From CNN Money. 

 TOKYO, Jan. 7, 2008 (Thomson Financial delivered by Newstex) — Japan’s Matsushita Electric Industrial Co (NYSE:MC) , the world’s largest consumer electronics maker, has teamed up with Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) and YouTube to commercialize flat panel television sets that allow users to access and view videos online, the Nikkei reported on Tuesday, without citing sources.

This will be the Google group’s first tie-up with a Japanese consumer electronics manufacturer in TV-related services, the business daily said.

The Internet-enabled plasma TVs are expected to hit store shelves in the US this spring, it said.

Google is the world’s largest Internet search engine, while YouTube is one of the most prominent players in online video distribution.

Matsushita’s Net-enabled TVs will let users access YouTube’s video-sharing site and Google’s Picasa photo-sharing site by simply pressing a button on the remote control, the Nikkei said.

The maker of Panasonic brand electronics is likely to monitor sales of the Internet-enabled TVs, as well as the development of copyright management systems around the world, before deciding whether to also sell the TVs outside the US, the report said.

YouTube attracts many webmasters and companies to repeat success or to get at least a little piece of market share. Many people create their own local or niche Tube sites to target certain group of users.

  It is clear that YouTube are full with millions videos and many good clips are getting lost in the competition to be on top and get some fame. This situation gives more hope to creators of niche video sharing websites.

  In 2006-2007 some YouTube copycat websites already became popular and millions people use them to share video or to get information they are interested in. YouTube copycats became something like local TV channels comparing with CNN, BBC, or Fox News.

 Here are some popular Tube sites:

• TeacherTube – video sharing network for teachers and students. Read more: Teachers got their own YouTube.
• GodTube – religious videos.
• PornoTube – network for adult and pornographic videos.
• TheDailyTube – media network to share most popular videos which people find online.
• JazzTube – jazz videos.
• FootyTube – network to share soccer clips.
• MastiTube – Indian videos.
• IndyTube – Indianapolis video sharing network. Read more: Bye-Bye YouTube! Hello IndyTube! in Douglas Karr blog.

  Scripts to create YouTube alike websites available online and everyone can create video sharing website without any programming or web design knowledge. It means that in the future we will see a little YouTube for every place and topic.

  Many webmasters create directory to earn extra money and they don’t really care who they approve. Adult, violent, and poor quality websites easily pass “human hand” check point. This situation affect quality websites which now located side by side with spammy and Google banned domains.

 To gain more money directory owners make different rules and change approval policy all the time. It became extremely difficult to fill form and successfully send it to editor. Often directory which seems to be free turn in to paid after webmaster already filled 50 form fields, passed 7 pages of questions and security codes, and spend more than 15 minutes trying to submit his site.

  Many reciprocal directories made just to get link from website and never approve any listings. Owners who host paid directories buy links on a websites with high Pagerank to sell submissions later for bigger price which cost over $100 in some cases.

  P.S. But some directories are damn good!

   I would like to explain how to make logo better using Photoshop (Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended).

 1) Create new file: File > New

 Preset should be “custom” and make enough field for your background especially if you have long domain name. You can pick your backgound to match your design.

 2) Type your domain name and play with text. Change text size, font, and layout. Highlight your text and pick the color in the right box. Make sure to pick text Anti-Alias as smooth (highlight > mouse right click > pick smooth).

 All chhanges like size or arrow under letter “T” I made using Photoshop fonts (top box) they provided.

 3) Now we should improve this logo:

 Right click on a text layer (located in the right box) and pick “Blending Options…” menu. Over there you will be able to make changes like shadows, color flow, border glow etc…

 4) Using “Blending Options…” menu we can make a nice shadow for our logo.

 I set up “Opacity” as 20% to make shaddow appear close to logo border. If you pick more than 50% it will make your shaddow more than 100% bigger than your actual logo design. Put angle as 90% if you want shaddow to appear directly under logo. Here how my logo looks now:

 5) Here another options to improve design: Go to Blending Options > Gradient Overlay > Opacity 30%

Your logo will look like:

 6) Now make sure to trim your image: Image > Trim > OK.

 After this save your file as JPEG.

Done!

