Got this email today, and decided to share it and my response as a message to college kids out there that are pretty much the same as I was. Here you go:

Mark, I was in the group  that listened to you speak at the XXXX.  And I need some guidance, dude.

I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced addictive behavior before, but I’m sure you’ve got an idea of what it would be like.  Now I want to specify that I’m not addicted to drugs or alcohol or any of that junk.  I’m addicted to adventure.  Of pushing physical boundaries and experiencing new things.

But man, it’s killing me right now.  I can’t focus on anything that I need to do.  I’m a full-time undergrad and real estate agent (among other things), and this desperate search for adventure is not driving me toward my goals; it is crippling me.  Before you had the freedom to do whatever you want, whenever you want, how did you maintain focus on the things you needed to do?

My Response:

You are still in school. You don’t need to have all the answers or focus on one thing. You should be trying a lot of things until you find the one thing you really love to do and are good at. When that happens, you will be able to focus.

Being focused at 21 is way over rated. Now is the time to screw up,  try as many different things as you can and just maybe figure things out.

The thing you do need to do is learn. Learn accounting. Learn finance.  Learn statistics. Learn as much as you can about business. Read biographies about business people. You dont have to focus on 1 thing, but you have to create a base of knowledge so you are ready when its time.

You will never know when that time will come.  But you can be ready when it does.

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The premise is very simple.  Over the air broadcasters, the people who bring you TV that you can get with rabbit ears, pay nothing to the government for the allocated digital spectrum over which tv is delivered. Not only do they pay nothing to the government for that spectrum, they are no longer only using it exclusively to deliver a tv signal. They have about 19.2mbs of digital bandwidth available to them and rather than using it all for the delivery of the highest quality tv signal, they are now trying to slice and dice that bandwidth and monetize it in any way they possibly can. They create new tv channels, they lease it to companies who use it for other applications.  They basically auction it off to where ever they can find the most profitable revenue stream.  So why should the broadcaster be allowed to keep the bandwidth they are not using for their TV channel ? Rather than their auctioning it off , lets let the government reclaim it and auction it off.  Offered on a national basis, the sum value is greater than its parts and should be able to put a pretty penny in the federal coffers at a time it is sorely needed .

It makes perfect sense to me. Except that no one has really taken a contrary view on how that spectrum could be used in the future. No one has asked the question of whether or not we will regret having reclaimed that bandwidth in the future.  Of course the cynic in me always looks to see how the government might be wrong. What would cause us to regret reclaiming and reselling the spectrum ?

At least a couple things I can think of.

1. The simplest  revolves around a  question: Will there be higher bandwidth applications in the future that consumers will expect to be delivered for free to our TVs ? On the bottom of the importance scale could be 3D TV.  Of course whether or not TV is delivered in 3D is not very important.  No more important than needing to have color delivered over the air as black and white disappeared. But if 3D does become important to consumers and an expectation of the TV viewing experience (there are technologies that dont require glasses, and they will improve in quality and decrease in price), if over the air broadcasters are not required to offer it, consumers will be at the mercy of cable/telco/satellite tv distributors to charge whatever they want and the value and most likely sustainability of over the air broadcasters will decline considerably.

As I said, 3D TV is an example, but not necessarily a good one.  Ask yourself a simple question. What type of high bandwidth applications could you imagine being delivered to our future digital TVs in 5, 10, 20 years ? Now that TV is delivered digitally over the air, and all new TVs are digital, basically computers behind a screen, is there any reason not to believe that an entirely new generation of applications will be developed that benefit from being delivered over the air ? That what we call TV today, could look very antiquated in 1o years if we only had the bandwidth to enable it ?

Of course this is where people chime in and say “the internet can support all of that”. Not so fast.  The beauty of broadcast TV is that it has 2 very unique features that differentiate it from delivery of content over the internet. The first of which is economic. The marginal cost per viewer is zero. In other words, it costs the same amount to deliver the 19.2mbs of applications and content to the first viewer as it does to every possible viewer. That is not the case with the internet. If that were the case there would be no need for companies like Akamai to even exist.  Every additional internet viewer or user costs the broadcaster of the content money. Each incremental viewer requires a variety of additional resources, from CPU cycles to bandwidth.  Broadcasting over the air is always cheaper than on the net.

