Technically Speaking

Sprint killing over 1000 accounts - now it seems it’s a big deal in the mainstream media. This leads me to believe the real reason that top C level executives are leaving old media. They are tired of the pace that it seems to move. Tired of the way old media has not embraced new media. Yes I already talked about Sprint last Friday.

I don’t blame them one bit. That is why I set up Planet Social Media Services. I’m not out to kill traditional places, I’m just here to offer the new companies the option of getting there via the social media outlets that are available. Using the tried and tested methods that rocketed Lending Club to where it is today; only like 50 days after launch on May 24th.

You can’t argue with the data that was reported both by TechCrunch and Mashable. Most interesting is watching from the inside how traditional media sources are also picking up on the buzz that is being created.

Places like the Boston Globe as well as the San Francisco Business Times and Kiplinger.

This all leads us back to where it all started. Well not where it started obviously as there were many that tried to get traction before, but MySpace is now recognized as the leader.

Why? Well fresh out of Europe is this look at how they have taken over the world. Not quite, but they have millions of registered users. I say registered, not active. The activity is high, as I can tell when it goes bonkers, but what is the actual activity going on?

A bit dangerous to talk about, but I’m glad that VentureBeat covered the porn connection of Stickam. I’m sure by the morning there will be some denials as well as clear distinction being made. The facts remain, I know VB does fact checking. Not only will they fact check, but they will double and triple fact check if need be. One site that I trust, will rather run a story late or not at all if the facts are not all checked - is VentureBeat.

Statistics. You have to love them, hate them, or just ignore them and continue doing what you do best. Allen is correct, stats are a freakin’ joke. He makes a valid point about “time spent on a site” as something that could be easily challenged and gamed.

Once again it’s to my main point that I have said many times now. Why are some sites considered the leader, and other stats ignored because the leader(s) say to ignore them?

I am agreeing totally, there needs to be a new stat master and I for one would love to see Allen be the one to erase the slate and come up with something. His background in the industry more than qualifies him to be the new slate eraser and creator all in one stroke.

Technically Speaking, I should have been working some more, but it’s been a long productive day and tomorrow awaits!

Very interesting article on cookies this morning. Not the chocolate chip kind obviously, but the computer kind

But this system of measurement has a well-known flaw: users are prone to delete their cookies, either manually or by using antispyware programs. Users who delete a cookie are eventually given a new one by that cookie’s issuer, meaning that they are often counted as unique visitors, inflating the numbers at host sites.

I wonder if there is a way to figure out who is fudging their numbers? It is quite obvious to me at least that many sites are counting on you asking for a new cookie nearly daily. Not to mention the spy sweeper type of programs that automatically clean up your cookie mess daily. The sad part as noted below, is a key element that advertisement dollars look at

Cookies let online hosts determine the number of unique visitors they reach, a key metric for advertisers.

Technically Speaking, there has to be a better way.

Now here is something that I have been preaching. Preaching to the choir I see by Scoble’s take on it. Yes, statistic services are all over the place. I’ve probably talked about statistics at least once a week. Why? Because all the services really, honestly, just suck.

Why? Because none of them are accurate. You get some degree of figuring out who is viewing your material. Yes, I’ll give it that much. As I said a little while ago, you either “get a hit, page view, unique” or you don’t. Period. End of story.

It’s really quite simple. The only way to figure it out is to be “standing over your server” and watch each hit, view, unique come in. Stand there with a hand held counter. That is about the only way any of these services can be truly accurate.

I personally watch like 3 of the services. I have scripts installed in the same spot on my pages. It still doesn’t matter. None of them count 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc… It’s really simple. It’s not rocket science. Why do these stat counters act like it’s a big technical deal? Money.

Bottom line, it’s the money they receive, the money they work with. The more money, the more inaccurate the counting mechanism becomes. How so? Well whoever funds these simple counting services can easily skew the numbers simply by asking. Simply by making a phone call.

Now I’m not saying that it all works like that, but it can. The point is again back to how simple this really is. In technical terms, when there is a view, hit, unique created - one IP address called a web formatted page from another IP address. Unless you are huge like Google and have many IP addresses, that IP address just called your IP address (or your servers where you site is hosted). That’s it. That is counted as ONE.

Technically Speaking, I can’t believe that in 2007 someone hasn’t figured out yet that these statistic people are all full of it. Should I just append the “sh” with that last two letter word? Yeah, I really wanted to do that, but I try to keep this blog as clean as possible. Why? For more hits, uniques, and page views baby!

So I haven’t been shooting off hot air have I? Yes, Rex Dixon does know WTF he is talking about. I’m glad someone had the time to provide a detailed statistical analysis. These basically show that none of these companies should be in the business of measuring you lifeline; your statistical power.

