Patricio Robles

Facebook's click fraud problem

Click fraud is a major issue when it comes to search marketing and big money is at stake.

The source of the most insidious click fraud: rogue third-party publishers who participate in PPC ad networks run by companies like Google and Yahoo and who use click fraud in an attempt to intentionally inflate their earnings.

by Patricio Robles 22 June 2009 09:45am 3 comments

Will online publishers self-censor for dollars?

Online publishers: what would you do to boost your ad revenue? What would you do to prevent your existing advertisers from walking away?

It appears that self-censorship in various forms could be a means of accomplishing both.

by Patricio Robles 19 June 2009 09:43am 2 comments

The myth of the 20-something founder

When you think of the word 'entrepreneur', who do you see? You might be inclined to think of a hungry 20-something who dropped out of college to follow his or her dream.

But according to a study (PDF) released by the Kauffman Foundation, it's not young people who are driving entrepreneurial activity in the United States. No, it's Baby Boomers.

by Patricio Robles 19 June 2009 11:45am 2 comments

5 reasons Google should worry about Bing

Google commands a dominant share of the search market and there's no sign that this will change anytime soon.

But should it be worried about Microsoft's recently-launched 'decision engine', Bing?

by Patricio Robles 19 June 2009 09:13am 12 comments

What will HTML 5 mean for Flash?

Little more than a decade ago, you were hot stuff if you called yourself an "HTML programmer". HTML as a markup language is great at what it was designed to do but today's web is about rich internet applications.

RIA technologies such as Flash, Silverlight and JavaFX do what HTML can't. But HTML 5 could change that and lately, this has some asking the question: could HTML 5 make RIA technologies like Flash obsolete?

by Patricio Robles 18 June 2009 09:26am 3 comments

Equity for attendance: has the conference circuit gone too far?

Loren Feldman has a reputation for being Web 2.0's bad boy. He's been highly critical of many of the startups and figures within the Web 2.0 community and doesn't mince words. Yet his popularity proves one thing: quite often, whether we'd admit to it publicly or not, he has a point.

Through Twitter (somewhat ironically), I was led to a video he posted with his comments on the 140 Characters conference, which, as you might guess, was focused on Twitter. Feldman's video is very NSFW but mentioned that the operator of the conference was doing something quite questionable: promoting that he'd take partial payment for the conference fee in equity.

by Patricio Robles 18 June 2009 13:19pm 0 comments

MySpace's lays off 30%, are its better days behind it?

Friendster provided the quintessential story of a hot company that rose quickly and fell even quicker. At one point, Friendster seemed set to dominate the social networking market.

Then two upstarts, MySpace and Facebook, left it battered and bruised. While the company still exists, the chances that it will ever recapture its past glory seem, to some observers, slim to none.

by Patricio Robles 17 June 2009 11:35am 0 comments

Relevance makes the difference for display ads: report

What's the most important factor in the success of a display ad? Size? Placement? Not surprisingly, it's relevance.

That's according to a study conducted by publisher Condé Nast and research firm McPheters & Company.

by Patricio Robles 17 June 2009 11:06am 2 comments

The rise of the branded netbook?

We all know that mobile phones have become a fashion item. Not only do people customize and accessorize them, we've even seen branded mobile phones.

Could the same thing happen with increasingly popular netbooks?

by Patricio Robles 17 June 2009 09:00am 0 comments

PageRank sculpting: Google's Matt Cutts tells all

Earlier this month, I wrote about reports that Google's Matt Cutts had essentially told an audience at the SMX Advanced conference that PageRank sculpting was a worthless exercise.