I see Facebook as the AIG of Web 2.0 - too big to fail - yet Facebook is running out of money, just like AIG did and Marketing Piligrim asks is Facebook Headed for Financial Ruin? According to TechCrunch:

“… Facebook’s growth, thanks to all these user-created translated versions of the site, has probably exceeded even their own internal projections. And running this engine isn’t cheap.

The company is likely spending well over a $1 million per month on electricity alone, say experts we’ve spoken with. Bandwidth is likely another $500,000 or more per month on top of that. The company has earmarked $100 million to buy 50,000 servers this year and next. And sources say they’ve been buying one NetApp 3070 storage system per week just to keep up with all this user generated content. At up to $2 million each, that adds up quickly - we’ve heard estimates that they may have spent as much as $30 million this year alone with the company. And the icing on the cake - earmark another $15 million per year in office and datacenter rent payments.

And don’t forget those human assets. With 750 employees and growing, Facebook is spending at least another $10 million per month on payroll.

It costs a couple of hundred million dollars a year just to keep the lights on at Facebook. But the real problem is keeping up with growth, particularly storage needs. Add another $100 million or more per year for capital expenditures, and you’ve got a company that’s doing exactly the opposite of printing money.”

But that’s my point - Facebook is too much a part of what is happening today to be left to fail - so I’m not worried about Facebook falling on it’s face - I’m more worried about the rest of the world falling into a financial depression, and what that is going to look like and be like, to live though.

I do think Facebook will need to become more profitable, though - and that means developing stuff people will buy more of - and at that, in an environment when people are spending less and less.

I wanted to see how far I could go with the iPhone as a replacement for my sketchpad and painting surface.

I had fun and lost sense of time, but when I finally gave up and felt as if I went as far as I could with my self portrait, 2 hours had passed.

Probably nothing - it’s not about the money - but some people do get paid according to a post on Read/Write Web - How Much Do Top Tier Bloggers and Social Media Consultants Get Paid? We Asked Them!

A friend sent me the RWW link today and I was thinking … so all that great stuff I read in TechCrunch and Gizmodo, etc .. the top Blogger is lucky to make what, say, a Teacher makes after a year or two - with a lot of uncertainty thrown in.

I mean, didn’t Gawker just close down a few more blogs recently and lay off some “Top Bloggers” - Yep… The Gawker Layoff Tipline.

If your into security - blogging is not for you.   But I find Blogging is great if your inclination is to blog, anyway.

It’s opened up a lot of doors for me, a lot.

Last week, while I was at Emetrics Marketing Optimization Summit in Alexandra, VA, Avinash Kaushik presented the new features of Google Analytics, see Google Analytics Enhancements - Avanish Kaushik (which I have hardly played with yet) and it’s just one more nail in vender oriented Web Analytics - the answer is no one “owns” the data anymore - or, should I say ….. Google owns it all…. ha, ha, ha.

Read about it in The Google Analytics update: Thoughts and Implications by Eric T. Peterson in Web Analytics Demystified blog.

Here’s a portion of Eric’s post where he talks about the motion chart, above, and what it means to the high end vendors who will find it harder and harder to get new contracts or keep the one’s they have.

Google Analytics, adding missing functionality like segmentation, customization, and data export functionality given the associated costs and the fact that Google Analytics already dominates the web analytics landscape with an over 65% marketshare across all sites with tag-based analytics deployed.”

Except it appears that nobody told Google this. Or, if they did, Google didn’t listen.

Now don’t get me wrong, the new features are not totally perfect.  The segmentation feature which is receiving the most hype within the web analytics community is not true visitor-level segmentation but rather session-based segmentation which severely limits an experienced practitioner’s ability to drill-down into the data. But I suppose this is a perfect example of “you get what you pay for” and since we’re not paying having multidimensional session-level segmentation that can be immediately applied to all historical data is pretty sweet.

On the upside, I was actually pretty surprised about Motion Charts which to me seemed like a tchotchky but after playing with it for just a little bit I’m inclined to agree with Yahoo’s Dennis Mortensen that Motion Charts have potential. I especially like the “Link to Chart” option that seems to allow us to share the visualizations we create with other Google Analytics users.

Here’s a Motion Chart that I’m rather enjoying the use of: Keywords by goal conversion rate by bounce rate sized by Percent New Visits colored uniquely with trails turned on.

But here’s my point - regardless of weather Google is being “Good” or “Evil”,  or of what it’s ultimately going to do with all this data - the issue is this …. if Omniture, Coremetrics and WebTrends don’t add enough value to the data, they’ll become obsolete, I’d say - within 3 years.

Yes, Google now has signaled they have the High End Vendors of Web Analytics in their sight.

But aren’t we just talking about no one “owning the data” anymore?   After all, isn’t everything going into the “Cloud” pretty soon?   Who really owns anything, anymore?