The 2nd feature that differentiates it significantly from the internet is the fact that it is a true broadcast medium.  There is no contention for the bandwidth that is being delivered. On the internet if someone in your neighborhood is using a lot of bandwidth, your performance could slow down. With a broadcast medium, you can run into distance limitations, and like the internet delivered over cable, there could be interference issues, but unlike the internet, the performance and quality of broadcast tv is never impacted by the number of people receiving the signal or the other things they may be using the shared bandwidth for. Thats important.

Why is it important ? For national security reasons ?

Right now the spectrum is officially owned by the government and broadcasters have an obligation to act in the interests of the people, as defined by the FCC.  If we auction off the spectrum to private interests, its gone. It is  owned privately. The government cant get it back no matter how badly it needs it without taking steps that are damning in their very nature.

What could the government need the spectrum for ?

2.  National Security. Thats what the government could  need it for. I don’t know of a single person with a technology background that doesn’t believe there will be a cyber attack of some consequence in the next 10 years that will essentially shut down a city, region of the country or worse.  I was in NY during the blackout 6 years ago. That was bad. We relied on backup generators to power our TVs and battery powered radios.  But things have changed considerably in just 6 years.  We have become far more digitally dependent.  Much of our lives is transported through the internet, and that dependence is increasing. It is going to happen. Hopefully it will be on a small scale and we will immediately get smart enough to prevent it from happening again.  But what happens while an entire city’s internet and digital infrastructure is down ? How do we communicate or receive communications ?

We get our communications through broadcast. Im not talking about being able to get your CBS evening news over the air to your TV. Im not talking about whether or not you have access to a crank powered radio to hear the latest.  Im talking about the value of having 19.2mbs of bandwidth that is able to reach most of the population in the continental US and deliver whatever type of information /data that we may need.

This isnt something that could easily happen today. But if there was a huge emergency, it sure would be nice if the government could step in and reclaim as much bandwidth as they need and broadcast whatever they need to broadcast to us. (im sure they will use satellite as well, but far from enough people have receivers).   It may be video. It may be maps localized to show us trouble spots. It may be information about utilities. It may be instructions on how to solve a problem caused by the cyber attack. Who knows. But i would rather be in a position where the bandwidth, and enough of it, was available for broadcast rather than reading how “shortsighted we were to sell off the bandwidth to wireless providers rather than consider how we could have used this broadcast bandwidth in a national or regional emergency”

I also know that once it happened twice (they would say the first time was a unique exception), then there would be a mandate to require that all new HDTVs and (possibly phones and future digital devices) to also be able to receive data from broadcast sources  and store it on internal and/or external storage  to be viewable on the tv , and potentially an executable file that provides support and help in the emergency.

The bottom line is whether or not there are applications that would benefit national security. I dont know, but i think we have to at least consider the possibility.

Of course this is all pie in the sky hypothetics. Maybe someone has already thought this side of it through. Maybe its ridiculous on its face. I dont know.

But maybe not.  I think there is a greater than zero chance that in the next 10 years  broadcast bandwidth can be of value to the country in an emergency. We need to at least consider this before we sell off the spectrum

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I can’t go more than a week without shooting baskets. There is something about the feel of the ball coming off my hand, and the sound of the ball going through the net. It just feels good.

If I’m just standing in the gym, I can shoot pretty well. Playing in a game. Well it’s not quite what it used to be. I used to have a spin move that would work for me no matter who I was playing against or what level they were at. If I could get a pick and the defender went under, I didn’t have to think about it, I could hit the shot. These days, my mind knows what to do, but my body just laughs at me. Put me up against 20 year olds, and I won’t embarrass myself but it’s only because I know how to set a pick and hit an open, a very wide open jumper, and spend the rest of the game getting out of the way.

I love to compete. I always have. Playing basketball was just something I had to do no matter how good I was and its something I will always do, no matter how old I get. It gives me a chance to blow off steam. It gives me a way to refocus.

But no matter how much I love to play the game or how involved and competitive I get during a Mavs game, it’s only a minor release. Real competition comes from the sport of business.

In sports, you know who your opponents are. You know when you are going to play a game. You know pretty much how long the game will last. It’s mentally and physically exhausting if you are at the top of the game, but it still pails at the effort required to be successful in business.

The sport of business isn’t divided into games. It’s not defined by practices. It doesn’t have set rules that everyone plays by.

The sport of business is the ultimate competition. It’s 7×24×365xforever.

