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The promise of the Microsoft Surface is now starting to come to life. AT&T is starting a roll out of the Surface as way to help demonstrate phone capabilities and provide services to existing phones while in store.

The big U.S. wireless provider says its retail customers will be able to place specific mobile phones on Surface’s 30-inch screen to learn about features, accessories and rate plans. They also will be able to compare two phones at a time, and use their hands to navigate a high-tech wireless coverage map.

AT&T says it plans to add more features later, such as the ability to select ringtones, graphics and other features by dragging icons of them across the screen and virtually “dropping” them onto the mobile phone.

Makes us think about the possiblities for all consumer electronics and future placements of the Surface.

via SeattlePI.com

I just recently came across some interesting information that I thought I’d share with everyone.

According to the Internet research and trend analysis website, eMarketer.com, ad spending on social networking sites is anticipated to grow 75% next year and ad revenue for niche communities is expected to grow to 10% from 8.2% in 2007.

This is good news for social networking as a whole since it continues to build on the fact that social networking communities are here to stay and aren’t simply Internet fads or “bubbles” that is building to burst.

And since several advertisers are still to see social networks as a platform for advertising, it’s good to see growth in this area and hopefully this will prompt others to see the valuable in having a presence in such communities and also test the waters.

Facebook’s ability for users and companies to make and distribute applications within its social network has been a rather unstoppable force within the Web 2.0 world. And it has been exciting seeing all the applications that have been developed and all the companies that have jumped on board to build their presence on Facebook. But until now, the only people that could actually make applications for Facebook were people with the ability to code- leaving all us non-coders out of the fun.

Therefore, WidgetBox.com has published a web-based tool that allows anyone to create an application for Facebook.

The application creation tool is one we’ve all been waiting for, and one many people and businesses can benefit from a great deal. For instance, small businesses can now setup a basic application to help promote their business and users can make tools to share with friends- all at no cost at all or having to learn any programming language.

Truthfully, I see this as just another indication that Facebook will one day be the biggest and best social network on the web.

We all know there’s nothing cooler than being the first on the block to have that new gadget. And the same goes for having early access to that hot new website currently in beta.

Why? Well… We get the status of being an “insider,” but mostly I think we just like to have bragging rights.

Still, whatever the reason, having access to different websites before everyone else is a very cool thing. Not only do you get bragging rights, but it may give you the opportunity to grow your business by giving you a head start on the competition. However, sometimes it can be very difficult to get an invitation unless you know someone or buy it.

Yes…I said, “Buy it,” I’ve seen many invitations being bought and sold on eBay in the past.

So, before you go ahead and pull out your wallet or beg your friends or business associates for an invite to that cool new website, check out Mashable Invites. Mashable Invites, by the great people at Mashable.com, is an invitation swapping service solely for Web 2.0 websites. The service works very well, so check it out. And hopefully you have some invites to contribute to the community as well.

Nevertheless, this is one of the coolest services out there and a vital tool for anyone looking to get an edge on what’s coming out in tomorrow’s Web 2.0 world.

Google has formally announced that it will begin trying ads on select YouTube videos. The way this will work, according to the announcement, is by having a short ad rise up from the bottom 20% of the video. The ad will have an X for you to close it out if you wish, and if not it will go away after it has played.

If you click on the ad, it will pause the video playing and play another short video in the middle of your video player. Once it has finished (or before if you don’t like what you see) you go back to your video. Clicking onto the ad video will also launch a new destination page for the advertiser, if you so choose. See some screen shots from the Linkin Park video below for an example:

On Click:

You can also see another example HERE - this one sheds a little more light on the relevancy factor, illustrating when these ads will actually show up. Of course with audio-to-text still not very good, relevancy will continue to be a question.

There are, of course, many people not too excited and a quick look at the comments on the blog post indicate that Youtube users are not really looking forward to this at all. But it will probably be a little longer before we see truly how everyone feels. The ads will only show up on YouTube content partners’ content for now (approximately 1,000 partners or so) and I’m sure won’t be rolled out entirely at once. But once users start to see them more, we’ll certainly see things showing up in the blogosphere about it.

I think it’s a step in the right direction. Others have been trying it - VideoEgg, for example, has tried something similar, as some have noted. However in YouTube this will certainly be the big stage for this all to play out on. In the Linkin Park example above, for instance, as the video is letterboxed the ad doesn’t actually interfere with any of the video’s content at all. Even in the Hairspray example, I’m really not bothered. And as someone who generally despises the approach of traditional advertising, I think that’s pretty impressive.

