Posted by Jared Barden on Aug 26, 2007 in
Sports I just finished watching the 2007 Little League World Series championship game between Warner Robins, GA and Tokyo, Japan. At the end of the game the players proved that sportsmanship hasn’t died.The game itself was close and ended up going in to extra innings before Warner Robins finished the game with a walk off home run. Not 10 minutes after the emotional ending, the players came together, as they do at the end of each game, to shake hands. However, the Japanese players, who were fighting off tears and disappointment, were actually hugging their American counterparts. In the midst of their sadness, they still showed respect to the other team. How often do we see that in American sports? As I watched several players over the last week hit home runs, I was struck by the fact that they didn’t stand there and gawk for a few moment before slowly plodding along the base path. I wonder where along the way players discover that it’s alright to run their hearts out after every single hit. Perhaps it starts in high school or college, I’m not sure. But it is most often on display in Major League Baseball.The professionals could take a cue from these kids when it comes to sportsmanship and professionalism.
Posted by Jared Barden on Aug 9, 2007 in
Personal Yesterday, Yahoo! Search Marketing announced the launch of their brand new Traffic Quality Center. The idea sounds good in theory, however…
It seems the good folks at Yahoo! Search Marketing (afterwards referred to as YSM) have other issues that are at least equally as important as battling click fraud. The number one issue that comes to my mind I’ll call traffic quality.
A little story to illustrate my point. Some company/person purchases a cheap Ad on Google Adwords for “blue widgets” (everyone seems to love the term “widgets” when giving examples). The landing page for that Ad is then filled with higher-paying Ads from another Pay Per Click provider, say YSM. These (usually) low-quality clicks end up costing advertisers, such as myself and my company, a fair amount of money.
YSM really needs to take a hard look at who they allow in their partner network. I’m not talking about the content network (Yahoo Publisher Network I believe it is called), but their regular network of search partners. There is not, at this time, any way to opt out of having certain web sites display your ads. You either drop YSM all together and lose one of the biggest sites on the net, or you deal with these frustrating clicks.
To be fair, Google is also partly to blame for this predicament. Part of their advertising program (Google Adwords) is based on the quality of their advertisers’ sites. Now, it would stand to reason that a site that is simply practicing PPC arbitrage would be rather low quality, but that’s just my opinion.
So please, Google and Yahoo, clean up your PPC partner programs. It will make your honest, quality advertisers much happier.
Posted by Jared Barden on Aug 3, 2007 in
Sports The Canton, PA Little League All Star team was featured in a recent article by Jim Caple on ESPN.com.
It was pretty cool to see a small neighboring (if 30 miles away is neighboring) town featured on ESPN. Apparently their 13-14 year old All Stars finished 4th in the state, so congratulations to them.
Hey even Mansfield got a reference in the store when Caple said, “It has one traffic light, and no McDonald’s (although there is a Wal-Mart 30 miles away).” That 30 miles away would most likely be Mansfield, according to Google Maps.
Again, congratulations to the 13-14 year old Canton Little League All Start team.
Posted by Jared Barden on Aug 2, 2007 in
Personal 10 Things I learned on Vacation 2007 in Ocean City, MD.
- The one piece bathing suit is apparently a thing of the past.
- Sunscreen lotion is much better than sunscreen spray.
- French fries taste really good with apple cider vinegar on them.
- Take your sunglasses off before you dive into a wave, no matter how tight you think they are.
- When tween girls run down your hall at 5 AM, instead of flashing them a dirty look out your door, say something clever.
- Ripley’s Believe It or Not was lame … believe it or not.
- Sandals are great, just not in the sand … go figure.
- Blackberry + National Broadband Access = Awesome.
- Make sure your giant kite is secured firmly to the beach, or it will end up in the ocean.
- A great time with family is something you can’t put a price on.