I love the sport of business. I love the competition. I love the fire of it. It’s the feeling of the clock winding down, the ball is in your hands, and if you hit the shot you win…all day, every day.

Relaxing is for the other guy. I may be sitting in front of the TV, but I’m not watching it unless I think there is something I can learn from it. I’m thinking about things I can use in my business and the TV is just there.

I could take the time to read a fiction book, but I don’t. I would rather read websites, newspapers, magazines, looking for ideas and concepts that I can use. I spend time in bookstores because 1 idea from a book or magazine can make me money.

I’m not going to go to dinner with you just to chat. I’m not going to give you a call to see how you are. Unless you want to talk business. Other guys play fantasy sports. I fire the synapses to get an edge.

That’s what success is all about. It’s about the edge.

It’s not who you know. It’s not how much money you have. It’s very simple. It’s whether or not you have the edge and have the guts to use it.

The edge is getting so jazzed about what you do, you just spent 24 hours straight working on a project and you thought it was a couple hours.

The edge is knowing that you have to be the smartest guy in the room when you have your meeting and you are going to put in the effort to learn whatever you need to learn to get there.

The edge is knowing is knowing that when the 4 girlfriends you have had in the last couple years asked you which was more important, them or your business, you gave the right answer.

The edge is knowing that you can fail and learn from it, and just get back up and in the game.

The edge is knowing that people think your crazy, and they are right, but you don’t care what they think.

The edge is knowing how to blow off steam a couple times a week, just so you can refocus on business

The edge is knowing that you are getting to your goals and treating people right along the way because as good as you can be, you are so focused that you need regular people around you to balance you and help you.

The edge is being able to call out someone on a business issue because you know you have done your homework.

The edge is recognizing when you are wrong, and working harder to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

The edge is being able to drill down and identify issues and problems and solve them before anyone knows they are there.

The edge is knowing that while everyone else is talking about nonsense like the will to win, and how they know they can be successful, you are preparing yourself to compete so that you will be successful.

That’s what makes business such an amazing sport. Everyone plays it. Everyone talks about how good they are or will be at it. Just a small percentage are.

Every single day someone has an idea. Every day someone talks about some business they want to start. Every day someone is out there starting a business whose entire goal is to beat the hell out of yours. How cool is that.

Every day some stranger from any where in the world that you have never met is trying to come up with a way to put you out of business. To take everything you have worked your ass off for, and take it all away. If you are in a growing industry, there could be hundreds or thousands of strangers trying to figure out ways to put you out of business. How cool is that.

The ultimate competition. Would you like to play a game called Eat Your Lunch. We are going to face off. My ability to execute on an idea vs yours. My ability to subvert your business vs your ability to keep it going. My ability to create ways to remove any reason for your business to exist vs your ability to do the same to me. My ability to know what you are going to do, before you do it. Who gets there first? Best of all, this game doesn’t have a time limit. It’s forever. It never ends. It’s the ultimate competition.

It’s the sport of business. It’s not for everyone, but I love it.

I’m fortunate. I have done well enough financially that I don’t have to play 24×7×365. I can and have cut back to 18×7×365. Family first now.

But in those 18 hours, you can bet I’m competing, and loving it.

But that’s me. You have to figure out what works for you.

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Unique opportunities. How many of them will you have in your life ? 1 ? None ? 100s ? The thing about life is that its impossible to know. You never know when something you never even considered could happen, will happen.

As something you has been incredibly blessed, let me just tell you that the things at the top of my list are not numbers or dollars.  They are my family and the things I had fun doing.

A lot of people think Im crazy, or chasing publicity, or whatever. I don’t care what they think. Before I do any of the many things that I get asked to do, and that I think might be fun, I have one simple question i ask myself.  When I hopefully turn 90 and look back at my life , would I regret having done it, or not having done it ?

Before I started Motley’s Pub with Evan Williams when we were at Indiana University and I wasnt even old enough to drink, it was the question i asked myself. Before we sold MicroSolutions. Before I spent the money to buy a Lifetime Pass on American Airlines when I was 29 and then retired to travel the word.  Before I bought the Mavs. Before I did The Benefactor on ABC, or Dancing with the Stars, or Survivor and RAW this coming monday nite, or any number of other fun and amazing things I have done. Its the question I asked myself. To me its part of being successful.