It’s understandable that your average YouTube user will not be too appreciative of the overall situation. While it is the truth, many folks probably won’t be thinking about the fact that Google put $1.6 billion dollars of investment into something that wasn’t making money and needs to find a way to change that. In fact, even though it is the almighty Google and they have a decent amount of cash to spare, if they cannot find acceptable ways to monetize YouTube it might not be long for this world. So while people may complain for now, I think “YouTube with ads” will be better for most than “no YouTube at all.” And this isn’t just for YouTube, it’s for all video sharing sites. There’s an awful lot of bandwidth being used up and someone has to pay for it.

Something has to be done in this space, so here we go. For me, the biggest questions will revolve around revenue sharing, copyright issues around ads and relevancy. I’m excited, should be interesting…

In case you missed it, Google officially ended its DTO/DTR (download to own, download to rent) video service last week. Google let folks who had previously purchased a video know (like me!) that:

…we will no longer offer the ability to buy or rent videos for download from Google Video, ending the DTO/DTR (download-to-own/rent) program. This change will be effective August 15, 2007…After August 15, 2007, you will no longer be able to view your purchased or rented videos.

To fully account for the video purchases you made before July 18, 2007, we are providing you with a Google Checkout bonus for $2.00. Your bonus expires in 60 days.

As you may have guessed, many people weren’t too happy with the way this originally went down. People who had purchased videos now had about a week to watch them before their purchases were rendered useless. The consolation? A $2.00 Google Checkout bonus.

Not too long after this announcement - about a few thousand letters and blog postings later - Google admitted that they made a mistake. On their official blog they wrote:

When your friends and well-intentioned acquaintances tell you that you’ve made a mistake, it’s good to listen…we thought offering the refund in the form of Google Checkout credits would entail fewer steps and offer a better user experience. We should have anticipated that some users would see a Checkout credit as nothing more than an extra step of a different (and annoyingly self-serving) kind. Our bad.

Among the changes they are making, Google will now offer a full refund to anyone who purchased a video, will allow users to continue to watch their videos for another 6 months and will also allow you to keep the $2.00 Google Checkout credit you’ve received.

This will no doubt make people much happier, and I believe, as I’m sure many others do, that it’s always good to see a company admitting they made a mistake and fixing it.

One thing that this does entire story does make you think about (which I thought PC Mag’s article captured quite well) is how this kind of thing really could happen. Google is a giant and therefore decided that based on the negative feedback it was getting they would remedy the situation - so more time to see your movies, a full refund and an additional credit for you. But what if this wasn’t Google? What if a video company or picture uploading site or blogging service that you had invested your time, uploads, content or writing to just went under? If they didn’t have the power of Google to give more back, where would you be?

All that said, I firmly believe that this is the nature of the evolving digital marketplace. It’s happened with other industries, that’s just the way it goes. In order to make things happen you have to try new things out. Way back when Google decided to roll out its own video service along with this DTR/DTO functionality, nobody had a clue on how to monetize video online. Surprise surprise, no one has really figured it out now either. So while there might be some repercussions that come along with this type of experimentation, there are still benefits that come from it. Now in this particular example the negatives are exacerbated because of the fact that users’ money is involved, but think of all of the benefits that come from companies like Google experimenting (and often failing) in the online sphere and developing (mostly) free products for folks to use. I think dealing with some failure is a byproduct that, in the end, most people are ok dealing with. The above blog entry from Google actually ends with a similar thought.

We make mistakes; we do our best not to repeat them — and we really do try to fix the ones we make. That said, the very least that our users should expect from us is that our mistakes be new and innovative, too.

Sure, there is a certain degree of spin on everything. But putting it all into perspective, I think these are things that we as users of the magical interwebonlineportalspace should not only expect, but embrace.

Now for some changes to the Google Video service as a whole…

Over the past couple of days, we’ve seen the next wave of video and audio content delivery pick up steam. Wireless on-demand services for portable devices such as mobile phones and portable gaming devices like the PSP are now becoming a reality. Yesterday, Sony Computer Entertainment of Europe and SKY teamed up to create a joint venture that will allow more than 2.3 million PSP owners to download video and movie film content, on-demand. Stay tuned to the Leipzig Game Conference for more news on this development.