  OfficeMax project ElfYourself became the hottest Christmas website during for the second year in a row. Simple idea to make people upload their picture and place into dancing elf body made site the most successful phenomenon in 2006 and 2007. According to Ryan Vero, OfficeMax vice president, company wasn’t expecting such a big exposure of the project.

Julian from Sacramento, CA made the best ElfYourself video for YouTube.

He used a program called iShowU for the Mac to capture his elf video.

  Viral success came to ElfYourself through word of mouth, blogosphere, and social networks like FaceBook, MySpace, Digg, Flickr. Later it was picked by major media agencies and press:

•  CNN: OfficeMax’s ElfYourself.com is One of the Hottest Holiday Web…
•  USA Today: Interactive campaigns build buzz with fun. 
•  Yahoo News: WEBSITE OF THE DAY - elfyourself.com

   In December 2007 OfficeMax reported that more than 65 million visitors created 41 millions elfs. ElfYourself again became Alexa Mover and Shaker keeping other holiday sites way behind.

   What web marketers should learn from ElfYourself: 

1. OfficeMax created the most adorable and funny website which simply attract people.
2. Everything made simple to upload picture, place into elf body, enjoy preview, and share with friends.
3. Registration, payment, annoying ads simply skipped.
4. Website was perfectly designed, it doesn’t show any visible bugs in the system.
5. ElfYourself is not the only one website like this OfficeMax created. Scroogeyourself, was less popular than ElfYourself. It shows that creators was trying multiple ideas before succeed.

Me and my girlfriend as elfs. Click to see our ElfYourself.

 Earlier this week I wrote a post called Paid directories are going out of business. Over there i told that many paid directory owners are loosing money because Google became more strict about selling links.

 BOTW Greg Hartnett found this post and replied to me:

“While I can’t speak for other directories, I can assure you that BOTW is nowhere near going out of business.

2007 has been a banner year for us - our best year ever. Every month of 2007 was stronger than the previous month (if you’re judging by the amount of submissions coming in).

We continue to do what we do - provide users with relevant resources for their topic of interest. We will continue on our mission and let the chips fall where they may.

Regarding the Alexa rank - we must have seen a shift in our users over the last handful of months from a webmaster centric crowd to a more general internet user. I say that because even though our traffic numbers are up, our Alexa rank is moving the other way. Which leads me to believe that more and more of our visitors don’t have the Alexa toolbar installed.” read here.

 I am really appreciate Greg Hartnett response and I would like to tell a little bit more about BOTW and their role in directory and web marketing industry.

 About 2 years ago I was doing research to find how big directories became successful. Using SEO tools I checked where directory owners promote their sites and host backlinks. Every directory owner was buying links from high Pagerank sites to improve PR and traffic… I was amazed when I found that BOTW don’t buy links and banners from hight Pagerank sites and receive only natural backlinks. Also, to make more money, other directory owners used to approve every website including gambling, spam, scam, adult sites… BOTW was probably the only directory which was able to refuse webmaster who was trying to submit spammy website.

 Let’s take a look… BOTW spent a long time working with each submission. They want to make sure that a website are long enough online, don’t spam, provide rich content and quality information. In this case i would like to say that charge for each submission are absolutely fair.

  BOTW future:

 We should admit that directory industry are in crisis for right now. Crisis in every field kick away weak players and move on top strong companies and individuals. Not long ago I read in Wall Street Journal article about situation in real estate, author told that real estate crunch will decrease amount of lenders from 90 000 to 30 000 by 2009. It mean that only strong companies will stay on top.

 Google did not punished BOTW (pagerank, rankings, indexing are still the same). Situation with other paid directories gives BOTW a chance to get rid of competitors and become even more popular.

 BOTW and Google:

•  Google index BOTW as trusted domain with sitelinks. Google Index
•  BOTW has Pagerank 7
•  Google indexed 163 000 pages from BOTW. See it here.
•  Google index and count links which hosted on BOTW.

Web Shot: BOTW are doing fine!

Greg Hartnett of BOTW at Pubcon. Source ShoeMoney.