The value of what we offer is the life we bring to it - not the acquisition of the data, not even the presentation of it - but the “intelligence” we produce from it.

So here’s how I see it.

Water.  Bottled Water.  And yes, some people like Anil Dash think Bottled Water is a scam -  but really, it water (data) is really …. free … then it’s how it’s presented that we’re paying for …. attributes of Branding that we value.

Except, Branding is related to “demonstrative value” - so ….. it’s not the data, itself, that we should be paying for (hell, Google is giving it all away to us for free … why should we go and pay a ton of money to big vendors … even companies like ComScore … which I personally feel should not be charging separately for each view of the data, when it’s the same data we’re looking at, that we already bought - same thing for the Web Analytics Vendors.

Pretty much, the age of vendors like WebTrends, Omniture, Coremetrics, is slowly setting - or should I say … quickly setting, much like the age of Elves in the Lord of the Rings - (towards the age of Man?).

Getting back to what Eric T. Peterson is saying (saw him last week at Emetrics, by the way, along with Avinash):

Especially in this uncertain economy, if I have to choose between spending between $20K to $50K on an entry-level SiteCatalyst/Coremetrics/WebTrends/Unica/Nedstat deployment or spending nothing to explore the use of segmentation, report customization, and Motion Charts while waiting for someone like DataLinks to port their application to the Google Analytics APIs so you can spend $995 to build totally customized key performance indicator reports in Excel … well, as a small business owner the choice is pretty clear.

WebTrends recent announcement about moving increasingly into BI, essentially as middleware between web data and traditional business analysis applications, is typical of the response I expect we’re going to see from the for-fee vendors. Some type of move up-market to continue to justify the expense of data collection, which will further limit opportunities for growth since I expect the end-user market to continue to mature at a much slower pace than the available technology set.

I mean, why pay for data collection and storage if Google and Yahoo are going to give it away? Especially in the context of those APIs and the low-cost applications we’ll inevitably see, I suspect the management teams at Omniture, Coremetrics, WebTrends, Unica, and Nedstat are looking suspiciously at their Q4 and Q1 2009 projections for SMB sales and global expansion trying to figure out exactly how much free web analytics will ultimately impact the business.

Eric ends his post by re-saying all he said, but in bullet points - and here’s the parts that most struck me:

“…I still don’t think Google Analytics is appropriate for advanced practitioners, at least not as a system of record, but the number of truly advanced practitioners working out there today is still relatively small;

• I think the Data Export APIs are the most exciting aspect of this announcement and I’m looking forward to all the cool, new applications that will inevitably spring up based on these APIs;
• I think that Google has sucked the wind out of Yahoo’s sails, whether they intended to or not, but I still don’t think that Google Analytics and Yahoo Web Analytics are directly competitive;
• I think the vendor folks most impacted by this announcement are the teams responsible for SMB sales, the expansion into Europe and Asia, and anyone selling web analytics solutions at a sub-$50K price point;
• I expect the for-fee vendors to respond to Google Analytics not by picking on the features (remember: voters don’t like negative campaigning!) but rather by working to more aggressively take their existing suites and platforms up-market;
• I don’t expect this announcement to be a death blow to anyone. Rather it serves as yet another reinforcement of the inevitable commoditization of the web analytics data collection market and a wake-up call to any company with a ten-year plan to continue to make money counting page views.

So … that means in a couple of years, the big three (WebTrends, Coremetrics and Omniture ……) … bye … they ‘re going to have a really hard time.

But again, if they’re charging for features that … have become like “water” then why should we drink their water when we can get the same features, almost, for free?

I think I need to spend a few days really playing with Google Analytics now … I have no excuse …. I asked Avinish and the Google Analytics team for these improvements and they have delivered.

Now, it’s time for me to do the same.

Looking forward to next Wednesday’s event (Mashable Motivational Meet with Gary Vaynerchuk (Post ad:tech NYC Event) where I’ll be attending a Gary Vaynerchuk event in Mid Manhattan - meanwhile Gary created a video clip about why smart business decisions often come out of hardship, but don’t need to.

I think people need to be challenged to bring out the best we have to offer - often we don’t know what we’re capable of, till our backs are against the wall - in order words, we all have hidden resources of energy and talent that often don’t come into play until we need them to draw on it.

Jetpack Dreams Trailer from Mac Montandon on Vimeo.

I always wanted one …. darn….
Just wondering how much more there is to say in a book that came out this week that is not actually in this video.

Maybe I’ll look for the Jetpack Dream book and find out -Jetpack Dreams: One Man’s Up and Down (But Mostly Down) Search for the Greatest Invention That Never Was.