Scroll down and look at the tables of data, or just click here to see the result data. It is not rocket science folks, the statistical game is one big mess. Numbers should not be that far off. In fact, even one number off is unacceptable.

What do I mean? Let’s go over the simplicity of this. Technically, when you received a “hit, view, unique, blah, blah, blah… ” that means someone made some sort of request to your web server. That means that the IP address you are coming from went to the IP address of that server (web site). It either went there, or it didn’t.

Now unless there were “phantom hits, uniques, views, blah.. blah.. blah.. ” that happened, it’s impossible to be “off” even by one number. It doesn’t work that way. Some computer visited or went to another computer, period. That results in either a hit, visit, page view or unique (if it was your first time there). End of story. Oh, last time I checked, “phantoms and ghosts” don’t surf the internet!

Technically Speaking, go look at the results and see for yourself how skewed all this really is. Trust no site currently saying they are the “true stats” site. Prove it.

Show me that you were certified in statistical analysis, and that your site can accurately track sites without missing one hit, view, unique, etc. If you can do that, then you need to be certified by ISO or some organization. If you do that, you will clean up on the internet. Since we all know that statistics are really “smoke and how much money you have“, I could use a vote right here!

Statsaholic, which was a great site looks to be pretty much being killed off now by the lawsuit from Amazon/Alexa. This is quite a shame, as I didn’t see what wrong Statsaholic was really doing. What really irks me to no end is that Alexa thinks they provide a great service.

A great service would go out and see if they can actually certify their statistics. I mean, so many sites go off of the Alexa rankings of your web site. You live or die by them, especially where advertisors are concerned. You would think instead of trying to make more money by placing more 125 x 125 ads, they would be seeing about securing some credentials.

To the offline world, Alexa has no real pull. I’m not talking about the fast money, but I’m talking about long term investors. They see Alexa as “a service” that does statistics. One of many you can point people to look at. When you dig a little deeper, they are nothing more then “first one, long time screw you” company. In other words, they got their first, but first isn’t always certifiable.

I have been talking about these web sites, being uncertified for one reason and one reason only. Statistics online are just an illusion at best. In fact, more then likely you can game any statistical system, Alexa being the worst.

How do you get a higher Alexa ranking? Just do that “referrer” game that every SEO will tell you to do. In fact, it’s not a secret, as my good friend Kittymama plays that game.

Technically Speaking, any service that says they are the statistical “king” needs to think about being certified offline as well to be taken seriously. I for one, don’t take any of the sites seriously. To be quite honest, unless you can show me statistics that match up all the way around, then you are doing nothing more then pulling a curtain in front of the man behind it.

I’m not talking “close“, because that is for hand grenades and horseshoes. I’m talking dead on number for number statistics. Show me Alexa and show me another service, pick one, and I can bet the numbers do not match. Remember, this isn’t rocket science, either you received a hit, unique, or page view. Period, end of story. You did or you didn’t. There should be absolutely no variation, zero, zip, none.

Technorati, changed up the way it ranks blogs this weekend. My only question is when did you receive any certification from any accredited institution of statistical data tracking? The point of that question is to get you all to realize that none of these places are accredited in any way, shape or form.

Allen is even further mystified this morning after his great explanation article done yesterday. He is so mystified he says WTF as Technorati thinks they can even change that meaning. Allen used the term in the normal meaning of WTF vs the “new and cool” term that they thought they could make everyone use.

The only reason Technorati, Alexa, and about handful of sites have any pull on ranking, advertising, etc… is because they were there first. Other then that, all the data that you see can be challenged by another site, that well, thinks they have the “real data” on your site.

Technically Speaking, until there is a site with true accredited power, this ranking, linking, traffic stats, are all just a guessing game. I can prove it with my own site as I track my statistics using like a few different “authoritative” sites.

The funny thing, none of my statistics are matching. They are within a few hundred or thousand hits of each other, but none are dead on matches. Until there is a site that has the accreditation and endorsement of top businesses, the statistics game is only good to just look over. Great thing to post on your site for bragging rights and to attract more paid advertisements.

Great for all that, but it’s just like getting one of those no exam life insurance medical exams by an insurance agent. When was that insurance agent medically certified? Last time I checked life insurance and the medical field are two different ball games all together.

Dig below the surface of any statistical analysis, and you will find too many discrepancies to be taken seriously. Numbers need to match up everywhere in order for a statistic to be fact. There so far are no real facts, only such fodder as Technorati changing up the way it ranks sites. That is the only news here.

Don’t get me wrong, if you have the right spin doctor, you can sell anything online. Technorati decided to play the game differently this weekend. To that I say, “Lie to yourself, Lie to your mother, but don’t lie to Rex Dixon.”