  TeacherTube is a network which based on YouTube concept and created for teachers and students. Website launched less than year ago and it has already about a million video previews a month. Over 40 000 users join network to share videos about education.

  The network which was made by former Texas principal was featured in Sunday edition of Daily News, read article. Article exposed more attention and now even more students and teachers go there to find information.

  In less than a year Amy Winehouse became a superstar of rock/pop music. Her album Back to Black lead to six Grammy nominations this year including Best New Artist, Album of the Year, Song of the Year and Record of the Year. Most people don’t even know that Amy Winehouse has a long music career and her first album Frank was released in 2003.

 What should we learn?  

 Amy Winehouse didn’t create new music style and she didn’t even copy any popular rock/alternative style (like “EMO”). She just gave 50s-60s music back to public in new way to perform and impress this style. From one side, her music is a folk / jazz / retro style. From another style, Amy Winehouse perform it in alternative angry-chick way.

 As we see, everything good is something we missed in the past. If we compare her music with latest technology success, we can see that “Guitar Hero” project succeed only because creators gave ”Guitar Hero” style of  80s hair metal. “Guitar Hero” came right on time, most customers who buy this product is a parents who were exactly 15-20 years old when Gun’s’n'Roses and Van Halen was huge.

 Be Creative:

  It is really annoying to see all this celebrities who look alike, who can tell me what the difference between kids in American Idol? This similarity gives them just a little piece of success they can get if they more agressive impressing themself.

 Amy Winehouse keep simple style to dress and impress herself, it makes people to remember her and recognize on magazine and tabloid covers. Her producers worked hard to make her look different from other pop celebrities, it gave her public recognition and media attention which went viral.

 Self Impression:

 Web marketers should see that Amy Winehouse did not changed her style right after success. She is still playing a role of a bad girl with drug and alcohol problems. This position keep her fans closer making them to spend more money on her products.  

 This post was written in the same style like ShoeMaker posts: 3 Things Internet Marketers Can Learn From Heroes, What Internet Marketers Can Learn From My Haunted Toilet, Things Internet Marketers Can Learn From The Pickup Artist

• Back in 70s… to start business Steve Jobs used to borrow space like garage or basement from friends and family.
• Apple first slogan was “Byte into an Apple”.
• Steve Jobs used to walk around Apple office barefoot.
• Apple Records sued Apple Computers because of trademark.
• Apple computer “Lisa” was the first computer ever to have a mouse.
• In the early 80s Apple II software package was donated to all public schools in state of California.
• In 1983 Apple sold to the public first computer with a GUI.
• Struggle between Jobs and new CEO John Sculley in 1985. Steve Jobs lost his management duties.
• Steve Jobs quit Apple in 1985 to start his own company called NeXT Inc.
• Jobs new company NeXT Inc failed to attract customers.
• Apple sued Microsoft for theft of intellectual property without any success.
• Microsoft release of Windows 95 put Apple in crisis.
• In 1997 Apple bought NeXT to bring Steve Jobs back.
• Apple and Microsoft signed partnership in 1997.
• First Apple retail store was opened in May, 2001.
• iPod was introduced in 2001.
• Apple iTunes store was introduced in 2003 after success of iPod.
• By 2007 Apple sole over 3 billion songs through Apple iTunes.
• In the beginning of 2001 Apple stock price was little more than $7 per share. By the end of 2007 price reached almost $190.
• InJanuary 2007 Apple Inc dropped the word “Computer” from its corporate name.
• By the April 2007 Apple Inc sold over 100 mil iPods.
• iPhone was introduced by Steve Jobs in January 2007.
• Greenpeace attacks Apple Inc for producing parts which unsafe for environment.
• Apple Records  (Apple Corps) sued Apple Inc again right after Apple Inc began to sell music.
• Apple iTunes don’t sell Beatles songs.
• Company was under blame for using “cheap labour” in China.
• Official Apple site is in top 100 most visited websites in the world.
• Research shows that Apple has the most artistic, educated, and creative people as customers.
• Apple has the biggest “fan club” comparing to other technology companies.
• Research shows that most people who buy Apple products for the first time come back later as regular customer.

 Also, we found another article by Richard MacManus which also called “30 facts about Apple”, you can see it here

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