Sometimes we get asked about copyright. Here are the basic facts.

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Reaching consumers is a little like pop music - one day, you wake up and Smells like Teen Spirit has morphed into Fergilicious as the dominent vibe. As a marketer, you have to sing in the right key or risk becoming as passe as an ocean crossing in Wooden Ships.

So it’s always interesting when someone dreams up a new consumer model as reported in Ad Age: Read more

Let’s say you find a great image on the internet and want to use it in your blog. Which is the correct technique:

1. Use hotlink so your blog grabs the image from another site
2. Download the image to your own computer or server

If you said #1, go sit in the corner and wear the pointy hat. Read more

Last week, we talked about powerful headlines on Craigslist “Best Of”. Here’s another great headline from the blog of copyranter:

Che Guevara’s ass splintered and raw from rolling over in his grave Read more

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As the world awakens to the power of social networking on the internet, all the hype has been about MySpace, YouTube and Second Life.

Want to go to a site that’s tapped into the buzz that will be tomorrow’s boom? Try Mashable.

Mashable reports on what’s new in the world of social networking. There’s a post about Yoomba, a service that let’s you make VoIP calls from your email. And Vizu, the free polling company. They’ve just added Google Maps to their service so you can see where your cause is rising (or tanking).

Some is good, some is bad. But to spot tomorrow’s stars today, bookmark Mashable.

When writing for the internet - websites, emails, CTAs - a great headline is the key to opening up the viewer’s interest. In many types of messaging (think Craigslist posting), no one will read your great message if the headline doesn’t suck them in.

I Stole Your Crutches

[Viewer warning - some of the links may use adult language. Don’t click if you are offended by that kind of stuff.] Read more

In our previous post, we told you about using Feedburner to syndicate your blog. In this entry, we’ll tell you how to use BuzzBoost. Read more

Once, we were blog dinosaurs. Blogosaurs. Then we found out about Feedburner.

Feedburner syndicates your blog. In essence, it richochets your content all over the web to places people gather in blog-reading frenzy. Places like Technorati, Bloglines, Yahoo and AOL.

Want people to see you blog? At least potentially? Get yourself a Feedburner account and follow the simple instructions to “claim your feed.” All you need is the web address of your blog (url).

Once you’ve claimed your feed, you can activate additional services to increase the visibility of your bloginess.

Next: Buzz Boost

This came up just today. For the record:

There are 70-75 words in a :30 TV commercial

80 is too many and 6o words feels too loose.

Although a writer may be able to read 85 words in half a minute, that hectic pace doesn’t allow for nuance, meaning or emphasis. Tighten it up and give the copy room to breathe.

After all, it’s the meaning the audience takes away, not how many words you can cram in.

Semantics - such a funny word.

se man tics - noun 1.a. the study of meaning.
- Dictionary.com

When is a particular design choice simple and functional and when does it crossover into being self-absorbed minimalism? We’re talking about web page tabs.

We’ve noticed two schools of thought regarding the coloration of web page tabs:

1. Tabs that show a change to indicate a live page
2. Tabs that don’t show a change to indicate a live page

WMBDB (we may be dinosuars but), we like to know what page we are on. We don’t like to hunt around for basic info - is it in the address bar? in the title bar?

SO: Tabs which change to show a live page are simple and functional. Tabs which leave a viewer searching for the information are just minimal.