points in this post. If I have to point them out, you’re not looking hard enough.

21 tips in 6 parts:

The First Impression
RSS & Subscriptions
Social Bookmarking (aka Going Viral)
Getting networked
Link Building
Finishing touches

Nice list of to do’s for new bloggers or those starting new blogs.

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Todd Malicoat aka Stuntdubl made his first horrible looking website full of animated .gifs in 1997, and after fours years of failure and experimentation ended up in the world of SEO and internet marketing in early 2001. He is currently an independent marketing consultant from the SEO school of thought. Todd earned a bachelors of business adminstration from Northwood University in 2003 while running an web design and consulting firm Meta4creations, LLC. Todd is a speaker at both Webmasterworld and Search Engine Strategies conferences.

In fact, print it out and memorize it, and cater all your decisions around it, and you will understand SEO as more than just a process. Rand has simplified his incredible search engine ranking factors paper (which I refer people to probably a dozen times per week). The Google algo IS complex, but there are some parts that are much more important than others. Create a strategy considering these google ranking criteria, and you’ll be well on your way to good rankings. There’s been some other nice discussions on the google algo in the past when part of it DID leak.

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Todd Malicoat aka Stuntdubl made his first horrible looking website full of animated .gifs in 1997, and after fours years of failure and experimentation ended up in the world of SEO and internet marketing in early 2001. He is currently an independent marketing consultant from the SEO school of thought. Todd earned a bachelors of business adminstration from Northwood University in 2003 while running an web design and consulting firm Meta4creations, LLC. Todd is a speaker at both Webmasterworld and Search Engine Strategies conferences.