Interesting article by Saul Hansell of the New York Times about collecting and harvesting web data to sell to interested third parties - Forget Taxes - This Plumber Wants to Sell Your Data; here’s an excerpt from the article

Last week, Akamai agreed to buy Acerno, a three-year old advertising network that draws data about what people shop for from more than 400 online stores. (I wrote about some of the privacy implications of Acerno’s existing business last week.)

But the bigger question is what does it mean that Akamai, one of the most important Internet companies that most people have never heard of, wants to collect data about people?

As best as I can tell, Akamai’s plan move doesn’t have the profound implications for privacy that the efforts by Internet service providers to monitor their customers’ Web surfing do. Unlike I.S.P.’s, Akamai doesn’t automatically know who Web surfers are and it doesn’t see every click they make. But Akamai does see a lot of clicks, and it works with companies that do know who users are, so there are potentially a lot of implications for both privacy and the advertising business.

Akamai gets paid by companies to make their Web sites appear on the screens of their users faster. It places copies of the largest files, like photos and videos, on thousands of servers spread all over the world to speed delivery. Akamai is the leader in these content delivery networks, but it has a lot of competition putting pressure on prices and creating an incentive to find new sources of revenue.

So, doesn’t everyone want your data?  Who doesn’t want it?

I guess, as long as Akamai doesn’t combine the data, it’s not violating any privacy rules - but if it enables someone else combining the data it wants to collect, it’s their problem, not Akamai’s.

Do you agree with that?   My feeling - if I’m around an alcoholic and I put out some booze, but I say … don’t drink this, it’s not good for you …. and the alcoholic drinks it anyway - is it all their fault?  I don’t think so.

It’s cold and chilly in NYC tonight; much of the day it rained and drizzled and I felt I was on the top of a 39 floor mountain looking down into the rainy fog, below, from my midtown office space.

Today was interesting for a number of reasons including a few good posts on Google Analytics new visualization features and a nice review of motion charts by Dennis in VisualRevenue, where he said that charting more than 3 dimensions requires more complex charting, and that such charting is much more than eye candy.

I also saw that NuConomy, whose CEO I interviewed here, last May, just entered into a public beta today, and NuConomy has some pretty unique visualizations.

And then I did some work, on my own, using Comscore Local Market reporting for a select group of DMA’s and websites, and overlayed unique visitors by DMA with internal data on job postings (by employers) and Resumes posted (by Job Seekers).

I saw some very interesting patterns once I overlayed the data, visualizing data in a way making sense to me.

It is all about traffic, but my visualization showed some DMA’s with less than expected visitors and resumes posted.

It got me thinking on how I may never have noticed the relationships between data points had I not had a hunch about it. I even figured out an “effectiveness metric” base on what percentage of traffic applied for a job during a session.

And it all comes back to visualization, which is why I’m an artist.

For me, it’s all about seeing relationships between data, and I was exhilirated as I had time to think this through.

Actually, there’s one more thing I’m adding (12 hours later) and I thought about it last week - in an organization, even a small one, but certainly in most large ones, there’s a lot of information lying around that only the people who use it regularly know about.   That’s a big challenge for a Web Analysts - because we create meaning in our work, largly by overlaying information.

But a lot of times ….. too often ….. we don’t have the right information (and even if we have it - it’s not in the right form or from the right source).    Therefore, I think it’s a top priority to create a map of every tool and every bit of information that exists in a company and who owns it (and uses it).   It starts with an audit - but it should be a database that you can search on, and it will will tell you the owner and users.

I’ve seen versions of tools at IBM that have some of this - but they were not created for the purposes I am talking about - it was more done for accountability, and only covered certain kinds of ownership - what I’m talking about is a map of all the knowledge in the organization - and who has it and uses it.

And I don’t see that anywhere.

A lot going on in the world, maybe more than usual. For one thing, I downloaded Google Earth for my IPhone today, and it felt as if the future, almost a science fiction future, suddenly materialized.

And then, the Economy, the World Mess, going into “withdrawal” over the “fake” pumped up financial system, that just crashed.

With all of this, decided to “go within” and paint about it, painting with Light, that is, on my iPhone.

Couldn’t sleep, maybe it was the spiced up Italian food I had for dinner last night, or just maybe it’s the Global Markets of Britian, Germany and France that are down an average of -5% morning, suggesting Monday will be another day of losses in the Dow - all too familiar by now - and nail biting.

Nope, reading my RSS Feeds in Google Reader this morning, as my stomach churns, is a Twitter message (which can be one of my “feeds”) telling me about a depressing New York Times article about Facebook…..

“…Awkward piece in NYTimes Magazine makes me never want to organize / attend Facebook meetup: http://tr.im/l4w [Via @serial_consign's blog.]

