The Social Network Movies Advertising on Facebook with Myspace?

The Social Network movie opens today (Yes: I loved it) and advertisements are appearing across the web. That's not 'newsworthy'... but:

- The ad units themselves look a great deal like Facebook (again: no shock) - And the main ad unit has an "Add to Friends" link (see below):

- when clicked, you arrive at The Social Network's website - ... which strangely lists MySpace, Twitter and Facebook sharing buttons in that order (shouldn't it be Facebook first? perhaps only?)

- If you click the Facebook share button, a lightbox appears to post a MySpace profile announcement for the movie on your Facebook page. And what is with the suggested creative?

Very bizarre... and for a movie dedicated entirely to Facebook - and marketing to Facebook users / fans - you would think this would be better thought through.

NBA Launches Player Cam, Facebook Connect for Conference Finals

The NBA clearly has MLB.tv envy...And it's not a bad thing! (now if only the NFL would start experimenting)

I have written before that Major League Baseball is the only major sports league to grasp the web and really innovate with MLB.tv and their successful iPhone App. Well the NBA is starting to test the waters.

During tonight's Conference Finals, viewers can actually follow the game entirely on NBA.com with:

nba-player-cam Four-Way Player Cams - Follow Dwight Howard or Lebron James directly - You can also choose between Robo Cam and Action Cam - Swap audio and customize the tiled screen layout (very much like MLB.tv) - No high definition option - but you can view in full screen

Socialize with Facebook, Twitter & MySpace While watching the in-game player cams, you can login with Facebook, Twitter or MySpace and converse on NBA.com. The integration doesn't look great and is far from YouTube's Facebook Connect implementation, but it's a good first step and, I believe, the first pro league integration of Facebook Connect.

Sponsorship Of course, the experience is ad-supported (by Axe Dry) but the integration is slick and non-intrusive.

Techcrunch Surveys Widget Tracking and Who's 'King' - Including Widgetbox, Clearspring, MySpace

Interesting post by Techcrunch and Erik Schnofeld today about the widget world and how tracking within this space is difficult. The trouble is that: 1) there isn't a standard widget format / type - Widgetbox, for example, offers both javascript and flash versions of widgets.

2) many widgets use multiple services for installers, analytics, etc - causing double counting among some providers.

3) it's a new, quickly growing frontier (which always presents challenges). This will get clearer over time.

Who rules the world of widgets? It is difficult to measure, but comScore takes a stab at it with a new ranking of widget providers as measured by viewing audience... It seems like Meebo should be in there, with a reach of about 19 million, which would put it right after iGoogle. Who else is missing?...

Erik then updated the post with the following message (kudos for doing so):

Update: WidgetBox claims 25 million monthly uniques for their widgets, but says they don’t all get counted by comScore because they use Javascript. Another problem with this list is that there might be double-counting. Clearspring, for instance, puts a tracking embed code in RockYou’s widgets. Like I said, these things are difficult to measure.

Full Comscore release is here. Update: VentureBeat has now covered the Comscore data but without much mention of tracking complexities.

Comscore Releases Search Engine and Search Query Traffic: Amazon +20%, Craigslist +6%

Comscore released their December search engine statistics and, among the usual information, there is some very interesting data. A couple thoughts: - Across the board, December traffic is lower than November (due to the holidays) - While that makes sense for informational sites, Amazon surged +20% - Craigslist (another highly 'transactional' site) was also +6% - In the social worlds, Youtube grew nearly 8% while Facebook dropped 14% and MySpace nearly reached 20%... but Youtube is more reliant on the search box than Facebook or MySpace - but that really shouldn't change that drastically on a monthly basis. - Mapquest is dying. Who uses Mapquest anymore?

Full chart after the jump...

 

comScore Expanded Search Query Report
December 2007
Total U.S. – Home/Work/University Locations

Source: comScore qSearch 2.0

 

Expanded Search Entity

Search Queries (MM)

Nov-07

Dec-07

Percent Change Dec-07 vs. Nov-07

Total Expanded Search

13,907

13,523

-2.8%

Google Sites

7,326

7,165

-2.2%

     Google

5,923

5,651

-4.6%

     YouTube/All Other

1,403

1,514

7.9%

Yahoo! Sites

2,395

2,363

-1.3%

     Yahoo!

2,358

2,326

-1.4%

     All Other

37

37

0.0%

Microsoft Sites

984

963

-2.1%

     MSN-Windows Live

947

927

-2.1%

     Microsoft/All Other

37

36

-2.7%

Time Warner Network

838

784

-6.4%

     AOL

445

434

-2.5%

     MapQuest/All Other

393

350

-10.9%

eBay

489

508

3.9%

Ask Network

464

416

-10.3%

     Ask.com

263

238

-9.5%

     MyWebSearch.com/ All Other

201

178

-11.4%

Fox Interactive Media

436

350

-19.7%

     MySpace

427

342

-19.9%

     All Other

9

8

-11.1%

Craigslist.org

207

220

6.3%

Amazon Sites

178

215

20.8%

Facebook.com

119

102

-14.3%

 

To request more information on comScore qSearch 2.0, please visit http://www.comscore.com/contact



About comScore
comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR) is a global leader in measuring the digital world. This capability is based on a massive, global cross-section of more than 2 million consumers who have given comScore permission to confidentially capture their browsing and transaction behavior, including online and offline purchasing. comScore panelists also participate in survey research that captures and integrates their attitudes and intentions. Through its proprietary technology, comScore measures what matters across a broad spectrum of behavior and attitudes.  comScore analysts apply this deep knowledge of customers and competitors to help clients design powerful marketing strategies and tactics that deliver superior ROI.  comScore services are used by more than 800 clients, including global leaders such as AOL, Microsoft, Yahoo!, BBC, Carat, Cyworld, Deutsche Bank, France Telecom, Best Buy, The Newspaper Association of America, Financial Times, ESPN, Fox Sports, Nestlé, Starcom, Universal McCann, the United States Postal Service, Verizon, ViaMichelin, Merck and Expedia.  For more information, please visit www.comscore.com