Although Google is a company, it is not unlike a person. Ever since its legendary ethical compass check " "don't be evil" " began circulating in the popular imagination, Google-watchers have often judged Google: is it evil or not evil? Is this Google product, action, or strategy evil or not evil? More subtly, it's possible to argue that Google is like a person because it's easy to see that it has better or worse natures. At its best,

Back fresh from a week at a resort in Costa Rica, I'm kicking myself' for being taken in by a "TripAdvisor scam". Essentially, we trusted a tour company because they touted their "great reviews on Trip Advisor" on the brochure, and verbally referred to it in their pitch. In short, we were done in by our love of user-generated content. The good news is, the resort itself totally exceeded expectations.

In today's ClickZ column I finish up a series about marketing budget allocation decisions . In the course of this discussion, I have wondered aloud about the value of "marketing" related investments as diverse as vanity URL's and renting Class A office space. And I've claimed that "signaling bonus" can be at work/play: you not only get benefit A from the investment, but your positioning or esteem in the eyes of the press, partners, investors, potential employees,

It was a wintry night in 2004 )guessing here( when my longtime Page Zero colleague Dean Towers poured the paid search advertising Kool-Aid and opined to me: "frankly I think the ads are way more relevant and compelling than the so-called organic or 'real' search results' when I look at the other stuff, I just see a mess of junk!" In particular, Dean was referring to the "metadata" or "description" parts of the organic SERP's in the ten blue links,

On Black Friday, nobody can hear you blog. But perhaps fittingly, our final post of the week comes from social media advertising expert Marty Weintraub. Mr. Weintraub has allegedly been quoted as saying: "Facebook is the new black." Will Smith )1998 vintage Grammy-winning( music please: Men in Black Official Video Marty Weintraub: The web is ubiquitous' and permanent. The web is as ubiquitous and permanent as business, sex, sharing, ego, voyeurism, exhibitionism,

In Canada, it is just barely legal to work on the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday. Hence, with turkey envy in my veins, I post the next installment in our five-part series of mini-essays on the future of the Web. Chris, you always have been and always will be webiquitous to us. Chris Sherman: This Is the Best of All Possible Webs As much as I respect and admire Tim Berners-Lee,

Continuing our five-part series celebrating Tim Berners-Lee's Scientific American essay, with some thoughts from yours truly. Andrew Goodman: People Don't Want to Live in Burma Tourism isn't booming in Burma: many think it might be unethical to enjoy paradise at the invitation of a military dictatorship. Or possibly you'd be worried that you'd be spied on constantly, or kicked out. That's what happened to this travel journalist the first time he went there,

Our next mini-essay contributor, Chris Tolles, takes a bullish view of the future open playing field of the Web, due to the continued prevalence of' of all things' spam! Chris Tolles: Spam as a social asset I'm not worried about the future of the web. And you know why? Spam.

The World Wide Web turns 20 next month. Will it make it safely into middle age, or flame out like Jim Morrison? Tim Berners-Lee sparked debate this week with a timely piece in Scientific American - Long Live the Web: A Call for Continued Open Standards and Neutrality . Some observers felt he was taking a particular swipe at Facebook and Apple. Sir Tim doesn't pussyfoot around about the open,

Ed's note: Every so often we publish a guest column )reprint( of our favorite candid SEO experts out there, Jill Whalen. This latest rant/sensible-advice appeared in this week's High Rankings Advisor. Enjoy! Last week I was speaking with a potential client in need of SEO consulting who told me that they had been working on their product part e-commerce website over the past few months by adding "SEO articles" to it on a regular basis. "SEO articles?" I thought.