When Im 90, will I smile when i think back, or will I frown and regret not having done it.  IMHO,  Success is about making your life a special version of unique that fits who you are. Not what other people want you to be.

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Google is unquestionably the best at selling advertising on line.  They can sell Text, Display, Video at a level that is unparalleled anywhere.  True ?

The Newspaper industry obviously sucks at doing the same. Eric Schmidt said so in his editorial in the Wall Street Journal.

So why isn’t Google taking advantage of this unique opportunity ? Why not just offer a specially tailored version of AdSense for Newspapers ? They do what they do, create content. You do what you do, generate content and sell ads ?

Makes sense. Wont happen.

Why ? Because of the Google hypocrisy in play.  This argument is no different than the same argument they made with Youtube and the music and film industries.  All those movies, tv shows, music videos on Youtube were GREAT PROMOTION. The music and movie industries shouldnt blame Google if they don’t know how to monetize all the billions of views and impressions Google and Youtube provided the content industry. Right ?

But a funny thing happened along the way. Google  caved on Youtube.  Their message is no longer “if you cant monetize the traffic, tough luck”. Youtube is now sharing revenue with as many music and video content sources as they can. They are even setting up VEVO a satellite music video site built around  Universal Music Group content.

There is absolutely zero chance that the end of this discussion is Google saying “You will take our traffic and like it”.  Google is posturing.  They recognize they have the advantage. Particularly  if MicroSoft/Bing do nothing with Newscorp. Its only a question of how they use it.

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Free ain’t what it used to be. It costs a lot of money.

Keeping content free can be very expensive. Just look at the decision process that Hulu is going through. On one hand, the site is an unquestionable success measured in visitors. People want the content. On the other hand, it doesn’t generate a consistent, predictable revenue stream. It has all the risks associated with any advertising supported content business.  To make matters far worse, their best and most popular content is the key to the largest and most consistent revenue stream that content licensees have, subscription fees from your local cable/sat/telco TV provider.

So what about this as an interim solution for Hulu and other comparable sites. Take a page from the first years of Facebook. Limit free to people with qualified .edu emails that register.

Students make up a big chunk of the population  most likely to make the time to steal content . So why not just recognize it ?

Sure, it may make some other people unhappy. Sure, its not foolproof.  But its a starting point.

Im curious what readers think.

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There was a note in today’s NY Times saying that European Soccer leaders have unanimously backed a proposal to limit participation in future Olympics to players under the age of 21. (Currently, the Olympics are limited to under 23 plus 3 overage players. ).

All I can say is Amen.

I have argued why its crazy for the NBA to loan its best players to the USOC , which is first, last and middle a for profit organization that is using our players to generate billions of dollars of revenues. Not millions, BILLIONs.

Its crazy on every level.

Now that the European Soccer Community is pushing to remove their most highly paid and best players from the Olympics, we should support their efforts.

For the major revenue generating sports, the Olympics are no longer about Patriotism. They are a business.

If we want to find out which country has the best basketball, lets create a competitive tournament that is honest about why it exists and make it a profit making entity that shares the profits with its participants. A notion that is foreign to the Olympic Committee .

When we sent the Dream Team in 1992,  it was the right thing to do at the right time.  Our competition was sending what were essentially professional teams to face our collegiate players. Today, that is no longer the case. The NBA and professional basketball has become an international sport.

We could still send our under 21 players to the Olympics.  They will represent our country admirably, Im sure.  More importantly, it would be a great business move for the NBA. Those players we send will get far more branding and marketing assigned to them then their current one and done collegiate careers (and the prospects of playing in the Olympics may incent them to stay in college as well).

The incremental branding the Olympics would provide the players would make them far more valuable to, and marketable by the NBA should they make it to our level. To those who can’t, as young Olympians, their opportunity to continue their careers as pro players in other leagues would improve as well.

NBA fans, and this owner are tired of players who are unable to play to their full potential because they play for other profit seeking enterprises . Its not just about Mavs players. Its about players for all NBA teams. Its harder to sell tickets when a star on the other team cant play due to injury. Its time we follow the lead of these European Soccer leaders and ask our players to only play for  the profit seeking enterprise that pays them and limit the Olympics to players under 21. IF the Olympics can make billions using our under 21 players, more power to them.

