Want to know what top brands are successfully using online video? divinity Metrics )with a lower case d( has started publishing their findings on their tool called Scope. It's called the Brand20 Index . How they arrived at Top 20 Brands using Online Video: indexed all the videos related to their client's campaign monitored millions of videos across multiple platforms in realtime looked at traffic, demographics,

"One of the largest online single events in the history of the Internet," turned into a news story about how it didn't happen. Almost anything Oprah Winfrey touches is a success, except online. At least on her first try. Oprah's first and much-hyped web debut crashed a few minutes after it started. Her apology is in the news today, and made me wonder if it's the first time Oprah has been mentioned in Information Week )and Marketing Pilgrim for that matter(.

February was a strong month for Google - the number of searches to the site was up one percent to equal 66.44% )to be exact( of searches in the U.S. I believe this is a new high, because according to HitWise, Google reached their highest share of searches in December 2007 - at 65.98%. Again Google takes the majority and the other search engines don't come close. Yahoo! Search had almost 21% of searches,

Rather than compete against Google on search, Yahoo is looking to find their niche by innovation on cell phone services. They announced a new bookmarking site for cell phones called OnePlace that will be released in a few months. The service goes beyond bookmarking by suggesting content related to the information you bookmark. The site is akin to del.icio.us but formatted to make it easier to navigate on small screens.

Not long after Google announced Google Sites , Microsoft announced that they will expand their enterprise-level software to small and mid-size business . Previously limited to businesses with more than 5,000 users, by this year businesses of all sizes will have access to Microsoft's email, online conferencing, and other services. The announcement came at the 2008 SharePoint Conference where Bill Gates described the changes in his keynote speech )see a live webcast here (.

In an effort to combine and expand offline market research with online market research, London-based TNS has acquired Compete.com for $75 million . Compete collects information about what people click on and their behavior online and compares it with your competitors. They also list your competitors top keywords that drive the most traffic to your site or blog )and it does this free(. Compete was founded in 2000 and is based in Boston, Massachusetts.

Affiliate Summit , a conference for affiliate marketers and affiliate managers, just ended in Las Vegas. I usually attend but I didn't go this year. Gary Marcoccia at AvantLink told me about a new affiliate tool that debuted at the Summit, that I wish every affiliate network had. AvantLink is a smaller network of affiliate programs. The tool is called the Affiliate Link Encoder )ALE( and it makes the process of adding affiliate links automatic.

Yahoo is changing the way they set minimum bids on paid search . Over the next few weeks they will set the minimum bid based on quality and value rather than how much you pay. The minimum bids will be set by individual keyword. Yahoo describes the change like setting minimum bids in an auction. So the more valuable, high quality, or demand there is the higher the starting bidding price is.

Following Andy's observation about Google : "You can tell which acquisitions are important to Google's bottom line and which are more speculative. All you need do is measure how long it takes them to start integrating the service with existing Google offerings." By that standard, JotSpot hasn't been a priority to Google since it was acquired over a year ago - in October 2006. JotSpot provided free, enterprise-level wikis.

36 year old geek Jonathan Coulton got sick of coding, he wanted to sing instead. He was a typical geek - no doubt working in a dark cube decorated with action figures and empty pop cans. His diet was full of caffeine and junk food. He didn't shave )which hasn't changed(. Then he decided to follow his dream of being a rock star - albeit on his own terms. Now he makes a living from his very plain blog , selling music and performing. More than he did programming.

It's a day of new releases for Yahoo! As part of Search Marketing Expo West )SMX( in Santa Clara, CA they've announced some new initiatives to try to build some buzz for the company. No doubt it's been a rough go at Yahoo lately and good news is needed. Other stories coming from Yahoo seem more buzz-worthy, but here's a preview of one new development from Yahoo. Yahoo Buzz Yahoo Buzz is the Yahoo version of Digg and other social voting sites .

Have you ever wanted to actually speak to a blogger who's blog you admire? You may be in luck, because Google's blogging platform Blogger is being integrated with their VOIP phone service, GrandCentral . Google bought the company last July and it's been in private beta since. However, if you want to try the service now, you can get an account without an invitation. All you need is a Blogger account.

Researcher The Kelsey Group has projected that online advertising will hit $147 billion by 2012. That's worldwide advertising and it's part of their report, "The Kelsey Group's Annual Forecast )2007-2012(: Outlook for Directional and Interactive Advertising." As it stands the group measures the market at $45 billion for last year )2007(. That's a compound annual growth rate )CAGR( of 23.4 percent. "Interactive advertising,

Barack Obama set a record in January by raising the highest amount of any candidate in a primary race . Online advertising may have contributed to his astonishing success. He raised $36.8 million last month compared to Hillary Rodham Clinton's $19.7 million. Obama beat his staff's projections of $32 million. Unfortunately the reports I read don't break down how the funds came through except to distinguish between individual and corporate donations. However,

According to comScore data released today, Ask.com had the biggest jump in search queries . By that measurement, Ask had more growth than Google, MSN, or Yahoo last month )January 2008( compared to the prior month's volume. Ask has a small piece of search market share but they have been a leader in universal search. That is, they integrate search results for more than web sites - but for images, video, local information, news, blogs, and other media.

Following record traffic to their site in January, Walt Disney 's Internet Group )WDIG(, has created a new team called Disney Online Studios . The team will focus on expanding Disney's popular games, virtual worlds, and social networks aimed at kids. This follows success they've had building virtual worlds and communities around their brands. Examples are the award-winning Disney.com XD , Pirates of the Caribbean Online , and Toontown Online .

Just in case you wanted to read more about Microsoft's bid to buy Yahoo'. Rather than upping their bid to buy Yahoo, as many speculate, Bill Gates said Microsoft's offer is firm . This came from an unrelated phone conversation yesterday. The call was about giving students free access to some of Microsoft's software. Gates said Microsoft's offer of $31 a share was a fair offer that Yahoo should seriously consider.