cnet's Best of CES 2011

If you were unable to attend the Consumer and Electronics Show (CES) this year, be sure to check out cnet's best of show video to see their top picks in a number of categories such as prototypes, auto, gaming, home theater, PCs and Laptops, etc. Hosted by Molly Wood and Brian Cooley, and presented by Natalie (Delconte) Morris. Be sure to watch for the prototypes and do a little google searching for the products... very cool stuff.

Oh!, and they have tablets too.

CNET To Be Acquired By CBS

It's not quite Microsoft / Yahoo! but it's the largest acquisition of a web company in some time. CBS announced Thursday that it would pay $11.50 a share in an all-cash tender offer for CNET. The deal is worth $1.8 billion and vaults the company forward in it's vision of becoming a bigger Web player. "There are very few opportunities to acquire a profitable, growing, well-managed Internet company like CNET Networks," CBS Chief Executive Leslie Moonves said in an interview. The deal is expected to be completed in the third quarter of this year. The LA Times has more here.

Weekends Made Easier With Batter Blaster?

Sunday mornings are often Pancake mornings at our house, simply because it's usually my turn to make breakfast and pan cakes are an easy solution. I often haul out the blender, slosh in the water and batter mix and spray the counter top with the flying doughy mixture. Now, at least in the western U.S., consumers have an easy alternative in "Batter Blaster"! It's pancake mix in a can reminiscent of Reddi Whip or spray on cheese and according to the website "Batter Blaster™ makes organic light and fluffy pancakes and light and crisp waffles in minutes!". The gals at Cnet's Kitchen Gadget Blog have put together a little show down of the Batter Blaster vs. Pancakes from scratch, check it out here.

What would you like to see in a new iPod?

Matt Rosoff over at c|net NewsBlog is not too impressed with the thought of a new generation of iPods said to be on it's way. Rumours have been rampant since the release of the iPhone and Matt is asking the questions "What would make you buy a new iPod?". His argument, there is not much you could do to the iPod to make most users want to shell out more money to upgrade to the next generation. I'm not so sure, I think we are all subject to a tiny bit of new product envy regardless of how trivial the updates may or may not be.

Do you accept people you don't know as a "friend" on social networking sites?

In an experiment conducted by IT security firm Sophos, 41% of Facebook users approached, accepted a fake user as their friend. Many of those who did fall for the trap also provided personally identifying information such as e-mail addresses and remarkably telephone numbers! Are we that desperate to find friends that we would let our guards down to complete strangers or is it simply the bragging rights we are seeking? Don't you watch Dateline people? c|net has the story.

Google News allowing comments from experts

c|net's News Blog, is reporting that in the U.S. version of Google News, a user who is somehow involved in a story will now be able to comment on it. There is a verification process that involves submitting your comment and credentials to a special e-mail address, and verifying your identity via domain name, the process concludes with a follow-up from Google staff. The idea is to limit the commenting to the experts involved in the story. It's an interesting idea but apparently not a novel one as Yahoo! tried a similar system but abandoned the idea, at least temporarily. It seems that Yahoo! didn't keep as a tight reign on things and suffered from comment spam. Here is an example as cited by News Blog.

NASA sponsored competition seeks Jetson's like future

c|net's News.com is running an article about a NASA sponsored competition that seeks to find the most fuel efficient personal aircraft vehicle (PAV). The competition is being held at Charles Schultz Sonoma County Airport in California, conjuring up images in my head of Snoopy cruising around on his dog house, but I digress. "These air vehicles can travel in three dimensions without any traffic jams, and the computer technology today enables travel that can be on demand at speeds three to four times faster than cars with equivalent gas mileage." If these guys get their way, we might all be flying our cars to work someday in the not too distant future. Think "The Jetsons" or perhaps "Blade Runner".

Gearing up to be your own IT help desk

c|net's "The Real Deal" episode 69 - "Be your own IT department" hosted by Tom Merrit and Rafe Needleman is a great listen if you are the tech go-to guy/gal on your block. I loved this episode for all of the software tools that are discussed. I hadn't considered creating a thumb drive tool box before, but this makes so much sense! Rather than trying to remember URLs, load up the flash memory with dozens of helpful utilities and be prepared for whatever that Windows machine throws at you. Tom and Rafe list dozens of apps that will help track down and fix whatever is ailing Granny's PC. Thanks guys, great episode!

The technology of racing - in photos

c|net has a photographic look at the technology that makes it into a grand prix racer... from tires to wires they have it covered. This is an up close look behind the scenes, very cool!