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More than a year ago I wrote a post (see below) about taxing stock transactions. I suggested 10c per share on both sides. Some of our politicians are suggesting .025pct.  There really is no reason not to do it either way. Spreads have narrowed in the past several years to pennies from nickels, dimes and quarters. So we know that the market can operate with the wider spreads.  Historically spreads are the profit margin of market makers. Well in this era, who is a bigger market maker than the US Treasury ? They are providing liquidity at every corner, so why shouldn’t they (we) get paid for it ?

Of course like any other government attempt to raise taxes, how they use the money is where they will absolutely screw it up. In this example they want to use half the money to fund a Job Creation Fund.  A government run Job Creation Fund is the ultimate Oxymoron.  Let me offer another post of mine that suggests that we open the doors to entrepreneurs and simplify and cheapen their cost to start businesses. The process of creating a company in this  country has become so burdensome at the hand of regulation, insurance, taxes and administrivia, that we are slowing the true job creation engine that this country needs right now. Instead of the Government funding jobs, if the focus is on job creation, which is what it should be today, these funds should be used to remove all friction to those who start, fund and run companies.

This is from an excerpt from a  post of mine and it is exactly what a smart politician should propose today in order to stimulate the creation of jobs in this country

How to Jumpstart the Economy – Tax Free Small Businesses

Jul 28th 2008 10:13AM

What has impacted my decision on whether or not to start a business is the amount of paperwork involved and the local, state and employer taxes involved. Its complicated and expensive to start even the smallest business in the real world. The real world of course is different than the Internet world. The state of business, and in particular, entrepreneurship in the US has devolved into two worlds, the Internet and the real world.

In the Internet world, all you have to do is setup an account with an ad network, put it on your website, generate some traffic and they send you a check. . No licenses, no tax id, no announcements in the newspaper. It took me minutes. Its exactly what millions of people do as well and its created an entire Internet economy that lives off of Google, Yahoo, MIcroSoft, AOL, Ebay and others. Its the entrepreneurs path of least resistance, which is exactly why most take this route.

Compare that with setting up a real world business. This is from the State of Texas: (Which I am proud to say makes it far easier than most states to start a business).

Step 1:Legal Structure and Registrations
Step 2:Business Tax Responsibilities
Step 3:Licenses Permits and Registrations (Note to State of TX, this link was broken, I had to find the destination page )
Step 4:Business Employer Requirements

As an entrepreneur , I can tell you that working through the requirements of these four steps is scary and intimidating. Why ? Because to merely start your business, you have to deal with lawyers and accountants, which not only costs a lot of money, but more importantly, requires you to trust those lawyers and accountants to make decisions that could have make or break consequences on your business. You may have the best idea with the ability to execute on that idea, but one little snafu by these professionals and your business is down the tubes.

Even worse, if you mess up on any of this, you could get in legal trouble. You could get sued, or find yourself in the middle of some legal nightmare.

Then of course, there is the financial reality of having to pay all of the business and employer taxes and ever increasing insurance premiums.

Which brings us back to How to Jump Start the Economy.

If you want to see an immediate re invigoration of the economy, open the door back up for individual entrepreneurs to enter the real world without fear and without an immediate financial burden that pre empts their ability to be successful.

If we really want to stimulate job creation in this country, take the same approach to small business with 25 or fewer employees that we take to Internet taxes. Outlaw them.

No taxes or license fees of any kind on small businesses with 25 or fewer employees. No employer payroll tax. No state or local taxes. No taxes on earnings. No Payroll taxes.  Nada. Use the money from the proposed taxes on the trade of public shares to fund not only this, but healthcare insurance premiums as well. The business owners and their employees will pay income taxes on their personal income , but not corporate earnings

The only taxes they would collect and remit are sales taxes and of course they would still file personal income taxes on their individual earnings.

Make this available exclusively to owner operated companies and only allow the operator to own and operate a single company (to prevent gaming the system).

The impact on the economy would be amazing and immediate. Those without jobs would be able to work for themselves. They would be able to join together and start companies. They would be able to take risks with far less capital and far less fear of failure.  Sweat Equity would be all it takes to start a business. In addition, we would see many cash only propreiters go legit.

Not only would we see hundreds of thousands of new businesses started seemingly overnight, with millions of new hires, but from those new businesses would come new ideas that hopefully would give us our next engine for economic growth that super cedes today’s ideas.

