integratePR blog

The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) is a House response to the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) that is under consideration in the Senate. These bills would require internet service providers (ISPs) to block access to websites that infringe on copyrights.

Simply put, anything that you re-post that is not your original content would be considered a copyright infringement. In many countries with internet access, online piracy is a massive problem for the industry, in China alone it costs $250 billion per year. However, this means potentially that anything you Re-Tumble, Re-Tweet or Re-tag could be considered piracy. These publishing laws would affect some of the most well-known and heavily trafficked sites on the web. Virtually everything on Wikipedia, Youtube, and Tumblr would be illegal to publish.

Internet giants who are fighting against the bill have made this an international day of protest by “blacking out” their websites.

Wikipedia

Google

WordPress

What you can do about it – Sign the petition and join the largest online protest in history – tell Congress to stop this bill now!

The past weekend we all officially “fell back” and if it threw off your schedule a little bit, here are some things you might have missed in the tech world since last Friday:

1. The CIA is watching you Tweet – According to a news article by the AP our government is monitoring what we have to say in social media spaces. After receiving an unexpected and unprecedented look inside the CIA, the AP has reported that the Central Intelligence Agency sees some 5 million tweets per day. While Twitter is a tool that one hopes citizens use for good; for example, as a means of gathering support or inviting people to a protest; with the proliferation of social media use in order to start riots across the globe, the CIA  reports that it watches Twitter with the best interests of national security.

2. Occupy Wall Street gets its own Social Media Aggregator – The Occupy movement has gained a large portion of its momentum online with protestors organizing via social media channels, especially Twitter. While the movement has soldered steadily along towards its third month of “Occupation” on November 17^th, Boulder Digital Works created an organizational system called Occupationalist to serve as a landing page for the movement’s many Tweets and updates. Subdivided so that each “Occupy” city maintains a separate stream, the site also offers pictures, videos and real time check-ins. No matter what your feelings on the protest, it is undeniable that they have done a great job leveraging social media to their advantage.

3. Movember – Since 1999 “Mo Bro’s” everywhere have championed the cause of Prostate as well as other cancers that affect men, by growing a mustache to last for the entire month of November. After registering with the official Movember Charity online, a “Mo Space” is created where members form teams and are able to track money raised for the cause. This year, for the first time, Movember bros are able to link with Facebook via Facebook Connect. The app allows moustache growing cancer crusaders to more easily showcase their teams and mustache pictures encouraging donations from their friends and spreading awareness. Take a look at the Movemeber website for more information or if you are interested in participating.

4. Mozilla Firefox 8 - Today! Although many dispute which Internet browser is the best – Safari, Explorer, Opera, Chrome, etc. – we can all agree that for professionals it is important to make sure your browser of choice is up to date. Today, the second most frequently used – Firefox – is available for upgrade, before the official release date, tomorrow, November 8^th. The download is available from their FTP server and will be manual, but if you can’t wait, download Firefox now for Windows, Mac, and Linux.

**5. G+ pages for Business - As we were posting this blog, G+ business pages debuted! There are still lots of questions to be answered about who and how these pages can be utilized, but we decided to create our own profile early so that we could best analyze the situation. Come have a look for yourself!

Since we’re constantly harping on the fact that technology changes each week, let’s discuss two breakthrough tools that debuted this week and how they can help you and your clients.

Google GoMo “More Clicks, More customers, more conversions”

Each day, thousands of consumers make purchasing decisions based on companies’ websites.  With a huge percentage of those accessing websites via mobile devices it is more important than ever for companies to design a pages that are mobile-friendly.

“Consumers are 61% unlikely to return to a site that’s not mobile friendly, while consumer engagement increases 85% for websites designed for mobile devices,” claims Jesse Haines, of Google Mobile Ads Marketing. Coincidentally, thanks to Google, mobilizing your website has never been easier.

With the Launch of GoMo –short for Go Mobile – yesterday, business websites are  easily optimized for smartphone users. Users can begin with the GoMoMeter, a tool that shows how your current site looks on a smartphone. In addition, it provides a free report with personalized recommendations tailored to how your business can build a more mobile-friendly experience.

We’ve spoken before about the importance of setting up a Google Local account and having an SEO-friendly Google Places presence. We’re guessing in tandem with Google+ and all of the changes we’ve seen on Google platforms lately, on July 21, Google Places announced a rather big change to their rating and review platform.

Like any other review website, Google Places allows users to comment, rate and share information about restaurants and businesses alike. Google reviews were used, occasionally, but not nearly as frequently as some of its counterparts (for reviews). However, the use of all third-party websites has been removed completely from the site. This means that Yelp, TripAdvisor and any other third-party site that you may have relied on for their positive reviews in the past are no longer viewable on place pages. Instead, links to these review sites will be placed at the bottom of the page, and will more often than not be looked over entirely.

This is where the next change plays an important role.

Since Google Places has removed all third-party websites, they have also added a big, red “Write a Review” button to the top of every place page. This addition encourages users to share their thoughts, and has made it insanely easy to do. Many businesses are unaware that their place page even exists, and often only oversees Yelp and location-based application reviews. For small business owners, this means that it’s more crucial than ever to actively monitor your Google Place page, especially in the appearance of a bad review. We help clients with this all the time and have seen a significant shift in the past week to more reviews on Google Places.

What does this mean for the other review websites out there? We can only hope that Google avoids the monopolization of the rating & review scene, but with the recent launch of Google +, we are very aware of their compelling nature.

There’s another Google doodle up on the search engine’s homepage! The doodle is celebrating what would be the 137^th birthday of famed magician, Harry Houdini. The doodle looks like a vintage poster of Houdini with chains draped around his shoulders.

Houdini, originally born Erich Weiss on March 24^th 1874, was one of the most famous magicians of his time. He was known for his escapes from a Chinese Water Torture Cell, the Milk Can escape and his Buried Alive stunt, among others.

He died in 1926 at the age of 52 from a ruptured appendix. In his life time Houdini also dabbled in an acting career, and had a personal mission to expose magicians claiming to have true supernatural powers.

Below is the doodle, but make sure to check out the Google homepage! If you click the doodle you’ll find out more information and pictures of Houdini.