Click fraud on the raise, botnets said to be the cause

Warning: Although I did not intend for it to happen, this post has turned into a bit of a rant.

Acknowledgment: I acknowledge that the blogosphere has differing opinions regarding advertising and blogs, you have your beliefs and I have mine. Neither is necessarily right or wrong, they are just different.

And now for the post...

Cnet is reporting on one of their news blogs that statistics are showing a rise in the number of fraudulent clicks on advertising networks such as Google's AdSense. The overall industry fraud rate is estimated at 15.8% for the second quarter of this year, up from 14.1% a year ago, and the numbers are worse for the big advertising networks like AdSense and Yahoo! Publisher Network, where their rate is estimated at 25.6 percent, up from 21.9 percent for the previous quarter. The increase is being blamed on the rise in the number of botnets which are designed to take over unsuspecting PCs for nefarious reasons, in this case systematically clicking repetitively on ads on websites. The botnet developer either benefits from the revenue generated by the clicks or in many cases, the attack is meant to burn through the advertising budgets of the advertiser without producing any results.

As a blogger who, obviously, is a member of such an advertising network, this is not good news! By no means am I getting rich from the revenue generated by this, in fact it falls somewhere in the "beer money" category, covering the cost of domain registration, and I shutter to think what the remainder translates to on an hourly basis. I'm obviously not in this purely for the money, but it would be great if there was some sort of compensation that fairly rewarded me and the throngs of other bloggers for our time and effort. The ad networks provide some monetary promise and as they say "the cream will raise to the top", meaning those who do a good job of attracting visitors may find themselves in the enviable position of making decent coin from writing about their passions, being comical, insightful, or whatever it is that makes their blog an interesting read. The numbers above are staggering and one would assume that advertisers must be seriously considering whether or not the conversion rate is worth the extra expense brought on by these fraudulent clicks. We all consume advertisements throughout our day via radio, television, print media, and telemarketing, and whether we chose to believe it or not it does have an affect on our purchasing decisions. I'd like to encourage readers of this or any blog to consider having a glance at the ads, don't just dismiss them as noise pollution. If something catches your eye click on it, and read the advertiser's message. With this small gesture you will be compensating the author of the site and creating more meaningful click through rates, maintaining the viability of these services. It only works however if you consume the message of the advertiser, randomly clicking just to serve the interest of the writer further dilutes the value of the click and jeopardizes the system. Advertisers are not expecting that every click results in an immediate sale, although they might like that, they just want to be considered when you make your purchase decision. Likewise I am not expecting that every visit results in an AdSense click, I would like to think that if you visit the site and like what you see both in terms of content and occasionally advertising, that you would click through and read an ad from time to time. In this way all parties benefit. Oh, and keep your security software up to date! If these botnets have no place to reside the process works better anyway.

FBI turns to spyware to trace bomb threat

According to this CNET post the FBI remotely installed spyware on a MySpace account suspected of being used by a bomb threat hoaxster. The software was designed to phone home with the IP address of the suspects computer and other information garnered from the PC. The suspect was a former student of the High School that was subject of the threats. The FBI had reported in 2001 that it was working on such software, a virus called Magic Lantern, but hasn't said much about it since. I wonder if MySpace cooperated in this case or if it was done totally cloak and dagger?

New hybrid from Toyota in 2009

According to this CNet article, citing the Nikkei Financial Daily, Toyota has a new hybrid in the works to follow on the success of the Prius and other hybrid models that see Toyota owning 90% of the market share. The new vehicle will posses a snappy 2 to 3 litre engine as compared to the 1.5 litre Prius. The company is aiming for sales of 100,000 units.

Take-Two holds back controversial title (two posts in one)

After being banned in Britain and being given an adult only rating in the US, game maker Take-Two Interactive has decided to temporarily hold back it's 'Manhunt 2' title due to be released on July 10th. Saying "We continue to stand behind this extraordinary game. We believe in freedom of creative expression, as well as responsible marketing, both of which are essential to our business of making great entertainment," Take-Two is contemplating the future of the game which was to be released for the Sony Playstation 3, PSP, and Nintendo Wii platforms. CNet has the story here and while you are on their site check out the 'Hottest Story' navigation they have going on in the form of coloured blocks! The larger the block the hotter the story, it's a novel idea and one that I think I can really get into. I'm not sure if I would want to see anymore than the 15 or so stories they are currently displaying though.