The Federal Trade Commission has released the results of a report complaining that mobile applications for children lack privacy policies and disclosure. Apps specifically marketed to children were evaluated in the App Store and Android Marketplace.
Some of Facebook's timeline app partners are apparently giddy with the relationship so far. Since Pinterest started its open graph integration last month, the virtual pin-up board has seen its daily visitors increase by 60 percent.
Only three news sites - CNN, Yahoo News and The New York Times – out of 22 appeared to use high levels of ad targeting, according to a Pew Research Center study. In these cases, 45 percent or more of the ads were different from one user to the next.
A limited number of Facebook advertisers are testing what appears to be the next iteration of Sponsored Stories. They are targeting the social site's users who have played video games, watched videos, or listened to songs, among other examples.
During its quarterly earnings call, CEO Jeff Weiner said mobile access represents an ever-growing share of time users spend with LinkedIn. He said the company is investigating ways to monetize those page views with mobile advertising.
Facebook's 2011 advertising revenues were $3.1 billion, up 69 percent from the year before, according to the Menlo Park, CA-based firm's S-1 filing today for its initial public offering.
For years legislators, privacy advocates, and the FTC have suggested Google simplify its privacy policies. In consolidating policies associated with various Google products, it stands to reason the company believed it was satisfying such requests.
Twitter has acquired security startup Dasient, which describes itself as an anti-malware vendor for large enterprises in the financial services, media, and online sectors. Its technology will be housed within Twitter's revenue engineering team.
After a slowdown in the fall of 2011, the share of adults who owned tablet computers or e-readers nearly doubled over the holidays, according to a new report from the Pew Internet and American Life Project. 19 percent of U.S. adults now own tablets.
Yahoo's 2011 Q4 search revenue was $465 million, down 27 percent compared to the same quarter for the previous year. Yahoo attributed the decline to the search agreement it signed with Microsoft. Overall fourth quarter revenue was $1.3 billion.
The study pointed to two reasons why tablet visitors may be more valuable than those using smartphones, laptops, desktops: tablet users are more affluent than those using other devices, plus the devices may be more conducive to shopping.
Former PayPal president Scott Thompson joins Yahoo as CEO. Yahoo credits Thompson with doubling PayPal's active user base from 50 million to 104 million. Acting CEO Tim Morse will resume his duties as chief financial officer.
SEO will continue to grow up in 2012 to be much more influenced by the social, mobile, and local movements. Companies that successfully address, understand, and act on these movements will have a head start in the race for SEO excellence in Asia.
Despite strong growth in display advertising for the first nine months of 2011, a tumbling market for paid search dragged overall Internet ad spending in the U.S. down 2.9 percent in Q3, at least according to a new report from WPP's Kantar Media.
Adobe has agreed to purchase search centric agency Efficient Frontier. The deal brings Adobe, traditionally a platform company, a global search marketing services business, as well as cross-channel campaign forecasting and optimization capabilities.
Yahoo, AOL, and Microsoft this week confirmed plans to pool together their unsold inventory in a deal that aims to increase their margins, secure higher prices for remnant ads, and augment the reach available to agencies and advertisers.
Search revenue was $374 million, a 13 percent decrease from the previous quarter. Search revenue was bolstered by the fact that Microsoft reimbursed Yahoo for its entire $53 million search operating cost and $4 million in transition cost.
Yahoo, Google, and AOL are investing more heavily in original video content, motivated by rising consumer demand for short-form series and strong advertiser interest in premium pre-roll ad inventory. Here's a look at what the companies will offer.
Staffers in Google's display ad operation are frustrated. They can't leverage search queries to create customized ads outside the search environment. Why doesn't Google want more personalized offers, better ad performance, and more revenue?
Yahoo has taken a drubbing in the media lately, with pundits opining it will soon be sold off for parts. ClickZ followed up with Vivek Sharma, VP of search products, to ask what aces Yahoo has up its sleeve and get a preview of new products launches.