Actually, the article is titled Facebook in a Crowd and reminds me of three facts - 1) that few virtual friends are going to show up when you set up an event AND 2)  Facebook and a few other Web 2.0 services, are going to be part of the new “glue”  that holds us together as the World Financial System unravels, perhaps, entirely. 3) Maybe there’s a way to measure the influence of a “virtual friend” or an “event” by holding one of them and seeing “who actually shows up”.

As I get tired, and ready to try to go back to bed again, with that sinking feeling that may be part my own exhaustion and part what is going on in the world, or even with my friends, a few that have just been “let go”, and even the uncertainty of anyone’s financial future right now (including my own), even as my body is telling me it’s time to sleep again … my thoughts go to 2 OP-ED articles appear in Monday’s New York Times.

In Paul Krugman’s Widening Gyre there’s the crisis of the emerging markets to get my stomach to churn again, and get dizzy, along with some poetry to go with it, according to Krugman, the Hedge Funds are now failing and it’s taking down developing markets, that were thinking, even recently, of decoupling and thriving as the West declined  ….. but that is not to be … because….

“…..as I was contemplating the latest set of numbers, I realized that I had William Butler Yeats running through my head: “Turning and turning in the widening gyre / The falcon cannot hear the falconer; / Things fall apart; the center cannot hold.”

The widening gyre, in this case, would be the feedback loops (so much for poetry) causing the financial crisis to spin ever further out of control. The hapless falconer would, I guess, be Henry Paulson, the Treasury secretary.

And the gyre continues to widen in new and scary ways. Even as Mr. Paulson and his counterparts in other countries moved to rescue the banks, fresh disasters mounted on other fronts.

“….The really shocking thing, however, is the way the crisis is spreading to emerging markets — countries like Russia, Korea and Brazil.”

And if that didn’t finish me off, and give me more fatigue to go back to bed - William Cohen writes in  “Shoot the Horses?” that ….

“….a banker friend, and he told me the “unraveling” could go on for ages. I thought he meant the unwinding of all the leverage that had inflated everything from the price of stocks to the price of homes.

But, just to be sure, I asked him: “Unraveling of what?”

He paused, before saying, “Almost our way of life.”

A friend of his, he went on, has a horse farm north of New York City. “I told him, for heaven’s sake, you have to get rid of your horses. Shoot them if necessary.”

That got me thinking.

Are we going to be living on horse meat before we get to the bottom of this?”

Now, I’m really getting dizzy and need to sleep, again, when I read further down in the article:

“…. It’s really a wonder, when you think about it, that there are still two guys in the race to become U.S. president, pulling out all the stops in these last eight days of campaigning to be chosen as the one to face the nightmare.

Let’s fast-forward a year to October 2009. The U.S. unemployment rate stands at 10 percent. Crime is up across the country. The economy is shrinking. No arm-twisting from the Treasury has managed to restore the broken confidence between borrowers and lenders. Banks, the few still standing, are holding fast to their cash. Property prices are down more than 25 percent from current levels.

The Dow is still heading south as people get used to the idea of stocks trading at no more than 10 times earnings, rather than the much higher ratios our former leveraged world delivered.

New buildings stand empty all over New York because at the end of a boom — that’s to say right now — a lot of new construction comes to market. Exports, long a bright spot in the economy, have plummeted because of a rising dollar. The deficit and national debt stand at unprecedented levels.

The hedge fund industry is decimated — its model of flipping cheap borrowings into leveraged bets around the world has blown up — and one desperate, even contrite, former master of the universe has just sold a Rauschenberg for $9 million less than he paid in 2004.

People still have way too much debt, and the collateral for it keeps evaporating. They are angry. Civil unrest is stirring.

I ask you, Senator McCain, Senator Obama, do you still want the job?”

To finish me off, but give us some hope again, maybe a new WPA program, a New York Times Editorial: As China Goes covers how China is doing what we should be, and spending money to stimulate it’s own economy, and support it’s people, which seems like we need to emulate, and hopefully, will emulate soon, with new leadership:

“….To get China’s consumers to spend, the government will need to spend more at home, investing in public works projects and providing more social benefits — including health insurance and pensions — so its citizens don’t feel they have to save so much for a rainy day.

This is clearly in Beijing’s interest, though China’s leaders are still clinging to the old export strategy.

China is already feeling the impact of a slower world economy. Both economic growth and export growth have braked sharply. The slowdown threatens job creation, direly needed to absorb millions of rural Chinese seeking employment in the cities.”

If anything, all of this stuff I read, which helped my stomach churn, or made it stop, is meant to highlight just how interconnected our world is now - how different it was from 1929 or 1932, in that those systems that were put in place to prevent the Great Unraveling that his happening now, were meant to safeguard on a national level - but no one thought the world would be so interconnected then, as it is now.

And now, time for bed, again - if only for a few hours - till I wake up and read the news, all over again.