Viacom Sues Google/YouTube: It’s About Time

Viacom Inc. reported this morning that it is suing Google and YouTube for $1 billion (via the Washington Post, BBC News, the Blogging Times).

Honestly, the only thing that surprises me about this is that it didn't happen sooner. 

Apparently, Viacom, which owns brands including MTV,...

Link Roundup (3/13/2007)

(1) Three Hypotheses of Human Interface Design

Tantek Celik of Technorati explains that Twitter is successful in part  because it requires a lot less key strokes than blogging or email. 

(2) John Edwards has 792 Twitter Friends  

I continue to think Twitter is going to be the next big thing....

When Customers Attack

In the past when a company goofed up with a patron, the snafu remained relatively unknown. The customer likely was disgruntled and either never turned to the company again with their business or thought hard before doing so. Very few people initiated a vicious word of mouth campaign since they have plenty of other things to do besides dissing a company....

The USA Today Website Launch

Mark Glaser from Mediashift has a good breakdown of the reader reaction to the recent relaunch of the USA Today website.  As background, USA Today's new site contains a lot of great social features but longtime site visitors have reacted negatively. 

Below is an excerpt of a comment I left on Mark's post:

I think there may be a lesson to be learned though in how to roll these things out....

Asking Politicos Questions On-line

Would you like to ask a politician or a political candidate a question? OK, maybe only if you're a political junkie, but now you don't have to track them down and get their attention in a personal setting. In fact, you can ask a politician a question using the same machine that allows you to read this post....