“An ATM that converts bitcoins to Canadian dollars and vice versa opened for business in a Vancouver coffee shop today, marking a world first.​”

– CBC news

What is Bitcoin?

Bitcoin is a decentralized cryptocurrency, basically a virtual form of money. Bitcoin is controlled by software algorithm. In order to control the amount of bitcoin that are released into the economy, the algorithm determines that there are only so many mined during certain period of time.

It is exciting to witness that the city we live in has transformed this virtual currency into physical form by installing ATM.

Source: http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/world-s-first-bitcoin-atm-opens-in-vancouver-1.2286877

As the guest speakers from 6S Marketing brought this topic to our class earlier this month, I was convinced that this is worth more researching and thinking.

Google announced a major algorithm update called “Hummingbird” that would affect 90% of all searches to mark its 15^th birthday on September 26^th, 2013. Google says that the name comes from the updates “being precise and fast,” as noted in its announcement about the new algorithm.

Fact: What’s a “search algorithm?”

That’s a technical term for what you can think of as a recipe that Google uses to sort through the billions of web pages and other information it has, in order to return what it believes are the best answers.

Conversational search

The biggest change that Hummingbird has brought around is offering direct answers to search questions. This is called “conversational search.” Unlike previous update like Caffeine, which targeted improved indexing of websites, Hummingbird is focused on ranking search information based on intelligent understanding of search queries.

Here is an example of how Hummingbird works:

“What’s the closest place to buy the iPhone 5s to my home?” A traditional search engine might focus on finding matches for words — finding a page that says “buy” and “iPhone 5s,” for instance. Hummingbird should better focus on the meaning behind the words. It may better understand the actual location of your home, if you’ve shared that with Google. It might understand that “place” means you want a brick-and-mortar store. It might get that “iPhone 5s” is a particular type of electronic device carried by certain stores. Knowing all these meanings may help Google go beyond just finding pages with matching words.

In particular, Google said that Hummingbird is paying more attention to each word in a query, ensuring that the whole query — the whole sentence or conversation or meaning — is taken into account, rather than particular words. The goal is that pages matching the meaning do better, rather than pages matching just a few words.

“This morning, Milan awoke to find something a little strange. Just off of Via dei Mercanti, near the heart of the old city, a submarine has apparently pushed its way through the paving stones and damaged a nearby car.”

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/submarine-appears-on-milan-street-2013-10#ixzz2hpWwd8Ib

I was shocked when I saw these pictures on the Internet! I mean, who has ever heard of a submarine breaking through the pavement in the heart of Milan? I can even see the famous Milan Cathedral in the background of the picture. Some bystanders guessed that there might be a secret ocean underneath the city of Milan.

Here is the original footage of the scene: watch?v=NFgQjTqKfOQ

The video received more than half a million views in less than two weeks. Well, never underestimate the power of social media. A few local tweets with #L1F3 (the name of the submarine) soon made this incident viral and far reaching. It was soon understood that the scene was created by an Italian insurance company, Europ Assistance Italia, for its “Protect Your Life” campaign.  The carefully executed stunt unfolded on October 1st was completed with a live reenactment meant to reinforce the idea of safeguarding yourself and your possessions against unforeseen events.

It is too soon to tell how much this campaign directly contributes to the sales of the insurance company, but the shock factor did make this local marketing scheme global. Who can say that this is not genius?

As I further looked into this stunt, the insurance company even created a website to back this campaign up. http://www.protectyourlife.it/

According to the South China Morning Post, the Chinese government has decided to lift a ban on foreign websites deemed politically sensitive, albeit only within the newly developed Shanghai Free Trade Zone.

When I first saw this news, I felt rather excited. Growing up in Shanghai, I always paid close attention to the current events in my hometown. The Free Trade Zone launched in September is designed as a testing ground for a number of economic reforms. The Free Trade Zone will also be the first area on mainland China to allow access to politically sensitive websites (such as Facebook, Twitter, and the New York Times) that were previously blocked by filters. These filters are casually referred to as the Great Firewall of China.

Although it only gives the newly developed 17 square mile Shanghai Free Trade Zone access to Facebook, this could have a bigger meaning for China, the country with the largest number of Internet users (513 million).

Facebook was banned in China since 2009 onward due to several members of the minority Uighur group that used the social media site to organize protests against the government. And this is the first time that the Chinese government has loosened their control over foreign social media websites like Facebook and Twitter. This could be a signal that China is more open to the politically sensitive websites. Could the similar policies apply to other cities in China?