Statisfy, is the twittervision for bloggers! I just was turned on to this, so shoot me if this is “old news“.

I signed up, which was totally painless btw, and was talking with NYC own Allen from CenterNetworks; you know Allen right? World Wide Live Allen!

Anyways, he sends me this link to his Statisfy. I was like, “That is way cool.” You see, his blog is one that is in the major leagues of blogging. He rubs shoulders with the big dogs, hits all the conferences, etc… I go there and it was like “Bang, bang, bang, bang!” - Like twittervision, only hits for the blogosphere.

I was impressed. I loaded it on my lowly blog, and I watched. Then I started to chat with Allen again. First hit that rolls in, honestly it was not from STL, it was from Melbourne, Australia. World Wide Live, I am here to statisfy ya! This could be really cool.

Technically Speaking, if you are bored, you can watch the grass grow on my Technically Speaking tracker; or see CenterNetworks tracker linked above and watch some major statisfaction.

In fact unless you are physically standing over your server and counting the hits, page views, uniques to your server - I don’t believe you. Seriously, the statistics game is a big scam. It’s about where you live and who you know.

Isn’t it about time that Comscore and other supposed “stat keeping giants” who determine how much money you receive just go away. There needs to be a new system. This one is seriously broken. When it comes down to “who you know“, we just gave in to the old world ways in the new web 2.0 world we live in.

Technically Speaking, there is no place for this in web 2.0 or web 2.1 and on. This falsifying of critical ad money information needs to be taken care of. It should have been taken care of yesterday.

Of course, nothing will happen and the big advertisers will keep dumping money into sites from the SV like everything is so “cool” coming out of there. I hate to say it, but the SV is not all paved in gold start up companies.

Look at where MyBlogLog came from, look at Planypus. Look at SplashCast. Tampa, Chicago, and Portland may not be STL. At least it’s not the SV.

Only thing here is - “Are they correct?” Are any of the services “correctly” tracking your stats? I use a few, and none of the numbers jive. In fact the one that I trust, is my Firestats. At least with that, I can see pretty much real time hits and the IP addresses they come from.

I can also see that with SiteMeter, but their numbers and the Firestats one do not jive. Google Analytics is off also. For those that want to ask, yes - the Analytics and the SiteMeter stat scripts are in the exact same location.

Technically Speaking, my Alexa numbers are off also, but we already know that! ComScore will probably make a lot of money with the IPO; let’s hope so - they owe a lot!

I have said it in my podcasts. I have even put together a rough outline business plan, and semi pitched it to someone that said,”Yeah, there is not a need for another web counter site in our industry.” Now this evening I wonder how many other sites are over stating their actual count? I do know this much, there is a small difference between the statistics plugin I use here in the WordPress package and what sitemeter is reporting. I think it’s just placement of the script that is required for each one.

As far as the feedburner stats. You can’t really muck with those unless there is some dishonesty going on somewhere. The only blogs that I know that can publish their numbers and back it up are - TechCrunch, GigaOM, and a few others. I name those off the top of my head, as I usually pick up a lot of cool news there. There are others of course, so don’t feel slighted.

As far as meme or site snarfers go. I like the term snarfer better then meme. Nevertheless, Techmeme and Tailrank go head to head. I will have to say that Megite is making a great run. So for the Snarfers, you have have 3 sites that are reliable snarfing tools. Techmeme, Tailrank, and Megite. It would be hard to make up data there, as snarfers are used by everyone in the blogging realm.

Then there is this issue of Link Blogging. It’s become a nice addiction, as well as time saver in sorting through the news. (thanks Robert!) Do you count your Link Blog views? I wouldn’t know how too really. Although just in the past day or so, Google reader did implement a nice stat tool; been so busy I haven’t had time to look yet!

There you go, we are back at square one. Numbers. Statistics. Stats. I still say they are important, and I think it’s almost to the point of needing to be regulated and monitored in some way. I agree that the ones that are over inflating their stats by intent to fool the user community should be ashamed of doing that. I am not in any way accusing anyone of doing any simple bot madness tricks either. I am just saying, it’s come time.

The ad industry will be dropping big money on blogs in 2007. I do not believe it is fair for some site to receive that ad dollar if they are playing the games that people say they are playing. It is not fair for the honest blog that will refuse to play the lying game.

Technically Speaking, I believe that this blog has provided some good content. It has had a steady increase in exposure throughout the blogosphere. The decision to add another writer to the team earlier today was all based on the simple fact of the only way to go up is to add another point of view which hopefully will bring in a new audience that I can’t tap on my own. I think Mae Oakmont is about to have the time of her life here in the blogosphere!