For Congress, the challenge will be to keep the process simple. A simple no cost, online registration for the businesses, with information about the who, what, where and ownership of the companies so that they can track and help fund them. Which in turn would create the information base from which to fund the state  and local revenue that would be lost. Easy  ? No. But a far greater reward in job creation and growth for the country than the Government creating Job Funds and public works efforts.

In this economy  we should open the door to our country’s Intellectual capital and the entrepreneurial energy that separates us from the rest of the world. Make it easy for entrepreneurs to do what entrepreneurs do, and great things happen. Voters and politicians alike seem to have forgotten what has made this country an economic powerhouse. We need to focus on creating a friction free environment for small businesses. That is exactly what will create jobs

Tax the Hell Out of Wall Street; Give it to Main Street

Sep 30th 2008 9:02AM

Tax every single share of stock that is bought and sold 10 cents per transaction. One dime. If you buy a share of stock, your brokerage pays a 10c tax. If you sell a share, your brokerage pays a 10c tax. 1 share, 100 million shares. Its 10 cents per share.

Of course the  tax will be paid for by those of us who are buying and selling stocks. So what. Here is the reality. If you are a true investor. Someone who wants to own a share of stock in a company you believe in, then its an amount that is not going to impact your investment decision making process.

If you are a professional trader or an institutional trader that trades continuously, then it may impact your decision making process, but only to the point of reducing your returns by a minimal amount. Its not going to change your inclination to trade. If you make 9.9pct instead of 10pct, you aren’t going to stop trading.

Whats the economic impact ?

If the NYSE, Nasdaq, Amex and OTC are trading 2 Billion shares a day, thats $ 200 Million Dollars PER DAY. If there are 260 trading days a year. Thats about 52 Billion dollars a year.

Thats real money.

Of course there has to be some fine print. You could reduce the tax per share for stocks under $5 dollars to 5cents. But i would leave it at 5cents even for stocks priced at pennies per share or less. This tax would act as a protection for investors and traders who get pitched unregulated penny stocks and who are more often than not the victims of rip off artists.

Take this $52 Billion Dollars and ????. I will open it to the floor for suggestions and save my conclusion for a later post.

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Ok,  I am getting bored talking about fox and google.  But as things pop up, like news in the media saying that MicroSoft is trying to entice Fox to “de-list” from Google, I cant pass up posting on it. Particularly when it makes so much sense

Here is why Bing paying Fox to De-list from Google can be a significant first step and can work:

First, Bing doesn’t  need to get the most popular sites to join fox in de-listing. They need the most popular searches in the categories they want to impact.

Bing just has to corner the market on specific categories. If they are  able to corner some little corners, say sites about auto news, by paying bloggers and news sites in this category to go exclusive with Bing, they can trumpet it loud and far that if you want information about a new car, you have to go to Bing because “they dont take Google”. (did Visa’s They Dont Take Amex ad campaign work ?”)

Or they can target to pay sites about mesothelioma and other diseases that ambulance chasers covet and pay huge dollars per click through, or other high paying PPC searches. The advertisers for these categories go where they can get the most clicks. It wont change marketshare, but it could change how the battle between Googe and Bing is fought. If they can win enough categories, all of the sudden they have some bragging rights that set a platform for people to question googles positioning.

Then consider MicroSofts first move on twitter and their investment in Facebook as an indicator they  could be looking to stake out a position in the value of realtime information.

Which makes  the public positions of AP and Reuters and other top news sites all the more interesting. One thing they all have in common ? They dont like the way google has treated them and they all need  money.  To think they wont jump aboard and grab a cash offer from MicroSoft that precludes Google is crazy. For the right amount of money you can get them to shut out Google and restrict downstream access of their content to Google faster than they can say “Google Who?” Thats how bad they need the money AND dislike Google (this isnt just about news, Google Scholar is going after  Reuter’s Westlaw as an example). Just as critical, I dont think it takes a relatively large amount to get them onboard.  Given the volume of news these two companies create, impacting the positioning of Google is not as far fetched as some may like to think.

Many, like Henry Blodgett on Silicon Insider correctly make the point that news from de-listed sites will eventually find its way on to other sites and into the Google Index. But  after how long ?