This latest development lets Facebook and Twitter get their feet in the door of the most populous and fastest-growing Internet community in the world.  Competition with other government approved social media sites, including Renren and Sina Weibo, is undeniably fierce. How will Facebook compete with these established Chinese social media platforms with their large online communities? This will be Facebook and Twitter’s upcoming obstacle as they decide to expand their strategies in China.

Source: http://money.cnn.com/2013/09/24/technology/china-facebook/index.html

As I scrolled through my Facebook feed, I couldn’t help but notice the many shared links by friends of an initially unfamiliar video titled Kony 2012. At first I tried to ignore these videos and move to other social networks that I use; yet again I was bombarded with the same video with multiple positive comments going along the lines of “Inspirational” and “thank you for modifying my perception of a single person’s ability to change the world”. This 30 minute campaign video was developed by the charitable organization Invisible Children with the goal of stopping Joseph Kony, the Uganda child slavery general. The video received an impressive 50 million views and 6 million shares in its first 3 days of being uploaded on Youtube! I thought to myself, how did Invisible Children manage such a feat? I believe the surprising and touching nature of the campaign was the fuel behind garnering millions of supporters. Also, it does help that influential icons such as Oprah Winfrey, Justin Bieber and Angelina Jolie expressed their support to the public.

A related post called “Kony 2012: A marketing phenomenon” I found on a blog site listed a few noteworthy marketing strategies behind the campaign’s success.

1. The embellishments:

–          Various use of visual imagery of the world that express the importance of the issue

–          A sequence of inspirational videos showing progress in the campaign

1. The deadline:

–          This further emphasizes the urgency of the matter

1. A single face:

–          Focusing on one person gives direction to supporters and a goal

Kony 2012 is a truly moving and successful campaign and it provides evidence that social networks can be used for other meaningful purposes rather than simply sharing frivolous happenings in your life.

Here is a link to the campaign video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc

As an international student from Shanghai, I access both Chinese and English social networks on my spare time. This allowed me to observe an interesting phenomenon on the internet where many of my friends started sharing Rage comics in both languages around the same time. What intrigued me the most was that these comics were trending all over the world and not just in North America on different social networks including Facebook, 9gag, YouTube and renren (a Chinese site). This sparked my curiosity into finding out where these comics originated. I learned that they are an Internet meme expressing rage or other simple emotions.

One might ask: why are these comics so popular? This is because they humorize shared experiences and people can relate to them in their daily life. Traditionally, comics are spread in hard copy or via Web 1.0 which allows people to read but not comment in contrast to the current Web 2.0 which allows viewers to comment and share information with friends. Nowadays, the use of Web 2.0 opens up the possibility for information and other content to go viral. Furthermore, Rage Guy’s topic range is very broad and can be applied to a range of situations and communities. For example, UBC has our own meme that highlights Vancouver’s culture and the mentality of UBC students. Another feature of this internet meme is that they are simple enough so fans can interact with one another by creating their own comics and sharing them with friends. I believe that social networks provide a platform for cultural exchange and have become a vital channel to obtain information. Mark Skolnik’s blog post titled “Botching and Sharpening Social Media” elaborates that many are addicted to the internet especially social networks. This   relates to the Rage Guy comics and explains how they went viral at such a rapid pace.

Here is a link to UBC memes on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ubcmemes

I’ve been a Firefox browser user since 2009, and I have always thought that it is a good product. Well, not until the day I switched from Hotmail to Gmail.
Last Summer, my hotmail account was hacked, and I was unable to retrieve it. I did think of switching to Gmail before since I saw it being advertised online all the time and many of my friends recommended it to me. However, due to the large amount of contacts that I had on my Hotmail account, I tolerated the low speed of Hotmail service. I decided that it’s finally the time to make a change.
I find Gmail to be much faster and that’s what I value the most. Also, the interface is much more concise and well-organized.

Here’s a quote I found from “http://www.squidoo.com/gmail-vs-hotmail” :
“Dee says:
If your Hotmail account has been hacked, Hotmail does not have my vote for better. I have lost all contacts and lots of photos I wanted to keep. I have tried everything to get access to my account and nothing works. So my vote will have to be Gmail. Plan on setting up account today.
Posted January 11, 2012”
That is exactly what happened to me! I lost a lot of valuable information and many contacts after my Hotmail account got hacked.
There are also some other awesome features like Google Docs (helped me in many team projects) and Google calling (works as a version of Skype to me).

Starting from the first day I logged on to Gmail through Firefox, one sentence caught my eye. It indicated that the browser I was using may cause some of the information to not be fully loaded. Furthermore, Gmail always suggested me to try their own product, “Google Chrome”. Not surprisingly, I switched again.

Right now I am blogging through Google Chrome. Google converted me without much effort through their undeniably superior marketing and products.
That is the power of Marketing as felt from my personal experience!