Today, C|Net News reported that AT&T and eMusic, the nations second largest online music seller after iTunes, have joined forces to allow users the ability to complete wireless downloads of independent music through cell phones. Here are some of the details:

‘Tracks will cost more than they do over the Internet–$7.49 for five songs, as opposed to $9.99 for 30 at the online site–because of the expense of sending them over a mobile network to a user’s phone. For that price, however, users can also get another copy of the song, which they can download from the Internet as an MP3.’

Did we mention this service won’t be available on the iPhone.

It’s clear that the convergence of on-demand and wireless are upon us. Of course there are still issues with regard to file sizes and load times. However, in the States, as the big players determine who will own the airwaves, it leaves us thinking, will home-based computing systems become ‘the third screen’.

A Google lawyer announced on Friday that they will apply video fingerprinting technology to YouTube by September.

This comes as great news to countless of video content producers, that are now seeing their copyright videos on YouTube without their permission.

The video screening technology will consist of a computer system which will automatically scan all videos uploaded to YouTube and compare them to a collection of digital fingerprints built by Google. According, to Google the process will only take a few minutes to scan and determine its acceptance onto YouTube.

This is definitely a large step forward for YouTube and one that will hopefully help to spend less time in the courtroom and more time revolutionizing the Internet.

Blogging as we know it today is a relatively new idea and one that has taken the internet by storm. Simply put… Blogs are the newest and best ways for getting any and all news. And for good reason; blogs give anyone with a computer and the internet the opportunity to express thoughts and spread news as they happen from almost anywhere in the world.

So it’s no wonder that some bloggers are now making big money!

While surfing the internet I came across a very interesting Business Week article about just how much some bloggers are making, so check it out:

“How Top Bloggers Earn Money“

There have been some recent revelations (see article) on Whole Foods CEO John Mackey (aka “rahodeb”) who, from 1999 to 2006, made several anonymous postings on financial forums and sites putting down his company’s rival competitor Wild Oats. Among other postings, Mackey wrote that Wild Oates’ management “clearly doesn’t know what it is doing” and that the company “has no value and no future.” Oddly enough, Whole Foods announced this past February that they were buying Wild Oates for $565 million - perhaps the tofu-organic equivalent of “no value.”

According to the article, Whole Foods is saying 1) that many of Mackey’s comment, in that they were written over the course of many years across the web, are being taken out of context and 2) that the comments were Mackey’s personal comments and not those of the company. Uhhh, sure. Semantically, that may be true. But if this is the person who runs said company, might there be some cross over? I think maybe.

To be realistic here, I highly doubt that any of Mackey’s anonymous comments had any effect on stock price or investors’ handling of their Wild Oats stocks. Nonetheless, it’s still bad PR and it reflects poorly on the company and its leader.

Recently Mackey has been blasting the FTC on the Whole Foods’ blog about their desire to block his company’s purchase of Wild Oats because of anti-trust concerns. While this may be raising eyebrows in some corners of the business world, from a social media standpoint this is certainly more proper behavior. We know who you are, we know who you work for and you can say whatever you want.

There have certainly been several examples of companies misbehaving in the social media space, often pretending NOT to be who they are to be more credible. (The irony being, of course, that once they are discovered the company’s credibility is shot.) This will likely continue until the end of time. In the same way that person to person interaction requires some feeling out before you start taking stock tips or buying a new sneaker brand, people in online spheres are pretty savvy and know not to believe every post in every forum. But not everyone knows…Ask me if my mom would know how to spot something online that might be a solicitation from an anonymous marketer and I’d say no. To her, and to many, the internet is where the information is…and it’s all right.

Surely people will continue to get fooled (not just my mom, mind you - me, you and everyone else…and multiple times). For small companies or individuals with no reputation at stake, aside from integrity there’s just not much stopping them from lying to people online. It really will be incumbent upon all of us online, just as in person, to pay attention to what information we’re taking in. But for large companies, it’s just not smart business to handle social media in this way. Don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t want my company’s CEO pretending to be someone else online and talking stock tips about my company and its competitors. Mackey and Whole Foods lose credibility online instantly.

…on the bright side, however, if no respect from the investor community he did score himself some more female fans with comment like this - “I like Mackey’s haircut,” “Rahodeb” said. “I think he looks cute!” (See full WSJ Article)