If Reuters and AP de-list, it will be a lot longer than you think. If you havent noticed the number of reporters generating original reporting is falling like a rock.  Much of the news you think is original content is reposted from Reuters and AP.  If Google doesnt have access to their output, they will have to wait for someone to actually re-write the story, probably after reading it on an AP or Reuters customer site (its called  plagiarism to some, fair use to others) and post it. Without question there will be  a lag time. Which may be all that MicroSing needs.  You can get ALL the news you need on Bing NOW, or you can wait, and wait, and wait for it on Google.

Getting news first has been a position of value that has worked for a long, long  time. No reason to think it might not work again here.

And finally, Google already has a problem in that they do a horrible job of blocking spam in their date sorted results. Removing valid results is going to make their date sorted results look even worse.

De-List a few key sites. Win a few categories. Offer the news first. Make the people you pay to de-list also make Bing their default on site search engine.  You just never know. Stranger things have happened. Like we say in sports. Thats why we play the games

So bing just might have a shot

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Hows that for a title.  Just thought it would be a fun day to rehash some old posts that made me look a little prescient

Today the feds arrested 2 programmers that worked for Madoff. I wrote this in January:

Jan 18th 2009 10:11AM

Im taking a flyer here, but if they were to put me on the case, the first people I would talk to are the software developers.  Somewhere along the line there was a software program written or modified that allowed Madoff to enter the numbers he made up, who they were paying out cash to and would print the checks and  statements.  Its very unlikely that it was off the shelf software because it would be impossible for all the numbers to balance, or he would need to use suspense type of accounts that would raise red flags for even the smallest of accounting firms.

Maybe I have missed it, but I have yet to see an article written or any commentary about the software Madoff Investments used or read about any programmers that have come forward that worked for him. Someone had to outline the details of what they wanted the software to do, and in a scam of this size, could it be anyone but Madoff himself ? Someone had to take that information and either create or modify software to keep the whole mess running smoothly for him.

Find the programmers who wrote the software and you will find out how the whole thing worked.

And as the Google, Murdoch discussions continue, some people have actually started to recognize there might be something to what I wrote in May of 08

Is there anything more fun than sitting around, growing your hair, drinking a Bud while listening to Jethro Tull and pondering how to change the balance of power in the search world and unseat Google ?
Better search ? Too subjective. Better monetization ? After the fact. Better User Interface ? Will we know it when we see it ? A new and different search ? Semantic ? Human powered ? We won’t know till we know.

But what about the Google Index, all the websites that are indexed by Google ? What is it worth to be in the Google Index ? What would you, as a website owner require in order to remove your site from the Google Index and no longer be available when someone does a google search ?

It should just be a matter of dollars and cents and sense, shouldn’t it ?

How many websites would have to recuse themselves from the Google Index before Google Search was negatively impacted ?

Mahalo.com thinks it needs to support the 25k most common search terms in order to be successful. What would happen if MicroSoft or Yahoo or a MicroHoo went to the 5 top results for the top 25k searches and paid them to leave the Google Index ?

A theoretical maximum of 125k sites, but with overlap, probably closer to 100k or less, times how much per site on average ?

The math starts to get interesting. At $1,000 per site average times 100k sites, thats only $ 1 Billion Dollars. The distribution would obviously favor the larger sites, so of that billion dollars, would the top 1k sites take 500k each and the remaining 99k split the rest ?

Given the stakes, why stop at $ 1 Billion Dollars ? Would the top 1k most visited sites take a cool $1mm each, plus a committment from MicroSoft or Yahoo to drive traffic through their search engines to more than make up for the lost Google Traffic. After all, once consumers realized that Google no longer had valid search results for the top 25k searchs, that traffic would most likely go to MicroSoft and Yahoo.

And why we are at it, why not require that these 100k sites switch from Googles Publisher Network to Yahoo’s or MicroSofts ? It would start to earn back the $1 Billion paid out very quickly.

On top of that, in order to grease the skids even further, why not issue advertising credits to the sites that switched off Google ? Its soft dollars, that would sweeten the pot and drive more traffic.

IN essence, its no different that any other content aggregation play. Its paying for content . But, It would take some big ones to go for it and see if it worked. However, without question, every search engine has some number of core sites, that when removed from its index , destabilizes the value of its search.

The question is how many ? What would it cost to get that number of sites to turn Google off and stay off, and would the traffic created as users switch from Google more than compensate for the cost ?

Or would Google recognize the risk and jump in and offer more to websites to stay ?

Sure would be interesting to find out.

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